Ask a physicist anything. (7)

[Elendur]

Okay, here's a question...

I kind of believe that God has a love or an affinity to certain numbers such as 3, 7, and 144,000.

Are any of these numbers found in physics or equations that unify complex theories about our existence?

Not really an answer to your question but I like the Fibonacci sequence:

1 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 5 , 8 , 13 , 21 , 34 , 55 , 89 ...

It's often appearing in the nature

Vihart - YouTube

 

[Jazer]

I kind of believe that God has a love or an affinity to certain numbers such as 3, 7, and 144,000.

There are 12 patriarchs and in the end there will be 12,000 that are pure and undefiled to represent each of them for a total of 144,000. The third day and the seventh day are basicly the same. That is the 1000 year reign of Christ.

(NKJV) Hebrews 4:1 Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it.

Luke 13:32. And He said to them, “Go, tell that fox, 'Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.'

Gen 22 4 Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.

 

[Chalnoth]

I can only picture myself five dimensions. Three dimentional room, wormholes as a forth and the largest buildingstones in the universe also being the smallest buildingstones as a fift (strings???)

These other things you mention are not dimensions.

 

[Chalnoth]

My question for today is, do you believe... R.E.M. Man On The Moon Lyrics - YouTube ...

Do we believe that we put men on the moon? Um, why on Earth would anybody fail to believe that? Of course we put men on the moon.

 

[Chalnoth]

Not really an answer to your question but I like the Fibonacci sequence:

1 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 5 , 8 , 13 , 21 , 34 , 55 , 89 ...

It's often appearing in the nature

Vihart - YouTube

Well, sort of. Many physical processes closely mimic the Fibonacci sequence (which adds the previous two elements). But they generally don't mimic it exactly, which is why I'm not entirely sure this one counts.

 

[Elendur]

Well, sort of. Many physical processes closely mimic the Fibonacci sequence (which adds the previous two elements). But they generally don't mimic it exactly, which is why I'm not entirely sure this one counts.

Of course it doesn't mimic it exactly, I don't think any object can mimic a concept exactly.
You know Platons ideal world.

Edit: I just like that it's appearing so often.

 

[Chalnoth]

Of course it doesn't mimic it exactly, I don't think any object can mimic a concept exactly.
You know Platons ideal world.

Edit: I just like that it's appearing so often.

Right. But in fundamental physics, you do find many exact numbers. The ones I mentioned, for instance:

1/2: The spin of electrons, protons, neutrons, quarks, neutrinos, and a few other particles.
1: The spin of photons, gluons, W and Z bosons, the symmetry group of electromagnetism.
2: The spin of gravitons, the symmetry group of the weak force.
3: The symmetry group of the strong force, the number of quark/lepton families.
4: The number of space-time dimensions easily observed.

I suppose if you really wanted to go nuts, you could get any integer you wanted up to 200 or so by examining the periodic table.

 

[GrowingSmaller]

The sun is not made of tinsel. Is "not made of tinsel" an objective physical property?

 

[Elendur]

Right. But in fundamental physics, you do find many exact numbers. The ones I mentioned, for instance:

1/2: The spin of electrons, protons, neutrons, quarks, neutrinos, and a few other particles.
1: The spin of photons, gluons, W and Z bosons, the symmetry group of electromagnetism.
2: The spin of gravitons, the symmetry group of the weak force.
3: The symmetry group of the strong force, the number of quark/lepton families.
4: The number of space-time dimensions easily observed.

I suppose if you really wanted to go nuts, you could get any integer you wanted up to 200 or so by examining the periodic table.

That sounds right but about irrational numbers, pi and the root of 2 etc, are those represented as well?
I know they appear in ideal figures but I don't know if they appear in their exact form.

Sin, tan, cos and radians use those all the time so if they would appear exactly pi and the root of 2 should appear as well.

 

[Chalnoth]

The sun is not made of tinsel. Is "not made of tinsel" an objective physical property?

Depends upon what you mean, but at the very least it is not a useful property. The Sun is not made out of an infinite variety of things, so listing one or a collection of things the Sun is not made out of is pretty much worthless.

What is of value is listing what the Sun is made out of. The Sun is a plasma of mostly hydrogen and helium. There are trace elements of other things, but the important point is that it is made of individual, ionized atoms. No atoms can form molecules in a plasma state.

 

[Chalnoth]

That sounds right but about irrational numbers, pi and the root of 2 etc, are those represented as well?
I know they appear in ideal figures but I don't know if they appear in their exact form.

Sin, tan, cos and radians use those all the time so if they would appear exactly pi and the root of 2 should appear as well.

Well, e is extremely common. Pi, of course, will always appear whenever we are taking the ratio of the circumference to diameter of a circle. In many situations, it may not be entirely obvious that that is what we are doing, so pi can pop up in many unexpected places. I don't think the square root of two, specifically, is important, but you will get many integer and half-integer powers of numbers like 2 or 2pi.

 

[Naraoia]

Thank you.

So there isn't any formula that comes to the front of your mind that has a seven in it?

Unless 1/7 counts...

Leibniz formula for π - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Okay, here's a question...

I kind of believe that God has a love or an affinity to certain numbers such as 3, 7, and 144,000.

Maybe God loves primes. Who doesn't?

Right. But in fundamental physics, you do find many exact numbers. The ones I mentioned, for instance:
[...]
4: The number of space-time dimensions easily observed.

Can you have non-integer numbers of spacetime dimensions?

 

[Forge3]

Are you a general physicist or do you specialize like a quantum physicist?

 

[Chalnoth]

Can you have non-integer numbers of spacetime dimensions?

I don't think so. You can have objects that have non-integer dimensions (fractals). But I don't think you can do this with space-time dimensions.

 

[Chalnoth]

Are you a general physicist or do you specialize like a quantum physicist?

Personally, I specialize in early-universe cosmology.

 

[Elendur]

Well, e is extremely common. Pi, of course, will always appear whenever we are taking the ratio of the circumference to diameter of a circle. In many situations, it may not be entirely obvious that that is what we are doing, so pi can pop up in many unexpected places. I don't think the square root of two, specifically, is important, but you will get many integer and half-integer powers of numbers like 2 or 2pi.

Thank you

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Are you a general physicist or do you specialize like a quantum physicist?

Personally I specialised in quantum and nuclear mechanics. Oh, cross-sectional surface areas, how I love thee...

 

[Wiccan_Child]

The sun is not made of tinsel. Is "not made of tinsel" an objective physical property?

Depends on how you're defining the term. I'd say no - it's a property, it's about the physical make-up of the Sun, it's objective (and not some liberal subjective/relative nonsense), but it's not an objective physical property itself.

 

[Naraoia]

I don't think so. You can have objects that have non-integer dimensions (fractals). But I don't think you can do this with space-time dimensions.

Good, I don't have to imagine fractal spacetime then!

Speaking of fractals, can a real-world object be a true fractal? Since physical objects have finite sizes, I would think that a fractal is always just an approximation.

Though, that's the same reasoning that says we can't have a perfect circle, so I'm not sure it's as profound as it seemed at first glance

 

[Wiccan_Child]

Good, I don't have to imagine fractal spacetime then!

Speaking of fractals, can a real-world object be a true fractal? Since physical objects have finite sizes, I would think that a fractal is always just an approximation.

Though, that's the same reasoning that says we can't have a perfect circle, so I'm not sure it's as profound as it seemed at first glance

Maybe there really is a fundamental particle far below quarks and gluons, which has a really real shape - but it's a 3D Koch snowflake, which (somehow) gives rise to the quantum effects we see at the nano scale, and in turn the classical effects at the macro scale. So who knows, maybe it really is squiggly edges all the way down...