String Theory coming to PBS

Woah ...
I just had a bit of a revelation of thought:


b) The universe has within it laws of physics that allow for the evolution of mankind

REALLY? THEY CANNOT EVEN AGREE ON LAWS OF PHYSICS IN THE UNIVERSE BEING A TRUE STATEMENT...

c) Humans are a direct result of processes contained within the universe (i.e. there is no outside agent besides the universe itself that has brought us here).

AND WE KNOW THIS BECUASE WE HAVE BEEN OUTSIDE THIS UNIERSE? WE HAVE ACTUALLY BEEN TO OTHER GALAXIES? NO...WE ONCE AGAIN ARE MAKING ASUMPTIONS, LIKE THE ONE ABOUT NO OTHER LIFE EXEPT THAT WHICH IS ON EARTH....BUT THEN THEY FIND WATER ON MARS

d) Evolution is fact
REALLY? ACCORDING TO WHO? IF EVOLUTION IS AFACT AND A PRODUCT OF PHYSICS OF THIS UNIVERSE AS YOU EXPLIANED, SHOULD IT NOT CONTINUE HAPPENING OVER AND OVER? WHY ARE APES STIL APES AND HOCOME THERE ARE NO NEANDERTHALL MEN WALKING AROUND?? FACT? NO..HYPOTHESIS? YES...DO I BELEIVE THAT SNAKES AND LIZARDS ECT..HAVE CHANGEDS AND ADAPTED OVER TIME , OF COURSE, BUT A HUMAN FROM AN APE??

e) Hence, the universe has encoded within itself the means to evolve mankind so that man himself can question the very nature of the universe -- including the origin of the universe and where the universe is headed.

THE UNIVERSE WOULD THUS BE CONSIDERED A GOD OR GOD LIKE ENERGY THAT IS GRANTING ALL THE POWERES TO MEN ,,,,DOES THAT SEEM LOGICAL?

believe that the universe is actually programmed in some manner to constantly evolve greater systems within itself so that those systems, while part of the greater whole, can eventually give the whole some meaning of existence.

All greater systems such as commerce, business, technology, industry exist solely to help man evolve into greater systems much further down the road.
I BELEIVE THEY EXIST TO PROVIDE $$...WHICH BUYS FOOD, SHELTER HAPINESS...


I think there is more here than first meets the eye. Regardless, it isn't about any one man or woman -- this is all about the universe trying to understand itself.
HOW DOES A UNIVERSE THINK? UNDERSTAND?


:confused: :confused:
 
there is most definitely inter species evolution, i am yet to see proof of very much intra species evolution....... just hypothesis.

best,

surfer:)
 
... You should enjoy the program .
More...
Yes,

It will be a special treat. I just hope it is not too elementary. With the super-stars they have lined up I don't think we'll be dissapointed. And with Michael Green aiding in rehashing the hard stuff into easily digestible nuggets, there should be a real nice balance.
...String theory is interesting: particularly if you like mathematics.
More...
String theory (now really M-theory) is essentially all mathematics. In fact, Ed Witten has never won the Noble Prize for Physics, but was awarded the greatest prize in Mathematics, The Fields Medal, for his work on String (M) Theory.

...you could spend years developing and refining the abstractions contained within the primary thesis: Several people at princeton did just that. In fact a large publicity push has been made - yes academic institutions with billion dollar plus endowments have PR people - by the proponent universities that stand to gain from funding.
More...
Yes. I used to go to the colloqiums at U Of C and Northwestern U. I even got to see Witten at one of them...

...However, one of my problems with it is that so much of it is untestable and that the details of the theory appear to be overly complicated
More...
Sheldon Glashow has this problem too. There are a couple of tests that they believe will be avaible when the new Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, which should be ready about 2007 or 2008. One prediction is that energy can escape from our known dimensions and leak into these extra dimensions predicted by String Theory under appropriate circumstances. Those appropriate circumstances might be generated in high-energy collisions that will take place at the new atom smasher, the Large Hadron Collider. If there is less energy the end of the collision than there was at the start, that would be astonishing evidence for String Theory.

...A good rule of thumb is that if your framework is very very complicated then you are missing something important.

As a stepping stone to a full quantum theory of Gravity the various flavors of this offer some utility but enough detail is missing that it is reasonable to look at other approaches and proceed cautiously in embracing this as worthy of the bulk of grant funding for quantum gravity research.
More...
Remember, M-Theory is very elegant and actually carries with it a very small number of ideas: The basic constituents of matter are vibrating strings or loops or branes, spacetime has more than 4 dimensions, 11 to be exact, and a few others that are more abstract, like nature is SuperSymmetric (Witten explains that "supersymmetric quantum mechanics" is just Hodge-de Rham theory, a branch of Differential Geometry.) The math is simply out of reach of most people, but that will change as training for mathematical phycists catches up.

Here is a really beautiful paper/audio that gives a relatively easy explanation of some of the concepts:

http://online.itp.ucsb.edu/online/plecture/witten/

nitro
 
<<Sheldon Glashow has this problem too. There are a couple of tests that they believe will be avaible when the new Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, which should be ready about 2007 or 2008. One prediction is that energy can escape from our known dimensions and leak into these extra dimensions predicted by String Theory under appropriate circumstances. Those appropriate circumstances might be generated in high-energy collisions that will take place at the new atom smasher, the Large Hadron Collider. If there is less energy the end of the collision than there was at the start, that would be astonishing evidence for String Theory.<<

Yes. I know a few people working on this ..... I have looked at this for a few years and I still think that this is not the right route. While the math is fun and quite nicely done it doesn't mean it correctly describes nature. It will be interesting when these experiments come on line and have enought data. The problem is it will be awhile before these large energy experiements collect enough data to decide and in the mean time it is important to fund other avenues. I know the mathematics well. Yet I do not see this an a very elegant description - too many issues that require near hurculean workarounds to get right and this points to important missing pieces ..... When your solution is not pretty you are usually on the wrong track ....
 
This is discussed by Green in his book.

The gist of it (as I remember it) of his explanation is:

Consider a book. A book consits of paragraphs, which in turn are made from sentences, which in turn are made from words, which in turn are made of letters. But what are letters made of? NOTHING! They are the building blocks of written text if you like. They have no deeper "structure."

Now granted that this is an imperfect analogy, but the point is that there are things that are truly fundamental, where "fundamental" might include a definition that uses the Uncertainty Principle.

nitro
Quote from aphexcoil:

What the hell makes up a string?
More...
 
Yes, many feel as you do, e.g., Sheldon Glashow. The Large Hadron Collider I think will tell us if we are on the right track or not...

nitro
Quote from CalTrader:

<<Sheldon Glashow has this problem too. There are a couple of tests that they believe will be avaible when the new Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, which should be ready about 2007 or 2008. One prediction is that energy can escape from our known dimensions and leak into these extra dimensions predicted by String Theory under appropriate circumstances. Those appropriate circumstances might be generated in high-energy collisions that will take place at the new atom smasher, the Large Hadron Collider. If there is less energy the end of the collision than there was at the start, that would be astonishing evidence for String Theory.<<

Yes. I know a few people working on this ..... I have looked at this for a few years and I still think that this is not the right route. While the math is fun and quite nicely done it doesn't mean it correctly describes nature. It will be interesting when these experiments come on line and have enought data. The problem is it will be awhile before these large energy experiements collect enough data to decide and in the mean time it is important to fund other avenues. I know the mathematics well. Yet I do not see this an a very elegant description - too many issues that require near hurculean workarounds to get right and this points to important missing pieces ..... When your solution is not pretty you are usually on the wrong track ....
More...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top