The Fundamentals, Part 1: Gravity

With all the talk happening on PiPT about fictitious motion, antimatter transformations, and overly-complicated analyses of the tides, it’s about time that we went back and explored the bare necessities of the Universe, those few things it absolutely needs to be what it is today. These absolutes are called the fundamental interactions of nature: 

• Gravity
• Electromagnetism
• Strong Force
• Weak Force

They're the four things that keep everything in one piece; without them, nothing, not even atoms, would exist. 

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1. Gravity

Good ol' gravity. It's the force that most of us are probably most familiar with, though it's the weakest of the four by far. Its effects have been known for about as long as humans have been on this Earth, yet it took a long time for someone to truly see it as its own entity. Aristotle was one of the first; he described gravity as the movement of objects to their 'natural place'. Earth went the lowest, water floated on that, air floated on that. Pretty straightforward. 

I Can't Believe They're Not Forces!

If you’ve ever taken a Physics course, you may have learned about Newton’s 3 Laws of Motion. In case it’s been a while:

1. An object in motion stays in motion
2. The force of an object is equal to the mass multiplied by the acceleration (F=ma)
3. For every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction.

These are the rules upon which Classical Physics was founded. They are taught in grade school like they are the end-all and be-all of motion in our Universe, and one can certainly do amazing things with them. However, think about this interesting mind experiment: you slide a puck on a frictional rotating table.

That’s it. That’s the mind experiment. You can picture that, right? Because Newton’s Laws can’t.

...pause for dramatic effect...

Flux Capacitors are so overrated

The concept of time has fascinated mankind for a long… time. Our lives are focused on its flow: when to grow food, when to sleep, when to mate, when to bundle up. We reminisce and anticipate. The flow of time is not only part of our lives, it is our lives, and our deaths, and everything in between. This all-encompassing feel to time is what makes it remarkable. Yet, until the turn of the century (excluding big thinkers like H.G. Wells) time was realistically seen as an immovable force that could never be manipulated or changed. It was Albert Einstein himself who put an end to that notion when he published his Theories of Relativity.

Now, though this blog does not have the time to go into his thought process in detail*, Einstein’s basic message was that the three dimensions of space, as well as the singular dimension of time, were not separate entities, but rather woven into one another, creating what we now call: ‘space-time’. 

Stay with me, now. 

Physics is fascinating, I swear.

Physics is fascinating. I’m a physicist, so I’m a bit biased, but I always experience a sense of wonder when experiencing the world around me through such terms. 

Now, this love of science is not universal. Some have big issues with the whole idea; they usually have some valid points: 

1. I’m not a science person. It’s really never interested me in the least.

2. Math.

3. Why do I want to know how to calculate a ball’s flight path? No, honestly, why?

4. I tried to get into it in high school, but my teacher/class/notebook wasn’t good enough. 

Fig. 1: Fun.

Well, I have come up with some rebuttals. You see, in all of its supposed complication and intricacy, Physics is nothing more than the science of change. And, as many of us have experienced first-hand, change happens all the time; anyone who notices this is already a type of scientist. Just like the world around us, change itself is ever-changing, you could say. 

Or not. I probably wouldn’t, it’s a strange turn of phrase. But you understand. 

The goal of this blog is to share with you, dear reader, my sense of wonder and, more importantly, the reason why I’m a scientist. Most teachers fail to put the science in context, which is 100% of the fun. I’ll even admit, the fact that a ball goes up and down is not exciting in itself; anyone who took basic physics in high school will tell you that. Yet it was the idea that prompted Galileo Galilei, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, and hundreds of other great minds to think long and hard about what makes the world go ‘round (in several cases, literally) and transform our universe from one of chance to one of intricate order, from one of blind faith to one of incredible utility. 

This transformation is never emphasized in introductory classes, even though it was the thing that got me and several other people I know hooked on physics, and more broadly science, in the first place. Moreover, observing how other things change, like the body, the stock market, or human emotions, make one just as scientific as a physicist, and those who excel at this study are just as capable as the great minds described above. 

Some would say that comparing a great writer/economist/artist and a great physicist is like comparing apples/bananas/kiwis and oranges, and in a way I suppose they’re right. But while the skill set might be different, the basic concepts that physicists use are the exact same concepts used in every other facet of academia. Anyone who doesn’t like physics, but is able to devote themselves to knowledge in some other way, is unknowingly a kind of physicist themselves. My hope is that by sharing my experiences in science with you, you’ll find a little beauty in it yourself. 

Except for the math part. There’s no getting past that one (See Fig. 1)


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