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The list is missing one of the most astonishing discoveries of all time: if you reflect the universe in a mirror, you can tell whether you are in our universe o
by MatteoFrigo 5y ago
The list is missing one of the most astonishing discoveries of all time: if you reflect the universe in a mirror, you can tell whether you are in our universe or in the mirror because the laws of physics are different in the mirror.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_experiment
- kadoban 5y agoReally like that one, especially because it's just so ... random. All the other forces just don't work that way, but the Weak force does, wtf.
- cycomanic 5y agoIt is a great discover I agree, it might not quite fit in the list because it's not so counterintuitive for someone not into particle physics though. There are actually many examples of things working different for the mirror image, e.g. many medical/chemical compounds work differently based on chirality. The topic of chirality is fascinating, one of the big puzzles in nature is for example why it so strongly prefers right-handedness.
- goohle 5y agoMaybe nature prefer right-handedness just because it started in North hemisphere.
- Ginden 5y ago> There are actually many examples of things working different for the mirror image, e.g. many medical/chemical compounds work differently based on chirality. It "works different" because you consider only change in one part of system. You change compound, but rest of system stays the same. If you mirror entire system, it works almost the same way (differences due to parity violation by weak force are millions time smaller than required to even detect differences).
- amelius 5y agoHow can someone rigorously prove that? E.g. perhaps there is something inside quarks that has chirality which we haven't discovered yet.
- oehtXRwMkIs 5y agoOne can't. It's science. One can't rigorously prove anything via induction.