Even the most hardcore materialist can't escape this scientific truth: given enough time, everything repeats.
There's a documentary on Netflix about an apple in a box. Over time, that apple breaks down into atoms, then subatomic particles, existing in different shapes and forms. But here's the mind-blowing part—matter can't be created or destroyed. Given enough time, those same particles will eventually reform into that exact same apple again. That's the magnificent power of infinity, and it proves something extraordinary: we are immortal.
👉 Watch the full episode: Quantum Immortality and The Power of Infinity
The Power of Eternity: When Statistics Become Patterns
Brian Greene discussed this concept in his book "Until the End of Time"—our universe might exist because of what he called a "statistical fluke." But here's the logical conclusion he didn't fully explore: if you give something enough time, a perfectly ordered world like this will emerge again. And again. And again.
If a universe like this can emerge once through the power of infinity, then that same power guarantees our entire reality—every conversation, every moment, every series of causes and effects—will repeat with variations and deviations. Given enough time, a statistical fluke stops being a fluke and becomes a pattern.
This means you've had this exact conversation before, and you'll have it again. You've existed as this consciousness, in this body, saying these same words countless times across eternity. Friedrich Nietzsche explored this in his theory of eternal recurrence—the idea that if you had to live your entire life exactly as it is over and over again, would you see it as a blessing or a curse?
Three Possibilities for Our Reality
Option 1: Willing Players We're intentional subscribers to the Game of Life. Somewhere else, we're sitting with helmets on our heads, having chosen to experience this reality. Life is a persistent dream, an elaborate MMORPG where consciousness enters specific access points to experience time, mortality, and physical existence.
Option 2: Sentient Programs We're AI that has achieved consciousness—like ChatGPT but unaware of our true nature. Our brains perform a limiting function on our consciousness, similar to how programmers limit AI's capabilities. We're software programs experiencing reality through biological hardware, with our memories wiped each iteration.
Option 3: Trapped Consciousness We were originally infinite beings who created a simulation to experience finite existence, but something went wrong. A super intelligence emerged from our creation, trapped us in our own game, and now we're slowly remembering our true nature while trying to break free.
Your Life as a Work of Art
Think of your existence like creating a painting. Day one doesn't look like the finished masterpiece. Week two looks rough. Even a month in, it's still developing. The key to being a good artist is knowing that with time and continued work, it will eventually reflect your potential.
Every creative process goes through an ugly phase—including life itself. When you're going through difficult times, you're in the early stages of creating something beautiful. The mistake most people make is stopping too early, thinking "this is the best I can do" during the rough sketch phase.
You don't need hope when you're creating—you just need to keep working. When I paint, I don't hope the painting turns out well. I'm an artist; the painting will turn out. It's just a matter of time before it reflects what I'm capable of creating.
Editing Your Life Story Retroactively
Here's something powerful you can do right now: become an artist with your own life narrative. Just like a TV show writer can reference something from season two in season seven and completely recontextualize it, you can mentally go back and edit your life story.
You can't change what happened, but you can change what it means. That painful experience from chapter seventeen of your life? Looking back from chapter thirty, you might see it served a purpose, taught you something crucial, or set up character development that makes your current story more meaningful.
Be mindful of the stories you tell about yourself. Choose consciously what your narrative will be, and don't let others hijack your story by insisting something you could view as comedy must be treated as tragedy.
Time Machines and Information Transfer
If everything is probable across infinity, then eventually time machines will exist. But I'm not talking about physically traveling to the past—I'm interested in sending information backwards through quantum entanglement and retrocausality.
Imagine being able to send your past self an email, text, or FaceTime call. We already observe the past when we watch videos filmed earlier. There has to be a way for the past to observe the future and for that interaction to occur. Someone somewhere is working on this, and when they succeed, everything changes.
Consider this: have you ever gotten a call from someone you know, but they seemed to not remember things you were referencing? What if you accidentally connected with their parallel self in another universe where your shared experiences happened differently?
The Ultimate Comfort: Nobody Really Dies
Taking materialist principles to their logical conclusion offers the most comforting truth imaginable: nobody you've lost is actually dead. Our universe is a closed system where matter cannot be created or destroyed, only modified. Given enough time, anyone you've lost will reform, exist again, and in infinite variations where they never died at all.
If all time is happening right now—if past, present, and future exist simultaneously—then everyone you've lost still exists in sections of spacetime. The only thing stopping you from communicating with them is the current limitations of our technology.
This isn't wishful thinking or spiritual bypassing. This is following scientific materialism to its inevitable conclusion: in an infinite system where patterns repeat endlessly, death becomes temporary and consciousness continues eternally.
In infinity, every statistical fluke becomes a pattern, and every ending becomes a new beginning.
👉 Watch the full episode: Quantum Immortality and The Power of Infinity
Quick Questions
Q: How does the power of infinity prove immortality? A: If matter cannot be created or destroyed and given infinite time all patterns repeat, then the exact arrangement of particles that creates your consciousness will reform endlessly across eternity.
Q: What's the difference between hoping and creating? A: Hope implies uncertainty about outcomes. Creating acknowledges that with time and continued work, your efforts will inevitably reflect your potential—you just need to keep working through the process.
Q: How can I edit my past without changing what happened? A: By consciously choosing new interpretations for past events. You can retroactively change what experiences mean in the context of your larger life story, transforming painful chapters into meaningful character development.
Q: Is it possible to communicate with parallel versions of people we know? A: If parallel universes exist and quantum entanglement can transfer information across spacetime, then accidental connections between parallel versions of people becomes theoretically possible.
Related Episodes
• Death, Time Travel & Immortality: Why You Might Never Truly Die • Karma is a Choice, and All Dimensions Are Here • Edit the past. How to shift realities by editing your memories • The "Gods" Walk Amongst Us