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The fact that matter warps spacetime still blows my mind. We can basically neglect the effect on light near Earth, although it's still present. But that "gravit
by javajosh 3y ago
The fact that matter warps spacetime still blows my mind. We can basically neglect the effect on light near Earth, although it's still present. But that "gravity" is merely what we call the minimizing the action of matter near a warped spacetime is an astonishing claim. If I'm being honest, I really only believe it because people I believe are smarter say it is so; it's so strange and alien that I find it almost impossible to accept. Luckily, apart from a few minor effects here and there, I don't have to think about it and can just accept gravity as a simple force with some unknown mechanism behind it, like Newton did, and I have to say that makes me happier. This talk of time slowing down gives me the creeps.
- eru 3y agoIt's not just gravity. All the other forces are pretty weird as well, if you think about them on a deep enough level. For example, rubber bands resisting elongation isn't even a 'real' force: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropic_force https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropic_force
- bowsamic 3y agoAs a physicist who learnt it years ago it’s actually not really that crazy to me now and is far more intelligible than quantum field theory
- trimethylpurine 3y agoIs it creepy when you throw a ball up and it magically falls back into your hand? It moves back into your hand specifically because time on the ground is moving slower. The ball, like everything else, moves towards the slower moving timeline (a lesser inertial state). That's actually not creepy at all. It would be creepy if the ball went the other way for no apparent reason like a poltergeist.
- mjan22640 3y agoThe fact that there exist consistent structured phenomena, instead of everything being pure noise, is actually creepy.
- javajosh 3y agoYes, it is creepy. And now that you mention it, Fermat's principle (the principle of least time) is creepy too. Why is physics so weird? It's like everything is choosing things all the time! And it gets worse with quantum effects, since apparently there is hidden computational machinery that happily computes superposition of essentially infinite wave forms - and that scales exponentially - without slow-down or effort. The comprehensibility of the world is an illusion. Humans don't explain, we describe, and we give ourselves credit for undoing the confusion of some superficial effects that turned out to have a simple description. The mystery and awe of what the universe is doing and how remains poignant.
- trimethylpurine 3y agoSure, that's true. My comment is expanding on your claim that you accept gravity as a simple force in contrast to the mystery of creepy spacetime concepts of the universe. You accept gravity which is the same force as time dilation. It sounds like if I change the name it's less creepy for you.
- javajosh 3y agoUpon further reflection the idea of inanimate objects "wanting things" is what I find most creepy. It's enough to make a person consider monadism seriously. The notion of inanimate objects modifying spacetime just by existing is secondarily creepy - it's destructive to the notion of "introduce a coordinate system" because now the phenomena you're describing messes with the coordinate system you picked to describe it! And yes renaming things does help. I don't like thunderstorms, I find them legitimately scary, and understanding their physics didn't help but calling them "unicorn farts" did.
- kjkjadksj 3y agoIts not that the ball wants things. Its own gravity and its behavior toward the gravity of other objects is just a result of what it is: a cluster of protons and neutrons and electrons in a given radius.