[“Quantum foundations” series] TABLE OF CONTENTS QUANTUM FIELD THEORY (QFT) LANDSCAPE Some recent articles prompted me to further explore (revisit once again, eh) some key features of quantum field theory (QFT). Without grasping all the esoteric math. As noted in a prior post (“QFT – How many fields are there?“), not all physicists tally these… Continue reading QFT – fields and wave packets
[Communicating science series][Gobbledygook ahoy, PopSci call-outs, …] “Can particles really be in two places at once?“ So remote from everyday experience: How to describe physical behavior that human communication never evolved to describe? To describe something that the mere act of observation extinguishes? Use an abstract symbolic framework like mathematics? And then “convert” mathematical expressions… Continue reading In two places at once – popsci call-outs
[Draft – more citations to come] Lately I’ve encountered many articles about research on the Higgs boson. Retrospectives, ongoing discoveries, and expectations for the upgraded LHC and its third run. The stuff of careers for 1000’s of scientists. This research is a fascinating effort akin to “particle archeology.” Inferring – detecting evidence for – the… Continue reading Higgs 10 years on – expectations for a path beyond
[“Living with a star” series] [This post was inspired by a Wired article (noted below).] Much has been written about our good fortune to live on a water world (with a stabilizing moon) in a goldilocks zone of a solar system with a star in a stable stage [1]. But stellar and planetary conditions are… Continue reading Living with stellar storms – the moods of our Sun
[“Our Milky Way” series] Years in the works. The announcement had been anticipated for awhile. The big news was released today: First image of Black Hole at the center of our galaxy. Heart of the Milky Way, eh. This is about more than synthesizing an image from photos taken by “telescopes on high mountaintops” positioned… Continue reading A ringed darkness at our Milky Way’s center – EHT images Sagittarius A*
[“Communicating science” series] This post celebrates communicating the cosmos at a scale local to the nearest star, our Sun. Our solar system. A recent Science Alert article acclaims a science communicator and his visualization of the scale of things. In this case, the scale of planets (also Ceres, Pluto, our Moon) and the Sun. Perhaps… Continue reading The scale of things – our solar system
[“Communicating science” series] [“Quantum foundations” series] [“What the heck” series] I’ve written about entanglement in prior posts and comments. Over a year ago, I also wrote some preliminary notes. A recent issue of The Caltech Weekly (April 14, 2022) prompted this post. In part because of my ongoing search for better, more compelling analogies (for… Continue reading What the heck is quantum entanglement?
[Draft] [“Beyond the Standard Model” series] Background on the “crisis” This Quanta Magazine article (below) has an eye-catching title, but its gist relates to the hierarchy problem, which I discussed in a prior post. That 2017 post (and additionaL commentary) used quotes by physicists – Sean Carroll, Leon Lederman, Fermilab’s Don Lincoln (video) – and… Continue reading Reductionism in quantum physics – a naturalness mire?
Update July 11, 2022 Quantum advantage? – the long road ahead to making a useful quantum computer. • Wired > “Quantum Advantage Showdowns Have No Clear Winners” by Sophia Chen (July 11, 2022) – A series of recent experiments between quantum and classical computers shows the term’s ever-evolving meaning. Each claim of quantum advantage has… Continue reading Quantum computing explained – 5 levels of difficulty
[Communicating science series] The current Caltech Weekly (February 10, 2022) highlighted a vintage video series of lectures for an introductory university physics course. Originally produced in 1985, perhaps this content is covered at the high school (or even earlier) level. While cosmology and physics offer compelling narratives, modern science remains a relatively new way of… Continue reading Online introductory physics course – The Mechanical Universe
