Fiddling With the Knobs of the Universe
This is a BloggingHeads video with Anthony Aguirre and Clifford Johnson.
Here’s the gist of Julian Barbour physics theory….
Time doesn’t exist. The universe isn’t really expanding. And if you want a theory of quantum gravity, look to the man who inspired Einstein, says Julian Barbour.
(via mikehudack, spytap)
Gravitational waves are….
predicted to exist by Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, the initial tests run by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory Scientific Collaboration (LIGO) failed to find anything. It doesn’t disprove their existence although it does rule out a subset of string theory. From the article, ‘For example, some models predict the existence of cosmic strings, which are loops in space-time that may have formed in the early universe and gotten stretched to large scales along with the expansion of the universe. These objects are thought to produce bursts of gravitational waves as they oscillate. Since no large-amplitude gravitational waves were found, cosmic strings, if they exist at all, must be smaller than some models predict.’ The scientists working in Washington and Louisiana (in tandem to rule out flukes) will now move on to Advanced LIGO which will analyze a volume of space 1,000 times larger. If they don’t find any gravitational waves in that experiment, the results will be more than unsettling to many theorists.
I don’t think it is actually being slowed down or stopped in the way most people think it is. It’s being absorbed by the atoms, and then re-emitted.
(via savagemike)
Interesting. Here’s a quote…
New UBC research has literally and figuratively poked holes in single-band Hubbard physics—a model that has been used to predict and calculate the behavior of high-temperature superconductors for 20 years. The findings are the first compelling evidence challenging the model under certain conditions, and could necessitate entirely new theoretical approaches to explaining superconductivity in cuprate materials, one of the outstanding mysteries in condensed-matter physics.
