Differences
This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.
Both sides previous revision Previous revision Next revision | Previous revision Next revisionBoth sides next revision | ||
membrane_theory [2008-05-27 16:52] – 62.202.92.250 | membrane_theory [2011-02-14 17:04] – FdiywlvrLMtZXEnRU 174.132.220.135 | ||
---|---|---|---|
Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
- | + | lFsgau | |
- | + | ||
- | ==== Subject: we have a theory of everything now - we can all relax ==== | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | by Honor Harger (with small edits and transclusions by [[nik gaffney]]) | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | basically, it appears that thanks to the popularisation of the eleventh dimension, a rock climbing physicist' | + | |
- | ==== The [Latest] Theory of Everything. ==== | + | |
- | + | ||
- | Yep, its sorted now. We apparently understand more or less everything | + | |
- | about where the universe began, what started it, and what's in it. It | + | |
- | turns out we live in a lumpy multiversal sea of where bubble-like | + | |
- | universes are thrown into each other like tidal waves. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | Here is the deal ..... | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | In the effort to establish a unified theory of everything, a theory of | + | |
- | matter was developed in the 1980s and 90s called String Theory. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | For years it had been an article of faith that all the matter in the | + | |
- | Universe was made of tiny, invisible particles. In the 1980s the | + | |
- | particle physicists discovered they'd been studying the wrong thing. | + | |
- | The particles were really tiny, invisible strings. The theory was | + | |
- | called String Theory and it maintained that matter emanated from these | + | |
- | tiny strings like music. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | As physicist, Burt Ovrut comments: | + | |
- | string or a guitar string. If you pluck it in a certain way you get a | + | |
- | certain frequency, but if you pluck it a different way you can get more | + | |
- | frequencies on this string and in fact you have different notes. Nature | + | |
- | is made of all the little notes, the musical notes, that are played on | + | |
- | these super-strings." | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | Another physicist, Michio Kaku reiterates, "All of a sudden we realised | + | |
- | the Universe is a symphony and the laws of physics are harmonies of a | + | |
- | super-string" | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | String Theory proved provocative. | + | |
- | closest theory to explaining everything which existed in the Universe. | + | |
- | It seemed to neatly summarise the material aspects of the universe. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | String Theory utilised additional dimensions in its framework. | + | |
- | extra dimensions were spaces in the Universe which we could not | + | |
- | perceive. | + | |
- | as a ten dimensional, | + | |
- | dimensions. For instance, super gravity, argued by Michael Duff of the | + | |
- | University of Michigan, was a comparatively obscure theory which had | + | |
- | long existed in the shadow of String Theory, as a single unifying | + | |
- | universal theory. | + | |
- | composed of 11 dimensions. | + | |
- | ridiculed by String Theorists. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | If String Theory was to become Einstein' | + | |
- | it would have to pass one test. It would have to explain the birth of | + | |
- | the Universe. | + | |
- | of the cosmologists who believed things had started with a giant | + | |
- | explosion - the Big Bang. While initially String Theory and the Big | + | |
- | Bang seemed to work perfectly in tandem as dual explanations for the | + | |
- | Universe (one explained its origins, the other everything which existed | + | |
- | in the Universe), problems soon started to emerge. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | In the early 1990s a major problem with String Theory developed. | + | |
- | more people worked in it, competing theories began to be developed, | + | |
- | variants on the original premises of the theory. | + | |
- | separate theories existed, each a subtle variant on the original String | + | |
- | Theory. | + | |
- | this was a major problem. | + | |
- | claim to be a single answer to the universe' | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | At the same moment, String Theory began to break down, cosmologists | + | |
- | began to have major problems with the Big Bang as a theory of | + | |
- | explaining the origin of the universe. | + | |
- | explains: "In spite of the fact that we call it the Big Bang Theory it | + | |
- | really says absolutely nothing about the Big Bang. It doesn' | + | |
- | what banged, why it banged, what caused it to bang. It doesn' | + | |
- | describe, doesn' | + | |
- | immediately after this bang." | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | In the early 1990s, with String Theory in tatters, a group of | + | |
- | physicists tried one last variant in their calculations. | + | |
- | desperate move the string theorists tried adding the very thing they | + | |
- | had spent a decade rubbishing: the eleventh dimension. Something almost | + | |
- | magical happened. | + | |
- | addition of the new dimension, all five variants on String Theory | + | |
- | turned out to be the same theory. | + | |
- | to be simply different manifestations of a more fundamental theory. | + | |
- | The additional dimension, had not only solved String Theory' | + | |
- | but also had rehabilitated the work of the super gravitists who had | + | |
- | long been operating in the Eleventh Dimension. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | It looked as if a single unifying theory explaining the universe was, | + | |
- | after all, plausible. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | The new dimension - the Eleventh - was a strange place. | + | |
- | calculated to be infinitely long, yet extremely narrow in width - an | + | |
- | estimated trillionth of a millimetre wide (and thus imperceptible). The | + | |
- | laws of physics as we know them would likely not operate in this | + | |
- | dimension. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | When scientist began to experiment using the Eleventh Dimension, | + | |
- | something very odd began to happen. | + | |
- | their experiments using the additional dimension, they began to | + | |
- | discover that the ' | + | |
- | turning out to be distinctly ' | + | |
- | was composed, in this new theory seemed much more lumpy, more elastic | + | |
- | than a string. | + | |
- | tiny invisible strings were changing. They stretched and they combined. | + | |
- | The astonishing conclusion was that all the matter in the Universe was | + | |
- | connected to one vast structure: a membrane. In effect, our entire | + | |
- | Universe is a membrane. The quest to explain everything in the Universe | + | |
- | could begin again and at its heart would be this new theory. Membrane | + | |
- | Theory, or M-Theory for short. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | ( | + | |
- | While all of this took place a rock-climbing physicist from Harvard | + | |
- | University - Lisa Randall - had been greatly troubled by one of our | + | |
- | physical forces: gravity. | + | |
- | comparatively weak, when compared with other physical forces? Though | + | |
- | intuitively gravity seems rather strong - it fixes us to the planet, | + | |
- | for instance - it is in fact surprisingly weak. Despite the force of | + | |
- | the sum of the Earth' | + | |
- | move, for instance. | + | |
- | by using a weak magnet. | + | |
- | out of gravity' | + | |
- | Could it be that its force is being dissipated in some way? Could | + | |
- | gravity be somehow ' | + | |
- | Dimension? | + | |
- | validity of this hypothesis, her calculations wouldn' | + | |
- | she started to consider a bizarre proposition. | + | |
- | leaking from our universe into one of our more unusual dimensions, | + | |
- | could gravity be instead **originate** from a different membrane, | + | |
- | elsewhere, and be leaking into our universe? | + | |
- | come from a parallel universe? | + | |
- | calculations using an alternative membrane as a point of origin for | + | |
- | gravity, she resolved her equations. The weakness of gravity could at | + | |
- | last be explained, but only by introducing the idea of a parallel | + | |
- | universe | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | The concept of a parallel universe seemed to be hypothetically | + | |
- | plausible, under M-Theory. | + | |
- | piled into the eleventh dimension trying to solve age-old problems and | + | |
- | every time it seemed the perfect explanation was another parallel | + | |
- | universe. Everywhere they looked it seemed they began to find more and | + | |
- | more of them. From every corner of the eleventh dimension parallel | + | |
- | universes came crawling out of the woodwork. Some took the form of | + | |
- | three-dimensional membranes, like our own Universe. Others were merely | + | |
- | sheets of energy. Then there were cylindrical and even looped | + | |
- | membranes. Within no time at all the eleventh dimension seemed to be | + | |
- | jam-packed full of membranes. | + | |
- | occasionally membranes would collide. | + | |
- | dimension would behave in much the same way as massive turbulent waves, | + | |
- | occasionally banging into each other, creating vast disturbances. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | M Theory was getting stranger and stranger, but could it really be a | + | |
- | theory which explained everything in our Universe? To have any chance | + | |
- | of that it would have to do something no other rival theory had ever | + | |
- | been able to do. It would have to make sense of the baffling | + | |
- | singularity at the beginning of the Big Bang. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | In 2002, Neil Turok, Paul Steinhardt and Burt Ovrut had a crazy | + | |
- | conversation in a train on the way to London. | + | |
- | Bang might be the aftermath of some encounter between two parallel | + | |
- | worlds. | + | |
- | would, in a collision create clumps of energy, some of which could form | + | |
- | into matter. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | The singularity had disappeared and it had taken them just under an | + | |
- | hour. If it computed it later experiments, | + | |
- | able to explain everything in the Universe. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | Later experiments and calculations seem to have borne out the train | + | |
- | chat. It seems indeed that our universe could be just one bubble | + | |
- | floating in an ocean of other bubbles. | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | **References: | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | * M-theory, the theory formerly known as Strings: The Standard Model Cambridge | + | |
- | * Burt Ovrut Dept Physics, University of Pennsylvania | + | |
- | * The Endless Universe: A Brief Introduction to the Cyclic Universe by Paul J. Steinhardt | + | |
- | * Joseph Henry Laboratories, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08544, USA http://feynman.princeton.edu/ | + | |
- | * Brane-Storm' | + | |
- | * Connecting Fundamental Physics and Cosmology http:// | + | |
- | * Big Bang's New Rival Debuts With a Splash by Charles Seife http:// | + | |
- | * transcript of BBC interview with Ovrut, Turok and co. http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/ | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | more (or less related) notes | + | |
- | * http:// | + | |
- | + | ||
- | + | ||
- | [[Category Physics]] | + |