02 MAR 2019 by ideonexus
Science Poem
The worm drives helically through the wood
And does not know the dust left in the bore
Once made the table integral and good;
And suddenly the crystal hits the floor.
Electrons find their paths in subtle ways,
A massless eddy in a trail of smoke;
The names of lovers, light of other days
Perhaps you will not miss them. That's the joke.
The universe winds down. That's how it's made.
But memory is everything to lose;
Although some of the colors have to fade,
Do not believe ...Folksonomies: science poetry
Folksonomies: science poetry
1 
notes
notes06 FEB 2015 by ideonexus
The One-Electron Universe
I
received a telephone call one day at the graduate college at
Princeton from Professor Wheeler, in which he said, "Feynman, I
know why all electrons have the same charge and the same mass"
"Why?" "Because, they are all the same electron!" And, then he
explained on the telephone, "suppose that the world lines which
we were ordinarily considering before in time and space - instead
of only going up in time were a tremendous knot, and then, when
we cut through the knot, by the pl... 1 notes
notes05 JUN 2012 by ideonexus
Wave-Particle Duality
It did not cause anxiety that Maxwell's equations did not apply to gravitation, since nobody expected to find any link between electricity and gravitation at that particular level. But now physics was faced with an entirely new situation. The same entity, light, was at once a wave and a particle. How could one possibly imagine its proper size and shape? To produce interference it must be spread out, but to bounce off electrons it must be minutely localized. This was a fundamental dilemma, and...Folksonomies: physics
Folksonomies: physics
1 The trouble with conceptualizing it.
14 APR 2012 by ideonexus
The Matter / Antimater Imbalance in the Universe
Physicists have long pondered the problem and may have an answer. It seems that just before the universe was one millisecond old, matter and antimatter annihilated each other in a sweeping extinction. But a tiny asymmetry was built into the universe so that matter dominated over antimatter by one part out of 100 billion. Why the built-in asymmetry? In the first 100 billion-billion-billionth of a second of the universe's history, particles called X particles and their antiparticles were create... 1 notes
notesIn less than the first second of the Universe's existence, 1/100 billionth of the matter was left over from the annihilation with antimatter.
16 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
The Concept of the Chemical Bond
[The chemical bond] First, it is related to the disposition of two electrons (remember, no one has ever seen an electron!): next, these electrons have their spins pointing in opposite directions (remember, no one can ever measure the spin of a particular electron!): then, the spatial distribution of these electrons is described analytically with some degree of precision (remember, there is no way of distinguishing experimentally the density distribution of one electron from another!): concept...Folksonomies: chemistry
Folksonomies: chemistry
1 notes
notes...is based on things we cannot see or measure and only exist in terms of probabilities.
08 MAR 2012 by ideonexus
Explanation of the Higg's Boson
Protons are more massive than electrons, for example, and electrons are way more massive than neutrinos. Photons have no mass at all. For most us, that's no more than a fun fact (and not all that much fun, really). For physicists, though, it's a mystery that demands a solution. Why are the masses so different — and why do any particles have any mass at all?
The answer, suggested several scientists back in the 1960's, is that the entire universe is suffused with a sort of energy field — i...Folksonomies: physics
Folksonomies: physics
1 notes
notesA descent, down-to-earth explanation of the Higg's Particle and why it matters.
31 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
The Power of Chemical and Nuclear Energy
New sources of power ... will surely be discovered. Nuclear energy is incomparably greater than the molecular energy we use today. The coal a man can get in a day can easily do five hundred times as much work as himself. Nuclear energy is at least one million times more powerful still. If the hydrogen atoms in a pound of water could be prevailed upon to combine and form helium, they would suffice to drive a thousand-horsepower engine for a whole year. If the electrons, those tiny planets of t...Folksonomies: energy
Folksonomies: energy
1 notes
notesChurchill recognizes the power of coal and predicts the awesome power of nuclear energy.
28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Do Not Extrapolate Macro-Philosophy from Quantum Phenomena
Many scientists have tried to make determinism and complementarity the basis of conclusions that seem to me weak and dangerous; for instance, they have used Heisenberg's uncertainty principle to bolster up human free will, though his principle, which applies exclusively to the behavior of electrons and is the direct result of microphysical measurement techniques, has nothing to do with human freedom of choice. It is far safer and wiser that the physicist remain on the solid ground of theoreti... 1 notes
notesPeople try to infer that the uncertainty principle means we have free will, but the principle only applies to the behavior of electrons.
28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
Electrons Cannot Simultaneously Have Position and Velocity
On careful examination the physicist finds that in the sense in which he uses language no meaning at all can be attached to a physical concept which cannot ultimately be described in terms of some sort of measurement. A body has position only in so far as its position can be measured; if a position cannot in principle be measured, the concept of position applied to the body is meaningless, or in other words, a position of the body does not exist. Hence if both the position and velocity of ele... 1 notes
notesIf the characteristics cannot be measured, they do not exist; therefore, electrons cannot simultaneously have both position and velocity characteristics.
13 DEC 2011 by ideonexus
Stable Orbits are Impossible in More Than Three Dimensions
If one assumes that a few hundred million years in stable orbit are necessary for planetary life to evolve, the number of space dimensions is also fixed by our existence. That is because, according to the laws of gravity, it is only in three dimensions that stable elliptical orbits are possible. Circular orbits are possible in other dimensions, but those, as Newton feared, are unstable. In any but three dimensions even a small disturbance, such as that produced by the pull of the other planet...The force of gravity gets weaker the more dimensions you add to the Universe, making stable planetary orbits impossible.
