[HN Gopher] Inside the Proton ___________________________________________________________________ Inside the Proton Author : shantanu_sharma Score : 404 points Date : 2022-10-19 14:22 UTC (8 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.quantamagazine.org) (TXT) w3m dump (www.quantamagazine.org) | w10-1 wrote: | Are we still wrongly talking about billiard balls? | | I'm guessing the field interaction when a high-energy electron | hits a proton is a lot more complicated than the kinetics implied | by the description, but "surprising" results are still stated in | terms of features of the "particle" produced. It seems like the | particle analysis is simply ignoring field interactions that are | not (currently) mathematically tractable, so instead of a 3-5 | quark zoo in proton, we are witnessing 3-5 types of field | interactions (and don't actually know how "many" "types" there | are). Is that the case? | programmarchy wrote: | Right? Intuitively it seems like there's some kind of vortex | dynamic happening that would be better represented by something | like fluid dynamics or harmonics, but we're trying to classify | different kinds of ripples and eddies as "particles". | | Hawking predicted low mass objects could form a black hole, and | while the proton has less mass than the minimum bounds he | calculated, it is extremely dense. Perhaps it's dense enough to | where it's close to a micro black hole such that it "sticks | together", but information can still be exchanged at its edges? | If it's acting as some kind of interface between our spacetime | and a gravitationally collapsed state, then this could possibly | explain phenomenon like how quantum entanglement is possible, | with information being exchanged across spacetime via these | quasi black holes. Just my layman speculation! | hither_shores wrote: | > Are we still wrongly talking about billiard balls? | | No. Particles are (approximately-)localized excitations in the | corresponding field. Think waves, not water balloons. | hinkley wrote: | When two waves interact it's more like an elastic collision, | isn't it? | | From the article it wasn't clear to me if these extra high- | energy particles they were seeing as fuzz in the data (which | are heavier than a photon) are actually unexplained mass or a | situation of conservation of energy meets special relativity | (kinetic energy -> mass). | | If you put enough energy into separating quarks, I'm told you | get extra quarks. So an energetic system where the masses | don't add up doesn't seem like an epoch defining mystery to | me. So what are we missing? | hither_shores wrote: | > So an energetic system where the masses don't add up | doesn't seem like an epoch defining mystery to me. | | Bound states aren't really made of their constituents in a | classical sense. A proton is a particular configuration of | the quark fields (really it's more complicated than this), | but not a simple sum of quark particle states. And in | particular, its mass doesn't have to be the sum of the | masses of particle states. | bowsamic wrote: | Actually the basic particle created by the creation operator | for a mode is totally delocalised. Applying the field | operator to get a localised particle is really an integral | over many particles | hither_shores wrote: | For a free field, yes. But the entities we actually | interact with are ... interacting. Mode expansion doesn't | work here. Electrons, photons, etc. aren't really | "particles" in the sense of ordinary quantum mechanics at | all. | amelius wrote: | How do protons all end up with the same/similar amounts of | quarks? | roywiggins wrote: | Higher numbers of quarks can get bound up together but aren't | stable. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetraquark | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentaquark | ketralnis wrote: | This could be asked at a few different layers of abstraction | but I'd start here | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_confinement | thesuitonym wrote: | I'm not smart enough to answer this, but it seems to me that | the question is along the lines of, "Why do all verbs describe | action?" Because if they were different, they'd be something | else. | tsimionescu wrote: | We call a particular configuration of 3 particular kinds of | quark "a proton", and another one "a neutron" (there are also | anti-protons). In general, combinations of an odd number of | quarks (3, 5, 7, ...) are called baryons (only combinations of | 3 and 5 have been proven to exist, any more are only | speculation). There are also some unstable but observable | combinations of equal numbers of quarks, which are collectively | called mesons (combinations of 2 and 4 quarks have been proven | to exist, others are only speculated). | | Now, why are the combinations of 3 quarks the only ones (that | we know of, at least) that are stable is a much more | complicated question related to properties of the strong force. | penciltwirler wrote: | Wait until our particle accelerators suddenly start saying "you | are but bugs"... | Razengan wrote: | DustinBrett wrote: | These posts always take me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole. | Currently on the "Higgs mechanism", throwing words at my brain in | hopes something sticks. | tsimionescu wrote: | If you're interested in the Higgs mechanism as a layman, I | highly highly recommend this talk by Leonard Susskind: | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqNg819PiZY | | It's about 1 hour long (plus some questions) and it goes | through some basic ideas of what it means for something to have | mass and all the way to the Higgs mechanism. | junglistguy wrote: | I don't think they will ever understand what this is all about. | This is a different level than our brains represent. | snarkypixel wrote: | Personally I think it's because we're "looking" at it from the | wrong angle. A bit like in programming when you're stuck and | you need to take a step back and approach the problem | differently. IMHO the fundamental construct is probably | something way more abstract, i.e. "information", with some laws | that we aren't even aware of yet that will probably challenge | the principle of locality. | user8501 wrote: | This. It's bad philosophy. Non local, non physical, these are | the concepts to get comfortable with before attempting to | understand the quantum in a coherent way, unless | understanding the nature of physicality and locality isn't | your goal. Looking at the quantum world as a bunch of tiny | objects will only lead to an infinite regression, where new | even smaller objects are continuously discovered. | swamp40 wrote: | I think we are still in the "universe orbits the Earth" stage | of quantum physics. | marstall wrote: | than most of our brains represent, perhaps ... but clearly | there are people who see things others don't ... give them the | ability to see at these scales, and enough explanatory skills, | and perhaps it will become something even a child can | understand. | criddell wrote: | A dog is never going to understand Fourier Transforms. I | expect there are concepts that our brains will never | understand as well. | brap wrote: | Indeed, it's an uncomfortable idea but maybe someday we'll | have to accept it. That we don't know, we'll never know, we | can't know. I wonder if we'll be able to _prove_ that we | can't know something. Or prove that we can't prove it. | [deleted] | photochemsyn wrote: | As I understand it, the reason Feynman diagrams in quantum | electrodynamics (where the primary entities are electrons and | photons) can be used to calculate properties very accurately is | that the electromagnetic coupling constant (1/137) results in the | higher-order terms in a series eventually vanishing away to | nothing, while with the strong force the coupling constant is >= | 1, so the higher-order terms have to be included, leading to | things like infinities (or at the very least, ratios of very | large quantities with correspondingly large uncertainties). | | The strong force is a bit confusing, as it binds boths quarks | with the proton and neutron, as well as binding the neutrons and | protons into atomic nuclei, over short ranges (accounting for the | upper size limit / stability limit of the largest nuclei). Mesons | are the force-carrying entity that bind the neutrons and protons | together, but gluons are the force-carrying entity that bind the | quarks together, as per this wiki article: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strong_interaction | | Is it the case that theoretical strong-force calculations have | just hit a dead-end and there's no way out in sight, due to the | coupling constant issue? | morbia wrote: | Actually there's a bit more to it than that. Coupling constants | change as a function of their energy, they're called 'running | coupling constants'. As a result of this phenomenon, there are | domains where alpha_s is small and therefore a perturbative | expansion of terms is possible. This happens at very high | energies, so at the LHC we can happily calculate the higher | order terms that you talk about and each successive term is a | smaller contribution than the last. | | Unfortunately, alpha_s is large at low energies, and by low I | mean at the atomic and nuclear scale. There you are well and | truly in the domain that perturbative QCD is impossible. The | only option at that point is something called lattice QCD at | the quark/gluon level. | | Edit: Typo | antognini wrote: | I have idly wondered whether or not there could be a | completely different approach to QCD from the usual | perturbative techniques. I remember reading in one of Zee's | books that back 80s he pointed out to Feynman that the path | integral formalism that QFT is based on has no natural way to | treat something as simple as a particle in a box. And an | object like a proton seems to be more like a particle in a | box than a free particle undergoing an interaction. | hither_shores wrote: | Lattice methods are probably the most common | nonperturbative approach to QCD. | morbia wrote: | Yeah as someone who spent 4 years of his life calculating a | second order term (Next-to-Next-to-Leading-Order), I have | often wondered the same thing! In my original post I | grossly simplified how challenging it is to calculate terms | in perturbative QCD, even when in the perturbative regime. | To name a few:- | | * Two loop calculations are extremely challenging on an | algebraic level | | * You get low energy (called 'infrared red') infinities | appearing at low energies. These need to cancel between all | your contributing terms, and getting them to cancel is | really really challenging. | | * The numerical Monte Carlo approaches become extremely | computationally intensive because of high dimensional | integrals and numerical instability caused by point 2 | | It was not uncommon for calculations of single terms to | involve multiple PhD students over a decade or more. | | Throughout my PhD I certainly felt like something was | fundamentally 'wrong' with the approach. Alas, I wasn't | smart enough to rewrite the field with a whole new way of | thinking so bailed instead. | TheOtherHobbes wrote: | Reminds me of: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle | selectodude wrote: | >It was not uncommon for calculations of single terms to | involve multiple PhD students over a decade or more. | | Forgive my ignorance, but what does calculating this sort | of look like? I am not a mathematician or even math- | adjacent. | davrosthedalek wrote: | Essentially, solving a large number of non-trivial | integrals. | Einstant wrote: | no, you're just going wrong about it; nothing Feynman was doing | was new. Except for the fact he had a nice semi-directed graph | to make sense of the celestial equations and the quintuple of | the time; the Dirac Sea, etc | Pet_Ant wrote: | How does the strong force bind neutrons to protons? Is it | connecting the quarks inside the proton with those of the | neutron? | yccs27 wrote: | How nucleons (neutrons and protons) are bound together is | similar to a molecule. If they are close enough, they can | 'share' their constituent quarks. You can calculate the | interaction by a feynman diagram where the two nucleons | exchange one quark in each direction. This is technically the | same as one nucleon sending and the other absorbing a quark- | antiquark pair, which is why physicists like to say that the | nucleon attraction is transmitted by mesons (quark-antiquark | pairs). Of course fundamentally the strong force still | facilitates the whole interaction, as it's the one preventing | nucleons from just falling apart into quarks. | photochemsyn wrote: | That's the role the meson (a quark-antiquark pair particle) | carries out, but I agree it's confusing. Here's a question | from physics stack exchange (without any really clear | answers, other than "go look up 'residual strong force'", not | very helpful) that spells it out: | | > "I just read somewhere that both gluons and mesons transmit | the strong force, gluons between quarks inside hadrons, but | mesons between nucleons. I thought that the strong force | would have one field, and one associated particle, whether | inside hadrons, or between nucleons" | Pet_Ant wrote: | https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/296457/gluons- | an... | foxes wrote: | I don't think this is necessarily new. On the level of fields the | universe is not nice little particles or waves in neat groups in | a vacuum. It's a roaring, swirling turbulent ocean. Yes what we | call a proton is still a particular configuration, but it's not | existing in a vacuum, it can entangle with other stuff. When we | do some experiment it's like trying to pick a particular wave out | of the ocean. Seeing a charm anti charm pair popping up sometimes | shouldn't really be a surprise. | | There's nothing wrong with the 3 quark description of a proton, | it's a model, it's useful up to a certain level of accuracy. | jerf wrote: | I don't think it is, I think this is just a popsci article on | that well-known (in the field) fact. | | I don't want to make it sound easy, because as the article | says, our math lacks the ability to handle the way our current | best theories describe it, but it certainly isn't any easier | trying to understand QCD through the lens of particles as the | fundamental objects. It's really a mess of field fluctuations, | and in those field fluctuations we have certain patterns we | call "particles", but those patterns can shift and ebb and flow | in any number of ways, including in ways we have no intuitions | for since our macroscopic intuition keeps wanting to sneak | particles in the backdoor despite everything being waves. | | Directly understanding what's going on isn't easy, but it's | probably still easier than trying to hold on to particle-based | ideas. | | Or, you know, since none of this matters on a day-by-day basis | to hardly anyone, I think just looking at it from the particle | point of view and calling it a day is a perfectly viable | option. In which case, a proton is three quarks, full stop. | It's not 100% correct, but hey, QCD isn't either (still waiting | on that Grand Unified Theory), so there's no real harm in | stopping at the 3-quark model. | tsimionescu wrote: | > but hey, QCD isn't either (still waiting on that Grand | Unified Theory) | | Note that there may well not exist any GUT. However, QCD | can't be correct until it also accounts for gravitational | effect, so what we're waiting for is a theory of Quantum | Gravity that is consistent with both QCD and General | Relativity. | khazhoux wrote: | Is there any information to be learned by the _direction_ of the | plumes? | koyanisqatsi wrote: | "What we observe is not nature itself but nature exposed to our | method of questioning." -- Werner Heisenberg, Physics and | Philosophy: The Revolution in Modern Science (1958) | Veliladon wrote: | This should be required reading for this article: | | https://profmattstrassler.com/2022/09/09/protons-and-charm-q... | | Virtual particles do not necessarily have an invariant mass. | That's why you can find examples of typically huge particles | inside protons. That's why a beta decay of a neutron can involve | the production of a virtual W- boson that has an invariant mass | that's 86 times more massive than the neutron. | Einstant wrote: | DisjointedHunt wrote: | Thank you for this link! This site is amazing! | ijidak wrote: | Thank you for this. | | Science communication, even between scientists, is filled with | lies and half truths that shroud the truth in mystery. | | Virtual particles are a good example. | | Quarks are fundamental is another example. | | A proton is made of three quarks is yet another. | | But there are countless others I've come across in studying | quantum mechanics and relativity. | cwillu wrote: | And also https://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and- | posts/particle-ph... | | "A virtual particle is not a particle at all. It refers | precisely to a disturbance in a field that is not a particle." | nimish wrote: | Also virtual particles don't make sense in a non-perturbative | regime like room-temp protons, since they are an aid to | understanding terms in the perturbation series expansion. | | Not sure how they even apply in the case where Feynman | diagrams aren't applicable. Hell, the calculations likely use | lattice QCD which eschews them entirely! | zakk wrote: | Protons are non-perturbative, indeed, but this does not | mean that there are no virtual particles exchanged inside a | proton. It seems like your comment implies that, sorry if I | misunderstood. | | On the contrary, this means that there are too many virtual | particles (gluons) being exchanged inside a proton, so many | that perturbation theory is not applicable. | hither_shores wrote: | Virtual particles are part of an indexing scheme for | perturbation series - saying that you leave the | perturbative regime when you have "too many" of them is | like saying that crystalline solids melt when they have | too many normal modes. | AnimalMuppet wrote: | Are gluons virtual? (Or are they virtual inside a | proton?) | frutiger wrote: | Gluons are real. | blueprint wrote: | Virtual particles are also "real", and if you don't | believe me, at least you have to admit that virtual | photons alone lead to real energy (e.g. Casimir effect) - | and it has also been stated that gluons within protons | can be interpreted as "virtual"... so I'm pretty sure | your comment is wrong. I'd downvote you if I could since | that seems to be what the cool kids here are doing but I | used up all my karma telling the truth. | cwillu wrote: | Your question is can be posed as "is there a well-behaved | resonance of the gluon field in a proton, that lasts long | enough for it to be identified". It's kinda like | identifying a bubble in a pot of cold water vs a pot just | starting to boil vs a rolling boil. | est wrote: | this is the most important TIL article I've read in years. | Thanks! | | Basically, it's like a playing around virtual machine on a | physical PC. | andrewflnr wrote: | Be sure to click through to the "What's a Proton" article, | which contains the delightful line: | | > In short, atoms are to protons as a pas de deux in a delicate | ballet is to a dance floor crowded with drunk twenty-somethings | bouncing and flailing to a DJ. | quickthrower2 wrote: | This is the direct link | https://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and- | posts/largehadron... | | Also check out the comments and comment answers there. Very | interesting too! | 1ark wrote: | They have not seen our legacy code base. | fnikacevic wrote: | Or my npm dependencies | hinkley wrote: | In the last couple years I've dropped our node_modules | directory size down by half, and I'm still disgusted both | with the state of it and how much work I put into | accomplishing that. | | The moral of too many of my stories is if something is | bothering you, track it first before trying to fix it. | Because it's easier to get other people to help police a | graph than a series of unix commands. And for everyone else | you'll get regressions when you're focused on some other | priority. Data points like "sometime in the last month" are | pretty hard to nail down on a large codebase, especially if | it's not a monolith. Last Tuesday around noon is pretty | specific. | amelius wrote: | Do you work on ProtonMail? | [deleted] | pokstad wrote: | Reminds me of the sophon from The Three Body Problem. | vutekst wrote: | hopefully when we finally unfold them we don't get attacked by | lower dimensional beings | SaberTail wrote: | I had a professor that was fond of saying "the proton is a | garbage can" when talking about its composition. | antognini wrote: | From "we are made of stardust" to "we are made of garbage | cans." | xdavidliu wrote: | "we are but stardust and garbage cans, Maximus". | onemiketwelve wrote: | If it's good enough to plug up wounds, it's good enough to | make the universe | stjohnswarts wrote: | trash within, trash without. very zen. | outworlder wrote: | > The proton is a quantum mechanical object that exists as a haze | of probabilities until an experiment forces it to take a concrete | form | | I don't necessarily subscribe to the 'simulation' viewpoint, but | that sounds exactly how some lazy evaluation/procedural | generation system would work. Don't need to compute values until | they are needed. Just like atomic orbitals. | | Add that to all the quantization we have discovered in nature, | the speed of light limit (which is also the speed at which | information can be transmitted), the time dilation effects with | speed... and that provides plenty of food for thought. | joyfylbanana wrote: | I was thinking about the Linux Steam compability software. | MobiusHorizons wrote: | I don't believe that would be referred to as "the proton" | unless it was being called "the proton compatibility layer". | It's important not to forget the colloquial meanings of words | :) | greenthrow wrote: | The GP makes sense, your comment makes no sense. | acomar wrote: | people make grammatical mistakes often enough when typing | that you kind of need to parse sentences in the way that | makes the most sense. this sometimes means parsing correct | grammar as a mistake because the fixed version makes perfect | sense. then you read the article and laugh at yourself | because yep, both kinds of proton are quite complicated. | moffkalast wrote: | Coincidentally, also the most complicated thing imaginable. | [deleted] | GiorgioG wrote: | They haven't seen Kubernetes. | bee_rider wrote: | They haven't seen Electron. | Scarblac wrote: | But is Kubernetes imaginable? | jq-r wrote: | Depends on your imagination. | 0xbadcafebee wrote: | "Don't take the brown acid, man, you'll get Kubernetes" | DonHopkins wrote: | Or node_modules! | | https://www.reddit.com/r/ProgrammerHumor/comments/6s0wov/hea... | lake_vincent wrote: | Plot twist: protons _are_ cosmic k8s! | yongjik wrote: | Reminds me of this comic: https://abstrusegoose.com/235 | tonymet wrote: | the most complicated model imaginable. | fleddr wrote: | A proton contains an entire universe on its own, and our universe | itself is a proton. You will never reach the end of its depth as | it will reveal just another nesting level, until you hit the | level where one would require more than all of the universe's | energy in existence to reveal it. | | Hence, reality cannot be understood, by design. Reality is chaos, | meaning and stability mere perception. | | Source: it was revealed to me. | davrosthedalek wrote: | Take less drugs. | cratermoon wrote: | It's interesting that the article and the animations still lean | on the concept of the proton having an "inside" with some kind of | boundary. It makes for interesting animations, but that's not | really a good way to understand anything at the quantum level. | The particles and forces that make up a proton have probabilities | of having certain features like momentum and velocity, and they | are more likely to be within a certain area, but there's no | "inside" for a charm quark to pop out of. The measurement that | finds a charm quark/antiquark pair is just showing a certain | state of the system that under standard conditions has a state we | call a proton. | dang wrote: | We've taken the bit out of the title that was sapping people's | ability not to make obvious jokes. Let's discuss the interesting | bits now please! | swamp40 wrote: | "My God, it's full of stars!" | mrwnmonm wrote: | Proton Saga | ur-whale wrote: | >Proton Saga | | LOL. | | Did you by chance live in Malaysia towards the end of the 80's | ? | | [EDIT]: never mind, I see they are still making them in 2022 . | Who knew! | davesque wrote: | Sort of off topic, but sometimes pondering these low-level | physics questions forces me into a philosophical state of mind. | It seems like asking questions about basic particles is | representative of a mode of thinking that drills down ever | further, trying to find some kind of conceptual bedrock. But it | always seems possible to ask again, "What lies underneath this? | What is the cause of this thing's existence?" In any case, it | seems either that you have found the one thing that underpins | everything else or you have found the collection of things that | all endlessly perpetuate each other. Both of those possibilities | seem somehow unsatisfactory or impossible. There must always be | something else. Could it be that this conceptual craving is | somehow just a side effect of how our minds are built? Or is it | fundamental to reality in some way? | d0mine wrote: | There are books on the topic e.g., "The End Of Physics" by | D.Lindley. | | There are two questions: | | - whether there are laws that describe everything there is to | know (e.g., the answer is yes for chess--there are rules that | describe it). It is the "fundamental" dimension (particle | physics at the moment) | | - whether there is something to do once we know all the laws. | The answer is yes ("knowing rules do not make you a | grandmaster") e.g., we likely know all of the fundamental | physics required for turbulence or brains but it doesn't solve | these fields (there are interesting unresolved problems). It is | the "applications" dimension. | | https://www.quantamagazine.org/contemplating-the-end-of-phys... | narag wrote: | I don't know, but let me point the obvious: it feels very weird | that fundamental things are so complicated. | | Somehow I _want_ to think that there 's a much simpler layer | underneath and all this _imperfection_ comes as a second order | side effect. | | Plato's cave seems the relevant meme. But is it really | complexity a side effect or, as you suggest, is simplicity a | side effect of our minds' pattern matching preferences? | davesque wrote: | I can sympathize with this. I love discovering some | generalization that subsumes all the complexity. But what if | we follow this to its extreme? Suppose we find the one | perfect symbol that precipitates all other concepts? What | then does that symbol even do but just reflect or perturb its | environment? Isn't that just like moving the goalposts? Makes | me think of the concept of Kolmogorov complexity. That's the | idea that the informational content of some signal is | equivalent to the length of the shortest computer program | that can produce it. But what interprets the program? And how | complex is that thing? It's all circular. And I'm not sure | there's really a way out of that. It's just an inherent | feature of looking at the universe conceptually. | ur-whale wrote: | The thing that really matters when breaking thing apart into | ever smaller things is not really if we are accessing ever | deeper level of reality. | | What matters is: can we use this newly discovered sub-structure | to _do_ something we couldn 't before. | | The answer to this was a clear and resounding "yes" when we | reached the level of molecules (chemistry, which allows us to | do a great many useful things), still "yes" at the level of the | atom (atomic energy, transistors, etc...). | | It is however unclear that QCD, quarks and inner proton | structure reality level have yet produced anything usable to | implement our will upon the world. | | It may yet happen, but to answer your questions: once the depth | we dig at stops producing anything usable by an engineer | (string theory, quarks both currently fall into that bucket I | think), not entirely sure the digging is philosophically | valuable in any way. | fleddr wrote: | Very limiting to couple the pursuit of knowledge to | application, commercial exploitation, or laying our "will" on | the world. | davesque wrote: | I think your reply gets at the answer to my own question that | I tend to lean towards. And that is that craving further | concepts is an inherent problem that follows from being a | thinking being. What you say seems like part of the answer, | which is that one needs to make a conscious decision not to | be bothered by the fundamental lack of a justification for | reality. Just focus on what your knowledge enables you to do. | But it still seems sad on some level that we're "condemned" | to coast through this world that is so rich in detail but | seemingly lacking in purpose. | lazide wrote: | LEDs and most modern microprocessors make no sense without | quantum mechanics, for one. | c0mptonFP wrote: | Neither do magnets. | Analog24 wrote: | I think you may have some hindsight bias here. I do not think | that when chemical and atomic structures were | discovered/understood that knowledge was immediately put to | use. Nuclear physics dates back to the late 1800s, it wasn't | until the 1940's where that knowledge was put to practical | use. I wouldn't expect anything different with QCD. In fact, | I would expect it to take significantly longer to develop | practical applications of the theory given how much more | complex it is. | ur-whale wrote: | Fair point, not knowing when something might come in handy. | | I still believe looking for things we can use should be a | guiding light. | tasubotadas wrote: | ur-whale wrote: | There seems to be an unspoken assumption that all protons (as in: | a set things that seem to have similar external properties and | behaviors) are actually identical "inside" or - to put it another | way - all "built" the same way. | | Other than Occam's razor, why is that assumption considered | valid? | | Have we verified this experimentally? | | Or does some complex piece of math show that only one possible | internal structure can lead to similar externally observable | behaviors? | blueprint wrote: | "one that's too bizarre to fully capture with words" | | well i guess we'd better give up. what a ridiculous statement. | planck01 wrote: | No, they're not wrong. Some of these concepts are hardly | explainable without math. | [deleted] | blueprint wrote: | Actually the concepts are perfectly explained by plenty of | people who, you know, actually know. Read the other links in | this thread. But please downvote me some more. It's obvious | you're not arguing reasonably because you're clearly leaving | out the fact that the terms in all these relevant equations | are associated with physical components that we talk about | WITH WORDS | | Like mass and charge and energy and probability | | If you know the math you can share it here and say what the | terms mean | | If you dont know the math then your comment contains the lie | that you know what you're talking about and that people | should listen to you | knaekhoved wrote: | Is the "charm quark is heavier than proton" thing the usual | situation where the author conflates the mass of the particle | with the mass of the particle plus the mass of the field | associated with a free particle? Every system is lighter than its | constituent particles in this sense, but sometimes people make a | big deal about it, usually when the binding energy is high (i.e. | the mass difference is large). | mrtri wrote: | causi wrote: | I've never really understood the statement that "most of the mass | of the proton comes from virtual particles inside it." That being | the case, why isn't the mass density of space outside the proton | almost as great as it is inside the proton? Is the density of | virtual particles greater inside, and if so, why? | cwillu wrote: | "A virtual particle is not a particle at all. It refers | precisely to a disturbance in a field that is not a particle." | | https://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and-posts/particle-ph... | sharpneli wrote: | Just ignore the "virtual particles" part. Most of the mass | comes from the binding energy. As in the rest masses of the | individual quarks is small compared to total mass of proton. | | Virtual particles themselves can always be ignored as they are | not physical. They're purely a computational method in some | approaches. They don't exist in others at all. And even when | they are part of the method what kind they are depends. Looking | at momentum space? Your virtual particles can have any | position. Looking at position? Your virtual particles can have | any momentum. | | Alternatively: Virtual particle just means that if you have a | certain kind of field, what kind of "particles" you need to sum | up to get that kind of field. The field itself is the physical | thing. Viewing it mathematically as sum of virtual particles is | just a mathematical viewpoint. | xeromal wrote: | Is the binding energy made up of gluons? | FranchuFranchu wrote: | It's a bit like the "energy" in an electric capacitor. It's | a property of the system's state that is related to the | interactions between the particles. | | In a charged capacitor, there's a lot of electrons on one | side, but very few of them on the other. When you close the | capacitor, suddenly you get a lot of energy out of it. | sharpneli wrote: | It's not. Just like how if you push two identically charged | plates towards eachother the potential energy in that | system is not made of photons. | | Sure you can describe the electric field in that case by a | viewpoint where you sum virtual photons together to get | said electric field. Whereas a non virtual photon is | alltogether a different thing. You can actually describe a | normal non virtual photon as a sum of virtual photons. | | Point is that virtual particles are just a mathematical | tool. | | Actual real gluons do exist and they're analogous to the | actual photon. | | In case of electromagnetism the actual stuff is the | electric field. With proton (so in quantum chromodynamics) | it's the gluon field. It's called that because every | particle has a field and every field a particle. It would | be kinda like calling electric field a photon field. Same | difference. | simonh wrote: | Looks like it, quarks are bound together by gluons so as | you go up the energy scale and 'see' more quarks the gluon | energies dominate. In fact about 99% of the Proton's mass | is in the form of this binding energy. | ars wrote: | Binding energy is not gluons. Gluons are massless, | binding energy is just energy, it's not a particle. | baq wrote: | No such thing as 'just energy', every force needs a force | carrier particle and gluons are that for the strong | force. Photons are massless, too. | sharpneli wrote: | Saying it's made of gluons is exactly the same as saying | that a charged object in electric field has it's | potential energy made of photons. | | It's not exactly informative nor true. Yes you can | describe the electric field as sum of virtual photons but | that's different to a normal photon. And even then the | electric field is not the same as the potential energy. | Sure it defines it but it's not the same as the potential | energy of the charged object. | | In case of protons it's the same. It's better to think of | it as a field, which it is. Gluon in itself is "just" an | excitation of that field. Just like photon is an | excitation of the electric field. And the binding energy | of the proton comes from the quarks interacting with the | gluon field. | | The reason I'm talking so much against the virtual | particle viewpoint because then people will start | thinking of some things whizzing about. That's not what | happens. It's a field. | | It's actually better to think of even the normal fermions | with mass with fields, because that's what they are. It's | no longer surprising that how does electron go through | both slits at the same time or how all electrons are | identical. Of course they are identical as there is just | one electron field that has a very specific kind of | excitation that propagates. | | This is not some random "Look at my weird theory". It's | what Quantum Field Theories are. I mostly blame bad | science journalism looking at Feynman diagrams (a great | mathematical tool, don't get me wrong) that has people | thinking too much about virtual particles. | simonh wrote: | I didn't say the binding energy is gluons, but I suppose | it's more accurate to say that the binding energy of the | strong nuclear force is mediated by gluons. | ars wrote: | It's not made of anything, it's just energy. | | To think of a proton as containing tons of gluons would be | a mistake. | | Additionally gluons are expected to be massless, they | basically come into existence as needed. | tsimionescu wrote: | The quarks that are bound in a way we call a proton are held | together by the strong force at a certain distance from each | other - that distance is what we consider the volume of the | proton, with the quarks being "inside that volume". This system | of 3 quarks has some amount of potential energy, and/or some | amount of kinetic energy from the relative movement of the 3 | quarks. The mass of this system is then given essentially by | E=mc^2, with E being this kinetic energy. | | There is a very good video of a lecture by Leonard Susskind | that explains why energy and mass are interchangeable in this | way if you want a more in-depth explanation: | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqNg819PiZY | mouzogu wrote: | what an obnoxious site. huge fixed cookie banner with only | "agree" option and saying they care about your data. | | reading the privacy policy they say: | | > We currently do not honor "Do Not Track" signals. | | I guess they mean "care" as in want. | dang wrote: | " _Please don 't complain about tangential annoyances--things | like article or website formats, name collisions, or back- | button breakage. They're too common to be interesting._" | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | gjsman-1000 wrote: | It seems every day that the concept of us existing, without an | external cause, is absolutely 0%. Or at least lim x-[?] ([odds of | us existing]) = 0. | breuleux wrote: | This is to be expected, though. Given that there is an infinite | number of possible things that could have existed, it is | natural that they all had very low to infinitesimal | probabilities to begin with. | ko27 wrote: | You don't need an "external cause". You would still have the | same trouble of explaining that. You only need many attempts, | same as with evolution. Life in space can be explained with | Anthropic principle | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle | AnimalMuppet wrote: | This fits the pattern of discussion I often see about the | anthropic principle. Someone (I'll label them the | "Creationist", though it could just as well be an advocate of | intelligent design) asserts that the probability of things | "just happening" is vanishingly small. Sometimes the | Creationist cites some generally-accepted science, and | sometimes does a probability calculation, resulting in a | _very_ small probability that things happened by purely | naturalistic means. | | Someone else (call them the "Evolutionist") responds with the | anthropic principle - that, if no intelligent life had arisen | in this universe, there would be nobody here to observe that | there was no intelligent life. And this is completely | logically correct. It is also irrelevant. The Creationist | never asserted that it was improbable that life arose in this | universe, but rather that it was improbable that it arose | _purely by naturalistic means_. The question isn 't _whether_ | we 're here; the question is _how_ or _why_. | | The Creationist was saying, either we're here by purely | naturalistic, evolutionary means, with some probability (call | that Pe), or by being created, with some probability (call | that Pc). As far as I can see, Pc is unknowable, even in | principle. But the Creationist argument is that Pe is so low | that it seems reasonable that Pc is higher. That is, it seems | reasonable to suppose that we are here due to creation, not | just evolution. | | The anthropic principle doesn't answer that argument at all. | It gives an argument about "whether", not about "how". | | Or to put it in different terms: The anthropic principle says | something like, if there are a billion universes, and life | only arose in a thousand of them, we have to be in one of | those thousand to be having this conversation. (Note that I | don't actually believe in multiple universes; this is just to | make the probability discussion clearer.) But the Creationist | never denied that. The Creationist says: Of those thousand | universes, if life arose by creation in 998 of them and by | evolution in only 2 of them, it seems reasonable to suppose | that we're in a universe where life originated by creation, | not evolution. The anthropic principle, which asserts that | we're in one of the thousand, doesn't address the | Creationist's argument at all. | | Unless. | | It seems to me that everyone who pulls out the anthropic | principle in this situation implicitly assumes that Pc is | precisely zero. They never explicitly state this assumption, | but I think it's there in their thinking. So for the | Evolutionist in this conversation, Pe and the probability of | life at all are exactly the same, and the anthropic principle | _does_ address the actual claim. | | But, instead of being irrelevant, in this case the anthropic | principle is begging the question. The Evolutionist starts | with the conclusion that they are arguing for. That's invalid | logic. That's so invalid that, to the degree that the | Evolutionist relies on the anthropic principle to support | their position, to that degree they should doubt their | position. | | (I think the Evolutionist pulls out the anthropic principle | for an additional reason - it's easy. It lets them "win" the | discussion without having to disprove the Creationist's big | scary probability number.) | jodrellblank wrote: | Nothing can be explained by the Anthropic Principle, it's an | observation not an explanation. | | "Why did you punch me in the face?" | | "Because if I hadn't, you wouldn't have a broken nose" | | That isn't an explanation why the punch happened, it is | observing that the nose would not have been broken without a | punch. | claar wrote: | I agree. I believe that the infinite engineering prowess | observed in the proton and so many other aspects of creation | (Like the eye! Wow!) point directly to the existence of God. | | But then again, I've never met anyone who became a believer | through observing creation. Just as my confirmation bias leads | me to see God in these stories, I imagine unbelievers tend to | receive confirmation of the absence of God. | DonHopkins wrote: | Well you believe in the absence of Zeus, don't you? Then why | doesn't that make you an atheist? (Hint: it does, since | you're atheistic about a hell of a lot more Gods than any you | might choose to believe in. So you're at least 99.99% | atheist, or 100% atheist as the number of Gods goes to | infinity.) | gjsman-1000 wrote: | No? Atheist literally is A-Theist, similar to amoral being | A-Moral ("a" being a common prefix for "anti" or | "opposite"). A-Theist means one does not believe Theism, | the "belief in the existence of a supreme being or | deities." | | In which case, by believing in one specific God, one is not | an atheist in any sense toward other religions. Believing | in one specific God literally means that you do have | "belief in the existence of a supreme being or deities," | your only dispute is to _which_ one. | tsimionescu wrote: | Note that a- is a different prefix than anti-. a- means | "without", whereas anti- means "the opposite of". So, | being a-theistic means that you are "without god(s)". | Being anti-theistic would meant that you oppose god(s). | An amoral thing is a thing to which morality doesn't | apply (for example, weather phenomena are amoral). Anti- | moral would mean something that is opposed to morality, | which would probably make it immoral (such as a human | killing another human that hasn't wronged them in any | way). | jerf wrote: | You believe your argument don't you? But how can you, when | there is such an infinity of arguments you don't believe | in? | | This is word chopping, not an interesting philosophical | argument. Truth is exclusionary, and the space of excluded | hypotheses is at a minimum exponentially larger than the | non-excluded ones, if not super-exponentially, if not some | variety of simply infinitely larger, depending on how you | count. Appealing to the size of the universe of false | statements and/or "things you don't believe" is not | meaningful. | gjsman-1000 wrote: | > imagine unbelievers tend to receive confirmation of the | absence of God | | Another interesting question to ponder though: Who's fault is | this? Is it God for not jumping out of the shadows screaming | "I am he, worship me!"? Or is it an unbeliever who makes | assumptions about how a God would act, and finds there is no | God because he doesn't fit the unbeliever's assumptions? In | which case, what is the unbeliever but a God himself? | DonHopkins wrote: | I remember my first joint. | syarb wrote: | You say "us" existing, but I think the more interesting way to | phrase it is "anything" existing. Why there is something | instead of nothing? | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_there_is_anything_at_all | thesuitonym wrote: | That page is strangely far in the Wikipedia game from getting | to Philosophy. I expected it to get there much sooner. | airstrike wrote: | The 'Existing' article is the one to blame... 'Philosophy' | is there as the second term, but 'reality' is the first | term and that one takes you on a pretty long detour | andrepd wrote: | I distinctly remember being 6 or 7 drifting to sleep one | night and suddenly visualising what it would be like if there | existed _nothing_ at all, not even empty space but nothing, | no Universe and nothing ever happening ever or anywhere. It | was terrifying. | | It was about the same time that a family member had died so I | was coming to terms with the fear of dying for the first | time, so I guess that's what triggered this. | DonHopkins wrote: | ...Which makes the concept of an external cause existing, which | must be vastly more complicated than us, absolutely less than | 0%. ;) | gjsman-1000 wrote: | It's an odd question either way. Does God need a cause? Does | the Big Bang need a cause? | DonHopkins wrote: | gjsman-1000 wrote: | I do not understand your point about his "Just Cause" | pun. Other than that it can mean two things | simultaneously depending on how it is interpreted. | vimacs2 wrote: | I think the point was that it is circular reasoning. | DonHopkins wrote: | "Just Cause" was certainly not intended by Bush or his | minions to be a pun. Remember, this is the same family | that gave us "Mission Accomplished". | | Conservatives aren't known for their sense of humor, | which is usually limited to punching down and demeaning | weaker opponents, not insightful self depreciation and | candor. Case in point: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_%C2%BD_Hour_News_Hour#R | ece... | | The "Just 'Cuz" interpretation was pointed out by critics | of Bush's otherwise unjustifiable invasion. The US | created the original problem by supporting and paying | Noriega while turning a blind eye to his abuses and | corruption for so long. | | The operation plan it came from was called the "Prayer | Book", so circular reasoning was the essential | justification of its self fulfilling prophecy, just like | with any religion. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_invasion_of_P | ana... | | >Origin of the name "Operation Just Cause" | | >Operation plans directed against Panama evolved from | plans designed to defend the Panama Canal. They became | more aggressive as the situation between the two nations | deteriorated. The Prayer Book series of plans included | rehearsals for a possible clash (Operation Purple Storm) | and missions to secure U.S. sites (Operation Bushmaster). | | >Eventually, these plans became Operation Blue Spoon | which was then, in order to sustain the perceived | legitimacy of the invasion throughout the operation, | renamed by the Pentagon to Operation Just Cause. General | Colin Powell said that he liked the name because "even | our severest critics would have to utter 'Just Cause' | while denouncing us." Critics, however, renamed it | Operation "Just 'Cuz", arguing that it had been | undertaken "just [be]cause Bush felt like it." | | https://www.outsidethebeltway.com/war-and-rhetoric/ | | >The incursion into Panama, which came to be derisively | known as "Operation Just 'Cuz," is the hardest to justify | on Realist grounds. The rationale for going in doesn't | stand up to the test of time but made some sense at the | time. The Panama Canal was indeed a longstanding American | interest. And the war on drugs angle was important, as | was the the complicated relationship with Noriega. | Regardless, we certainly didn't go in to make Panama more | safe for democracy. Nor did we stay for years nation- | building. It was a limited incursion, over in less time | than an NBA postseason. | | https://web.archive.org/web/20210603051719/https://www.lo | nel... | | >The US reaction was swift and unrelenting. In the first | hour of December 20, 1989, Panama City was attacked by | aircraft, tanks and 26,000 US troops in 'Operation Just | Cause,' though the US media often labeled it 'Operation | "Just 'cuz."' Although the stated intention of the | invasion was to bring Noriega to justice and create a | democracy, it left more than 2000 civilians dead and tens | of thousands homeless, and destroyed entire tracts of | Panama City. | xeromal wrote: | They're making a joke. | indymike wrote: | I'm not sure a pun this bad is allowed to have a point. | Tao3300 wrote: | I can ask the question, so yes, they do. | AnimalMuppet wrote: | God has to have a cause _because you can ask the | question_? To me, that logic seems rather suspect... | dQw4w9WgXcQ wrote: | You assume that God is bound to the system of causality | in which you exist? | tsegratis wrote: | You assume we exist. DonHopkins effectively assumes we | don't exist, so reaches an opposite conclusion | | On just cause ;), cyclical explanations create a giant | hamster wheel. Why the wheel at all? So I think he implies | the need for a prime mover. I.e. a force outside the system | that defines the system. Kinda like axioms are needed to | make maths work | | Just my 2p ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-10-19 23:00 UTC)