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You stated the valid reason why physicists do this naming. The mathematics is analogous. This means that by studying the different system (eg. the wormhole in t

You stated the valid reason why physicists do this naming. The mathematics is analogous. This means that by studying the different system (eg. the wormhole in the lab), the physicists are probing the mathematical structure of the theory of the original system- except that studying the different system is easier than the original system. Actual wormhole physicists then might learn from this research to understand how wormholes might behave. Why this is a recent trend is because only in the past few decades have experiment technologies improved to the point where exotic systems can be physically simulated in the lab using simple systems. My own research is partly of this sort and so we have fancy names too, but I assure you that, at least in my group, no one cares one bit about our research being published in pop-sci magazines

archgoon 10y ago
It's not clear in this case that what they've built is mathematically analogous to GR wormholes. This seems more on the "it's kinda conceptually similar" rather than "this works exactly the same as a wormhole under the proper translation of variables" If they had such a correspondence, than I would definitely say this was an awesome accomplishment, but I do not believe that they do.
- abdullahkhalids 10y ago
  Kindly read the last paragraph of my comment on your sibling.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
gaur 10y ago
> This means that by studying the different system (eg. the wormhole in the lab), the physicists are probing the mathematical structure of the theory of the original system I just don't buy that argument, because it is essentially the same argument that was used to support the ether hypothesis. Both sound and light are governed by a wave equation. Since sound is observed to have a preferred frame (the rest frame of the medium), the above argument asserts that light should also have a preferred frame, since the mathematics is the same. But that line of reasoning is obviously wrong, as we know now. I don't think that observing some wormhole-like feature in a metamaterial provides any information about how wormholes may or may not behave in GR. The entire endeavor of analogue gravity seems specious to me.
- abdullahkhalids 10y ago
  Science going wrong (ether) is not a bad thing. In fact, if scientists were not routinely wrong, we would suspect there was something wrong with our scientific method. Let me challenge your argument more directly. Postulating ether after observing that sound and light have similar properties (wave behaviour) is not stupid. It is the logical thing to do. It was also a hypothesis. Scientists did well-designed experiments and eventually realized that light does not a need a medium to travel. The scientific process correctly identified falsehood. Outcome: we are clear on which properties light and sound share (wave equation) and which they don't (medium or lack thereof) I haven't read the paper, but let me make a statement about metamaterial wormholes. Metamaterial experiments in the lab might be able to simulate a type of wormholes. If they can then we know that within another theory that shares enough math with EM will also have wormholes of that type. The question then is if GR has and EM share enough of that mathematical structure. If they do then these types of wormholes will also exist in GR. This is a different way of investigating GR wormholes then directly looking at the theory of GR. The differences between EM theory and GR might make it easier to discover wormholes in the former than in the latter. TLDR; Let scientists get creative.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - semi-extrinsic 10y ago
    > The question then is if GR has and EM share enough of that mathematical structure. And how do we answer that question, other than directly looking at GR theory? Moreover, even if we do find EM evidence in favor of wormholes, how do we know quantum gravity doesn't prevent their formation?
    - abdullahkhalids 10y ago
      Yes. We will have to directly look at GR to verify. But as I said before, it might be easier to do the investigation first with EM and then compare to GR rather than look at GR directly. We don't know what quantum gravity says. The job of the theorist to form self-consistent theories and find the strongest predictions of these theories. When we get experimental data we will find out which theories are falsified.

archgoon 10y ago

It's not clear in this case that what they've built is mathematically analogous to GR wormholes. This seems more on the "it's kinda conceptually similar" rather than "this works exactly the same as a wormhole under the proper translation of variables" If they had such a correspondence, than I would definitely say this was an awesome accomplishment, but I do not believe that they do.

abdullahkhalids 10y ago
Kindly read the last paragraph of my comment on your sibling.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

gaur 10y ago

> This means that by studying the different system (eg. the wormhole in the lab), the physicists are probing the mathematical structure of the theory of the original system I just don't buy that argument, because it is essentially the same argument that was used to support the ether hypothesis. Both sound and light are governed by a wave equation. Since sound is observed to have a preferred frame (the rest frame of the medium), the above argument asserts that light should also have a preferred frame, since the mathematics is the same. But that line of reasoning is obviously wrong, as we know now. I don't think that observing some wormhole-like feature in a metamaterial provides any information about how wormholes may or may not behave in GR. The entire endeavor of analogue gravity seems specious to me.

abdullahkhalids 10y ago
Science going wrong (ether) is not a bad thing. In fact, if scientists were not routinely wrong, we would suspect there was something wrong with our scientific method. Let me challenge your argument more directly. Postulating ether after observing that sound and light have similar properties (wave behaviour) is not stupid. It is the logical thing to do. It was also a hypothesis. Scientists did well-designed experiments and eventually realized that light does not a need a medium to travel. The scientific process correctly identified falsehood. Outcome: we are clear on which properties light and sound share (wave equation) and which they don't (medium or lack thereof) I haven't read the paper, but let me make a statement about metamaterial wormholes. Metamaterial experiments in the lab might be able to simulate a type of wormholes. If they can then we know that within another theory that shares enough math with EM will also have wormholes of that type. The question then is if GR has and EM share enough of that mathematical structure. If they do then these types of wormholes will also exist in GR. This is a different way of investigating GR wormholes then directly looking at the theory of GR. The differences between EM theory and GR might make it easier to discover wormholes in the former than in the latter. TLDR; Let scientists get creative.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- semi-extrinsic 10y ago
  > The question then is if GR has and EM share enough of that mathematical structure. And how do we answer that question, other than directly looking at GR theory? Moreover, even if we do find EM evidence in favor of wormholes, how do we know quantum gravity doesn't prevent their formation?
  - abdullahkhalids 10y ago
    Yes. We will have to directly look at GR to verify. But as I said before, it might be easier to do the investigation first with EM and then compare to GR rather than look at GR directly. We don't know what quantum gravity says. The job of the theorist to form self-consistent theories and find the strongest predictions of these theories. When we get experimental data we will find out which theories are falsified.