Why are things in space the shape that they are?

[Michael 345]

You mean proton decay?
Never been seen, but seems logical considering its made up of quarks.

From what I recall of the article I read long ago the decreased pressure of space (add to that the quantum foam field) would overcome the binding energy of the atom

Brain fart idea

Would virtual particles popping in and out of existence be the disintegrate atoms from another Universe?

Just passing through ours and showing up when happen to bump into one of our atoms

 

[paddoboy]

From what I recall of the article I read long ago the decreased pressure of space (add to that the quantum foam field) would overcome the binding energy of the atom

In the far far distant future, when BH's have even evaporated, the decay of atoms would also have taken place...not controversial at all...they will break down into their component electrons protons and neutrons.....
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton_decay
In particle physics, proton decay is a hypothetical form of particle decay in which the proton decays into lighter subatomic particles, such as a neutral pion and a positron.[1] The proton decay hypothesis was first formulated by Andrei Sakharov in 1967. Despite significant experimental effort, proton decay has never been observed. If it does decay via a positron, the proton's half-life is constrained to be at least 1.67×1034 years.[

 

[Michael 345]

If it does decay via a positron, the proton's half-life is constrained to be at least 1.67×1034 years.[

So far enough into the future and no need set alarm clock?

 

[Xelasnave.1947]

Would virtual particles popping in and out of existence be the disintegrate atoms from another Universe?

I can't answer your question but I do not buy this idea of particles popping into and out of existence as reflective of reality...where does this come from?

Any ideas.

I did read once that it was a math thing but I can't find that or remember enough to explain it that way...other than the particles are there but it is convenient for the math to deal with them as if they appear and disappear and certainly far from the popping in and out thing..
Alex

 

[paddoboy]

Would virtual particles popping in and out of existence be the disintegrate atoms from another Universe?

I can't answer your question but I do not buy this idea of particles popping into and out of existence as reflective of reality...where does this come from?

First thing that came to mind was the "Casimir Effect" which is observational verification of virtual particles. Then I decided to google and brush up on what I read a long time ago......
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/are-virtual-particles-rea/#:~:text=Virtual particles are indeed real particles.&text=Quantum mechanics al
Are virtual particles really constantly popping in and out of existence? Or are they merely a mathematical bookkeeping device for quantum mechanics?
Gordon Kane, director of the Michigan Center for Theoretical Physics at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, provides this answer.

Virtual particles are indeed real particles. Quantum theory predicts that every particle spends some time as a combination of other particles in all possible ways. These predictions are very well understood and tested.

Quantum mechanics allows, and indeed requires, temporary violations of conservation of energy, so one particle can become a pair of heavier particles (the so-called virtual particles), which quickly rejoin into the original particle as if they had never been there. If that were all that occurred we would still be confident that it was a real effect because it is an intrinsic part of quantum mechanics, which is extremely well tested, and is a complete and tightly woven theory--if any part of it were wrong the whole structure would collapse.

But while the virtual particles are briefly part of our world they can interact with other particles, and that leads to a number of tests of the quantum-mechanical predictions about virtual particles. The first test was understood in the late 1940s. In a hydrogen atom an electron and a proton are bound together by photons (the quanta of the electromagnetic field). Every photon will spend some time as a virtual electron plus its antiparticle, the virtual positron, since this is allowed by quantum mechanics as described above. The hydrogen atom has two energy levels that coincidentally seem to have the same energy. But when the atom is in one of those levels it interacts differently with the virtual electron and positron than when it is in the other, so their energies are shifted a tiny bit because of those interactions. That shift was measured by Willis Lamb and the Lamb shift was born, for which a Nobel Prize was eventually awarded.

Quarks are particles much like electrons, but different in that they also interact via the strong force. Two of the lighter quarks, the so-called "up" and "down" quarks, bind together to make up protons and neutrons. The "top" quark is the heaviest of the six types of quarks. In the early 1990s it had been predicted to exist but had not been directly seen in any experiment. At the LEP collider at the European particle physics laboratory CERN, millions of Z bosons--the particles that mediate neutral weak interactions--were produced and their mass was very accurately measured. The Standard Model of particle physics predicts the mass of the Z boson, but the measured value differed a little. This small difference could be explained in terms of the time the Z spent as a virtual top quark if such a top quark had a certain mass. When the top quark mass was directly measured a few years later at the Tevatron collider at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Chicago, the value agreed with that obtained from the virtual particle analysis, providing a dramatic test of our understanding of virtual particles.

Another very good test some readers may want to look up, which we do not have space to describe here, is the Casimir effect, where forces between metal plates in empty space are modified by the presence of virtual particles.

Thus virtual particles are indeed real and have observable effects that physicists have devised ways of measuring. Their properties and consequences are well established and well understood consequences of quantum mechanics.

 

[Write4U]

Things in space are shaped by mathematical self-ordering. In art this is called "curve-stitching".

Create Parabolic Curves Using Straight Lines

Example:

One of the easiest curves to create using curve stitching is a parabola. The straight lines do not actually create the curve, they merely approximate it. The parabola is the envelope of the straight lines. This mathematical paper proves that the curve formed by the method below is a parabola. Once a parabolic section has been created, you can use it to form interesting designs. Four of the designs above only use parabolic sections.

https://mathcraft.wonderhowto.com/how-to/create-parabolic-curves-using-straight-lines-0131301/

 

[Write4U]

Would virtual particles popping in and out of existence be the disintegrate atoms from another Universe?

That does not solve the problem of "creation", it merely suggests a multiverse.

Why make it that difficult? Is it not a lot easier to create virtual particles from excitation of the quantum energy foam?

This phenomenon is described in Chaos theory.

 

[Xelasnave.1947]

irtual particles are indeed real particles. Quantum theory predicts that every particle spends some time as a combination of other particles in all possible ways.

I take this to contradict the notion that particles "pop into and out of existence" and as far as we can now tell enlisting your input is what we deal with is a change of state something reasonable and with no requirement of "magic" as results from such a misleading term ..pop in and out of existence...
I am aware of Casimir effect it is an observation that I feel could be enlisted to support the notion that gravity is best understood as a universal pressure rather than a force of attraction, a force I propose that although referred to has never been established to exist.
Thank you Paddo for your observations.
Alex

 

[Michael 345]

creation

Current Science thinking, as I understand, the Universe is ETERNAL

Universe takes in the totality of everything in existence, not just this corner which had a start at the Big Bang

 

[Write4U]

Current Science thinking, as I understand, the Universe is ETERNAL

Which Universe? Small Universes emerging from a Big Universe? A Big physical Universe with many small physical univesrses within it?

Universe takes in the totality of everything in existence, not just this corner which had a start at the Big Bang

I understand the concept, but I just cannot conceive of an eternally existing physical object, with eternally existing physical objects within it. Where did it all come from if not by evolutionary processes? What then was the BB and what caused it and what determined the singular potential that allows for an "orderly mathematical process" to begin with?

If one trusts in the Evolutionary process, then the Original condition only "needs" to be permittive of change, i.e. no physical (mathematical) restrictions of any kind , including "dynamical potential", i.e. "potential energy", i.e. "potential matter" i.e. ''matter".

I can imagine something energetic "emerging" from a local disturbance (singularity) within a purely permittive condition and that energy converting into physical matter.

Our "known" Universal history after the BB. Seems a logical evlutionary progression to me.....

That concept would also explain the ability for a FTL inflationary epoch. At the time of the BB there was only an "infinite timeless permittive condition", without any logic mathematical restrictions, i.e. not nothing, but not yet something, but not an eternal fully formed object, and posessing NO mathematical Imperatives yet.

Any other physical construct, other than a purely permittive condition of any size, argues for "irreducible complexity" and ID !

 

[Michael 345]

argues for "irreducible complexity" and ID !

Do you argue for "irreducible complexity" and ID?

 

[Write4U]

Do you argue for "irreducible complexity" and ID?

NOOOOO. I start with the MOST simple "condition" from which complexity might emerge and evolve via dynamical mathematical evolutionary processes based on the abstract logic of "relational values" and "mathematically ordered functional processes".

Universal Mathematics, not God, makes complexity possible. "In the Beginning" there is no irreducible complexity, but only a mathematical non-zero condition, which produced an "imbalance", the causality of "dynamical change", i.e. BB!

Even God has to create the Universe from Nothing. It is one of the shared truths between scripture and science. God saw an empty permittive condition and wished (intent) for complex objects to emerge.

Interestingly, no one considers that God itself is an irreducibly complex object...he is divine............

 

[Michael 345]

NOOOOO

OK

When I started to think about Life, chocolate and the rest of stuff I soon came across

why is there something instead of NOTHING?

Seems a fair enough question. My thoughts go along the lines of the default position should be a TOTAL INFINITE VOID where not a single photon exist

Few years ago Science was/is saying a state of ABSOLUTELY NOTHING is an impossibility. Don't understand but I'll accept it

The latest talks about quantum foam permeating the Universe

So there goes my TOTAL INFINITE VOID

However TOTAL INFINITE BLOCK OF QUANTUM FOAM still works

until

what is our region (and by our Minion standards a big region) doing here?

 

[Write4U]

OK

When I started to think about Life, chocolate and the rest of stuff I soon came across

why is there something instead of NOTHING?

Seems a fair enough question. My thoughts go along the lines of the default position should be a TOTAL INFINITE VOID where not a single photon exist

Few years ago Science was/is saying a state of ABSOLUTELY NOTHING is an impossibility. Don't understand but I'll accept it

The latest talks about quantum foam permeating the Universe

So there goes my TOTAL INFINITE VOID

However TOTAL INFINITE BLOCK OF QUANTUM FOAM still works

until

what is our region (and by our Minion standards a big region) doing here?

Dynamical Potential <---> Implicate <---> Becoming.

Who says that Causality needs to be physical or spiritual. How about mathematical?....

 

[Michael 345]

How about mathematical?

How about Physics running physical stuff then we invent maths so we can explain physics to each other

 

[Xelasnave.1947]

Even God has to create the Universe from Nothing. It is one of the shared truths between scripture and science. God saw an empty permittive condition and wished (intent) for complex objects to emerge.

There can be no creation as something must have always existed ..whatever it is was or maybe is perhaps irrelevant but there can be no creation of anything from nothing...if science indulges a speculation that something came from nothing it is clearly only trying to please religious grant givers.
Now I cant prove that but that is a long way ahead of proving something from nothing...
The big bang was an extrapolation of an observation that the universe is expanding, and note that observation is supported by only one line of science, however after an initial extrapolation back to a begining or very close to it it was realised there was a problem and inflation was added which throws doubt on the original extrapolation and perhaps explains why inflation could only last a zillionth of a zillionth of a zillionth of a second...and now inflation seems to be losing favour..i dont know but it would be no surprise...just how far back can we reliably extrapolate the observed expansion in reverse...why does it need to go all the way back to have the universe start as atom size why not something much much bigger..I still think the desire to have a point of creation exists in most humans and greatly colours the science.
If we go for a big bounce I expect the universe would not need to reduce all the way down to the size of an atom.
Alex

 

[Write4U]

How about Physics running physical stuff then we invent maths so we can explain physics to each other

And the mathematical information is causal to the physical action.

A diabetic is thirsty, but ignores all soda-pop containing sugar, until he sees the word "sugar-free", and selects that physical stuff to quench his thirst. The non-physical information about the potential inherent in the soda-pop is causal to the physical selection.

p.s. "sugar-free" is mathematical information about a soda-pop "minus" sugar.....

 

[Write4U]

There can be no creation as something must have always existed ..whatever it is was or maybe is perhaps irrelevant but there can be no creation of anything from nothing...if science indulges a speculation that something came from nothing it is clearly only trying to please religious grant givers.

Au contraire, assumption of a prior eternal complex pattern with "intent" to create (causality) is a religious perspective.

That "initial" causal something may well be the simplest thing imaginable. A geometric tensor? A minor imbalance, subject to the "butterfly effect" (chaos theory) ?

Tensor

In mathematics, a tensor is an algebraic object that describes a (multilinear) relationship between sets of algebraic objects related to a vector space. Objects that tensors may map between include vectors and scalars, and even other tensors. Tensors can take several different forms – for example: scalars and vectors (which are the simplest tensors), dual vectors, multilinear maps between vector spaces, and even some operations such as the dot product. Tensors are defined independent of any basis, although they are often referred to by their components in a basis related to a particular coordinate system.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tensor

Seems that any relational "imbalance" of any kind may introduce a tensor which is causal to a physical dyamic.

Towards a Framework for Observational Causality from Time Series: When Shannon Meets Turing by David Sigtermans
Received: 19 January 2020 / Revised: 12 March 2020 / Accepted: 25 March 2020 / Published: 9 April 2020
(Download PDF)

1. Introduction

Many real-world phenomena are nonlinear and stochastic, and therefore difficult to model. Several methods have been developed over time to recover information from time-series characterizing these phenomena, many of which are parametric in nature.

These parametric models assume certain relationships, e.g., linear relationships, between the random variables to reconstruct the (statistical) characteristics of the parameters of interest.

The difficulty with this approach is that oftentimes the nature of their interaction is unknown, and that “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts”, i.e., the processes constituting such a system can behave synergistically.

The underlying structure of complex systems can be represented by graphs [1] (see, for example, Figure 1). The variables representing underlying processes are the nodes; the directed edges indicate how the processes influence each other. Knowledge of this structure allows us to understand and predict the behavior of the complex system [2].

Figure 1. This graph represents the underlying (temporal) structure for a system of four linearly and non-linearly coupled Ornstein–Uhlenbeck processes [3]. The vertices represent random variables. The directed edges indicate the directionality of the association.

The existence, directionality, and strength of influences is the subject of causal inference [4]. In a causal relation, the cause precedes the effect, and the cause physically influences the effect [5]. A causal description is essentially different from a description via statistical associations as illustrated by the adage “correlation does not imply causation”.

Apart from directionality of associations, a causal description can differentiate between direct associations and indirect associations (an indirect association is an association via one or more mediators). To differentiate unequivocally between direct and indirect associations, intervention is required [4].

Since interventions, that is, experiments, are not always possible, we have to make do with observational data. A plethora of nonparametric methods to infer causal structures from observational data have been developed (see, for example, [3,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14]). What most of these methods have in common is that they describe associations via pointwise estimators representing the “strength” of the association. To differentiate direct from indirect associations, these methods all use multivariate analysis, leading them to suffer from the “curse of dimensionality” [3].......more

https://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/22/4/426/htm

 

[Michael 345]

And the mathematical information is causal to the physical action.

Multi Choice

Stuff - physical reality came first [ ]

Mathematics - language came first [ ]

Stuff + Mathematics came together [ ]

Go

 

[Write4U]

Multi Choice

Single Choice

Stuff + Mathematics came together [ ]
Go.....

I see it as Mathematical (relational) values and Mathematical (algebraic) functions coming together and self-ordering into Stuff (mathematical compound atomic patterns of varying physical shapes and densities.)......