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Me , Myself and Nurul: June 2008
"Tuhan Masih Sayang-kan Kita" : Temuramah
Tan Sri Hassan Merican, CEO Petronas
Ketika membicarakan tentang prospek industri minyak dan gas baik di dalam negara ataupun global, Presiden dan Ketua Pegawai Eksekutif Petronas, Tan Sri Mohd. Hassan Marican, merupakan orang yang paling arif untuk dijadikan rujukan.
Selain berpengalaman luas, beliau adalah seorang yang cukup teliti tentang apa yang diperkatakan dan sentiasa membuat kajian sendiri.
Tidak hairanlah apabila beliau membayangkan rakyat Malaysia perlu bersedia membayar lebih (untuk mendapatkan minyak) pada masa depan berikutan berlakunya penyusutan dalam sumber negara, ia harus diberikan perhatian serius kerana implikasi besarnya terhadap pembangunan ekonomi negara dan juga rakyat.
‘‘Pada pandangan saya, perkara yang berlaku ini adalah satu yang kritikal kepada anak cucu kita. Sumber (minyak dan gas) semakin berkurangan,’’ kata beliau.
Mohd. Hassan menjangkakan Malaysia yang kini merupakan pengeksport minyak, akan menjadi pengimport bersih bahan berkenaan menjelang tahun 2010, iaitu hanya tiga tahun dari sekarang apabila permintaan yang ada bakal mengatasi pengeluaran.
‘‘ Hari ini, sumbangan Petronas masih lagi tinggi tetapi esok apabila sumber makin sikit dan harganya pula jatuh, sumbangan akan berkurangan, macam mana kita akan menanggung semua (membangunkan negara) ini. Keadaan ini akan berlaku dan hanya menunggu masa sahaja,’’ kata beliau.
Pengurangan sumber berkenaan bukan fenomena yang hanya berlaku di Malaysia, tetapi juga melanda dunia berikutan usaha mendapatkan komoditi yang dikenali sebagai emas hitam, kini diburukkan oleh peningkatan kos untuk mengeluarkannya dari perut bumi selain terdapat kekangan terhadap tenaga manusia dalam industri itu.
‘‘Tuhan masih lagi sayang kepada kita kerana itu kita berjaya temui rizab laut dalam,” kata beliau dalam satu temu bual dengan wartawan Mingguan Malaysia, MOWARDI MAHMUD, KHAIRUDDIN MOHD AMIN dan AMRAN AHMAD di pejabatnya baru-baru ini.
Namun begitu, menurut Mohd. Hassan, penemuan kawasan minyak laut dalam yang baru masih belum mencukupi kerana permintaan dalam negara yang dijangka terus meningkat, lambat-laun apa yang dimiliki itu akan habis juga.
Dalam temu bual itu, beliau juga menceritakan kesukaran mendapatkan sumber manusia dan kejayaan Petronas melahirkan jutawan bumiputera melalui pengendalian stesen minyaknya dan penting syarikat bumiputera membina modal insan dan juga keupayaan diri untuk bersaing.
MINGGUAN: Petronas sekali lagi mengumumkan hasil kewangan yang tertinggi dalam sejarahnya, jadi banyaklah duit yang ada
Mohd. Hassan: Keuntungan itu juga kita terus pulangkan kepada kerajaan. Pada tahun ini, kita memberi balik sebanyak RM58.1 bilion atau 77 peratus kepada kerajaan bagi digunakan untuk tujuan pembangunan dan melaksanakan agendanya yang memberi faedah kepada rakyat. Tetapi, sejauh mana ia digunakan secara cekap, ia adalah satu soalan lain.
Bolehkah Tan Sri jelaskan lagi?
MOHD. HASSAN: Tanggungjawab Petronas adalah mengembalikan (keuntungan) kepada kerajaan untuk melakukan apa yang perlu dibuat supaya kesannya dirasai oleh rakyat. Tahun lepas, terdapat pihak mempersoalkan kenapa keuntungan itu tidak diberikan terus kepada rakyat RM1,000 seorang dan berdasarkan pencapaian yang baru diumumkan, kita patut bagi RM3,000 seorang. Persoalan itu menjadi satu isu, sama ada duit digunakan sebaiknya atau dibazirkan, contohnya dalam pemberian subsidi ketika sumber minyak dan gas yang dinikmati semakin berkurangan.
Ini bermakna hasil Petronas boleh berkurangan pada masa depan
MOHD. HASSAN: Memang kerana berlakunya penyusutan itu. Kami merupakan penyumbang terbesar tunggal kepada pendapatan kerajaan sebanyak 35 peratus berbanding sektor-sektor yang lain termasuk perkilangan. Hari ini, sumbangan Petronas masih lagi tinggi tetapi esok apabila sumber makin sikit dan harga minyak pula jatuh, sumbangan akan berkurangan, macam mana kita akan menanggung semua ini (membangunkan negara). Keadaan ini akan berlaku dan hanya menunggu masa sahaja.
Apakah kita harus bersedia untuk membayar lebih?
MOHD. HASSAN: Saya rasa rakyat kena sedar yang sumber petroleum semakin susut. Dulu bijih timah tapi kita sudah kehabisan bekalannya walaupun harga timah sekarang ini mencapai AS$13,800 setan, kita sudah tidak ada sumber bahan itu lagi.
Berdasarkan kepada perkembangan semasa, bilakah ia akan habis?
MOHD. HASSAN: Itu terpulang kepada permintaan dan bagaimana kita menggunakan sumber yang kita ada. Jadi, sekiranya permintaan meningkat tinggi maka kadar pengurangan bekalan akan menjadi semakin cepat. Soalnya, adakah kita mahu terus guna (sumber yang ada) selagi boleh sampai habis dan mana manfaat yang boleh kita raih? Apakah kerana benda itu kita peroleh secara murah maka kita tidak payah simpan atau menggunakan secara cekap? Berdasarkan kepada kekurangan yang kita hadapi ini, pada hari ini (bekalan) hanya hampir mencukupi dan memenuhi permintaan.
Adakah tahap penyusutan sumber petroleum membimbangkan?
Mohd. Hassan: Pada kadar pertumbuhan permintaan sebanyak empat peratus setahun terutamanya dalam sektor pengangkutan, negara akan menjadi pengimport bersih minyak menjelang tahun 2010. Permintaannya menjadi lebih besar daripada pengeluaran. Kadar penyusutannya adalah tinggi. Kita bernasib baik mempunyai 30 peratus daripada rizab (minyak) di laut dalam yang ditemui lima tahun lalu. Kalau tidak, sumber kita sudah habis lama (tanpa penemuan medan minyak laut dalam), apa yang kita miliki berkurangan pada kadar yang pantas. (Jika tiada rizab minyak laut dalam) Pengeluaran akan berkurangan daripada 600,000 tong sehari kepada 250,000 atau 300,000 tong sehari. Menjelang tahun 2010, pengeluaran akan berkurangan kepada 300,000 tong sehari tetapi ketika ini kita mempunyai pengeluaran baru. Pengeluaran akan jatuh sebanyak 15 peratus setahun menjelang tahun 2011. Bermula tahun 2014, pengeluaran akan jatuh sebanyak 10 peratus setahun. Nasib kita jumpa (medan minyak) di laut dalam pada tahun 2002. Tuhan, masih sayangkan kita.
Bukankah kita menemui telaga baru di laut dalam?
Mohd. Hassan: Pengeluaran minyak laut dalam di Kikeh (Sabah) akan dilakukan pada bulan September tahun ini. Ia akan tampung balik kejatuhan yang berlaku sebelum ini (pengeluaran). Tapi selama mana? Lambat laun akan habis juga.
MOHD. HASSAN: Kita boleh import (gas asli) dari negara-negara lain. Tetapi apabila pengeluaran di seluruh dunia jatuh, mereka (pengeluar gas asli) memberikan keutamaan kepada kegunaan sendiri. Sebagai contoh, Indonesia tidak benarkan import (gas asli) dilakukan. Ini adalah satu masalah. Begitu juga di Vietnam dan Mesir yang menetapkan pengeluaran gas pada jumlah tertentu untuk penggunaan dalam negara. Jadi, kita hendak import (gas asli) dari mana? Kalau dapat import pun kita kena bayar harga pasaran yang mana jauh lebih tinggi daripada harga domestik. Pada pandangan saya, perkara yang berlaku ini adalah satu yang kritikal kepada anak cucu kita. Sumber (minyak dan gas) semakin berkurangan.
Ada yang mengatakan kenapa tidak kita terus sahaja mencari gali?
Mohd. Hassan: Kos operasi telah meningkat. Kos penggerudian naik 200 peratus. Kos mencari dan kos pembangunan (medan minyak) juga meningkat dalam tempoh satu hingga dua tahun ini. Ini kos yang ditanggung hari ini. Sekiranya harga (minyak) kekal tidak mengapa tetapi jika harga jatuh, anda akan menanggung kerugian, ia tidak lagi menguntungkan dari segi (skala) ekonomi. Beberapa projek (dalam industri minyak dan gas global) telah ditangguhkan kerana kenaikan kos ini. Ia merupakan kitaran jangka masa panjang. Jika dilihat daripada penangguhan projek, kita akan menyaksikan pembekalan berkurangan dan permintaan akan meningkat.
Mohd. Hassan: Pada hari ini, permintaan adalah 84 juta tong sehari dan pada tahun 2012 pula sebanyak 120 juta. Persoalan timbul di mana kita perlu mencari 36 juta tong sehari (menjelang tahun 2012). Kita perlu bergantung kepada Timur Tengah iaitu Iran dan Iraq tetapi keadaan geopolitiknya tidak stabil. Apa akan berlaku jika Timur Tengah tidak dapat memenuhi permintaan?
Sebelum ini kekurangan modal insan juga dikatakan perkara serius?
Mohd. Hassan: Industri juga mengalami kekurangan modal insan. Bagi mengatasinya, pada tahun lalu kami mengambil 1,100 jurutera dalam semua bidang kejuruteraan dan kemudiannya menukarkan mereka menjadi jurutera petroleum. Mereka akan pergi ke universiti, belajar balik selama 18 bulan untuk jadi jurutera petroleum. Mereka yang mempunyai (ijazah) sains tulen pula akan ditukarkan kepada saintis geologi. Bagaimanapun ini mengambil masa. Selepas mereka menamatkan pengajian (di universiti) mereka masih lagi baru (tidak mempunyai pengalaman) dan ia mengambil masa antara lima tahun hingga tujuh tahun sebelum mereka boleh digunakan. Anda mengambil masa antara tujuh hingga 10 tahun sebelum mereka bersedia. Purata umur pekerja dalam industri ini ialah 52 tahun dan jika masa selama 10 tahun diperlukan untuk mendapatkan orang baru, pekerja yang ada akan berusia 62 tahun (ketika kakitangan baru berkhidmat). Jurang antara pekerja sedia ada dan pekerja baru adalah besar.
Bagaimana pula dengan kehadiran pekerja yang berpengalaman?
Mohd. Hassan: Hampir separuh daripada pekerja dalam industri minyak dan gas global akan bersara dalam jangka masa 10 tahun akan datang. Kami juga rekrut dan latih tetapi kami merana. Dalam masa tujuh hingga 10 tahun mereka lari ke Australia, Timur Tengah dan United Kingdom. Kami menjangkakan akan terus kehilangan (pekerja) berpengalaman walaupun kami mengambil 1,100 pekerja ini. Modal insan merupakan masalah jangka panjang. Ia mengambil masa sekurang-kurangnya lima tahun untuk menyelesaikannya, khususnya saintis geologi. Kita juga memanggil balik pesara Petronas.
Kenapa perkara itu boleh berlaku?
Mohd. Hassan: Generasi muda tidak seperti generasi tua yang lebih setia. Mereka melihat kepada wang. Ini adalah sifat biasa generasi lebih muda. Syarikat minyak di negara lain menawarkan gaji yang lebih tinggi. Tahun lalu, kami kehilangan 270 orang pekerja yang mana 131 orang majoritinya jurutera. Mereka meninggalkan (Petronas) sebab wang. Sekumpulan lagi yang lebih berpengalaman, mereka pergi (ke luar negara) sebab mahukan sistem pendidikan yang baik untuk anak mereka.
Ada yang menyertai semula Petronas?
Mohd. Hassan: Tidak. Saya tidak menukar dasar (tidak mengambil balik pekerja yang telah keluar). Saya mahu menghargai mereka yang setia. Kami ada 75 peratus pekerja yang setia tetapi saya tidak memerlukan mereka yang keluar dan mahu kembali semula.
Dengan peningkatan kos, adakah Petronas mempunyai dana yang mencukupi?
Mohd. Hassan: Kami mempunyai dana yang mencukupi. Kita mempunyai kerajaan yang bertanggungjawab dan Petronas mempunyai 25 peratus keuntungan untuk berkembang. Sekiranya kalau kos terlampau tinggi, kami tidak akan melabur. Ia tidak menguntungkan berdasarkan (skala) ekonomi. Ini yang berlaku di seluruh dunia. Semua orang melihat dan mengkaji semula pelaburan mereka.
Berbalik kepada perkara lain, Petronas juga terlibat dalam membangunkan ekonomi bumiputera
Mohd. Hassan: Petronas Dagangan Bhd., anak syarikat Petronas, mempunyai 832 stesen minyak, yang mana 95 peratus pemilik adalah bumiputera. Stesen minyak ini merupakan tempat latihan orang Melayu menjadi pengedar. Ia untuk pembangunan ekonomi orang Melayu. Jika dilihat pengusaha stesen Shell (yang majoritinya bukan bumiputera) mereka menjadikan stesen minyak ini sebagai tempat proses pembelajaran perniagaan pertama untuk anak-anak mereka. Anak mereka datang (ke stesen minyak) pada hujung minggu. Stesen minyak Petronas ini boleh dijadikan mekanisme latihan untuk masyarakat Melayu berniaga. Selain itu ia juga untuk perusahaan kecil dan sederhana (PKS) memasarkan produk mereka. Pada hujung minggu anak ataupun anak saudara pengusaha stesen minyak boleh datang ke stesen minyak dan lihat bagaimana ia beroperasi dan ini merupakan permulaan keusahawanan tetapi mereka tidak mahu belajar.
Bagaimana mereka boleh memperbetulkan keadaan ini?
Mohd. Hassan: Apabila mereka telah menjadi pengedar, bawalah anak ke stesen dan melihat bagaimana perniagaan dilakukan. Ia adalah tempat untuk melahirkan usahawan.
Adakah Petronas telah mencapai kejayaan?
Mohd. Hassan: Kita telah lahirkan banyak jutawan Melayu melalui perniagaan pengendalian stesen-stesen minyak Petronas. Bagaimana pula dengan perkembangan syarikat penyedia khidmat sokongan Petronas.
Adakah Tan Sri puas hati?
Mohd. Hassan: Mereka telah dibangunkan sejak 20 tahun lalu tetapi mereka kurang memberi tumpuan kepada latihan. Mereka sepatutnya membangunkan modal insan dan bukan mengambil pekerja dari syarikat lain selain membina keupayaan diri. Kesemua ini untuk faedah tempoh jangka masa panjang. Ini adalah perniagaan global, mereka perlu cekap dari segi kos, mempunyai bakat dalam modal insan, mempunyai teknologi barulah boleh bersaing.
**Dipetik daripada : UTUSAN ONLINE
Posted by fixxxxxer at 2:28 AM No comments:
Sunday, June 15, 2008
The Beginning of Time
In this lecture, I would like to discuss whether time itself has a beginning, and whether it will have an end. All the evidence seems to indicate, that the universe has not existed forever, but that it had a beginning, about 15 billion years ago. This is probably the most remarkable discovery of modern cosmology. Yet it is now taken for granted. We are not yet certain whether the universe will have an end. When I gave a lecture in Japan, I was asked not to mention the possible re-collapse of the universe, because it might affect the stock market. However, I can re-assure anyone who is nervous about their investments that it is a bit early to sell: even if the universe does come to an end, it won't be for at least twenty billion years. By that time, maybe the GATT trade agreement will have come into effect.
The time scale of the universe is very long compared to that for human life. It was therefore not surprising that until recently, the universe was thought to be essentially static, and unchanging in time. On the other hand, it must have been obvious, that society is evolving in culture and technology. This indicates that the present phase of human history can not have been going for more than a few thousand years. Otherwise, we would be more advanced than we are. It was therefore natural to believe that the human race, and maybe the whole universe, had a beginning in the fairly recent past. However, many people were unhappy with the idea that the universe had a beginning, because it seemed to imply the existence of a supernatural being who created the universe. They preferred to believe that the universe, and the human race, had existed forever. Their explanation for human progress was that there had been periodic floods, or other natural disasters, which repeatedly set back the human race to a primitive state.
This argument about whether or not the universe had a beginning, persisted into the 19th and 20th centuries. It was conducted mainly on the basis of theology and philosophy, with little consideration of observational evidence. This may have been reasonable, given the notoriously unreliable character of cosmological observations, until fairly recently. The cosmologist, Sir Arthur Eddington, once said, 'Don't worry if your theory doesn't agree with the observations, because they are probably wrong.' But if your theory disagrees with the Second Law of Thermodynamics, it is in bad trouble. In fact, the theory that the universe has existed forever is in serious difficulty with the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The Second Law, states that disorder always increases with time. Like the argument about human progress, it indicates that there must have been a beginning. Otherwise, the universe would be in a state of complete disorder by now, and everything would be at the same temperature. In an infinite and everlasting universe, every line of sight would end on the surface of a star. This would mean that the night sky would have been as bright as the surface of the Sun. The only way of avoiding this problem would be if, for some reason, the stars did not shine before a certain time.
In a universe that was essentially static, there would not have been any dynamical reason, why the stars should have suddenly turned on, at some time. Any such "lighting up time" would have to be imposed by an intervention from outside the universe. The situation was different, however, when it was realised that the universe is not static, but expanding. Galaxies are moving steadily apart from each other. This means that they were closer together in the past. One can plot the separation of two galaxies, as a function of time. If there were no acceleration due to gravity, the graph would be a straight line. It would go down to zero separation, about twenty billion years ago. One would expect gravity, to cause the galaxies to accelerate towards each other. This will mean that the graph of the separation of two galaxies will bend downwards, below the straight line. So the time of zero separation, would have been less than twenty billion years ago.
At this time, the Big Bang, all the matter in the universe, would have been on top of itself. The density would have been infinite. It would have been what is called, a singularity. At a singularity, all the laws of physics would have broken down. This means that the state of the universe, after the Big Bang, will not depend on anything that may have happened before, because the deterministic laws that govern the universe will break down in the Big Bang. The universe will evolve from the Big Bang, completely independently of what it was like before. Even the amount of matter in the universe, can be different to what it was before the Big Bang, as the Law of Conservation of Matter, will break down at the Big Bang.
Since events before the Big Bang have no observational consequences, one may as well cut them out of the theory, and say that time began at the Big Bang. Events before the Big Bang, are simply not defined, because there's no way one could measure what happened at them. This kind of beginning to the universe, and of time itself, is very different to the beginnings that had been considered earlier. These had to be imposed on the universe by some external agency. There is no dynamical reason why the motion of bodies in the solar system can not be extrapolated back in time, far beyond four thousand and four BC, the date for the creation of the universe, according to the book of Genesis. Thus it would require the direct intervention of God, if the universe began at that date. By contrast, the Big Bang is a beginning that is required by the dynamical laws that govern the universe. It is therefore intrinsic to the universe, and is not imposed on it from outside.
Although the laws of science seemed to predict the universe had a beginning, they also seemed to predict that they could not determine how the universe would have begun. This was obviously very unsatisfactory. So there were a number of attempts to get round the conclusion, that there was a singularity of infinite density in the past. One suggestion was to modify the law of gravity, so that it became repulsive. This could lead to the graph of the separation between two galaxies, being a curve that approached zero, but didn't actually pass through it, at any finite time in the past. Instead, the idea was that, as the galaxies moved apart, new galaxies were formed in between, from matter that was supposed to be continually created. This was the Steady State theory, proposed by Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle.
The Steady State theory, was what Karl Popper would call, a good scientific theory: it made definite predictions, which could be tested by observation, and possibly falsified. Unfortunately for the theory, they were falsified. The first trouble came with the Cambridge observations, of the number of radio sources of different strengths. On average, one would expect that the fainter sources would also be the more distant. One would therefore expect them to be more numerous than bright sources, which would tend to be near to us. However, the graph of the number of radio sources, against there strength, went up much more sharply at low source strengths, than the Steady State theory predicted.
There were attempts to explain away this number count graph, by claiming that some of the faint radio sources, were within our own galaxy, and so did not tell us anything about cosmology. This argument didn't really stand up to further observations. But the final nail in the coffin of the Steady State theory came with the discovery of the microwave background radiation, in 1965. This radiation is the same in all directions. It has the spectrum of radiation in thermal equilibrium at a temperature of 2 point 7 degrees above the Absolute Zero of temperature. There doesn't seem any way to explain this radiation in the Steady State theory.
Another attempt to avoid a beginning to time, was the suggestion, that maybe all the galaxies didn't meet up at a single point in the past. Although on average, the galaxies are moving apart from each other at a steady rate, they also have small additional velocities, relative to the uniform expansion. These so-called "peculiar velocities" of the galaxies, may be directed sideways to the main expansion. It was argued, that as you plotted the position of the galaxies back in time, the sideways peculiar velocities, would have meant that the galaxies wouldn't have all met up. Instead, there could have been a previous contracting phase of the universe, in which galaxies were moving towards each other. The sideways velocities could have meant that the galaxies didn't collide, but rushed past each other, and then started to move apart. There wouldn't have been any singularity of infinite density, or any breakdown of the laws of physics. Thus there would be no necessity for the universe, and time itself, to have a beginning. Indeed, one might suppose that the universe had oscillated, though that still wouldn't solve the problem with the Second Law of Thermodynamics: one would expect that the universe would become more disordered each oscillation. It is therefore difficult to see how the universe could have been oscillating for an infinite time.
This possibility, that the galaxies would have missed each other, was supported by a paper by two Russians. They claimed that there would be no singularities in a solution of the field equations of general relativity, which was fully general, in the sense that it didn't have any exact symmetry. However, their claim was proved wrong, by a number of theorems by Roger Penrose and myself. These showed that general relativity predicted singularities, whenever more than a certain amount of mass was present in a region. The first theorems were designed to show that time came to an end, inside a black hole, formed by the collapse of a star. However, the expansion of the universe, is like the time reverse of the collapse of a star. I therefore want to show you, that observational evidence indicates the universe contains sufficient matter, that it is like the time reverse of a black hole, and so contains a singularity.
In order to discuss observations in cosmology, it is helpful to draw a diagram of events in space and time, with time going upward, and the space directions horizontal. To show this diagram properly, I would really need a four dimensional screen. However, because of government cuts, we could manage to provide only a two dimensional screen. I shall therefore be able to show only one of the space directions.
As we look out at the universe, we are looking back in time, because light had to leave distant objects a long time ago, to reach us at the present time. This means that the events we observe lie on what is called our past light cone. The point of the cone is at our position, at the present time. As one goes back in time on the diagram, the light cone spreads out to greater distances, and its area increases. However, if there is sufficient matter on our past light cone, it will bend the rays of light towards each other. This will mean that, as one goes back into the past, the area of our past light cone will reach a maximum, and then start to decrease. It is this focussing of our past light cone, by the gravitational effect of the matter in the universe, that is the signal that the universe is within its horizon, like the time reverse of a black hole. If one can determine that there is enough matter in the universe, to focus our past light cone, one can then apply the singularity theorems, to show that time must have a beginning.
How can we tell from the observations, whether there is enough matter on our past light cone, to focus it? We observe a number of galaxies, but we can not measure directly how much matter they contain. Nor can we be sure that every line of sight from us will pass through a galaxy. So I will give a different argument, to show that the universe contains enough matter, to focus our past light cone. The argument is based on the spectrum of the microwave background radiation. This is characteristic of radiation that has been in thermal equilibrium, with matter at the same temperature. To achieve such an equilibrium, it is necessary for the radiation to be scattered by matter, many times. For example, the light that we receive from the Sun has a characteristically thermal spectrum. This is not because the nuclear reactions, which go on in the centre of the Sun, produce radiation with a thermal spectrum. Rather, it is because the radiation has been scattered, by the matter in the Sun, many times on its way from the centre.
In the case of the universe, the fact that the microwave background has such an exactly thermal spectrum indicates that it must have been scattered many times. The universe must therefore contain enough matter, to make it opaque in every direction we look, because the microwave background is the same, in every direction we look. Moreover, this opacity must occur a long way away from us, because we can see galaxies and quasars, at great distances. Thus there must be a lot of matter at a great distance from us. The greatest opacity over a broad wave band, for a given density, comes from ionised hydrogen. It then follows that if there is enough matter to make the universe opaque, there is also enough matter to focus our past light cone. One can then apply the theorem of Penrose and myself, to show that time must have a beginning.
The focussing of our past light cone implied that time must have a beginning, if the General Theory of relativity is correct. But one might raise the question, of whether General Relativity really is correct. It certainly agrees with all the observational tests that have been carried out. However these test General Relativity, only over fairly large distances. We know that General Relativity can not be quite correct on very small distances, because it is a classical theory. This means, it doesn't take into account, the Uncertainty Principle of Quantum Mechanics, which says that an object can not have both a well defined position, and a well defined speed: the more accurately one measures the position, the less accurately one can measure the speed, and vice versa. Therefore, to understand the very high-density stage, when the universe was very small, one needs a quantum theory of gravity, which will combine General Relativity with the Uncertainty Principle.
Many people hoped that quantum effects, would somehow smooth out the singularity of infinite density, and allow the universe to bounce, and continue back to a previous contracting phase. This would be rather like the earlier idea of galaxies missing each other, but the bounce would occur at a much higher density. However, I think that this is not what happens: quantum effects do not remove the singularity, and allow time to be continued back indefinitely. But it seems that quantum effects can remove the most objectionable feature, of singularities in classical General Relativity. This is that the classical theory, does not enable one to calculate what would come out of a singularity, because all the Laws of Physics would break down there. This would mean that science could not predict how the universe would have begun. Instead, one would have to appeal to an agency outside the universe. This may be why many religious leaders, were ready to accept the Big Bang, and the singularity theorems.
It seems that Quantum theory, on the other hand, can predict how the universe will begin. Quantum theory introduces a new idea, that of imaginary time. Imaginary time may sound like science fiction, and it has been brought into Doctor Who. But nevertheless, it is a genuine scientific concept. One can picture it in the following way. One can think of ordinary, real, time as a horizontal line. On the left, one has the past, and on the right, the future. But there's another kind of time in the vertical direction. This is called imaginary time, because it is not the kind of time we normally experience. But in a sense, it is just as real, as what we call real time.
The three directions in space, and the one direction of imaginary time, make up what is called a Euclidean space-time. I don't think anyone can picture a four dimensional curve space. But it is not too difficult to visualise a two dimensional surface, like a saddle, or the surface of a football.
In fact, James Hartle of the University of California Santa Barbara, and I have proposed that space and imaginary time together, are indeed finite in extent, but without boundary. They would be like the surface of the Earth, but with two more dimensions. The surface of the Earth is finite in extent, but it doesn't have any boundaries or edges. I have been round the world, and I didn't fall off.
If space and imaginary time are indeed like the surface of the Earth, there wouldn't be any singularities in the imaginary time direction, at which the laws of physics would break down. And there wouldn't be any boundaries, to the imaginary time space-time, just as there aren't any boundaries to the surface of the Earth. This absence of boundaries means that the laws of physics would determine the state of the universe uniquely, in imaginary time. But if one knows the state of the universe in imaginary time, one can calculate the state of the universe in real time. One would still expect some sort of Big Bang singularity in real time. So real time would still have a beginning. But one wouldn't have to appeal to something outside the universe, to determine how the universe began. Instead, the way the universe started out at the Big Bang would be determined by the state of the universe in imaginary time. Thus, the universe would be a completely self-contained system. It would not be determined by anything outside the physical universe, that we observe.
The no boundary condition, is the statement that the laws of physics hold everywhere. Clearly, this is something that one would like to believe, but it is a hypothesis. One has to test it, by comparing the state of the universe that it would predict, with observations of what the universe is actually like. If the observations disagreed with the predictions of the no boundary hypothesis, we would have to conclude the hypothesis was false. There would have to be something outside the universe, to wind up the clockwork, and set the universe going. Of course, even if the observations do agree with the predictions, that does not prove that the no boundary proposal is correct. But one's confidence in it would be increased, particularly because there doesn't seem to be any other natural proposal, for the quantum state of the universe.
The no boundary proposal, predicts that the universe would start at a single point, like the North Pole of the Earth. But this point wouldn't be a singularity, like the Big Bang. Instead, it would be an ordinary point of space and time, like the North Pole is an ordinary point on the Earth, or so I'm told. I have not been there myself.
According to the no boundary proposal, the universe would have expanded in a smooth way from a single point. As it expanded, it would have borrowed energy from the gravitational field, to create matter. As any economist could have predicted, the result of all that borrowing, was inflation. The universe expanded and borrowed at an ever-increasing rate. Fortunately, the debt of gravitational energy will not have to be repaid until the end of the universe.
Eventually, the period of inflation would have ended, and the universe would have settled down to a stage of more moderate growth or expansion. However, inflation would have left its mark on the universe. The universe would have been almost completely smooth, but with very slight irregularities. These irregularities are so little, only one part in a hundred thousand, that for years people looked for them in vain. But in 1992, the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite, COBE, found these irregularities in the microwave background radiation. It was an historic moment. We saw back to the origin of the universe. The form of the fluctuations in the microwave background agree closely with the predictions of the no boundary proposal. These very slight irregularities in the universe would have caused some regions to have expanded less fast than others. Eventually, they would have stopped expanding, and would have collapsed in on themselves, to form stars and galaxies. Thus the no boundary proposal can explain all the rich and varied structure, of the world we live in. What does the no boundary proposal predict for the future of the universe? Because it requires that the universe is finite in space, as well as in imaginary time, it implies that the universe will re-collapse eventually. However, it will not re-collapse for a very long time, much longer than the 15 billion years it has already been expanding. So, you will have time to sell your government bonds, before the end of the universe is nigh. Quite what you invest in then, I don't know.
Originally, I thought that the collapse, would be the time reverse of the expansion. This would have meant that the arrow of time would have pointed the other way in the contracting phase. People would have gotten younger, as the universe got smaller. Eventually, they would have disappeared back into the womb.
However, I now realise I was wrong, as these solutions show. The collapse is not the time reverse of the expansion. The expansion will start with an inflationary phase, but the collapse will not in general end with an anti inflationary phase. Moreover, the small departures from uniform density will continue to grow in the contracting phase. The universe will get more and more lumpy and irregular, as it gets smaller, and disorder will increase. This means that the arrow of time will not reverse. People will continue to get older, even after the universe has begun to contract. So it is no good waiting until the universe re-collapses, to return to your youth. You would be a bit past it, anyway, by then.
The conclusion of this lecture is that the universe has not existed forever. Rather, the universe, and time itself, had a beginning in the Big Bang, about 15 billion years ago. The beginning of real time, would have been a singularity, at which the laws of physics would have broken down. Nevertheless, the way the universe began would have been determined by the laws of physics, if the universe satisfied the no boundary condition. This says that in the imaginary time direction, space-time is finite in extent, but doesn't have any boundary or edge. The predictions of the no boundary proposal seem to agree with observation. The no boundary hypothesis also predicts that the universe will eventually collapse again. However, the contracting phase, will not have the opposite arrow of time, to the expanding phase. So we will keep on getting older, and we won't return to our youth. Because time is not going to go backwards, I think I better stop now.
Posted by fixxxxxer at 11:53 PM No comments:
Monday, June 2, 2008
Economic Models Explained with Cows
You have 2 cows.
You give one to your neighbour.
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and gives you some milk..
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and sells you some milk.
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both and shoots you.
You have 2 cows.
The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then
throws the milk away...
You have two cows..
You sell one and buy a bull.
Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows.
You sell them and retire on the income
You have two giraffes.
The government requires you to take harmonica lessons
You have two cows.
You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four
Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped
You have two cows.
You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using
letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then
execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you
get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk
rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman
Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the
rights to all seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report
says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. You sell
one cow to buy a new president of the United States , leaving you with
No balance sheet provided with the release.
The public then buys your bull.
You have two cows.
You go on strike, organise a riot, and block the roads, because
you want three cows.
You have two cows.
You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary
cow and produce twenty times the milk.
You then create a clever cow cartoon image called 'Cowkimon'
and market it worldwide.
You have two cows.
You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a
month, and milk themselves.
You have two cows, but you don't know where they are.
You decide to have lunch.
You have two cows.
You count them and learn you have five cows.
You count them again and learn you have 42 cows.
You count them again and learn you have 2 cows.
You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka.
You have 5000 cows. None of them belong to you.
You charge the owners for storing them.
You have two cows.
You have 300 people milking them.
You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine
You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.
Two cows have you.
You have two cows.
Everyone thinks you have lots of cows.
You tell them that you have none.
No-one believes you, so they bomb the **** out of you and
You still have no cows, but at least now you are part of a
You have two cows.
Business seems pretty good.
You close the office and go for a few beers to celebrate.
A NEW ZEALAND CORPORATION
You have two cows..
The one on the left looks very attractive
Posted by fixxxxxer at 7:58 PM No comments:
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