String Theory Vs. Traditional Particle Physics

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For those that know - Discuss.For those that don't - Don't even try, I'll ask a Mod/Admin to just delete the wasted post.

What do you mean by "traditional particle physics"? Newtonian physics?

I tried doing a search on it, but I didn't come up with anything.

Traditional Particle Theory. I put Physics there, so people know it's physics.You could apply Newtonian Physics...

I don't know if there is such a thing as traditional particle theory. String theory attempts to combine general relativity and quantum mechanics.I might add that the large number of dimensions in string theory looks ugly to me.

Too many dimensions... Anyway;The String Theory is basically a partially proven idea about elementary particles that is explained by using "strings", which are basically pieces of string (our idea of string) which make loops. These loops are thought to wiggle, or vibrate, in certain ways, and those vibrations determine which particle it is. These strings are all the same in composition, in theory, but they vibrate differently to make up every existing sub-atomic particle.This is in contrast to the two previous beliefs/theories:----That atoms are the smallest indivisible particles and they are composed of just protons, neutrons, and electrons----That quarks (six different kinds of them) make up each of these particles, the types of quarks being up, down, charm, strange, top, and bottom (very strange names, pardon the pun).

But string theory goes beyond just giving a theory of elementary particles as standing waves. It's meant to be a theory of all physics.

Would we not call that the "M-theory?"Could they explain time travel? Or Quantum Physics?

No you didn't. You're not talking about the mechanics of particles in space; "particle physics" refers to theory that that atomic particles (protons, neutrons, and electrons) are themselves made of smaller particles, called subatomic particles. (By the way, the idea that matter is made of atoms is also a theory.) These "particles" sometimes act like particles and sometimes like waves, depending on how you look at them.

The ultimate idea of theorizing about and studying fundamental physics, whether particle, quantum, string theory, "brane" theory, etc., is to find the underlying principles that govern the universe, and uniting all the fundamental forces (gravitation, electromagnetism, the weak interaction, and the strong interaction). Eletricity and magnetism were shown to be different aspects of the same phenomoenon a while ago. We're waiting for a "grand unification theory" to bring all of them together.

The idea of string theory is to look at the fundamental building blocks as very small one-dimensional strings rather than as infinitesimal points. See the Wikipedia entry on string theory. So far there is no experimental evidence to support string theory, although that might change in 2007, when the Swiss Large Hadron Collider is functioning.

Do you have any thoughts on the subject? (And should we get a mod to delete Ineligible's post?)
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Edit: You got a post off before I put this one up.

> The String Theory is basically a partially proven idea about elementary particles

It's not at all, in any way, proven. In fact, as I stated above, there is no experimental result that supports it (nor are there any results that oppose it, as far as I know). Anyway, science doesn't "prove" things. Newtonian mechanics was never proven, and after a few hundred years, turned out to be not quite correct.

Until one becomes law, you won't know what one is true. What can 'dimension' tell us?dimension Particles --Predictive particle theories do not exist in dimension D>4, and thus effectively predict the correct result D=4 (3 space, 1 time). Strings --known string theories do exist in D>4. They effectively predict "critical" D=10, 11, or 26. If the observable dimensions are constrained to 4, predictive power is lost. However, useful particle models can be accommodated.I may not be too accurate - this is only grade 11 physics lol.

Until one becomes law, you won't know what one is true. Not true. Newton's Laws are laws, but they're not quite true, as Einstein showed. A "law" is nothing more than a theory, but about a narrow concept; theories cover broad and complex sets of ideas.Science can prove things wrong, but it can't prove anythng right. The idea is that you get closer and closer to a true representation of the universe, but you are not likely to reach the ultimate goal (an explanation for all natural phenomena), and you could never be sure that you were there even if you did.Think of the theories as useful models that mathematically explain what's going on in the universe.Yes, string theory requires more than the four dimensions of Einsteinian space-time, but the spatial dimensions beyond the 3 familiar ones are very small. In science, clean, simple mathematical explanations are preferred, and are more likely to be correct, so, as Ineligible mentioned, the many dimensions required for the variations on string theory is not very elegant. That doesn't mean that it's wrong. It just means, as I said, that it's less likely to be right.

Perhaps I was using "string theory" too loosely. My feeling is that starting with fundamental particles may be starting at the wrong end of theoretical physics - that when you get the mathematics right, the fundamental particles will pop out as solutions.

String theory is a very complex theory based upon large series of extrapolations. Occam's Razor, "All things be equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one". All physics of that level, obviously, is based upon extensive extrapolation, but string theory takes it further than the traditional idea of subatomic particles being the basis of all matter (and antimatter).

Nonetheless, it's really interesting. I haven't really looked it up or talked about it with anyone for awhile though, I need to do some reading as a refresher on this.

What you're looking at isn't grade 11 physics. You're obviously not doing this in class as a curriculum topic. You either are looking this up yourself or your teacher is cool and tells you interesting concepts and theories outside the curriculum. String theory was something a friend of mine in engineering looked into on his own time.

Nonetheless, I think that string theory is excellent in that it takes a step back and approaches small scale physics from a different perspective, that of an existence of greater dimensions, rather than the rigid thinking the restricts everything to 4D space and views everything in a way we can visualize it (since we obviously can't truly see it, so why not step outside the box and consider other options).

As Steve said though, the building of the new particle accelerator in Geneva might shed some light on the topic, although I don't know the specifics of what is different about the new facility as opposed to the current big one which is in France I believe? Correct me if I'm wrong, I can't remember.

The largest particle accelerator currently is at CERN in Switzerland, near Genva. The new one, the Large Hadron Collider, will be pretty much the same but a lot more powerful (i.e., it will acelerate particles to a higher velocity, thus conferring more energy to them), and will straddle the border of France (which will hold most of it) and Switzerland.Wikipedia on the Large Hadron Collider.

There was another one in, Spain, I believe... or Germany?

any whom;

What causes the black wholes? Strings or Particle?

Particles A black hole is defined by an "event horizon", which is the border of the part of space where even light must hit the singularity, which is in turn defined as the region where the theory breaks down. Thus the very existence of black holes in a theory of gravity indicates its inadequacy. (However, black hole singularities might be avoided by formulations in "Euclidean space", with imaginary time.) Black hole solutions are not expected in a composite-state theory of gravity.

strings--Some advantages are found in the description of black holes, but the situation is unclear.

As Warren Siegal said "-ds2 = -dt2 + dx2 + dy2 + dz2"

"Spacetime ("D") D = 4 --> D = 10 --> D = 11
--> twistor space (bosonic spinor coordinate)
--> superspace (bosonic + fermionic coordinates)"

I'm not aware of any large particle accelerators outside of CERN (Switzerland) and the U.S.> What causes the black wholes? Strings or Particle? Strings and particles are two ways of looking at the same thing. It's like asking, What causes length? Feet or meters?Black holes are thought to be caused by the collapse (under their own mass) of large neutron stars.

I'm pretty sure there is another one - not as a big, but oh well.

I'm asking, which theory would be more relevant to it. They both give us different explanations.

They're both relevant. We'll have to see which one is the closest to being correct; it may be a theory that hasn't even been thought up yet. Beyond that, you'll have to find someone who knows more about string theory than I do to answer your question.It appears that there's a black hole at the center of every galaxy, and galaxies eat each other (the bigger ones absorb the smaller ones). Our galaxy, the Milky Way, is on a collision course with Andromeda, and there will be real fireworks when they get close. Their black holes will merge.