> 1. Are all the (measurable) dimensionless parameters that characterize
> the physical universe calculable in principle or are some merely determined
> by historical or quantum mechanical accident and uncalculable? Einstein put
> it more crisply: did God have a choice in creating the universe? Imagine
> the Old One sitting at his control console, preparing to set off the Big
> Bang. "How fast should I set the speed of light?" "How much charge should I
> give this little speck called an electron?" "What value should I give to
> Planck's constant, the parameter that determines the size of the tiny
> packets -- the quanta -- in which energy shall be parceled?" Was he
> randomly dashing off numbers to meet a deadline? Or do the values have to
> be what they are because of a deep, hidden logic?
No one randomly dashed off numbers.
The values do not have to be what they are if they are measured differently
(using different units of measure.)
For example, change the speed of light by re-calibrating seconds to the resonant
frequency of a crystal other than quartz. (I know this because god told me so.
<smirk>)
> These kinds of questions come to a point with a conundrum involving a
> mysterious number called alpha. If you square the charge of the electron
> and then divide it by the speed of light times Planck's constant, all the
> dimensions (mass, time and distance) cancel out, yielding a so-called "pure
> number" -- alpha, which is just slightly over 1/137. But why is it not
> precisely 1/137 or some other value entirely? Physicists and even mystics
> have tried in vain to explain why.
Well, of course a physicist can't explain it to a mystic, because mystics don't
understand physics. Likewise, mystics can't explain it to physicists, because
physicists don't understand mysticism.
What we need here is a mystic physicist, one who understands both. Obviously
mystic physicists could only explain it to each other. But they wouldn't need
to, because as mystic physicists, they would already know it. Consequently,
those who know wouldn't say, and the only ones who felt a need to say, would be
the ones who didn't actually know.
> 2. How can quantum gravity help explain the origin of the universe?
This requires a deep understanding of gravity (a very heavy subject).
Black Holes collapse infinite space in infinitesimal time producing Big Bangs up
the wazoo.
So the multiverse (the sum of all universes) doesn't have an origin -- it has
always been Big Banging away.
> 3. What is the lifetime of the proton and how do we understand it?
This one is easy, because brainwaves generate photons in the microtubules which
connect the neurons of the human brain. Hold your head very still, close your
eyes, take a deep breath, let it out slowly, don't think about anything at all,
and in about 15 minutes you'll see the photons whirling around in there, and lo
and behold! the little buggers last no longer than a flash in a hemorrhoidal
forty-niner's gold pan at high noon. After that, they just kind of disintegrate
into whatever. Although this happens in a matter of minutes, the exercise is so
boring that it seems like a billion trillion trillion years or more.
> 4. Is nature supersymmetric, and if so, how is supersymmetry broken?
No, it's not supersymmetric, it's just normally symmetric. This is because the
symetry of nature is equaled by the chaos of cybernetics in its out-of-control
trajectory toward the Singularity.
> 5. Why does the universe appear to have one time and three space
> dimensions?
Well, how would you like it if the universe had three time dimensions and one
space dimension? That would make it rather difficult to keep the trains running
on time wouldn't it? (Yes, I know. You wouldn't have to worry about the trains
de-railing, but you wouldn't have anywhere for them to go either.)
What I really want to know is why does the universe appear to move in five
dimensions and rainbow colors come out of my stereo speakers and my head melt
into the keyboard whenever I drop acid.
> 6. Why does the cosmological constant have the value that it has? Is it
> zero and is it really constant?
The cosmological constant used to have a value somewhat less than its present
value. Like everything else, inflation has made it seem more valuable. No, it's
not zero, and it's not constant, no matter what the government wants you to
believe. The feds really have a tight hold on the media, because you just never
hear about inflation anymore. (And Greenspan can't really do anything about it
anyway.)
> 7. What are the fundamental degrees of freedom of M-theory (the theory
> whose low-energy limit is eleven-dimensional supergravity and that subsumes
> the five consistent superstring theories) and does the theory describe
> nature? [....] The
> question now is, Which is more fundamental -- are strings made from branes
> or vice versa? Or is there something else even more basic that no one has
> thought of yet? Finally, is any of this real, or is M theory just a
> fascinating mind game?
No, none of this is real. M theory was devised by cunning social manipulators to
distract cosmologists from the more important and relevant questions such as How
to build a computer that can predict the stock market accurately. Strings and
branes are actually devices which will be encrypted into e-cash (cyber money) to
keep it from being counterfeited by greedy hackers.
> 8. What is the resolution of the black hole information paradox?
Currently, it's 600 X 800 pixels, but with a bit of tinkering, you might expect
as much as 1200 X 1600 (without flicker, if you have sufficient refresh rate on
your monitor).
> what would happen if you dropped a copy of the Encyclopaedia
> Britannica down a black hole?
Are we talking about a copy on a CD or the Presentation Edition? Well, it
doesn't much matter, because in either case the information would come out the
other side of the black hole as disinformation in a baby universe. The boffins
of the black hole would probably get agitated by this reckless discharge of
refuse, and they'd vigorously pursue you. Remember: Every litter bit hurts.
> 9. What physics explains the enormous disparity between the gravitational
> scale and the typical mass scale of the elementary particles? In other
> words, why is gravity so much weaker than the other forces, like
> electromagnetism?
As we all know, the Earth is a giant magnet. What most people don't know is that
gravity actually plays no part in the mass scale of the elementary particles.
You see, the whole universe sucks, and that's why enormous disparities exist
everywhere, especially at the socio-economic level. So, it's not so much that
gravity is weaker than the other forces so much as that the other forces all
(kinda sort of) suck in unison. It's like one big ol' conspiracy of suck-ass
forces conspiring to commit even more disparate enormities. Bother!
Incidentally, those extra dimensional black holes are the real force behind
gravity, and they do their best to keep the entire cosmos from being sucked into
electromagnetic oblivion.
> 10. Can we quantitatively understand quark and gluon confinement in
> quantum chromodynamics and the existence of a mass gap?
Yes, we can.
> 11. (Question added in translation). Why is any of this important?
These questions are important because they help us to understand that the
universe has wider horizons than our theories can accommodate without making
mysteries out of what we formerly thought made sense. Also, these questions keep
us from building a computer that can accurately predict the future of the stock
market, which would take too much of the fun out of being very rich. I know,
because a wise old Turk once told me so.
--Alligator Grundy, bricoleur ordinaire
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