Okay, that attachment link does not seem to work so here is the paper.
The Cosmic Web, Black holes and the Multiverse
This is a conceptual paper. I am not a scientist and I have no mathematics to support my theories, but I do have the benefit of the observations of others scientists. Unfortunately there are things in reality we may never be able to observe.
I Believe...
I believe in most of the mainstream cosmological ideas:
The big bang really occurred. It created our universe.
Inflation occurred within the very first second of the universe's existence. It is likely still occurring in some local parts of our universe.
Dark Matter exerts gravitational force even if we don't yet know what it is yet.
Dark Energy exists and is causing space to expand even if we don't know what it is yet. It may be related to some local areas of inflation.
The universe is approximately 2/3 dark energy and 1/3 matter (baryonic and dark). This is an approximation but I am rooting for it to be found exact. (Three seems to be the magic number. We have three observable dimensions, three quarks in a proton ...).
Einstein's theories of relativity, space and time.
Matter warps space-time and reveals itself as gravity.
I also believe in some of the edgier theories.
A version of string theory called M-theory seems to be a successful attempt to reconcile the differences between Einstein's General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. One of the predictions of M-theory is the existence of 10 spacial dimensions and one time dimension. The 6 extra dimensions beyond the ones we recognize are thought to be curled up, into tiny pockets inside observable space. The 6-extra dimension seems a little flaky to me (but at least it is a multiple of three). Maybe they exist, maybe they don't.
Dark Energy is like an anti-gravity. It is repulsive and increases with distance.
We are just one universe of many in the multi-verse. The idea of a multiverse is not new. In 1992 Lee Smolin hypothesized the theory of Cosmolgical Natural Selection (CNS). According to CNS, black holes may be mechanisms of universe reproduction within the multiverse, it is an extended cosmological environment in which universes grow, die, and reproduce.
It is unclear to me if new universes have similar fundamental laws as the parent universe ; what Max Tegmark would call a level I multiverse. Or whether these laws may be slightly altered in some fashion during the replication process; a level II multiverse. It would seem that if natural selection is at work here, then these replications should be fine tuned to create universes with laws and values conducive to creating more blackholes and thus more universes. Kind of a cosmic evolution.
A bubbly new reality?
While I agree with Dr. Smolin that new universes are being created by black holes, I believe that the mechanism for this process remains a mystery. Here is how I believe this is happening.
Let's start with the cosmic web, the largest known structure in the universe. The Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) has revealed a startling construction of galaxies and galaxy clusters arranged in long filament strands. It also indicates that there are large voids where no matter appears.
We see matter being accumulated along the filaments with what appear to be larger nodes of visible matter where filaments intersect. These nodes contain thousands if not millions of galaxies. When viewed on a smaller scale, these nodes would reveal themselves to be a local super cluster. Current theories propose that there are massive amounts of dark matter in these nodes as well as the visible matter.
Observations have shown that the galaxies within the web seem to all be aligned in the same general direction. Some recent theories attribute this alignment to the properties of the matter (visible and dark) contained in the web. I contend that is not the entire story. I have no doubt that the gravitational attraction of all this matter plays a part in determining the structure of the cosmic web. However I believe that dark energy is also contributing the the web structure!
Let's take a step back and look at the nature of space-time. Einstein said that gravity is the presence of mass warping space-time inward into a gravity well. Think of dark energy as a repulsive force that increases with distance (sort of an anti-gravity). As such it may be possible that dark energy also warps space-time, but in the opposite direction. It warps space-time outward creating 'bubbles' in space-time.
To visualize what I think is happening, picture it this way. Think of the bubbles in a soapy foam. Where two bubbles touch you see an edge. Where three bubbles touch you see a Y-shape. In space, I suppose that the number of bubble intersections may be greater than three, but consult your local topologist about that.
To continue the analogy, if the cosmological bubbles are being inflated by dark energy and warping space-time outward, then two dark energy bubbles should be pushing matter toward their common boundary, i.e. their two-bubble edge. I believe that is exactly what is creating a filament of galaxies along the two-bubble edge
Similarly, at a Y-intersection, three inflationary bubbles would all be pushing matter towards that intersection. In the three-bubble intersection we should expect to see massive amounts of matter being accumulated. That is exactly what we see in the nodes composed of massive amounts of gravitationally bound matter.
I believe these dark energy bubbles are what gives the cosmic web its shape. Since dark energy is repulsive and gets stronger with distance, dark energy bubbles are expanding. In fact, the bigger they get the faster they grow.
So while the nodule's matter is attracting itself with gravity, the dark energy is 'pushing' it into the filaments and nodes. This combination of forces causes the matter to create a deeper and deeper gravity well. After all, the super clusters in the nodes already contain million or even billions of black holes!
As surveys like SDSS continue to improve our observations of the cosmic web they will encompass larger areas of space. And 3-D images of the cosmic web get better, I believe that we may be able to differentiate larger bubbles from smaller bubbles.
I expect that larger bubbles should have thicker filaments and larger 'nodes' because they are 'pushing' harder on the matter. They are also warping space-time more than a small bubble.
We should also see both red-shifted AND blue-shifted galaxies. The closer the galaxies are to us, the more likely to be blue shifted. I can think of two possible reasons. (1) our local bubble may be small and does not have enough 'push' to overcome the gravitational attraction of our local super cluster. (2) our local bubble is large but it is actually pushing galaxies toward us.
Eventually the super cluster of galaxies is drawn together by a combination their own gravity and the force of dark energy bubble pushing the matter together. Over billions of years all the matter in a local super cluster would be eventually drawn into that node. And the gravity well will become enormous; many trillions of trillions of solar masses. Big enough to create an alternative universe big-bang?
What if there is some critical mass beyond which these multi-galactic black holes become unstable and rupture spacetime? Maybe it happens when the gravity becomes strong enough to crush the 6 extra dimension (predicted by M-theory) out of existence and time truly stops. Unlikely, but who knows?
I have another idea. It is not the critical mass of the singularity that determines when such a big bang can happen. Rather, a big bang is triggered when the dark energy bubble is large enough to accept the new universe. In other words, there may be some critical size to the bubble that determines when the black hole seed can become a new universe.
That trigger might be when there is sufficient local space-time to accept a new universe. What do I mean by 'sufficient space-time'? That is the space required so that the new universe cannot interact with any existing universes. Keep in mind that Cosmic Natural Selection allows that new universes may or may not share the fundamental laws of its neighbor. It is probably best if they don't interact. This new universe must be totally isolated from any other Big Bang seeds that may be erupting throughout the multiverse.
Or maybe it is both--a critical singularity size AND a dark energy bubble that is sufficiently large to prevent the new universe from interacting with their neighbors.
Fiery new realities or a single cold death?
Some scientists believe that in about a hundred trillion years our local super cluster will be isolated from all other matter in the universe because dark energy will have forced all matter away at such great speeds that the light from other super clusters can never reach us. We will be essentially isolated from all other super clusters in the universe.
Surely each of these isolated super clusters of galaxies will accrete into a massive black hole singularity. Ultimately the Universe will consist of only super massive black holes that are totally isolated from each other.
I believe that the first big bang (whenever that was) created the seeds of future big bangs. Who knows whether we are in the first big bang or the fiftieth or just one of an infinite number of big bangs. It may be that universes are being created at an exponential rate within the multiverse. But we will never know since they have long since disappeared from our knowable experience. I prefer to envision a future where endless universes are being constantly being born rather than one where our single universe dies out with a whimper of proton decay and black hole evaporation. Everything else in nature is cyclical, why not the universes?
Paul Henry
Florida