I don't have the smarts to be discerning either, but that's probably due to a damning California education.

I'll be discerning anyway: According to the article, quantum physics states that particles pop in and out of existence all the time. Now, I know s*** about quantum physics, but I was taught throughout grades 1-12 that all matter can neither be created or destroyed, and this seems like a clear violation of that. Since this "knowledge" has supposedly been around for a while, I don't fancy being taught one thing in one school and being told it's completely wrong the next step up.

This guy furthers this line of thought by saying that according to that principle, entire universes must pop in and out of existence all the time. We've been around for more than 14 billion years; so either ours has a damn fine bit of luck (what with his "winning lottery ticket" and all), or it's simply in no danger of collapsing and his physics is wrong.

I think I see where he's going with his talk about gravitational energy, but it still needs a lot more explaining. Basically, I think he's referring to gravitational potential and kinetic energy when he simply states "gravitational field energy". I'm seeing a concept likened to a scale, one side potential, one side kinetic. When balanced, both are at what could be called the "zero line". When one side increases (gets higher on the scale), it takes away energy from the other side (which gets lower on the scale). This happens because the scale represents both sides of the same energy, so if an object gains more potential energy, it loses kinetic energy, and vice versa. No matter what happens, the negative energy on one side balances out the positive energy on the other side so it always equals zero.

The flaws I see with this, though, are that I've never heard of "negative" potential or kinetic energy, nor do I see how it could occur in the universe; and that if mater does pop in and out of existence like he says, then this gravitational "balance" in the universe would be thrown off and equal something greater or less than zero. Then again, gravitational field energy could be something completely different (remember, I'm no expert at this stuff).

And of course there's his "It's 'how', not 'why'" thing. In my opinion, while physics and philosophy can and probably do on some level, it's best to make sure that the physics part actually corresponds to reality.