WEBVTT - Are Wormholes Real? 0:00:08.320 --> 0:00:11.360 Hey, Daniel. So we did an episode about teleportation, whether 0:00:11.400 --> 0:00:14.000 it's possible to go from one point in space to 0:00:14.000 --> 0:00:18.080 another point in space instantly, that's right, without actually moving 0:00:18.200 --> 0:00:21.119 through space. And the episode was very popular, but we 0:00:21.239 --> 0:00:25.120 got a ton of comments on Twitter and the Facebook's 0:00:25.280 --> 0:00:28.440 about something we may have missed. That's right. A lot 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:32.920 of people commented that we didn't talk about one possible way, 0:00:32.960 --> 0:00:36.280 one important possible way to move to another part of 0:00:36.320 --> 0:00:40.760 the universe very rapidly. Yeah, like there's a loophole in 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:45.320 the laws of the universe. Perhaps I don't think this 0:00:45.400 --> 0:00:47.960 counts as a loophole. I don't think it counts as teleportation, 0:00:48.360 --> 0:01:08.000 but we'll dig into it. Him and I'm Daniel. Welcome 0:01:08.040 --> 0:01:11.400 to our podcast. Daniel and Jorge explain the Universe, in 0:01:11.400 --> 0:01:14.080 which a physicist and a cartoonist try to take the 0:01:14.160 --> 0:01:17.360 universe apart, break it into pieces you can understand, and 0:01:17.480 --> 0:01:20.360 download them one at a time into your brain. Today 0:01:20.400 --> 0:01:24.319 on the episode, we're going to talk about possible loophole 0:01:24.560 --> 0:01:34.160 in the laws of physics worm more molds. A lot 0:01:34.240 --> 0:01:37.720 of people commented when we talked about teleportation that wormholes 0:01:37.800 --> 0:01:40.120 might be another way to get from one place in 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:44.600 space to another place in space without actually moving through space. 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:48.960 And I'm going to take issue with that that. Yeah, 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:52.559 wormholes might let you move um rapidly from one place 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:56.280 in space to another, but it's not technically teleportation. But 0:01:56.360 --> 0:01:58.680 we'll dig into that in a moment. So, yeah, wormholes, 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:00.360 they're they're kind of the basis of one of my 0:02:00.440 --> 0:02:06.160 favorite movie sci fi movies, which is Okay, good Contact interest, 0:02:06.440 --> 0:02:08.640 Why is Contact your favorite movie? It's one of my 0:02:08.680 --> 0:02:12.720 favorite movies just it's such a great, well me made movie. 0:02:13.320 --> 0:02:15.959 The storyline is is great, and it's just kind of 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:19.480 this great character portrait of Jodie Foster's character kind of 0:02:19.520 --> 0:02:22.480 searching for answers out there in the universe. Yeah, it's 0:02:22.520 --> 0:02:25.000 also one of my favorite movies because it touches on 0:02:25.040 --> 0:02:27.720 a bunch of really interesting themes. First of all, of course, 0:02:27.760 --> 0:02:30.720 it's fascinating to have to potentially get a message from 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:33.520 outer space that's like everybody's dream, right. But the other 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:35.040 thing I really like about that movie is that it 0:02:35.080 --> 0:02:37.920 shows the process that a lot of the excitement of 0:02:37.960 --> 0:02:40.840 the plot is in unraveling the message. Right. You don't 0:02:40.880 --> 0:02:42.840 just get the message and boom you understand it. It's 0:02:42.880 --> 0:02:45.200 like in English, and it makes perfect sense. It's a 0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:47.200 puzzle and they have to figure it out and think 0:02:47.200 --> 0:02:48.800 about it, and then it clicks into place and all 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:51.960 of a sudden, this gibberish turns into into physics and math. 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:53.840 And to me, that was really exciting to see that 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:56.679 process played out. Yeah, and I liked how you Know 0:02:56.840 --> 0:02:59.760 is based on a book written by Carl Sagan. Do 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:02.560 of that, yes, Yeah, And so he really thought about 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:04.600 the whole process of like, if we had to build 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:08.000 this giant machine from a message from aliens, have would 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:11.760 that happen? You know, what sort of international cooperations or 0:03:11.880 --> 0:03:15.799 organizations and how how would the engineering be done? And 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:20.679 he really thought through all these kind of interesting political details. Yeah. 0:03:20.720 --> 0:03:22.840 I think Carl Sagon probably spent a lot of time 0:03:22.880 --> 0:03:24.720 thinking about how to talk to aliens and how to 0:03:24.760 --> 0:03:27.040 respond if they talk to us, and all sorts of stuff. 0:03:27.320 --> 0:03:29.200 I bet that dude smoked a lot of banana peals 0:03:29.240 --> 0:03:30.760 and had a lot of deep thoughts on the topic. 0:03:31.040 --> 0:03:34.480 Ate a lot of banana, right, probably ate a lot 0:03:34.520 --> 0:03:36.600 of bananas as well. That's why I don't think that 0:03:36.640 --> 0:03:38.560 puts you in the same frame of mind is smoking 0:03:38.560 --> 0:03:42.560 the peels. But it's probably helpful. Yeah, but anyways, in 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:48.000 that movie, Jodie Foster's character goes to another galaxy through 0:03:48.080 --> 0:03:51.040 a wormhole. Like that's what. Sorry, I may have spoiled 0:03:51.040 --> 0:03:53.520 the plot, but they build a machine and it takes 0:03:53.520 --> 0:03:56.760 her through a wormhole and she travels to another part 0:03:56.840 --> 0:03:59.200 of the universe with through it. I think it's okay 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:01.440 to spoil the plot twenty year old movies at this point, 0:04:01.560 --> 0:04:04.240 or Hey, you don't need to never talk about that movie. 0:04:04.920 --> 0:04:06.840 I think it's all right. Yeah, um, yeah, they in 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:09.400 that movie they have like this intergalactic network. It's like 0:04:09.400 --> 0:04:11.360 a subway system where you can like zip from one 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:13.480 place to the other um in order to get around 0:04:13.600 --> 0:04:15.600 and and it's a sort of a common trope that's 0:04:15.680 --> 0:04:19.200 like the thinking of humans as new on the scene 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:21.720 and then maybe somebody else in the galaxy has already 0:04:21.720 --> 0:04:25.000 built this incredible infrastructure. And it's a common way that 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:28.920 science fiction writers approached this problem of we're so isolated, 0:04:28.960 --> 0:04:31.840 we're so far from everybody else. How could we possibly 0:04:31.880 --> 0:04:36.320 have either an interstellar civilization of just humans or interact 0:04:36.360 --> 0:04:38.839 with and and live with and develop with and talk 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.080 to communicate with aliens and other star systems When everything 0:04:42.160 --> 0:04:45.680 is so dang far apart. Yeah, so warmholes is kind 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:47.919 of one way you could do it, at least in 0:04:47.920 --> 0:04:51.280 science fiction, is have these tunnels through space that connect 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:54.279 really far away points. That's right. Typically you do either 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:59.000 fasten the light travel or warp speed or wormholes. Right, 0:04:59.080 --> 0:05:01.200 and so we've covered two of those already, So it's 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.440 time to dig into wormholes. Try to jump into the hole. 0:05:04.760 --> 0:05:09.719 It's worm our way into this holy topic. Well, as usually, 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:12.360 we were wondering how many of you out there knew 0:05:12.640 --> 0:05:14.880 what a wormhole was and whether or not they're real, 0:05:15.240 --> 0:05:17.040 that's right. So I walked around and I asked a 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:19.200 bunch of random people, one of whom was my wife, 0:05:19.800 --> 0:05:22.160 if they knew what wormholes were and if they thought 0:05:22.279 --> 0:05:24.599 they were a real thing out there in space or 0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:26.360 just sort of an idea and a head of science 0:05:26.360 --> 0:05:28.760 fiction authors, So does have you listening think about it 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:31.880 for a second. Do you think wormholes are real? And 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:34.600 do you know what they are? Here's what people had 0:05:34.640 --> 0:05:38.120 to say. Um, and the question was if that would 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:40.680 be possible. It's a real thing, like it's out there, 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:44.920 it's pretty somewhere. I don't think so. No, Yeah, that 0:05:45.040 --> 0:05:47.920 seems something like I would see like in a scientific 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:50.599 or like a sci fi movie. But yeah, I don't. 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:52.640 I don't think they're a real thing. I think so, 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:56.800 I'm pretty sure, all right, I believe it's a distinct possibility. 0:05:57.120 --> 0:05:59.719 I don't. I will not say for sure that it 0:05:59.839 --> 0:06:02.080 is or it isn't, but I do believe the possibility 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:05.440 remains open that there is ways to traverse through space. No, 0:06:06.240 --> 0:06:09.840 why not? I don't know. They just have this sci 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:15.280 fi sheen about them. Probably maybe I don't know. I'm 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:17.920 a chemical engineer, so it was not really my field, 0:06:18.000 --> 0:06:20.920 but it's possible. Yeah, in this case, I think a 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:23.240 lot of people seem to have heard about wormholes, Like 0:06:23.360 --> 0:06:27.680 almost nobody has said what what the wormhole um? And 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:30.120 a lot of people believe that they exist and and 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:32.600 a lot of people believe that scientists will be able 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:34.359 to make them. Yeah, a lot of people seem to 0:06:34.360 --> 0:06:36.480 know them from science fiction. Like it's kind of a 0:06:37.200 --> 0:06:40.279 well known science fiction idea and used a lot in 0:06:40.480 --> 0:06:43.720 science fiction. Yeah, it's a common trop um to solve 0:06:43.800 --> 0:06:47.200 that problem with with your your plot having people spread 0:06:47.240 --> 0:06:49.120 all over the galaxy. And so it's definitely something we 0:06:49.120 --> 0:06:51.839 should talk about because it's something that's out there. So 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:54.040 I wonder if if that's a thing, like, if you 0:06:54.800 --> 0:06:57.640 show it enough in science fiction, eventually people will think 0:06:57.680 --> 0:07:00.640 it's just an engineering problem. I thought you were gonna 0:07:00.680 --> 0:07:03.000 say something else. If it's an if it appears in 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:06.520 science fiction oft enough, does it become real? That would 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:09.600 be pretty cool, right if if things that were right 0:07:09.640 --> 0:07:12.120 into novels eventually turned out to be reality because they 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:14.280 were written into novels, that would be a cool sci 0:07:14.280 --> 0:07:16.400 fi novel right there. Yeah, well, sort of in a way. 0:07:16.440 --> 0:07:21.320 I mean, it's sort of becomes possible in the minds 0:07:21.320 --> 0:07:23.720 of people, and so engineers then go like, hey, what 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:25.840 what will we need to make this happen? And so 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:28.040 then um, yeah, you kind of have to believe that 0:07:28.040 --> 0:07:30.240 it's possible before you can try to do it, right, 0:07:30.360 --> 0:07:32.280 That's right. It might seem like a bit of a stretch, 0:07:32.320 --> 0:07:35.800 but I definitely include science fiction authors in the sort 0:07:35.840 --> 0:07:39.560 of spectrum of intellectuals who are responsible for creating the future. 0:07:39.640 --> 0:07:41.920 You know, in my mind, he goes from science fiction 0:07:41.960 --> 0:07:44.040 authors who do whatever they need to do to get 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:47.280 inspired and think of crazy ways that that technology might 0:07:47.360 --> 0:07:51.000 change our society, to physicists who think is that at 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:54.360 all possible, like even technically that could even ever happen, 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:56.840 And once physicists sign off on it, then yeah, it 0:07:56.840 --> 0:08:01.000 gets dumped on the engineers like make it so. Yeah. 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:04.000 But science fiction authors also have to know the science right, 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:06.520 Like they can't just say like, hey, here, here is 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:09.280 a pink unicorn that make helps you travel through space. 0:08:09.880 --> 0:08:13.680 Oh man, I don't know how much science fiction. I 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:15.360 read a lot of science fiction, and a lot of 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:18.560 it doesn't sound science at all. I just said they 0:08:18.560 --> 0:08:28.120 have to read signs, not understand signs. So what is 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:33.319 a wormhole? A wormhole is a connection between two parts 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:38.160 of space that otherwise seem very distant. Okay, And it's 0:08:38.240 --> 0:08:41.280 not a teleportation. It's not like I'm here in Los 0:08:41.320 --> 0:08:43.040 Angeles and I want to go to New York and 0:08:43.080 --> 0:08:45.800 I disappear from Los Angeles and then I appear in 0:08:45.840 --> 0:08:49.840 New York. That's teleportation with you, you appear in another 0:08:49.840 --> 0:08:53.360 place in space without actually moving through space. A wormhole 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:56.360 is a very different solution. A wormhole says, can we 0:08:56.440 --> 0:08:59.240 create a connection between l A and New York? And 0:08:59.280 --> 0:09:02.360 I'm not talking about elon Musk underground tunnels or anything crazy. 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:05.400 I'm saying, can you bring those two parts of space 0:09:05.720 --> 0:09:08.719 close together. Can you connect them so that you are 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:12.439 still moving through space? But that the distance is very short? Right? 0:09:12.480 --> 0:09:14.480 So what does it mean to connect two points that 0:09:14.520 --> 0:09:18.400 are distant to each other? Meaning like, I'm here in 0:09:18.480 --> 0:09:22.480 Pasadena and next to me is another point in space, 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:24.280 so I can move to that point in space. But 0:09:24.320 --> 0:09:26.120 you're saying that my point in space that I'm in 0:09:26.200 --> 0:09:29.559 right now could also potentially be connected to another point 0:09:29.640 --> 0:09:32.560 far away from here. That's right, And to understand this 0:09:32.600 --> 0:09:35.120 you need to relax a little bit your concept of 0:09:35.120 --> 0:09:38.040 what space is. Right, If you're thinking of space as 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:42.560 like emptiness, like the backdrop, the stage on which the 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:44.960 theater of the universe takes place, that's an old idea 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:47.240 and it makes a lot of sense based on your experience, right, 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:49.960 that's what how it seems to work. But that's but 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:52.760 we have a more modern idea of space. Now. Space 0:09:52.800 --> 0:09:55.800 can do all sorts of weird things that that nothingness 0:09:55.880 --> 0:09:59.760 or emptiness or backdrop can't do, right, and most importantly, 0:10:00.160 --> 0:10:03.640 space can bend. Space has a shape. Okay, you know 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:05.600 this is a very confusing topic for a lot of 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:08.200 people to get their minds around, meaning that space is 0:10:08.240 --> 0:10:11.800 not rigid, you know, like a big empty warehouse that 0:10:11.960 --> 0:10:14.960 just it's it's there and it's fixed and it's square. 0:10:15.120 --> 0:10:18.160 You're saying space is more like I think the idea 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:20.840 is more like spaces like like the ocean, you know, 0:10:20.960 --> 0:10:22.960 like it's like like we're swimming in water and this 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:26.360 thing can kind of squish and bend and flow and 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:29.400 and and push you in different directions. That's right. The 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:31.840 ocean is a useful analogy because it tells you that 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:34.320 this space can do all sorts of interesting things, and 0:10:34.320 --> 0:10:36.560 that we're embedded in it. And it's not an emptiness, 0:10:36.559 --> 0:10:39.719 it's a thing. It's a physical thing with behaviors. Right. 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:42.280 And a very common way to think about the bending 0:10:42.280 --> 0:10:44.880 of space is to think about the bending of space 0:10:44.920 --> 0:10:48.199 in a higher dimension, and typically people use a two 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:51.360 dimensional analogy. Now this analogy is flawed for one very 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:53.760 important reason, which I'll tell you after we're done with 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:56.440 the analogy, but it is still helpful in thinking about 0:10:56.480 --> 0:10:59.440 how space can move. So typically people think about space 0:10:59.440 --> 0:11:01.679 and two to pensions so that then they can then 0:11:01.720 --> 0:11:04.240 they can think about the bending of space and three dimensions, 0:11:04.320 --> 0:11:06.640 because it's really hard to think in four dimensions, right, 0:11:07.080 --> 0:11:09.560 bending of three dimensional space and four dimensions is hard, 0:11:09.840 --> 0:11:12.679 so let's just start with two. So you imagine your 0:11:12.720 --> 0:11:14.960 typical notion of two dimensional space might be like a 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:18.360 rubber sheet, okay, and then we think about the bending 0:11:18.360 --> 0:11:20.880 of that spaces that bending in the third dimension, Like 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:22.800 you put a heavy ball on the rubber sheet. What 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:25.920 happens while the sheet bends right? Where you can imagine 0:11:25.920 --> 0:11:29.880 twisting a rubber sheet or or folding a rubber sheet over. Right, 0:11:30.000 --> 0:11:33.120 If you fold a rubber sheet over, then two parts 0:11:33.240 --> 0:11:36.000 which would be far apart if you moved along the sheet, 0:11:36.120 --> 0:11:39.400 could be very close to each other in that third dimension, right, 0:11:39.480 --> 0:11:42.079 Or if you roll it up right, imagine rolling up 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:45.840 a two dimensional um sheet of space, then you have 0:11:45.880 --> 0:11:48.520 like a toilet paper roll or a toilet paper universe 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.760 in which parts of the sheet are touching other parts 0:11:51.760 --> 0:11:53.800 of the sheet that are outside or inside on the roll, 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:56.280 and then they're actually very close to each other. Oh 0:11:56.360 --> 0:11:59.480 you mean, like I can walk forward for a long 0:11:59.559 --> 0:12:01.760 time and I think I'm going straight, but really I'm 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:04.880 going around and around this toilet paper. That's right. And 0:12:05.080 --> 0:12:09.200 a wormhole would be a connection that's not along the paper. 0:12:09.480 --> 0:12:11.440 It would be a more complex connection to be a 0:12:11.440 --> 0:12:15.319 connection from one um one roll around to the next roll, 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:16.960 or to the to the inner roll, or to the 0:12:16.960 --> 0:12:19.560 more outer roll. Or if you imagine just a simple 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:22.319 simple rubber sheet where you're folding it like a taco, 0:12:22.440 --> 0:12:24.280 it would be a connection between the two sides of 0:12:24.280 --> 0:12:26.360 the taco, and you can go the long way around 0:12:26.559 --> 0:12:29.560 by moving along the sheet. But a wormhole would be 0:12:29.800 --> 0:12:32.160 a more unusual connection, would be a connection that sort 0:12:32.200 --> 0:12:35.360 of shortcuts. And space can do these things, right. We 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:38.360 know that space is more complicated than just emptiness, and 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:41.280 it has a shape, and that shape can be complicated. Right. 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:45.000 It can bend, it can stretch, you can wiggle, it 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:48.520 can ripple. They could also just have strange connections to it. Right, 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:51.520 you can connect two parts of space that are distant 0:12:51.559 --> 0:12:53.640 along one path, and you can make them very close 0:12:53.679 --> 0:12:56.920 together on other paths. Right. I thought of a great analogy. 0:12:57.160 --> 0:12:58.680 You know, how you when you're an how to do 0:12:58.720 --> 0:13:02.679 with the banana most it's yellow? Um, you know when 0:13:02.679 --> 0:13:06.319 you're in ikea and you're walking along and you're you know, 0:13:06.360 --> 0:13:08.280 watching all the furnit turn and stuff, and then suddenly 0:13:08.320 --> 0:13:10.439 you come upon like a here, here's a shortgut to 0:13:10.600 --> 0:13:13.960 betting or here's her shortgut to kitchen, and it's like, 0:13:14.000 --> 0:13:17.080 you're like, what what's going on? It's like the Ikea. 0:13:17.120 --> 0:13:18.880 It takes you in a path that curves around every 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:20.760 every once in a while you can cut through some 0:13:20.880 --> 0:13:23.520 of these folds of your path. That's sort of like 0:13:23.679 --> 0:13:26.240 what a worm hall is, right, that's exactly right. And uh, 0:13:26.480 --> 0:13:28.600 some hot times when I'm in Ikea, I really wish 0:13:28.640 --> 0:13:30.240 I had a wormhole to just get me out of 0:13:30.320 --> 0:13:33.120 here immediately and send me home. Oh my god. Well, 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:36.160 they really do kind of distort your spacetime in there 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.280 that you never leave. It's like a casino. There's no 0:13:39.360 --> 0:13:41.040 outside windows. You can't tell if you've been there for 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:43.920 ten minutes or ten hours. It's sort of a nightmare. Now, 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:46.480 that's a that's a perfect analogy, um, And it shows 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:48.640 you how there can be two paths to get to 0:13:48.640 --> 0:13:50.960 the same place, right, a long one and a short one. 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:53.720 And the thing that's tricky for people to understand is 0:13:53.760 --> 0:13:55.959 how this space can be bent. And the problem with 0:13:56.000 --> 0:13:59.120 the analogy we talked about earlier bending of two dimensional 0:13:59.160 --> 0:14:02.520 space in the third dimension, right, it's that third dimension 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:04.280 that helps you get from one place to the other 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:06.760 because the bending is in that third dimension. So you 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:08.800 have to be able to move in that third dimension 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.960 or connect space in that third dimension. The problem with 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:15.280 that analogy is that we don't think our three dimensional 0:14:15.360 --> 0:14:19.560 space is embedded in some four dimensional space. Right. The 0:14:19.600 --> 0:14:23.040 bending of space is not in some other higher fourth dimension. 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:27.760 It's intrinsic, okay, rather than extrinsic. It's intrinsic. It's the 0:14:27.880 --> 0:14:31.680 relationship between points in space. It's not that the space 0:14:31.720 --> 0:14:34.840 itself is embedded in some four dimensional space that's twisting 0:14:34.880 --> 0:14:37.560 it like a three D rubber sheet. Right. It's all 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:41.040 about the relationship between points in space. Right. But I 0:14:41.040 --> 0:14:43.760 guess the weird thing is to think about these forks 0:14:43.800 --> 0:14:45.880 in the road, right, like an I key, I'm walking around, 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:49.160 walking forward, and suddenly I have two options. I can 0:14:49.240 --> 0:14:52.160 keep going on the loopy path, or I can take 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:56.440 the shortcut to the next loop. Right, that's right? And 0:14:56.520 --> 0:14:58.720 so what does it mean to connect something in space 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:01.560 for us? You know? Like, does that mean that I 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:03.760 can either move to the side of myself or I 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:07.040 can move a bazillion light years away if I move 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:09.440 in a special direction. What does that mean to have 0:15:09.520 --> 0:15:12.240 two points connected? That are actually far away. It just 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:15.040 means that there's two different paths with two different lengths 0:15:15.080 --> 0:15:17.720 to the same place. Right when you say that other 0:15:17.760 --> 0:15:20.080 point is a Brazilian light year was away, Yeah, it's 0:15:20.080 --> 0:15:21.800 a bazilion light years the way if you move through 0:15:21.840 --> 0:15:24.440 flat space, right, if you sort of like point yourself 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.360 in that direction and go right. But um, there can 0:15:28.400 --> 0:15:31.320 be another path that's shorter. Right, But how do I 0:15:31.400 --> 0:15:33.720 choose those paths? Like, how do I choose to take 0:15:33.760 --> 0:15:36.120 the shortcut or not the shortcut? Well, there has to 0:15:36.160 --> 0:15:38.120 be a connection there, and that's where the wormhole is, right. 0:15:38.160 --> 0:15:40.480 A wormhole is that kind of connection. It's a connection 0:15:40.520 --> 0:15:43.040 between two parts of space which otherwise are far apart, 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:46.360 to make them actually closer. And that's why earlier I 0:15:46.400 --> 0:15:50.200 was saying it's not teleportation. You're still just moving through space. 0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:54.320 If we define teleportation as moving to another location without 0:15:54.440 --> 0:15:58.160 moving through space, then a wormhole is not teleportation because 0:15:58.160 --> 0:16:01.360 you're still moving through space. You've just shrunk the distance 0:16:01.400 --> 0:16:04.560 you have to travel by bringing those two things closer together, 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:08.000 by creating a path between them that's short. And the 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:10.200 only way this is possible is if space can do 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:12.840 these weird things. If space can twist and bend and 0:16:12.840 --> 0:16:15.920 and have bizarre shapes to it. M always see you're saying, 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:18.800 teleportation is more like you disappear from here and you 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:22.880 appear over there. But traveling through a warm hole is 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:26.280 basically just um, just still traveling. You're still moving. It 0:16:26.360 --> 0:16:28.680 just so happens to be a shortcut, that's right. It's like, 0:16:29.080 --> 0:16:32.120 you know if you say, hey, can you teleport something 0:16:32.280 --> 0:16:35.080 from the fridge to the couch, and I like, you know, 0:16:35.160 --> 0:16:37.360 make a lasso, and I dragged the fridge over to 0:16:37.400 --> 0:16:39.280 the couch, and I'm like, hey, look, I don't have 0:16:39.280 --> 0:16:40.720 to get off the couch to get something out of 0:16:40.720 --> 0:16:43.640 the fridge anymore. That's not really teleportation, right, I've just 0:16:43.760 --> 0:16:46.120 brought the destination closer to me so that I can 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:48.440 reach it without getting off the couch. Right, Although for 0:16:48.520 --> 0:16:52.000 me either way, you did it for me, so I'm happy. 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:54.400 You're like, I don't care about the details. Just get 0:16:54.440 --> 0:16:58.560 me that drink, my next banana, right, I don't pay 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:01.080 you to bother me with the details. Um. Yeah, And 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:03.240 so it's a semantic distinction. I only I don't really 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:05.720 usually care about semantic distinctions, but a lot of people 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:07.879 were curious about why we didn't talk about wormholes in 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:10.560 the teleportation episode. And that's why because in my mind, 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:14.960 it's not really teleportation. Also, it's actually maybe possible, whereas 0:17:14.960 --> 0:17:17.680 teleportation is, like, you know, much more difficult. You're being 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:21.040 a physics lawyer, Yes, I was being a physicist. That's 0:17:21.040 --> 0:17:27.560 sort of my job, is his lawyer. Before we keep going, 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:42.000 let's take a short break. So, yeah, so that's a wormhole. 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:45.200 It's connect It's like when you short circuit two point 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:48.080 in space. That's right, Yeah, you bring them, you make 0:17:48.160 --> 0:17:51.000 you create a path between them. Um, a short path 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:54.120 between two points that are otherwise really far apart. That's 0:17:54.119 --> 0:17:57.840 where a wormhole is. Yeah. So this seems to really fantastical. 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:01.040 Is this real? Is this actually based on the laws 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:05.240 of physics? That this is possible? It's an amazing idea, right, 0:18:05.359 --> 0:18:08.520 And the craziest thing about it is that it does 0:18:08.600 --> 0:18:11.320 follow the laws of physics. If you brought this concept 0:18:11.359 --> 0:18:14.560 to the International or the Intergalactic or the Universal Court 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:19.119 of Physics, they would say, yeah, that's allowed. WHOA, what 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:21.520 does that mean? How kind of how can the laws 0:18:21.520 --> 0:18:24.320 of physics allowed? Is? Well, you know, um, it violates 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:27.080 our intuition and it seems really odd. But a lot 0:18:27.119 --> 0:18:29.680 of things in the universe violate our intuition and seem odd. 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:31.359 And those are the most fun things, right, Those are 0:18:31.359 --> 0:18:34.119 the things that make physics so interesting. Um. But we 0:18:34.240 --> 0:18:37.280 say that it's theoretically allowed because we figured out some 0:18:37.400 --> 0:18:40.080 rules of the universe. Right. We watch the universe, We 0:18:40.160 --> 0:18:42.719 watch apples fall off trees, we see balls moving through 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:45.200 the air, we watch planets go around suns, and we 0:18:45.560 --> 0:18:49.080 observes various things, and then we develop laws that describe them. Right. 0:18:49.400 --> 0:18:51.760 So in this case, we're talking about general relativity, right 0:18:51.760 --> 0:18:55.840 Einstein's field equations. That's say, here are the rules of 0:18:55.880 --> 0:19:00.600 how space can be bent. I remember general relativity described gravity, 0:19:00.680 --> 0:19:03.320 and gravity is not a force like other forces, and 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:05.720 that we have like a quantum mechanical description of little 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:08.920 particles being sent back and forth to transmit the force. 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:11.679 As far as we know, gravity is a bending of space. 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:14.640 And so general relativity tells us what are the rules 0:19:14.920 --> 0:19:17.760 for bending space? And there's a list of rules. Right, 0:19:17.840 --> 0:19:19.800 space can do this basically do that's basically do the 0:19:19.840 --> 0:19:23.200 other thing. So when we say is something theoretically allowed, 0:19:23.240 --> 0:19:26.280 what we mean is does it follow those rules, Right, 0:19:26.960 --> 0:19:29.360 And so the rules say that you can bend space 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:33.680 so much that it comes around and kind of touches itself. Again, 0:19:33.920 --> 0:19:38.440 that's right, wormholes satisfy those equations. According to those equations, 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:42.120 wormholes are allowed. And that that doesn't mean that wormsholes exist, right, 0:19:42.200 --> 0:19:45.320 It means that they are allowed. It's like saying, you know, 0:19:45.359 --> 0:19:48.560 before anybody had ever build a tesla, you might say, 0:19:48.560 --> 0:19:50.879 we'll do the laws of physics prevent anyone from building 0:19:50.880 --> 0:19:53.000 this awesome car. They can go two miles an hour 0:19:53.040 --> 0:19:55.240 and looks really cool. You might say, yeah, the laws 0:19:55.240 --> 0:19:57.159 of physics allow it, but nobody has ever built a 0:19:57.200 --> 0:20:00.520 tesla before. Right, In the same way, worm holes are 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:02.639 allowed by the laws of physics. But that doesn't mean 0:20:02.680 --> 0:20:06.119 necessarily that there are any, right. And then, and black 0:20:06.119 --> 0:20:08.919 holes were also in this category for a long time, right, Like, 0:20:09.600 --> 0:20:12.080 we thought black holes were possible, but we had never 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:16.280 absorved one or seen evidence of one. That's right. Black 0:20:16.320 --> 0:20:18.240 holes were just theoretical for a long time. And it 0:20:18.280 --> 0:20:20.679 came about exactly the same way. People were playing with 0:20:20.720 --> 0:20:24.000 the Einstein equations and saying, well, what's the weirdest thing 0:20:24.040 --> 0:20:26.399 we can get space to do? Right? One, can you 0:20:26.520 --> 0:20:28.080 can you do this, can do that, can do this 0:20:28.119 --> 0:20:30.760 other thing? And they found all these solutions to the equations. Right, 0:20:30.760 --> 0:20:32.919 a solution of the equation is a description of space 0:20:33.320 --> 0:20:36.119 that follows all those rules. And from the case of 0:20:36.119 --> 0:20:38.119