Write4U
Valued Senior Member
Right, they are symbolized "relational values". The symbols are unimportant, it is the differential ratios in values that "count".
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The Language of Physics.
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exchemist
Valued Senior Member
Somerfeld's constant, a.k.a. the Fine Structure constant is approximately 1/137.Physical units are arbitrary (made up concepts)
Minions did not find a inch or centimetre, or any other measurement laying around waiting to be found
Measurements were invented and then standardised. A few NUMBERS do appear to be just numbers and 1/137 (B) appears to be such a number
View attachment 3662
Seems like this number pops up in many places
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Note that α is quite a small number, very nearly 1/137. This makes theoretical physicists happy, because it is much easier to calculate things when the forces are not very strong. The theory of radiation and.......
The best way I have found to think of this constant is as a ratio of two energies: that of the electrostatic energy of two electrons a certain distance apart to the energy of a photon with a wavelength of the same distance x 2π.
So it's something that relates electrostatics to radiation in a vacuum, i.e. the to properties of the vacuum. There are other ways to express it involving magnetic permeability of the vacuum etc., but it always comes down to properties of the vacuum relative to electric charge in some form. I think.......
Indeed, physics might be just a set of relations between physical units. The problem with a language of physics is that formally, a language doesn't have any meaning; meaning is not related to the information content of a message in some language.
So what does energy mean, is not a useful physical question, type of thing.
On the other hand, questions in physics kind of need to be meaningful; the "why ask otherwise" caveat.