This seems like rampant speculation. At least the title of the post doesn't imply the search is over. :) The assumption that the universe is two entangled quantum particles is a stretch, to say the least.
And maybe I'm missing a piece of the argument but it seems a terrible leap to say that because they can observe this static-outside, dynamic-inside effect that now time is an illusion might be an even larger stretch. Even if all these speculations and assumptions were proven true, how does this render time as an illusion? Isn't the proper conclusion that time is just an internal process which essentially shielded from observing externally? It seems more like conservation of time rather than "time is an illusion". I have always liked the idea of a static universe that our conscious minds are zipping though.
They aren't asserting the universe is two entangled particles, they are asserting that they can use two entangled particles to model an effect that may explain the universe.
"time is an illusion might be an even larger stretch"
The word "illusion" should be struck entirely from these articles. Just because a quantity is derived and not "fundamental" doesn't make it not real. Temperature is already known to be an "illusion" by this measure but I've sure been burned before. There's no scenario here where one day you're just walking along, and then bam you're frozen forever because some physicist just realized for the last time that time is an "illusion". If time isn't quite what we may have once naively thought it is, we still clearly live in a universe with before & after relations, just as we live in a universe in which it is perfectly sensible and meaningful to talk about "heat", even if "temperature" does have some behaviors our ancestors wouldn't have anticipated, such as http://www.nature.com/news/quantum-gas-goes-below-absolute-z... .
Time is one slippery concept. I have a book called "The End of Time" by Julian Barbour http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_Time_(book) , which I have read, but lack enough of a formal education to understand.
And maybe I'm missing a piece of the argument but it seems a terrible leap to say that because they can observe this static-outside, dynamic-inside effect that now time is an illusion might be an even larger stretch. Even if all these speculations and assumptions were proven true, how does this render time as an illusion? Isn't the proper conclusion that time is just an internal process which essentially shielded from observing externally? It seems more like conservation of time rather than "time is an illusion". I have always liked the idea of a static universe that our conscious minds are zipping though.