I consider Smolin’s CNS theory, that universes evolve to maximize black hole production one of the most brilliant ideas ever, true or not.
Your post is an excellent primer on the concept. Not sure yet how much is new here but I will eagerly await follow ups including your predictions.
IMHO Smolin has saddled CNS with the unnecessary prediction that our universe should be at a local maximum for black hole production. This is designed to insulate CNS from charges of unfalsifiability. If a slight tweak in our particle configurations would increase black hole creation then, according to his formulation, CNS would be falsified.
But, and this is where I borrow my science epistemology from Popper and Deutsch, Smolin’s theory is even better than he realizes. If it is the only hard-to-vary theory that explains all our relevant observations then it should be our preferred explanation even *before* we can test it. Being hard-to-vary is sufficient to tentatively prefer an explanation if it has no hard-to-vary rivals.
Also definitely like your point that evolution speeds up at new scales.
I consider Smolin’s CNS theory, that universes evolve to maximize black hole production one of the most brilliant ideas ever, true or not.
Your post is an excellent primer on the concept. Not sure yet how much is new here but I will eagerly await follow ups including your predictions.
IMHO Smolin has saddled CNS with the unnecessary prediction that our universe should be at a local maximum for black hole production. This is designed to insulate CNS from charges of unfalsifiability. If a slight tweak in our particle configurations would increase black hole creation then, according to his formulation, CNS would be falsified.
But, and this is where I borrow my science epistemology from Popper and Deutsch, Smolin’s theory is even better than he realizes. If it is the only hard-to-vary theory that explains all our relevant observations then it should be our preferred explanation even *before* we can test it. Being hard-to-vary is sufficient to tentatively prefer an explanation if it has no hard-to-vary rivals.
Also definitely like your point that evolution speeds up at new scales.