Thought provoking as always. I know some readers took issue with “Relativity says that time is an illusion”, but I know that you were speaking in a literary manner — simply saying that time is relative and that it is (according to GR) merely a dimension and thus does not play a role in the explaining how the universe came to be.

In any case, if Smolin is right, then what is the selective function in the evolution of universes? In natural selection, the mutations that favor the creation of more offspring are the mutations that perpetuate more successfully and become the norm. Is Smolin saying that those universes that diverge slightly in their “program” (“DNA”) and spawn more “successful” child universes will propagate more? And if so, what is it that makes a universe “successful” in creating child universes? Is it that the set of values for physical constants acts as a selector in making child universes more successful? And that child universes can be born with slightly different (not randomly different) values for those constants?

Regarding the discrepancy between the cosmological constant and quantum field theory, we are clearly missing a big piece here. It will be interesting to know what that missing piece is — if we ever discover it.