This video is of Garrett Lisi on his theory of everything.
I pushed my brain beyond redline to try and understand even a bit of this - it is really really complex. But this kind of thing, and the ability of the human mind to construct such models, truly amazes me. This may represent the 'true' representation of how the universe works - something humans have been pondering forever and a day.
The talk is 18 mins long, but does not include any maths. Give your brain a work out!
Garrett Lisi: A beautiful new theory of everything (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-Gk_Ddhr0M#normal)
Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" seriously make the beast with two backsed up my brain for about two weeks.
I should really dig it out and read it again...
I know the feeling. I've tried at least once a year over the past couple of decades to try to get through some version of "Quantum Physics for Dummies" and been stymied every time. One really nicely written book* called "In Search of Schrodinger's Cat" (subtitled something like "A Layman's Guide to the Quantum World") has done it to me three times. I make it just fine through Planck & black-body radiation, Einstein and am mostly holding my own through Special Relativity, then OK, I'm hanging on still with Schrodinger's thought experiments. Then I hit a series of pages where I realize that I've understood every single word, but have no clue whatsoever what the sentences mean. Soldiering on just gets worse, and eventually I stop and go read something goofy like Tom Robbins or Christopher Moore just to reassure myself that English is still my first language.
It's been a while, maybe I should give it another shot...
*Well written, at least as far as I've gotten.
I'm not even going to try. I'm still working on the Ducati owner's manual. [bang] [laugh]
Watched it. Makes some sense to me but I did spend 3 years studying Physics. Most of it though was over my head...
OK. I don't want to sound like a dick or anything, but I think understand what he's proposing. Basically what he's saying is at the heart of reality, matter and energy are simply facets of this E8 structure that has a spin which transcends what we perceive as a finite point in space-time. So, an electron is a manifestation of this particles position (or combination of positions) and other basic elements of matter are simply a different manifestation.
Can Pompetta weigh in here? He's the physics geek.
I kind of like this theory a lot as I would like to imagine the universe, nay multiverse being a symmetrical, beautiful thing.
I don't know enough about Physics but this does seem like a long shot. He takes the known particle interaction mapping to the 4th demension to form a pattern. And then adding new demensions and spins the graphs to form "beautiful pictures"... Even he knows that he is reaching on this one....
I watched the PBS Nova a few years ago on the String Theory. It's all making sense at the begining until these theoretical physicists take it to the nth level...
Interesting talk. I gotta say though, if this guy was an actor, he would be Keanu Reeves. Smart guy but he's got the public speaking delivery of a high school boy.
It's like trying to understand calculus...
pointless. :-\
At least calculus and Newtonian physics go hand and in hand. Hard to understand one without the other, but study them both together and the light bulb goes off.
That TOE ain't physics. That's pure math that just might apply to physics (and the latest poking around in his theory looks like it might not after all)
Still, the math of Lie Spaces that this is based on is kinda cool. Wish I understood them better (the most complicated rotational symmetry possible in any number of dimensions?)
Scientists don't even know what gravity is yet. Of the four fundamental forces is physics, it's both the most powerful and least understood.
Newton never "discovered" gravity, nor did he define it. Rather he coined the term in order to label a "force", then gave a system to describe how that force behaves. His system is not perfect, and so Einstein came up with his system. But Einstein did not actually define gravity either.
Much of this talk about string theroy, quantum whatnot, and 11 or 12 dimensions is really just speculative ad hoc premises used in order to make certain mathmatical models work. Not much different from what Ptolemy did centuries ago with his epicycles in the heavenly spheres.
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 05:23:02 AM
Scientists don't even know what gravity is yet. Of the four fundamental forces is physics, it's both the most powerful and least understood.
Newton never "discovered" gravity, nor did he define it. Rather he coined the term in order to label a "force", then gave a system to describe how that force behaves. His system is not perfect, and so Einstein came up with his system. But Einstein did actually define gravity either.
Much of this talk about string theroy, quantum whatnot, and 11 or 12 dimensions is really just speculative ad hoc premises used in order to make certain mathmatical models work. Not much different from what Ptolemy did centuries ago with his epicycles in the heavenly spheres.
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.
And he says as much when he referred theoretical physicists being used to being wrong as new experiments confirm or disprove theories. We're not going to be building a warp drive any time soon, but it's still fun to speculate, hypothesize and drive experimentation.
I did pretty well in calculus and physics, but I can't believe how content I am to just go about my daily life and not stress over this kind of stuff.
Call me small minded, but I'd rather spend my time learning about things in the physical world that are more applicable (probably the wrong word) to me.
However, I am glad that there are people that understand this stuff and make it more applicable to me through advances in technology in a way that I can see and appreciate in my daily life.
that drive to find out hte unknown is what leads to crazy shit being built. Look at GPS systems. Without the through understanding of special relativity, a GPS would of never been accurate down to the foot and would rather be floating around somewhere in the 100's of feet making guided weapons, road map GPS and other devices completely useless.
Now before people start fighting, there are many many many THEORIES out there on how everything works. String Theory, or "Theory of everything" is the leading one and was proposed by that japanese physicsist (and his collegues) that just so happens to teach at my school.
The only thing people that dont directly study this stuff needs to know is that, it tries to describes the very small, the very big and everything in between. But there are parts of it which does not explain everything, which is why it is not taught as how the world works, but much rather how we think it works, where we know how quantum mechanic more or less works, and we know how newtons laws works, but they simpley are not interchangeable.
The end result is even newtons physics isnt the key to our world. It just so happens to model it very very very accurately.
Schrodingers equation just so happens to map out how the sub-atomic particles work very very well.
THeory of everything is trying to model the quantum world and the physically large world together. The key here to understand what string theory is, is the fact that it looks at the Newtonian world in a completely different way, yet it still accurately models it, which means it must yeild the exact same results as newtons laws, and at the same time, it must yeild the same results we know exist in the quantum world, but again looks at it in a different way.
if anyone is confused at how they are looking at more than 3 dimensions on that screen, they are depicted by color and not an axis.
Actually, I think physicists/cosmologists are moving away from string theory these days.
(http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/string_theory.png)
http://xkcd.com/171/ (http://xkcd.com/171/)
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 09:43:51 AM
Actually, I think physicists/cosmologists are moving away from string theory these days.
really? where the hell are they headed to now then?
I dont know what the next theory of everything is, but it all sure sounds like none of it will be solved anytime soon.
Quote from: He Man on January 22, 2010, 10:01:50 AM
really? where the hell are they headed to now then?
I dont know what the next theory of everything is, but it all sure sounds like none of it will be solved anytime soon.
And when it is you know what will happen? Universal apocalypse.
Quote from: He Man on January 22, 2010, 10:01:50 AM
really? where the hell are they headed to now then?
As I understand it by watching and reading this stuff casually, string theory has been extended into "membrane theory" aka "brane theory" or "m theory". It works much the same way but extends the "strings" into membranes. This is what takes the math to 11 dimensions from the 10 of string theory I believe.
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 05:23:02 AM
Scientists don't even know what gravity is yet. Of the four fundamental forces is physics, it's both the most powerful and least understood.
This is a bit misleading. Scientists understand how gravity manifests but are stumped by 2 things.
1.) Where does mass come from? Hopefully the Higgs will be seen at the LHC and that will take care of that little problem.
2.) Why is gravity so weak? As I understand it, M-theory hopes to answer that by showing that we only see part of the force of gravity in this dimension, with the greater portion of it acting in another one.
Even with a lot of casual interest in this, an 18 minute talk about high dimension symmetry with very little lead in will confuse more than it will inform.
Neat idea though. It will be interesting to see if we can create those missing particles. Hell, I will be excited if we can find the Higgs.
[EDIT: String theory works in 10 dimensions, m-theory, 11]
Quote from: yotogi on January 22, 2010, 12:28:56 PM
As I understand it by watching and reading this stuff casually, string theory has been extended into "membrane theory" aka "brane theory" or "m theory". It works much the same way but extends the "strings" into membranes. This is what takes the math to 12 dimensions from the 10 or 11 of string theory I believe.
This is a bit misleading. Scientists understand how gravity manifests but are stumped by 2 things.
1.) Where does mass come from? Hopefully the Higgs will be seen at the LHC and that will take care of that little problem.
2.) Why is gravity so weak? As I understand it, M-theory hopes to answer that by showing that we only see part of the force of gravity in this dimension, with the greater portion of it acting in another one.
Not sure what understanding "how gravity manifests" really means. But answering where mass comes from doesn't explain what gravity is. There is an observational correlation between mass and gravitational force, but that's not nailing down what that force is.
And gravity is not weak, it's the strongest of the four fundamental forces. Think "Black Hole".
(http://www.demotivateus.com/posters/devided-by-zero-demotivational-poster.jpg)
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 12:54:47 PM
Not sure what understanding "how gravity manifests" really means. But answering where mass comes from doesn't explain what gravity is. There is an observational correlation between mass and gravitational force, but that's not nailing down what that force is.
"How gravity manifests" was a bad way to express that thought. Gravity works on mass, we have not found how the fundamental particles attain mass. That is the search for the Higgs. I should have said, we can see gravity working, but we have yet to show how mass gets there.
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 12:54:47 PM
And gravity is not weak, it's the strongest of the four fundamental forces. Think "Black Hole".
Sorry, that is not true. Gravity is in fact very weak. It takes a lot of matter in a very small space to create a black hole. Once you do, it can overcome the other forces, ripping atoms apart. But consider gravitation in the normal sense. A tiny magnet can create enough of a magnetic force to overcome the entire gravitational force of the earth.
This is a quote from an article talking about the weakness of gravity in New Science.
"Take a moment to try a jump into the air. Have you ever thought about how remarkable it is that so little effort is required to jump a few inches off the ground. Your puny muscles, weighing just a few kilograms, can overcome the gravitational force of the Earth, all 6 × 1024 kilograms off it. Gravity is a real weakling - 1040 times weaker than the electromagnetic force that holds atoms together."
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227122.900-gravity-mysteries-why-is-gravity-so-weak.html?haasFormId=46aa9eea-8158-4b87-8d70-3994c2a1bd64&haasPage=0 (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227122.900-gravity-mysteries-why-is-gravity-so-weak.html?haasFormId=46aa9eea-8158-4b87-8d70-3994c2a1bd64&haasPage=0)
All of that coupled with the fact that can't account for where most of the mass in the universe come from (dark matter), why it is accelerating (dark energy), how it was able to expand so quickly (cosmic expansion) and why it doesn't fit at all into the standard model. We have an excellent model for gravity on the large scale but the "theory of everything" is making it work with the rest of the Standard Model.
Quote from: yotogi on January 22, 2010, 01:59:15 PM
Sorry, that is not true. Gravity is in fact very weak. It takes a lot of matter in a very small space to create a black hole. Once you do, it can overcome the other forces, ripping atoms apart. But consider gravitation in the normal sense. A tiny magnet can create enough of a magnetic force to overcome the entire gravitational force of the earth.
It is true. Of the four forces, gravity overcomes the other three. Just because it only does so in certain places under certain circumstances, it is still the strongest. The gravitaional force of a Black Hole counts.
I'm interested to know which of the forces you consider the strongest? Electromagnatism? Weak Nuclear? Strong Nuclear?
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 09:43:51 AM
Actually, I think physicists/cosmologists are moving away from string theory these days.
Two pieces of string walk into a bar and the bartender looks at them suspiciously. He says "Sorry, boys, we don't serve your kind here." So the pieces of string walk out again.
They're sitting in the gutter outside and feeling really thirsty when one piece of string says "Hey! I've got an idea to get me into the bar."
So he starts twisting and turning, wriggling this way and that, pulling out a few threads here and there. His mate's looking at him and thinks he's gone completely nuts.
Then the piece of string walks back into the bar. The bartender looks at him a little suspiciously again and says "Here, you're not a bit of string, are you?"
The piece of string replies "No, I'm a frayed knot."
Quote from: Autostrada Pilot on January 22, 2010, 09:33:26 AM
I did pretty well in calculus and physics, but I can't believe how content I am to just go about my daily life and not stress over this kind of stuff.
Call me small minded, but I'd rather spend my time learning about things in the physical world that are more applicable (probably the wrong word) to me.
However, I am glad that there are people that understand this stuff and make it more applicable to me through advances in technology in a way that I can see and appreciate in my daily life.
Well said.
Still enjoying this thread though, wouldn't get one like this on the gixxer forum I'm sure.
I was hoping he would explain countersteering.
Quote from: bobspapa on January 23, 2010, 08:06:02 AM
I was hoping he would explain countersteering.
And if the airplane was on a conveyer belt that was spun in 8 dimensions would it take off, or travel through time.
Quote from: NorDog on January 22, 2010, 02:06:54 PM
It is true. Of the four forces, gravity overcomes the other three. Just because it only does so in certain places under certain circumstances, it is still the strongest. The gravitaional force of a Black Hole counts.
I'm interested to know which of the forces you consider the strongest? Electromagnatism? Weak Nuclear? Strong Nuclear?
I cannot argue my point. I am going with what I have read in many places and seen in many science tv shows. If I were to try to make an argument, I would say that strength would have to have some metric. One that you might use would be measure of effect per unit weight. This sets up gravity to fail as it is a function of mass.
The quote from New Scientist magazine that I quoted and linked would lead me to say that any of them are stronger, electromagnetism at 1040 times stronger.
But what is the point of going on about it? There is current research attempting to find out where the expected strength of gravity is going. If you really want me to try and dig it up I can do some searching.
When you are doing quantum mechnics, you always ignore gravity since you are dealing with a small quanta of whatever it is your looking at, gravity is so weak, it can be ignored.
However, you can add up gravity with mass. So in some cases it is the strongest force and we must take it into account, but in other cases, it is the weakest force and we can ignore it.
to argue which is stronger is a moot point because all 4 forces are fundamental and cannot be compared to any of the other 3 forces, without looking at the whole picture of what you are trying describe.
Perhaps a bit of Aristotelean potency and act can help here.
Gravity has the greatest potential for strength, and sometimes that maximum strength is actualized.
Quote from: NorDog on January 25, 2010, 04:06:40 AM
Perhaps a bit of Aristotelean potency and act can help here.
Gravity has the greatest potential for strength, and sometimes that maximum strength is actualized.
The other forces have have a pretty large potential for strength. think about it this way.
All matter orbits some other bit of matter because of gravity.
But what if everything was a giant block of magnetic iron spinning and orbiting.
Whats more powerful? The force of gravity of 2 earth sized magentic iron planets? or the force of gravity? In this case gravity is easily overcome.
You just never see this in nature because of the way the universe works.
"Whats more powerful? The force of gravity of 2 earth sized magentic iron planets? or the force of gravity?"
Yeah, I think you're getting confused here. You're asking what's greater, this gravity or that gravity.
Black Hole vs Gigantic Monster Magnet Planets?
Black Hole wins. It will eat GMMPs all day.
It's all about mass and not size. (at least that's what she said)
Quote from: superjohn on January 25, 2010, 10:34:35 AM
It's all about mass and not size. (at least that's what she said)
Except that it is about both.
My favorite story of the LHC still has to be this one:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/discoblog/2009/11/06/lhc-shut-down-by-wayward-baguette-dropped-by-bird/ (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/discoblog/2009/11/06/lhc-shut-down-by-wayward-baguette-dropped-by-bird/)
Late in the video it explains how gravity is 10 to the 25th weaker than the nuclear binding force.
Large Hadron Rap (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM#normal)
im getting out of my mind here.
My final thought because this is getting beyond me.
Gravity vs all other forces 1 on 1, is the weakest force. But it is the only force that can indefintely mulitply and beat the others. However it is only in a blackhole that gravity can acheive this, but blackholes only exist after it overcomes electron degeneracy and neutron degeneracy in a star that has gone supernova.
When people start talking baout gravity and other dimensions, i start walking the other way.
Quote from: He Man on January 26, 2010, 12:09:05 AM
But it is the only force that can indefintely mulitply and beat the others. However it is only in a blackhole that gravity can acheive this, but blackholes only exist after it overcomes electron degeneracy and neutron degeneracy in a star that has gone supernova.
That counts.
I am not touoching this thread, either. :P