I enjoy considering the Observer Effect, in which that which is being observed, whether people, animals or subatomic particles, changes its behavior specifically because it’s being observed.
I like String Theory because it posits multiverses. I might be Queen of the Galaxy in one universe - or maybe I have legs that go all the way up in another universe. I might even be able to carry a tune in a third.
In which universe do I have long legs?
The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle is just plain old fun to talk about. One can never precisely measure both the momentum and the position of a particle because if you increase your precision in one area, you lose precision in the other. So you never really know what your particles are up to, do you? For all you know they’re up to no good. I know mine are, up to no good that is.
This one is really cool - The Quantum Zeno Effect in which an unstable particle under continual observation never ever decays. In a sense it becomes frozen in time, immortal. Interesting, huh? And we’re back to the Observer Effect.
It’s sort of cool to consider the shape of our universe. What if it really is one big sphere and not ever-expanding? (Which begs two questions… If the universe is expanding, what is it expanding into, and if it’s not, what lies beyond the boundaries of our spherical universe?) However, for the sake of argument let’s say we inhabit a spherical universe. If I left home and traveled the circumference- if I lived long enough or could move fast enough - I’d end up back where I started. Which then leads me to the logical conclusion that the universe begins and ends with me. I stand in the center of the universe.
Kind of like Where’s Waldo.
Is light a wave or a particle? Or is it both- sometimes a wave, sometimes a particle?
The Aborigines in Australia have a concept of Dreamtime - From Australian Aborigine Dream Beliefs:
“The aborigines call it the ‘all-at-once’ time instead of the ‘one-thing-after-another’ time. This is because they experience Dreamtime as the past present and future coexisting.”
I’ve been there. Not to Australia, but to Dreamtime.
I guess if you’ve ever wondered what goes on in my head, well, there you have it. Yeah, I’m either pondering the above or inventing a recipe for the gooiest chocolate brownies in the world. Usually at the same time. But lets not talk about Schrodinger’s Cat because that paradox is just damned depressing.
I’m baking brownies tomorrow!
Schrodinger’s Cat would rather have one of your brownies and be left in peace.
XXOO Kat
Kat… hahahahahahahah! I’ll never look in the box therefore I’ll never know!
Julia,
I discovered your post through Triberr’s global stream. Your writing is delightful. I tend to think that Shrodinger’s cat is alive and well, using the tiny radio active isotope to evolve into a cat with opposable thumbs. Once he has his thumbs in hand (giggle), he will use any remaining fissionable material to craft a small nuclear device and eventually take over the world. I’m very much pro-cat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6CcxJQq1x8
The bit on the Quantum Zero effect was news to me. I do love learning new things.
Great post.
Hey Brian! Thanks for stopping by. If I open the box that cat better be alive, and if he takes over the world, well, that works for me. I figure it’s like asking if a tree falls in the woods and there’s no one there to hear it, does it make any noise… and yes it does therefore the cat is alive and knitting a super-duper mouse catcher!
That commercial is hilarious!
I don’t generally watch videos in blog posts, but I am a fan of “The Big Bang Theory”. You picked a good one. “A dogopus can play fetch with eight balls…nobody can hate that.”
I adore The Big Bang Theory, Brian. Plus Sheldon subscribes to the Homer Simpson theory of life under the sea. I have to agree with both - I want a dogopus and when things come crashing down I’m going to live under the sea.
That is a sound strategy. Everyone knows that zombies can’t swim, so you’ll be protected from the apocalypse.
Ahhh, I’ll watch Big Bang Theory anytime.
Now I’m craving brownies…guess my family will be happy tonight.
Julia, I would actually risk climbing into a box filled or not filled with radioactive isotopes to get one of your brownies. On the way out I would take the cat with me.
Brian, do we really know that zombies can’t swim? Zombies from the Chinese mainland could be paddling toward Washington State at this very moment.
I guess I had always assumed they couldn’t because of how uncoordinated they are and their slow movement. Also, I figured the undead wouldn’t be very buoyant, but you may be right. Now, I’m worried about swimming zombies. Darn.
Brian, Kat… Shark bait. No worries. They would float however due to those gases caused by decomposition. And I doubt they’d get anywhere since they seem to wander in aimless circles…
Thanks, Jaye! Ha! I once had a cat who lived in a suitcase in the garage. It was his choice and yes, I often wondered what, on earth, was going on in there.
Better bake some brownies, Amber!
Brian, even if zombies can’t swim, they won’t sink. And the salt water will make them swell. And it will be gross. I think survivors in a zombie apocalypse had better live in floating homes. http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&newwindow=1&sa=X&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=-e2vmMRJYxHwLM:&imgrefurl=http://dvice.com/archives/2008/02/dutch_homebuild.php&docid=kotNz-O1d7FKQM&imgurl=http://dvice.com/pics/dutch_floating_homes.jpg&w=550&h=269&ei=ANB-UJO8Ic_YigKn9oGIDw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=400&sig=114120876726705833347&page=1&tbnh=134&tbnw=268&start=0&ndsp=8&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:99&tx=109&ty=24&biw=1179&bih=528
Speaking of the Observer Effect… every dang time I attend a San Francisco Giants game, they lose. I believe this illustrates the Observer Effect.
If the universe is expanding, what is it expanding into, and if it’s not, what lies beyond the boundaries of our spherical universe?
I have wondered about this for as long as I can remember. Good to know I’m not the only one. Great post.
I would love to live in that floating house.
I had a similar experience with baseball growing up. I love the Reds and went to 5 games over an eight or nine year period. In two years they won the world series and in another they had the best record in baseball, but didn’t qualify for the playoff because of the strike. I never saw a win. It wasn’t until I saw them play the Nationals in DC, many years later, that I got to observe a win. I suspect it was because I went to the game unsure if I should root for the home team or not. I was uncertain, in principal.
Wherever you go there you are. S
Steph - or the faster I go the behinder I get.
Observer Effect, Brian. You jinxed them by your very presence.
Hey Stephanie - I’m glad I’m not the only one!
I want to organize a “Zombie Hobble” in my town. I think it would be great to have everyone dress as zombies and stagger down main street, moaning.
Kat, tell them to hobble Gangnam Style!
The best explanation I have heard to try to illustrate the expansion of the universe is that space in between everything is growing, not that the universe is expanding “into” anything.
As to what is beyond the universe, well, what we call the “universe” is actually the “observable universe”, which is what we can see limited by time and the unbreakable limit of the speed of light. What we see is simply how much of the universe is close enough that light has been able to reach us in the amount of time available since the Big Bang. This is why the observable universe is a spherical area - because that’s as far as we can see in all directions.
But because there are no privileged frames of reference, if you could pick a point on the “edge” of our observable universe and transport yourself there, then that point would have an observable universe that extended in a spherical area around it. And a large chunk of that observable universe would be beyond the boundaries of our observable universe. So the answer to “what lies beyond the universe” is basically “more universe”.
Aaron. Yes. Nicely put. But then one must ask the question… what existed in the ‘nothing’ before The Big Bang? Which would tend to imply nothing=something because it’s difficult for the human mind to conceive of an actual ‘nothing’ - In fact, even using the word ‘nothing’ is a contradiction in terms. Or misleading at best.
Of course another question is… if our universe is of infinite dimension or infinitely expanding, what of multi-verses? Are they also infinitely expanding and if so, in what dimension? Surely not ours.
And then, of course, what we can actually see of our universe no longer exists in the state in which we see it by the time we see it due to the speed at which light and other forms of energy from distant parts of our visible universe reaches us.
Okay, talked out!
OMG bouncy, rotting flesh Gangnam dance-crazed zombies invading from the east…. I’m going to have to have nightmares for sure!
See what you did? You started an refined intellectual argument and it devolved to this-Korean Disco zombies!
Whoa, I sure hope it rains soon because you are getting positively loopy- in a good way- sort of. So is The Quantum Zeno Effect the quantum physics version of “a watched pot never boils”? Just wondering…..
Exactly, Yoshi. You nailed it. I almost said that.
*Brownies* ‘whispers’ Send ‘em over…
Okay, Anny, next time I come out to Charm City!