Terahertz

For those who don’t know, there’s an intelligent-design creationist in Toronto by the name of Denyse O’Leary, who wrote the book “The Spiritual Brain” which tries to develop a “non-materialist view of neuroscience.” As with most creationist books this is one of those regions where if it was science she would have published papers in journals, and not books.

The goal from her new blog “Colliding Universes” is stated as:

I hope to write a book with a physicist about the “God vs. the multiverse” conflict: Is our universe fine-tuned or are there zillions of flopped universes out there, so that it only looks that way. For now, I will just make notes about things that may (or may not) find their way into the book. [emphasis added]

Note how she says “with a physicist” but no where on the site does she name one. This leads me to believe she (a) has talked to no physicists, (b) has been turned down by physicists, or (c) that a physicist is working with her but wants his or her name withheld. In any case, it loses a lot of credibility for the premise.

Her goal is to establish that religion and multiverse theory are incompatible:

As noted top left, I want to write a book with a physicist that explains why the multiverse – the idea that there is an infinity of flopped universes out there – is a crock. (He would say the idea is “deeply problematic.”)

Now here at the University of Alberta, we have a physicist who talks about (an evangelical Christian) God and the multiverse (Don Page), except, unfortunately for Denyse, he realizes the two are potentially compatible (like evolution and religion!). Denyse lives in a land of dichotomies where anything that challenges her literal interpretations is flat out wrong. She contributes to the blog (she has several of her own too) is called “Uncommon Descent” and is a landmine of creationist ramblings.

She does cite a lecture by Neil Turok at the Premier Institute (a theoretical physics group in Canada) as bringing up several different ideas of the universe formation, however none of his fall into the “goddunnit” category she seems to want to create. His all fit with naturalistic explanations.

The crux of her problem lies in this idea:

What mainstreams the multiverse is the prospect of getting tested. But that raises the question – if a fair test shows that there is no multiverse, what about our own universe’s exquisite fine-tuning?

Well here’s the issue: The tests haven’t come in yet (a prediction is that we will observe the remanents of micro-black holes at LHC), so no physicist is going to go too much into wild speculation, at least not with a crackpot creationist who has an obvious agenda to push. I may end up being wrong on this point, however, if I am it is to the shame of the yet unknown physicist. And finally, the “exquisite fine-tuning” may not need a multiverse theory to solve, Victor Stenger graces us with decades of experimental particle-astrophysics experience and eloquently explains possible scenarios for our existence and the “appearance” of fine-tuning in his books “Has Science found God?” and “God: The Failed Hypothesis” (side note: Dr. Stenger will be appearing in Calgary in mid-late June).

Finally, I should not she ends her introduction to this idea with what comes down to adds for her other books. That’s classy. Note she even gives a “no one asked”:

In what ways will it resemble The Spiritual Brain?

It will be fun and funny as well as hopeful and illuminating.

In what ways will it not resemble The Spiritual Brain?

It will use lots of examples, anecdotes, and illustrations from science fiction, for inventive but accurate explanations. The Spiritual Brain mostly uses other interesting stuff.

Science fiction is not science reality! Wow. And I believe the term she was searching for instead of “other interesting stuff” is crap she made up.

Denyse is treading far from her expertise (journalism relating to bioethics) by attempting to criticize quantum cosmology (something the average physics graduate student doesn’t grasp). Let’s hope this goal of hers dies in the water.