- A wormhole is defined and described as:
- " a 'shortcut' through space and time. A wormhole has at least two mouths which are
connected to a single throat. If the wormhole is traversable, matter can 'travel' from
one mouth to the other by passing through the throat. While there is no observational
evidence for wormholes, spacetimes containing wormholes are known to be valid
solutions in general relativity." [1]
Relativists go to important meetings and workshops at your expense. There they discuss wormholes seriously and
speculate on the possibility to travel through them to circumvent time:
- " This column is about the Advanced Quantum/Relativity Theory Propulsion Workshop,
a gathering held at the Caltech Jet Propulsion Laboratory which I attended last week
(May 16-17, 1994). It was sponsored by NASA's Office of Advanced Concepts and
Technology, and its purpose was to bring together a group of experts and interested
parties to review quantum mechanics and relativity theory as applied to concepts
such as space-time wormholes, trans-relativistic physics, spacetime structure, and
quantum nonlocality. In other words, we were to review possible physics routes to
faster-than-light (FTL) travel and/or communication." [2]
- " Wormholes are a type of hypothetical warped spacetime which are also permitted
by the Einstein field equations of general relativity, although it would be impossible
to travel through a wormhole unless it was what is known as a traversable wormhole...
A proposed time-travel machine using a traversable wormhole would (hypothetically)
work in the following way: One end of the wormhole is accelerated to nearly the speed
of light, perhaps with some advanced propulsion system, and then brought back to
the point of origin. Due to time dilation, the accelerated end of the wormhole has now
aged less than the stationary end, as seen by an external observer; however, time
connects differently through the wormhole than outside it, so that synchronized
clocks at either end of the wormhole will always remain synchronized as seen by an
observer passing through the wormhole, no matter how the two ends move around.
This means that an observer entering the accelerated end would exit the stationary
end when the stationary end was the same age that the accelerated end had been at
the moment before entry; for example, if prior to entering the wormhole the observer
noted that a clock at the accelerated end read a date of 2005 while a clock at the
stationary end read 2010, then the observer would exit the stationary end when its
clock also read 2005, a trip backwards in time as seen by other observers outside." [3]
Susskind is one who managed to publish a couple of formal articles on wormholes in the establishment's journals, one of
which is the 'Rebuttal' paper I discuss here.
The first comment I will make is that a wormhole is not supernatural. It is and irrational proposal. We have to get our
terminology straight if we are to decide whether to put proponents of wormholes in churches or in asylums. The second
comment is that the specialized journals seem to have space for this kind of garbage, but not for science. The editors and
peers find time to read about wormholes, yet they can find no time to review an article that criticizes relativity or quantum.
See for example:
- L. Abbott, Baby universes and making the cosmological constant zero, Nature 336,
- (29 Dec 1988) 711-712 [4]
- P. Davies, Wormholes through physics, Nature 413, (27 Sep 2001) 354-355 [5]
Time's Up on Time Travel, Science 308, (20 May 2005) 1110 [6]
C. Seife, Calculations Pop the Cork on Travel Through Spacetime Tunnels, Science 300
- (6 June 2003) 1489 [7])
Certainly, papers which criticize Relativity, Quantum, and String Theories go through a much more rigorous review than
papers that fantasize about the poppycock of wormholes, dark matter, and virtual particles. That's what peer review has
become: a mechanism to protect the status quo at all costs.
In the instant article, Susskind says two things that caught my eye. The first one is his comment that wormholes are
"interesting subject[s]." The second one is that:
- " None of this means that wormholes make sense. I share the prejudice of the
author of that they do not."
- Again, these comments confirm that the journals who make room for people like Susskind are in the business of
publishing nonscientific articles about nonsense that admittedly doesn't make sense. They clutter journal space with
this rubbish because the topic is 'interesting' and because the author is a celebrity and not because the subject matter
is scientific.
I take exception to and am offended by Susskind's comment that wormholes are interesting topics. What could possibly
be interesting about such poppycock as wormholes? What does this have to do with science? If you want to read fantasy,
go get a fascinating book such Little Red, Snow White, or Alice. If you need a shot of surrealism in your life, go see some
Dali pictures at the art museum. Don't bring this garbage into the world of science because you cheapen it. What sad state
our scientific world is in if this is the stuff a world-famous institution such as Stanford formally teaches its graduate
students.
The issue with wormholes is simple. There is no such entity except in the sick minds of lamebrain mathematicians. A
wormhole is not just counter-intuitive, and it doesn't just violate common sense as the idiots of Mathematics like to say.
A wormhole is a logical impossibility. The idiots who believe in wormholes should be interned in a lunatic asylum without
a hearing. Period! Padded walls! No furlough!
| L. Susskind, Rebuttal to a Paper on Wormholes, arXiv:gr-qc/0504039 (Apr. 5, 2005). |
Relativity's
amusing
wormhole
amusing
wormhole
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- Copyright © by Nila Gaede 2008