Theory of Everything - View Single Post

tom mccurdy · 02:06 PM

Although this is very rough... with many grammatical errors it should help you understand a lot about string theory if you were to read it

here is url for better formating
http://www.quantumninja.com/toe/modu...le=print&sid=7

Part 1:
Greetings, My Name is Tom McCurdy and I will be discussing the quest for the holy grail of physics, the quest for the theory of everything or as it is sometimes referred toe. This theory that was even able to elude Einstein for the 3 decades he searched for it. The search for the theory of everything is trying to unite the four forces of our world and our universe; electromagnetism, the strong force, and the weak force. In doing so it hopes to solve one of the biggest conflicts in the history of physics, the conflict between General Relativity versus Quantum Mechanics. However before you we talk about the current conflict it is necessary to see how we arrived at this conflict. The conflict between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics is really the 3rd of three major conflicts in physics. The first major conflict was between predictions made by Maxwell’s electromagnetism Equations vs the older Newtonian ideas of the universe. According to Newton if you were able to run fast enough you could quite literally catch up and surpass light in speed. This is not to say that Newton in any way thought it was possible for some living thing on earth to catch up to light, it just meant that there were no laws preventing it from happening. However Maxwell’s equations prevented you from catching up to light. The conflict was eventually solved by none other than our good friend, Albert Einstein., with the creation of Special Relativity. Einstein’s Special relativity completely revolutionized our view of the universe. It took it from the classic view of a static unchanging universe to the idea that the universe was actually a malleable construct whose form and appearance was dependent upon one’s state of motion. This is the law that causes things such as Lorenz contraction or time dilation, it is the thing that would cause two passing people in space traveling at good portions of c to see the other’s person’s time as running slower. However To better understand some of the implications of SR let me give you an example with this little riddle. Hypothetically speaking lets say there is fierce fighting between two countries that we will refer to as Country Bob and Country Joe. To solve the problem between the two countries the UN gets the leaders of Bob and Joe to agree to sign a peace agreement to end the violence. The problem is that neither leader wishes to sign it first. To solve the problem they put the two leaders in a room across from each other equal distant to a light source at a long table. They decided that the peace agreement signing will occur the exact second the light reaches each leader. Since light travels at the same velocity it reaches the leaders at the same time, and the agreement is signed and both countries are happy as there is now peace between the longtime rival countries. Later two new countries lets call Flat and Round are fighting. The US is trying to help the two countries get a peace agreement signed to end the fighting, however they have the same problem as the first two countries. The leaders of both countries again refuse to sign the document first as it would anger their people. To solve the problem the leaders meet on a train, and again the same thing is set up. The two leaders sit on opposite ends of a table on the train, one facing the front of the train (F-Leader), the other facing the back of train (B-Leader). They set up the light in the middle and turn it on, and they both sign it when the light hits them. The two leaders and especially the US are quite pleased until they find out the fighting started again. It turns out to the observers watching outside of the train, they "saw" the F-leader sign the document just before the b-leader claiming the light had to travel a smaller distance even though it is at the was traveling the same speed. However the people on the train maintain that the peace documents were signed at the exact same time. Who is correct? Why? The answer is that they are both right. Special relativity allows for each viewer to have a unique viewpoint and still be telling the truth about what they see. To the people inside the train the documents were in fact signed at the same time, however to the people outside the train the documents were signed at different times. What’s the lesson: Don’t trust the U.S. to solve any foreign relations problem by itself. Or make sure everyone has the same frame of reference when attempting anything similar again. So it seems like everything should be fine in physics at this point, after all the conflict was solved however as often in the case in physics, especially in the quest for the theory of everything, one solution lead to a whole new problem. This problem we will refer to as Conflict Number 2. Conflict number 2 stemmed from some of the implications of Special Relativity. According to SR nothing could in fact travel faster than light, including any sort of influence or disturbance. This went directly against what is described Newton’s Universal theory of gravitation, which implies that everything has instant influence on other objects, versus Einstein who said this influence is limited by the speed of light. So at this point we once again we find ourselves in the boxing ring of physics with Newton returning fresh from his recent defeat and apparently back from the dead against Einstein. To really illustrate what the problem is let’s use the common example that many physicist like to use. Hypothetically let’s say for whatever reason the sun explodes. According to Newton we feel its lack of presence instantly and the earth would immediately veer off its elliptical orbit. However according to Einstein the earth would not feel its affect until at maximum around the eight minutes it takes light to reach earth or in other words it is limited to go no faster than the speed of light. However unfortunately for Newton he was going to go 0 and 2, once again Einstein stepped in and solved the problem presented by his previous solution. And in doing so he once again revamped our views of the universe. He was able to something that had puzzled Newton to the point where he simply “feigned no hypothesis.” Einstein provided an explained gravity with the creation of General Relativity. Now the universe was something that could in fact warp and curve in response to matter of energy, it wasn’t the boring old static place we sometimes would like to think it is. However the familiar curse of one solution giving birth to a new problem didn’t want to be left out of the picture and bore its ugly head once again, and lead us to the current problem, the 3rd Conflict General Relativity versus Quantum Mechanics. This time the boxing gloves were off and it was a good old fashion brawl. General Relativity governs the world of the very large with its laws, things such as planets, stars and galaxies, while Quantum Mechanics governs the world of the very small, things like atoms, electrons and quarks. The problem was and still is that both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics have been proven to work to impressive degrees of accuracy, however mathematically speaking if one of the theories is correct than it forces the other theory to be wrong. They just don’t get along with each other peacefully. By now one question may be popping up in your minds. Alright so we have two theories, that both seemingly work. Why do we even need a unified theory? The problem is they work when you are examining something that requires only one theory, something solely large or solely small. Unfortunately there are many questions in physics that require the use of both equations. These problems are some of the most important mysteries to solve, such as the mystery of the big bang. What exactly happened during the big bang, when you have the mass of the entire universe compressed to an infinitely small point?

	(#3 (permalink))
tom mccurdy Orange Belt Status: Offline Posts: 20 Thanks Given: 0 Thanked 0x in 0 Posts Join Date: Jun 2004 Rep Power: 0	Rough Copy of Lecture I gave in England - 12-04-2004, 02:04 PM Although this is very rough... with many grammatical errors it should help you understand a lot about string theory if you were to read it here is url for better formating http://www.quantumninja.com/toe/modu...le=print&sid=7 Part 1: Greetings, My Name is Tom McCurdy and I will be discussing the quest for the holy grail of physics, the quest for the theory of everything or as it is sometimes referred toe. This theory that was even able to elude Einstein for the 3 decades he searched for it. The search for the theory of everything is trying to unite the four forces of our world and our universe; electromagnetism, the strong force, and the weak force. In doing so it hopes to solve one of the biggest conflicts in the history of physics, the conflict between General Relativity versus Quantum Mechanics. However before you we talk about the current conflict it is necessary to see how we arrived at this conflict. The conflict between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics is really the 3rd of three major conflicts in physics. The first major conflict was between predictions made by Maxwell’s electromagnetism Equations vs the older Newtonian ideas of the universe. According to Newton if you were able to run fast enough you could quite literally catch up and surpass light in speed. This is not to say that Newton in any way thought it was possible for some living thing on earth to catch up to light, it just meant that there were no laws preventing it from happening. However Maxwell’s equations prevented you from catching up to light. The conflict was eventually solved by none other than our good friend, Albert Einstein., with the creation of Special Relativity. Einstein’s Special relativity completely revolutionized our view of the universe. It took it from the classic view of a static unchanging universe to the idea that the universe was actually a malleable construct whose form and appearance was dependent upon one’s state of motion. This is the law that causes things such as Lorenz contraction or time dilation, it is the thing that would cause two passing people in space traveling at good portions of c to see the other’s person’s time as running slower. However To better understand some of the implications of SR let me give you an example with this little riddle. Hypothetically speaking lets say there is fierce fighting between two countries that we will refer to as Country Bob and Country Joe. To solve the problem between the two countries the UN gets the leaders of Bob and Joe to agree to sign a peace agreement to end the violence. The problem is that neither leader wishes to sign it first. To solve the problem they put the two leaders in a room across from each other equal distant to a light source at a long table. They decided that the peace agreement signing will occur the exact second the light reaches each leader. Since light travels at the same velocity it reaches the leaders at the same time, and the agreement is signed and both countries are happy as there is now peace between the longtime rival countries. Later two new countries lets call Flat and Round are fighting. The US is trying to help the two countries get a peace agreement signed to end the fighting, however they have the same problem as the first two countries. The leaders of both countries again refuse to sign the document first as it would anger their people. To solve the problem the leaders meet on a train, and again the same thing is set up. The two leaders sit on opposite ends of a table on the train, one facing the front of the train (F-Leader), the other facing the back of train (B-Leader). They set up the light in the middle and turn it on, and they both sign it when the light hits them. The two leaders and especially the US are quite pleased until they find out the fighting started again. It turns out to the observers watching outside of the train, they "saw" the F-leader sign the document just before the b-leader claiming the light had to travel a smaller distance even though it is at the was traveling the same speed. However the people on the train maintain that the peace documents were signed at the exact same time. Who is correct? Why? The answer is that they are both right. Special relativity allows for each viewer to have a unique viewpoint and still be telling the truth about what they see. To the people inside the train the documents were in fact signed at the same time, however to the people outside the train the documents were signed at different times. What’s the lesson: Don’t trust the U.S. to solve any foreign relations problem by itself. Or make sure everyone has the same frame of reference when attempting anything similar again. So it seems like everything should be fine in physics at this point, after all the conflict was solved however as often in the case in physics, especially in the quest for the theory of everything, one solution lead to a whole new problem. This problem we will refer to as Conflict Number 2. Conflict number 2 stemmed from some of the implications of Special Relativity. According to SR nothing could in fact travel faster than light, including any sort of influence or disturbance. This went directly against what is described Newton’s Universal theory of gravitation, which implies that everything has instant influence on other objects, versus Einstein who said this influence is limited by the speed of light. So at this point we once again we find ourselves in the boxing ring of physics with Newton returning fresh from his recent defeat and apparently back from the dead against Einstein. To really illustrate what the problem is let’s use the common example that many physicist like to use. Hypothetically let’s say for whatever reason the sun explodes. According to Newton we feel its lack of presence instantly and the earth would immediately veer off its elliptical orbit. However according to Einstein the earth would not feel its affect until at maximum around the eight minutes it takes light to reach earth or in other words it is limited to go no faster than the speed of light. However unfortunately for Newton he was going to go 0 and 2, once again Einstein stepped in and solved the problem presented by his previous solution. And in doing so he once again revamped our views of the universe. He was able to something that had puzzled Newton to the point where he simply “feigned no hypothesis.” Einstein provided an explained gravity with the creation of General Relativity. Now the universe was something that could in fact warp and curve in response to matter of energy, it wasn’t the boring old static place we sometimes would like to think it is. However the familiar curse of one solution giving birth to a new problem didn’t want to be left out of the picture and bore its ugly head once again, and lead us to the current problem, the 3rd Conflict General Relativity versus Quantum Mechanics. This time the boxing gloves were off and it was a good old fashion brawl. General Relativity governs the world of the very large with its laws, things such as planets, stars and galaxies, while Quantum Mechanics governs the world of the very small, things like atoms, electrons and quarks. The problem was and still is that both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics have been proven to work to impressive degrees of accuracy, however mathematically speaking if one of the theories is correct than it forces the other theory to be wrong. They just don’t get along with each other peacefully. By now one question may be popping up in your minds. Alright so we have two theories, that both seemingly work. Why do we even need a unified theory? The problem is they work when you are examining something that requires only one theory, something solely large or solely small. Unfortunately there are many questions in physics that require the use of both equations. These problems are some of the most important mysteries to solve, such as the mystery of the big bang. What exactly happened during the big bang, when you have the mass of the entire universe compressed to an infinitely small point? Last edited by tom mccurdy : 12-04-2004 at 02:06 PM.