Stephen Hawking Was Wrong, Said Stephen Hawking

Today's Guardian carries an excited article about a forthcomibg book by the physicist Thomas Hertog called On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s Final Theory. Hertog, a cosmologist and string theorist, collaborated closely with Hawking during the last years of the older man's life.

"The problem for Hawking was his struggle to understand how the universe could have created conditions so perfectly hospitable to life,” says Hertog. "Stephen told me he now thought he had been wrong (in A Brief History of Time) and so he and I worked, shoulder to shoulder, for the next twenty years to develop a new theory of the cosmos, one that could better account for the emergence of life."

Together,' says Wikipedia of their collaboration, 'they came to a new insight by combining the mathematics of quantum cosmology and that of string theory.'

I suppose this is what the book is about.

A certain sceptical anxiety troubles me, however. I worry about the infamous condition known as elderly-scientist syndrome, as well as possible lapses in mutual understanding between the two men due to Hawking's deteriorating physical condition at the time. The final works of great scientists are often problematic: think of Einstein wasting his intellect on attempts to refute quantum theory, or the futile alchemical experiments on which Newton frittered away his mature years. Similar examples abound.

The Guardian article seems to flirt with mysticism. Of course that may be just the writer's interpretation rather than anything Hertog actually said to him. But attempting to give theoretical weight to the so-called anthropic principle, which seems to be what Hawking and Hertog were trying to do, is always a dubious business.

I look forward to reading more about the book before I decide about reading the book itself. If any of you read it before I do, I should love to hear what you think.

originally posted by: Astyanax
Together,' says of their collaboration, 'they came to a new insight by combining the mathematics of quantum cosmology and that of string theory.'

If you could put aside all the "modern" mainstream physics concepts that you have probably absorbed during your life and managed to focus solely on the high minds of field theory that grounded the base of Physics before Einstein came around, you'll realize that quantum cosmology and string theory are THEORIES that contradict themselves in so many ways, probably you wouldn't feel this anxiety.

originally posted by: Astyanax
I worry about the infamous condition known as elderly-scientist syndrome, as well as possible lapses in mutual understanding between the two men due to Hawking's deteriorating physical condition at the time. The final works of great scientists are often problematic: think of Einstein wasting his intellect on attempts to refute quantum theory, or the futile alchemical experiments on which Newton frittered away his mature years.

LOL, in which medical diagnosis book do you find this "elderly-scientist syndrome" described?... Sorry but, that sounds like the defamatory fabrication of someone who is invested too much on a theory to let it go. Probably Einstein, as Hawking, started to realize (or accepting) how wrong they were as years went by, which is quite common, not only in physics, but in all aspects of life.

Good luck with the book though.

a reply to: ltrz2025

Thank you for your reply. Just a couple of comments:

If you could put aside all the "modern" mainstream physics concepts... you'll realize that quantum cosmology and string theory are THEORIES

I don't know how it is nowadays, but in my time you got a solid grounding in classical physics -- Maxwell's field equations, etc -- in high school, before they started us on the ‘modern stuff’. When you got to university, you learnt even more. Anyone who has formally studied physics is closely familiar with classical physics.

...the defamatory fabrication of someone who is invested too much on a theory

And which theory would you say that was?

a reply to: Astyanax

Hey man, no need to thanks, pleasure to share.

Yep, I'm sure that you are familiar with the classical physicists, that was not really the point. The point was: how capable are you of harnessing what you call classical physics and seeing it, not as a preliminary stage of physics when compared to the "modern stuff", but for what it is: a complete different paradigm that doesn't depend simply on math and "measurements" like the "modern stuff" does. Atomism vs. Aether.


Regarding to your last question, no theory in particular. As an example: Einstein published the theory of relativity, but shortly after he published it, he started questioning it. During his last years, he didn't believe in it anymore, and he actually died trying to figure out an appropriate model.

You call this the "elderly-scientist syndrome", but how can assure that he was affected by this "disease" you name? Isn't it more likely that Einstein, the guy who came up with the theory (therefore, he knew it better than anyone), simply realized that the theory was wrong?...

originally posted by: ltrz2025
a reply to: Astyanax

Hey man, no need to thanks, pleasure to share.

Yep, I'm sure that you are familiar with the classical physicists, that was not really the point. The point was: how capable are you of harnessing what you call classical physics and seeing it, not as a preliminary stage of physics when compared to the "modern stuff", but for what it is: a complete different paradigm that doesn't depend simply on math and "measurements" like the "modern stuff" does. Atomism vs. Aether.


Regarding to your last question, no theory in particular. As an example: Einstein published the theory of relativity, but shortly after he published it, he started questioning it. During his last years, he didn't believe in it anymore, and he actually died trying to figure out an appropriate model.

You call this the "elderly-scientist syndrome", but how can assure that he was affected by this "disease" you name? Isn't it more likely that Einstein, the guy who came up with the theory (therefore, he knew it better than anyone), simply realized that the theory was wrong?...

he just forgot to carry the 1.

it happens.




137 is the magic number.

You might want to rethink your whole post?


Quantum is outside the box running parallel with reality and is proof that you can "Think" and change physical properties.

Schrodinger's cat was our first reach into Quantum and Einstein was on it like white on rice. What these string theories do to my Scientific knowledge is TIE THINGS TOGETHER that heretofore were confusing the theories. Now we can explain a few things about 'entanglement' that we were observing.

The quantum experiment with two slits is the clue of our lifetime

originally posted by: ltrz2025

originally posted by: Astyanax
Together,' says of their collaboration, 'they came to a new insight by combining the mathematics of quantum cosmology and that of string theory.'

If you could put aside all the "modern" mainstream physics concepts that you have probably absorbed during your life and managed to focus solely on the high minds of field theory that grounded the base of Physics before Einstein came around, you'll realize that quantum cosmology and string theory are THEORIES that contradict themselves in so many ways, probably you wouldn't feel this anxiety.

originally posted by: Astyanax
I worry about the infamous condition known as elderly-scientist syndrome, as well as possible lapses in mutual understanding between the two men due to Hawking's deteriorating physical condition at the time. The final works of great scientists are often problematic: think of Einstein wasting his intellect on attempts to refute quantum theory, or the futile alchemical experiments on which Newton frittered away his mature years.

LOL, in which medical diagnosis book do you find this "elderly-scientist syndrome" described?... Sorry but, that sounds like the defamatory fabrication of someone who is invested too much on a theory to let it go. Probably Einstein, as Hawking, started to realize (or accepting) how wrong they were as years went by, which is quite common, not only in physics, but in all aspects of life.

Good luck with the book though.

This demonstrates the major problem I have with theoretical physics, in general. Really, it's much closer to philosophy than to anything which can properly be called a science. Most of the theories presented are not even remotely falsifiable. Certainly not in the near future, and in many cases probably not ever.

originally posted by: Astyanax
Today's Guardian carries an excited article about a forthcomibg book by the physicist Thomas Hertog called On the Origin of Time: Stephen Hawking’s Final Theory. Hertog, a cosmologist and string theorist, collaborated closely with Hawking during the last years of the older man's life.

"The problem for Hawking was his struggle to understand how the universe could have created conditions so perfectly hospitable to life,” says Hertog. "Stephen told me he now thought he had been wrong (in A Brief History of Time) and so he and I worked, shoulder to shoulder, for the next twenty years to develop a new theory of the cosmos, one that could better account for the emergence of life."

'Together,' says Wikipedia of their collaboration, 'they came to a new insight by combining the mathematics of quantum cosmology and that of string theory.'

I suppose this is what the book is about.

his struggle to understand how the universe could have created conditions perfectly hospitable to life

Erm, I think he meant barely tolerant of life.

a reply to: TzarChasm

Erm, I think he meant barely tolerant of life.

Just quoting the article, which was quoting Hertog. Why do you feel Hertog -- or Hawking -- meant 'barely tolerant'?

originally posted by: Astyanax
The Guardian article seems to flirt with mysticism. Of course that may be just the writer's interpretation rather than anything Hertog actually said to him. But attempting to give theoretical weight to the so-called anthropic principle, which seems to be what Hawking and Hertog were trying to do, is always a dubious business.

Very dubious. This statement from the Guardian article is problematic to me:

"The problem for Hawking was his struggle to understand how the universe could have created conditions so perfectly hospitable to life,” says Hertog, a cosmologist currently based at KU Leuven University in Belgium.

I think some people have attempted to redefine the anthropic principle, which as discussed in the following link is simply a tautology that "we exist, therefore somehow the universe must allow for our existence". The vast majority of the universe is extremely inhospitable to life such as ours so it's somewhat troubling to hear the phrasing used by Hertog in that quote.

the Weak and Strong Anthropic Principles, have been misinterpreted so thoroughly that now they're routinely used to justify illogical, non-scientific statements

Together,' says Wikipedia of their collaboration, 'they came to a new insight by combining the mathematics of quantum cosmology and that of string theory.'

Quantum cosmology isn't yet a testable theory, and string theory has been criticized for not being a scientific theory...see the summary in my current signature. That's not to say that either or both are "wrong", but physicists have an even more damning expression than wrong, called "not even wrong", which means the speculative idea or hypothesis is so incomplete that it can't even be tested to see if it's right or wrong.

Not Even Wrong: The Failure of String Theory and the Search for Unity in Physical Law

At what point does theory depart the realm of testable hypothesis and come to resemble something like aesthetic speculation, or even theology? The legendary physicist Wolfgang Pauli had a phrase for such ideas: He would describe them as "not even wrong," meaning that they were so incomplete that they could not even be used to make predictions to compare with observations to see whether they were wrong or not.

Now you can hear claims that string theory needs a particle accelerator the size of the Milky Way galaxy to test it, and you can also hear claims that tests are just around the corner which makes it a scientific theory (claims mentioned in the following video). I found a discussion involving three physicists insightful and I'm going to mention it here because it discusses string theory, which Michio Kaku claims is testable with 4 specific tests. But the other two physicists, Sabine Hossenfelder and Roger Penrose, explain rather bluntly to the audience that the "tests" that Kaku proposes are not valid tests because they do not make "string theory" "falsifiable". If the test fails to meet predictions, instead of admitting string theory has been falsified, string theorists will just claim that "one version of string theory has been falsified, but there's nearly an infinite number of alternative versions, so string theory itself hasn't been falsified", so that's why they say string theory isn't falsifiable and some of the claims made for it supporting other ideas are not well-founded. If you want to know why you should hear alarm bells ringing when you hear claims about string theory, pay attention to what Penrose and Hossenfelder say in this video:

Should we abandon the multiverse theory? | Sabine Hossenfelder, Roger Penrose, Michio Kaku


The reason this is relevant to this thread is that you can hear a mainstream physicist like Sabine Hossenfelder explaining the reasons why string theory is not yet part of mainstream theoretical physics, and it's certainly not a foundation for wider claims like multiverse. She says science can neither confirm nor deny multiverse, so why are people like Kaku claiming it's a scientific claim based on string theory which also cannot yet be tested scientifically, at least not using the four "tests" proposed by Kaku. By the way, the LHC-Large Hadron Collider- has ruled out many other "predictions" of "string theory" which failed to show up in the last decade.

originally posted by: ltrz2025
You call this the "elderly-scientist syndrome", but how can assure that he was affected by this "disease" you name? Isn't it more likely that Einstein, the guy who came up with the theory (therefore, he knew it better than anyone), simply realized that the theory was wrong?...

Einstein sumbitted a paper for publication in 1927 called “Does Schrödinger’s Wave Mechanics Determine the Motion of a System Completely or Only in the Sense of Statistics?”, but he ended up withdrawing the paper because he thought it was flawed. This article talks about how Einstein's objections to QM and what further research has revealed:

How Einstein challenged quantum mechanics and lost

There must be something missing from the theory, Einstein reasoned. Beneath the mathematical structure, there must exist some set of hidden variables. If those variables were known, they would restore the common sense intuitions that made the classical physics of Newton so lucid...

What is amazing about this story is that the greatest physicist of the 20th century tried to show that quantum mechanics was wrong, or at least incomplete, and he ended up doing the exact opposite. The EPR paper eventually let physicists see what is now called entanglement, where widely separated systems can act as a weird kind of single quantum entity. Most importantly, entanglement represents the cutting edge of modern quantum physics, with powerful applications, inluding the development of quantum computers.

So, is quantum mechanics weird? Yes. Is it wrong? No. At least not in any way we can yet discern.

Since Einstein's time, there has been more research to rule out many aspects of the hidden variables ideas, even closing some of the loopholes in the tests for Bell's inequalities, and if Einstein was alive today and presented with this experimental evidence, many would predict that it's more likely Einstein would admit it was he who was wrong, and not the theory that is wrong.

Of course quantum theory and relativity are likely still incomplete in some way since they do not work together to describe black holes, but QM doesn't appear to be incomplete in the way Einstein suspected. There have been numerous approaches to try to get those theories to work together to describe black holes, but none have yet claimed success in the mainstream:

Quantum cosmology

...a theory is needed that integrates relativity theory and quantum theory. Such an approach is attempted for instance with loop quantum cosmology, loop quantum gravity, string theory and causal set theory.

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: TzarChasm

Erm, I think he meant barely tolerant of life.

Just quoting the article, which was quoting Hertog. Why do you feel Hertog -- or Hawking -- meant 'barely tolerant'?

See Arbitrageur's response above.

Also, quantum cosmology is an oxymoron and one of those elderly scientist absurdities where the apogee of theoretical physics is somehow relevant to the spiritual growth of society and the copium of daily adulting. The direct product of philosophy and astronomy crossing wires.

a reply to: TzarChasm

Also, quantum cosmology is an oxymoron and one of those elderly scientist absurdities where the apogee of theoretical physics is somehow relevant to the spiritual growth of society and the copium of daily adulting. The direct product of philosophy and astronomy crossing wires.

Maybe, but that wasn't what I asked you. Do you think Hertog meant 'barely tolerant' although he was quoted as saying 'perfectly suited' (OWTTE)? If so, why do you think so?

Just idly curious.

originally posted by: Astyanax
a reply to: TzarChasm

Erm, I think he meant barely tolerant of life.

Just quoting the article, which was quoting Hertog. Why do you feel Hertog -- or Hawking -- meant 'barely tolerant'?

With all we have seen from that class of upper crust know it alls, I suspect he meant human life messing with things. The unwashed masses and such being a theme. I hope I am wrong....

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Spot on. And to clarify my "Einstien was on it..z"

I meant he was deeply into the concepts and was even able to see the possibility his theories were the ones that needed checking.

Good post.

originally posted by: AndyFromMichigan
This demonstrates the major problem I have with theoretical physics, in general. Really, it's much closer to philosophy than to anything which can properly be called a science. Most of the theories presented are not even remotely falsifiable. Certainly not in the near future, and in many cases probably not ever.

I agree with this, and I would add, not only the "modern theories" are not falsifiable, but also most makes no sense.

Take Quantum, it's completely illogical to assume that the universe has different laws for the micro than for the macro. Like if the universe was this type of nerdy scientist with a super calculator measuring what every single particle does in the universe at any given moment and assigning different properties to it depending on its size. It's total none sense. The universe operates like a symphony, which is basically pressure administration, that is: the most simple way. Anyway, when you tell people that all subatomic particles are just THEORETICAL, and never observed, their mind goes puff.

Or Einstein's space-time theory! How does space (which is nothing) and time (that is a unit of measure conceptualized by humans) have PROPERTIES?.... Ridiculous. Sure, in math can look "okay", but it makes absolutely no sense. Besides being not falsifiable as you say. Physics has lost its common sense, that's why the mainstream model is a friggin circus.

Exactly. I think most of it is made up. How do you refute or prove anything on this level.

Hey look I'm a theoretical physics genius:

EM = 3rd1 x pyR 9(3d)

If you could put aside all the "modern" mainstream physics concepts that you have probably absorbed during your life and managed to focus solely on the high minds of field theory that grounded the base of Physics before Einstein came around, you'll realize that quantum cosmology and string theory are THEORIES that contradict themselves in so many ways, probably you wouldn't feel this anxiety.

originally posted by: Astyanax
I worry about the infamous condition known as elderly-scientist syndrome, as well as possible lapses in mutual understanding between the two men due to Hawking's deteriorating physical condition at the time. The final works of great scientists are often problematic: think of Einstein wasting his intellect on attempts to refute quantum theory, or the futile alchemical experiments on which Newton frittered away his mature years.

LOL, in which medical diagnosis book do you find this "elderly-scientist syndrome" described?... Sorry but, that sounds like the defamatory fabrication of someone who is invested too much on a theory to let it go. Probably Einstein, as Hawking, started to realize (or accepting) how wrong they were as years went by, which is quite common, not only in physics, but in all aspects of life.

Good luck with the book though.

BTW, anyone going to read the book? It's out on April 11th. I ordered one. I prefer to get the information from the horse's mouth. So should you.

a reply to: Phantom423

BTW, anyone going to read the book?

Arbitrageur excepted, I don't suppose any of the others who have posted here will go as far as that! They all seem to be convinced that modern physics is bunkum, that quantum mechanics is a fraud, etc. Which, of course, I anticipated. It is the reason why I made the thread.

For myself, I told you in the OP what I plan to do:

I look forward to reading more about the book before I decide about reading the book itself. If any of you read it before I do, I should love to hear what you think.

* * *

Interestingly, this thread grew out of an email conversation with a real physics professor, at UC Berkeley no less. Cosmology is not his field but he knows I'm interested, so he sends me stuff from time to time. He read the Guardian story and sent me the link.

Neither of us was sure quite what to make of the article. We were discussing whether the book might be worth reading or not. We both enjoyed A Brief History of Time very much and weren't sure this wouldn't be a let-down in comparison -- though we're both curious about whether Hawking had changed his mind about certain things, such as his idea that time should be reversible and his opinions about the hypothetical multiverse. Obviously the latter bears on the anthropic principle, which is mentioned in the Guardian article.

In the course of our conversation, it occurred to me that the subject would make a good ATS thread. So I started one.

originally posted by: Phantom423
BTW, anyone going to read the book? It's out on April 11th. I ordered one. I prefer to get the information from the horse's mouth. So should you.

a reply to: Astyanax
I can't say if I'll read their book or not, but generally I prefer to read the scientific papers because science is done in peer-reviewed papers published in journals, not in popular books. However, physics papers aren't often well suited reading for people who don't have a background in physics so the books do serve a purpose for communicating the information in a simplified way to a wider audience.

And then there's Michio Kaku, certainly a well-qualified physicist, who seems to spout endless streams of unverifiable and questionable BS in his books, some of which I doubt could get published in reputable journals because it couldn't pass peer review and certainly a lot of what he said in the multiverse video I posted was shot down in flames in the informal peer review by Hossenfelder and Penrose.

So, as you may or may not know, Hawking and Hertog actually did publish a paper on this topic or at least a very similar topic, in 2006:

Populating the Landscape: A Top Down Approach

I skimmed through it, and it does mention multiverses so that multiverse video I posted is very on-topic in this thread.

We argue that the quantum origin of the universe naturally leads to a framework for cosmology where amplitudes for alternative histories of the universe are computed with boundary conditions at late times only. We thus envision a set of alternative universes in the landscape, with amplitudes given by the no boundary path integral

So if I understand the paper, they are using the anthropic principle to assign probabilities to the likelihood of string theory based alternative universes evolving into what we see today with the alternate universes most like our own having the highest probability. That sounds more logical than some of the multiverse claims Michio Kaku makes. The paper certainly does seem like an innovative approach to use top-down thinking instead of the usual bottom-up, and it's such a different way of thinking that I have to give it some more thought, but it seems like some of Sabine Hossenfelder's observations about multiverse still apply here which is something to the effect that science can't say much about the existence or non existence of these alleged alternate universes unless there is a scientifically verifiable method of confirming their existence, which is going to be either impossible, or at best, a very difficult thing to do. Again if I understand their paper, they claim their idea might be evaluated by analyzing the CMB (Cosmic Microwave Background), so if that's correct and they've had from 2006 to 2023 to do that, how's it going?

one can calculate the relative amplitudes of neighbouring geometries by perturbatively evaluating the path integral around the dominant saddle point. Neighbouring geometries correspond to small quantum fluctuations of various continuous quantities, like the temperature of the CMB radiation or the expectation values of moduli fields. In inflationary universes these fluctuations are amplified and stretched, generating a pattern of spatial variations on cosmological scales in those directions of moduli space that are relatively flat. The shape of these primordial spectra depends on the (no) boundary conditions on the dominant geometry and provides a strong test of the no boundary proposal.

Burton Richter made a few comments about that 2006 paper by Hawking and Hertog:

What we have is a large number of very good people trying to make something more than philosophy out of string theory. Some, perhaps most, of the attempts do not contribute even if they are formally correct.

I still read theory papers and I even understand some of them. One I found particularly relevant is by Stephen Hawking and Thomas Hertog. Their recent paper “Populating the Landscape: A Top-down Approach” starts with what they call a “no boundary” approach that ab initio allows all possible solutions. They then want to impose boundary conditions at late times that allow our universe with our coupling constants, number of noncompact dimensions, and so on. This approach can give solutions that allow predictions at later times, they say. That sounds good, but it sounds to me a lot like the despised fine-tuning. If I have to impose on the landscape our conditions of three large space dimensions, a fine structure constant of 1/137, and so on, to make predictions about the future, there would seem to be no difference between the landscape and effective field theory with a few initial conditions imposed.

Although the Hawking and Hertog paper sometimes is obscure to me, the authors seem to say that their approach is only useful if the probability distribution of all possible alternatives in the landscape is strongly peaked around our conditions. I’ll buy that.

I have no idea how similar or different the book is from their 2006 paper, but Phantom423 since you ordered the book, maybe you could give us your thoughts on that here after you get the book?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I have no idea how similar or different the book is from their 2006 paper, but Phantom423 since you ordered the book, maybe you could give us your thoughts on that here after you get the book?

Sure. I too look to the references in the book i.e. the published papers. Sabine is excellent in that regard. Her books her great, but her references and notes are outstanding. That's where the real knowledge is. Takes time and work but if you're really interested in the topic, then it's worth the effort.