Beyond the big bang: Irishman's universal evolution theory challenges accepted cosmology
origin story
of our universe for decades. But what if it's wrong?
What if, instead of starting 13 billion years ago as a tiny ball of incomprehensibly hot gas exploding with unimaginable force and expanding eternally into an inexplicable nothingness, it evolved from another universe which in turn evolved from another?
Julian Gough, the Irish author, playwright and one-time musician, has unveiled a cosmological theory he believes may better explain the origins of our universe than widely accepted theories.
He admits there will be blowback for the 'blowtorch theory' published on his cosmology website
The Egg and the Rock
but is not fazed by the criticism that will come his way.
READ MORE
The author, who wrote the last chapter of
Minecraft
and whose novels have been published in 37 languages, has seen his website achieve a cult following driven by his successful prediction, before the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) sent back its first data in 2022, that it would observe extremely early, rapid galaxy formation, with those galaxies dominated by supermassive black holes.
His predictions saw many scientists actively helping him to develop the new theory and attracted funding from Emergent Ventures (run by the economist and polymath
Tyler Cowen
), and O'Shaughnessy Ventures (run by the venture capital investor, quant pioneer, and former board chair of Stability AI,
Jim O'Shaughnessy
).
His theory posits the idea that sustained, powerful jets from supermassive black holes in the extremely early universe 'actively carved the large-scale structure of the universe we see all around us today, including galaxies, cosmic voids, and filament'.
Julian Gough: The Irish author, playwright and one-time musician believes his 'blowtorch' theory may better explain the origins of our universe than widely accepted theories. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times
He said the JWST 'has shaken the faith of many cosmologists, astronomers and astrophysicists in their models' adding that the telescope's observations 'are causing ongoing chaos and I'm the only guy who accurately predicted, at every stage, what it would see'.
Gough's blowtorch theory and the evolutionary cosmology is, he suggested, 'more exciting and attractive right now than the mainstream theory, 'lambda cold dark matter', which, after 50 years of constant tweaking, still didn't see any of this coming'.
[
James Webb telescope finds its first exoplanet, raising hopes it will discover life elsewhere in universe
Opens in new window
]
The blowtorch theory 'is a product of three-stage cosmological natural selection, or what we're now starting to call evolutionary cosmology', Gough said, that draws much from evolutionary biology and 'has huge explanatory and predictive power when applied to our universe'.
The core idea is that our universe evolved, in the Darwinian sense, and that it's descended from earlier, simpler universes, which reproduced through black holes.
'Evolution has therefore fine tuned our particular universe to produce, first, some supermassive black holes, which then generate stars and thus galaxies around themselves, which generate many more secondary, star-sized black holes but also the periodic table of the elements, which generate planets, which generate life, which generates technology, which generates huge numbers of small, technologically produced third-stage black holes (for extremely efficient, sustainable, long-term energy production),' Gough said.
'Each of these three evolved developmental steps helps the universe reproduce more efficiently, by generating more black holes – more offspring – from the same amount of matter.'
His conclusion is that 'biology is the first half of the periodic table coming to life; technology is the second half of the periodic table coming to life in an evolved developmental process that helps the universe to reproduce'.
The James Webb Space Telescope whose observations have 'shaken the faith of many cosmologists, astronomers and astrophysicists in their models', says Julian Gough. Photograph: Nasa
According to Gough, the mainstream approach 'has always been, there is one universe, and everything that happens in it is random and arbitrary, and life is just this weird, unlikely accident'.
'But that mainstream approach has great difficulty explaining the extremely rapid, efficient, step-by-step development of our universe since the big bang, from a ball of hot gas to the hyper-sophisticated world we live in. And, unfortunately for the status quo, predictions based on evolutionary cosmology now massively outperform predictions made using the old approach.'
Some recent developments seem to be working in the theory's favour. Late last month, Nasa reported that an international team of astronomers using the JWST 'identified bright hydrogen emission from a galaxy in an unexpectedly early time in the universe's history'.
'The surprise finding is challenging researchers to explain how this light could have pierced the thick fog of neutral hydrogen that filled space at that time,' it said.
Gough said the findings could be explained by an 'enormous jet from a supermassive black hole'.
Not everyone is convinced. One Irish-based scientist dismissed Gough's work out of hand: 'This looks like crazy stuff to me and I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole.' Others are far less dismissive.
We need a more open-minded dialogue between mainstream and unconventional lines of research to escape the dead end we manoeuvred ourselves into
—
Dr Jenny Wagner
Dr Jenny Wagner, a German cosmologist, physicist and author based at the Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics in Helsinki, told The Irish Times Gough has developed 'an interesting idea'.
She noted that standard observational cosmology collects evidence to track the evolution of the cosmos from the first picture we have, which, she argued, goes from 'the rather homogeneous and isotropic cosmic microwave background to the highly complex landscape it has become with all its galaxy clusters, galaxies, stars, and planets'.
Wagner said it was possible to 'only observe and draw conclusions from the single universe we happen to live in. These are the huge drawbacks. It is like studying medicine on a single patient.'
She suggested the extremes of thinking were the anthropic principle, where 'the universe is as it is because we are here to observe it, because we are special' and the 'nihilistic answer that everything that is possible is actually created, so there should not be a single universe with fine-tuned conditions for life, but rather a multitude of universes (a multimultiverse) realising every possible scenario.
'Between these extreme ends, the blowtorch theory assumes that there is an evolution of universes. Complexity increases with every step forward and builds upon the previous stage.'
Wagner said an 'intriguing part of the blowtorch theory stays at the level of observationally testable predictions in our cosmos: it raises highly important questions on the validity of our current concordance model in cosmology. For instance, do we really need dark matter to explain our observations?
The Tarantula Nebula star-forming region which lies about 170,000 light years from Earth. Photograph: European Southern Observatory
Dark matter supposedly contributes 85 per cent of the total matter content of the universe. It is a single and elegant concept that can successfully explain many data sets from the cosmic microwave background to the non-linear structures we observe today.
'However, after more than half a century of dark-matter research, all we have is indirect evidence. Cern and other experiments like DAMA/LIBRA, XENONnT or IceCube have not found any particle candidate.'
[
Euclid space telescope reveals exquisite images of dark universe
Opens in new window
]
She said the problem 'lies in the fact that the inconsistencies in our current data do not hint at specific alternative models. There are many ways to resolve the issues, as well. Hence, we need more blowtorches to shed light in a 95 per cent dark and mysterious cosmological model. In particular, we need a more open-minded dialogue between mainstream and unconventional lines of research to escape the dead end we manoeuvred ourselves into.'
Clément Vidal, a philosopher at the
Vrije University Brussels
in Belgium, said Gough 'paints an accurate picture of the crisis in cosmological models, as they are having a hard time to accommodate new observational data from JWST'.
He said theories in cosmology 'are in a dark age, and the present crisis deserves to be addressed with new thinking'.
He noted that previously Gough predicted using an evolutionary take on cosmology drawing on Lee Smolin's theory of cosmological natural selection that galaxies should form as early as 100 million years after the big bang.
He said evolutionary theory and thinking have been 'successfully extended well beyond the biological realm, into culture, technology but also economics or psychology. Evolutionary cosmology continues this extension, and offers a new paradigm for cosmology. This is still early, and more effort is needed to further test new predictions, ideally with more detailed models making even more specific predictions, published in peer-reviewed articles so that more scientists can engage in this fascinating debate.'
Johannes Jaeger, an evolutionary biologist, systems thinker and philosopher based at the University of Vienna, said Gough's James Webb predictions 'should stand as evidence that he is certainly no crackpot'.
He accepted that while 'evolutionary cosmology may be speculative at this point' it could 'contain the kind of explanation that could tell us why the parameters of the universe are fine tuned the way they are. At least, it seems to me, somebody in the physics community should be open to having a look at this theory', and while Gough's ideas 'are no doubt speculative [they] are definitely worthy of checking out. Isn't this how science was meant to work?'
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Independent
13 hours ago
- Irish Independent
Irish professor appointed to UN panel on effects of nuclear war
An Irish professor is one of 21 scientists that have been appointed to a United Nations panel to report on the effects of a nuclear war. Dr Neil Rowan of the Technological University of the Shannon, who was recognised in the top 2pc of scientists in the world by Stanford University in 2023, has been appointed to the newly established panel. Register for free to read this story Register and create a profile to get access to our free stories. You'll also unlock more free stories each week.
Irish Examiner
2 days ago
- Irish Examiner
Can Ireland's ash trees stage a comeback against deadly dieback?
For more than a decade, Ireland's ash trees have been quietly dying. Victims of a deadly fungal disease known as ash dieback, they have withered in woodlands, fallen from hedgerows, and left gaps in a landscape where they once stood proud and plentiful. Since its arrival in 2012, ash dieback has spread relentlessly across the island, and with it has come growing concern for biodiversity, forestry, and even national identity. Yet, amid the losses, a new hope is sprouting. Science shows our ash trees may be fighting back. A devastating foe Ash dieback, caused by the fungus Hymenoscyphus fraxineus, sneaked into Ireland through imported plants, spreading like wildfire. Its spores attack ash trees' leaves, choking their ability to carry water and nutrients. Ash dieback The result? Withered branches, cracked bark — and, for many young trees, a death sentence. It's estimated that up to 90% of Ireland's ash trees could be at risk, with entire woodlands and hedgerows fading away. The fallout is more than just a loss of trees. Ash trees are the backbone of our ecosystems, supporting more than 40 species of insects, lichens, and fungi that keep our woodlands teeming with life. Their decline ripples through the food chain, threatening birds and other wildlife. And then there's hurling. Our beloved sport that relies on ash for crafting hurleys. With local ash in short supply, we've had to turn to imported timber... a bittersweet shift for a game woven so deeply into our national identity. Nature fights back But the story doesn't end there. A groundbreaking study from Britain, hot off the press in the journal Science , brings a ray of hope. Researchers from Kew Gardens and Queen Mary University of London studied a woodland in Surrey and discovered that young ash trees are tougher than their parents. By comparing DNA, they found that these saplings have inherited thousands of tiny genetic tweaks that help them fend off the fungus. It's evolution in action, happening right before our eyes. Here in Ireland, this discovery hits home. Our ash trees share the same genetic roots as those in Britain, and Irish scientists are already spotting survivors in our woodlands. By collecting their seeds and using cutting-edge genetic tools, foresters are working to determine if they can grow a new generation of ash that can stand strong. But this process will take time. Resistance is not immunity, and many trees, particularly older ones, will continue to die. But it's a start. Echoes from the past This isn't the first time Ireland's trees have faced a crisis. While ash dieback is a modern disease, the idea of trees succumbing to disease is not new. Thousands of years ago, around 5,000–6,000 years back, our elm trees vanished in a mysterious 'elm decline'. Ancient pollen buried in bogs and lakes show a dramatic and rapid drop in elm (Ulmus) trees. For years, scientists debated whether this decline was caused by early farming practices or a natural disease outbreak. Today, many palaeoecologists believe that a form of Dutch elm disease (or a closely related pathogen) may have triggered this ancient collapse. Though not directly linked to ash, the elm decline provides a powerful precedent for how tree disease can reshape entire landscapes. More subtle changes in the pollen record, such as temporary declines in ash or oak, might also reflect short-lived disease events or stressors like drought or fire. New techniques, such as sedimentary ancient DNA (sedaDNA) analysis, are beginning to offer even greater insight, detecting not only the presence of tree species but also the DNA of associated fungi and pathogens preserved in sediment layers. These long-term records remind us that forest ecosystems are dynamic and resilient, capable of both suffering and recovering from shock. They also provide a long-term perspective on how tree species may have responded to past climate changes and biological threats. A path forward Today, scientists and foresters are working together to manage the immediate crisis and prepare for the long haul. Elongated angular stem lesions, one of the symptoms to look out for with ash dieback /(Chalara fraxinea). Across Ireland, seeds are being collected from surviving ash trees, saplings are being tested for resistance, and new planting strategies are being explored to determine if resilient stock could be reintroduced into the landscape. At the same time, it's important to not view the ash crisis in isolation. A more diverse forest, one that includes native species like oak, birch, rowan and hazel, is more likely to withstand future challenges, whether from disease, invasive pests, or a changing climate. Still, the idea that ash could one day reclaim its place in Irish hedgerows, woodlands, and hurley workshops is no longer just wishful thinking. It won't happen overnight. Rebuilding our ash woodlands will take decades, blending nature's resilience with human ingenuity. But imagine a future where ash trees once again shade our fields and fuel our hurling matches. So, while ash trees are down, they're not out of the game just yet.
Irish Independent
2 days ago
- Irish Independent
Irish navigation gyroscope to guide new European space mission
An Irish navigation gyroscope will guide a European space mission carrying four Earth observation satellites and another to measure global greenhouse gas distribution, set to launch from French Guiana early tomorrow morning.
