Why Does the World Exist?: An Existential Detective Story (36 page)

122
“Arrogant in tone”: Jim Holt, review of David Deutsch’s
The Fabric of Reality
,
Wall Street Journal
, August 7, 1997.

124
“setting international standards”: Morton, “Computational Cosmos,” p. 51.

129
“I do not believe”: Deutsch,
Fabric of Reality
, p. 17.

129
“It is not enough”: Ibid., p. 139.

Interlude: The End of Explanation

133
“Self-subsumption is”: Nozick,
Philosophical Explanations
, p. 120.

133
“The ultimate principle”: Ibid., p. 134.

134
“a self-subsuming statement”: Ibid., p. 138.

134
“for surely never”: Swinburne,
Existence of God
, p. 79.

135
“If it is a very deep fact”: Nozick,
Philosophical Explanations
, p. 131.

135
“There isn’t”: Ibid., p. 130.

136
“they exist in independent”: Ibid., p. 129.

8. The Ultimate Free Lunch?

138
“The clear light of science”: Julian Huxley,
Essays of a Humanist
(Harper & Row, 1969), pp. 107–108.

140
“the most profound development”: John Gribbin,
Q Is for Quantum
(Free Press, 1998), p. 311.

141
“Maybe the universe”: Quoted in Alex Vilenkin,
Many Worlds in One
(Hill and Wang, 2006), p. 183.

142
“stopped in his tracks”: Quoted in John Gribbin,
In the Beginning
(Bullfinch, 1993), p. 249.

142
“In answer to the question”: Ed Tryon, “Is the Universe a Vacuum Fluctuation?”
Nature
, vol. 246 (1973), p. 396.

142
“A proposal that”: Alan Guth,
The Inflationary Universe
(Addison-Wesley, 1997), p. 273.

145
“A quantum theory”: Stephen Hawking,
Black Holes and Baby Universes
(Bantam Books, 1993), p. 61.

146
“with the discovery”: Weinberg,
Dreams of a Final Theory
, p. 240.

147
“With his crab-apple cheeks”: John Horgan,
The End of Science
(Addison-Wesley, 1996), p. 71.

147
“With or without religion”: Steven Weinberg, “A Designer Universe?”
New York Review of Books
, October 21, 1999.

9. Waiting for the Final Theory

160
“supposes that there”: Weinberg,
Dreams of a Final Theory
, p. 238.

160
“This may happen”: Steven Weinberg, “Can Science Explain Everything? Anything?”
New York Review of Books
, May 31, 2001, p. 50.

161
“The tunneling process”: Alex Vilenkin,
Many Worlds in One
(Hill & Wang, 2006), p. 204.

161
“What is it that breathes”: Stephen Hawking,
A Brief History of Time
(Bantam, 1998), p. 190.

162
“The whole modern conception”: Ludwig Wittgenstein,
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
, trans. D. F. Pears and B. F. McGuinness (Humanities, 1961), 6.371.

Interlude: A Word on Many Worlds

164
“a trillion trillion other universes”: Swinburne,
Is There a God?
p. 68.

164
“there is not a shred”: Martin Gardner,
Are Universes Thicker Than Blackberries?
(W. W. Norton, 2004), p. 9.

164
“invoking an infinity”: Paul Davies, “A Brief History of the Multiverse,”: op-ed,
New York Times
, April 12, 2003.

168
“Surely the conjecture”: Gardner,
Are Universes Thicker
, p. 9.

168
“there is no reason”: Davies, “A Brief History.”

169
“The many-worlds”: Leonard Susskind,
The Cosmic Landscape
(Little, Brown, 2005), p. 317.

170
“It is probable”: Quoted in Paul Davies,
The Mind of God
(Touchstone, 1992), p. 140.

10. Platonic Reflections

172
“there exists, independently”: Alain Connes and Jean-Pierre Changeux,
Conversations on Mind, Matter, and Mathematics
(Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 26.

172
“Mathematicians should have”: Quoted in Thomas Tymoczko,
New Directions in the Philosophy of Mathematics
(Princeton University Press, 1998), p. 26.

172
“We do have something”: Kurt Gödel, “What Is Cantor’s Continuum Problem?” in
Philosophy of Mathematics
, ed. Paul Benacerraf and Hilary Putnam (Cambridge University Press, 1983), p. 484.

172
“unreasonable effectiveness”: Eugene Wigner, “The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences,” in
Communications in Pure and Applied Mathematics
, vol. 13, no. 1 (February 1960), pp. 1–14.

172
“You can recognize”: Richard Feynman,
The Character of a Physical Law
(MIT Press, 1967), p. 171.

172
“book of nature”: Galileo,
Saggiatore
, Opere VI, quoted in
The Penguin Book of Curious and Interesting Mathematics
, ed. David Wells (Penguin Books, 1997), p. 151.

173
“God is a mathematician”: Quoted in John D. Barrow,
Pi in the Sky
(Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 292.

174
“I imagine that”: Roger Penrose,
The Emperor’s New Mind
(Oxford University Press, 1989), p. 428.

174
“His argument is”: Quoted in Matt Ridley,
Francis Crick
(Eminent Lives, 2006), p. 197.

180
“To me the world”: Roger Penrose,
Shadows of the Mind
(Oxford University Press, 1994), p. 417.

180
“eternally existing”: Ibid., p. 428.

180
“profound and timeless”: Penrose,
Emperor’s New Mind
, p. 95.

180
“ancient and honorable”: W. D. Hart,
The Evolution of Logic
(Cambridge University Press, 2010), p. 277.

181
“ ‘Imaginary universes’ are”: G. H. Hardy,
A Mathematician’s Apology
(Cambridge University Press, 1940), p. 135.

182
“the essence of mathematics”: Quoted in Loren Graham and Jean-Michel Kantor,
Naming Infinity
(Harvard University Press, 2009), p. 199.

182
“The elements of this multiverse”: Max Tegmark, “Parallel Universes,”
Scientific American
, May 2003, p. 50.

182
“have an eerily real feel”: Ibid., p. 49.

183
“It’s just a feeling”: Quoted in Davies,
Mind of God
, p. 145.

183
“Rightly viewed”: Bertrand Russell,
Mysticism and Logic
(Doubleday, 1957), p. 57.

183
“largely nonsense”:
Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell
, p. 255.

183
“To be is”: Willard Van Orman Quine,
From a Logical Point of View
(Harper Torchbooks, 1953), p. 15.

184
“We have the same”: Hart,
Evolution of Logic
, p. 279.

185
“Avaunt! You”: Bertrand Russell,
Nightmares of Eminent Persons
(Touchstone, 1955), p. 46.

Interlude: It from Bit

187
“What reason”: Quoted in Marc Lange,
Introduction to the Philosophy of Physics
(Blackwell, 2002), p. 168.

188
“Kick at the rock”: Richard Wilbur, “Epistemology,” in
New and Collected Poems
(Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988), p. 288.

188
“in language”: Quoted in Jonathan Culler,
Saussure
(Fontana, 1985), p. 18.

189
“all mathematical structures”: Tegmark, “Parallel Universes,” p. 50.

189
“Our knowledge”: Arthur Eddington,
The Nature of the Physical World
(Cambridge University Press, 1928), p. 258.

190
“at the most basic ontological”: Frank Tipler,
The Physics of Immortality
(Anchor Books, 1997), p. 209.

191
“The subjective features”: Thomas Nagel,
The View from Nowhere
(Oxford University Press, 1986), p. 15.

191
“frankly, quite crazy”: John R. Searle,
Mind
(Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 217.

192
“Postulating special inner qualities”: Daniel Dennett,
Consciousness Explained
(Little, Brown, 1991), p. 450.

192
“The world just
isn’t
”: Nagel,
View from Nowhere
, p. 15.

193
“What has structure”: T. L. S. Sprigge,
Theories of Existence
(Penguin, 1984), p. 156.

193
“rather like the kind”: T. L. S. Sprigge, “Panpsychism,” in
Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy
, ed. Edward Craig (Routledge, 1988), vol. 7, p. 196.

193
“the stuff of the world”: Eddington,
Nature of the Physical World
, p. 276.

194
“Experience is information”: David Chalmers,
The Conscious Mind
(Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 305.

195
“How can many consciousnesses”: William James,
Writings, 1902–1910
(Library of America, 1988), p. 723.

195
“Take a sentence”: William James,
Principles of Psychology
(Dover, 1950), vol. 1, p. 160.

196
“the unity of a single mind”: Penrose,
Shadows of the Mind
, p. 372.

196
“I think that something of this nature”: Roger Penrose,
The Large, the Small, and the Human Mind
(Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 175.

196
“absurd”: John R. Searle,
The Mystery of Consciousness
(
New York Review of Books
, 1997), p. 156.

11. “The Ethical Requiredness of There Being Something”

198
“the most interesting”: Larry Kaufman, www.hostagechess.com.

200
“However complex the object”: James,
Principles of Psychology
, vol. 1, p. 276.

205
“The notion”: Mackie,
Miracle of Theism
, p. 232.

213
“the noblest and most”: Russell,
History of Western Philosophy
, p. 569.

214
“Each act of cruelty”: Ibid., p. 580.

214
“overwhelming bleakness”: Interview with Father Robert E. Lauder,
Commonweal
, April 15, 2010.

Interlude: An Hegelian in Paris

218
“Pure Being makes”: Hegel,
Logic of Hegel
, p. 135.

218
“simple and indeterminate”: Ibid.

218
“This mere Being”: Ibid
.
, p. 137.

218
“is just Nothing”: Ibid.

218
“No great expenditure”: Ibid., p. 140.

218
“an unsteady unrest”: Ibid.

219
“The worse your logic”: Russell,
History of Western Philosophy
, p. 746.

219
“an ontological proof of”: Arthur Schopenhauer,
On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason
, trans. Mme. Karl Hillebrand (George Bell and Sons, 1897), p. 13.

219
“The Idea, as unity”: Hegel,
Logic of Hegel
, p. 323.

219
“very obscure”: Russell,
History of Western Philosophy
, p. 734.

219
“possess the world”:
The Philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre
, ed. Robert Denoon Cumming (Modern Library, 1965), p. 331.

12. The Last Word from All Souls

222
“Why Anything? Why This?” Derek Parfit,
London Review of Books
, January 22, 1998, and February 5, 1998. All Parfit quotations in the chapter are from this essay unless otherwise noted.

223
“The truth is very different”: Derek Parfit,
Reasons and Persons
(Oxford University Press, 1984), p. 281.

229
“What interests me”: quoted in Steve Pyke,
Philosophers
(Distributed Art Publishing, 1995), p. 43.

229
“a florid antique shop”: Christopher Hitchens,
Hitch-22
(Twelve, 2010), p. 103.

231
“In the Ultimate Multiverse”: Brian Greene,
The Hidden Reality
(Allen Lane, 2011), p. 296.

231
“Nothingness haunts Being”: Sartre,
Being and Nothingness
, p. 11.

13. The World as a Bit of Light Verse

244
“skate upon an intense radiance”: John Updike, “The Dogwood Tree,” in
Assorted Prose
(Fawcett, 1966), p. 146.

244
“Barth’s theology”: Updike, preface to
Assorted Prose
, p. viii.

244
“Satanic nothingness”: Updike,
Picked-Up Pieces
, p. 99.

246
“cosmic bootstrap”: Peter Atkins,
The Creation
(W. H. Freeman, 1981), p. 111.

246
“beset by an embarrassment”: Martin Amis,
The War Against Cliché
(Vintage, 2002), p. 384.

252
“blot on nothingness”: Updike,
Bech
, p. 131.

14. The Self: Do I Really Exist

253
“How often have I said”: Arthur Conan Doyle,
The Sign of the Four
(Spencer Blackett, 1890), p. 93.

254
“Existence precedes essence”: Jean-Paul Sartre, “Existentialism Is a Humanism,” in
Existentialism from Dostoevsky to Sartre
, ed. Walter Kaufman (Meridian Books, 1956), p. 290.

254
“The purpose is to live”: Ivan Goncharov,
Oblomov
, trans. Marian Schwartz (Yale University Press, 2010), p. 254.

255
“the lucky ones”: Richard Dawkins,
Unweaving the Rainbow
(Mariner, 2000), p. 1.

255
“There is a general belief”: Russell,
History of Western Philosophy
, p. 594.