What a black hole looks like, maybe. Artist’s rendition via NASA.

Everything you know to be true may be an illusion, specifically, an optical illusion, according to scientists who suggest our universe is a hologram. This is not the first time the possibility has been raised, but it is the most convincing.

New research from scientists at the Vienna University of Technology concludes that the holographic principle is possible in the context of a mostly flat space-time continuum. Let’s back up.

The holographic principle was first proposed by theoretical physicists Gerard’t Hooft and Leonard Susskind back in 1993. PBS’s Kate Becker explains:

“The holographic principle, simply put, is the idea that our three-dimensional reality is a projection of information stored on a distant, two-dimensional surface. Like the emblem on your credit card, the two-dimensional surface holds all the information you need to describe a three-dimensional object — in this case, our universe.”

The principle serves as a way to solve the black hole information paradox — according to […]