Jan 16, 2026 08:52 PM
Wormholes may not exist - we’ve found they reveal something deeper about time and the universe
https://theconversation.com/wormholes-ma...rse-272832
EXCERPT: Our recent work revisits the Einstein-Rosen bridge puzzle using a modern quantum interpretation of time, building on ideas developed by Sravan Kumar and João Marto.
Most fundamental laws of physics do not distinguish between past and future, or between left and right. If time or space is reversed in their equations, the laws remain valid. Taking these symmetries seriously leads to a different interpretation of the Einstein-Rosen bridge.
Rather than a tunnel through space, it can be understood as two complementary components of a quantum state. In one, time flows forward; in the other, it flows backward from its mirror-reflected position.
This symmetry is not a philosophical preference. Once infinities are excluded, quantum evolution must remain complete and reversible at the microscopic level - even in the presence of gravity.
The “bridge” expresses the fact that both time components are needed to describe a complete physical system. In ordinary situations, physicists ignore the time-reversed component by choosing a single arrow of time. But near black holes, or in expanding and collapsing universes, both directions must be included for a consistent quantum description. It is here that Einstein-Rosen bridges naturally arise.
Solving the information paradox. At the microscopic level, the bridge allows information to pass across what appears to us as an event horizon - a point of no return. Information does not vanish; it continues evolving, but along the opposite, mirror temporal direction.
This framework offers a natural resolution to the famous black hole information paradox. In 1974, Stephen Hawking showed that black holes radiate heat and can eventually evaporate, apparently erasing all information about what fell into them - contradicting the quantum principle that evolution must preserve information.
The paradox arises only if we insist on describing horizons using a single, one-sided arrow of time extrapolated to infinity - an assumption quantum mechanics itself does not require.
If the full quantum description includes both time directions, nothing is truly lost. Information leaves our time direction and re-emerges along the reversed one. Completeness and causality are preserved, without invoking exotic new physics.
These ideas are difficult to grasp because we are macroscopic beings who experience only one direction of time. On everyday scales, disorder - or entropy - tends to increase. A highly ordered state naturally evolves into a disordered one, never the reverse. This gives us an arrow of time.
But quantum mechanics allows more subtle behaviour. Intriguingly, evidence for this hidden structure may already exist. The cosmic microwave background - the afterglow of the Big Bang - shows a small but persistent asymmetry: a preference for one spatial orientation over its mirror image.
This anomaly has puzzled cosmologists for two decades. Standard models assign it extremely low probability - unless mirror quantum components are included.
Echoes of a prior universe? This picture connects naturally to a deeper possibility. What we call the “Big Bang” may not have been the absolute beginning, but a bounce - a quantum transition between two time-reversed phases of cosmic evolution.
In such a scenario, black holes could act as bridges not just between time directions, but between different cosmological epochs. Our universe might be the interior of a black hole formed in another, parent cosmos. This could have formed as a closed region of spacetime collapsed, bounced back and began expanding as the universe we observe today... (MORE - details)
https://theconversation.com/wormholes-ma...rse-272832
EXCERPT: Our recent work revisits the Einstein-Rosen bridge puzzle using a modern quantum interpretation of time, building on ideas developed by Sravan Kumar and João Marto.
Most fundamental laws of physics do not distinguish between past and future, or between left and right. If time or space is reversed in their equations, the laws remain valid. Taking these symmetries seriously leads to a different interpretation of the Einstein-Rosen bridge.
Rather than a tunnel through space, it can be understood as two complementary components of a quantum state. In one, time flows forward; in the other, it flows backward from its mirror-reflected position.
This symmetry is not a philosophical preference. Once infinities are excluded, quantum evolution must remain complete and reversible at the microscopic level - even in the presence of gravity.
The “bridge” expresses the fact that both time components are needed to describe a complete physical system. In ordinary situations, physicists ignore the time-reversed component by choosing a single arrow of time. But near black holes, or in expanding and collapsing universes, both directions must be included for a consistent quantum description. It is here that Einstein-Rosen bridges naturally arise.
Solving the information paradox. At the microscopic level, the bridge allows information to pass across what appears to us as an event horizon - a point of no return. Information does not vanish; it continues evolving, but along the opposite, mirror temporal direction.
This framework offers a natural resolution to the famous black hole information paradox. In 1974, Stephen Hawking showed that black holes radiate heat and can eventually evaporate, apparently erasing all information about what fell into them - contradicting the quantum principle that evolution must preserve information.
The paradox arises only if we insist on describing horizons using a single, one-sided arrow of time extrapolated to infinity - an assumption quantum mechanics itself does not require.
If the full quantum description includes both time directions, nothing is truly lost. Information leaves our time direction and re-emerges along the reversed one. Completeness and causality are preserved, without invoking exotic new physics.
These ideas are difficult to grasp because we are macroscopic beings who experience only one direction of time. On everyday scales, disorder - or entropy - tends to increase. A highly ordered state naturally evolves into a disordered one, never the reverse. This gives us an arrow of time.
But quantum mechanics allows more subtle behaviour. Intriguingly, evidence for this hidden structure may already exist. The cosmic microwave background - the afterglow of the Big Bang - shows a small but persistent asymmetry: a preference for one spatial orientation over its mirror image.
This anomaly has puzzled cosmologists for two decades. Standard models assign it extremely low probability - unless mirror quantum components are included.
Echoes of a prior universe? This picture connects naturally to a deeper possibility. What we call the “Big Bang” may not have been the absolute beginning, but a bounce - a quantum transition between two time-reversed phases of cosmic evolution.
In such a scenario, black holes could act as bridges not just between time directions, but between different cosmological epochs. Our universe might be the interior of a black hole formed in another, parent cosmos. This could have formed as a closed region of spacetime collapsed, bounced back and began expanding as the universe we observe today... (MORE - details)