Ask any question you want about Physics

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I see what you are getting at.

Many scientists call fossil fuels like oil liquid sun. I think it would take massive leaps in technology and a lot of materials to utilize the suns energy here from earth compared to getting a working fusion reactor. We are so close to cracking the fusion reactor right now.

originally posted by: Soylent Green Is People

originally posted by: KrzYma
I think the range how we have build colour pallets, especially in digital numbers, has more to do with mathematics rather than real distribution of wave lengths in visible spectrum.
We use a close circle to digitally represent all the colours, it is a continuous spectrum.
Real EM waves begin with gamma rays and and with radio waves, they are linear

Yes. As I said in my post, if we look at a part of the EM spectrum that also includes visible light, we may see it go from:

-radar
-infrared
-the visible spectrum, starting with red and ending in violet
-ultraviolet
-X-rays

(with langer wavelengths of EM radiation before radar, and shorter wavelengths of EM radiation after x-rays).

So looking at the spectrum, violet light seems to have no relationship to red light -- at least not the same relationship that (say, for example) orange light has to red light. Because while orange and red are adjacent to each other on the spectrum, violet and red are not.

It just seems counter-intuitive (although it is true) that violet light does not have the same type of relationship to red light as orange does with red.

I think it does. wee can see between 400-780 nm roughly
violet begins at 400nm, red ends at 780, that's almost twice of violet's wavelength.
our brain do not see the wavelength, but the electric impulses from our eyes
I'm not a specialist on how our eyes interpret the EM energy (change in potential) but I think the receptors in out eyes do not work digital, they work analog

Analog, as its name suggests, refers to being analogous to something. If we’re referring to the adjective used in technology, the definition of analog is: Of, relating to, or being a device in which data are represented by continuously variable, measurable, physical quantities, such as length, width, voltage, or pressure. – Wordnik

violet wavelength is almost half the wavelength of red.
if our brain interprets those two incoming violet waves as being one, this would be the case why we think violet is kind of reddish. I think our sensors are not so sensitive to distinguish single waves.

Now mixing blue paint with red to get violet, again, our sensors can't really differentiate from mixture of 465nm ( mid blue ) and 700nm ( mid red ) but why our brain interprets it that way we think it's violet, I have no good knowledge.

a reply to: PhoenixOD
Only time will tell which we figure out first, but from my perspective, the engineering problems in making more efficient means to utilize power from the sun (like 80% efficient solar cells instead of 20%) may be easier to solve than the engineering problems associated with trying to make miniature suns on Earth.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
a reply to: PhoenixOD
Only time will tell which we figure out first, but from my perspective, the engineering problems in making more efficient means to utilize power from the sun (like 80% efficient solar cells instead of 20%) may be easier to solve than the engineering problems associated with trying to make miniature suns on Earth.

I always thought using the sun to create hydrogen from water when be an excellent resource. Using the suns heat you can use high temperature electrolysis with about 50 percent efficiency rate. Since we would be using the heat or more the energy the sun and a photo-catalyst this produces 1 step instead of converting heat to electricity electricity to chemical energy. Another possibility is hydrogen can be produced in an algae bioreactor if you deprive algae of sulfur instead of oxygen they produce hydrogen. So this could be cost effective with large farms being built i suppose never crunched the numbers, but i guess the energy taking care of the algae could cause a problem depends on the system i guess.

a reply to: KrzYma

The relationships from the visible light spectrum I'm talking about is this:

Orange is about 610 nm. That's about halfway between red (~650 nm) and yellow (~570 nm). That makes intuitive sense, because orange light seems to be a a little red and a little yellow, and orange is next to both red and yellow.

Green is about 525 nm. That's about halfway between yellow (~570 nm) and blue (~470 nm). That makes intuitive sense, because green light seems to be a a little yellow and a little blue, and green is next to both yellow and blue.

Violet is about 400 nm. That's about 70 nm shorter than blue, so that makes comparative sense (compared to the other color relationships), but it is about 250 nm shorter than red. That's a large difference compared to the other colors' relationships.

Intuitively, we think violet is a little blue and a little red. HOWEVER, the place that violet holds on the spectrum (not next to red, but actually on the opposite side of the visible spectrum from red) does not hold the same relationship as orange has with red and yellow, nor the relationship green has with yellow and blue. Violet may be next to blue on the spectrum, but it is not next to red on the spectrum.

I understand that violet is not necessary the mid-point color between blue and red on the visible light spectrum, but intuitively most people think it is.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

What is the glue that holds atoms together? Why is it for example, our bodies don't just fall apart from the downward force of 1G?

Wow thank you for the opportunity, I have a question that I have been struggling with for some time, I do not posses the physics or mathematical knowledge to even begin to answer it.

As a spacecraft (or any object) approaches light speed it gains mass, thus requiring more fuel, and so on till it gains infinite mass.

Consider a spacecraft carrying its own fuel, as the spacecraft gains mass so does the fuel, as the mass of spacecraft reaches infinity, presumably so does the mass of the fuel, however the ship is also using up the fuel, decreasing its mass.
So my question is:
Is there any ratio or a point or something, where the mass of fuel the ship uses is less than that which it gains? And if so what would happen if such a ship were to be automated and left to accelerate as fast as possible, would it reach the light barrier? If so what would happen then?

Thanks.

originally posted by: kaleshwarchand77
Wow thank you for the opportunity, I have a question that I have been struggling with for some time, I do not posses the physics or mathematical knowledge to even begin to answer it.

As a spacecraft (or any object) approaches light speed it gains mass, thus requiring more fuel, and so on till it gains infinite mass.

Consider a spacecraft carrying its own fuel, as the spacecraft gains mass so does the fuel, as the mass of spacecraft reaches infinity, presumably so does the mass of the fuel, however the ship is also using up the fuel, decreasing its mass.
So my question is:
Is there any ratio or a point or something, where the mass of fuel the ship uses is less than that which it gains? And if so what would happen if such a ship were to be automated and left to accelerate as fast as possible, would it reach the light barrier? If so what would happen then?

Thanks.

The reason you cant go the speed of light is energy. Best way i can explain this is mass can mean a couple of different thing but its important to understand Einsteins definition.. First when people here mass increases there are two types. Mass can be looked at as the amount of force needed to accelerate an object. And mass can also be its weight but the two do not have to be the same.

Heres an example weight (mass) can be looked at as the amount of force the earth pulls on an object in a gravitational field. Weight stops an object from going into free fall on earth for example. Because were dealing with gravity ill explain newtons 1 kilogram of force = 9.80665 newtons on earth. So lets say we have a person a small person with a mass of 50 kilograms he jumps up there is 491 newtons of force pushing him back down.we would see this as his weight on earth.Now we take him to the moon his mass is still 50 kilograms however do to moons gravity being lower he weighs only 81.5 newtons. His mass didnt change a bit yet now he needs less energy to jump the same height because his weight is lower.

Now to your scenario mass doesnt change on the ship same size but as we move closer to the speed of light the amount of newtons needed to move the craft increases exponentially. So just like some one jumping on the moon and then the same jump on earth uses more energy.As you approach the speed of light inertia increases meaning it takes more energy to go faster. But the mass of are spaceship remains the same meaning we still have the same amount of fuel or energy. So no matter how fast you try to go you cant actually reach the speed of light because eventually you hit the point where the entire energy of the universe isnt enough to push our craft to light speed we can get close but never reach it just to many newtons fighting against our attempts to accelerate.

Like trying to ride a bike up a steep hill eventually you cant produce enough energy to peddle and have to get off the bike.

originally posted by: MarlinGrace
What is the glue that holds atoms together? Why is it for example, our bodies don't just fall apart from the downward force of 1G?

Our bodies do sag as we age right?

Skin and in fact large portions of our bodies (maybe 35% when we are young) are held together by a substance called collagen, it's the most abundant protein in the body, but the amount we produce decreases with age and that's part of the reason we sag as we get older. (Elastin is another important protein). You've heard about old useless horses being sent to glue factories? They made glue by boiling parts of the horse with a lot of collagen (like the skin and connective tissues) and the the word collagen literally means "glue producing" I suppose from the glue factory history, but you could say collagen is the glue that holds much of our bodies together.

So what holds the atoms together in collagen and other substances?

Chemical bonding

Atoms sticking together in molecules or crystals are said to be bonded with one another. A chemical bond may be visualized as the multipole balance between the positive charges in the nuclei and the negative charges oscillating about them.

So in simplest terms, the atoms in collagen and molecules in our bodies are held together by electric forces (positive and negative charges attract), and while that concept seems extremely simple, it gets fairly complicated with quantum mechanics, etc.

originally posted by: kaleshwarchand77
As a spacecraft (or any object) approaches light speed it gains mass, thus requiring more fuel, and so on till it gains infinite mass.

OK let me make some comments here which relate to this slightly controversial topic. You probably know this idea is based in relativity, which was the theory of Albert Einstein, correct? Did you know that Einstein said this is not what happens?

However some educators decided to not take Einstein's advice and this concept gets taught and you can find sources citing it, but some people (like me) think that if it's Einstein's theory, and Einstein says this idea is not what his theory implies, maybe we should consider he knew what he was talking about. I agree with Einstein that this idea is wrong and we should not be teaching it, and I made a thread which relates directly to this topic that the equation E=mc^2 is not the right equation because it's incomplete, and the reason it's incomplete is because there is a separate term for momentum (and it's not mass, aka relativistic mass), so I suggest looking at the more complete, and more correct equation I posted in that thread, which again should emphasize in math that it's not relativistic mass and things don't gain mass as they accelerate.

Science Quiz #2: Is E=mc² right or wrong?

This is explained in detail in this post in the other thread:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

See the excerpt of Albert Einstein's letter dated June 18, 1948. So the answer to your question, according to that letter from Albert Einstein, is that neither the spacecraft nor the fuel ever gains any mass no matter how fast they go. I apologize for the teachers who taught you a wrong concept and I hope you believe what Einstein says about his own theory as more credible.

This is one of those over-simplified ideas we teach in low level science courses like the idea that the electron orbits the nucleus, the way a planet orbits the sun. Modern science says this isn't the way an electron really behaves, so then students need to unlearn this wrong concept in more advanced studies. This relativistic mass thing is similar, in that some people think it helps beginning students to grasp complex topics in simple terms, but like the electron orbit, in more advanced study we learn the concept is wrong. Personally, I think it hurts more than helps to teach this relativistic mass concept and I think it shouldn't be taught at all.

As a substitute for pursuing the relativistic mass concept, let me share this interesting graphic somewhat related to your question about rocket propulsion technologies:

www.nasa.gov...


Also there is one single best site on the internet that I've found regarding rocket technology; I saved the whole site for offline use in case it ever goes down; there is simply no alternative I've found. You can learn a lot here and it's fairly simplified for those of us who aren't rocket scientists:

Welcome to Rocket and Space Technology. 

a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

Intuitively, we think violet is a little blue and a little red. HOWEVER, the place that violet holds on the spectrum (not next to red, but actually on the opposite side of the visible spectrum from red) does not hold the same relationship as orange has with red and yellow, nor the relationship green has with yellow and blue. Violet may be next to blue on the spectrum, but it is not next to red on the spectrum.

I think you see this colour configuration, the progression from red to violet in the scenario where violet should be between blue and red on a circular scale.
EM frequencies are on a linear scale
like 0-2-4-6
0 - red
1 - orange
2 - yellow
3 - green
4 - blue
5 - indigo
6 - violet

so 1 is between 0 and 2
3 is between 2 and 4
6 (violet ) is actually between 5 and 7

in our circular colour scale however where 6 ends 1 begins again

why violet looks reddish to us I have explained already few posts back

a reply to: kaleshwarchand77

As fuel is stored energy and it takes an infinite amount of energy to reach light speed you would run out of fuel before you reached light speed.

I am interested in any musings regarding the apparent baryon asymmetry in the observable universe.

a reply to: EasyPleaseMe
The article in wikipedia lists three possibilities but I think it's out of date and an updated article would probably reduce the likelihood of antimatter dominated regions (which would mean there isn't such a baryon asymmetry). Therefore I think we can discount that option based on findings that antimatter falls down, not up. (If it had fallen up this would have made the transition regions between matter and antimatter more difficult to detect).

So we are still likely left with the apparent asymmetry, and two possibilities of charge parity violations or the the electric dipole moment idea. I don't have much to add to those two possibilities as described in the wiki. It's still an unsolved problem in physics.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

What % of the average or better University physics textbooks would you guesstimate to be in significant error to what is really the now believed to be true in the field? . . . i.e. . . . e.g. the black projects with exotic . . . tech etc.

How many curies in a gram of cesium 137. And can you translate that from smaller than quantum forces?

a reply to: symptomoftheuniverse

I saw your name and had to run over. We all miss you on Mars, and funbox recently brought up the skull with the helmet as a graphic again. Anyway, on topic, give me a minute...

A question about physics. It looks like my long-time guess that there is no supersymmetry may be accurate - do you think the next year at CERN will find evidence of it or not? Thanks.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
Ask any question you want about Physics

How come I cannot get my Overunity Device to work?

I sent my money in to the guy on youtube but this damn thing is not making free energy. Hell, it makes no energy.

Help my Arbitrageur, you're my only hope.

originally posted by: Aleister
a reply to: symptomoftheuniverse

I saw your name and had to run over. We all miss you on Mars, and funbox recently brought up the skull with the helmet as a graphic again. Anyway, on topic, give me a minute...

A question about physics. It looks like my long-time guess that there is no supersymmetry may be accurate - do you think the next year at CERN will find evidence of it or not? Thanks.

Deny- ,Ignore-

originally posted by: BO XIAN
What % of the average or better University physics textbooks would you guesstimate to be in significant error to what is really the now believed to be true in the field? . . . i.e. . . . e.g. the black projects with exotic . . . tech etc.

I know people have a lot of ideas about black projects, but all I have to go on are the black projects of several decades ago which have been declassified, meaning we can take say 1980 era black projects and compare them to 1980 era public knowledge in textbooks. I really don't see any earth-shaking physics in the old black projects, but they do have more advanced technology than the general population. So my take is the engineering textbooks on state of the art tech are behind the curve a bit regarding advanced military tech, but I don't really see gaps in knowledge of fundamental physics. If we extrapolate to the present, why would it be any different? Could be I suppose but I see no evidence for this.

originally posted by: symptomoftheuniverse
How many curies in a gram of cesium 137. And can you translate that from smaller than quantum forces?

Is there some reason this matters? No context and I'm not sure I understand the question or the purpose in asking it, if there is one. I don't even know what "smaller than quantum forces" means.

originally posted by: Aleister
A question about physics. It looks like my long-time guess that there is no supersymmetry may be accurate - do you think the next year at CERN will find evidence of it or not? Thanks.

I'm not sure my guess is any better than your guess. I don't think it's a completely dead idea yet.

When the weatherman predicts a 50% chance of rain, I always thought that was a pretty cool way to make sure he's never wrong. If it rains he wasn't wrong, and if it doesn't rain he wasn't wrong, how can he lose? So if we're guessing at the outcome, why not go with the weatherman strategy and say both outcomes are possible, that way our prediction can't be wrong?

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus
I didn't send any money, but I know how you feel, mine isn't working either. I'll show you the video of mine, where you need a power strip and a lighter:

Free Energy Generator (ORIGINAL)



So plugging the power strip into itself doesn't work, without the energy source, but give it an initial energy source like the lighter, and maybe some perpetual motion of the electrons, and the video shows it works.


But my results look more like this:
free energy generator

Not sure what I'm doing wrong but I guess violating the laws of physics is harder than it looks on youtube videos.


I have the plans for Leedskalnin's perpetual motion holder, so I'll have a place to put my perpetual motions, if I ever get them. I'll help you get yours working just as soon as I get mine working!

originally posted by: KrzYma
a reply to: Soylent Green Is People

Intuitively, we think violet is a little blue and a little red. HOWEVER, the place that violet holds on the spectrum (not next to red, but actually on the opposite side of the visible spectrum from red) does not hold the same relationship as orange has with red and yellow, nor the relationship green has with yellow and blue. Violet may be next to blue on the spectrum, but it is not next to red on the spectrum.

I think you see this colour configuration, the progression from red to violet in the scenario where violet should be between blue and red on a circular scale.
EM frequencies are on a linear scale
like 0-2-4-6
0 - red
1 - orange
2 - yellow
3 - green
4 - blue
5 - indigo
6 - violet

so 1 is between 0 and 2
3 is between 2 and 4
6 (violet ) is actually between 5 and 7

in our circular colour scale however where 6 ends 1 begins again

why violet looks reddish to us I have explained already few posts back

Yes. As I have said, I know the visible spectrum is linear, and that red is nowhere near violet on that spectrum....

....and that is my whole point.

I'm just pointing out that while orange light is a hybrid between red and yellow light (falling between the two on the spectrum), and green light is a hybrid between yellow and blue light (falling between the two on the spectrum), violet light is NOT a hybrid between blue and red light, because (as you pointed out) the visible light portion of the EM spectrum is linear...

...i.e., violet light does NOT fall in between blue and red on the spectrum. I'm not saying it's wrong, I'm just saying it is counter intuitive and odd. Looking at violet as a color, the color has qualities that make it seem as if it should fall between blue and red, but obviously it can't because red is on the opposite side of the visible light spectrum from violet and blue.