Great Scott!

By now, you've either heard from me that CERN found faster-than-light particles, heard it from the news, or just not heard about it at all (in which case, don't you dare stop reading). This finding has turned the scientific community for a loop, and no one quite knows how to react. The popular news has been reporting it as the end-all-and-be-all of physics discoveries, but that's not true at all. To be sure, the significance of this find is mind-blowing, but I'm willing to bet that reporters took the ambitions and cautions of scientists (wild things, they are) at face value, instead of looking at the facts. 


You and I know better.* 

...or is it?

You know that article I just wrote? Hold on to your hats, kids. These neutrinos may have just broken the speed of light. This... is interesting.


http://news.yahoo.com/particles-recorded-moving-faster-light-cern-164441657.html
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EDIT: Here's an article about the experiment from a much more... scientifically sound source:


http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2011/09/neutrinos-travel-faster-than-lig.html

News: Google Global Science Fair

I realize that the purpose of my blog is to explain science in a friendly way, but sometimes science is better told by others. This is the case at the Google Global Science Fair. These kids are just incredible; check out the finalists, as well as their amazing works, at the project's website:

The Google Global Science Fair 2011

Also, in addition to the ridiculous opportunities these students were provided for their amazing work, they got giant Lego trophies. That's something.

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. 

Have a heart...

For most of my life, I’ve had minor heart palpitations. They’ve never been very serious, at their worst making me mildly uncomfortable for a few seconds, but they've always thrown me a little off my guard. An irregular heartbeat is an uncomfortable thing to experience; that pumping rhythm is there one’s entire life, and the body doesn’t react well when the tempo switches up. 

But what if there was no tempo? Enter science. NPR recently covered a story about an artificial heart that doesn’t act like a heart at all… at least in the traditional sense. In the past, artificial hearts like the Jarvik 7 were designed to mimic the natural processes of the originals – mainly, the electrically-stimulated 'pumping' action – and act as a total replacement for the damaged organs. In most cases, though, damage wasn’t severe enough to cause a total shutdown, and so a total heart replacement would actually do more harm than good.

...in some cases.

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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