45 ms·
> Quantum mechanics can and does predict every element on the periodic table. Given that we can't confirm that, how do we actually know this?
by GFK_of_xmaspast 10y ago
> Quantum mechanics can and does predict every element on the periodic table.
Given that we can't confirm that, how do we actually know this?
- Xcelerate 10y agoSorry. I should have just said "can". It can't be confirmed yet that it does for every element, but it would be very surprising if it didn't. A huge amount of computational power was used to calculate the gyromagnetic moment of the isolated electron to ten decimal places using QED, and it was found to exactly match those digits obtained experimentally. It's one of the greatest precision tests of QED ever performed. So there's not really any a priori reason to think that, were we given exponentially large computational resources, we couldn't compute any property of a compound or chemical reaction to as many decimal places as we desired (ignoring some details like the divergence of Feynman path integrals and the effects of quantum gravity, which are both expected to affect calculations at some far out point in their decimal expansion).
- 21 10y agoIt's quite a big leap from a single isolated electron to a system with hundreds of them (not to mention QCD interactions). While you are right that there is no a priori reason to dismiss that, it's not quite a bagged thing. Especially considering that we are missing some things for sure (neutrino mass, ...)