Aboagora "Chaos and Cosmos" 2014 - Workshop 7 "Before the Beginning"

Workshop 7 Before the Beginning: From Quantum Chaos to our Cosmos How big is the universe? How old is the universe? What is space? What is time? Is the universe unique? Is its history linear, or can it evolve in cycles? These fundamental questions about our existence have been asked by all peoples. Before the advent of modern science, humans invented sophisticated mythologies to address these questions. Interestingly, in modern cosmology some of these old ideas have resurfaced, but with the crucial difference that they can now be compared with increasingly detailed knowledge gained by means of astronomical observations. This workshop will discuss both science and mythologies, with the aim of providing a bird’s-eye view of human thinking about the cosmos. Speakers and Performers: Jean-Luc Lehners Before the Beginning: From Quantum Chaos to our Cosmos Cosmology is the science that deals with the origin and evolution of the universe. For a long time, the popular notion of the hot Big Bang as the beginning of everything, including space and time, prevailed in people’s minds. I will review some of the arguments for why this cannot be so, and I will then present two contemporary ideas for what the universe might have been like before the Big Bang: these are the theories of inflation and of a cyclic universe. Both of these theories have a remarkable consequence: according to them, all structure in the universe (all planets, stars, nebulae, galaxies) has arisen out of primordial quantum fluctuations, thus intimately linking the very largest and very smallest phenomena in the universe. Jean-Luc Lehners currently leads the String Cosmology Research Group at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute) in Potsdam, Germany. After completing his studies at Imperial College, London, Dr. Lehners was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge and at Princeton University. His research focuses on the early universe. This talk features the new dance piece “A Single Quantum of Light”, choreographed and performed by Linda Gieres, to an original musical score by Patrick Muller. Linda Gieres is a dancer, choreographer and writer. She obtained her dance training in Luxembourg, Paris and New York. Dr. Gieres holds an MFA from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, as well as a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies from the University of London. Patrick Muller is a freelance sound designer, composer and musician. He studied at the University of Arts in Berlin and at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. He lives in Berlin. Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila In the Beginning: From Chaos to Cosmos through Creation Modern cosmology endeavours to describe the universe independently of the human viewpoint. For earlier peoples, cosmology was a science that explained our position in the universe, often vis-à-vis gods. In Antiquity and the Middle Ages, cosmology tried to give an intelligible explanation of the world in terms of what was considered to be science at the time. I will discuss two aspects of mainly Near Eastern cosmology in my talk, viz. creation and the microcosmos/macrocosmos analogy. The first was an answer to the problem of infinite regression of causation (if everything has a cause, there either must be a non-thing, God, at the beginning of it all, or else we have to take recourse in infinite regression, which in the Aristotelian worldview is impossible), while the second is an attempt to find the place of the human being within the universe. Jaakko Hämeen-Anttila is Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies (University of Helsinki), as well as President of the Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants. His work has mainly been on mediaeval Arabic literature and cultural history, as well as cultural contacts, transmission and translation between various Near Eastern cultures in Antiquity and the Middle Ages.