Around Halloween, I have a tradition of posting about the “spooky” side of physics. This year, I’ll be comparing two no doubt often confused topics, Cosmic Horror and Cosmology.
Pro tip: if this guy shows up, it’s probably Cosmic Horror
Cosmic Horror |
Cosmology |
| Started in the 1920’s with the work of Howard Phillips Lovecraft | Started in the 1920’s with the work of Alexander Friedmann |
| Unimaginably ancient universe | Precisely imagined ancient universe |
| In strange ages even death may die | Strange ages, what redshift is that? |
| An expedition to Antarctica uncovers ruins of a terrifying alien civilization | An expedition to Antarctica uncovers…actually, never mind, just dust |
| Alien beings may propagate in hidden dimensions | Gravitons may propagate in hidden dimensions |
| Cultists compete to be last to be eaten by the Elder Gods | Grad students compete to be last to realize there are no jobs |
| Oceanic “deep ones” breed with humans | Have you seen daycare costs in a university town? No way. |
| Variety of inventive and bizarre creatures, inspiring libraries worth of copycat works | Fritz Zwicky |
| Hollywood adaptations are increasingly popular, not very faithful to source material | Actually this is exactly the same |
| Can waste hours on an ultimately fruitless game of Arkham Horror | Can waste hours on an ultimately fruitless argument with Paul Steinhardt |
| No matter what we do, eventually Azathoth will kill us all | No matter what we do, eventually vacuum decay will kill us all |
4 gravitons 