From: John K Clark (johnkc@well.com)
Date: Sat Dec 28 1996 - 22:31:43 MST
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On Sat, 28 Dec 1996 Michael Lorrey <retroman@tpk.net> Wrote:
>>John:
>>I think most would say the universe is probably open and so
>>will never collapse. Even Tipler thinks the universe is
>>ALMOST open and so will take a very long time before it
>>starts to collapse, 10^18 years. So according to Tipler The
>>Omega Point will happen in 2 * 10^18 years, give or take a
>>few hundred trillion. That's a very large number to be sure,
>>but it's no closer to being infinite than the number 1 is.
>Michael:
>John, how does this relate to the rate of proton decay?
>Will all the matter in the universe evaporate before it
>starts to collapse again?
If the Proton is unstable, 2*10^18 years is far too short for proton decay to
be important. In Physics a Grand United Theory (GUTS) is something that
unites all the forces of nature except Gravity, a Theory Of Everything (TOE)
would include Gravity too. A few years ago the most popular GUTS theory was
called SU(5), it predicted that the half life of the proton was 10^31 years.
Several very large and expensive experiments were performed and they should
have detect this decay, but they did not, so SU(5) must be wrong. If the
Proton does decay its half life is a good deal greater than 10^31 years.
John K Clark johnkc@well.com
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