WEBVTT - Listener Questions #14 0:00:08.240 --> 0:00:11.879 If everything is quantum fields, how do their ripples make 0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:12.799 banana peels? 0:00:13.200 --> 0:00:15.840 What's the mutation rate for the common cold? Does the 0:00:15.920 --> 0:00:18.239 virus change moving through my household? 0:00:18.600 --> 0:00:22.400 Is their mass? In pure information? Do I get heavier 0:00:22.560 --> 0:00:23.720 with more education? 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:27.160 Whatever questions keep you up at night, Daniel and Kelly's 0:00:27.200 --> 0:00:28.320 answers will make it right. 0:00:28.960 --> 0:00:32.879 Welcome to another Listener Questions episode on Daniel and Kelly's 0:00:33.080 --> 0:00:34.760 Extraordinary Universe. 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:51.120 Hello. I'm Kelly Wienersmith, and I study parasites and space, 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:53.040 but not parasites in space. 0:00:53.520 --> 0:00:54.920 Not yet, at least that's all right. 0:00:55.000 --> 0:00:55.120 Hi. 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:55.880 I'm Daniel. 0:00:55.920 --> 0:00:58.280 I'm a particle physicist, and I want to figure out 0:00:58.280 --> 0:01:01.120 the problems of the universe before the aliens come and 0:01:01.200 --> 0:01:03.040 spoil the story by telling. 0:01:02.800 --> 0:01:05.960 Us, oh, interesting, you know. The intro sort of makes 0:01:06.000 --> 0:01:07.520 it sound like maybe this is going to be an 0:01:07.560 --> 0:01:10.880 episode about Bigfoot or something. We both have gotten a 0:01:10.880 --> 0:01:14.360 little bit out there with our intros this morning, but 0:01:14.400 --> 0:01:16.720 we're going to bring it down to Earth, which reminds 0:01:16.760 --> 0:01:19.680 me of an interesting talk that I gave on Earth. Well, 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:21.360 I don't know if it's interesting. It was my talk, 0:01:21.680 --> 0:01:24.720 the talk that I gave for Western University Space Day 0:01:24.920 --> 0:01:28.720 recently and I was giving my usual City on Mars 0:01:28.760 --> 0:01:32.080 talk and up in the balcony was an entire Girl 0:01:32.120 --> 0:01:33.400 Scout troop boom. 0:01:33.440 --> 0:01:35.600 Do you think they were looking to plan an expedition 0:01:35.640 --> 0:01:36.080 to space? 0:01:36.360 --> 0:01:38.800 I don't know. Girl Scouts can do anything. Many maybe 0:01:38.800 --> 0:01:40.840 they were. Maybe they're planning on taking over the world, 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:42.800 but they want to know how to take over space too. 0:01:42.880 --> 0:01:45.640 They did bring delicious cookies, so that was great. 0:01:45.720 --> 0:01:46.759 Do they ask good questions? 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:48.400 That's what I was going to say. They asked the 0:01:48.440 --> 0:01:51.280 greatest questions, so they asked fantastic questions. And I was 0:01:51.280 --> 0:01:53.240 a little bit nervous because I hadn't planned on there 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:55.760 being kids. So I have a whole section about how 0:01:56.200 --> 0:02:00.720 the process of expanding family size might be indited by 0:02:00.760 --> 0:02:04.320 the space environment. And the first question that I got 0:02:04.760 --> 0:02:06.920 was one of the girls from the Scouts raised her 0:02:06.960 --> 0:02:10.280 hand and said, in your section on reproduction. And I 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:15.239 immediately was like, oh God, this is not a good start. 0:02:15.280 --> 0:02:17.440 I don't want to give the birds and the bees chat. 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:20.240 And she said something about the image you used on 0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:24.280 that slide had two adults in spacesuits holding two babies 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:27.600 in spacesuits. Wouldn't it be expensive to make spacesuits. 0:02:27.120 --> 0:02:29.200 For babies, all right, it's an engineering question. 0:02:29.360 --> 0:02:30.960 Yeah, And I think I. 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:33.760 Said something like I am so relieved that that's what 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:36.720 you asked, And then I explained, like, you know, sometimes 0:02:36.760 --> 0:02:40.120 it's hard using arts to explain concepts, because we didn't 0:02:40.120 --> 0:02:42.880 actually mean that people will probably be bringing babies in 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:45.160 space suits out on the surface because space radiation. You 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:46.959 probably wouldn't want to expose your baby to that on 0:02:47.000 --> 0:02:47.840 the Martian surface. 0:02:48.000 --> 0:02:51.120 And then you need like constantly new spacesuits as they grow. 0:02:51.600 --> 0:02:53.800 I know, as a parent of children who once grew 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:57.080 very rapidly, that's very frustrating how quickly they outgrow all 0:02:57.120 --> 0:02:57.560 their stuff. 0:02:57.600 --> 0:02:59.519 Oh my gosh. Yes, but I mean eventually we will 0:02:59.520 --> 0:03:01.919 need different shapes and sizes of space suits for the 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:04.400 diversity of body types that will be up there. But 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:07.800 my question for you is, have you ever worked with 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:11.320 an artist or use some art that didn't at all 0:03:11.440 --> 0:03:13.919 portray what you had intended and you didn't realize it 0:03:13.919 --> 0:03:17.000 would be taken seriously because you just meant it to 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:19.440 be like a cute, funny image about families in space, 0:03:19.440 --> 0:03:20.040 for example. 0:03:20.520 --> 0:03:22.840 Well, the stuff that I write about usually is pretty 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:27.560 family friendly, but often it's kind of abstract, and I 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:31.360 struggle sometimes to describe it accurately with words, and then 0:03:31.400 --> 0:03:34.960 I wonder, like, hmmm, how is my illustrator friend going 0:03:35.000 --> 0:03:37.240 to put this into a picture? Like what visual can 0:03:37.280 --> 0:03:40.520 you use to describe quantum fields and tie this all together? 0:03:41.040 --> 0:03:44.200 But I've been lucky to work with very talented illustrators 0:03:44.240 --> 0:03:47.960 who do a great job of making these exceptional visuals, 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:50.760 taking the abstract and making a concrete so that the 0:03:50.800 --> 0:03:53.000 reader can understand the concepts. 0:03:53.160 --> 0:03:56.080 To be clear, I think my artist collaborator, slash husband 0:03:56.360 --> 0:03:59.280 does a great job. But I think sometimes you just 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:01.680 assume that the audience will get that this is just 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:04.840 like a fun artistic image, as like a palette cleanser 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:07.360 for the difficult stuff we just told you. But you 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:09.880 know it doesn't always go over the way that you intended. 0:04:10.200 --> 0:04:12.920 Yeah, well, there's another fine line there, which is sometimes 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:14.960 you want to make jokes to lighten the mood, right. 0:04:15.280 --> 0:04:17.760 I remember in our first book, we talked about what 0:04:17.839 --> 0:04:20.920 space can do, and I'd written this space can bend, 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:24.880 it can expand, it can ripple, and Jorge drew a 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:28.360 hilarious little doodle of space bending and expanding and rippling, 0:04:28.400 --> 0:04:31.200 and then he added a fourth one of like space breakdancing, 0:04:31.800 --> 0:04:35.040 and you always got to wonder like, okay, is that 0:04:35.160 --> 0:04:38.360 ridiculous enough that people get Okay, that's obviously a joke 0:04:38.400 --> 0:04:41.080 to lighten the mood, or somebody out there being like, well, 0:04:41.160 --> 0:04:43.760 I don't know if space can ripple and expand maybe 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:44.599 it could breakdance. 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:45.279 What does that mean? 0:04:45.279 --> 0:04:47.159 We are the equations of breakdancing. 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:47.640 Yep. 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:49.440 So you always gott to walk that fine line. 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:51.480 Zach and I have had so many of those conversations 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:53.320 where he's like, people are going to get it's a joke, 0:04:53.360 --> 0:04:56.760 and I was like, maybe they won't. There are humorless 0:04:56.800 --> 0:04:59.479 people out there who will be confused. 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:01.960 And sometimes the reality is so ridiculous people might think 0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:04.760 you're making a joke. In our latest book about what 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:07.680 science Aliens Might do, we talk about how people tried 0:05:07.720 --> 0:05:10.520 to communicate with aliens, and there's a guy who wrote 0:05:10.640 --> 0:05:13.479 letters in the sand and set them on fire hoping 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:16.040 that Martians would read them. And that sounds like I'm 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:19.480 made up ridiculous example. So I remember adding a footnote 0:05:19.480 --> 0:05:22.239 being like, I know, we make a ridiculous example sometimes 0:05:22.240 --> 0:05:24.400 for humor. This is not one of those cases. 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:27.760 Yes, everyone while humans are just so crazy you need 0:05:27.800 --> 0:05:30.120 to be like, no, this isn't a joke. I'm not 0:05:30.160 --> 0:05:31.160 going into fiction here. 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:34.360 Amazing And if anybody's interested in that book, it's coming 0:05:34.360 --> 0:05:38.279 out in November. It's called Do Aliens Speak Physics? By 0:05:38.279 --> 0:05:39.920 it anywhere you get books, and. 0:05:39.880 --> 0:05:41.479 I read an early copy and I can tell you 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:42.760 it's amazing. 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:44.280 And we're gonna be talking about it a lot until 0:05:44.279 --> 0:05:44.760 it comes out. 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:47.400 Yep. Yeah, nice to have a platform. You know what 0:05:47.440 --> 0:05:48.279 else is awesome? 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:48.840 What's that? 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:53.000 Our listeners, they are so awesome and they ask such 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:56.200 amazing questions. And we've got like a question from kids 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:59.599 theme going on today, and so let's start with our 0:05:59.600 --> 0:06:02.320 first ques question from Ryan and thirteen year old Grace 0:06:02.480 --> 0:06:05.640 from the best states in these United States. 0:06:07.800 --> 0:06:09.560 I'm confused, they're not from California. 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:10.000 What are you. 0:06:09.960 --> 0:06:12.560 Talking about, oh, Daniel. 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:15.479 Despite their coming from Virginia, Let's hear about Grace's question. 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:17.960 Hey, Daniel and Kelly. My name is Ryan and I 0:06:18.000 --> 0:06:20.120 have my thirteen year old daughter, Grace here with me. 0:06:20.640 --> 0:06:22.400 We live in Virginia, and she came up with an 0:06:22.440 --> 0:06:25.800 interesting question after we discussed your episode on particles and 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:28.360 the current understanding that they are ripples in fields? 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:32.000 Hi, this is Grace, and here's my question. I don't 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:34.919 understand how ripples make things. For instance, how do a 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:37.240 bunch of ripples in a field somehow all add up 0:06:37.279 --> 0:06:40.400 to make a person or banana or sloth? Thanks for 0:06:40.400 --> 0:06:42.960 taking my question. We love the podcast all. 0:06:42.920 --> 0:06:45.719 Right, Daniel, As someone who is a huge fan of sloths, 0:06:45.839 --> 0:06:49.240 I now desperately want to understand how ripples help make 0:06:49.320 --> 0:06:50.160 up a sloth. 0:06:50.360 --> 0:06:53.159 I love this question because this is the whole point 0:06:53.200 --> 0:06:56.680 of physics, to take our everyday experience and explain it 0:06:56.720 --> 0:06:59.560 in terms of the microscopic stuff that's happening. To like 0:06:59.760 --> 0:07:02.839 pull back the veil and say what's really going on underneath? 0:07:03.240 --> 0:07:05.279 And it's cool to say, oh, what's going on underneath? 0:07:05.360 --> 0:07:08.000 Is this complicated thing with fields and particles and waves 0:07:08.000 --> 0:07:10.760 and whatever. But Grace is exactly right that the second 0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:13.200 part of that is to weave it together so that 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:16.200 it does explain our everyday experience. You've got to give 0:07:16.240 --> 0:07:19.080 a path sort of like an intellectual ladder, from the 0:07:19.080 --> 0:07:23.040 microscopic explanation back to the macroscopic to show how they 0:07:23.080 --> 0:07:25.680 come together. So thank you Grace for asking this question. 0:07:25.880 --> 0:07:28.440 It's a fantastic question, and I love that both banana's 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:32.680 and sloughts got featured exactly because what good is physics 0:07:32.680 --> 0:07:35.680 if it's not explaining biology. 0:07:36.720 --> 0:07:39.160 And maybe there's a banana sloth out there, oh that 0:07:39.200 --> 0:07:40.160 we could explain. 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:42.800 One day, delicious and easy to catch. 0:07:46.200 --> 0:07:47.360 Probably why they went extinct. 0:07:47.680 --> 0:07:50.239 So let's get to particles and ripples and quantum fields 0:07:50.240 --> 0:07:54.000 and all that. Grace's question is how ripples make things. 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:56.280 So let's zoom all the way back down to ripples, 0:07:56.280 --> 0:07:58.360 and then let's walk our way back up to the 0:07:58.400 --> 0:08:01.240 macroscopics to the sloth in the banana. So like one 0:08:01.280 --> 0:08:03.559 hundred years ago, we were trying to understand what stuff 0:08:03.640 --> 0:08:05.840 is made out of. We started taking stuff apart, and 0:08:05.840 --> 0:08:07.800 we realized it's made out of elements, and those elements 0:08:07.800 --> 0:08:10.120 are made out of atoms, and eventually we had little 0:08:10.120 --> 0:08:12.920 particles protons and neutrons and electrons, and back then, I 0:08:12.920 --> 0:08:15.960 think people were still thinking that those were little bits 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:18.920 of stuff that you could like pack together like legos 0:08:18.960 --> 0:08:21.560 to make bigger stuff that was the sort of microscopic 0:08:21.600 --> 0:08:25.640 to macroscopic, Like the legos were super duper tiny, almost 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:28.680 incomprehensibly tiny, and there were so many of them. You know, 0:08:28.680 --> 0:08:31.160 Avogado's number is a big number. But if you click 0:08:31.200 --> 0:08:33.480 them all together, you made macroscopic stuff. And that was 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:34.920 our understanding, right. 0:08:34.720 --> 0:08:36.280 And on the plus side, you can step on them 0:08:36.320 --> 0:08:37.120 and it doesn't hurt. 0:08:40.480 --> 0:08:41.760 The a particle legos. 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:44.439 Yes, But then we learned, oh, they're not really little 0:08:44.480 --> 0:08:48.920 bits of stuff. Actually, they're like waves. And quantum mechanics 0:08:49.000 --> 0:08:51.840 came around and told us that they don't have specific 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:56.360 locations and maybe these particles are actually tiny zero volume points. 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:59.160 And then quantum mechanics grew up and said, those waves 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:02.480 are actually even more important because the particles themselves are 0:09:02.600 --> 0:09:04.479 just waves and quantum fields. 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:05.760 And so that's where. 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:07.880 We are now that we understand that all the matter 0:09:07.920 --> 0:09:10.160 that's out there, the electron, the quarks inside the proton 0:09:10.200 --> 0:09:12.840 and the neutron, all these things are actually just ripples 0:09:12.960 --> 0:09:14.200 in quantum. 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:14.920 Fields, all right. 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:16.920 And there are a bunch of different kinds of fields. 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:20.240 We've talked about those before, right, And so are we 0:09:20.480 --> 0:09:23.160 talking about a very particular kind of field that makes 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:25.679 up bananas and slots or are all the fields relevant? 0:09:25.800 --> 0:09:27.800 So you're right, there are lots of different kinds of fields. 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:30.720 Every particle has a field. So the electron is a field, 0:09:30.720 --> 0:09:32.880 the muon has a field, the cow has a field, 0:09:32.920 --> 0:09:35.280 the top qrk has a field. Every different kind of 0:09:35.320 --> 0:09:37.280 particle has a field. We don't understand why there are 0:09:37.280 --> 0:09:40.280 so many. There're dozens of these fields. Every bit of 0:09:40.320 --> 0:09:42.600 space that's out there has all these fields sitting on 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:44.720 top of each other in the same chunk of space. 0:09:45.200 --> 0:09:47.120 It's kind of hard to wrap your mind around because 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:49.960 if you're thinking of like blankets, you know, blankets you 0:09:50.040 --> 0:09:52.560 stack because they can't be in the same location. But 0:09:52.600 --> 0:09:55.280 these fields are all in the same place, and they 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:58.720 can all oscillate independently. And you asked, which fields are 0:09:58.760 --> 0:10:01.280 we talking about in this case, we're talking mostly about 0:10:01.280 --> 0:10:04.360 the fields that make up us, which are electron fields, 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:06.960 and two of the cork fields, the upfield in the downfield. 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:09.080 So there are dozens of those fields out there, and 0:10:09.120 --> 0:10:11.680 there's like big fundamental questions about what that means and 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:13.240 how do we unify them, and it can be simplified, 0:10:13.240 --> 0:10:15.640 et cetera. But most of the matter in the universe 0:10:15.760 --> 0:10:18.200 is made out of particles which are oscillations in three 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:20.760 of those fields, the electron field and then the up 0:10:20.800 --> 0:10:23.760 and down cork fields which make the proton and the neutron. 0:10:24.080 --> 0:10:26.400 And how do you understand like a particle being an 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.360 oscillation of a field, what does that really mean? 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:29.520 What are we talking about? 0:10:29.960 --> 0:10:31.960 Well, when we say an oscillation of a field, we 0:10:32.040 --> 0:10:34.440 really mean that it's vibrating, like the value of the 0:10:34.440 --> 0:10:37.560 field is going up and down, and so because it's moving, 0:10:37.600 --> 0:10:40.680 it can have kinetic energy. And as it has different values, 0:10:40.720 --> 0:10:42.880 it can have potential energy. The way they like a 0:10:42.960 --> 0:10:45.400 book on a shelf has a different potential energy if 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:46.880 it's on a high point of the shelf or a 0:10:46.920 --> 0:10:49.839 low point on the shelf. Right, you like store energy 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:51.800 in a book by moving to the top of the shelf, 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:54.240 you release energy from the book when it falls off 0:10:54.280 --> 0:10:57.120 the shelf. The same way these fields oscillate. They go 0:10:57.200 --> 0:10:59.200 up and they go down, They slosh back and forth 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:03.160 between tential and kinetic energy, and so there's energy stored 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:05.439 in the field. So you should think of the particles 0:11:05.480 --> 0:11:08.319 as like not a little dot of stuff, but instead 0:11:08.520 --> 0:11:11.320 a little vibrating blob of energy in the field. 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:13.400 Oh way, already, like where this is going, I'm a 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:16.560 vibrating field of energy or made up of vibrating fields 0:11:16.559 --> 0:11:20.080 of energy, and If so, why are the sloths so slow? 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:22.840 Exactly, they are filled with energy. 0:11:22.960 --> 0:11:24.000 They should be all right. 0:11:24.040 --> 0:11:26.240 So now we have these little vibrating fields of energy. 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:28.520 Grace's question is how do you put that together to 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:29.679 make a banana. 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:29.920 Or a sloth? 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:32.960 Basically, these things are super duper tiny, but they're not 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:36.400 like little volume cubes like legos. How do you put 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:38.360 them together to make something big? 0:11:38.800 --> 0:11:39.240 Right? 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:42.280 Well, here's the crucial insight. You need the volume that 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:46.360 we experience. The reason things take up space is not 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:49.520 from the stuff that they make, but from their interactions 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:52.000 with each other. So it's not like you have two 0:11:52.000 --> 0:11:54.760 particles and they have surfaces and those surfaces click together, 0:11:55.240 --> 0:11:57.320 or even that they're like two tennis balls that you're 0:11:57.360 --> 0:12:01.600 packing into a space and their surfaces are particles have 0:12:01.720 --> 0:12:04.640 interactions with each other. They exchange energy. This energy we 0:12:04.640 --> 0:12:07.559 were talking about slashing in the electron field or slashing 0:12:07.559 --> 0:12:10.480 in the quarkfield. That energy can slide from one field 0:12:10.520 --> 0:12:13.240 to another. That's when an interaction is so. For example, 0:12:13.280 --> 0:12:16.600 an electron moving through space will also make ripples in 0:12:16.640 --> 0:12:21.360 the electromagnetic field the photons field because those two fields interact. 0:12:21.400 --> 0:12:24.440 There's a connection between those two fields and the ripples 0:12:24.440 --> 0:12:27.120 in the electromagnetic field will then push or pull on 0:12:27.320 --> 0:12:30.839 other electrons. So how do two electrons interact with each other? 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:33.760 Why do they repel? Because they are both making ripples 0:12:33.800 --> 0:12:36.840 in the electromagnetic field, which has the capacity to affect 0:12:36.880 --> 0:12:37.800 other electrons. 0:12:38.160 --> 0:12:39.920 So I'm going to try to tie this back to biology. 0:12:39.960 --> 0:12:42.680 So I'm thinking, you know, Christmas has ended and I'm 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:46.120 feeling like my body could do with fewer interactions. Is 0:12:46.160 --> 0:12:49.320 there is there a way to think about it, like 0:12:49.360 --> 0:12:52.080 as you go into calorie deficit, can you think about 0:12:52.120 --> 0:12:55.160 it as like electrons sort of leaving the electric field? 0:12:55.320 --> 0:12:57.040 Or am I just making this too complicated? 0:12:57.200 --> 0:12:58.959 I think there's a Christmas analogy if we can do 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:01.640 use to understand here. Think about what happens at a 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:04.199 Christmas party. Right when you put people into a room 0:13:04.200 --> 0:13:07.360 at a Christmas party, do they stack like sardines against 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:09.880 the wall or like physically phase on top of each 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:12.360 other and occupy the same space. No, they talk to 0:13:12.440 --> 0:13:15.320 each other and they get like a comfortable distance from 0:13:15.400 --> 0:13:17.520 each other. Right, So you're at a party, people are 0:13:17.520 --> 0:13:18.559 sort of scattered. 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:18.720 Through a room. 0:13:19.160 --> 0:13:22.200 You're all sipping your Christmas cocktails or whatever, and they're 0:13:22.240 --> 0:13:25.559 not squeezed and touching each other. Right, there's this comfortable 0:13:25.600 --> 0:13:27.520 distance because people are talking to each other and they 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:30.160 respect each other's personal space. The reason that we can 0:13:30.240 --> 0:13:32.880 generate volume in a banana from a bunch of tiny 0:13:32.960 --> 0:13:35.400 little particles, which are actually ripples in the fields, is 0:13:35.440 --> 0:13:37.640 for the same reason that they have their own little 0:13:37.640 --> 0:13:41.640 personal space. Their interactions keep them apart, and so like 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:45.440 inside your banana, are a bunch of little ripples that 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:48.439 are keeping their space between them because of their interactions. 0:13:48.480 --> 0:13:50.720 So the volume of the material comes from the bonds 0:13:50.760 --> 0:13:54.160 between these particles, these little ripples, not from like the 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:56.840 inherent volume of them, as they're stacked together on top 0:13:56.880 --> 0:13:59.000 of each other. So let's zoom all the way in 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:00.720 and then out again, just to make sure it all 0:14:00.760 --> 0:14:03.560 makes sense. We zoom as far in as we understand 0:14:03.600 --> 0:14:05.880 the nature of the universe. We have these little ripples 0:14:05.880 --> 0:14:08.960 and fields which are just little buzzing blobs of energy. Right, 0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:12.160 particles are not little scoops of universe stuff. They are 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:15.120 little blobs of buzzing energy in the field, and the 0:14:15.160 --> 0:14:17.240 fields interact with each other. So buzzing energy in the 0:14:17.280 --> 0:14:20.320 electron field also means buzzing in the electromagnetic field, and 0:14:20.360 --> 0:14:22.600 also in the Higgs field and all sorts of other fields. 0:14:22.680 --> 0:14:26.720 Whatever the electron interacts with and interactions between those fields 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:30.320 keep these little buzzing blobs in harmony and in balance 0:14:30.520 --> 0:14:33.280 and allow you to build up bigger things. So they're 0:14:33.320 --> 0:14:35.600 not little lego bricks that you click together, but they 0:14:35.680 --> 0:14:38.200 little buzzing blobs sort of in balance with each other, 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:40.960 keeping their space. And that's where the volume comes from. 0:14:41.160 --> 0:14:42.720 So you zoom all the way out and you look 0:14:42.720 --> 0:14:44.960 at a banana, should think of it as like a 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:48.520 matrix of these buzzing blobs that are all somehow in 0:14:48.600 --> 0:14:50.920 balance with each other because of their interactions. 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:53.360 It doesn't sound beautiful, but you know, I study dumb 0:14:53.400 --> 0:14:56.920 trucks full of dead fists, so who are to judge? 0:14:57.320 --> 0:14:59.240 No, but I think that is like peeling back a 0:14:59.320 --> 0:15:02.040 layer of reality, like seeing the matrix and like, oh, 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:04.600 this is what makes up the banana. And you know, 0:15:04.720 --> 0:15:08.000 what's a banana in your mind is your experience the banana, 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:11.200 poking on it, pushing on and tasting it, whatever, chasing 0:15:11.200 --> 0:15:14.360 that sloth, all these experiences of what build your sort 0:15:14.400 --> 0:15:16.800 of your mental construct of the banana. But it's nice 0:15:16.840 --> 0:15:20.000 to know, like mathematically, how that comes from the littlest 0:15:20.040 --> 0:15:22.120 bits it's made out of. So thank you Grace for 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:25.680 asking that question. And we're curious if this answered your 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:28.680 question and if you have follow ups, So we'll ship 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:30.360 this off to Grace and we'll hear what she. 0:15:30.400 --> 0:15:31.000 Has to say. 0:15:31.280 --> 0:15:33.600 I also don't think answers have to be beautiful, but 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:37.040 maybe that's because I'm a biologist. Our answers are rarely. 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:38.800 Beautiful, but often they're insightful. 0:15:38.920 --> 0:15:41.080 Yeah, I wasn't implying they weren't, Daniel. I don't know 0:15:41.080 --> 0:15:43.800 why you felt you needed to say that, well. 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:48.400 Because that's where the beauty comes from, right the inside. Like, oh, no, 0:15:48.520 --> 0:15:51.160 I understand this in a way I didn't before. Yeah, 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:52.840 it can still be gooey, it's true. 0:15:53.080 --> 0:15:56.360 Hi, Daniel Keilly, thank you so much for answering our question. 0:15:56.720 --> 0:15:59.040 I'm still not sure I understand all of it, but 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:01.040 it was really helpful here you explain it. 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:04.080 I agree, it's clear I need to change my mental 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:07.280 model of ways and particles stecking up like lego bricks 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:10.720 to make things like sloths and instead think about blobs 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.440 of energy. Thank you for all that you both do 0:16:13.680 --> 0:16:16.520 to help educate us and break down complex topics and 0:16:16.600 --> 0:16:19.320 have fun while doing it. I rate your answer a 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:20.680 solid A plus. 0:16:21.080 --> 0:16:22.000 Thank you so much. 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:43.480 Bye. 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:46.080 All right, we're back and the next question is from 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:49.120 a listener who, when they emailed us, was working through 0:16:49.160 --> 0:16:52.440 a very miserable cold. I believe they're feeling better now. 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:53.800 But here is their question. 0:16:54.280 --> 0:16:56.560 A common COLDE seems to have a lot of variants, 0:16:56.920 --> 0:16:59.560 But how quickly does it mutate? Such as for the 0:16:59.560 --> 0:17:02.680 common I'm suffering with at the moment, Is there a 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:06.720 quantifiable percentage of my sneezing and coughing that I accidentally 0:17:06.960 --> 0:17:11.400 spew onto others noticeably different compared to my original infection? 0:17:12.240 --> 0:17:16.640 Or are the variants pretty rare? But given the billions 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:19.480 of us who get a cold that can create variants, 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.359 a big number times a small percentage can have a 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:25.040 surprisingly noticeable number. 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:28.000 Help me out, all right, this is a great question, 0:17:28.080 --> 0:17:30.640 and it's sort of similar in spirit to the previous one, Right, 0:17:30.920 --> 0:17:35.040 getting a microscopic understanding of a common experience, in this case, 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:38.240 the common cold. So let's see if biology can provide 0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:41.680 the insights to give you that sense of understanding, even 0:17:41.720 --> 0:17:43.200 if we are talking about mucus. 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:46.439 Well, let's give it a shot, all right, So it 0:17:46.480 --> 0:17:50.320 gets complicated right from the beginning. The common cold. According 0:17:50.359 --> 0:17:53.160 to the Centers for Disease Control, this is defined as 0:17:53.160 --> 0:17:56.359 a viral infection of the upper respiratory track. Okay, okay, 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:58.960 but it turns out it's not caused by just one 0:17:59.040 --> 0:18:02.119 kind of virus. It's caused by something like over two 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:06.200 hundred different kinds of viruses. But depending on the time 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:09.080 of year, between fifty to eighty percent of the common 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:11.680 colds that people have are caused by a group of 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:15.560 viruses called the rhinoviruses. So we're going to answer Tim's 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:18.639 question based on data that we've gotten in labs that 0:18:18.680 --> 0:18:20.160 have looked at rhinoviruses. 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:23.320 So this is like asking, why is my house infected 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:25.400 with insects? Well, it turns out there's lots of different 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:27.120