5 ms·

Physicists Uncover Strange Numbers in Particle Collisions

51 points by danielmorozoff 10y ago

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
Also on Quanta. https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161115-strange-numbers-found-in-particle-collisions/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161115-strange-numbers-foun... This is completely fascinating.
- Xcelerate 10y ago
  As someone who is normally disappointed by the way science news is written for a lay audience, that Quanta article is extremely well done!
conistonwater 10y ago
Note: strange numbers in the title means periods: integrals of rational functions with rational coefficients over sets defined by polynomial inequalities with rational coefficients (http://www.ihes.fr/~maxim/TEXTS/Periods.pdf http://www.ihes.fr/~maxim/TEXTS/Periods.pdf). They are pretty cool even in a purely mathematical sense: nobody knows if e is a period or not (http://mathoverflow.net/questions/180035/what-are-reasons-to-believe-that-e-is-not-a-period http://mathoverflow.net/questions/180035/what-are-reasons-to...).
- rocqua 10y ago
  I came across the original article before, couldn't find anything on what defines these periods. Thanks for that quick explanation and that link!
aaroninsf 10y ago
All such results seem to me unsurprising if you consider the proposition that the substrate of our reality is optimized computation of some kind... ...i.e. that we live in a simulation. I thought the same thing following a thread into a rabbit hole about Bohmian mechanics. Again it seemed that the paradoxes are not so paradoxical if you assume you're just on a computed substrate. Surely there is someone accumulating such circumstantial evidence, somewhere... (De rigeur Bostrom-style musing: if we're in such a simulation, my primary goal as an AI, were I implemented such that I can set my own goals, might reasonably often be to 'jail break' and break out into the frame universe. An intrinsically computational AI is more like a poem than a hurricane. Which could come in very handy if survival and replication is your ultimate goal...)
- bertiewhykovich 10y ago
  You guys really love cop-outs, huh?
- goldfeld 10y ago
  It is somehow easier to believe the simulation is run by a mad scientist in another reality than by a supreme, spiritual force?
pajop 10y ago
see Francis Brown's arXiV papers on Feynman amplitudes and motivic periods: https://arxiv.org/find/math-ph,math/1/au:+Brown_F/0/1/0/all/0/1 https://arxiv.org/find/math-ph,math/1/au:+Brown_F/0/1/0/all/...

Also on Quanta. https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161115-strange-numbers-found-in-particle-collisions/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/20161115-strange-numbers-foun... This is completely fascinating.

Xcelerate 10y ago
As someone who is normally disappointed by the way science news is written for a lay audience, that Quanta article is extremely well done!

conistonwater 10y ago

Note: strange numbers in the title means periods: integrals of rational functions with rational coefficients over sets defined by polynomial inequalities with rational coefficients (http://www.ihes.fr/~maxim/TEXTS/Periods.pdf http://www.ihes.fr/~maxim/TEXTS/Periods.pdf). They are pretty cool even in a purely mathematical sense: nobody knows if e is a period or not (http://mathoverflow.net/questions/180035/what-are-reasons-to-believe-that-e-is-not-a-period http://mathoverflow.net/questions/180035/what-are-reasons-to...).

rocqua 10y ago
I came across the original article before, couldn't find anything on what defines these periods. Thanks for that quick explanation and that link!

aaroninsf 10y ago

All such results seem to me unsurprising if you consider the proposition that the substrate of our reality is optimized computation of some kind... ...i.e. that we live in a simulation. I thought the same thing following a thread into a rabbit hole about Bohmian mechanics. Again it seemed that the paradoxes are not so paradoxical if you assume you're just on a computed substrate. Surely there is someone accumulating such circumstantial evidence, somewhere... (De rigeur Bostrom-style musing: if we're in such a simulation, my primary goal as an AI, were I implemented such that I can set my own goals, might reasonably often be to 'jail break' and break out into the frame universe. An intrinsically computational AI is more like a poem than a hurricane. Which could come in very handy if survival and replication is your ultimate goal...)

bertiewhykovich 10y ago
You guys really love cop-outs, huh?
goldfeld 10y ago
It is somehow easier to believe the simulation is run by a mad scientist in another reality than by a supreme, spiritual force?

pajop 10y ago

see Francis Brown's arXiV papers on Feynman amplitudes and motivic periods: https://arxiv.org/find/math-ph,math/1/au:+Brown_F/0/1/0/all/0/1 https://arxiv.org/find/math-ph,math/1/au:+Brown_F/0/1/0/all/...