steevey

If you want to know how this applies on an observable level, you really need to think, because quantum mechanics is all about what you can't actually see, with the exception of the colors of photons. Otherwise, trying to use quantum mechanics to describe a something like a ball is just too difficult right now because theres literally trillion trillions of atoms in it, its just very complex and in order to use quantum mechanics to completely describe a physical object probably takes some more research in it. What your talking about is essentially like trying to use a single cell of your body to describe your entire body, which can be done to an extent with a ton of work with mapping out the genes and running simulations of those genes and looking at the cell cycle and what other cells it could have become and etc. We still haven't even filled in all the gaps with why fores work the way they do and what they are comprised of.

Math combined with physics are things put into terms of numeric values which represent something, which is why without physics or something to describe what things in math mean, numbers would be meaningless. People noticed that atoms are quantized, so right off the bat we can put that into terms of numeric values to describe it, like for describing emitted photons, just take any whole number multiplied by Planck's constant times the frequency of light to get the energy of a photon emitted by an electron. But, the whole number, Planck's constant and the frequency would have no meaning unless we actually told people what they are describing. The problem arises from the fact itself that math has no meaningless unless you say what it describes, so you could write an equation for something and it would make sense, yet that thing doesn't have to exist since when its being described just by numbers, which is why you have all these extra-dimensional theories. So in physics when you use math, and you have an "equals" sign, you are inherently saying what two things are or are equivalent to. So in the example I showed earlier, it doesn't describe the behavior of anything at all, it describes what the energy of a photon actually is or how is equal to, which is [math]E=nhv[/math]

Those extra-dimensional theories are just the most popular theories, or the theories with the most attention, they aren't the only explanations scientists have for how the universe works. There's also virtual particles which appear out of the nothingness of space, so that's something to think about before the big bang. There didn't have to be much of anything before it, but the big bang itself might have arose out of some improbability.

If you can represent of a force as a composite of numeric values, then if its equal to something, your describing what that is. Like E=mc^2, so the amount of energy is mass times the speed of light squared, which is physics combined with math.

Yeah, how would spin physically behave, but refsmmat has already said we can't answer it anyway, so you don't need to respond.

Ok, physics describes how things behave, so now that we've gotten that out of the way, tell me what spin is physically like. Or, How exactly could a magnetic field of an electron rotate but not the electron itself? Or can we not answer it with our current knowledge because we don't know exactly what comprises a magnetic field? Also, can't physics describe what things are made of too? Through physics and testing of experiments and observation, we determined what an atom is, or is that just science in general?

Spin doesn't appear in Schrödinger's equation, but spin is used to describe physical effects of the properties as a wave. So how does spin have a physical effect if it isn't a physical thing? It's how the magnetic field is oriented isn't it? And by the way I've seen it, I haven't seen the electron itself spinning, only the magnetic field in a certain direction, but how is the magnetic field rotating then if the electron isn't? Spin is quantized though, which means there's a reason particles don't posses just any and all spins, which I'm guessing has something to do with wave interference, but if that isn't true for spin which I don't know if it is, its still true for an electron's energy or angular momentum. An electron cannot posses any and all possible energies because not every value of energy allows a non destructive wave. A proton is made up of three quarks which can only have only two possible spin states. So, two quarks will have opposite spins which will cancel out, then what's left over is an extra up quark which could account as a sort of net spin.

Then what's moving the electrical field? If angular momentum isn't even a physical thing, why would that move it? Also, can't quantinization be explained by destructive interference in the waves? If an electron could posses any energy or any spin or any etc, then the waves would be too destructive to be coherent or form really any matter. So quantinization is the result of only the possible non destructive waves existing. So if electrons with only whole integer energies can exist without producing destructive wave interference, then those are the only ways they will exist.

Well, according to the definition of a magnetic field, there has to be a specific motion that makes the electrical field rotate in the specific oriented way that it does. That's exactly what he seems to be doing though. Its as if he can't accept the possibility it might be a real physical thing thats going on just because I'm stating that possibility. I already know it might not be physical, but I also know that it could too be physical.

Isn't that just one explanation for it? There doesn't seam to be actual proof of virtual particles, but rather just evidence that would make sense in describing certain things, and wouldn't that also violate the statement that matter and energy can't be created or destroyed? Or is there some quantum mechanical thing about their determination and indetermination too?

So just because I point something out its automatically invalid? That seems sort of, uh...ludicrous. Anyway, a magnetic field is a moving electrical field, which means the electron has to be causing the motion of the electrical field in some way. Electrons take up physical space, that's why when you have a bunch of them, you can see a physical 3D object. Its like saying paper is only 2D, yet if I stack them, I make a 3D object because they are actually 3D. And since as an undefined wave state the electron occupies the entire orbital, then the physical space being taken up by the electron is the entire orbital.

How can scientists detect them then and know they exist?

In that case though, wouldn't an electron have to have a magnitude and a direction? And the "angular momentum" is just the pattern of the electron's most probable place. We don't actually know that the electron is or isn't moving in a spherical way (or etc), but with spin, I don't see how there can't be some physical movement to generate a magnetic field. Also, if spin truly isn't physical, why is it that when two electrons are forced to occupy the same physical orbit or distance from the nucleus, that their spins are forced to be come opposite? Because then the opposite spin would be the result of a physical force, and if a physical force is effecting it, I don't see how it isn't physical. Even virtual particles are physical for a short amount of time.

Well, swan's going to probably punch you because he firmly believes that spin isn't physical in any sense. Though I do have to point out that a magnetic field is a moving electrical field, so when an electron has a magnetic field oriented which ever way, what's moving the electrical field if not the particle itself in some way?

If the spins didn't weren't opposite, then the electrons would cancel out each others existence. I think existing is useful for accomplishing pretty much anything. And I think because two electron can't occupy the same exact place at the same time, that if you can play around with spins and charges the right way that you can force electrons out of an atom to build up a charge. I think there's some type of medical equipment that relies on spin to do that, it might be a defibrillator. Now that I think about it, it might rely on the spin of protons of hydrogen nuclei.

So there's literally different amounts of momentum from photon to photon as I constrain the slit even more? Why not just an uncertainty in one direction as I constrain the other?

I guess that makes sense. But, what I'm saying is, if I have an electron in the ground state or I suppose any state, then it could appear pretty much anywhere in the universe, but the chances of its position being anything like that away from its most probable location is highly unlikely, right? Even for a bound electron to appear any observable distance away from its most probable place is 1 in a very large number.

But I was talking about an electron at the ground state having a probability of its position extending indefinitely through space, however its position appearing large distances away from its most probable location is highly improbable.

Then why did you point out that I was describing an atom in the ground state if its true for every other state the electron has?

But if its energy changes, so will its position anyway. Also, why would that only apply for a single electron at the ground state? Atoms in other orbitals are subject to the same type of randomness aren't they?

I didn't say virtual particles in an atom, I said a pair, because as I've heard it, pairs of virtual particles seem to come into existence in a vcuum, or otherwise everywhere, then annihilate each other. I know that they are also associated with Gauge Bosons, but that's not what I'm talking about.

How is the momentum being unconstrained though? The photons of the beam generally have the same wavelength and frequency, but it seems as though when I constrain one direction, how it moves in the other direction is less constrained, it doesn't seem like the momentum is changing, just where the particles of the beam end up.

Because its improbability. You can find an electron really far away from the atom its bond to, but its just really unlikely. Think of it this way: Gravity goes on indefinitely through space, but its force gets very very weak over large distances. Its the same sort of principal with the electron acting as a wave. Its wave extends indefinitely through space, which other physicists have told me causes a lot of confusion, but its just very improbable to find the electron large distances away from its most probable place. I think it might have been more about a wavelength

I think there's multiple contexts for symmetry. One can be used to describe a wave function equation, if you add the wave functions of two different particles instead of subtracting them, its symmetrical. The shape of an s orbital is symmetrical. And then there's also super-symmetry which is something about equivalent fermions and bosons which differ in spins or something like that.

Like a particle and its anti-particle appearing out of nothing then eliminating each other. Or is there some other way random unbound virtual particles disappear more often? I'm actually thinking of a post you made in another thread and a wiki article stating the process of a virtual particle pair anihilating each other once they appeared in space generates 2-3 gamma rays. There's also a bunch of stuff Stephen Hawking said about this, and how radiation might seen to be coming from a black hole because virtual particle pairs didn't always annihilate if one of the particle got sucked in.