Do we need to abandon Einstein? | Eric Weinstein and George Ellis go head to head on wormholes

[Music] I want to be outrageous I think that the problem is is that when you've lost your ability to dream when you're told what you can't do you know something bad happens uh nobody's searching for a fraction for pi because you've been told it's not possible to find one so that's good you don't waste your lives but when somebody tells you look up at the night sky try to imagine all the amazing things and you're never getting there it's incredibly frustrating I don't understand why we aren't taking these things more seriously look there are topological and geometric ways of considering worm holes and you have to get the matter right in the pressur so that the thing doesn't close up and maybe it's impossible whatever why are you wasting your time on a wormhole what is it with all of you that you want to stay responsible and in the scientific einsteinian Paradigm and yet clearly you've got science fiction Hearts you're pining after Jodie Foster you're you're forcing Kip for Kip Thorn and car a to be somewhat mathematically realistic when Consulting to these films at some level get out of Einstein's prison and explore the idea of the theory Beyond Einstein that renders Einstein effective don't stay in the prison and daydream about Freedom the door is open it's yours to leave Einstein theory is incredibly well tested in the solar system um to it's being tested by looking at the way particles move or planets move satellites move but far more important a kip Thorn that was just mentioned won the Nobel Prize for his incredible work in building these gravitational wave detectors and Einstein's theory predicted gravitational wave detectors that predicted the black holes would exist that they would Circle each other they would give off gravitational waves all of that has been proven to be true in the last three or four years which is why Kip Thorn was awarded the Nobel Prime so let's stick with a theory which is incredibly well tested until there's a reason to say it is not the way things are so I just want to take a poll does anyone want to see three people agree for a debate all right in that case even though we're old friends George George George the situation is different than you say it used to be we got to have fun girdle had you could put together a universe with closed timel curves that would allow us to go backwards in time did not Herman Bondi in 1957 at the famous Chapel Hill conference talk about the issue of negative mass and general relativity i s say that he did and the reason that he did was is that the negative mass is still attracted to the positive mass in the same way but the positive mass is the one repelled the two of them chase each other towards unbounded acceleration that at least is exciting sir stay in your chair George George is it not true that you of all people have to recognize that the Einstein field equations are made from from some pure geometry whereas the energy conditions are brought in to keep us from Madness to prop up what would otherwise fall apart as a theory with toothpicks and and and and masking tape I submit to you sir that in fact the entire thing is on very shaky ground and you are trying to keep us in a pkin village what say [Laughter] you I say if you could do it you would be able to get Eternal motion going you'd make your fortune you'd get your Nobel Prize which is what really matters to physicist well but but my claim isn't that this is possible but my claim is is that when we do not allow ourselves to go into the Adaptive Valley of Madness we have no possibility of getting out the other side at a higher level if had dur stopped with numbers where a * B was equal to negative B * a there aren't numbers that do that and if he'd stopped there we wouldn't have the direct equation but he later realized that that it had to be matrices so my question isn't that what we are saying here makes sense but that we have to enter some kind of a state where we suspend the very strong structures on reason and and logic and consistency that you would have us uh you would impose upon us so that we may discover what this is actually meant to be I I want to respond to Eric wanting us to open our minds to all possibilities and again I'm going to go to an economic analogy and I've talked about if the energy density plus the pressure is negative all sorts of things go wrong the economic analogy is I can run a simulation on a computer where the interest rate is negative and the more money I put in the more money I make money comes out of nowhere and that's an exact analogy just the way the gecko climbs the wall using the Casmir effect with negative pressure and negative negative energy so do negative interest rates actually occur and we have things like GIF and goods and I put it to you sir that we consider those things inside of economics it's time to let different voices uh be as irresponsible as the other voices remember irresponsibility is the Hallmark of great science it is a byproduct Watson and Crick and Pauling both came up with the triple helix with the sugar phosphate Backbone in the inside before Watson and Crick figured it was a double helix with it with it on the outside you have to let people be wrong you have to let people dream and you cannot keep shutting people down uh just because they've uh failed to do something within the theory all of our old people Fineman showed up at the 1957 uh conference under the pseudonym I believe Mr Smith uh quantum gravity was founded by two anti-gravity uh benefactors named Babson and banson nobody talks about this modern quantum gravity is an outgrowth of the anti-gravity movement of the 50s you have to let people go to esselin you have to let them lie in uh sensory deprivation tanks take some psychedelics talk some absolute Madness and stop pretending that we're so respectable and you can't let one Community dominate everything it's time to party rock and roll have a great time be much more irresponsible and try to generate new ideas rather than recycling the same seven ideas like wormholes that we've been discussing to death to continue watching this video click the link in the top left or in the description below or visit I a.tv for more debates and talks from the world's leading thinkers on today's biggest ideas

Channel: The Institute of Art and Ideas

Views: 55,993

Keywords: learning, education, debate, lecture, IAItv, institute of art and ideas, IAI, philosophy

Id: BpGBkJ-3g-g

Length: 6min 37sec (397 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 14 2023