Scientists Confirm It Is Turtles, All The Way Down

Stephen Hawking incorporates the saying into the beginning of his 1988 book A Brief History of Time:

A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise." The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?" "You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady. "But it's turtles all the way down!"

Source: Wikipedia.com, Turtles all the way down.

Two years ago, physicists at the University of Chicago were greeted with fireworks—atoms shooting out in jets—when they discovered a new form of quantum behavior. But the patterns underlying the bright jets were difficult to pick out from the noise.

"In understanding complex quantum dynamics, we start to be limited by our intuition, but machine learning could be a new tool for understanding such systems," said lead author Cheng Chin, a professor of physics at the University of Chicago and a pioneer in using ultracold experiments to study the quantum phenomena that underlie the behavior of the smallest particles and the universe.

In the original study, Chin's lab cooled particles down to nearly absolute zero until they all condensed into the same quantum state, called a Bose-Einstein condensate. Next, they applied a magnetic field, and were surprised to see atoms shooting out in bright jets.

The algorithm picked out a correlation in a shape that resembles a turtle: a ring around a central source that forms the "shell;" four secondary points that appear like feet around it; and two extended points as the "head" and "tail." "If you see a particle going in one direction, there's always another at a 45-degree angle," Feng said. Essentially, it's a series of chain reactions: The first particles interact close to the source, bouncing off each other; the next ring forms as those particles interact, and so on. The physics behind the phenomenon is termed high-harmonic generation.

"In essence, each image consists of many such turtle patterns," Cheng added. "It is turtles all the way down."

phys.org, Feb. 11, 2019 - Machine learning reveals hidden turtle pattern in quantum fireworks.

A little culture, some humor, and a dip into the realm on the quanta!

There are a couple of neat things happening. First, they made a BEC, Bose-Einstein Condensate, which consists of many atoms cooled down to just above Absolute Zero. There, they enter the same quantum state and behave like one particle. So they tried to probe it with a magnetic field and it gave off a light show called, "fireworks"!

The second part was they had a difficult time seeing what was happening so they threw some new tech at the problem: a machine learning algorithm! You can usually just say, "AI" and that will cover it (unless your buddy is showing off his college ecumenical learning and begs to differentiate between ANN, CNN, AI, and MSNBC for the heck of it!).

After handing the photos over to the computer they got a clear result that indeed, looks like a turtle! These are the individual atoms before they cascade into each other and shoot fireworks due to the magnetic field.

Now you can brag at the party about how it is actually turtles, all the way down!

Credit: Lei Feng, phys.org article

Cute quantum turtle!!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

They say the historical source for the ^ mathematical operator was from the Latin caret, "it lacks", from carēre, "to lack; to be separated from; to be free from"

Free at last, Free at last, they are finally free at last?

So...if it's turtles all the way down, what about the little old lady's "flat plate"? I just hope this doesn't become another flat earth thread.

a reply to: Slichter


A great wise man once said, or maybe it was just Sting...

If you love something, set them free!

There is a carrot/stick pun dying a slow death in the sea of metaphor!

Curse my slow wits!!

a reply to: Lazarus Short

I like the tiger, elephant, tortoise one myself! No plate! No flat earth! Just one of those coincidences that I had thinking about it being turtles all the way down and was going to post something to that effect on another thread but somebody beat me to it. Then this showed up and made me smile!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

nice find!!

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

And the fact that our ancients knew this, in a way, can only mean something far more advanced informed them of it.

I'm treating this as disclosure. Premeditated ages ago.

a reply to: Duderino


The Turtle abides!

The anecdote may seem quaint and sometimes comes off that way but when the human mind boggles at the concept of infinity and regression, a little visualization of some terrapins can help!

Now if I can only get a visual of everything happening at once!!

youtu.be...

Sturgill Simpson! Turtles all the way down!

Ancient cosmology is all BS trust me... the reductionist told me so

originally posted by: TexasTruth
youtu.be...

Sturgill Simpson! Turtles all the way down!

That video is AWESOME!!! Country western science fiction music!!! A new genre I've never heard before.

Here's the link fixed:

originally posted by: TexasTruth
youtu.be...

Sturgill Simpson! Turtles all the way down!

That video is AWESOME!!! Country western science fiction music!!! A new genre I've never heard before.

Here's the link fixed:

a reply to: dfnj2015

Thank you. All these years and I still can’t post a video or picture lol.
“Reptile aliens made of light”. That there is taking redneck music to a great place.

I believe what they discovered is just another form of Mandelbrot's Fractal Zoom distribution.






Enjoy!

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Credit: Lei Feng, phys.org article

Cute quantum turtle!!

Not much of a turtle though...

I'm surprised no one posted this yet. I guess I'll be that guy:

www.youtube.com...

Thank you Terry Prachett.

All things turtle, big and small.

LOL

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF
a reply to: Lazarus Short

I like the tiger, elephant, tortoise one myself! No plate! No flat earth! Just one of those coincidences that I had thinking about it being turtles all the way down and was going to post something to that effect on another thread but somebody beat me to it. Then this showed up and made me smile!

This is the image burned in my brain of "turtles all the way down", so I'm going to have to contemplate why the actual data doesn't match this pre-conceived notion:

originally posted by: whereislogic
Not much of a turtle though...

Since the actual data doesn't seem to match the turtles drawing, one or the other must be wrong, but whichever one that is, I have to say my drawing of turtles looks more like turtles.

Wonder how Yurtel is doing? I knew modern physics would end up back at terrapins...

and to paraphrase a certain bald kid,

one can wonder about the turtles supporting reality, but remember,

there are no turtles.

Woooooah.

originally posted by: edmc^2
I believe what they discovered is just another form of Mandelbrot's Fractal Zoom distribution.

Agreed as a potential. My first thought on seeing the image was it's a Mandlebrot or Julia set working on the assumption the second iteration is at the mid point of the two turtleheads (lol) and third iteration is roughly where the 'blue dots' are located.

Will be interesting to see how this pans out.