by Daniel Romm
The Ultimate
Reprieve
BY DANIEL ROMM
Eloquent Books
Copyright © 2010
All rights reserved – Daniel Romm
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the permission, in writing, from the publisher.
Eloquent Books
An imprint of Strategic Book Group
P.O.Box 333
Durham, CT 06422
www.StrategicBookGroup.com
ISBN: 978-1-60976-760-0
Printed in the United States of America
Contents
Part I: May 3, 2297
1 Ben's Manuscript
2 Relativity Theory in the 23rd Century
3 Jenny
4 Jim
5 Quantum Theory in the 23rd Century
6 Ben's Reverie
7 Ben's Reverie — Continued
8 A First Date
9 A Fruitful Friendship
Part II: The 24th Century
1 Are We Gods?
2 Crisis
3 The Mission
4 The Corporation
5 A Picnic
Part III: The 25th Century
1 Utopia
2 The Beginning of The End
3 A Theoretical Glimmer of Hope
4 The Time Machine
5 Our Finest Hour
Part IV: Epilogue
Part V (Appendix): Is Quantum Theory True?
Part I
May 3, 2297
1
Ben's Manuscript
On a typically glorious summer morning in Seattle Ben Davis entered his living room and noticed a large manila folder on his carpet that wasn't there the previous night. “What's this?” he asked himself as he browsed the cover.
“URGENT — open immediately. Your very life depends upon it!” It was signed Ben Davis and dated March 11, 2501. Even though running a little late for class he felt compelled to open the folder and read the contents while gulping down his morning coffee, a prerequisite for clear thinking. “Hello Ben. I am you in the future and my world is irrevocably doomed to extinction in three months! But you may survive if you take the enclosed manuscript to Professor Donald Richardson.”
Ben scoffed. “What balderdash! To still be alive in 2501 I'd have to be more than 240 years old! Furthermore, how can I save myself if the entire world will become extinct? The world must either survive or perish; it can't do both. In any event, even though time travel may be theoretically possible, actually doing it is a preposterous notion fit only for science fiction and not to be taken seriously.”
Although the signature appeared authentic, he couldn't recall having ever written such a strange and impossible warning. Convinced he was the object of a crude hoax, Ben flung the manuscript on his kitchen table wondering how and why such a transparently confused prankster managed to smuggle a folder into his locked apartment and reproduce his signature so precisely. He looked forward to some amusing bedtime reading upon his return from the Academy later that evening.
Any aspiring scientist coveted admission to the National Science Academy, renowned worldwide for its august faculty, leading edge technology and state-of-the-art facilities. One's entire career, from cradle to grave so to speak, could unfold within its hallowed walls. If selected as a graduate student (the Academy only chose from among its own undergraduates) and upon attaining an advanced degree in any of the numerous available fields of scientific study that the Academy offered, one could stay on to pursue a lifelong career of research in his or her specialty including mathematics, all physical and biological sciences, engineering, computer science and robotics.
Ben wasn't immune from the allure and prestige of a tenured position at the Academy. As a youngster he had precociously exhibited an exceptional aptitude for science and mathematics and was blessed with a corresponding passion for the same. After receiving a perfect score on the Academy's rigorous entrance exam, he was put on the administration's fast track and could virtually write his own ticket in his chosen field — astrophysics; ever since he was old enough to dream Ben yearned to be an astronaut. He only needed to pass his finals in relativity and quantum theory to graduate from the astronaut-training program and was fully confident that he would. Theoretical physics had always been his cup of tea.
The Academy was on the brink of a major breakthrough that would solve the current energy crisis threatening to end the high standard of living to which the nation had become accustomed. It was conjectured that a journey into space would be required and, being next in line to participate in such a venture, Ben was certain he would soon be privy to the latest information. But for now he had to be content with spoon-feeding; the administration had arranged private tutelage from two of the most erudite physicists of the modern age, Professor Donald Richardson in relativity theory and Professor Andrew Ryan in quantum theory.
2
Relativity Theory in the 23rd Century
“As usual, you're right on time,” said the somewhat reserved Professor Richardson, smiling broadly through a neatly trimmed beard and moustache. “Today we will discuss the baffling mystery regarding the composition of dark matter that had stumped physicists until 2289 when the riddle was deciphered in spectacular fashion,” he droned in his customary monotone. Ben always eagerly anticipated the professor's interesting lectures even though his delivery produced a strongly soporific effect. He was particularly looking forward to this one since the professor had hinted that the subject matter entailed a fundamental flaw in the most venerated physical theory of the 20th century — Einstein's special theory of relativity.
Ben's expectations came to instant fruition as the professor continued, “I will begin with a brief introduction into Einstein's special theory which correctly postulates that there must be a cosmic speed limit. Einstein knew that gravitational influences between large massive objects took time to arrive at their destination and weren't instantaneous, in which case there must be a finite limit to the speed at which they travel. Influenced by James Clerk Maxwell's 19th century mathematical proof and the subsequent Michelson-Morley experiment, both of which confirmed that the speed of light in a vacuum was a constant value, Einstein erroneously concluded that light speed was the barrier that his theory required and that nothing could travel faster.”
“Why erroneously?” asked Ben. “Surely Einstein's reasoning was correct. If anything could travel faster than light then we would probably never see it since its light wouldn't arrive here until well into the future, if at all.”
“During the inflationary period that occurred in the first few milliseconds after the big bang the universe expanded at an enormous rate, much faster than the speed of light. The first visible objects in our universe were formed much later. Perhaps tachyons1 are profuse remnants from this early period that haven't yet come close enough to any massive objects so as to be slowed by gravity to the point where they would become visible.”
Ben's eyes widened. “Then our universe would be submerged in an invisible one containing myriads of tachyons that we could never see.”
“Yes. For the sake of argument let's assume that the universe is teeming with distant tachyons. Then by Einstein's very argument we couldn't possibly detect them in present time, so how would we know whether or not they were there? Although we could never be able prove that tachyons do exist, as any theologian will tell you this isn't the same as, and is in fact a far cry from, proving that they don't.”
“But we are scientists not theologians.”
“Granted. We certainly go too far if we assert that any u
ndetectable object must exist. Such blather in the absence of supporting evidence leads to absurdities. As an example, consider the fable, popular in the days before space travel, that the far side of the moon is made of green cheese.”
“Clearly nonsense.”
“But suppose that an omnipresent atmospheric aroma of moldy cheese ostensibly emanating from the moon itself supported the contention. Then what would you say?”
“In that case it would have been worthy of consideration and couldn't be lightly dismissed.”
“Exactly. And what if I told you that at the turn of the 20th century supporting evidence was discovered for the proposition that swarms of tachyons exist throughout the universe.”
“I presume you are speaking of the fact that quantum theory requires short-lived tachyons.”
“Not at all. Quantum theory was well known in Einstein's day; he knew that tachyons instantaneously flit in and out of existence. But this was insufficient to undermine his theory, which was merely reworded to say that nothing could travel faster than light for any appreciable length of time.”
Ben interjected, “When tachyons suddenly appear or disappear where do they come from or go to?” He had been fruitlessly grappling with this perplexing question and, being obsessed with it, couldn't refrain from distracting the Professor.
“Good question. I don't know. Ask Professor Ryan. Let's stick to the present subject.”
“Okay, so then what are you referring to?”
“Dark matter. Although it isn't visible and has no olfactory emanation akin to mildewed cheese, it has an emanation of another sort — gravitons, the carriers of gravity. Try as they might, scientists couldn't directly observe dark matter, whence the adjective ‘dark’, but there was no denying its gravitational influence on visible objects throughout our universe, whence the noun ‘matter’.”
“Ah, of course! But isn't dark matter now called ‘dark energy’?”
“Not any more. The name had been changed to underscore the discovery that although the gravitational effects of ordinary matter only attract, this strange stuff also had to be able to repel if it were to explain the fact that the universe was inflating faster than could be accounted for without employing some other artifi ce2. Although an invisible substance attracting an object from behind would appear to be indistinguishable from one repelling it from the front, it was thought that nothing could be located beyond the universe's perimeter, so repulsion from within still afforded the only explanation.
“But we now know that the real culprit is attraction from without by an enveloping layer of dark matter. Thus the idea of repulsion, being superfluous, was rejected and the concept of ‘dark energy’ was no longer needed. Today the term refers only to dark matter's gravity, not dark matter itself. If dark matter consists of gravity-emitting tachyons then that would explain how it got outside of the visible universe.”
“Gravity would have to be faster than light to reach us from an invisible source. But we know that it propagates in waves and Maxwell's equations show that no wave travels faster than light.”
“Not exactly. Maxwell only proved it for electro-magnetic waves. But unlike light, gravity is a wave of a different kind and its carrier, the graviton, is different from light's carrier, the photon. Its speed had never been actually measured; only Einstein's overly hasty assumption precluded gravity from being faster than light. But if it were, then other tachyons could be wedged between its speed and light's. These would be ‘dark’ if far enough away so that their photons haven't arrived but their emitted gravitons, being faster yet, would still be able to affect the motion of visible objects.”
“Then Einstein's theory would have to be altered. Wouldn't that undermine all its valid predictions?”
“The solution is subtle, yet elegantly simple. Suppose gravitons are not merely faster than photons, but the fastest particles of all. Then in addition to providing room for dark matter tachyons, they could also fill the bill for the cosmic speed limit required by Einstein's theories of relativity, both special and general (which we will discuss in a later lecture).
“Before we could entertain this notion, the next logical step would be to substitute higher speeds than light in all known physical equations and see if the results remain consistent with observation. If so, this would put all the pieces of the puzzle in place. Realizing this, some enterprising physicists programmed a computer to plug in some hypothetical values, with the startling result that a substantial range of variances would indeed produce discrepancies too miniscule to be noticeable using any of the relatively imprecise instruments then available. In particular, the photon would now have positive (but nearly infinitesimal) mass; only the graviton would have zero mass. All that remained was to hope that gravity's speed really is faster than light, yet still within an acceptable range.”
“And is that the case?”
“Yes. Although the usual skepticism accompanying any proposed revision to a sacrosanct theory upon which many subsequent seemingly irrefutable ‘truths’ have been based forestalled widespread acceptance of the idea, there was no denying it after it was experimentally confirmed.”
“You are referring to your own dazzling experiment. It is hailed as the most illustrious of the 23rd century and the accolades are richly deserved.”
“Thank you,” responded Professor Richardson uncomfortably. He was modestly reluctant to divulge that he had designed and carried out the tide-turning experiment. “In 2263 sufficiently precise instruments emerged, enabling me to subsequently ascertain a value for gravity's speed in a vacuum to within four decimals. Lo and behold, it is indeed faster than light but still close enough to preserve Einstein's equations for most practical purposes!
“But since gravitons are faster than photons, Einstein's original theory is no longer strictly true and won't protect us from the possibility of an even faster tachyon. However this isn't a problem because, unlike dark matter, its gravity would never reach us and thus it could not affect our world in any possible way. So we can ignore it and reword our theory to say that gravity is the fastest traveler throughout the known universe.
“There may not be a speed limit in the unknown universe. In any event, it’s intuitively plausible that any particle with a singular characteristic, such as being fastest, is selected by virtue of some correlation with a universal quantity rather than arbitrarily. Since gravity is related to mass, whereas other tachyons or other waves, such as light, are unrelated to mass or anything else that might be pertinent, we are on firmer ground to assume that gravitons move at the ultimate speed than was Einstein when he posited photons as the fastest possible.
“Let me wrap up this qualitative introduction with an apt analogy: Newtonian physics, although not exactly right, works perfectly well for all earthly applications, only breaks down at velocities unattainable by us, strips out the extraneous complexity of relativity theory, and remains the preferred method of solving all but the most esoteric problems; likewise Einstein's theory, although not exactly right, works perfectly well throughout the visible universe, only breaks down at velocities faster than light, strips out the extraneous complexity of the new theory, and remains the preferred method of solving all problems outside the fuzzy realm of tachyons.”
“Wow!”
“Wow indeed. Now it's time to tear into the meat of the new theory, namely the mathematical equations themselves. If we let C stand for light speed and G stand for gravity speed then G = C + Δ where Δ is a very small positive quantity. We shall see that the tensor forms of all true physical quantities are preserved by replacing C with C + Δ in all relevant equations….”
____________________
1 A tachyon is a particle that is moving faster than the speed of light.
2 Such as, by diluting the purity of general relativity by rigging it with a cosmological constant.
3
Jenny
Ben had two hours to kill before his next lesson and his head was throbbing from Professor Ric
hardson's lecture. He had never paid much attention to dark matter but now he couldn't stop thinking about it until something even more interesting caught his attention. Many of the Academy's brilliant freshmen tended to be more emotionally unstable than their less gifted contemporaries, so they were required to regularly visit a class counselor. While wandering around in deep concentration and entirely oblivious to his surroundings (at least consciously, but the subconscious never sleeps), Ben found himself standing in front of her door, on which was written ‘Jenny Doyle’.
He was wholly captivated by her charms since their very first meeting, liked spending time with her, and never squandered an opportunity to drop in. Although never needing much of a reason, he always conjured one up in order to disguise his amorous intentions and make it seem as if their frequent encounters were totally unplanned and accidental. “Hi, Jenny,” said Ben as he briskly entered. “If you've got a few minutes to spare I'd like to ask your opinion about a bizarre event that occurred this morning.”
“Sure,” she replied, flashing her brightest smile. Jenny would have preferred to talk about more personal matters with Ben whenever he popped in for an impromptu visit. Being taken with his dark complexion, smiling brown eyes, athletic physique and bubbly personality, she had grown increasingly fond of him.
“Someone is playing a prank on me. Whoever the perpetrator is, he or she is both extremely clever and extremely naïve. On one hand he has pulled off a couple of extraordinary stunts and on the other he has drummed up a hokey scenario that he expects me to swallow.” Ben recounted the discovery of the mysterious manila folder. “Do you have any idea who could have done this and why?”
A key aspect of Jenny's job was being fully cognizant of the foibles, idiosyncrasies and neuroses of all of her assigned charges, so she was uniquely qualified to provide an answer to the question if it had one. But none of Ben's classmates came immediately to mind. “Does anyone have access to both your apartment and a document with your signature on it?” she replied, trying to buy time.