Pete Townshend and String Theory.....Did he see it?
Ok now we have this new Theory using Quantum Mechanics and/or Quantum Chromodynamics which tells us that the building blocks of EVERYTHING are basically "Strings"
Think of a guitar string that has been tuned by stretching the string under tension across the guitar. Depending on how the string is plucked and how much tension is in the string, different musical notes will be created by the string. These musical notes could be said to be excitation modes of that guitar string under tension. In a similar manner, in string theory, the elementary particles we observe in particle accelerators could be thought of as the "musical notes" or excitation modes of elementary strings. In string theory, as in guitar playing, the string must be stretched under tension in order to become excited. However, the strings in string theory are floating in spacetime, they aren't tied down to a guitar. Nonetheless, they have tension. The string tension in string theory is denoted by the quantity 1/(2 p a'), where a' is pronounced "alpha prime"and is equal to the square of the string length scale. If string theory is to be a theory of quantum gravity, then the average size of a string should be somewhere near the length scale of quantum gravity, called the Planck length, which is about 10-33 centimeters, or about a millionth of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a centimeter. Unfortunately, this means that strings are way too small to see by current or expected particle physics technology (or financing!!) and so string theorists must devise more clever methods to test the theory than just looking for little strings in particle experiments. String theories are classified according to whether or not the strings are required to be closed loops, and whether or not the particle spectrum includes fermions. In order to include fermions in string theory, there must be a special kind of symmetry called supersymmetry, which means for every boson (particle that transmits a force) there is a corresponding fermion (particle that makes up matter). So supersymmetry relates the particles that transmit forces to the particles that make up matter. Supersymmetric partners to to currently known particles have not been observed in particle experiments, but theorists believe this is because supersymmetric particles are too massive to be detected at current accelerators. Particle accelerators could be on the verge of finding evidence for high energy supersymmetry in the next decade. Evidence for supersymmetry at high energy would be compelling evidence that string theory was a good mathematical model for Nature at the smallest distance scales.
So is this what Pete Townshend dreamed about? That everybody and everything are or can be identified by musical notes? That is basically what the Theory is stating. Unfortunately it is just a theory and until a test can be developed we can only assume. Pete Nostradomus???? Are we made up of strings, each one with a unique sound?
If or when Pete makes Lifehouse a movie, maybe the Scientists will get a better understanding of what we and this universe are made of...... more about "String Theory" below
SUPERSTRINGS! String Basics
We are used to thinking of fundamental particles (like electrons) as point-like 0-dimensional objects. A generalization of this is fundamental strings which are 1-dimensional objects. They have no thickness but do have a length, typically 10-33 cm [that's a decimal point followed by 32 zeros and a 1]. This is very small compared to the length scales that we can reasonably measure, so these strings are so small that they practically look like point particles. However their stringy nature has important implications as we will see.
Strings can be open or closed. As they move through spacetime they sweep out an imaginary surface called a worldsheet.
These strings have certain vibrational modes which can be characterized by various quantum numbers such as mass, spin, etc. The basic idea is that each mode carries a set of quantum numbers that correspond to a distinct type of fundamental particle. This is the ultimate unification: all the fundamental particles we know can be described by one object, a string! [A very loose analogy can be made with say, a violin string. The vibrational modes are like the harmonics or notes of the violin string, and each type of particle corresponds to one of these notes.]
Go here for overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory#Overview
Think of a guitar string that has been tuned by stretching the string under tension across the guitar. Depending on how the string is plucked and how much tension is in the string, different musical notes will be created by the string. These musical notes could be said to be excitation modes of that guitar string under tension. In a similar manner, in string theory, the elementary particles we observe in particle accelerators could be thought of as the "musical notes" or excitation modes of elementary strings. In string theory, as in guitar playing, the string must be stretched under tension in order to become excited. However, the strings in string theory are floating in spacetime, they aren't tied down to a guitar. Nonetheless, they have tension. The string tension in string theory is denoted by the quantity 1/(2 p a'), where a' is pronounced "alpha prime"and is equal to the square of the string length scale. If string theory is to be a theory of quantum gravity, then the average size of a string should be somewhere near the length scale of quantum gravity, called the Planck length, which is about 10-33 centimeters, or about a millionth of a billionth of a billionth of a billionth of a centimeter. Unfortunately, this means that strings are way too small to see by current or expected particle physics technology (or financing!!) and so string theorists must devise more clever methods to test the theory than just looking for little strings in particle experiments. String theories are classified according to whether or not the strings are required to be closed loops, and whether or not the particle spectrum includes fermions. In order to include fermions in string theory, there must be a special kind of symmetry called supersymmetry, which means for every boson (particle that transmits a force) there is a corresponding fermion (particle that makes up matter). So supersymmetry relates the particles that transmit forces to the particles that make up matter. Supersymmetric partners to to currently known particles have not been observed in particle experiments, but theorists believe this is because supersymmetric particles are too massive to be detected at current accelerators. Particle accelerators could be on the verge of finding evidence for high energy supersymmetry in the next decade. Evidence for supersymmetry at high energy would be compelling evidence that string theory was a good mathematical model for Nature at the smallest distance scales.
So is this what Pete Townshend dreamed about? That everybody and everything are or can be identified by musical notes? That is basically what the Theory is stating. Unfortunately it is just a theory and until a test can be developed we can only assume. Pete Nostradomus???? Are we made up of strings, each one with a unique sound?
If or when Pete makes Lifehouse a movie, maybe the Scientists will get a better understanding of what we and this universe are made of...... more about "String Theory" below
SUPERSTRINGS! String Basics
We are used to thinking of fundamental particles (like electrons) as point-like 0-dimensional objects. A generalization of this is fundamental strings which are 1-dimensional objects. They have no thickness but do have a length, typically 10-33 cm [that's a decimal point followed by 32 zeros and a 1]. This is very small compared to the length scales that we can reasonably measure, so these strings are so small that they practically look like point particles. However their stringy nature has important implications as we will see.
Strings can be open or closed. As they move through spacetime they sweep out an imaginary surface called a worldsheet.
These strings have certain vibrational modes which can be characterized by various quantum numbers such as mass, spin, etc. The basic idea is that each mode carries a set of quantum numbers that correspond to a distinct type of fundamental particle. This is the ultimate unification: all the fundamental particles we know can be described by one object, a string! [A very loose analogy can be made with say, a violin string. The vibrational modes are like the harmonics or notes of the violin string, and each type of particle corresponds to one of these notes.]
Go here for overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory#Overview
posted by Michael | 12:09 PM
2 Comments:
My brain is too small for this...but US Tour dates have been announced!
Whoa! That is deep! I'll have to read this again later, when I'm not tired. my head hurts!
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