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Its a common problem. I remember getting really frustrated over articles announcing time crystals. What is a time crystal? They never actually said.
by thereddaikon 3y ago
Its a common problem. I remember getting really frustrated over articles announcing time crystals. What is a time crystal? They never actually said.
- fnordpiglet 3y agoFWIW, and IANAP, a time crystal is a structure that causes things to apparently reverse their structure back and forth without additional energy. This is similar to a spatial crystal in that the physical configuration repeats in space, except the configuration repeats in time without additional energy. A time mirror causes a configuration to reverse in a way that’s a reflection of the original. Someone in a parallel thread gives examples of this. They’re not the same thing. IMO time crystals are more amazing.
- JoBrad 3y agoAlso NAP, but how is a time crystal different than the metamaterial used for a time mirror, wouldn’t a reversed light beam be reversed again, when it is reflected?
- fnordpiglet 3y agoThe time mirror applies energy to create the transformation. A time crystal requires no energy but you still see perpetual motion (not violating thermodynamics fwiw).
- wholinator2 3y agoQuantum physics does lots of fuzzy things that look like they'd have to violate thermodynamics, but "really don't" due to uncertainty mainly.
- fnordpiglet 3y agoIndeed all time crystals created to date leverage quantum effects to work.
- embwbam 3y agoTime crystals are neat! A normal crystal is one that has a definite repeating pattern in space. A time crystal is similar, but instead of repeating in space, it repeats in time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_crystal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_crystal Here's a gratutious example thanks to ChatGPT: "Imagine a line of atoms that flip their spins periodically, creating a pattern that repeats not only in space (like the atoms are arranged in a regular grid) but also in time (like the atoms flip their spins at regular intervals). This repeating pattern in time, which occurs without continuously adding energy, is what makes time crystals so intriguing and different from other states of matter."
- oneshtein 3y agoSomeone should make a time-image about time-crystals.