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The Guru
The Guru
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Particle Physics Explained An Astrophysicist asked: Can you please explain in your infinite wisdom how the recent events in particle physics >have turned causality and therefore Einstein's theory of General relativity on it's head? A young spotty physicist from deepest darkest Croydon
Dear Ratul Thankyou for your query. It is indeed a sad fact that the majority of the populace are unfamiliar with the intricacies of theoretical physics. I will attempt to clarify the main points in this answer. As you will be aware, Einstein's Theory of Relativity predicts well the behaviour of large objects, but ceases to be an accurate theory when we enter the realm of sub-atomic particles. To understand the behaviour of these objects, we have to apply Quantum Mechanics, which is utterly inapplicable to larger objects. So, we have two completely distinct theories necessary to describe the state of the universe. Obviously, while they may both be useful predictive models, they cannot be "correct" - and so, we continue to strive for a Grand Unified Theory, that could describe everything at all levels of scale in one elegant theorem. The best contender at the moment is String Theory- which has as the basic unit of physical reality a string vibrating in 9 dimensions. As you know, the length of any piece of string is always infinite (see How Long Is A Piece Of String?). These pieces of string (actually minute yet infinitely long pieces of baling twine) tie together billions upon billions of tiny little lobsters. Some of these lobsters whizz round and round a nucleus of tightly packed miniscule mudskippers, attached as they are with 9-dimensional string, and this combination of tiny lobster revolving around a nucleus of tightly packed mudskippers is known as an "atom" Lobsters which have no mudskipper nucleus restraining them whizz around the cosmos at the speed of light, and depending on their orientation can have various effects when they reach an object. They sometimes appear to be a bit wavy, but they also sometimes appear to behave as particles (this is the quantum mechanics bit). When you look at one of the little lobsters, it gets self-conscious and its waveform collapses. This is quite unpleasant for the lobsters, so it is difficult to observe them. When one of the lobsters gets its string caught up with the string of another lobster, they get entwined, and changes to one of them will instantaneously affect the other of the pair. This is known as "quantum entanglement." Different lobsters are known as photons, quarks, muons, protons, electrons and so on- all depending on the temperament of the individual lobster. There are various small lobsters that are predicted by theory but which have yet to be observed. These lobsters are very shy, and scientists have to revert to smashing them toether in a "particle accelerator" in order to get them to come out. This is not nice for the lobsters at all, and should be stopped. String Theory has very complicated maths behind it, as the string is wrapped over on itself in a multi-dimensional way, but the lobsters do not seem unduly worried by this. The lobsters originally condensed out of pure energy shortly after the Big Bang and have been expanding ever since (not literally the lobsters- they stay the same size but get further away from each other). When they condense, they can form anything from stars and galactic super-clusters to you and me. Clever lobsters. The mudskippers do not seem to do anything much except to form an anchor for the string. This is a far more sophisticated theory than Relativity, which falls down because it fails to predict the actions of the lobsters, whatever their mood, and makes no mention of string. I hope that this clarifies the issue for you. Regards The Guru |
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