“We have never observed infinity in nature. Whenever you have infinities in a theory, that's where the theory fails as a description of nature. And if space was born in the Big Bang, yet is infinite now, we are forced to believe that it's instantaneously, infinitely big. It seems absurd.”
Janna Levin“We have never observed infinity in nature. Whenever you have infinities in a theory, that's where the theory fails as a description of nature. And if space was born in the Big Bang, yet is infinite now, we are forced to believe that it's instantaneously, infinitely big. It seems absurd.”
Janna Levin“Joe’s scientific life is defined by these significant near misses… He was Shackleton many times, almost the first: almost the first to see the big bang, almost the first to patent the laser, almost the first to detect gravitational waves. Famous for nearly getting there.”
Janna Levin, Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space“An idea sparked in the 1960s, a thought experiment, an amusing haiku, is now a thing of metal and glass.”
Janna Levin, Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space“I don't believe that math and nature respond to democracy. Just because very clever people have rejected the role of the infinite, their collective opinions, however weighty, won't persuade mother nature to alter her ways. Nature is never wrong.”
Janna Levin, How the Universe Got Its Spots: Diary of a Finite Time in a Finite Space