Good day.

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I'm the one that posted the thread ''What is the most important
field in science'' and ''OK, physic is the most important, what's
next ?'' Annoyingly, my latest thread has been ''assimilated'' back
in the previous one, even if I specifically choose to create a brand
new and separate thread. Beside personal preferences, after
40+ replies, there are some justifications to start fresh...
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I can see that my questions spawn a lot of replies, many times
not directly related with the initial questions. I guess I touched
some sensible string here...

WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN SCIENCE ?

First of all, I think that energy itself is the answer. If you
think about it, everything is energy, and everything need energy.
Even if it's limited only to the strong force to keep atoms together,
energy is still involved.

No matter what you do, everyday of your life, you will need
energy, beginning with yourself !! Energy to keep you warm,
energy to cook your meal, energy to drive you around, energy
to make work all type of devices/machines human civilization use
everyday.


Today's extensive automatizations of our world is primarily based
on our knowledge of energy. We now know how to make
machine that work for us. These machines (Washing machine, ATM,
copier, computer,robot, and very soon cyborg, replican and other
thinking humanoid) all use and need this same energy to work
properly. We are on a strong trend of more and more
automatizations for many years now. No sign of stopping anytime
soon.

Be honest... Would you bother to hand wash your cloth in
the bath when you have a washing machine right beside you ?
Unless you think the best thing in life is to hand wash cloth of
course... Think about it... The only thing we have all in common is
to win the big millions dollars ticket. For what ? To stop working
and enjoying life !! Only this time, energy is the ticket. Why
produce goods and services by yourself when: machine can do it
faster and better than you could ever do it, freeing you to
do more creative and interesting thing in the process ? No reason
really...

When we hit unlimited supply of energy, no one will work
anymore. Everything will be made by machine/robots/cyborg
and fully automatized. Why not anyway, energy not being an
issue anymore ? You like to work ? I don't. Enjoying life is way
better than 9 to 5 slavery. If the resources and technology were
available, and if the choice was yours, you wouldn't want to work
either as you will never hand wash your cloth if a washing
machine is available.

We will soon (before the next 100 years) need to get to other
star system to expand humankind and get over the limitation of
our resources. Only vast amount of energy will enable us to
realize concept like warpdrive, wormhole or any other similar
solution to get there quickly. If we don't , Humanity may not see
the 23rd century at all, slowly going instinct from lack of
resources on a near dead, over crowded, resources washed
planet Earth.


My conclusion:

Energy is the thing that will dramatically influence
the next 100 years. Unlimited supply of energy will
change the face of this planet and get us to other
stars. What could be more dramatic than that ?


This is only my humble view of the situation. Anyone free to challenge me on these ideas !

Steph

Hi Steph,

I agree that energy is the one of the two most important concepts in science. However, it is nothing "real" (you cannot pick up a bar of energy). Add to that the different definitions of energy amongst physical theories and you'll soon get a mess of definitions of fictious concepts.

I also think you shouldn't forget about entropy. It is often the clash of entropy and energy that gives rise to interesting effects: a system will tend to minimalize its energy, and maximize its entropy at the same time. For example, this battle for minimalization and maximalization can explain why galaxies cluster.

But unfortunately, entropy (just like energy) is a fictious concept that was introduced for making calculations easier. Therefor I am not entirely sure whether we could give the award for "most important item in science" to either of them. However, I can agree with your analysis that "applied energy" (eg. in the form of electrical current) can seriously revolutionalize our way of life.

Bye!

Crisp

Hi Crisp !


Your point is very interesting. I'm not a scientist by any mean.
I would say that I'm more a visionary or a ''futurologist'.

I like to explore concept without limitation. Science have a
very radical and crude approach when it come to new idea.
This is the part of science I dislike the most. Theorie is my bag !

If I followed you correctly, energy is more a state than a tangible
thing. To realize that is a strange feeling... but what about
plasma ? Isn't it pure energy ?


See you later,

Steph

Hi Steph,

"I like to explore concept without limitation. Science have a very radical and crude approach when it come to new idea. This is the part of science I dislike the most. Theorie is my bag !"

Exactly why I am about to graduate in theoretical physics. Inventing theories and then letting them crack down by others ;).

"If I followed you correctly, energy is more a state than a tangible thing. To realize that is a strange feeling... but what about plasma ? Isn't it pure energy ?"

Well, I wouldn't say that energy is a state, but rather something people came up with originally to make calculations in physics more easy. I don't think energy is something tangible, but there's no scientific evidence to support that yet (you could argue that matter can be converted to energy, e.g. light, but that raises the question whether light is "matter" - in that case energy would still be the fictious concept I talk about - or really "energy" - in this case energy would be something of the real world).

About plasma: plasma's are not pure energy. They are highly heated atoms, stripped of all electrons.

Bye!

Crisp

The scientific method.

A bunsun burner and test tubes?

curiosity

Hi Mr G !

I think that equilibrium would be more important than scientific
method by itself. We need vision, imagination, concept, new idea
and theories to eventually go for the scientific method to establish
the true nature of all those ideas and theories.

Otherwise, we would be stuck at the ''I don't see it, it doesn't exist'' state of mind.

Ultimately, creativity is the key, just like in art, human relation
and of course, science.

Regards

Steph

Hi Crisp !


Thank for the precision about the plasma. Very interesting.

I'm grateful that a simple citizen like me got the opportunities to be heard by a real theoretical physicist !!

Now get this: E=MC2 and C2 is constant, we can only work
on ''M'' to get more ''E'' out of the equation. Is possible
to think about a mass generator/motor, just like an electric
dynamo/motor ? Would be great to generate mass to get an
an anti-grav effect and use the same device to tap into
Planet/start/black hole/galaxy mass to get unlimited supply of
energy !


Have a good day,

Steph

Originally posted by Steph
Hi Mr G !

I think that equilibrium would be more important than scientific method...vision, imagination, concept, new idea and theories... Otherwise, we would be stuck at the ''I don't see it, it doesn't exist'' state of mind.

Vision, imagination, new ideas, theories and concepts are just as likely to get you UFO's, pyramid powers, crystal powers, Tarot, Quija, reflexology, numerology, ghosts, spirits, etc., ad nauseam.

Disciplined creativity is the hallmark of Science.

Hi Steph,

"I'm grateful that a simple citizen like me got the opportunities to be heard by a real theoretical physicist !!"

That was actually meant as a warning rather than a necessity to show off with the little knowledge I have of physics. A warning in the sense that either my answers are complete wrong, my answers consist of technical mumbo-jumbo to impress my friends and hide my ignorance of the subject, and that only once in a while I hit the ball right ;).

"Now get this: E=MC2 and C2 is constant, we can only work
on ''M'' to get more ''E'' out of the equation. Is possible
to think about a mass generator/motor, just like an electric
dynamo/motor ? Would be great to generate mass to get an
an anti-grav effect and use the same device to tap into
Planet/start/black hole/galaxy mass to get unlimited supply of
energy !"

The famous E = mc². First of all let me say that this form of Einstein's formula is an abbreviation and should be interpretted in the correct way. The expanded/unabbreviated formula reads:

E = m₀c²/(1 - v/c)^1/2.

Where m₀ is the restmass of the object in question (is a constant for all observers), v is the velocity of the object, c the speed of light (also constant for all observers). Reading the formula from right to left, that leaves only one variable on the rightside, v, to vary: if you increase the speed of an object, its energy increases (sounds quite logical) - or, given a mass and the velocity it is moving at, you have an amount E of energy. Reading from left to right: a given amount of energy can correspond with a number of possible m₀ and v values.

To answer your question: the formula indeed allows an amount of mass m₀ to be converted into a specific amount of energy E. However, this only has been observed on the level of elementary particles (where high-energy collisions can lead to creation or annihilation of particles). To my knowledge, no spontaneous transformation of a macroscopic object to energy (e.g. light or heat) has ever occured.

So to drive an engine with mass, you would have to tear down that planet atom by atom, then accelerate those atoms in a particle accelerator, hope that the atoms you accelerated collide and form light (and not new particles for example), then gather all that light, convert it into a usable propulsion mechanism and all this without too much loss of the created energy.

The largest problem that pops into my mind is that it takes an awful lot of energy to accelerate particles in a particle accelerator to the appropriate speeds for high-energy collisions. A lot more than you would gain from the collisions (simply because you have to power magnets, electrical fields, controls, ... ). Believe me, if it were a profitable business, then someone would already have patented it a long time ago for human power generation ;).

So to conclude: theoretically it is possible, practically it's way beyond our reach at the moment.

Bye!

Crisp