@Mikey  
@Cirrus Light  
Oh hey - something I forgot to mention - I mentioned Eternal Inflation in my reply; so, before Hawking died, he worked on a paper on Eternal Inflation, and it was taking some (weeks? months?) time to get published, and he died during that time. So his last paper was actually solving a big problem in the mathematics of Eternal Inflation titled, “A Smooth Exit from Eternal Inflation”. I’m not sure exactly what “exit” means in this context, but from what I’ve gathered it’s a pretty significant paper for bolstering Eternal Inflation.
 
So that actually ties back to Hawking a bit :q

@Ninji  
Lol, yeah, basically that’s it, at least afaik.
 
 
@Ninji  
Everett Many Worlds’ Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, I’d point out. There is no actual “multiverse theory”. But there are many theories that would imply we’re in a multiverse. But then you have to be careful what you mean by a “multiverse”.
 
Like I said in the last comment, if you just mean some volume of space that’s inaccessible from another, then the space between the Hubble Volume and the limits of the Observable Universe are actually in another universe. And if you go in a black hole, then the whole universe is a separate universe to you.
 
Gonna give a third (and final?) shoutout to Brian Greene, here. He took me from casual observer to a much deeper understanding of all this stuff and all these theories.

@Cirrus Light  
“Basically it’s just, “what if there is an ether, but you use Lorentz transformations on it?”.”  
Then you’re left with an ether of a very interesting, four dimensional shape.

Hawking was a huge proponent of the many worlds theory, believing that the collapse of wave functions are not observer dependent, but instead observers find themselves in variable branches of reality that correspond to different outcomes.
 
Rick and Morty is a fun cartoon that models itself around this theory.

@Ninji  
Shouldn’t involve any quantum stuff. It’s an interpretation of Special Relativity, after all. Heh, did you wiki it? Wiki articles always seem to be written to Ph.D’s. I can look up a wiki article on something I thought was really basic and that I understood well, only to get totally lost, lol.
 
Basically it’s just, “what if there is an ether, but you use Lorentz transformations on it?”.
 
If you’ve taken a class that even just solved a few homework problems in SR, then you were probably thinking in terms of Lorentzian ether when you worked on it, actually. At least I think. I could be wrong about that, but from what I understand it’s basically just like saying “even if the entire universe really had ‘one true reference frame’, if you use the Lorentz transformations, it is impossible to single out this frame.”
 
@Cyan Lightning  
I’m commenting a lot but it’s just I can’t leave these common misconceptions unanswered! >.<
 
I will say, though, that General Relativity is based on the idea that spacetime is a 4-dimensional [hyper]surface, with time as one of those dimensions.
 
I don’t know of any major theories that propose multiple dimensions of time, though.
 
There’s Everett’s Many Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics, but that’s really more like “anything that has any chance of happening (as defined by quantum probability) happened in offshoot universes that are just as real as this one and still exist but we can’t interact with those modes of existence”.
 
There’s like 7 different big theories that predict a multiverse should exist within the mainstream, and one of them that’s actually kinda provably observed.
 
You know that thing I said about time and space being one thing? Well, because the universe is expanding, some parts of it that we can observe at the very edge of the observable universe, are actually impossible to reach. In some relativistic interpretations, you could say they’re really no longer within our universe, since it’s fundamentally impossible to reach them anymore because of relativity stuff (heh). That’s the first one - Brian Greene called this the “quilted multiverse” in The Hidden Reality. I suggest it to you, as well, if you’re interested.
 
I think it’s also been called the “patchwork multiverse”. Specifically, it comes from either a) the difference in-between the “Hubble Volume” (the universe we can reach) and the “Observable Universe”. The universe is expanding, so there’s a limit to how far you can reach because of relativity reasons (heh), but because the expansion is accelerating, we can see (observable) parts of the universe that are now beyond reach.  
b) and if you assume the universe is bigger even than the observable universe - maybe even infinite, then there’s a lot of space out there, indeed, that we cannot reach. An infinite amount, even, if it’s infinite.
 
But hey, all that changes (I think?) if FTL is possible, so who knows :q
 
Most physicists will tell you FTL is unlikely, I’d argue it’s actually totally real and the Hubble Volume and black holes and Shapiro effect are all proofs of it fundamentally, but that’s a technical argument for another day… But things like wormholes and even a form of warp drive are totally within General Relativity (GR), the question is if they’re within a valid part of GR.

@Cirrus Light  
Lorentz Ether went over my head in the minute I took to review it. Sounds like quantum electrodynamics and special relativity. I’ll probably watch a video later.
 
The Lorentz transformation is an incredible tool for understanding how coordinates transform through frames of reference in special relativity.
 
This is probably my favorite video on special relativity  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YFrISfN7jo

@Mikey  
Well my favorite theory is multi-verse. The thing that I like from is that the time isn’t 1 dimension but rather 3 dimension or more, in this way everything that could happened already happened in the other universes like Axis won the war, Adolf Hitler never born and…. Wait a sec since when this place became a nerd forum? not really have a problem just it’s amusing me XD

@Dust Rock  
Maybe you’ll change your mind when you see my earlier reply :p  
If it’s time you’re interested in, I’d argue General Relativity is where it’s at, not Quantum.
 
@Mikey  
Afaik that theory doesn’t have a lot of solid grounding and is based on String Theory, which is, itself, rather speculative. I’d say if you’re a fan of the idea of a multiverse, then Eternal Inflation is probably your best bet.
 
Lol, probably the best way to describe it is that there’s another plane of reality with a sea of energy that quantumly fluctuates, and whenever those random quantum fluctuations make a little spike in the energy high enough, a big bang happens in a little offshoot universe, and that’s what happened for ours.
 
I could go in depth on what I mean by “another plane of reality”, about relativity and it being in our past and all that relativistic weirdness, but I think shy of years of me studying it to understand better, and a long sit-down conversation and lecture, just saying it’s the plane of reality older than and beyond Cthulu’s comprehension probably paints an accurate enough picture :q
 
I super duper highly recommend Brian Greene’s The Hidden Reality. Greene explains it surprisingly deep and well without getting into all the math, and goes over like 7 or so versions of a multiverse that current theories predict may exist. Amazing book, and Brian Greene (through his books) is probably the single person that made me decide to switch from engineering to physics, lol.

@Dust Rock  
I actually think God might be our invention. Lol, it’s probably just one of these many little fleeting ideas I play with, but here’s one - what if in a thousand years we have time travel and AI using computers we can’t even imagine now with intelligence far beyond our comprehension. Would we not have created God?
 
Simulation hypothesis is also a fun avenue into a scientifically possible God.
 
Though I wonder if that’s really any different from some solipsistic/metaphysical God?
 

 
At any rate, even taking Christianity with its classic modern interpretations, it seems we’re here in a place separated from God ever since Adam and Eve were booted from Eden, which means to some extent or other, it’s our playground to do as we please and whether or not God interferes with history, I don’t think we can rely on Him to make my paycheck next month or design and build FTL travel for us, and He certainly doesn’t seem to get in the way if some of us do stupid things like killing millions of people, so it’s really up to us to make our future a bright one.
 

 
As for time, General Relativity is my suggestion. Time is a dimension like distance. In fact, space (aka distance) and time are actually two manifestations of the same entity; spacetime. Time does not exist as a distinct thing from space, and space does not exist as a distinct thing from time.
 
If we have two different events, like the blink of a light - these events can be seperated by some x distance in space (meters) and some t distance in time (seconds) - ie, on happens before the other by t seconds, and they happen x meters apart. It turns out, how fast you go relative to them will change that distance x, and that time t, but what will always remain constant no matter how fast or slow you go in whatever direction, is the spacetime interval, s, where s is given by  
s^{2 = x}2 - c^{2 * t}2
 
That’s just kinda the tip of the iceburg, yet also the core of it, but suffice it to say, space does not exist as a distinct thing from time, and time does not exist as a distinct thing from space, as the two interchange depending on your motion relative to whatever you’re measuring, or even the gravitational field you’re in.
 

 
Oh, and spacetime is a curved surface. A curved “hypersurface”, technically, but that’s basically just another way of saying it’s a curved “surface”.
 
I’m also extremely intruiged by time, and space, since they are the canvas upon which reality exists, and probably the closest physics gets to metaphysics, so it’s my main interest in study - General Relativity is the description of spacetime as a curved hypersurface, and one of the two most successful physical theories ever - even so much it literally overwrites Newton’s theory of gravity.
 
Also it’s the theory that predicts black holes, time dilation, and has written within its mathematics the tantelizing possibility of wormholes and even other forms of faster-than-light travel. Whether those are odd artifacts of the theory or actual things that can exist is a great question you could devote your life to trying to figure out :q

@Dust Rock  
One of my personal favorite theories on the creation of this universe is from the multiverse theory, where the big bang was caused by two other universes colliding, and is a common thing.

@Cirrus Light  
I’m actually a big fan of quantum physics and string theory myself.

@Ninji  
@Ninji  
Theoretical models are tools we use to be able to make predictions about the universe. Also I dunno if autocorrect hit ya there but it’s “casimir”, not “cashmere” :q
 
Also if you want a fun trip with the aether, look up the “Lorentzian aether” interpretation of Special Relativity.
 
What’s even funner is what you’ll get if you ask a Relativist if spacetime itself is curved, or if matter just behaves a different way in gravitational fields and deflects around (Kip Thorne, Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein’s Outrageous Legacy).
 
Different interpretations are always weird and fun, especially how sometimes they can make problems easier to solve. Sort of like using polar coordinates for some problems and cartesian for others. Which is the “true” coordinate system? No real answer to that, but one is better for some problems, and the other is better for solving other problems. A lot like interpretations of physical theories.
 

 
I’m actually a bit of a fan of metaphysical philosophy and stuff. If a tree falls in the woods, and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? aka, are phenomenon and noumenon really two different things, or is the universe solipsistic?
 
I’ll be sure to test it scientifically if I ever manage to astral project :p

@Ninji  
What I would like to know in science is if time is just a concept or an actual physical construct we can manipulate. If so, it would answer life’s most burning questions.
 
Side note, that’s why neither side can (admittingly) truly be right. We don’t have a way to go forward or backward in time nor come back from death after the brain is fully dead, so proof of the big bang nor god is at a true stand still.
 
In a weird way it might be for the best. If God does exist and everyone knows for sure then we would just give up trying to improve the world and wait until our demise naturally. I think God wants us to continue to grow or the purpose he gave us would be over.
 
So either way you look at it we need scientific advances.

@Dust Rock
 
I love to read proto-science. Early science can give incite on the way people use to see things, how language works, and ultimately how to use the bible as a more accurate gauge of history, regardless of what you believe about it. It goes to show that everyone has come a long way.
 
My favorite theories:
 
Miasma Theory: Sickness and disease is caused by an elemental gas that comes from death and destruction.  
Spontaneous Generation: Specific conditions caused animals and disease to spontaneously enter existence.  
Classical elements: Phosphorous was the raw element of fire, Mercury was the unadulterated metal, Water, Air, and Aether where stand alone elements.
 
The aether was a substance in space which electromagnetic waves propagate. Issac Newton and Einstein redifined and ultimately dismissed it, and then we found a substance that permeates space, the Higgs Boson, AKA vacuum energy. It actually fits the classical definition of aether, and it does bump certain waves like the electron around, by randomly donating and stealing ‘weak hyper charge’ to change the chirality of the electron. Many geckos use microscopic tendrils to induce the cashmere effect, where frequency cutoffs cause vacuum energy to cling them to walls.
 
Science answers so many things, and works so well, but it’s going to be written over and over till the end of time, and in no way should be seen as an ultimate authority or answer. It’s a useful mindset, but it can’t tell you why or how you should live your life, ultimately that’s up to you.

@Ninji  
You do have a valid point and I would be wrong to say that Christian haven’t used science to evolve their structure, hell even our spiritual structure is increased with all the new technology boosting our passion to get out message out there.
 
Do not get me wrong, I do not stand with the ignorant who believe God is hateful towards those who hold “strange” sexuals or beliefs. God negates all that saying “love thy neighbor” and “he who is without sin cast the​ first stone”.
 
We need to embrace the new world and realize we cannot stay traditional. Steven Hawkings really pushed that envelope as well.

@Dust Rock  
It’s an extremely common theme in the scientific community. You shouldn’t be offended, because it’s not like anyone can agree on a system to quantify whos beliefs and efforts in life is worth more.
 
I’ve always felt like if their was a god, it would be virtuous to challenge the idea, so a lot of people get the wrong idea out of me, but I hold the same stance many ‘atheist scientist’ do, that is that people believing different things is an inherit part of life, and not necessarily a bad thing.
 
Steven Hawking was a hard but fair contender in challenging beliefs. It created some turbulence in his first marriage, but the thing to understand is scientist challenge everything, and faith never rewards them, it doesn’t mean they hate religion, or can’t coexists with it.

It’s like Shin Megami Tensei but with ponies instead of demons

I know he hated religion and as a Christian that offended me, but…
 
I didn’t want him to die. He was a very kind and wise man. His intellect couldn’t be matched.

@Nittany Discord  
I get to sit in with the physics faculty at my university for a weekly relaxed meeting thing they do. He was also known as a very good scientist, but very ambitious, lol. It felt to me like everyone was unsure quite what to think but were interested to see him try to solve the information paradox. Simultaneously skeptical but giving the benefit of the doubt in his ability to solve such a hard problem.
 
And he also communicated to the public well.
 
Scientist like Einstein or Newton, though, would’ve freaking unified Gravity and Quantum, lol. It’s hard to say if they were so revolutionary in and of themselves, though, or if problems of their times were just easier. A lot, lot, WAY less complicated, but they also needed a lot more creativity it seems like.
 
It’s like the difference in-between founding a new city and navigating the maze of streets of an old one and trying to improve it.

@Background Human
 
And the Conversion Bureau wasn’t just humans turning into ponies but all recorded human history, science, paintings, etc. being destroyed because they would “corrupt” the “perfect” pony society.

@Cyan Lightning  
Fun Fact: Stephen Hawking is the only person to ever play himself on Star Trek.

@Edhelistar  
That was Equestria coming to us. A hostile takeover.

@Edhelistar  
I’m clueless.

@CountSeartheMetalhead  
Wasn’t that the plot to The Conversion Bureau?

Stephen Hawking: We only have 100 years left on Earth. Discover new Worlds or face Extinction.
 
Me/Everyone Else: Let’s find and move to Equestria and become magical ponies.