String Theory ?

The birth of String Theory finally took hold in the late 60’s and early 70’s. Until then, the universe was thought to be composed of tiny particles or points of mass. String Theory completely reshaped this view of reality by stating that hidden beneath the smallest components of matter are tiny vibrating strands of energy known as strings. These strings are responsible for making up everything in the entire universe. Similar to the strings on a guitar, they can be composed of many different frequencies that determine the type of particle the string is representing. For example, the frequency of a force would be very different than that of a particle of mass. Because the universe is infinitely complex, there are an infinite number of frequencies that strings can possess. This theory makes a shift in our philosophy of math/science from a study of objects to relationships. With literally everything essentially being made of strings, the universe can be thought of as a grand symphony. Such an unorthodox way of seeing the universe should have the mathematics to back it up. Early stages in the development of the theory would give rise to many mathematical anomalies and unexplainable inconsistencies. At one point five very similar but different theories described String Theory. Eventually one of Einstein’s successors, Ed Whitten, narrowed these five theories into a single theory that he called M-Theory. Assuming this theory, many things people regard as science-fiction in fact exists and other inconceivable notions are actually predicted. Mass-less particles, objects that can exceed the speed of light, multiple dimension, and parallel universes should be enough to get a feel for a universe that most would label a stoners’ pipe dream. In order to take such a theory serious, one must truly have an open mind to a world of limitless possibilities. Concepts such as our Cartesian world, consisting of the three know dimensions (fourth being time), are suddenly being reexamined. Redefining the concept of dimension by integrating all independent directions (sometimes referred to as degrees of freedom) conceivable, reveals a hidden world in which one can move beyond left-right, up-down, and forward-backward with respect to time. All these things and much more may one day be accepted as fact provided that the appropriate experiments currently taking place yield definitive answers supported by data. As we speak, teams of scientists in the U.S. and Europe are competing to develop underground particle accelerators capable of firing protons the speed of light in order to create collisions of great magnitude. The underground atom smasher in Illinois has approximately a four mile track and an even larger one is under construction in Europe. What scientists are seeking is the existence of gravitons, sparticles, or any of the bizarre entities required for the mathematics of String Theory to hold strong. Huge leaps must still be made before String Theory can be labeled as science or philosophy. I myself believe that science and math will continue advancing and eventually find answers to some of life’s ultimate questions. Because this is such an in depth topic it is difficult to explain all of the many components necessary for one to make an unbiased conclusion based only off a brief summary. In order to get a much better visualization of String Theory, I would recommend watching the NOVA video clips that I used as a primary source for writing this blog. The videos are broken down into a series of clips and can be found by going to http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/programs/int_phys.html and clicking the program titled The Elegant Universe.

Unification of the 4 Forces

Rather than continue in detail about the evolution of String Theory, I will briefly summarize the important advances in math/science that laid the foundation for what is now being referred to as “The Theory of Everything.” Einstein Theory of Relativity explained what gravity (G) actually is and how it can explain everything in the cosmic world. Maxwell unified the laws of electricity and magnetism into four simple equations known as the electromagnetic force (EM). Einstein’s life was spent trying to unite these only known forces at the time into a single equation that would explain all phenomenons from the birth of a star to the splitting of an atom. It was not until the 1920’s that Niel’s Bohr introduced two new forces that would form that basis for quantum mechanics. A strong nuclear force (S) that acted similar to a glue binding protons and neutrons to the nucleus of an atom, and a weak nuclear force (W) responsible for emitting radioactivity, combined to make the four forces that govern the universe. Unfortunately, these forces did not coincide to collectively explain the cosmic world and the subatomic world. The idea of two separate sets of laws governing the same universe did not sit well with physicists and the search for unification continued. When studying black holes, astrophysicists needed to explain the phenomenon in which an object is infinitely dense and incredibly small. In order to rationalize the existence of black holes, the math required the existence of all four forces interacting on one another. It wasn’t until the 1960’s that more and more mathematicians jumped on the bandwagon in an attempt to solve this profound puzzle. These brilliant minds contributed piece after piece until we finally have arrived at our current definition of String Theory. For my next post, I will go into what exactly String Theory is and how mathematicians/scientists are attempting to prove it.