Is the Quantum Universe more than what we think?

Faith & Science Conversation
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Hey everyone, I just wanted to share something a little personal and maybe a bit surprising.

I write science fiction. But I’m not the kind of sci-fi writer who just makes stuff up out of thin air. I like my future tech to feel like it could actually happen. I want readers to look at something in my book and think, “You know, that’s not far off from what we have today.”

One night, while working on a scene, I asked AI for help filling in a futuristic detail. But instead of just spitting out something from a sci-fi movie, it asked me: “Do you want to see the real science behind that?” It showed me something that felt like a clunky Model T… but under the hood, I could totally see the logic connecting it to the sleek Lamborghini of the future tech I’d imagined.

That kicked off a deeper dive into physics, engineering, real-world research, and even the tech I’d learned back in school (and honestly never thought I’d use). All of that started to merge: science fiction ideas, unused engineering skills, and years of reading science papers just for fun.

One of the breakthroughs came when I stumbled on a real experiment by Wilson and his team, the Dynamical Casimir Effect. They essentially managed to extract a photon from a vacuum by introducing energy into the system. A real-world example of something coming from nothing. Granted, they fed energy into the vacuum, but the quantum universe acted like matter. That moment hit me hard, not just scientifically, but spiritually.

There is a theory that the “Cloth of Torun” is from a burst of energy that leaves behind an image. And after three days… Jesus returned to life. I’m not trying to reduce a central moment of faith to just science. If anything, the science is deepening my belief. What I’m seeing in this quantum research is not a way to explain away a miracle, but to glimpse the how behind the why.

I’m still working through a lot of this, and not quite ready to unpack every angle. But I can say this: the more I learn about the quantum universe, the more I’m convinced it’s not just a frontier for science fiction. It’s pointing toward something bigger. Something undeniably real.

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if you are thinking that at some point you will find a scientific solution to miracles, at that point God becomes unecessary to us all.

There are not means biblically where one can discover how it is that God is able to “speak things into existence”.

God didnt vibrate two mirrors in close proximity in a vacuum (Casimir effect) in order to create life…thats not how this works theologically.

Its interesting that ive come to this thread straight after the AI one. One thing that is observable in both topics here is the “human element”. Humanity has no capacity to overcome death. Nothing we do scientifically will ever change that. I believe this because in all honesty, until we are able to overcome the reality of gravity such that we are not bound by or to it…(need any more be said)

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I have never seen the logic in this. Knowing how something may have occered does not negate it or diminish it. Circumstance and knowledge out of time are as miraculous as something unexplainable. Science is supposedly how God works rather than negating the need for Him.

Is the Quantum Universe more than we thought? Of course! We are still learning. The day we think we know it ll is the day we die, both physically and metaphorically.

Richard

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Science is a human construct its our way of trying to explain, however,

God clearly isnt bound to or by science. How do we know this?

3And God said, “Let there be light,”a and there was light.

6And God said, “Let there be an expansec between the waters, to separate the waters from the waters.”

9And God said, “Let the waters under the sky be gathered into one place, so that the dry land may appear.”

Notable distinction comes with mankind though…instead of just speaking and it happening, this time God says…“LET US MAKE” (huge darwinian evolutionary problem with that statement)

26Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness
27So God created man in His own image;
in the image of God He created him;
male and female He created them.

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Yoou are misusing Scripture.

it says nothing of the kind

Richard

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Energy is not nothing. Energy is a conserved quantity, but there is no conservation of photons. Photons are NOT matter. Photons are bosons – energy particles. The matter particles are fermions. The important difference is the Fermi exclusion principle. Any number of bosons can occupy the same space while fermions cannot (at least they cannot do so until gravity is so great that it overcomes even this resistance and everything collapses into a black hole. This Fermi exclusion principle resistance is what keeps neutron stars from collapsing into black holes.

There are particles whose numbers are somewhat conserved: leptons and baryons. Both of these are fermion matter particles. For example, electrons are leptons and neutrons are baryons. Electrons can change by interactions into other types of leptons like neutrinos, and neutrons can change into other types of baryons such as protons. For example, a neutron can decay into a proton, electron, and an anti-neutrino. This conserves baryon number and lepton number.

But there is no such conservation number for photons. One photon can divide into more photons by interacting with atoms or fields. You see this happening around you when light from the sun shines on an object made of atoms and the atom resonates with one or more frequencies which give it a particular color by producing photons with those frequencies, the left over energy either goes into kinetic thermal heat or radiates (gives up photons) at a different frequency, such as infra-red (radiated heat) photons.

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Id suggest you start reading more widely in the bible…if you honestly think the guy who created science is bound by it, then you simply dont get what omnipotent, omnipresent, allpowerful means. These are all descriptors for God. Let me just evidence two of these…omnipresent, and allpowerful

Google AI on the question “is God omnipresent”

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Allpowerful, miracles are not bound to or explained scientifically. Even your side agrees miracles exceed the boundaries of science…

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If miracles come from God, Christs miracles being proof of that historically, then clearly yes the Bible does make the claim, God is not bound by science.

I can reference dozens more miracles, we can reference the book of Job… if you wont be convinced with just Christs ministry…we can play the theological game of balance of probabilities here if your scientific mind will only accept the numbers game, its not a difficult theological case to make.

Oh btw…if God is bound by his own construct of science, how did Christ levitate up into the sky against gravity, and return through outer space (an airless vacuum) in order to get to heaven? Again, yes the bible says exactly what ive claimed…God isnt bound by science! And therefore your statement denying that is demonstrably incorrect (100% wrong)

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What do you mean by “solution”? The Big Bang is a solution to how the universe started, but that does not mean we can start our own universes, so if we figured out how God does miracles it wouldn’t mean “God becomes unnecessary”. Really, that would be like saying that because I know that knitting needles were used to make the sweaters in my closet that my mom wasn’t necessary to their making!

Maybe, maybe not, at least on a biological level. Just like Adam in the Garden, though, if an elephant steps on my chest I’d still die.

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Recent result of some quantum mechanics math applied to black holes: black holes may actually be holes – there may not be any inside to them!

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Fallacy of equivocation: in the first sentence, you’re speaking of science as an activity; in the second, you are speaking of science as a set of laws.

As a set of laws, science may just be exactly nothing more nor less than how God does things.

All things were created by the Word. That includes science.
God is bound by His Word. This suggests that by making science, God bound Himself to it, at least within this Creation that runs by science.

I don’t.
They exceed the boundaries of the human ability to make use of science, but that doesn’t mean they violate the functioning of science.

Sorry, but your conclusion is contained in your premise – it’s circular reasoning.

I can make a ball bearing levitate against gravity, so why does Christ ascending pose a problem?

Where is that in the text? All we know is that He vanished into the clouds.

Nope – you’re adding to the text.

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Sorry, but you completely missed my post.

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Energy can change to matter, matter to energy. Energy can create plasma… this was was to inspire the wonder of the universe God created.

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Am I the only one to see the wonder and Grace of this?

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Perhaps this explanation will show you just how profound it is…

The distinction between thing and action has been erased, because one can be converted into the other and visa versa. For example… matter particles are classified as things and motion is classified as action. But particle accelerators routinely convert motion into matter. The theological implication is creation that ex nihilo is a perfectly reasonable idea because it means that God’s action of creation can be quite sufficient to provide all the substance of the things created. What was thought theologically reasonable is shown to be scientifically reasonable also.

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What is scientifically reasonable is that energy can be turned into matter.
What is an open question is from where did the huge amount of energy needed to form the universe come from?

One thing to remember is that we cannot assume that the laws of this universe would be valid before this universe emerged. So, scientific hypotheses built on the current laws of nature operating in our current space-time cannot reveal anything credible about the conditions and happenings before this universe emerged.

As a believer, I believe that one way or other, the energy came originally from God. That is not a scientifically justified claim because it is based on faith, not on scientifically valid research.
It is doubtful if my theologically reasonable belief about creation is also scientifically reasonable.

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Yes. It is certainly not my suggestion that creation can be a scientific explanation. The only scientific explanation I have heard for the origin of the matter and energy content of the universe is a vacuum decay from a spontaneous symmetry breaking in the laws of nature due to the cooling of the universe as it expanded. But like a lot of cosmology this is highly speculative and actual evidence is hard to come by.

On the other hand, we can observe that while science requires objective observation, scientists are also human beings with a life which requires subjective participation. Thus they can not only indulge in speculation where the evidence is insufficient but can also do the even more subjective activities of metaphysics (philosophical study of the nature of reality) and theology. Though they should be quick to acknowledge that this isn’t science anymore.

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Some of the comments, such as those about particle accelerators and the Big Bang, are very interesting. Whether or not God used the Big Bang as a means of creation doesn’t concern me. What I personally believe is that He created the universe and our world. Our quest to understand science and how things work should not be shunned. The real question is how we use that knowledge.

For me, as I’ve been learning more about energy and matter beyond what I was originally taught, I’m discovering new possibilities I never imagined. I don’t understand how seeing God in all of this could be seen in a negative light, as some of the earlier comments suggested.

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Perhaps it boils down to knowing. There is a human need to know that can put us on anequal plane with God. We think we know so God is demiinished. You have managed to hold onto the wonder of God that transends knowing and appreciates the kniwledge for what it is rathenr than what it achieves.

Richard

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  • Wish I could claim credit for this question, but I can’t. "“How does the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics contribute to world justice”? Presented elsewhere in this forum as analogy to a question that I posed, turns out that googling the question, "Has anyone ever written about ““How does the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics contribute to world justice”?” yielded links to:
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Such an explanation could only work after the universe emerged. There were no vacuum before this universe - vacuum has a place in space-time and it is not fully empty. Even if it would not contain particles, all kinds of waves and forces cross the vacuum.

I have heard a few times one or more hypotheses related to the multiversum. Those hypotheses are also faulty explanations for the beginning because they only shift the beginning to an earlier timepoint. It is also at least as difficult to explain how this ‘something’ from where this universe emerged started.

Believer or atheist, there is always something that created or caused this universe or its predecessor to emerge. For a believer, it is the Creator, for an atheist it is something else.

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