Our Mathematical Universe: My Quest for the Ultimate Nature of Reality
Our Mathematical Universe is a journey to explore the mysteries uncovered by cosmology and to discover the nature of reality. Our Big Bang, our distant future, parallel worlds, the sub-atomic and intergalactic - none of them are what they seem. But there is a way to understand this immense strangeness - mathematics. Seeking an answer to the fundamental puzzle of why our universe seems so mathematical, Tegmark proposes a radical idea: that our physical world not only is described by mathematics, but that it is mathematics. This may offer answers to our deepest questions: How large is reality? What is everything made of? Why is our universe the way it is?Table of ContentsPreface 1 What Is Reality? Not What It Seems * What's the Ultimate Question? * The Journey Begins Part One: Zooming Out 2 Our Place in Space Cosmic Questions * How Big Is Space? * The Size of Earth * Distance to the Moon * Distance to the Sun and the Planets * Distance to the Stars * Distance to the Galaxies * What Is Space? 3 Our Place in TimeWhere Did Our Solar System Come From? * Where Did theGalaxies Come From? * Where Did the Mysterious MicrowavesCome From? * Where Did the Atoms Come From? 4 Our Universe by NumbersWanted: Precision Cosmology * Precision Microwave-Background Fluctuations * Precision Galaxy Clustering * The Ultimate Map of Our Universe * Where Did Our Big Bang Come From? 5 Our Cosmic Origins What's Wrong with Our Big Bang? * How Inflation Works * The Gift That Keeps on Giving * Eternal Inflation 6 Welcome to the Multiverse The Level I Multiverse * The Level II Multiverse * Multiverse Halftime Roundup Part Two: Zooming In 7 Cosmic Legos Atomic Legos * Nuclear Legos * Particle-Physics Legos * Mathematical Legos * Photon Legos * Above the Law? * Quanta and Rainbows * Making Waves * Quantum Weirdness * The Collapse of Consensus * The Weirdness Can't Be Confined * Quantum Confusion 8 The Level III Multiverse The Level III Multiverse * The Illusion of Randomness * Quantum Censorship * The Joys of Getting Scooped * Why Your Brain Isn't a Quantum Computer * Subject, Object and Environment * Quantum Suicide * Quantum Immortality? * Multiverses Unified * Shifting Views: Many Worlds or Many Words? Part Three: Stepping Back 9 Internal Reality, External Reality and Consensus Reality External Reality and Internal Reality * The Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing but the Truth * Consensus Reality * Physics: Linking External to Consensus Reality 10 Physical Reality and Mathematical Reality Math, Math Everywhere! * The Mathematical Universe Hypothesis * What Is a Mathematical Structure? 11 Is Time an Illusion? How Can Physical Reality Be Mathematical? * What Are You? * Where Are You? (And What Do You Perceive?) * When Are You? 12 The Level IV Multiverse Why I Believe in the Level IV Multiverse * Exploring the Level IV Multiverse: What's Out There? * Implications of the Level IV Multiverse * Are We Living in a Simulation? * Relation Between the MUH, the Level IV Multiverse and Other Hypotheses *Testing the Level IV Multiverse 13 Life, Our Universe and Everything How Big Is Our Physical Reality? * The Future of Physics * The Future of Our Universe--How Will It End? * The Future of Life *The Future of You--Are You Insignificant? Acknowledgments Suggestions for Further Reading Index