A New Map of All the Particles and Forces | Quanta Magazine
WEBOct 22, 2020 · A New Map of All the Particles and Forces. We’ve created a new way to explore the fundamental constituents of the universe. Ashley Mackenzie for Quanta Magazine. [Editor’s note: The full, interactive map is available below.] All of nature springs from a handful of components — the fundamental particles — …
A Physicist’s Physicist Ponders the Nature of Reality
WEBNov 28, 2017 · A Physicist’s Physicist Ponders the Nature of Reality. Edward Witten reflects on the meaning of dualities in physics and math, emergent space-time, and the pursuit of a complete description of nature. Edward Witten in his office at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. Jean Sweep for Quanta Magazine.
The Mystery at the Heart of Physics That Only Math Can Solve
WEBJun 10, 2021 · The accelerating effort to understand the mathematics of quantum field theory will have profound consequences for both math and physics. Olena Shmahalo/Quanta Magazine. Over the past century, quantum field theory has proved to be the single most sweeping and successful physical theory ever invented. It is an umbrella term that encompasses many ...
Mathematician Proves Huge Result on ‘Dangerous’ Problem
WEBDec 11, 2019 · Lothar Collatz likely posed the eponymous conjecture in the 1930s. The problem sounds like a party trick. Pick a number, any number. If it’s odd, multiply it by 3 and add 1. If it’s even, divide it by 2. Now you have a new number. Apply the same rules to the new number. The conjecture is about what happens as you keep repeating the process.
How Gödel’s Proof Works - Quanta Magazine
WEBJul 14, 2020 · So the only prime factorization of 243,000,000 is 2 6 × 3 5 × 5 6, meaning there’s only one possible way to decode the Gödel number: the formula 0 = 0. Gödel then went one step further. A mathematical proof consists of a sequence of formulas. So Gödel gave every sequence of formulas a unique Gödel number too.
Physics News, Interviews and Columns | Quanta Magazine
WEBSep 12, 2024 · By Janna Levin. August 29, 2024. Since Newton had his initial revelation about gravity, our understanding of this fundamental concept has evolved in unexpected ways. In this week’s episode, theoretical physicist Claudia de Rham and co-host Janna Levin discuss the ways our current understanding of gravity needs to continue to evolve.
How Claude Shannon Invented the Future | Quanta Magazine
WEBDec 22, 2020 · In that sense, he was a scientist. Shannon invented new mathematics to describe the laws of communication. He introduced new ideas, like the entropy rate of a probabilistic model, which have been applied in far-ranging branches of mathematics such as ergodic theory, the study of long-term behavior of dynamical systems.
How Bell’s Theorem Proved ‘Spooky Action at a Distance’ Is Real
WEBJul 20, 2021 · The root of today’s quantum revolution was John Stewart Bell’s 1964 theorem showing that quantum mechanics really permits instantaneous connections between far-apart locations. We take for granted that an event in one part of the world cannot instantly affect what happens far away. This principle, which physicists call locality, was long ...
What Is a Particle? - Quanta Magazine
WEBNov 12, 2020 · A Particle Is a ‘Collapsed Wave Function’ 1. The quest to understand nature’s fundamental building blocks began with the ancient Greek philosopher Democritus’s assertion that such things exist. Two millennia later, Isaac Newton and Christiaan Huygens debated whether light is made of particles or waves.
A Mathematician’s Guided Tour Through High Dimensions
WEBSep 13, 2021 · The formal study of higher dimensions emerged in the 19th century and became quite sophisticated within decades: A 1911 bibliography contained 1,832 references to the geometry of n dimensions. Perhaps as a consequence, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the public became infatuated with the fourth dimension.