We, as human beings, are always driven by the desire to discover the roots of our existence. Are we made of stardust? Did we evolve from apes? What is that super particle that can make anything? (Thinking Alchemy anyone?) These are some questions that intrigued human beings for centuries.
The more curious of the lot experimented with organisms around us. And some with things (elements/substances). The adventurous explored every corner of earth - and oceans - and some even beyond earth in search of roots of life. While the quest continues, there's a lot we know now more than some centuries ago and a lot more we don't know!
That's what I sought to ponder over today.
Let it be a futile exercise to summarize our disillusionment. The deepest of the mysteries that surround us are astounding!
The atomic/sub-stomic models of elements, for instance, went through different representations. Some called it like matter as ether and some calling it seeds-in-watermelon-like. Some finally zeroed on orbital model of electrons revolving around nucleus with positively charged protons and neutral neutrons. And then Planck, Maxwell and Schroedinger added radiation and uncertainity models which created a confusion between particle as a entity or wave. EPR paradox called out spooky phenomenon across sub-atomic particles that surprisingly revealed some unpredictable linking. It came to be famously known as quantum entanglement later. This phenomenon also allowed us to design computation layer which uses the dynamics of quantum states especially the superposition to augment/challenge the existing classical computing architecture (look more about quantum supremacy here). Stephen Hawking brings attention to second law of thermodynamics stating particle systems forming unique seemingly disordering mixtures of their own. He strongly feels this, in turn, also asserts the big bang model of a more ordered system tending to form a less ordered system.
Traditionally we observed systems and phenomenon on electro-magnetic dimensional spectrum on a time scale. Einstein's general theory of relativity introduced the space-time dimension, which was initially very hard to wrap heads around. This eventually led to the re-interpretation of Newton's law of gravity.
Gravity, on the other hand, proved to be the most mysterious of all the particle phenomena. Our minds and system analyses are boggled by the manifestation of gravity on celestial bodies. It looks like it is not simply an acceleration "g" as we all have known it. Instead, it represents the curvature of space-time that is formed by the presence of a mass.
As always, Physicists are not the souls to let the systems be. They had stayed busy building their nuclear reactors and hadron colliders to let us understand the fundamental phenomenon - fissions and fusions. Trying to answer questions like "What initiates the high energy reactions in the stars?" "How does gravitational field span out at different stages of a star's existence?" "What happens if stars collide?"
Our quest, is fuelled by the research and capabilities that we built to get beyond our homes and probe our dearly neighbour, the moon. And fuelled further by the strong hope to find living beings like us, we built inter-planetary probes. Our spectroscopy evolved to such an extent that we deployed telescope satellites to observe astronomical phenomena.
Some physicists argue that so far, the biggest mystery that surrounds us is the lack of a unifying theory that links general theory of relativity to quantum mechanics. This is so challenging that the events like black-hole mergers of the big bang model universe had to be studied more closely using specialized high-precision scientific facilities like Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories (LIGOs) to study gravitational waves from supernovae. One of the long term plans of space agencies is also to deploy LIGOs in space. We will study more about astronomical events like formation of black-holes in the coming days.
With advances in AI, statistical modeling, natural language processing, image processing, spectroscopy, life science and material science, it is very likely that we make leaps in explaining such phenomenon in greater detail. However, to validate our understanding, we are quite limited in our ability to travel or communicate to distant celestial realms that can boost our understanding. Multi-dimensional analyses and spacecraft technology needs an overhaul to extend our presence on to the edge of our known celestial zones few light years away.
The more curious of the lot experimented with organisms around us. And some with things (elements/substances). The adventurous explored every corner of earth - and oceans - and some even beyond earth in search of roots of life. While the quest continues, there's a lot we know now more than some centuries ago and a lot more we don't know!
That's what I sought to ponder over today.
Let it be a futile exercise to summarize our disillusionment. The deepest of the mysteries that surround us are astounding!
The atomic/sub-stomic models of elements, for instance, went through different representations. Some called it like matter as ether and some calling it seeds-in-watermelon-like. Some finally zeroed on orbital model of electrons revolving around nucleus with positively charged protons and neutral neutrons. And then Planck, Maxwell and Schroedinger added radiation and uncertainity models which created a confusion between particle as a entity or wave. EPR paradox called out spooky phenomenon across sub-atomic particles that surprisingly revealed some unpredictable linking. It came to be famously known as quantum entanglement later. This phenomenon also allowed us to design computation layer which uses the dynamics of quantum states especially the superposition to augment/challenge the existing classical computing architecture (look more about quantum supremacy here). Stephen Hawking brings attention to second law of thermodynamics stating particle systems forming unique seemingly disordering mixtures of their own. He strongly feels this, in turn, also asserts the big bang model of a more ordered system tending to form a less ordered system.
Traditionally we observed systems and phenomenon on electro-magnetic dimensional spectrum on a time scale. Einstein's general theory of relativity introduced the space-time dimension, which was initially very hard to wrap heads around. This eventually led to the re-interpretation of Newton's law of gravity.
Gravity, on the other hand, proved to be the most mysterious of all the particle phenomena. Our minds and system analyses are boggled by the manifestation of gravity on celestial bodies. It looks like it is not simply an acceleration "g" as we all have known it. Instead, it represents the curvature of space-time that is formed by the presence of a mass.
As always, Physicists are not the souls to let the systems be. They had stayed busy building their nuclear reactors and hadron colliders to let us understand the fundamental phenomenon - fissions and fusions. Trying to answer questions like "What initiates the high energy reactions in the stars?" "How does gravitational field span out at different stages of a star's existence?" "What happens if stars collide?"
Our quest, is fuelled by the research and capabilities that we built to get beyond our homes and probe our dearly neighbour, the moon. And fuelled further by the strong hope to find living beings like us, we built inter-planetary probes. Our spectroscopy evolved to such an extent that we deployed telescope satellites to observe astronomical phenomena.
Some physicists argue that so far, the biggest mystery that surrounds us is the lack of a unifying theory that links general theory of relativity to quantum mechanics. This is so challenging that the events like black-hole mergers of the big bang model universe had to be studied more closely using specialized high-precision scientific facilities like Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories (LIGOs) to study gravitational waves from supernovae. One of the long term plans of space agencies is also to deploy LIGOs in space. We will study more about astronomical events like formation of black-holes in the coming days.
With advances in AI, statistical modeling, natural language processing, image processing, spectroscopy, life science and material science, it is very likely that we make leaps in explaining such phenomenon in greater detail. However, to validate our understanding, we are quite limited in our ability to travel or communicate to distant celestial realms that can boost our understanding. Multi-dimensional analyses and spacecraft technology needs an overhaul to extend our presence on to the edge of our known celestial zones few light years away.
No comments:
Post a Comment