Micah Redding — faith in humanity's future

The Physics of Immortality

When I was about 13, I read a book called “The Physics of Immortality”. Now, 12 years later, the author (Frank Tipler), has released a sequel called “The Physics of Christianity”. I recently bought it and read it.

Let me attempt to explain his theory.

1) In the beginning, the universe began with a big bang. Billions of years later, mankind exists. In the near future, mankind will spread outward from earth, propagating across the universe, until it is full of intelligent life. Eventually the universe will begin to contract, and intelligent life will guide the contraction of the universe so that life can continue to exist at higher and higher levels of energy, possessing more and more power and control over the universe, gaining more and more knowledge, and thinking faster and faster.

Approaching the final big crunch, the natural thought processes of life speed up to infinity, the amount of knowledge and information stored goes to infinity, and the amount of available energy goes to infinity. Life will have an infinite number of experiences and thoughts before the final big crunch.

2) The universe began and ends with a Singularity of infinite knowledge, power, and life. This Singularity is outside of both space and time, yet gives rise to all of space and time.

This Singularity created reality, life, and the laws of physics, and draws all of reality into it. Specifically, this Singularity is what forces life to begin and to spread out from earth, and to ultimately unite with it. This Singularity has the power to resurrect us all and to grant us eternal life.

This Singularity is required to exist by the laws of physics, but the laws of physics do not and cannot apply to it: physical laws cannot deal with a literal infinity.

This Singularity is in the future (our ultimate Final Cause and Destination), the past (our ultimate First Cause), and the present (more on that later).

3) The universe is actually a multiverse of an infinite number of parallel histories, wherein different versions of ourselves do slightly different things, make different choices, etc.

(This I ABSOLUTELY agree with. This one thing solves the problem of free will and the problem of evil in one fell swoop, while NO ONE ELSE has ever solved these problems.)

All histories began and end in the same Singularity.

4) We might as well go ahead and call the Singularity, “God”. In fact, Frank Tipler goes ahead a calls it a Triune God, consisting of One Singularity which is also Three Singularities: Ultimate Past, Ultimate Present, Ultimate Future. Or, God the Spirit, God the Son, God the Father, respectively.

5) Jesus was necessary: in order for mankind to begin its outward spread to unite with God, Jesus had to live, die, and be raised again. Since the Singularity controls all of reality for Its ultimate goals, the Singularity caused Jesus to rise again so that mankind could one day be united with it.

More to come…



I'm on the waiting list at work to read this book, I can't wait!<br/>I like point 3... I'm anxious to hear more about it.


Much of the concept of singularity is similar to how Dao may be expressed as a concept--though both singularity and Dao are beyond words themselves, as they are both the essence of and yet beyond the material realm. I disagree with the jump from singularity to God/Jesus, though, as a broader concept of God is needed if we are talking about something that everything and everyone arose from and will return to--religions also arose from it, and to discount all other ways because we have a preference for the practice and belief of one could be limiting us from realizing an ultimate truth which encompasses all; one all true teachings arise from. Jesus was not the only one who sacrificed to save humanity, he is just the most well-known one, because the sacrifice and example was indeed great. Jesus was an excellent example and is one of my role models, but to deny the teachings and sacrifices of teachers that blazed the path for thousands of years before Jesus (and after) in the name of science or philosophy is a jump that can only be made by belief, and a belief that has not been broadened by the great opportunity we have today to tap into the wisdom of the East as well as the West. The truth, if truth is that which is most long-lasting, must be the heart of all Ways which point toward eternity/singularity, not just one. Maybe the parallel universes concept is the only thing that explains evil and free will effectively to you, but cause and effect also helps us to understand the true nature of "evil" and "free will". Unfortunately, the modern understanding of cause and effect is overly simplified, which is why we often find it lacking in understanding why things happen as they happen. Perhaps parallel universes do exist, but wherever we are now, that is what we need to focus on and deal with. Dreaming of an alternate better reality (whether past, present or future) instead of dealing with what we have brought upon ourselves in our current reality may lead to complaints instead of improvements.