Electron And Positron

[Kramer]

"Electron is what it is" and "there is nothing inside it" ask for more to elucidate an ignoramus lay-man, doctor Swansont. If you have nothing new about questions : is electron particle or not? , Is it "excitation" of field or it is standing wave? Has it any thing similar with photon as they, after your statement, are both e.m waves? How you explain the mass of electron and the gravity property? If it has not form, that it is only a point, how much is the density.? etc.... then ...... say bluntly that modern physics is nothing but a mean to derange the lay mans and why not even the non physics intellectuals.

[swansont]

Physics can only address what the electron "is" to the extent that one can test how the electron behaves. That's the only evidence available to us.

 

say bluntly that modern physics is nothing but a mean to derange the lay mans and why not even the non physics intellectuals.

 

"Physics" doesn't give a damn whether you understand it or not, and your understanding of it is not a metric to gauge its success. There is no guarantee that nature can be understandable to anyone. It works. That's what matters.

[MigL]

Understand that physics is about model building, Robin and Kramer. We build models so as to make valid predictions of effects and reality. If we say an elementary particle like an electron sometimes behaves like a wave, that leads to certain useful predictions, but is it really a wave ? If we say sometimes it acts as a classical particle, does that mean it is a tiny billiard ball ? We can definitely say it is a quantum particle, but we have no common ground with everyday items and things.

 

I have, in previous posts, given examples of some models. I'll give you another.

If general relativity is an accurate description of reality except at certain boundaries like extremely small separations and extreme energies, then two gentlemen in the 1920s, named Kaluza and Klein decided to incorporate a fifth dimension to the space-time dimensions of GR. This 5th dimension would be compacted at the Planck scale and in effect, be invisible. To everyone's amazement all of Maxwell's equations describing electromagnetism 'popped out'. So does that mean that the charge of an electron could be an effect of the compacted 5th dimension. And if so how would you describe it, then ? It is certainly not a physical difference such as size, shape or composition.

 

This approach of adding 'extra' dimensions is still used today, but to account for forces which were unknown in the 1920s ( the weak and strong nuclear ), the number of dimensions has risen to 11 in modern string theory ( see swansont's caveat in a previous post regarding string theory ).

Edited May 12, 2013 by MigL