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Not

Member
Oct 25, 2017
4,596
US
Yeaaaaah I'm thinking after about a googolplex of not existing for --whatever the equivalent of time is when time doesn't exist, everything popped into existence instantaneously, just because it finally hit the very edge of probability.

In fact, I think everything's already happened, or ISN'T happening all at once, because time and distance is a force of nature that humans can perceive, and the universe just feels big and infinite and old to us because that's how we in our temporal relative space perceive it.
 

mugurumakensei

Elizabeth, I’m coming to join you!
Member
Oct 25, 2017
11,320
A limitation of thinking we simply exist. Maybe we exist and do not exist at the same time.
 
Oct 26, 2017
8,686
I remember once asking a physicist, after learning about CPT symmetry (or perhaps more accurately CT symmetry in this case?), if the fact that matter is much more common than antimatter in the universe could be related to the fact that time has a dominant direction (i.e. forward rather than both forward and backward)?

Don't remember what the physicist answered..
 

Mattakuevan

Self requested ban
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
765
This is great news, this is how science actually progresses.

They've proven their model wrong, that's generally a good thing.
 

RealCanadianBro

The Fallen
Oct 25, 2017
2,193
So we are a simulation afterall.

back_cover_lessthan_web-700x6372x.jpg
 

Felt

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
3,210
Multiverse? Many-worlds of QM? Many universes with all statistical variations of antimatter to matter, most commonly being ~equal, some universes have different ratios, i.e. us? Eh? Maybe? Not?
 

FFNB

Associate Game Designer
Verified
Oct 25, 2017
6,089
Los Angeles, CA
I'm sure there's an asymmetry there somewhere that they are probably unable to detect at the moment. Even so, this shit is fascinating and I love it.
 

Deleted member 1852

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,077
Best to enjoy it while it lasts. Trump in the White House points to likely being stuck on the Beta worldline and getting to be around for where THAT leads.
I doubt Trump knows what CERN is nor would he understand how time machines work. If there is to be a dystopia, it certainly wouldn't be his doing.
 
Oct 27, 2017
487
I remember once asking a physicist, after learning about CPT symmetry (or perhaps more accurately CT symmetry in this case?), if the fact that matter is much more common than antimatter in the universe could be related to the fact that time has a dominant direction (i.e. forward rather than both forward and backward)?

Don't remember what the physicist answered..

Generally no, there is no connection. I'll try to explain why and if is too confusing feel free to ask me to clarify.

All theories consistent with relativity and quantum mechanics obey what is called CPT symmetry, which is a combination of charge conjugation C (flipping the sign of all charges), parity P (space inversion, like in a mirror) and time reversal T (reversing the direction of all motions in time). This symmetry implies among other things that all antiparticles have exactly the same (positive) mass as their particles.

Now, the weak interactions violate C and P, which is just what you need to produce the baryon asymmetry in the early Universe. This implies a slight bias in processes involving particles over anti-particles. Because CPT is conserved, a CP violation is equivalent to a compensating T violation, such that CPT remains conserved. All this really means is that slightly more particles will be produced than antiparticles, but this is a tiny effect, and the theory still has no preferred direction of time, information is still conserved and you may still predict the future from the initial state (we say it is unitary).

The direction of time in macroscopic processes would be there even without T violation. It comes simply from the natural tendency of systems to evolve towards more disordered configurations, for purely probabilistic reasons. There are many more scrambled arrangements than ordered ones, such that naturally if you start in an ordered state, later there is a far larger probability of finding the system in a more disordered one. This is the thermodynamic or entropic arrow of time, which says that the number of possible arrangements of the constituents (the entropy) tends to increase irreversibly. This evolution is irreversible, unlike the microscopic one, and is the true origin of a preferred direction.

What this does not explain is why the initial state of the Universe was so ordered to begin with (if you start at maximum entropy nothing happens, the state is a inert thermal equilibrium), this is the real problem of the origin of time's arrow, and is codified in the initial conditions of the Big Bang.
 

Abstrusity

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,656
The only explanation is that the universe was kept in flux, never destroying itself, by David Bowie.

Think about how everything has gone to shit since he went home.

This is what happens to the dream when the dreamer wakes up.
 
Oct 26, 2017
8,686
Generally no, there is no connection. I'll try to explain why and if is too confusing feel free to ask me to clarify.

All theories consistent with relativity and quantum mechanics obey what is called CPT symmetry, which is a combination of charge conjugation C (flipping the sign of all charges), parity P (space inversion, like in a mirror) and time reversal T (reversing the direction of all motions in time). This symmetry implies among other things that all antiparticles have exactly the same (positive) mass as their particles.

Now, the weak interactions violate C and P, which is just what you need to produce the baryon asymmetry in the early Universe. This implies a slight bias in processes involving particles over anti-particles. Because CPT is conserved, a CP violation is equivalent to a compensating T violation, such that CPT remains conserved. All this really means is that slightly more particles will be produced than antiparticles, but this is a tiny effect, and the theory still has no preferred direction of time, information is still conserved and you may still predict the future from the initial state (we say it is unitary).

The direction of time in macroscopic processes would be there even without T violation. It comes simply from the natural tendency of systems to evolve towards more disordered configurations, for purely probabilistic reasons. There are many more scrambled arrangements than ordered ones, such that naturally if you start in an ordered state, later there is a far larger probability of finding the system in a more disordered one. This is the thermodynamic or entropic arrow of time, which says that the number of possible arrangements of the constituents (the entropy) tends to increase irreversibly. This evolution is irreversible, unlike the microscopic one, and is the true origin of a preferred direction.

What this does not explain is why the initial state of the Universe was so ordered to begin with (if you start at maximum entropy nothing happens, the state is a inert thermal equilibrium), this is the real problem of the origin of time's arrow, and is codified in the initial conditions of the Big Bang.

Thank you for the in-depth reply!
As far as the macroscopic tendency of systems to increase in disorder, based purely on combinatorial principles, I understand your point.

How then are we able to distinguish between microscopic systems evolving in one direction of time from systems evolving in the other? Is it just based on certain subatomic reactions that are observed to occur in either direction with equal likelihood?

So for example if particles A+B interact to form particles C+D and vice versa (let's assume for simplicity that the reaction ratios are all 1:1) then we say there is no T violation if we observe equal amounts of A and B as we do C and D?

The reason I ask is - unless I'm misunderstanding? - you say there is a slight T violation to compensate for the small CP violation due to the weak interaction (though I do not know the source of this T violation).
Is this T violation essentially just the same as saying we observe more matter than antimatter? So it adds no new information to the puzzle? Or is there some additional process going on?
 

Parthenios

The Fallen
Oct 28, 2017
13,601
Is their anti-light/anti-energy/dark energy? Light behaves like a particle and a wave, shouldn't it therefore have an anti-particle/wave then?

Could all the anti-matter that should exist just be outside the observable universe? Like, maybe something in the early universe after the Big Bang caused matter and anti-matter to segregate, and cosmic expansion would have split the universe into halves, one built on matter and the other on anti-matter?
 
Oct 27, 2017
487
Thank you for the in-depth reply!
As far as the macroscopic tendency of systems to increase in disorder, based purely on combinatorial principles, I understand your point.

How then are we able to distinguish between microscopic systems evolving in one direction of time from systems evolving in the other? Is it just based on certain subatomic reactions that are observed to occur in either direction with equal likelihood?

So for example if particles A+B interact to form particles C+D and vice versa (let's assume for simplicity that the reaction ratios are all 1:1) then we say there is no T violation if we observe equal amounts of A and B as we do C and D?
Yup, you got it!
The reason I ask is - unless I'm misunderstanding? - you say there is a slight T violation to compensate for the small CP violation due to the weak interaction (though I do not know the source of this T violation).
Is this T violation essentially just the same as saying we observe more matter than antimatter? So it adds no new information to the puzzle? Or is there some additional process going on?
Both CP and T violation are in the weak interactions. It is not exactly the same process as the CP one, because instead of exchanging particle and anti-particle you exchange initial and final states. For instance,if there is a process A+B ->C +D under CP becomes anti-A+ anti-B -> anti-C + anti-D, while under T its the process C+D -> A+B (under CPT it would be anti-C + anti-D -> anti-A+anti-B).

A famous example, where CP (or in this case, equivalently, T) violation was first observed, is: you could start with a down quark and a anti-strange quark, forming a K0 meson, and end up with an anti-down quark and a strange quark, forming an anti-K0 meson. The K0 meson can turn into its own antiparticle through weak interactions and later oscillate back, but the rate one way is not the same as the other way.

So you have: d+anti-s (K0) -> anti-d+s (anti-K0)
under CP you exchange particles to anti-particles so you have: anti-d+s (anti-K0) -> d+anti-s (K0)
Finally, under T you would exchange the initial and final state: anti-d+s (anti-K0) -> d+anti-s (K0)

You see that In this particular example CP has the same effect as T, so you can't really disentangle the two, but in other processes you can.

A similar thing happens in B0 mesons containing a bottom quark. And in fact a direct violation of T was only recently (2012) observed in the B0 anti-B0 system, see here https://arxiv.org/pdf/1207.5832.pdf .
 
Oct 27, 2017
487
I'll take sensationalized title for 500, Alex.
I know, right?
Is their anti-light/anti-energy/dark energy? Light behaves like a particle and a wave, shouldn't it therefore have an anti-particle/wave then?
The photon is its own antiparticle, there is no distinction between the two. Incidentally, it is not just light that behaves both as a particle and a wave. Electrons and every other particle do, too.
Could all the anti-matter that should exist just be outside the observable universe? Like, maybe something in the early universe after the Big Bang caused matter and anti-matter to segregate, and cosmic expansion would have split the universe into halves, one built on matter and the other on anti-matter?
People thought there might be regions made of antimatter, but this idea is excluded today, because right at the boundary with the normal matter there would be a lot of matter anti-matter annihilation, making a lot of gamma rays, these are not seen, so we don't think its like that anymore. Of course, it could still be true on an unobservably large scale, but that doesn't really help with the problem because we really need a similar amount of matter and anti-matter (close up to an excess of one part in a billion) in the beginning in order for all the detailed observations of the abundance of the elements to fit.
 

LL_Decitrig

User-Requested Ban
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
10,334
Sunderland
If the universe didn't exist, we wouldn't be in any position to observe this fact. This anthropic argument is pretty good for waving away annoying questions, which is why I can understand why it isn't really much use. But it's lurking there in the background, all the same.
 

TrueSloth

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,065
I think to conclude that the universe shouldn't exist due to some expectation in dark antimatter is a little presumptuous. The universe is vast and our knowledge of it is so miniscule. Everything we know could be wrong.
 

LL_Decitrig

User-Requested Ban
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
10,334
Sunderland
I think to conclude that the universe shouldn't exist due to some expectation in dark antimatter is a little presumptuous. The universe is vast and our knowledge of it is so miniscule. Everything we know could be wrong.

Well that's the point, really. The physicists are saying their models, which are correct on so many things, don't agree with reality inasmuch as the universe does exist. There not saying it's the universe's fault for not agreeing with their models.
 

ErichWK

Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,532
Sandy Eggo
Where did anti matter and matter come from?? What created it all?? Gonna save all this thought for next time I'm stoned out of my mind and halfway through a bag of marshmallows
 

LL_Decitrig

User-Requested Ban
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
10,334
Sunderland
Where did anti matter and matter come from?? What created it all?? Gonna save all this thought for next time I'm stoned out of my mind and halfway through a bag of marshmallows

The basic idea is that the universe originated in quantum fluctuations which eventually led to expansion (the Big Bang). According to that theory and the standard model, matter and antimatter should have formed in equal amounts, which would eventually cancel one another out.


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

MCN

Banned
Oct 26, 2017
2,289
United Kingdom
This is where we find out the entire universe is just a subatomic quark in a much bigger universe, and quarks in our universe are actually universes in themselves. And so on for infinity in both directions.