Carlo Rovelli Has Once Again Taken Me Along For The Ride

White Holes - Carlo Rovelli (2023)

I have admired so many great thinkers, imagining how it must have been for contemporary readers of Goethe, Homer, Nietzsche, etc.  To share in the intimate thoughts of those at the cutting edge of abstract human exploration (Literature, Philosophy, Science, Arts) as they themselves first share them with the world at large seems to me one of the rarest glories that life may afford for a layperson such as myself, in love with science and human exploration.  Reading the work of Carlo Rovelli I find myself exactly where I imagined decades ago, with open ears and mind, receiving original ideas from someone on the leading edge of abstract thought, ideas which will alter everything moving forward.  I feel so fortunate.

(I must mention here that Mr. Rovelli is Italian, and writes in his native language.  I feel a great debt owed to the translator of this book, Simon Carnell.  He managed to convey both the facts and the subtle meanings in a wonderful way.)

Carlo Rovelli is a theoretical physicist, and one of the most original thinkers.  He is gifted not only with the ability to grasp and calculate abstract mathematics and physical theory, but he writes like a poet, explaining the science with the same fervor with which he explains his personal mode of work.  He not only loves ideas, and exploring them as far as possible, but he loves the process by which he develops his ideas.  The joy he finds in work that, to many, may seem like mathematical drudgeries and theoretical mazes, is readily apparent.  I felt his joy and wonderment as his conclusions led to new questions, and eventually to the idea that a black hole does not "die" but is instead, reborn as a "white" hole.  

Thirty years ago, black holes were barely an accepted theoretical idea.  Today, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of them catalogued in visible space, with nearly every galaxy containing a massive black hole at its center.  Physicists sought to understand the "life cycle" of a black hole, much like they studied the life cycle of stars.  Many assumed that a black hole was a permanent null void in space, while others, such as Stephen Hawking, surmised that through natural quantum effects, the black holes would slowly "evaporate" away.  Evidence of these processes has been found.   These became the consensus on black holes.

Mr. Rovelli's genius lies not only in the real of physical science, but in the much-admired (by me) and often lacking skill that is pure abstract thought.  It is in abstract thought that the human mind achieves greatness.  This place is where intuition, knowledge, and the magic of consciousness combine to create the truly new ideas.  From the first human to note that fire made the clay underneath hard and sturdy, thereby intuiting that shaping the clay while wet and then placing it in the fire she could create a vessel or bowl, to Albert Einstein discovering the relativity of time while pondering the way train stations miles apart managed to keep track of departures and arrivals, this mind abstraction has shaped all of humanity.  It is in this realm that Carlo Rovelli realized a black hole does not need to evaporate or die, since quantum effects prevented the actual formation of a singularity, always assumed to reside inside all black holes.  Instead, Rovelli grasped that the gravity pit would bounce back, in a sense, and that the black hole would become a "white hole," an object that spews matter and energy out of itself into the universe at large, without ever becoming a singularity.  This is a BIG idea, and the hard part was yet to come.

Many non-scientists assume that the job of physicist is to come up with ideas.  That is only the very start of the process.  The work comes in using rigorous mathematics to test the ideas over and over again, looking for any and all possibility of error, assumption, and misunderstanding.  One must also look into any previous work that may have analyzed the same phenomenon.  It can take a lifetime to properly verify that a physical theory stands up.  It is now 2024 and we still run experiments testing the theories Einstein crafted one hundred years ago.  THEY HOLD UP! My favorite sections of this book are when Rovelli describes the joy he feels when the mathematics consistently work in his idea's favor.  What the Universe does not allow will not happen. The joy of discovery is a pure one, and rarely described so beautifully.

I am fortunate to find myself here, with Carlo Rovelli, at the start of his journey.  I expect he will explore white holes and every new possibility they may bring.  I will be right there with him, receiving periodic updates hopefully, as he continues his foray into the unknown, leading the charge for the rest of us.  I highly recommend this book. 

(White Holes can be purchased here: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/724426/white-holes-by-carlo-rovelli/ )

Freeman Dyson describes his life and science, and his hope for humanity.

Disturbing the Universe – Freeman Dyson (1979)

            While exploring the bibliography section of some of the science books I have read recently, I came across a mention of this book, by noted theoretical physicist and mathematician Freeman Dyson, and thank goodness the amazing M.D. Anderson Library had a copy for me to check out.  I had previously read that Mr. Dyson wrote some very interesting books which did not stick strictly to equations and mathematical rigor, but instead explored the Universe through Mr. Dyson’s inquisitive mind.  These types of books provide a great insight into the minds that have shaped our modern scientific world.

            The preface to this book details the circumstances leading up to its writing.  The Arthur P. Sloan Foundation started a book series.  They requested eminent people, people who were the leaders in their respective fields, to write something for publication.  It could be a small tome on pure mathematics, or a detailed history of a great scientist’s life, or, as in the case with Freeman Dyson, an exploration of his own life in the sciences, mixed in with the wisdom and gathered insights that he developed through his life.  Because of this, the title of the book,  Disturbing the Universe, is very apt.  The story contained within is of Freeman Dyson and the many times in his life where a chance encounter, a choice made, or an accidental experience, have led to a shake-up, a disturbance, in the way he saw and understood the Universe at large. 

            I love how this book begins.  It pays homage to the written word and the human imagination as being the grounds upon which greatness is dreamed of.  Mr. Dyson begins by detailing a children’s science fiction story that really stuck with him from his childhood, The Magic City by Edith Nesbitt.  This story detailed an alternate world, and Dyson mentions one rule that the story’s citizenry needed to heed.  In this world, you are free to choose to use any type of technology available, but, once chosen, the individual would have to use that technology, and ONLY that technology, for the rest of their lives.  For example, should a person choose to use roller skates as a means of transportation, that person, once they chose, would be denied the use of any other transporting technology.  This idea became a metaphor for Freeman Dyson.  He came to understand that any technology that is created by humans has the power to alter anything and everything that comes after its creation.  The scary part is that, as Freeman Dyson explains, 99% of all new technology stays purely as a clever toy for the powerful and rich few.  Only around 1% of all created technology finds a wide use and spreads throughout the human world.  The problem lies in that there is no way to predict what tech will catch on, and what the moral and philosophical implications and repercussions will be.  Once the printing press was invented, there was no shortage of people who sought to destroy or abandon this technology because of the fear that printing presses would allow for the dissemination of ideas and knowledge contrary to what the powers-that-be wish the masses to read or know about.  Freeman Dyson understood that this same problem applies to even seemingly innocuous technology, such as household goods, and not just to new weapons or giant machines.

            Mr. Dyson goes on to discuss his education and development into one of the premier mathematical and theoretical minds of the 20^th century.  He details his involvement in the British Air Force during WWII, and how the omnipresent bureaucracy showed him the blind stupidity of man, the illogic of “leadership”, and the brutality of those that send our youngest to die in war.  He saw the stupidity of the Air Force equating mission successes with number of sorties flown, or number of planes involved, and not with whether the target was actually hit, whether the crews came back alive, or whether their methods were pure suicide for these air crews.  The crews were never told the amount of planes and airmen that came back or that died or that were lost.  They were fed lie after lie after lie to keep them motivated to enter unsafe flying targets and get blown the F up over some unseen and unimportant target.  This shaped him very much.  He stated that when he moved to the USA, it was not until the Vietnam war that the people of the USA lost their innocent and naïve belief in the inherent goodness of their leaders.  The British and most of Europe had lost this during the interminable First World War.

            One of my favorite passages deals with Freeman Dyson’s relationship with my idol, Richard P. Feynman.  The two worked together while at Cornell University, and shared a road-trip across the USA.  His descriptions of Feynman and their relationship are so cool.  Freeman Dyson was lucky to work with the greatest minds around, from Feynman to Hans Bethe, to Robert Oppenheimer.  He is very honest in his portrayals of these peers of his.  It is always reassuring to me to hear of how deeply scientists can disagree over issues and still maintain a collegial working relationship and even be very close friends.  More people could learn from such things.

            Much of the latter half of this book deals with the various political and social engagements that Freeman Dyson took up after his main work was complete.  He is candid about his failures and humble about his achievements.  The last chapters deal with Mr. Dyson’s vision for the future of humanity, of life itself, and make for very moving reading.  I wish his vision of our future indeed comes to pass, allowing humans to differentiate themselves by exploring our solar system, creating colonies, and spreading Life through the cosmos.  Dyson has done the math and he feels, much like I do, that, while Life existing on Earth seems to point to the ability of Life to be anywhere in our Galaxy and Universe, the truth may very well be that the myriad conditions needed, not only for cellular Life to develop, but for the planet to be stable enough for Billions of years to allow for the creation of “Intelligent” Life, are only found here on our Planet Earth, out of all the possible worlds of our Multi-verse.  If there are a quadrillion planets in our Universe, and the odds against Life arising are 1 in a quadrillion, then we are indeed alone.  If the odds turn out to be 1 in a septillion or bigger, then the very existence of Life on Earth can be seen as the ultimate miracle and all of our humanity as a blip in the vast expanse of space-time.  I too think we humans have a mandate to spread Life, in all forms, throughout the Galaxy and then the Universe.  I hope Freeman Dyson’s vision comes to pass.  I will definitely be on the lookout for more books by Mr. Freeman Dyson.

(This book can be purchased here:  AMAZON  )

Soft Matter, Hard Science, and How to Teach It

Fragile Objects: Soft Matter, Hard Science, & The Thrill of Discovery – Pierre Gilles de Gennes, Jacques Badoz (1996)

            It is rare that a book starts off due to a great idea and then the author is able to match it with the actual content found within.  That is what I have found in this great and highly informative book by the French scientist and educator, Pierre Gille de Dennes.  Because of his involvement in education he was asked to speak to the advanced science classes at many French secondary schools regarding science itself, the pursuit of a career in science, and the methods by which science is best elucidated and taught to students.  Before writing this book, Mr. Gilles de Gennes visited and spoke at over 150 different French schools, both on the continent and in various French-system schools throughout the world.  He sought to teach the students about his field, the study of soft matter and its properties, but wound up learning just as much from the questions posed to him by the many students he met along the way.

            This book is constructed in this manner, where the author discusses a specific science story that illustrates a point he is making about the properties of a soft matter such as rubber, then he details certain audience responses and/or questions that came up often during his trips.  He first describes what he studies, which are long, chain molecules called polymers.  Polymers are naturally all around us, from the keratin in our fingernails and hair, to the collagen in our ligaments and skin, to the snot created by our mucus glands.  The author focuses on one type per chapter. In the first chapter, he tells the students how the native people of South America would use a certain tree’s latex to coat their feet and ankles.  After an hour or so, this liquid latex turned into a solid material, natural rubber.  The native people did not know why this occurred, or why, after about a day, their rubber coatings would begin to fall apart and become unusable.  He then explains to the students that the latex combined with the free oxygen in our atmosphere.  These oxygen atoms would bond with the latex at various points and change the properties of the latex from a liquid to those of a solid.  The reason that the rubber “boots” would disintegrate is that nothing stopped the oxygen from continuing its reactions, so eventually so many oxygen atoms bond with the latex that the bonds between the latex are broken, causing the disintegration of the natural rubber.  It was not until Mr. Goodyear experimented with adding trace amounts of sulfur to cooking latex that an actually durable rubber was created.  We call this vulcanized rubber, because of the added sulfur, and it is still in use in every single vehicle tire around, not to mention a host of other uses. 

While this is a neat story in and of itself, the author seeks to also prod the students into pursuing their ideas by describing how it took another hundred plus years after Mr. Goodyear vulcanized rubber, to actually begin to understand the physical and chemical reasons for the valuable reaction.  Why did not one seek to follow up on it?  Who knows, but it is the spirit of curiosity that is most alive in those that seek to become scientists.

Other chapters deal with soft matter such as soap bubbles, liquid crystals, wetting and de-wetting, India ink, and many other of the everyday items around us that are touched by the science of “soft matter.”  For instance, one of the interesting things is that a minute quantity of a substance can greatly change the properties of something else.  Ink, for instance.  Most ink is just minute particles of carbon floating in water.  The issue with keeping ink for any length of time is that the particles will all coalesce and sink to the bottom of the container, essentially separating the two components of the ink.  Back in human history, someone figured out that a tiny amount of gum Arabic (sap from a Mediterranean tree) added to the ink kept it from separating and would last over a year.  This is what we call India ink.  The addition of Gum Arabic helped coat each of the individual carbon particles with a one atom thick layer of gum, keeping the particles from collecting and settling down to the bottom.  Now, it took hundreds of years for someone to figure out WHY it worked (in terms of physics), but it is amazing that it was actually discovered!

            The author also describes his personal scientific quest, as he proceeded to leave behind scientific disciplines in favor of new fields ripe for exploration.  Sometimes it is the only option for a scientist.  Certain fields stagnate, whether due to lack of funding or due to a bottleneck in technological ability.  The author went from studying surfactants (molecules with two separate ends each with different chemical properties) which are used throughout human industry, the most familiar ones being the varieties of soaps we have access to, to studying adhesives and their properties.  Each time he made a change he had to spend years learning the foundational ideas of the new field.  This is something that he made a very good point of sharing with his students.  It is very difficult to pick a new field of research and be successful in it.  It takes teamwork, patience, and the true love and desire to learn something new.  Many people, even top scientists, do not have such fortitude.

I would recommend this book to any secondary school educators out there, for it is a great study and critique of the methods used in the author’s home of France to teach children.  He describes the French over-reliance on teaching theory as opposed to practical applied science and engineering.  He describes the triumphs and challenges faced by American school systems and the methods used to foster academic excellence in the USA.  It is all very interesting and will give me much to think about for a long time to come.

(This book is available for purchase here: FRAGILE OBJECTS )