NMT (No-Me Teaching) new series 51:
Prior to excerpting the Ramana Maharshi disciple, Master Nome in the text below we continue the series: Fine-Tuned Universe , the premise that a small change in several of the dimensionless fundamental physical constants would make the Universe incapable of Life.
Fine-Tuned Universe 31:
[In the unreal reflection called the “Universe”, a product of an unreal Mind, even there, Infinite Intelligence is evident and inspiring.]
So, how does Inflation explain the special initial conditions of the Big Bang, which is the primary aim of the theory? According to Albrecht, it explains the initial conditions by a two-stage process, via the “chaotic inflation” models. First, as Andreas Albrecht explains, “One typically imagines some sort of chaotic primordial state, where the Inflaton field is more or less randomly tossed about, until by sheer chance it winds up in a very rare fluctuation that produces a potential-dominated state. ..” Potential-dominated states are those in which the potential energy of the Inflaton field is enormous compared to the rate of change of the Inflaton field with respect to time and space. That is, in order for inflation to occur, the Inflaton field must be both spatially and temporally almost uniform relative to the total energy density of the field .[1] Although macroscopic uniformity of matter is typically a state of very high entropy (such as perfume spread throughout a room), it is generally accepted that in the case of the gravitational field and the Inflaton field, greater uniformity entails lower entropy. This is said to explain why the universe becomes more and more inhomogeneous as it expands (with matter clustering into galaxies and stars forming), and yet at the same time its entropy increases. Entropy increases because the gravitational field becomes less uniform. Since the gravitational field would play a significant role in the space-time of the early universe, a near uniform Inflaton field would correspond to extremely low entropy.
Now a general requirement for inflation is that the Inflaton field be nearly uniform, in the potential-dominated sense defined above, over some very small patch. Although these states will be extremely rare, given a large enough initial Inflaton field, or enough time, they are likely eventually to occur in some small patch of space simply as a result of thermal fluctuations. Once they occur, inflation sets in, enormously expanding the patch. Eventually, because of the postulated nature of the Inflaton field, in one or more regions of this expanded space, the field decays, resulting in re-heating that produces a bubble universe with ordinary matter. So, in effect, because Inflation can only occur in highly uniform states of the Inflaton field, any Universe produced from an inflated region will have initially low entropy.
Accordingly, Albrecht proposes that inflation explains the low entropy of our universe by a two-stage process:
(i) a low entropy patch occurs as a result of a statistical fluctuation, and then
(ii) that patch inflates into our Universe. As John Barrow and Frank Tipler pointed out decades ago, however, if the right special initial conditions must be stumbled upon by a statistical fluctuation, why not simply hypothesize a very large, or infinite, material field that undergoes a random fluctuation that produces a universe relevantly like ours? Why invoke the additional mechanism of inflation?
The answer requires looking at the standard objection to “random fluctuation models.” The objection is that universes being produced by such a fluctuation (without inflation) would almost certainly lead to small islands of observers surrounded by chaos, not one with a low degree of entropy throughout. Even more ominously, a random observer most likely would be a so-called “Boltzmann Brain.” A Boltzmann Brain (BB) is a small region of mass-energy with the same structure as our brains (including the same sort of apparent memory and sensory experiences), but with the surrounding regions of space and time in a chaotic, high-entropy state. Although the experiences of such brains would be highly ordered for a brief time, they would not in any way correspond to reality, and any sort of inductive reasoning would fail.
The BB concept was originally articulated as part of an objection raised against the proposed anthropic-selection-effect explanation of the low initial entropy offered by Ludwig Boltzmann, one of the principal founders of statistical mechanics. Boltzmann attempted to explain the relatively low entropy of the universe by claiming that it was the result a fluctuation from the normal “chaotic,” equilibrium state, and that a fluctuation with a high degree of order was necessary for the existence of observers. As theoretical physicist Paul Davies and many others have pointed out in responding to Boltzmann’s anthropic explanation, a fluctuation “the size of the solar system would be sufficient to ensure the existence of life on Earth, and such a fluctuation is far more probable than one of cosmic proportions”. Indeed, fluctuations of even smaller dimensions – ones in which matter has the same organization as the brain with all its apparent memories and sense experiences but in which the surrounding space-time was chaos – would be even more likely. Consequently, insofar as a random fluctuation world contained observers, any randomly selected observer would almost certainly be a BB.
Some more selected verses from the Ramana Maharshi disciple Master Nome:
All the objects of knowledge change. All that are described as “mine” & Ego, also cannot illumine themselves, nor can they illumine each other. The Self is different from all that are described as “mine” & Ego. The Self is the unchanging, illuminating Consciousness. This Consciousness is truly one’s only Identity. Therefore, there can never truly be Bondage.
One Non-Dual Self alone is. The one Non-Dual Self is the undivided Consciousness. This is the only Knower in all. There are not different kinds of Knowers, such as higher & lower knowers. The Minds of all are pervaded by the one Consciousness within, which is the Self. This is the “I” of all. So there is no one else who knows, or who does not know. The “I” is truly the Absolute, Brahman, all-knowing & all-pervading.
This “I” pervades & illumines the Mind. An the Mind pervades & illumines all things ever experienced. Thus this “I” is the illuminator & pervader of all. This Self is the Witness of all objects of the Mind. These mental objects are subtle thoughts & also all the objects conceived as external as well. This includes being the Witness of all other Minds conceived as existing within the Mind. Thus the Self is the Witness of all.
The Mind cannot conceive the Self, yet the Mind has no existence apart from the Self. The Self can neither be accepted, nor rejected by any of the Minds. That which cannot be accepted or rejected by the Mind is Brahman. That is truly the “I”. Brahman & the Self are One.
The above themes & 1600 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through:
http://jstiga.wixsite.com/nonduality/
or with Caps-sensitive:
Duplicates (but with graphics) have been available on:
http://www.blogger.com as “Being-as-Consciousness, Non-Duality – new & final version” with link:
http://being-as-consciousness.blogspot.com/
[But from now on, they will be different & still usually daily.]
Nonduality and Science 