Sorry, I haven't got it. I just want to hear your opinions of it. Are you all atheists or do some of you see the potential for the spiritual in your own GUT? As a non-mathemetician I think I can envisage how the universe works by combining quantum theory and relativity. This would of course be a lot harder to do thinking as a mathematician, but it would also be much more useful - my conceptualization is vague. Essentially, nothing's really there, but it's all binary. That is to say there's either something or there's nothing. Everything that's something is a string of energy. EM waves for example, don't experience time so they are one long stretched out line of energy, not points as we perceive them. Matter (because of E=mc2) is the same thing but it's all balled up and this causes it to behave differently. But oh, because of quantum theory, you can never quite know where any of the points on these strings are. Or you can know where it is as long as you don't know where it will be very soon or something. I don't know about all these extra dimensions people are inventing to explain stuff. I can see one extra one would be useful to explain dark matter. If it was perpendicular to ours then, whether it were temporal or spacial, it could effect our dimensions' gravity. I think. I mean it could hold things big enough to be noticeable. Please, tell me where I'm wrong and expand where you can. This is not a complete picture yet.
Either way, they all involve sensory perception which really doesn't do all that much to prove or disprove anything if you were to ask a real scientist. I'm not claiming to know jack shit about physics, but I have discussed these topics with a philosophy professor who also holds a masters in physics and is a good friend of mine, as well as another friend of mine who is more into relativity, although his credentials aren't nearly as impressive. Jim, my professor, explained quantum physics to me as the exception to the rule when we try to determine the validity of scientific law... for instance, there is the rather notorius particle placement experiment where it was noted that a particle existed in more than one place at the same time. Relativity can simply be summed up and understood by how we perceive the passage of time in certain conditions... If there's a pretty girl around... time speeds up... If you're filing your taxes.... time slows to an unbearable crawl...
And of course we're not all atheists.... I personally don't believe much I read about science, especially medical science and physics. Metaphysics (meta=beyond and physics= physics -no shit, right?) has shown that the power of the spirit, soul, psyche, whatever you want to call it... can be one of the most real and important factors in not only our health and well-being, but also in how we perceive the world and manipulate it. Sometimes it takes ignorance and awe beyond our comprehension in order to take real control of the physical, sensory world of perception and experience. Essentially, by incorporating metaphysical practices, you can manipulate and change the world into what you want, but you need to understand what you're doing with the mind of a scientist (somewhat) in order to accurately hone those skills. For example, a yogi can hold his breath for periods of time that would kill any other human being. A tibetan monk can dry wet sheets using his body heat in temperatures that would send anyone else into a lethal state of hypothermic shock. Science, while practical at time, is essentially a crock of shit if you take it far enough. The same thing goes for metaphysics... you just have to find the balance that works for you.
My question is, do they know what space is? is there really nothing there or are there atoms or what? because i would think that, at the atomic level, even the atoms that make atoms or whatever, it's pretty much like the entire universe is one organism. but that wouldn't be true if there really were nothing, which is something, between the stars and planets.
MM, I didn't mean any offence, but I suppose it was silly of me to expect even the majority of ppl on this forum to be atheists as it is part of hipforums which is a very spiritually inclined place. I have an A level in physics and we went beyond the syllabus in abstract, but not mathematical terms. I started a degree in physics but found that it was the abstract, rather than the mathematical, that interested me so I dropped out. I have a very spiritual take on the universe but I have met many physicists who think that being a physicist and having any kind of spiritual belief are mutually exclusive. Like I said, it was silly to expect such a belief to occur here. I was actually kinda hoping that some spiritual truth would be added to my very mechanical outline. If I wanted that, thinking about it, i should have posted this in a religion or philosophy forum. Duh. One thing I did learn from the time I spent at Uni was that being able to do the maths invloved with Relativity does not by a long way mean you understand it. If it did, if you'll bear with me as I head off on a slight tangent, knowing Newtonian Mathematics would make you better at basketball, if you see what I mean, cos you would know exactly how much force to apply and at what angle to get the ball to go in the net. But back to the point... I think, when Stephen Hawking used the term (I don't know if he coined the phrase) "Grand Unified Theory", I think even he was hinting that perhaps there is no such thing, and it's all just about what you feel in your gut... maybe. LBD, I say this with a desire to learn... Without sensory perception what is there? Surely scientists accept that, don't they? Also, I'm not sure I agree with you. Number is the language which describes the universe, surely, not our perception of it, and both relativity and quantum physics are very number heavy. Numbers can be perceived, and manipulated by the mind, but they represent something objective. I can imagine Einstein saying that pretty girl thing as a way of popularizing his theories but that's not what it'(relativity)s about. Time is often thought of as a human construct It's true that we appear to pass through it at different rates depending on psychological factors but there are certain things (like the radioactive decay of certain isotopes) that scientists use to define time in an objective way and it is that idea of time which changes (slows down) as you accelerate until it stops as you reach the speed of light, according to relativity. In effect, you are always travelling at the same speed, all that changes is the dimensions you are travelling in. That is to say - when you are stationary in the spacial dimensions you go at full speed through time, when you are moving through space you move slower through time. It is a very elegant theory isn't it? About your sig, LBD, what do you suggest? I would.
Hey K, howdyoudo? As far as science sees it, although they're still looking for different 'fundamental particles', essentially, when you get down small enough, there is either something or nothing. 1 or 0. It's binary information in a four-or-more dimensional realm and that's all there is. Something or nothing. As such, space is generally pretty much nothing, except when you take the uncertainty principle into account. To take that principal into account you have to get down really small, and when you do that you will see that there is always something which is somewhere between something and nothing. I'm afraid modern science, as far as I know, can't give a more satisfying answer than that. This sounds a lot like philosophy, rather than science, but then sometimes (I'm not sure if this has been measured but it's definitely a theory) a pair of opposite particles just big enough to be real will 'escape' from this fog of uncertainty and become real and measurable. This is a possible explanation for the big bang: A fundamental pair of particles escaped from the uncertainty and, rather than expanding (altgough to our perception it is expanding), it has simply begun growing in complexity. Do you see how that would work? The universe isn't getting bigger, everything in it is getting smaller, more complex.
Lol... you are partially getting to something when you say ask what is there other than sensory perception? I mean, honestly... it makes sense.... no pun intended. That is simply how we experience the world, and perhaps it all is simply relative to the feeling we get in our guts, heart... whatever... What I am saying goes far beyond the whole Idea of a definite universe. For this, my friend... you need to become adept in Platonian metaphysics and understand what an Idea really is when it all comes down to it. Essentially, you will never be able to fully comprehend the answer that you seek if you only examine some sort of finite number or try to determine and define the universe by a set theory or number. Plato would say that you can never understand such a thing because of the nature of the Universe. The Universe is an idea.... obviously we can never fully comprehend that idea, just as we can never fully comprehend or bring to fruition the full potential of a perfect idea in the "real" world that we interpret through physical means (relying entirely on our classical sensory data).... Plato would also say that it is this notion of the soul being an idea and not a tangible part of our anatomy that makes that "sensory data" intrinsically different from the sensory data we gather via tangible, real evidence... particles, waves, electrical pulsings and what not... All in all, the other extreme that goes beyond your definite and numerical comprehension is that which is always unfolding unto a continually unfolding idea... in essence... the will of the individual interacting with the will of all who exist to have a will. We will never understand how far that goes necessarilly (whether or not rocks and "dead" matter may have wills) yet my friend Jeffrey best said it when he said there is the Tangible world... and then there is the existence where we have will unfolding unto will... It is the latter of the two schools of thought that most people never fully comprehend, but those who do can manipulate the world just as efficiently as those who can manipulate and utilize the physical world. To close this, I'll make it easy.... your number or numerical formula exists... it really does, but not in the real world as we experience it via our sensory perception. It exists as an idea, but it is useless if we try to apply it because it can never be utilized in a world composed of ideas and imperfect results as long as there are two sides to every coin... so to say.... As real as your idea is.... it's equally as unreal all at the same time....
That's what I was trying to tell this dude when I got into the idea of metaphysics. Quantum mechanics and even Newtonian theory are all nullified by the most base, simple, and least credible notion ever to pass through the scientific community.... and here it is, "What if you're wrong?" Quantum mechanics is all well and good, and I'll even buy into it partially, but how much of that is really all that relevant to our lives as human beings? The Ultimate Truth seems to be less complicated than all the bullshit that keeps popping up here. What rocks the scientific community more than anything else? When someone simplifies everything to an unbelievable extent, most likely bringing on the death of all of the previous notions... which oftentimes results in their dismissal as credible thinkers and philosophers. Well... I'm just asking how much longer we expect these two schools of thought to remain alive and well when someone, someday is bound to come in and tell everyone that we've all been wrong all this time, and that things are much simpler than all these crazy notions of blackholes and all this other bullshit.... What says a black hole isn't an organism of some type, or that we actually live inside of a huge contained universe and that a blackhole is just a pore in the walls of the universe? How the fuck can we know how far all this stuff stretches unless we can go there and find out for ourselves? The Ultimate Truth is that we don't know shit, we're not going to know shit, and even if we do ever find shit out, we'll just get really depressed that we wasted our whole lives finding out what a blackhole is instead of feeding our souls and our hearts... and having lots of sex as well... Life is a gift man... blackholes are meant to be filled with penises... so are whiteholes and asianholes too.... and anyone else i may have forgotten... that is the Universal Truth... That and the fact that I am the sexiest man alive....
Dude... chill out with the penis envy! You wanna know something serious? You take things far too personally, my friend! You can call my make-believe theories bullshit... and that's fine man, but don't tell me that your theories are any closer to the truth that is quite honestly yet to be determined! I proposed questions... not theories. I have no theories, nor do I even want to pretend to have any theories. Besides... you've already given me all the evidence I needed to show that you and I are both full of shit... only I can sit back and laugh at it, and you take gigantic offense to it. Either way, I think you're scared of something, friend... and perhaps you would do better to learn what that is before you reduce yourself to the mentality of a pre-pubescent boy-child in a "Batman vs. Spiderman" fight... If I wanted to argue with you, I would have already made you my bitch aeons ago, but that was never my intention. All I wanted to do was be the catalyst for you to put that smart mind of your's outside of your comfort zone and accept that although these things you study are quite amazing... they really haven't done that much to bring balance and harmony to our lives or the life of the planet we live on. Hell... you, as a scientist who I am almost positive has had to read Karl Popper at one point or another, should have already moved on beyond the notion that things can really be proven or disproven... especially if you have any educated faith in quantum mechanics! You sure do like to throw that "p" word around a lot, but it makes you sound like more of a fool than I think you really are... I might only be 21, and I certainly have not read the vast amount of theory on quantum mechanics that it seems that you have, but it seems that you have missed my point completely. I'll just go ahead and spell it out for you since your complex mind seems to be to constipated with pride to see through the thick jungle of "fact" you've created for yourself... As much as Einstein, Newton, Hawking, Kepler... etc (and not in chronological order), have revolutionized the scientific world, they all admit that we still don't "get it" concerning our place in the world and our potential as a species of physical and metaphysical beings. This isn't something that they had to write down or publish as a formal, declarative statement, rather this is something that they allowed to subtlely be extracted from their works combined with their persona upon reaching the states of enlightenment that each thinker obtained. All in all, they admit that even though they now have that slight advantage of being able to figure all that stuff out and relate it in a way that you and i can understand (somewhat...), they still admit that they are no wiser, nor is the quality of their life improved because of their discovery. Yes... your work and inspiration has provided you all of these things... but you have shown yourself to be more of a pompous ass than an enlightened thinker... although I firmly believe you have the potential to be both, just like all of those men I mentioned above... You can take my words however you wish, and you can react to them as an angry, defensive little man from now until the cows come home, but I don't believe that I am the first person to tell you these things... You have a brilliant mind, and I appreciate your work and your contribution to this site and to society... I sincerely do! I just wish that you would not close the doors of extraordinary intervention and discovery so quickly just because something is "fact" or "proven" through numbers and formulas... If there is one things we have ever discovered, it IS that knowledge is infinite... therefore I ask you not to discredit my "bullshit theories," rather I would ask you to prove me wrong by showing me (not through math!!!) that you and your predecessors have come closer to "the truth" than I did! I don't seriously believe in all the shit I said up there in my previous posts! You almost directly insult me just by assuming that! As a matter of fact... you should bitch-slap yourself for me (not too hard ) just for reacting so seriously! Just remember... for every theory you present... someone will always come along to show that their theory is better... I can't say that I agree with it, or that it's the best way to come to any real conclusion about anything, but if knowledge is truly infinite... then solid proof cannot exist in the same universe where knowledge is infinite. We can always learn more about something... and sometimes we learn things that completely reshape or even kill the "proof" we had assumed to be true before... therefore knowledge can be both collectively and singularly infinite... or it can be neither... Two sides to every coin... at least two sides... Come on man.... you shoulda figured this much out by now at the very least....
ah go on then, at the risk of having my head bitten off ill jump in. When we describe things in physics we assume that maths does a good job of describing the universe, the physical part at least. We then construct a model using a set of equations to predict the behaviour of whatever we are trying to model. At the moment we have 3 frameworks for constructing these models relativistic mechanics (the very large and very fast), Newtonian mechanics (the stuff we see around us) and Quantum Mechanics (the very small). For the very small and very fast elements of relativity are placed into quantum mechanics. As there is no clear boundary to each of these regemes physicists kind of assume that they are part of some greater theory and we are seeing an approximation to this theory under different conditions. Like if you insert a very small velocity into a relativistic equation it behaves exactly like a Newtonian equation. So far this greater theoy has proved very illusive. At the start of the 20th century it was found that as Newtonian mechanics was applied to smaller and smaller objects, classical wave and particle equations started to differ quite substantially from observation. In fact for black body radiation it gave complete crap. Eventually we ended up with quantum mechanics (which, incidentally is used to derive the Heisenburg uncertainty relations). When combined with elements of relativity has provided the most accurate theory ever created and has been experimentally tested. Some everyday things that could not be understood without QM are Lasers (so thats CD, DVD players and long distance comms), LEDs, transistors, Ovens (in a way) and the sun also wouldnt burn if QM was wrong. However while QM uses more fancy maths and is philosphically far more involved it is still fundamentally and extension of the the models of waves and particles. To my mind this is where problems occur, is an electron and particle of a wave, its both and its neither. I personally take the view that an electron is neither, we cant see one and appearance to something that is smaller than the wavelength of light is pretty meaningless, all we can do is measure its influence. Under some conditions it follows the rules of the mathematical model of a particle and under other conditions it behaves like a wave, its behaviour can still however be accurately predicted using the Schrodinger eqn, what it actually is who knows, all we know is what it behaves like. I would argue whether this matters, it seems clear that QM does a very good job of describing the natural world, even if we cant take a photo of it.
Cheers Fat Tony, I hate it when it comes down to ego driven dominance competitions. Seems to happen a lot around here (hey, I'm not above it myself at times). Tis clear you're a scientist, in so far as that can be seperated from a philosopher. What's your take on the idea that science is fast approaching its limits? Do you think we're approaching a GUT or TOE or is it a mirage destined to remain on the horizon, no matter how much progress we make? I personally think there is no limit to the complexity of even the tiniest things. We may find refinements to QM that will allow us to predict more and more precisely the movements of tiny particles but I think an analogy could be found in group dynamics. Though simple equations can tell you how many of a group will do this or that, they will never take into account individual decisions without becoming prohibitively complex. I'm sure there are groups of 'fundamental' particles which can all be said to behave in a particular way, but there are similar groups of galaxies which are shaped the same and behave the same, without every star being in exactly the same place. I think they should stop saying they're looking for fundamental particles and just admit that they're looking for very small particles, you know, like, really small. These 'quanta' we hear so much about, can you tell me how they came about? Is it believed that, in reality, quanta are the smallest things possible or is it to do with our perception? I mean, the fact that you can't measure something without changing it (which is easily understandable in itself), doesn't change the fact that it exists. Because if reality depends on the ability to measure it in some way, then that kinda means that, rather than a huge universe with some minds (us) floating in it, it's some minds with a huge universe floating in them. Doesn't it?
Quantum mechanics is a way of taking into account what you call 'the complexity of even the tiniest things'. In classical physics you say this ball is here and its going to be there in a few seconds. In quantum mechanics the best you can do is to say that there is a certain chance it will be here. The larger the object the smaller this uncertainty becomes so eventually for everyday objects the uncertainty is far smaller than the object. However for an electron they can often turn up in wired places which is just as well for us as the electrons ability to do strange things allows nuclear fusion without which the earth would be an exceptionally cold place. This interpretation of QM is known as the Copenhagen Interpretation and has been the dominant interpretation of the equations of QM for almost a century now. Though it may not be correct, again we're in the situation where its been successful so its unlikely to be totally wrong but it does have some flaws. At this point, if your interested, I suggest investing in/loaning Schrodingers Cat and then Schrodingers Kittens both by John Gribbin, an excellent non-mathematical introduction to quantum mechanics, otherwise this thread will get out of control and its a far better explanation than I can provide. As for a GUT and the TOE, I think theres no reason why we can't achieve them in principle. While the universe may well be to complex to ever model totally I see no reason why we cant know all the laws that govern it. After all QM already says we cant know everything all we can know is a series of probabilities. Testing them is a problem at the moment theorists can throw lots of fancy theorys at us (string theory, brane theory, twistor theory and so on) knwoing full well that they are completely untestable for the time being. This has happened before, back in the days of the nuclear test ban treaty mathematicians were making all kinds of bizarre predictions knowing that nuclear testing was banned so they couldnt never be shown incorrect. When that treaty was lifted there were a lot of mathematicians backpedalling very quickly. However superstring theory may soon be testable, if it was found to be on the right lines even then physics will have to find some new fundamental problems quite qucikly. Ive done this in the wrong order really but im not willing to change it so ill carry on. Quanta are where quantum mechanics comes from and is latin for packet which is a useful thing to remember. I mentioned blackbody radiation a while ago and how classical theory gave utter rubbish. Firstly blackbody radiation is the phenomenon where a warm object emits radiation, something anyone who lives in a house without AC will appreciate as their house emits radiation all night stopping them sleeping. Essentially classical mechanics when used to describe this problem for a closed box (like an oven, which is why is mentioned it before) it predicts an infinite energy density, this is clearly wrong otherwise cooking dinner could be an expensive affair on the elecricity bill. People knew the answer experimentally but couldnt make theory match it. In 1900 Planck came up with an equation that matched experiment, it was a total fudge with no theoretical proof it was just an equation desigend to produce the same answer as an experiment. It called for EM radiation to be treated as quantities of discrete energy (quanta) not the continuous field envisaged by Maxwell. A number of papers in the proeceeding years by Planck, Eintein and DeBroglie finally showed that light was not a particle or a wave but both. This was one of the discoveries that helped to fully formulate QM. It all kind of happened in the wrong order, im not sure exactly when but is was quite a few years before Plancks fudged equation was finally proved properly from theory.
