July 12, 2024 8-10 PM

Event Type: Lecture and Stargazing
Title: An Odyssey Through the Warped Side of Our Universe
Lecturer: Kip Thorne
Position: Emeritus Professor
Institution: Caltech
Abstract:
In the sixty-odd years of my career in astrophysics, we have come to understand that our universe has a very rich warped side.  By this I mean objects and phenomena made from warped spacetime instead of from matter.  In this lecture, I will describe some of what we have learned. For example: weird facets of black holes that you may not have not heard of before. And also likely new to you:  voracious, ‘vacuum fluctuations’ — tiny bits of everything that ever could inhabit our universe, flashing in and out of existence, randomly.  These fluctuations suck energy from rapidly distorting spacetime and use it to convert themselves into real, material stuff.