**Ask a monkey a physics question thread**

[OngBonga]

Anti matter is just matter that has identical mass but opposite charge. I think the name antimatter is misleading, like it makes people think it's some mythical stuff that resides in another universe. The only mystery regarding antimatter is why there isn't as much as the stuff as there is matter. Antimatter is matter.

I sense an Ongdentity paradox arising here.

Exactly.

The cat in the box is nonsense, by the way. Schrodinger was never seriously suggesting the cat is both alive and dead at the same time, he was attempting to draw attention to the potential paradox that seemed to emerge from quantum mechanics, or more specifically, the Copenhagen Interpretation. That's about as much as I can get my head around on that matter. When we start talking about wave function collapse, I start looking for my king skins.

[Savy]

When we start talking about wave function collapse, I start looking for my king skins.

|> <|

[MadMojoMonkey]

Anti Matter. Explain please?

Anti-matter is identical to matter in every respect except the sign of it's electric charge.

Any particle and its anti-particle have the same mass, same spin, same expected decay half-life, same magnitude of charge, even.
The only difference is that a + charged particles have - charge anti-particles, and vise versa.

Are they real or theoretical?

Positrons are anti-electrons.

A PET scan is a medical procedure in which Positron Emission within your body causes positron-electron annihilation events to release photons of a specific frequency, which are measured by an external sensor and fed to a computer to form an image out of (Tomography).

Where do positrons come from?
Certain "Weak Interactions" release them in a nuclear process called positron emission. It is possible for a proton to change into a neutron. This is a common occurrence in certain radioactive nuclei. They spit out part of their nucleus and what gets left behind is not in the lowest energy state, so it will release energy in various ways until it is in the lowest available energy state.

One way this happens is when the ratio of protons to neutrons is such that it takes more energy to have that 1 more proton and 1 less neutron than the cost to change a proton into a neutron. In this case, it is energetically favorable for this to occur. As the proton switches into a neutron, it goes from having a +1 charge to having a 0 charge. It emits a positron (and an electron neutrino) in the process, thus conserving charge and some other properties.

Another source of positrons is in pair production. Technically, pair production can occur when any neutral boson with enough energy turns into a particle / antiparticle pair. Mostly, though when people talk about pair production, they're talking about a photon turning into an electron / positron pair.
The rest mass of an electron (or positron) is ~511 keV (an eV is a measure of energy). If a photon has just over 1.022 MeV, then it has enough energy to "pay" the cost in rest mass for the particles. It needs to have a little more than this, so that the pair are created with some momentum. All of this happens "near" an atom.

So there are 2 well known and often used methods of creating anti-matter electrons. One of them is a medical scan which most people have heard of.

Where is all the anti-matter?
Dunno. It's an open question in physics as to why there isn't an equal amount of anti-matter as there is matter with only a fairly hand-waving explanation about some process which could have gone like [...] happened just prior to or during the cosmic inflation period, which physics has done nothing, really, (yet) to explain.

We are pretty sure that the universe isn't actually in balance, but with some regions dominated by matter and other regions dominated by anti-matter. If this were true, there would be bright flashing boundaries where these regions met, dominated by particle-antiparticle annihilation.

[Poopadoop]

The cat in the box is nonsense, by the way. Schrodinger was never seriously suggesting the cat is both alive and dead at the same time

I thought the question revolved around whether the cat was still in the box or not during the time you couldn't observe it.

[OngBonga]

It's a straight line through curved spacetime in Einstein's model, but a curved line through flat spacetime in Newton's model.

This is an interesting contradiction. Maybe both are right. Curvature (and indeed flatness) are relative. It's much like time. From your frame of reference, time is normal, it doesn't speed up or slow down from your point of view based on your velocity. It just appears to from the point of view of observers. The same will be true of spacetime curvature. As far as you're concerned, you're in a flat region, and everywhere else is curved. Meanwhile, those in the curved regions, looking at you, will say their region is flat, and yours is in fact curved.

Newton sees a curved path in flat spacetime because he's speaking from an intertial frame of reference.

Einstein sees a straight line in curved spacetime because he's speaking from a non-intertial frame of reference.

Technically, Einstein is right because there's no such thing as an inertial frame of reference... everything is in motion relative to everything else... but because the majority of that motion we observe is close to zero, or at least muc closer to zero than c, Newton's ideas hold up to observation within acceptable parameters. And because we're always in a flat region of space from our own point of view, it's fair to say that the moon is folllowing a curved path relative to us. But it's a straight path from the point of view of the moon, and what Einstein appears to have done so brilliantly is to mentally observe this neither from earth, nor from the moon, but from a third vantage point, and in doing so, he saw both are curved, and that flatness is exlcusive to your frame of reference.

[Poopadoop]

So how does Newton explain the moon not crashing into Earth? It's inertia is what is keeping it going?

Why then (from either N or E's perspective) do some orbits decay? The thing is not going fast enough to overcome the pull of gravity I suspect?

[MadMojoMonkey]

Anti matter is just matter that has identical mass but opposite charge. I think the name antimatter is misleading, like it makes people think it's some mythical stuff that resides in another universe. The only mystery regarding antimatter is why there isn't as much as the stuff as there is matter. Antimatter is matter.

Well said. There is no reason that one is "anti" other than we're familiar with the abundant one, and the less abundant one we call anti-.

Physics would change one bit if every particle in the universe was exchanged for its anti-particle. The sign conventions we humans use to describe things would be all inverted, but that's merely a contrivance to keep the math orderly. The math would be just as orderly once we replaced the "right hand rule" with the "left hand rule," etc.

Exactly.

It wasn't eloquent, but the Ongdentity was, I think, correct in general.

The cat in the box is nonsense, by the way. Schrodinger was never seriously suggesting the cat is both alive and dead at the same time, he was attempting to draw attention to the potential paradox that seemed to emerge from quantum mechanics, or more specifically, the Copenhagen Interpretation. That's about as much as I can get my head around on that matter.

Yep. It was meant to be an absurd example to illustrate a hard-to-accept fact about QM.

The superposition of states is a real thing. The notion that it can happen with an ensemble of many Avogadro's number of particles is not practical.

When we start talking about wave function collapse, I start looking for my king skins.

Lies. You always know where your king skins are like a sixth sense. Even in the depths of your pondering of wave function collapse, your hand will absent-mindedly and automatically find your king skins on their own.

If you look down, you'll find you're holding them right now.

(It's like I know you or something.)

[MadMojoMonkey]

So how does Newton explain the moon not crashing into Earth? It's inertia is what is keeping it going?

Why then (from either N or E's perspective) do some orbits decay? The thing is not going fast enough to overcome the pull of gravity I suspect?

Gravity is one form of energy. It's effect on orbits is not the only effect.

Consider the tides are caused by the moon (and the Earth's rotation under the seas, to a degree). There is energy transfer from the Moon's orbital energy into tidal energy. So the energy in the moon's orbit must not be constant.

There are other effects. Tidal heating is when the gravitation is not merely enough to pull water around, but the actual rock the body is made of. Many of Jupiter's moons have volcanic activity due to the constant squeezing and stretching of the moon like a stress ball. It heats the interior of the moon and keeps it molten.

Other effects serve to circularize orbits over time. Elliptical orbits will slowly become more and more round as gravitational energy is transformed back and forth into other forms.

[Poopadoop]

Gravity is one form of energy. It's effect on orbits is not the only effect.

Consider the tides are caused by the moon (and the Earth's rotation under the seas, to a degree). There is energy transfer from the Moon's orbital energy into tidal energy. So the energy in the moon's orbit must not be constant.

There are other effects. Tidal heating is when the gravitation is not merely enough to pull water around, but the actual rock the body is made of. Many of Jupiter's moons have volcanic activity due to the constant squeezing and stretching of the moon like a stress ball. It heats the interior of the moon and keeps it molten.

Other effects serve to circularize orbits over time. Elliptical orbits will slowly become more and more round as gravitational energy is transformed back and forth into other forms.

That's interesting but answers none of my questions.

Can Newtonian physics explain why one body will orbit another in a more or less stable way whereas another's orbit will decay into crash phase?

[MadMojoMonkey]

I thought the question revolved around whether the cat was still in the box or not during the time you couldn't observe it.

No. The cat is in a box with a lethal dose of some poison. The container of poison will be broken if a radioactive sample has decayed, triggering the release, killing the cat.

The thought experiment is that once the box is sealed, and no further observations are made, the quantum mechanical description of the radioactive sample is that it exists in a state of both having decayed and not having decayed. But this means that the cat is in a superposition of being alive and dead, which seems absurd.

This was meant to show that superpositions of states is absurd, and that the American description of QM was superior to the European description.

It fails on many levels, and the fundamental premise was flat out wrong.

A) both interpretations of QM are identical, but present themselves against a backdrop of different-looking mathematical frameworks. All predictions made by one group are predicted by the other group, there is nothing one predicts that the other does not. They are the same, though they are presented differently.

B) The superposition of states, absurd though it sounds, is easy to experimentally verify, and is done by undergraduate physicists all over the world.

[Poopadoop]

Anti-matter is identical to matter in every respect except the sign of it's electric charge.

Any particle and its anti-particle have the same mass, same spin, same expected decay half-life, same magnitude of charge, even.
The only difference is that a + charged particles have - charge anti-particles, and vise versa.

Where does the idea that if they meet they will destroy each other come from, or is that just science fiction?

[MadMojoMonkey]

That's interesting but answers none of my questions.

Can Newtonian physics explain why one body will orbit another in a more or less stable way whereas another's orbit will decay into crash phase?

Yes, and it all has to do with the movement and concentration of energy from one form to another.

I described some forms of energy transfer, which would contribute to these different orbital behaviors. There are more avenues of energy transfer, but I'd have to know specifically what you're talking about to answer the mechanism involved.

In general, objects in orbits do not "decay into crash phase." The most prevalent decay phase is for an elliptical orbit to become more circular over time.

Not all decays involve the orbiting objects moving toward each other. The moon's orbital decay is taking it away from the Earth, not toward it.

[Poopadoop]

Not all decays involve the orbiting objects moving toward each other. The moon's orbital decay is taking it away from the Earth, not toward it.

So this leads into my question, just in an opposite form. What are the properties of a stable orbit that make it different from one that decays? Or do all orbit situations decay and if so, why?

[MadMojoMonkey]

Where does the idea that if they meet they will destroy each other come from, or is that just science fiction?

Fiction? IDK. Depends what you mean.
Nothing I say in this thread is intentional fiction.

Science doesn't produce facts, it produces falsifiable statements. So if you say, "If a statement of science is shown to be false, then that statement was fiction," then yes. Everything in this thread is fiction. All the scientific "truths" of the past were later shown to be approximations. It stands to reason that all our understanding today is approximations. If you consider approximation to be fiction, that's cool. BUT if you think that a good description being off by a fraction of a percent from "perfect" is non-fiction, then nothing in this thread is (intentional) fiction. (I do make mistakes and don't understand everything as well as I think I do.)

Does that make sense?

Where I cannot rely on publicly available, peer reviewed data or my own personal experiments, I make it clear that those topics are theory based, and not observation-based.
If you go back and read what I said about virtual photons, this is plainly evident. (but at 13 pages, I don't really expect you to do this.)

***
particle-antiparticle annihilation is well observed and a fundamental mechanism of the PET scan. The annihilation creates 2 photons of specific frequency, moving in opposite directions. The scanner looks for 2 photons moving exactly away from each other, and measures the difference in time between those signals. It then backs out the distance to the common origin in space and time of those 2 photons to determine where the flows of bodily fluids are going inside your body.

[Poopadoop]

Fiction? IDK. Depends what you mean.
Nothing I say in this thread is intentional fiction.

Science doesn't produce facts, it produces falsifiable statements. So if you say, "If a statement of science is shown to be false, then that statement was fiction," then yes. Everything in this thread is fiction. All the scientific "truths" of the past were later shown to be approximations. It stands to reason that all our understanding today is approximations. If you consider approximation to be fiction, that's cool. BUT if you think that a good description being off by a fraction of a percent from "perfect" is non-fiction, then nothing in this thread is (intentional) fiction. (I do make mistakes and don't understand everything as well as I think I do.)

Does that make sense?

Where I cannot rely on publicly available, peer reviewed data or my own personal experiments, I make it clear that those topics are theory based, and not observation-based.

I was not attacking you personally. If you said it was true, I didn't see it and wasn't questioning it. I was asking the question based on what I'd heard about it from other sources.

It's funny that you feel the need to teach me about what science is though...you know I am a scientist, right?

If you go back and read what I said about virtual photons, this is plainly evident. (but at 13 pages, I don't really expect you to do this.)

If you said it 13 pages ago I certainly would not have remembered it when I posed the question, assuming I understood it when i read it in the first place.

***

particle-antiparticle annihilation is well observed and a fundamental mechanism of the PET scan. The annihilation creates 2 photons of specific frequency, moving in opposite directions. The scanner looks for 2 photons moving exactly away from each other, and measures the difference in time between those signals. It then backs out the distance to the common origin in space and time of those 2 photons to determine where the flows of bodily fluids are going inside your body.

Ok, so if I understand this correctly two photons are being created in the process. What is being destroyed (i.e., a molecule, an atom?). Again, not trying to be difficult I just want to understand.

[Savy]

A Psychologist calling himself a scientist. That is funny. Good post.

[Poopadoop]

A Psychologist calling himself a scientist. That is funny. Good post.

Well, I do experiments where I manipulate variables and measure the effects, and these are then peer-reviewed and published in reputable scientific journals.

If that doesn't make me a scientist, I don't know what does.

[OngBonga]

My phsychology teacher at college told me about an experiment she and her class did on their lecturer at university... this tutor was quite animated in that he would pace around a lot while talking... well, the class decided to only maintain eye contact with him when he was addressing them if he was standing still.

It worked. Over time, he stopped pacing around, and didn't even realise it.

[Poopadoop]

My phsychology teacher at college told me about an experiment she and her class did on their lecturer at university... this tutor was quite animated in that he would pace around a lot while talking... well, the class decided to only maintain eye contact with him when he was addressing them if he was standing still.

It worked. Over time, he stopped pacing around, and didn't even realise it.

The only thing that would make that story better would be if he were giving a lecture on classical conditioning at the time.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I was not attacking you personally.

Me or anyone, as far as I can tell.
IDK what you're talking about with "attack" word.
You asked a question. I answered to the best of my ability.

It's funny that you feel the need to teach me about what science is though...you know I am a scientist, right?

My intent wasn't to teach you about science, it was to describe my approach to science and physics.
My intent was to provide future context so that your question was answered not only in this case, but in all cases.

If you said it 13 pages ago I certainly would not have remembered it when I posed the question, assuming I understood it when i read it in the first place.

Page 1 has some gold. Prob other pages, too.
I didn't realize you've been on FTR for so long.

Ok, so if I understand this correctly two photons are being created in the process. What is being destroyed (i.e., a molecule, an atom?). Again, not trying to be difficult I just want to understand.

The particle and antiparticle are annihilated and 2 photons are created with equal energy.

[MadMojoMonkey]

A Psychologist calling himself a scientist. That is funny. Good post.

We can't all enjoy a field which actually produces incontrovertibly true statements.

Snob.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Well, I do experiments where I manipulate variables and measure the effects, and these are then peer-reviewed and published in reputable scientific journals.

If that doesn't make me a scientist, I don't know what does.

Well, I wouldn't say that anyone who meets those criteria is automatically a scientist. If it weren't for the hubbub in the psychological fields over reproduciblility experiments, I'd say you had stronger legs to stand on with the "publication in reputable journals" part. It's just that it has recently been unveiled that those publications have gone untested by peers, and now that they are being tested, they're refuting more results than they are affirming.


You also left out hypothesis, creating and testing models and something about falsifiable conclusions, but meh. You probably do those things, so often that it is not in the front of your head that those are the sign posts on the path of science.

[Poopadoop]

Well, I wouldn't say that anyone who meets those criteria is automatically a scientist. If it weren't for the hubbub in the psychological fields over reproduciblility experiments, I'd say you had stronger legs to stand on with the "publication in reputable journals" part. It's just that it has recently been unveiled that those publications have gone untested by peers, and now that they are being tested, they're refuting more results than they are affirming.

For one, those reproducibility studies are themselves statistically flawed by the very criteria they use to assess what is reproducible. I've co-authored a paper on that very topic that is currently passed the first line of reviews and I expect to be getting accepted soon. So having the reproducibility project fail to replicate your work using their flawed criterion it is a bit like a moron calling you an idiot for them not doing things properly.

For another, going from the (flawed) assumption that the reproducibility studies are valid to the conclusion that as a psychologist I therefore belong in the same bin as the people whose studies fail to replicate (presumably through being poor at science) is itself a flawed generalisation, though I can see how it might be handy to make that assumption if it fits your purpose.

You also left out hypothesis, creating and testing models and something about falsifiable conclusions, but meh. You probably do those things, so often that it is not in the front of your head that those are the sign posts on the path of science.

lol, well since everyone in grade 8 knows that I didn't think it needed to be stated explicitly.

[OngBonga]

Ok so I figured out what "dark energy" is while smoking. It's what happens when you attempt to measure something in a non-intertial frame of reference, from an intertial frame of reference. It's the Coriolis force, or the centrifugal force, applied to a rotating universe.

Sadly, google seems to tell me I'm not the first person to have this idea. Doesn't look like I'll get to reject that Nobel prize anytime soon.

[Poopadoop]

It is annoying when other people not only steal your idea but do so before you even have it.

You prolly still in with a shot with the Ongdentity Paradox, though.

[OngBonga]

It is annoying when other people not only steal your idea but do so before you even have it.

Yeah, wankers. Wish I'd thought of this before so I could've been the first on the internet to say it, so when it's proven by someone competent I can argue that it's my idea.

I've been trying to get my head around intertial forces. If you're on a carousel that's turning, and you walk from the centre to the edge, then you'll feel two intertial (fictitious) forces... the force that causes you to turn to the right (assuming anti-clockwise rotation) is the Coriolis force, which is why hurricanes rotate in different direction depending on hemispehere... and the force that forces you away from the centre... that's the centrifugal force and is what pins you to the side of a spinning circle. Neither of these forces are real, they emerge simply because we are rotating and because of conservation of energy.

If the universe is rotating around a central point (it's what I believe... the central point has a name... the "big bang"), then we should expect intertial forces to emerge within the system. Dark energy is what's believed to be causing the expansion of the universe... well, if it's rotating, then the outer regions will appear to be moving away from the centre faster than the inner regions, because of the centrifugal foce. This will give the illusion of expansion. However, we're not moving directly away from the centre, because of the Coriolis force... we're being deflected as our motion changes relative to the source of our motiion... so this "expansion" is drifting and is following a curved path which is ultimately circular.

If we throw a ball from the equator towards the north pole, we can see the ball drifitng, following a curved path, because we are using the earth as a reference point (Coriolis). If we took the earth away and looked at the ball from its frame of reference, it would be travelling in a straight line. However, we know it has drifted through space, and over time, the drift becomes greater... the space that the ball is travelling would appear to be "expanding", given the right frame of reference.

I certainly like the idea that dark energy is an inertial force. Dark energy arises becuse we're making the mistake of thinking the universe isn't rotating.

[OngBonga]

Coriolis is easy to understand... throw a ball from the equator to the north pole... when you throw it, you're rotating on the earth's axis from the equator, where it is fastest. As the ball travels north, the earth below it rotates slower, because the radius of rotation is decreasing. However, the ball still has the rotational energy it has when it began its journey... conservation of energy means that the ball will rotate "faster" and drift eastwards.

I'm yet to find a way of easily understanding the centrifugal force, despite it being the more familiar case.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I'm on board with the assessment that a sloppy reproduction of the original experiment is unable to comment on the validity of the original experiment.

I'm under the impression that, even in cases where the initial researcher was involved in the reproduction, the results were not stellar. There have been a slew of failures to reproduce, even when the procedures of the original experiment were followed to a T.

Unless I misunderstood you. If your argument is that psychology deals with people, who can be roughly described as chaotic systems, and therefore reproducibility is not as fundamental to the field... then I'd say that's a step away from scientific rigor. It doesn't mean it's not science, but it certainly means it's using a permutation of scientific method.

***
In science, stating things explicitly is the bees knees.
That's why I give all my presentations wearing only a thong.

[OngBonga]

Only a thong? Come on man. I like to wear a thong, but under my normal clothes, jeez.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Only a thong? Come on man. I like to wear a thong, but under my normal clothes, jeez.

Not explicit enough, you wanker!

[OngBonga]

Oh, while we're on the subject of Coriolis, hurricanes (or, more to the point, their rotation) proves that the world is not flat. Just in case anyone here was in any doubt...

A flat earth that is rotating would have hurricanes all rotating in the same direction. Well, unless by "flat earth" they mean flat like a coin, with people living on both sides. But they obviously don't argue in favour of that model, because we can travel to Australia without having to go round an edge.

[Savy]

Oh, while we're on the subject of Coriolis, hurricanes (or, more to the point, their rotation) proves that the world is not flat. Just in case anyone here was in any doubt...

A flat earth that is rotating would have hurricanes all rotating in the same direction. Well, unless by "flat earth" they mean flat like a coin, with people living on both sides. But they obviously don't argue in favour of that model, because we can travel to Australia without having to go round an edge.

lies

[Poopadoop]

I'm on board with the assessment that a sloppy reproduction of the original experiment is unable to comment on the validity of the original experiment.

I'm under the impression that, even in cases where the initial researcher was involved in the reproduction, the results were not stellar. There have been a slew of failures to reproduce, even when the procedures of the original experiment were followed to a T.

There's two major classes of issues around reproducibility, methodological (i.e., how closely the replication reproduces what was done in the original study) and statistically (how the original study's results are compared to the replication attempt and how inferences are drawn as to whether the result constitutes a replication).

As for methods, the willingness of someone to cooperate in a replication attempt speaks mainly to their own integrity - it doesn't necessarily ensure the replication attempt itself isn't being corrupted by some unknown variable or the replicator's general incompetence in trying to replicate a study done outside their own area of expertise. This can happen despite everyone's best intentions.

Fwiw, i have spoken to some of the people whose work was reproduced in the psych reproducibility project. Even among the ones who agreed and cooperated, many of them had criticisms regarding how much the replication faithfully reproduced the original methods. This of course is clearly a concern in interpreting the results.

Regarding statistics, it is SUPER annoying that these people (the reproducibility project) set out to assess reproducibility without even one of them appearing to have a solid grasp of how to do so statistically. The way they did the stats doesn't pass the laugh test because it relies on matching the results of two separate null hypothesis statistical tests with binary outcomes (haha) rather than measuring the evidence that the replication provides evidence for the existence of an effect consistent in size with that implied by the original research.

If your argument is that psychology deals with people, who can be roughly described as chaotic systems, and therefore reproducibility is not as fundamental to the field... then I'd say that's a step away from scientific rigor. It doesn't mean it's not science, but it certainly means it's using a permutation of scientific method.

I didn't say anything like that. If you have an effect that is large and consistent enough to be of import then by definition you will be able to design a study with sufficient power to find it and it should reproduce reliably. You should also provide enough information that a person acting in good faith can repeat your methods as precisely as is humanly possible.

People who run thousands of subjects and report 'significant' correlations of 0.2 are bigger morons than people who report large effects from small samples that may be difficult to replicate (though the latter are still morons, just as not on the same scale as the former). The reason for this is that many replication attempts are done in bad faith - the authors often have a vested interest in disproving someone's results and so (consciously or not) manipulate the methods or analyses just enough to make that happen.

That said, it is entirely possible to obtain spurious results due to statistical variance alone. Thus, the best defense for a scientist of integrity against having their reputation tarnished by failures to replicate is to replicate themselves at least once and preferably several times before they publish anything.

In the end, it would not surprise me entirely if a fair number of people are making errors in their design and/or analyses and thus reporting spurious results. Statistics is a complicated subject and analyzing numerous variables simultaneously is not a trivial matter. Whether the number of fuck ups is anywhere near the ~50% claimed by the reproducibility project is something I very much doubt for the reasons given above. In the end, though, the vast majority of important effects obtained in the field have been replicated dozens if not hundreds of times and shown to be reliable because they are of sufficient interest that people want to study them.

The layperson's impression that half of what we know about the mind must be bullshit because of the reproducibility project's report is just wrong.

[OngBonga]

Wiki -

Inertia is the resistance of any physical object to any change in its state of motion.

In physics, mass is a property of a physical body. It is the measure of an object's resistance to acceleration (a change in its state of motion) when a net force is applied.

What's the difference between mass and inertia? Is there any?

[MadMojoMonkey]

Wiki -

What's the difference between mass and inertia? Is there any?

According to those definitions, inertia and mass (inertial mass) are identical.
It's saying that inertial mass and inertia are the same, with perhaps some prevarication about mass is the cause and inertia is the effect.

It's not pointing out that gravitational mass is, in fact, a different beast. That is - the mass which gives rise to the attractive gravitational force is NOT defined in your inertial mass statements. The force is not well explained by saying that these 2 bodies resist a change in their state of motion, therefore they accelerate toward each other. Rather, "not well explained" is a pretty glorified way of saying it's completely ludicrous.

An as yet unexplained portion of physics is why the inertial mass and gravitational mass are identical to something like 30 + decimal places, but may deviate after that.

[OngBonga]

Yeah from what I've learned over the last few days, gravitational and intertial mass are experimentally identical. There was emphasis on the word "expeirmentally", like they were trying to emphasise they are not considered as identical.

You say "may" derive after 30+ decimal places. I assume that 30+ decimal places is therefore as accurate as we can measure these things? Are you saying that gravitational and inertial mass may be the same thing? Or are you saying they may just measure the same?

[OngBonga]

...with perhaps some prevarication about mass is the cause and inertia is the effect.

I'm afraid this statement, if true, would simply lead me to asking the question...

Is intertia and gravity the same?

Because gravity, too, is the effect of mass.

[OngBonga]

It's clear to me that mass, intertia and gravity are different aspects of the same beast, but quite how they relate to each other is something that's confusing me. I feel like intertia must be either mass or gravity, or perhaps a bridge between the two.

[OngBonga]

Einstein used the fact that gravitational and inertial mass were equal to begin his Theory of General Relativity in which he postulated that gravitational mass was the same as inertial mass and that the acceleration of gravity is a result of a 'valley' or slope in the space-time continuum that masses 'fell down' much as pennies spiral around a hole in the common donation toy at your favorite chain store.

This kinda makes some sense. Where spacetime is curved, an object travelling in a straight line will resist such curvature. An object's mass is still its resistance to a change of state of motion, it emerges as it encounters curvature. The more resistance it has, the more it distorts spacetime to maintain its straight path, and the more it influences other bodies. Rather than change course, a body curves spacetime by a sufficient amount to maintain equlibirium between its intertia and motion. This creates an emergent force as other bodies resist a change in motion that the curvature is demanding.

So gravitational mass and inertial mass, it makes sense for them to be syonymous. Gravity is merely curved spacetime, inertia is why spacetime is curved, and mass is either a measure of resistance (intertia) or curvature (gravity), which both amount to the same thing because the curvature emerges as a result of the resistance.

...as yet unexplained...

Depends who you're listening to!

[OngBonga]

So in a week I've solved dark energy and gravitational vs intertial mass. I think this calls for a cup of tea and a spliff.

[OngBonga]

And some shortbread.

I deserve it.

[Savy]

rename thread "ask ong" imo

[OngBonga]

"ong tells you what he thinks and doesn't give a fuck if it's nonsense" is probably better.

[Savy]

"ong tells you what he thinks and doesn't give a fuck if it's nonsense" is probably better.

ohh so we'd have to merge all threads

[Poopadoop]

ohh so we'd have to merge all threads

lol

[Poopadoop]

I think this calls for a cup of tea and a spliff.

Doesn't pretty much everything call for that?

[MadMojoMonkey]

This kinda makes some sense. Where spacetime is curved, an object travelling in a straight line will resist such curvature. An object's mass is still its resistance to a change of state of motion, it emerges as it encounters curvature. The more resistance it has, the more it distorts spacetime to maintain its straight path, and the more it influences other bodies. Rather than change course, a body curves spacetime by a sufficient amount to maintain equlibirium between its intertia and motion. This creates an emergent force as other bodies resist a change in motion that the curvature is demanding.

So gravitational mass and inertial mass, it makes sense for them to be syonymous. Gravity is merely curved spacetime, inertia is why spacetime is curved, and mass is either a measure of resistance (intertia) or curvature (gravity), which both amount to the same thing because the curvature emerges as a result of the resistance.



Depends who you're listening to!

This is a surprisingly cogent thought process.

I've not heard that about Einstein's GR before. I'm not sure if it's accurate, or if it's one of those things like...
Maxwell wrote over 20 equations to unify Electromagnetic theory. Today, we call a set of 4 equations which capture all of those ideas, Maxwell's Equations.
So Maxwell didn't write Maxwell's equations, but he wrote a more complicated presentation of equivalent statements.
Maybe it's the same with Einstein. He didn't start with gravitational mass being equal to inertial mass, as such, but it was in there, and was sufficient.
IDK.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I found your quote "from the Internet." There is no greater context in that page to the statements about Einstein's first principles for GR.

[OngBonga]

I found your quote "from the Internet." There is no greater context in that page to the statements about Einstein's first principles for GR.

Yeah I'm not really very good at checking the validity of my sources when I'm buzzing around google looking for vague answers to my questions. I think this is probably the opinion, or interpretation, of the author.

Still, I kinda like the idea that the difference between gravitational mass and intertial mass is simply a case of one being a measurement of the cause, and the other of the effect.

[OngBonga]

I've not heard that about Einstein's GR before. I'm not sure if it's accurate, or if it's one of those things like...
Maxwell wrote over 20 equations to unify Electromagnetic theory. Today, we call a set of 4 equations which capture all of those ideas, Maxwell's Equations.

So basically, if I talk enough bollocks, sooner or later I'll accidentally say something brilliant.

I'll be sure to give Maxwell a mention when I'm telling them where to stick their Nobel Prize.

[OngBonga]

ohh so we'd have to merge all threads

All except the "what song am I listening to" thread, since I own that one with the quality of music I've posted relative to others.

Only aubrey comes close to challenging me.

[OngBonga]

Doesn't pretty much everything call for that?

I agree, and I'm on the case.

[Savy]

So basically, if I talk enough bollocks, sooner or later I'll accidentally say something brilliant.

I'll be sure to give Maxwell a mention when I'm telling them where to stick their Nobel Prize.

The nobel prize comes with a nice chunk of money, I wouldn't turn it down.

[Poopadoop]

So basically, if I talk enough bollocks, sooner or later I'll accidentally say something brilliant.

Seems easier than hiring a million monkeys and a million keyboards. Though probably in this day and age you could probably just program a twitter account to do it.

[MadMojoMonkey]

If only twitter wasn't already a million...

wait...

What's that you're saying about monkeys, scrub?

[OngBonga]

The nobel prize comes with a nice chunk of money, I wouldn't turn it down.

I'm fairly certain that if I a) actually solved these physics problems, and b) rejected the Nobel Prize, I'd milk a living through alt media interviews and fringe science conventions. Fuck it, I reckon I'd get sponsorship piece of piece to be a top poker player. It's not about skills at the top, it's about who's willing to bankroll you.

I reckon turning it down is probably worth more than whatever bollocks they'll offer me.

[Savy]

It's ~£725k so i doubt it.

[MadMojoMonkey]

I hate to break it to you, but there's next to 0 interview fame cache for a Nobel Prize in physics.
Can you name any Nobel Prize in Physics winners w/o using google?
If so, are they names from a hundred years ago?*

I mean, you may get a couple of paid interviews on the day, but it's not gong to be something you can milk for year after year. I doubt you'd get hundreds of thousands of monies for interviews, which will probably pay little if at all after the first week. You'd have some decent time over the year at touring to universities and giving a presentation about your solutions and how you came to them or their significance. A decent part of my job is familiarizing a visiting speaker with the AV controls in the lecture hall. I presume they are paid for their time, but IDK how much.

If you did this, you'd get your name on a short list with Jean Paul Sartre, who declined a Nobel Prize in Literature, and Le Duc Tho, who declined a Nobel Peace Prize. Sartre said he wouldn't have as much impact as a writer if he accepted the prize. Tho said there was no peace in Vietnam.


*

Spoiler: Show

(If you guessed Feynmann, then you get a point)

[OngBonga]

I'll take a punt at Marie Curie, and assume that's who's in the spoiler.

Haha nope, not heard of him (or her).

Also... Faraday, Maxwell, Newton, Hertz, Watt, Ohm, Joule, Calorie, Kilogram, Hector Acre, Bob Dylan... I must have binked one or two there...

You'd have some decent time over the year at touring to universities and giving a presentation about your solutions and how you came to them or their significance.

This would rock.

"So yeah, I was basically drinking tea and smoking weed while talking shit on the internet, and I accidentally said the right words in the right order to make someone cleverer than me go "fuck you might just have said something brilliant there" and so he did the work and took the credit, while I'm milking it for all its worth by touring USA all expenses paid by mojo's University because he and they look great thanks to my stoned ideas and lack of motivation and/or ability to coherently put it in writing.

What, you want more? Fuck man, this few hundred bucks for talking isn't as easy money as I thought.

Um... God told me this shit, I have no idea what he's on about but I just say the words he tells me. You can join my cult, sorry I mean church, by paying me $1000, sign up here. I'm just going for a smoke, back in ten mins... grab youselves coffee and tea and whatnot."

*fucks off*

[OngBonga]

Gah I could've got Lorentz, I was only reading his name an hour ago.

[OngBonga]

And Einstein obviously goes without saying.

(Or to put that another way, how the fuck did I not guess him?)

[OngBonga]

Gustav Hertz? Haha some of these people have funny names for people so famous.

[OngBonga]

Oh yeah and Higgs... so basically I knew Curie, binked Hertz as a lucky guess based on units of measurement, I obviously should get Einstein, should get Lorentz and Higgs too, while the rest I've either never heard of, or it's vague.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Those are all people who won the prize over 100 years ago, though, which illustrates my point perfectly.
For whatever reason, physics doesn't really stay in the news cycle for very long these days.

Richard Feynman was like a Carl Sagan or Neil DeGrasse Tyson kind of guy from ye olde grandad times.
Check out Project Tuva to see him in action.
It's a black and white recording of physics lectures from like 60 years ago. May not be suitable for all audiences.

[OngBonga]

Except Higgs. He's a household name, although maybe that's just because he's British. Maybe random Americans haven't heard of him.

Although I have to admit, I had to google his name to remember if it's John or Peter.

[Savy]

Except Higgs. He's a household name, although maybe that's just because he's British. Maybe random Americans haven't heard of him.

Although I have to admit, I had to google his name to remember if it's John or Peter.

That's only really because science has to justify spending billions of dollars building a toy.

The problem is that when you look through the list for reasons why people won the award the words don't really mean anything to the average person and those that do tend to be for fairly "tame"* things. I think the same is true for most of the awards.

*Not to diminish the work or how important it is.

[OngBonga]

That's only really because science has to justify spending billions of dollars building a toy.

Probably. It'll be interesting to see how famous he is in a decade.

[Savy]

Probably. It'll be interesting to see how famous he is in a decade.

Nah he'll be remembered because he has a pretty important mechanism named after him in a part of physics that will, at least in the foreseeable future, be important in answering some of the biggest questions about life.

[Savy]

You'd have some decent time over the year at touring to universities and giving a presentation about your solutions and how you came to them or their significance.

Tbf I'd pay to see ong do this.

[OngBonga]

The problem is that when you look through the list for reasons why people won the award the words don't really mean anything to the average person and those that do tend to be for fairly tame things. I think the same is true for most of the awards.

Well this is why Marie Curie is the obvious famous one. Noone disputes she deserves to be on the list, and I doubt many people will argue with Einstein's name being on it. Beyond that, these people's achievments are just beyond the realm of understanding for the average guy. Like, if you asked me two days ago why Lorentz is famous, I'd have been mostly clueless. I know the name, isn't a force or a unit of measurement named after him? Today, I know he played a key role in unifying electricity and magnetism. The Lorentz Force, along with Maxwell's equations, is electromagnetism. How many people know that? He's one of the more famous names on the list, and very few people could tell you why. Even I couldn't tell you why he got the Nobel Prize, I just know he got it, and I'm aware of some of his work.

[MadMojoMonkey]

That's only really because science has to justify spending billions of dollars building a toy.

"'Cause it's da biggest toy, though!" seems justification enough to me.

We've worked our way up to this point over millennia. First particle accelerator was bangin' 2 rocks together and seeing what's inside.
We're a bit more sophisticated than that, nowadays. We have Punkin' Chunkin' competitions and stuff.

We didn't build a particle accelerator that big until we'd exhausted the experiments we could think to do with lower energy accelerators. Having built that one, we've confirmed a hypothesized implication of our other theories, the Higgs field, which is always a hallmark of good science.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Tbf I'd pay to see ong do this.

I wouldn't miss it for anything.

[Poopadoop]

Tbf I'd pay to see ong do this.

OTOH, you can listen to him talk shit for free on this forum.

[MadMojoMonkey]

Nah he'll be remembered because he has a pretty important mechanism named after him in a part of physics that will, at least in the foreseeable future, be important in answering some of the biggest questions about life.

IDK. It's not something a non-physicist will need to learn about. It'd be a challenge to describe the Higgs field in any non-hand-wavey manner to a 2nd year physics major. It's not something a non-physicist is going to understand in a comprehensive way other than to memorize some statements.

Even the layman's understanding of "Physicists have detected Higgs Bosons." is misleading, because we haven't had any detector register the presence of a Higgs Boson. We've observed the decay products of a particle with the properties hypothesized by Higgs, et al. If it has all the properties of the thing, it is that thing. So we've detected evidence of Higgs Bosons' decay, which implicitly confirms the existence of Higgs Bosons.

If our new understanding of Higgs bosons leads to a new unforeseen shift in technology, then his name will be remembered. Like Einstein's. If Einstein's relativity didn't tell us to look for Black Holes, or enable us to create big explosions, microwave ovens and GPS, then I doubt he'd be much remembered, either, like so many names of Nobel Prize recipients.

[MadMojoMonkey]

OTOH, you can listen to him talk shit for free on this forum.

It's not the same as sitting in a room full of physicists who got outsmarted at their own game by some random non-college-educated stoner.

It gets even better if his presentation is full of hubris and bravado, but not nonsense. I mean... he'd have to actually come up with the revolutionary ideas which earned him the prize, which means that on some level he understands the physics at play. It'd be brilliant to have him explain to the room that they were all just failing try-hards w/o the requisite creativity to see past their own false presumptions, but not coming out and saying it directly.

Entertainment value off the charts.