# We are a Hologram? Able to probe Planck world? Hocus-pocus or profound discovery? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 15, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502 "2009-01-15T21:43:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/1 "2009-01-15T21:43:09Z")
– Not sure if this belongs in GD but didn’t seem appropriate elsewhere so dropped it here. I was just reading the following article (linked below quote): > [@](#): > > For the past seven years, this German set-up has been looking for gravitational waves - ripples in space-time thrown off by super-dense astronomical objects such as neutron stars and black holes. GEO600 has not detected any gravitational waves so far, but it might inadvertently have made the most important discovery in physics for half a century. > > For many months, the GEO600 team-members had been scratching their heads over inexplicable noise that is plaguing their giant detector. Then, out of the blue, a researcher approached them with an explanation. In fact, he had even predicted the noise before he knew they were detecting it. According to Craig Hogan, a physicist at the Fermilab particle physics lab in Batavia, Illinois, GEO600 has stumbled upon the fundamental limit of space-time - the point where space-time stops behaving like the smooth continuum Einstein described and instead dissolves into “grains”, just as a newspaper photograph dissolves into dots as you zoom in. “It looks like GEO600 is being buffeted by the microscopic quantum convulsions of space-time,” says Hogan. > > \ > > If space-time is a grainy hologram, then you can think of the universe as a sphere whose outer surface is papered in Planck length-sized squares, each containing one bit of information. The holographic principle says that the amount of information papering the outside must match the number of bits contained inside the volume of the universe. > > \ > > This is good news for anyone trying to probe the smallest unit of space-time. “Contrary to all expectations, it brings its microscopic quantum structure within reach of current experiments,” says Hogan. So while the Planck length is too small for experiments to detect, the holographic “projection” of that graininess could be much, much larger, at around 10[sup]-16[/sup] metres. “If you lived inside a hologram, you could tell by measuring the blurring,” he says. > > SOURCE: [Our world may be a giant hologram | New Scientist](http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126911.300-our-world-may-be-a-giant-hologram.html?full=true) My mind is boggling at the whole thing (lots more detail in the full article). Sounds like new age junk science except they have the likes of the Director of Fermilab’s Center for Particle Astrophysics. That is not a position given to hocus-pocus new agey kooks. Then add in Leonard Susskind and Nobel prizewinner Gerard 't Hooft among others. Seems like serious scientists are taking this very seriously. They fully admit it is far too soon to say for sure what they have detected, if anything. It is interesting though that the “noise” being observed is what was previously predicted elsewhere. So, opinions? Discussion? Can anyone help my limited understanding grok how I am a projection from a 2D surface somewhere? (or am I projecting down from a 4D surface…brain exploding…must…hit…Submit Thread button…) ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/2 "2009-01-15T22:31:09Z")
The hologram stuff seems a little out there, but how awesome is it that they maybe found the resolution of the universe? ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/3 "2009-01-15T23:10:50Z")
I subscribe to the theory. This new finding is very interesting. I don’t really have more than that. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/4 "2009-01-15T23:14:08Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > The hologram stuff seems a little out there, but how awesome is it that they maybe found the resolution of the universe? Yeah…having a hard time wrapping my head around it. The hologram thing is probably just a useful analogy to help visualize what is going on but as with most analogies in physics only goes so far. Hell, I dunno, maybe they mean it is working exactly like a hologram. Just have not gotten my intuition about what they are on about here engaged yet. ---
**Author:** ![Astroboy14](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df705f/32.png) [@Astroboy14](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astroboy14)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/5 "2009-01-15T23:16:03Z")
I read [The Holographic Universe](http://www.amazon.com/Holographic-Universe-Michael-Talbot/dp/0060922583/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232061225&sr=8-1) more than a decade ago. [sup]\*[/sup] Very interesting. [sub]\*I understood about 10% of it too![/sub] ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/6 "2009-01-15T23:20:28Z")
> [@Astroboy14](#): > > I read [The Holographic Universe](http://www.amazon.com/Holographic-Universe-Michael-Talbot/dp/0060922583/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232061225&sr=8-1) more than a decade ago. [sup]\*[/sup] > > Very interesting. > > [sub]\*I understood about 10% of it too![/sub] I read that, too, back in 2004. I think I probably hit the 25% mark. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/7 "2009-01-15T23:27:06Z")
> [@Astroboy14](#): > > I read [The Holographic Universe](http://www.amazon.com/Holographic-Universe-Michael-Talbot/dp/0060922583/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232061225&sr=8-1) more than a decade ago. [sup]\*[/sup] > > Very interesting. > > [sub]\*I understood about 10% of it too![/sub] I have not read that and while it seems to reference a holographic concept of the Universe what little I could gather (from a quick perusal of the linked page) suggests a very new agey hocus pocus thing too (linking our minds to all this). Does it have any bearing on the science referenced in the OP? ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/8 "2009-01-15T23:28:41Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > - > > So, opinions? Discussion? What about : explanations? Because I don’t have the slightest idea of what this is supposed to mean. ---
**Author:** ![Astroboy14](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/df705f/32.png) [@Astroboy14](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Astroboy14)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/9 "2009-01-15T23:29:49Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Does it have any bearing on the science referenced in the OP? I’m 90% sure I have no idea; 10% sure that the book discusses the possibility that the universe is a hologram, while the science in the OP is evidential proof that it is. I think. ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/10 "2009-01-15T23:48:03Z")
> [@Astroboy14](#): > > I read [The Holographic Universe](http://www.amazon.com/Holographic-Universe-Michael-Talbot/dp/0060922583/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232061225&sr=8-1) more than a decade ago. [sup]\*[/sup] No, Talbot’s book probably has nothing to do with the OP, as it’s just a reheated version of the vague “holograms are all-interconnected like, deeeeep” stuff that did the rounds in the Seventies. The [holographic principle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_principle) is a much more respectable, if inevitably still somewhat speculative, idea in quantum field theory. For a good pop science take, Smolin’s _Three Roads to Quantum Gravity_ has a chapter on it. Nor is the idea that spacetime is “granulated” and that this might produce observational effects in signals travelling over astronomical distances that off the wall. What’s new is Hogan suggesting that these ingredients may explain the lack of signal in GEO600. But one can easily think of other speculative reasons why they might not see a signal anyway, so his suggestion is no more than that at this stage. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2009, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/11 "2009-01-15T23:55:29Z")
> [@bonzer](#): > > What’s new is Hogan suggesting that these ingredients may explain the lack of signal in GEO600. I’d somehow gathered the impression that these detectors expect to only detect gravity waves of the scale that would be generated by a black hole merger, which is rare enough that they’d expected to wait possibly years before a detection. No? ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/12 "2009-01-16T00:24:31Z")
> [@bonzer](#): > > No, Talbot’s book probably has nothing to do with the OP, as it’s just a reheated version of the vague “holograms are all-interconnected like, deeeeep” stuff that did the rounds in the Seventies. > > The [holographic principle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holographic_principle) is a much more respectable, if inevitably still somewhat speculative, idea in quantum field theory. I want to reiterate this. The “holographic principle” is the name of a real scientific concept, but Michael Talbot’s book is **not science** (despite the fact that I saw it recently in the “Science” section of Barnes & Noble). It’s a bunch blather about telepathy and souls and the afterlife. In typical crackpot style Talbot mixes it with misappropriations of real scientific terminology like “holographic”, and claims that it’s a “scientific theory.” It isn’t. In comparison, if I were to say “I have a theory that predicts God exists because of the non-unitary evolution of the universal many-body wavefunction,” I’m not doing science, I’m just name-dropping science terms to try to convince you I’m “smarter than you” or that I “know what I’m talking about”, in hopes that this will make you buy into my speculations about God. Quantum mechanics doesn’t predict the existence of God, and the holographic principle doesn’t predict the existence of souls. In fact, those scientific ideas don’t say _anything_ about God, souls, the afterlife, etc. Anyone telling you otherwise is deluded or lying. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/13 "2009-01-16T00:43:23Z")
> [@Astroboy14](#): > > I’m 90% sure I have no idea; 10% sure that the book discusses the possibility that the universe is a hologram, while the science in the OP is evidential proof that it is. Talbot does reference the notion that the “universe is a hologram”, which is a real idea from quantum gravity. But instead of talking about what this idea means in the context of quantum gravity, Talbot claims it supports his “theories” about telepathy, the afterlife, etc.. In fact, the holographic principle has nothing to do with anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![tim314](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tim314/32/3468_2.png) [@tim314](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tim314)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/14 "2009-01-16T01:04:18Z")
If this does end up being physical evidence of the holographic principle, and that the universe is coarse-grained on a much larger scale than the Planck length, then that would be a _tremendous_ scientific achievement. But it’s important to note that the scientists involved aren’t ready to say that yet. From the article: > [@](#): > > No one - including Hogan - is yet claiming that GEO600 has found evidence that we live in a holographic universe. It is far too soon to say. “There could still be a mundane source of the noise,” Hogan admits. > [@](#): > > However Danzmann is cautious about Hogan’s proposal and believes more theoretical work needs to be done. “It’s intriguing,” he says. “But it’s not really a theory yet, more just an idea.” Like many others, Danzmann agrees it is too early to make any definitive claims. “Let’s wait and see,” he says. “We think it’s at least a year too early to get excited.” ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/15 "2009-01-16T01:18:07Z")
If I may briefly indulge in a mild _ad hominem_, it seems to me that NewScientist has a tendency to let their enthusiasm get the better of them. They seem to unveil a potentially earthshaking physics discovery like every other issue. I think optimism about scientific progress is great, but I don’t know that I’d invest money in the stuff they report on. I’m still waiting on that microwave-powered antigravity car they had on the cover a few years back. > [@](#): > > This is good news for anyone trying to probe the smallest unit of space-time. “Contrary to all expectations, it brings its microscopic quantum structure within reach of current experiments,” says Hogan. So while the Planck length is too small for experiments to detect, the holographic “projection” of that graininess could be much, much larger, at around 10[sup]-16[/sup] metres. “If you lived inside a hologram, you could tell by measuring the blurring,” he says. This puzzles me. Don’t physicists already study particles smaller than 10[sup]-16[/sup] meters? If the resolution of the universe isn’t that fine-scale, then what are they looking at? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/16 "2009-01-16T01:55:52Z")
I read an article about matters closely related to this in SciAm a couple of years ago. The article said that if this stuff is true, then it is equally well possible to describe the universe as a two dimensional plane as it is to describe it (as we normally do) as a three dimensional plane. The math works out either way. There was a subsequent wondering (whether in my head or in the article I don’t recall) whether it might be that alien intelligences could evolve in such a way that a two dimensional understanding of the universe seems as natural to them as a three dimensional one seems to me. That would be totally wierd. -Kris ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/17 "2009-01-16T02:14:47Z")
Could you perhaps give more description to help find that article, or another description of what it was talking about? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/18 "2009-01-16T02:24:11Z")
The first thing to realize here is that gravitational wave detectors are incredibly sensitive instruments, and can pick up noise from more sources than you’d ever dream of. A similar instrument, the LIGO detector in Hanford, WA, was getting noise from (among many other sources) tumbleweeds blowing past the facility, for crying out loud. So it’s a very definite possibility that there’s some tumbleweeds or something at GEO that nobody’s considered yet, that accounts for this noise. And they’re diligently working on looking for such things as we speak. That said, this is a real, legitimate theory, that follows from valid science, and (wondrously) has what most quantum gravity models lack: Falsifiability. If the folks at GEO do manage to get past this noise, then we’ll know for certain that Hogan’s model is false, and if they can’t get past it no matter what they do, and if subsequent purpose-built experiments also see the same effect, then we’ll have at least a reasonable indication that it’s true. That alone is enough to make it very impressive, to me. Honestly, I think that this is the most exciting new result currently known in physics (though the results from the LHC, once it comes on line, may surpass it). The only disappointing factor is that this model is inconsistent with the ones which predict that we might see black holes produced at CERN, so we’ll only have one excitement or the other. Quoth **squeegee** : > [@](#): > > I’d somehow gathered the impression that these detectors expect to only detect gravity waves of the scale that would be generated by a black hole merger, which is rare enough that they’d expected to wait possibly years before a detection. No? That’s correct-- The LIGO detectors are currently (though it’ll be improving significantly within a couple of years) at a sensitivity where we’d expect to see about one detection every 30 years or so, and I don’t know precisely where GEO stands right now, but it’s worse than that. The fact that we’re not detecting any gravitational waves at GEO isn’t the puzzling part: Even without this unexplained, possibly-holographic noise, any gravitational wave detection would come as a very pleasant surprise at this stage. The puzzling part is that even though the sensitivity is still too low to pick up gravitational waves, we know what the sensitivity should be, and it’s not there. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/19 "2009-01-16T02:27:41Z")
> [@Terrifel](#): > > This puzzles me. Don’t physicists already study particles smaller than 10[sup]-16[/sup] meters? If the resolution of the universe isn’t that fine-scale, then what are they looking at? Further, if the Universe is expanding, then isn’t everything getting “blurrier”? Could we reach a day where it is blurry on a macro scale? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2009, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502/20 "2009-01-16T02:29:03Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > Could you perhaps give more description to help find that article, or another description of what it was talking about? I’m pretty sure it was this issue from [August 2003](http://www.sciamdigital.com/index.cfm?fa=Cart.ViewCartList) but unfortunately I am not willing to spring the eight bucks to be sure. -FrL- [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/we-are-a-hologram-able-to-probe-planck-world-hocus-pocus-or-profound-discovery/481502.md?page=2)