Thomas Hertog and Stephen Hawking hit it off right away when the young Belgian researcher was first called into the renowned British theoretical physicist’s office in the late 1990s.
“Something clicked between us,” Hertog remarked.
That relationship would endure even after Hawking’s crippling ALS condition took away his final means of communication, enabling the two to finish a novel hypothesis that attempts to fundamentally alter how science views the cosmos.
Hertog’s book “On the Origin of Time,” which was released in the UK last month, has the full explanation of Hawking’s final theory before his passing in 2018.
The cosmologist discussed their 20-year working relationship with AFP, how they communicated by facial expressions, and why Hawking ultimately realised that his seminal book “A Brief History of Time” was written from the wrong point of view.
The ‘designed’ universe
When they first met in 1998 at Cambridge University, Hawking immediately brought up the issue on his mind.
Using a clicker connected to a speech machine, Hawking said to Hertog, “The universe we observe appears designed.”
The laws of physics, which govern how the universe functions, “turn out to be just perfect for the universe to be habitable, for life to be possible,” according to Hertog.
This incredible run of luck extends from the delicate equilibrium that enables atoms to combine to create the molecules required for chemistry to the expansion of the universe itself, which enables the creation of enormous cosmic structures like galaxies.
The multiverse, a concept that has recently gained popularity in the film business, has been one “trendy” solution to this issue, according to Hertog.
By reducing the cosmos to one of countless others, most of which are “crap, lifeless, sterile,” the 47-year-old continued, this hypothesis explains away the universe’s clearly intended nature.
Hertog claimed that Hawking recognised the “great mire of paradoxes the multiverse was leading us into” and claimed a more satisfactory explanation must exist.
Outsider’s perspective
After a few years of working together, “it began to sink in” that they were lacking something crucial, according to Hertog.
Even “A Brief History of Time” and the multiverse were “attempts to depict the birth and evolution of our universe from what Stephen would call a “God’s eye perspective,” according to Hertog.
However, he continued, because “we are within the universe” and not on the outside, our theories cannot be divorced from our viewpoint.
“That was why (Hawking) said that ‘A Brief History of Time’ is written from the wrong perspective.”
The couple spent the next 15 years creating a new “observer’s perspective” theory of physics and cosmology using the peculiarities of quantum theory.
But by 2008, Hawking had lost the capacity to utilise his clicker, and he had grown more and more reclusive.
“I thought it was over,” Hertog admitted.
A “somewhat magical” degree of non-verbal communication was then formed by the two, enabling them to carry on their task, he said.
Hertog would stand in front of Hawking and question him while gazing into his eyes.
He was described as having a wide variety of facial expressions, from strong disapproval to tremendous joy.
Hertog stated that it is “impossible to disentangle” which components of the final theory were created by him and which ones by Hawking.
‘One grand evolutionary process’
Their theory is centred on what took place immediately following the Big Bang.
They suggest that the laws of physics formed with the cosmos, rather than being the result of an explosion that adhered to pre-existing principles.
This indicates that, as Hertog put it, “the laws of physics themselves begin to simplify and disappear” if you go back in time long enough.
“Ultimately, even the dimension of time evaporates.”
The title of Hertog’s book alludes to Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species” and proposes that the laws of physics and time themselves have evolved in a manner resembling that of biological evolution.
In essence, Hertog added, “what we’re saying is that (physics and biology) are two levels of one big evolutionary process.”
Because the early years of the cosmos are still “hidden in the mist of the Big Bang,” he recognised that it is challenging to demonstrate this idea.
He said that one method to remove this curtain might be to study gravitational waves, which are ripplings in space-time, and another might be to use quantum holograms created on quantum computers.
