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The main difference is that spinning gears makes sense, whereas spinning electrons do not! (I kid of course. Spin in physics relates to inherent angular moment
by lapetitejort 5y ago
The main difference is that spinning gears makes sense, whereas spinning electrons do not!
(I kid of course. Spin in physics relates to inherent angular momentum. If you wonder why that exists, you may also want to wonder why mass exists.)
- whatshisface 5y agoIntrinsic angular momentum is weirder than intrinsic mass because you can take it out and put it back in - although for most particles you're not allowed to have zero. But you are allowed to take 1 from an electron to go from 1/2 to -1/2. If that is not enough, you can go back from -1/2 to 1/2 by changing your basis vectors. ;)
- jeffwass 5y agoFurther - paired electrons can collectively form the spin-zero singlet state, or spin-one triplet state. In either case the two electrons, which are fermions independently, together act like a boson (eg, Cooper Pairs in a Superconductor). Addition of quantum angular momentum is really weird.
- jacobolus 5y agoI don’t know enough physics and haven’t put in enough effort to understand https://arxiv.org/pdf/1910.10478.pdf https://arxiv.org/pdf/1910.10478.pdf but it seems intriguing.
- whatshisface 5y agoI thought complex phase precession was from energy, I don't see how it's related to spin.