Ask A Genius 1338: Can an Informational Universe Cycle Between Dormancy and Activity to Maintain Structural Integrity?
Author(s): Rick Rosner and Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): Ask A Genius
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2025/04/06
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Could you fathom a universe that is still functional but oscillates in its progression through time—so that time is not strictly linear? Its net vector in spacetime still points forward, as in a directional “arrow of time,” but the progression jumps around: something like t₁, t₃, t₂, t₄—stuff like that?
Rick Rosner: No. No—I mean, no. You need an arrow of time—at least for a universe of any appreciable size. You sure do not have much of an arrow of time in a tiny universe with only two iffy particles. It is very nebulous.
Jacobsen: The net functional scale matters for a macro-universe with many particles. Reasoning by analogy with our minds: our minds operate close to their informational capacity when we are awake and then function at a much lower capacity when we are asleep. A universe could transition from a highly information-rich state to a sort of shutdown or dormant state and then back to an informationally active state.
Rosner: You could imagine a “shutdown” universe with galaxies drained of energy—each one falling into its gravitational well, dark and quiet, with not much going on. However, perhaps the universe “starts up” again: galaxies light back up, radiation spreads, and stars begin forming again. I do not know if I would call that oscillation, but I could see a universe cycling between high-information and low-information states.
Jacobsen: Could that kind of cycle be a means for maintaining structural integrity—analogous to how humans manage alertness and fatigue? This is more metaphorical than literal, but it conveys the idea. Human responsiveness, for instance, fluctuates. We have sleep-wake cycles—our alertness to new stimuli ebbs and flows.
We get bored if we sit on a call and do nothing for a while. However, if we get up, walk around for a couple of minutes, and then come back, things feel fresh again.
Rosner: That is probably more about biology—our evolutionary history. However, it raises an interesting question: How much of a universe’s structural integrity, over vast periods, comes from the intrinsic properties of its spacetime architecture? Moreover, how much—if any—might come from something external? Some framework or armature that stabilizes the universe from the outside?
Jacobsen: I do not know. Again, going by analogy, our minds require a healthy brain to support them. When the brain is compromised—due to Alzheimer’s, metabolic disorders, or other issues—the mind struggles to function.
Rosner: So, I do not have a solid answer—it is not even a great response—but the best I can do is pose the question. And you are suggesting that if it is fundamentally made of information, a universe might need to consolidate itself periodically to maintain stability. I do not know. What do you think? Do you think consolidation periods are necessary for an informational universe’s stability?
Jacobsen: There does seem to be a weird duality between wave functions and particles. It seems like fidelity is increased through oscillation and focus. I do not know if that describes information accuracy, but it is a visual I keep returning to.
Imagine volumes of space filled with probability clouds—those clouds, as they shift and interact with others, create interference, amplification, and other dynamics. That interaction might allow more precision in how information expresses itself in space and time. It is how I visualize it—not through equations or formal language, just as an intuitive construct.
Rosner: Say this: an old-ass universe is held up—like the tent poles of the universe are these ancient, collapsed galaxies. Maybe even clusters of galaxies, each sunk down its own gravitational well, each with its vector. Moreover, pointing in different fourth-dimensional directions, all those vectors help hold open three-dimensional space.
So then—if you were to “open them all up” at once, would that disrupt the structure? Would it destabilize the four-dimensional hyperspherical shape of the universe, making it unstable—maybe even prone to collapse? I do not know.
Rosner: The question is: how much of the universe can you “wake up” at once?
Constants like the electron-proton mass ratio have something to do with how much of the universe is defined by information that is out of sync with the currently active universe. You have all these collapsed galaxies—regions of space that are, in a sense, sitting near t₀ again. They would need to be “lit up” and reconnected to a shared history—a 30-billion-year narrative—with the active center of the universe to come back into logical alignment.
So you cannot light up all the tent poles at once. These collapsed regions do not share much of a common history. Moreover, for them to align again, you must actively build that history by reactivating them individually.
That raises another question: How much can be done simultaneously without risking instability? What happens if these galaxies start barfing energy at each other along filaments, lighting up too much of the cosmic web at once?
It sounds like something from that near-death “life flashing before your eyes” phenomenon. People say that in moments of extreme crisis, they suddenly see everything—like their whole life at once. That is not exactly how they describe it, but how I interpret it.
Moreover, maybe that is not just poetic. Maybe, in a crisis, the brain’s default mode is to open up to as much stored information as possible, hoping to stumble across a solution—some latent pattern in memory that could help avoid death. It sounds like a stretch, but there might be some math to support it. For example, maybe in a system under maximum threat, the most natural move is to unlock everything it has.
I do not know. It sounds iffy. But…
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