1 00:00:08,600 --> 00:00:11,160 Speaker 1: Hey, Daniel, have we figured out yet what dark matter 2 00:00:11,360 --> 00:00:15,160 Speaker 1: is made out of? Checking? Checking, checking? Nope, not yet. 3 00:00:15,280 --> 00:00:17,080 Speaker 1: We'll have a new theory. I think it's made out 4 00:00:17,120 --> 00:00:21,640 Speaker 1: of everyone's lost socks. Oh man, it's not lost socks, 5 00:00:22,280 --> 00:00:26,040 Speaker 1: not even the really dark socks. No, they just aren't 6 00:00:26,160 --> 00:00:29,440 Speaker 1: enough socks in the universe to explain dark matter. All right, 7 00:00:29,480 --> 00:00:31,600 Speaker 1: it's not made out of socks. But have you found 8 00:00:31,600 --> 00:00:33,960 Speaker 1: the particle yet? It's made out of you know, no 9 00:00:34,120 --> 00:00:38,519 Speaker 1: sign so far. You just need to think outside the box. Well, 10 00:00:38,600 --> 00:00:40,880 Speaker 1: we're trying to be open minded. I mean, we're open 11 00:00:40,880 --> 00:00:43,400 Speaker 1: to any kind of particle, but what if it's not 12 00:00:44,080 --> 00:00:47,839 Speaker 1: even made out of particles? Then maybe asking a particle 13 00:00:47,880 --> 00:01:06,920 Speaker 1: physicist is the wrong approach. Hi am orhandmade cartoonists and 14 00:01:06,959 --> 00:01:10,319 Speaker 1: the creator of PhD comments. Hi, I'm Daniel. I'm a 15 00:01:10,360 --> 00:01:13,920 Speaker 1: particle physicist and I'm particularly good about thinking about particles. 16 00:01:14,000 --> 00:01:16,920 Speaker 1: And welcome to our podcast, Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, 17 00:01:17,000 --> 00:01:19,399 Speaker 1: a production of I Heart Radio in which we think 18 00:01:19,440 --> 00:01:22,760 Speaker 1: about everything in the universe and its particles. We try 19 00:01:22,800 --> 00:01:26,520 Speaker 1: to take all the big questions about life, the universe, 20 00:01:26,600 --> 00:01:30,280 Speaker 1: and everything and break them up into their smallest microscopic 21 00:01:30,319 --> 00:01:33,160 Speaker 1: little pieces so that we can all understand them, because 22 00:01:33,160 --> 00:01:36,400 Speaker 1: we all have a certain curiosity about what things are 23 00:01:36,520 --> 00:01:38,400 Speaker 1: made of. We see all the things around us and 24 00:01:38,400 --> 00:01:41,720 Speaker 1: we wonder, is that made out of what? And it's 25 00:01:41,760 --> 00:01:47,080 Speaker 1: fascinating how taking something apart is somehow explaining what it is. Right, 26 00:01:47,480 --> 00:01:50,120 Speaker 1: you look at something and you wonder, what is that thing? Well, 27 00:01:50,360 --> 00:01:53,040 Speaker 1: let me zoom in and see what it's made out of, 28 00:01:53,080 --> 00:01:56,440 Speaker 1: because that will give me some insight into what it is. Yeah. 29 00:01:56,480 --> 00:01:59,080 Speaker 1: This kind of strange that breaking something tells you what 30 00:01:59,120 --> 00:02:01,160 Speaker 1: it is. Yeah, I guess it tells you what's inside 31 00:02:01,400 --> 00:02:03,560 Speaker 1: or what the little bits it's made out of. Art 32 00:02:03,720 --> 00:02:05,960 Speaker 1: And it works for physics, not so much for society. 33 00:02:06,040 --> 00:02:07,960 Speaker 1: Like you meet a friend and you want to understand 34 00:02:07,960 --> 00:02:10,400 Speaker 1: what's their motivation. You don't like slice them up into 35 00:02:10,440 --> 00:02:16,000 Speaker 1: little pieces. Oh boy, that's dark. But in physics we 36 00:02:16,040 --> 00:02:18,600 Speaker 1: do that. We say, if we try to understand why 37 00:02:18,639 --> 00:02:20,600 Speaker 1: this wave works the way it does, or why this 38 00:02:20,760 --> 00:02:23,560 Speaker 1: hurricane turned left instead of right, we think that we 39 00:02:23,600 --> 00:02:25,840 Speaker 1: can explain it by breaking it into as small as 40 00:02:25,880 --> 00:02:29,440 Speaker 1: pieces and then somehow reassembling it mentally, understanding how those 41 00:02:29,440 --> 00:02:32,760 Speaker 1: small pieces work together to make the emergent phenomenon the 42 00:02:32,760 --> 00:02:35,240 Speaker 1: thing at the larger scale. Yeah, because there's a lot 43 00:02:35,240 --> 00:02:38,480 Speaker 1: of stuff out there in the universe, and by now 44 00:02:38,480 --> 00:02:40,040 Speaker 1: we know that a lot of it is made out 45 00:02:40,080 --> 00:02:42,720 Speaker 1: of atoms, and those atoms are made out of protons 46 00:02:42,760 --> 00:02:45,800 Speaker 1: and neutrons and electrons, and those protons and neutrons are 47 00:02:45,840 --> 00:02:48,560 Speaker 1: made out of quarks, and that's pretty much it. We 48 00:02:48,600 --> 00:02:52,120 Speaker 1: sort of know what most regular matter is made out of. 49 00:02:52,280 --> 00:02:54,560 Speaker 1: And this approach has worked pretty well. You know, a 50 00:02:54,639 --> 00:02:56,880 Speaker 1: hundreds or so years ago, we had all these weird 51 00:02:57,000 --> 00:02:59,840 Speaker 1: kinds of stuff, different kinds of metals and gases, and 52 00:03:00,000 --> 00:03:03,200 Speaker 1: all had different behavior, and we didn't understand why why 53 00:03:03,200 --> 00:03:05,720 Speaker 1: does this thing conduct electricity and this thing is active 54 00:03:05,720 --> 00:03:08,080 Speaker 1: and that thing is not. And now we found that 55 00:03:08,120 --> 00:03:12,000 Speaker 1: explanation precisely by peeling back a layer and digging deeper 56 00:03:12,000 --> 00:03:15,200 Speaker 1: and understanding what's going on inside. And it's all those 57 00:03:15,360 --> 00:03:18,960 Speaker 1: atomic orbitals and the electrons moving around, which precisely explains 58 00:03:18,960 --> 00:03:21,640 Speaker 1: that behavior and answers those questions. So, you know, we 59 00:03:21,720 --> 00:03:23,400 Speaker 1: make fun of it a little bit, but this approach 60 00:03:23,440 --> 00:03:26,680 Speaker 1: has been spectacularly successful. Yeah, And it's actually when you 61 00:03:26,720 --> 00:03:29,960 Speaker 1: step back, it's a little maybe surprising or interesting that 62 00:03:30,120 --> 00:03:32,680 Speaker 1: it is made out of little bits like matter, and 63 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:36,280 Speaker 1: everything we know about is made out of little tiny 64 00:03:36,480 --> 00:03:39,400 Speaker 1: lego bits that you can't break apart. It's pretty weird 65 00:03:39,520 --> 00:03:42,360 Speaker 1: because things seem smooth like you look around you and 66 00:03:42,400 --> 00:03:46,080 Speaker 1: things seem pretty much like continuous It's weird to imagine 67 00:03:46,320 --> 00:03:48,920 Speaker 1: that when you zoom in suddenly it looks different, that 68 00:03:49,000 --> 00:03:51,040 Speaker 1: it looks like it's made out of these tiny dots. 69 00:03:51,120 --> 00:03:54,400 Speaker 1: Is incredible that you can make something smooth out of 70 00:03:54,480 --> 00:03:57,280 Speaker 1: something that's not smooth. Yeah, the universe, I guess that 71 00:03:57,360 --> 00:04:01,440 Speaker 1: as hard is chunky, like chunky peanut butter. It's not smooth. Yeah, 72 00:04:01,600 --> 00:04:03,920 Speaker 1: it's incredible. It tells you that what you see with 73 00:04:03,960 --> 00:04:06,840 Speaker 1: your eyes, your idea of the universe, just from interactions 74 00:04:07,040 --> 00:04:10,160 Speaker 1: at this sort of size of stuff and speed, is 75 00:04:10,240 --> 00:04:12,520 Speaker 1: not fundamental to the universe. That you need to dig 76 00:04:12,600 --> 00:04:16,280 Speaker 1: deeper and peer into the smaller, smaller distances to understand 77 00:04:16,520 --> 00:04:18,800 Speaker 1: what the real rules are. Yeah, and I feel like 78 00:04:18,839 --> 00:04:22,200 Speaker 1: this idea is kind of really ingrained now for those 79 00:04:22,200 --> 00:04:24,839 Speaker 1: of us who know a little bit of physics and science. 80 00:04:25,000 --> 00:04:27,039 Speaker 1: Is it's just that it seems natural now to think 81 00:04:27,040 --> 00:04:29,599 Speaker 1: that everything is made out of little tiny pieces. Yeah, 82 00:04:29,640 --> 00:04:31,240 Speaker 1: And That's why it's fun, I think, to go back 83 00:04:31,240 --> 00:04:33,480 Speaker 1: to the Greeks and hear their discussions. You know, they 84 00:04:33,480 --> 00:04:36,039 Speaker 1: had no data, no evidence, but they were open to 85 00:04:36,160 --> 00:04:38,600 Speaker 1: lots of different ideas about how the world might work. 86 00:04:38,680 --> 00:04:43,040 Speaker 1: Like maybe it's made out of four smooth elemental things fire, air, water, 87 00:04:43,160 --> 00:04:46,200 Speaker 1: and earth. Right, maybe it's made out of some tiny bits, 88 00:04:46,279 --> 00:04:48,839 Speaker 1: or maybe they had all sorts of crazy, bonkers ideas. 89 00:04:48,880 --> 00:04:51,160 Speaker 1: But the cool thing about those ideas is that they 90 00:04:51,160 --> 00:04:53,880 Speaker 1: were trying to be as open minded as possible. They 91 00:04:53,880 --> 00:04:57,359 Speaker 1: were like trying to span completely the space of possible 92 00:04:57,480 --> 00:05:00,360 Speaker 1: universes we could live in. Yeah, so everything we see 93 00:05:00,360 --> 00:05:03,480 Speaker 1: around us is made out of those little tiny bit 94 00:05:03,680 --> 00:05:07,600 Speaker 1: quirks and electrons. But it turns out that that's not 95 00:05:07,800 --> 00:05:11,400 Speaker 1: all there is in the universe. There's a big part 96 00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:13,920 Speaker 1: of the universe that we can't see. Yeah, and that 97 00:05:13,960 --> 00:05:16,880 Speaker 1: makes us worry that maybe we've been led down the 98 00:05:17,000 --> 00:05:20,120 Speaker 1: rose Garden path a little bit. Maybe our success in 99 00:05:20,240 --> 00:05:23,080 Speaker 1: describing the kind of matter that we are made out of, 100 00:05:23,120 --> 00:05:25,640 Speaker 1: me and you and hamsters and ice cream and lava 101 00:05:25,880 --> 00:05:28,800 Speaker 1: has led us to over generalize and to imagine that 102 00:05:28,800 --> 00:05:31,920 Speaker 1: that's the same pattern that applies to everything in the universe, 103 00:05:32,080 --> 00:05:34,520 Speaker 1: but maybe it's not so to the on the podcast 104 00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:38,240 Speaker 1: will be asking a really fundamental question. We'll be asking, 105 00:05:43,000 --> 00:05:49,200 Speaker 1: can you have matter that's not made out of particles? Whoa? Whoa? 106 00:05:49,279 --> 00:05:51,760 Speaker 1: You just put me out of a job. Man, What 107 00:05:51,800 --> 00:05:55,280 Speaker 1: do you mean your job is not to explain things? Well, 108 00:05:55,320 --> 00:05:58,440 Speaker 1: you know, if of the matter in the universe is 109 00:05:58,480 --> 00:06:00,360 Speaker 1: the kind of matter that's made out of part nicles 110 00:06:00,800 --> 00:06:03,200 Speaker 1: and eighty five percent of it is something else, that 111 00:06:03,279 --> 00:06:07,440 Speaker 1: maybe of the physicists should not be particle physicists. Well, 112 00:06:07,720 --> 00:06:09,720 Speaker 1: I guess what you mean is that we know that 113 00:06:09,760 --> 00:06:12,520 Speaker 1: the regular matter that we know about, you know, things 114 00:06:12,600 --> 00:06:15,400 Speaker 1: made out of electrons and courts and protons and neutrons, 115 00:06:15,800 --> 00:06:20,159 Speaker 1: only accounts for fifteen percent of the matter in the universe. Yeah, 116 00:06:20,160 --> 00:06:22,679 Speaker 1: it's percent of the matter of the universe and five 117 00:06:22,760 --> 00:06:25,920 Speaker 1: percent of the energy of the universe, because two thirds 118 00:06:25,920 --> 00:06:27,600 Speaker 1: of the energy in the universe is this other thing 119 00:06:27,640 --> 00:06:30,800 Speaker 1: called dark energy. Yeah, but there's a whole eighty five 120 00:06:30,800 --> 00:06:34,240 Speaker 1: percent of matter in the universe that is not like 121 00:06:34,320 --> 00:06:37,039 Speaker 1: the stuff we know about. That's exactly right, And we're 122 00:06:37,040 --> 00:06:38,840 Speaker 1: spending a lot of time trying to figure out what 123 00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:40,599 Speaker 1: it is made out of. Is it this particle is 124 00:06:40,600 --> 00:06:43,560 Speaker 1: at that particle, but sometimes people wonder maybe it's not 125 00:06:43,640 --> 00:06:46,160 Speaker 1: a particle at all. Yeah, and that's crazy to think 126 00:06:46,200 --> 00:06:49,320 Speaker 1: about that. Maybe there are things that are not made 127 00:06:49,320 --> 00:06:51,240 Speaker 1: out of a little bit. What does that even mean? 128 00:06:51,360 --> 00:06:52,919 Speaker 1: What does that even mean? And that's why you have 129 00:06:52,960 --> 00:06:54,800 Speaker 1: to go back to the Greeks and wonder, like, well, 130 00:06:55,080 --> 00:06:56,840 Speaker 1: what are the ideas that we left, you know, more 131 00:06:56,880 --> 00:06:59,000 Speaker 1: than a hundred years ago on the side of the highway, 132 00:06:59,160 --> 00:07:01,680 Speaker 1: once we decided that everything was actually made out of 133 00:07:01,720 --> 00:07:04,039 Speaker 1: atoms and smaller bits. But to sort of go back 134 00:07:04,080 --> 00:07:08,160 Speaker 1: to that original grab bag of ideas and consider other alternatives. Yeah, 135 00:07:08,200 --> 00:07:11,000 Speaker 1: like maybe you could have matter that's not made out 136 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:15,400 Speaker 1: of particles, like things that have mass but not constituent 137 00:07:15,640 --> 00:07:18,960 Speaker 1: little pieces that what non particle matter would mean. Yeah, well, 138 00:07:18,960 --> 00:07:21,040 Speaker 1: we need to be open to other ideas. We don't 139 00:07:21,080 --> 00:07:23,280 Speaker 1: know what kind of things could be in the universe. 140 00:07:23,320 --> 00:07:25,440 Speaker 1: Particles is a kind of a Boner's idea, So we 141 00:07:25,520 --> 00:07:28,520 Speaker 1: just need to be like open to brand new ideas. 142 00:07:28,560 --> 00:07:31,280 Speaker 1: Maybe it's made out of totally smooth stuff that isn't 143 00:07:31,360 --> 00:07:33,920 Speaker 1: broken into little bits, or maybe it's made out of 144 00:07:33,960 --> 00:07:36,360 Speaker 1: something else where. The particles aren't as discreet. You know, 145 00:07:36,520 --> 00:07:40,040 Speaker 1: they're not counted by integers but by real numbers. All right, 146 00:07:40,080 --> 00:07:42,560 Speaker 1: So this is a pretty mind blowing question, and as 147 00:07:42,640 --> 00:07:45,680 Speaker 1: usual people wondering how many people out there I thought 148 00:07:45,680 --> 00:07:49,040 Speaker 1: about this question or might even have ideas about whether 149 00:07:49,080 --> 00:07:51,640 Speaker 1: it's possible. So, as usual, Daniel went out there into 150 00:07:51,640 --> 00:07:55,000 Speaker 1: the Internet and ask listeners if they thought that matter 151 00:07:55,360 --> 00:07:58,320 Speaker 1: could be made not out of particles. That's right, So 152 00:07:58,440 --> 00:08:02,800 Speaker 1: thank you to everybody who participated in this exercise in speculation. 153 00:08:03,120 --> 00:08:06,640 Speaker 1: If you would like to similarly speculate for our podcast, 154 00:08:06,760 --> 00:08:09,880 Speaker 1: please write to us two questions at Daniel and Jorge 155 00:08:10,040 --> 00:08:11,880 Speaker 1: dot com. So think about it for a second. Do 156 00:08:11,920 --> 00:08:14,280 Speaker 1: you think you can have matter that's not made out 157 00:08:14,320 --> 00:08:16,840 Speaker 1: of particles? Here's what people had to say. So, I 158 00:08:16,880 --> 00:08:20,000 Speaker 1: think that we don't actually know if dark matter is 159 00:08:20,080 --> 00:08:23,760 Speaker 1: made of particles, so dark matter may not be made 160 00:08:23,760 --> 00:08:27,720 Speaker 1: of particles. And also if there's something that makes up 161 00:08:27,920 --> 00:08:35,120 Speaker 1: the particles understandard model, then probably the particles themselves are 162 00:08:35,240 --> 00:08:39,439 Speaker 1: not made of particles. Well, nobody really knows what dark 163 00:08:39,520 --> 00:08:43,080 Speaker 1: matter is, so I guess that might be something that's 164 00:08:43,200 --> 00:08:46,080 Speaker 1: not a particle. The only other thing I can think 165 00:08:46,080 --> 00:08:49,360 Speaker 1: of is something like strange matter. My initial assumption is 166 00:08:49,400 --> 00:08:53,640 Speaker 1: that baryonic matta has to be made of particles, maybe 167 00:08:53,920 --> 00:08:58,120 Speaker 1: I think, but maybe not like dark matter, because as 168 00:08:58,160 --> 00:09:01,240 Speaker 1: I understanding, we have no idea. We have no idea. 169 00:09:01,520 --> 00:09:04,800 Speaker 1: By the book, I'd say that all matter that we 170 00:09:04,840 --> 00:09:08,840 Speaker 1: deal with on a regular basis is made of particles 171 00:09:08,880 --> 00:09:14,880 Speaker 1: like quirks and protons and electrons. But maybe dark matter 172 00:09:15,080 --> 00:09:21,000 Speaker 1: if you really consider that matter, dark matter, and dark energy. 173 00:09:21,400 --> 00:09:24,120 Speaker 1: So far, all of the matter we know these metal 174 00:09:24,200 --> 00:09:27,840 Speaker 1: particles actually feels but let's not get into that. We 175 00:09:27,960 --> 00:09:31,160 Speaker 1: think that the dark matter should also be metal particles, 176 00:09:31,200 --> 00:09:34,720 Speaker 1: but we haven't found any of that kind yet. So nope, 177 00:09:35,120 --> 00:09:38,160 Speaker 1: I don't think there is any matter that's not metal particles. 178 00:09:38,440 --> 00:09:43,120 Speaker 1: Matter by definition is a group of particles, So there 179 00:09:43,200 --> 00:09:46,480 Speaker 1: cannot be any matter and not made of particles. All right, 180 00:09:46,600 --> 00:09:50,760 Speaker 1: some pretty technical answers there. We have a pretty educated audience, 181 00:09:51,240 --> 00:09:54,120 Speaker 1: Yes we do. Good job listeners. A lot of folks 182 00:09:54,160 --> 00:09:56,640 Speaker 1: are keen in on this question of dark matter, so 183 00:09:56,800 --> 00:10:00,480 Speaker 1: good job. Yeah, and they even talk about pretty cool 184 00:10:00,520 --> 00:10:03,920 Speaker 1: neat like strange matter is that a thing. Strange matter 185 00:10:04,000 --> 00:10:06,240 Speaker 1: is a thing. It's matter made out of strange quarks. 186 00:10:06,280 --> 00:10:08,920 Speaker 1: We had a whole podcast about that and strange stars 187 00:10:08,960 --> 00:10:11,960 Speaker 1: that might be filled with strange matter. It's pretty awesome, 188 00:10:11,960 --> 00:10:14,280 Speaker 1: but it's definitely made of quarks, which means it's made 189 00:10:14,280 --> 00:10:17,199 Speaker 1: of particles. Even strange matter is made out of works 190 00:10:17,200 --> 00:10:20,640 Speaker 1: made out of little strange particles. It's pretty strange. So 191 00:10:20,679 --> 00:10:22,920 Speaker 1: I guess the question is, can you have matter that's 192 00:10:22,960 --> 00:10:26,520 Speaker 1: not made out of particles? And so um maybe steps 193 00:10:26,559 --> 00:10:29,040 Speaker 1: through here, Daniel. Is everything we know about made out 194 00:10:29,040 --> 00:10:31,360 Speaker 1: of particles so far, so far, everything that we've been 195 00:10:31,400 --> 00:10:34,200 Speaker 1: able to understand has been made out of particles. So 196 00:10:34,520 --> 00:10:38,080 Speaker 1: set aside dark energy, and set aside dark matter, and 197 00:10:38,080 --> 00:10:40,720 Speaker 1: focus on just the five percent of the universe that 198 00:10:40,880 --> 00:10:43,920 Speaker 1: science has been studying for the last few hundred years. 199 00:10:44,400 --> 00:10:47,480 Speaker 1: That portion of it, the stuff that's made out of atoms, 200 00:10:47,720 --> 00:10:50,400 Speaker 1: All of that is made out of particles. Right, So 201 00:10:50,720 --> 00:10:52,960 Speaker 1: I made out of atoms, and you're made out of atoms, 202 00:10:52,960 --> 00:10:55,520 Speaker 1: and stars are made out of atoms, and gas and 203 00:10:55,640 --> 00:10:58,280 Speaker 1: dust and and everything that we see and all that 204 00:10:58,280 --> 00:11:00,960 Speaker 1: stuff we're familiar with that's all made out of atoms. 205 00:11:01,400 --> 00:11:03,520 Speaker 1: And then you break those atoms apart, and you have 206 00:11:03,640 --> 00:11:07,960 Speaker 1: protons and neutrons and electrons flying around them. Break those 207 00:11:08,000 --> 00:11:10,800 Speaker 1: protons and neutrons apart, and inside them you have corks. 208 00:11:11,160 --> 00:11:14,040 Speaker 1: And that's as far as we've gotten. But everything that 209 00:11:14,080 --> 00:11:17,160 Speaker 1: we know, everything you've ever eaten, everything you've ever stepped on, 210 00:11:17,480 --> 00:11:20,840 Speaker 1: everything your little brother ever through it, you across the room, 211 00:11:20,960 --> 00:11:22,920 Speaker 1: has been made out of atoms, which means it's been 212 00:11:22,960 --> 00:11:25,480 Speaker 1: made out of particles. Yeah, all the stuff you can 213 00:11:25,559 --> 00:11:28,760 Speaker 1: see and touch, And it's even more amazing that even 214 00:11:28,920 --> 00:11:32,680 Speaker 1: the act of touching something is also made out of particles, 215 00:11:32,720 --> 00:11:34,920 Speaker 1: Like forces are also made out of particles. Yeah. The 216 00:11:34,920 --> 00:11:38,120 Speaker 1: way particles talk to each other is with forces. And 217 00:11:38,160 --> 00:11:40,400 Speaker 1: you can think about the way that happens in two ways. 218 00:11:40,480 --> 00:11:43,240 Speaker 1: One is having fields. You know these fields that every 219 00:11:43,240 --> 00:11:46,120 Speaker 1: particle has, like an electron has an electric field. But 220 00:11:46,200 --> 00:11:48,400 Speaker 1: another way to think about those fields is in terms 221 00:11:48,440 --> 00:11:51,400 Speaker 1: of particles. Like what happens when two electrons get close 222 00:11:51,480 --> 00:11:54,400 Speaker 1: to each other is they exchange photons. They shoot photons 223 00:11:54,440 --> 00:11:57,760 Speaker 1: at each other. A changing electric field is a photon. 224 00:11:57,840 --> 00:12:00,680 Speaker 1: Of photon is a way of carrying information and about 225 00:12:00,720 --> 00:12:03,760 Speaker 1: an electric field, for example, And so even your fridge 226 00:12:03,800 --> 00:12:07,680 Speaker 1: magnet uses photons to communicate when it moves and everything. 227 00:12:07,800 --> 00:12:11,600 Speaker 1: All particles shoot other particles at each other to push 228 00:12:11,679 --> 00:12:14,160 Speaker 1: to pull, to do any kind of communication. So it 229 00:12:14,200 --> 00:12:16,920 Speaker 1: really is a particle universe. I was just wondering, is 230 00:12:17,000 --> 00:12:19,559 Speaker 1: even energy made out of particles? Is energy made out 231 00:12:19,559 --> 00:12:22,960 Speaker 1: of particles? While that's an awesome question, you can imagine 232 00:12:22,960 --> 00:12:25,040 Speaker 1: it to be made out of particles in some context, 233 00:12:25,200 --> 00:12:28,240 Speaker 1: like light is a form of energy, and that's definitely 234 00:12:28,320 --> 00:12:30,920 Speaker 1: made of particles. When you think about heat, for example, 235 00:12:30,960 --> 00:12:34,120 Speaker 1: that's the vibration in you know, the crystal lattice of 236 00:12:34,120 --> 00:12:36,320 Speaker 1: a solid. We talked about how you can think about 237 00:12:36,360 --> 00:12:40,560 Speaker 1: that in terms of virtual particles like phonons and rotons, 238 00:12:40,679 --> 00:12:43,400 Speaker 1: and so in lots of cases, you can understand energy 239 00:12:43,440 --> 00:12:46,839 Speaker 1: in terms of particles, usually when it's discreete usually when 240 00:12:46,880 --> 00:12:49,599 Speaker 1: it's like quantized, and that usually happens when something is 241 00:12:49,640 --> 00:12:52,400 Speaker 1: confined or contained in some way, it's in a solid 242 00:12:52,559 --> 00:12:55,040 Speaker 1: or it's in a system. When things are just flying 243 00:12:55,040 --> 00:12:58,439 Speaker 1: out in space, just raw energy that it's harder sometimes 244 00:12:58,440 --> 00:13:01,240 Speaker 1: to think about in terms of particles. So I guess 245 00:13:01,360 --> 00:13:03,679 Speaker 1: energy doesn't have to be made out of particles, that 246 00:13:03,800 --> 00:13:06,080 Speaker 1: it can be any value. I'm trying to think about 247 00:13:06,120 --> 00:13:10,000 Speaker 1: an example of energy that isn't quantized, where it could 248 00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:12,560 Speaker 1: be any value, and I suppose you could think about 249 00:13:12,600 --> 00:13:16,000 Speaker 1: like an individual photon photon flying through space. It is 250 00:13:16,040 --> 00:13:19,360 Speaker 1: a particle, but it can have an arbitrary amount of energy, 251 00:13:20,200 --> 00:13:22,640 Speaker 1: all right, But you can only have one or two photons, 252 00:13:22,640 --> 00:13:26,320 Speaker 1: so that's still a particle. But another example is dark energy. 253 00:13:26,559 --> 00:13:29,120 Speaker 1: Dark energies most of the energy in the universe, and 254 00:13:29,160 --> 00:13:30,800 Speaker 1: we have no idea what it is. It might be 255 00:13:30,840 --> 00:13:33,720 Speaker 1: some new kind of field, might have a particle associated 256 00:13:33,760 --> 00:13:36,839 Speaker 1: with it, but we really just don't know. So it's 257 00:13:36,920 --> 00:13:40,400 Speaker 1: kind of strange then that you can have energy and 258 00:13:40,640 --> 00:13:42,960 Speaker 1: that's not made out of particles, but then once it 259 00:13:43,000 --> 00:13:47,720 Speaker 1: gets transformed into mass, then it does then to clustering 260 00:13:47,800 --> 00:13:49,960 Speaker 1: little bits. Yeah, And one thing to realize is that 261 00:13:50,040 --> 00:13:52,920 Speaker 1: particles is sort of something we do. It's a way 262 00:13:52,920 --> 00:13:56,400 Speaker 1: that we have to understand the universe. It's like something 263 00:13:56,480 --> 00:14:00,440 Speaker 1: we have done to organize our understanding, the experiments you've done, 264 00:14:00,720 --> 00:14:03,160 Speaker 1: and our thoughts about the way things work. There might 265 00:14:03,160 --> 00:14:05,400 Speaker 1: be other ways to think about the universe to explain 266 00:14:05,440 --> 00:14:08,680 Speaker 1: the phenomena we've seen, not using particles as sort of 267 00:14:08,679 --> 00:14:11,479 Speaker 1: a mental picture. If you talk to people in philosophy, 268 00:14:11,800 --> 00:14:13,960 Speaker 1: you know, they recognize that what we're doing in particle 269 00:14:14,000 --> 00:14:16,840 Speaker 1: physics is sort of building mental models which may or 270 00:14:16,880 --> 00:14:20,240 Speaker 1: may not reflect what's actually happening deep down in the universe. 271 00:14:20,400 --> 00:14:23,400 Speaker 1: I see, it just sort of looks like particles to us. 272 00:14:23,640 --> 00:14:26,720 Speaker 1: But maybe if you drill down even deeper, maybe you 273 00:14:26,760 --> 00:14:29,320 Speaker 1: could even get rid of this idea. Yeah, And there's 274 00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:32,680 Speaker 1: actually divide in the field about whether particles are the 275 00:14:32,720 --> 00:14:36,160 Speaker 1: more fundamental thing or whether fields are the more fundamental thing. 276 00:14:36,560 --> 00:14:38,800 Speaker 1: Like on one hand, people say, well, particles, they're just 277 00:14:38,840 --> 00:14:41,720 Speaker 1: like excitations of a field. The real fundamental thing in 278 00:14:41,760 --> 00:14:45,240 Speaker 1: the universe are these quantum fields that feel space. And 279 00:14:45,280 --> 00:14:47,560 Speaker 1: what is a particle? It's just like a place where 280 00:14:47,560 --> 00:14:49,440 Speaker 1: that field is wiggling a little bit, a little bit 281 00:14:49,480 --> 00:14:52,160 Speaker 1: of energy in that field. As you were saying, other 282 00:14:52,200 --> 00:14:54,640 Speaker 1: people say, no, no, no no, fields, you don't see them 283 00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:57,560 Speaker 1: ever directly. They're not the real thing. It's particles that 284 00:14:57,600 --> 00:15:00,280 Speaker 1: are real and fields are just another way to to 285 00:15:00,320 --> 00:15:03,160 Speaker 1: talk about virtual particles. So this sort of a division, 286 00:15:03,200 --> 00:15:05,240 Speaker 1: like what is the most fundamental thing in the universe? 287 00:15:05,320 --> 00:15:08,400 Speaker 1: Is it fields or is it particles? So I guess 288 00:15:08,440 --> 00:15:10,920 Speaker 1: if you ask the field people, then they will tell 289 00:15:10,960 --> 00:15:13,280 Speaker 1: you that most of the matter in the universe is 290 00:15:13,280 --> 00:15:15,320 Speaker 1: not made out of particles. It's made out of fields, 291 00:15:15,320 --> 00:15:17,560 Speaker 1: which are not quant Yeah, they would say that, you know, 292 00:15:17,640 --> 00:15:20,280 Speaker 1: particles is just a special case of a field. The 293 00:15:20,360 --> 00:15:22,720 Speaker 1: real thing in the universe is fields, and sometimes you 294 00:15:22,760 --> 00:15:25,560 Speaker 1: get energy in them, and then energy can move around 295 00:15:25,640 --> 00:15:28,120 Speaker 1: and like discrete units ensure you can call that a 296 00:15:28,160 --> 00:15:30,960 Speaker 1: particle if you like to. But I really just like 297 00:15:31,080 --> 00:15:33,160 Speaker 1: to think about the whole field. Why focus on the 298 00:15:33,200 --> 00:15:36,680 Speaker 1: one individual particle? And we started from the particle picture 299 00:15:36,720 --> 00:15:39,600 Speaker 1: because we found particles, like you know, J. J. Thompson 300 00:15:39,680 --> 00:15:42,640 Speaker 1: more than years ago, we found this electron started to 301 00:15:42,680 --> 00:15:45,160 Speaker 1: think about things made out of tiny little bits of 302 00:15:45,240 --> 00:15:48,120 Speaker 1: sort of a natural ideas, definitely a more natural idea 303 00:15:48,160 --> 00:15:51,040 Speaker 1: than imagining that everything which is like an excited state 304 00:15:51,080 --> 00:15:53,760 Speaker 1: of fields that fill the universe. And so yeah, a 305 00:15:53,840 --> 00:15:56,080 Speaker 1: person who thinks that fields of the fundamental thing in 306 00:15:56,120 --> 00:15:58,680 Speaker 1: the universe would say, particles, they're just like, you know, 307 00:15:59,120 --> 00:16:01,160 Speaker 1: they're a step along in the way. There's nothing real 308 00:16:01,240 --> 00:16:04,360 Speaker 1: about them. So well, I guess is that how you 309 00:16:04,360 --> 00:16:07,560 Speaker 1: would define it? Is like when a field gets excited 310 00:16:07,560 --> 00:16:09,720 Speaker 1: and wiggles and it sort of gets a little bit 311 00:16:09,720 --> 00:16:11,880 Speaker 1: of a bump there. Well, this is the deep, dark, 312 00:16:11,920 --> 00:16:14,880 Speaker 1: dirty secret of particle physics, which is that if you ask, 313 00:16:15,000 --> 00:16:18,320 Speaker 1: like five particle physicists what is a particle, you might 314 00:16:18,320 --> 00:16:21,880 Speaker 1: get five different answers. Right, So nobody even really agrees 315 00:16:21,920 --> 00:16:24,920 Speaker 1: on what it means to be a particle. You know, 316 00:16:25,000 --> 00:16:27,760 Speaker 1: you have the experimental people who say, well, I don't 317 00:16:27,760 --> 00:16:29,640 Speaker 1: know what you want to think about them theoretically, but 318 00:16:29,720 --> 00:16:31,800 Speaker 1: I know that I shoot one at another one, and 319 00:16:31,840 --> 00:16:33,920 Speaker 1: I can measure how they bounce off each other. So 320 00:16:33,960 --> 00:16:37,920 Speaker 1: it's this thing in my experiment. Somebody else might say, yeah, 321 00:16:37,920 --> 00:16:40,360 Speaker 1: it's just an excited state of these quantum fields that 322 00:16:40,400 --> 00:16:44,400 Speaker 1: I use in my calculations. And a mathematician might say, well, 323 00:16:44,480 --> 00:16:47,520 Speaker 1: I can use this group theory to describe the transformation 324 00:16:47,680 --> 00:16:50,360 Speaker 1: from one thing to another place in space. So really, 325 00:16:50,680 --> 00:16:55,080 Speaker 1: particles are like a physical manifestation of a mathematical construct, 326 00:16:55,400 --> 00:16:58,479 Speaker 1: you know, or a string theorist might say, a particles, 327 00:16:58,480 --> 00:17:01,080 Speaker 1: that's way too big. You need to do much deeper 328 00:17:01,360 --> 00:17:04,239 Speaker 1: and think about like the tiny vibrating strings that make 329 00:17:04,320 --> 00:17:08,040 Speaker 1: up everything in the universe, including particles, including fields. And 330 00:17:08,080 --> 00:17:10,719 Speaker 1: so nobody even really agrees about what a particle is. 331 00:17:11,640 --> 00:17:14,760 Speaker 1: And it could be that they're all right, right, Like, 332 00:17:14,800 --> 00:17:16,720 Speaker 1: it could be it's not that they're all wrong, or 333 00:17:16,760 --> 00:17:18,480 Speaker 1: that one of them is right and the rest of wrong. 334 00:17:18,480 --> 00:17:20,560 Speaker 1: It could be that you know, a particles, all of 335 00:17:20,640 --> 00:17:23,800 Speaker 1: these interesting things. Yeah, I think most likely they're all 336 00:17:23,880 --> 00:17:26,640 Speaker 1: right and they're all wrong. You know, particles are definitely 337 00:17:26,680 --> 00:17:30,280 Speaker 1: something weird, and why we're struggling is because there's something 338 00:17:30,320 --> 00:17:33,280 Speaker 1: new to us. They're not like anything we've experienced before. 339 00:17:33,680 --> 00:17:35,520 Speaker 1: And what we're doing all the time and physics is 340 00:17:35,560 --> 00:17:38,480 Speaker 1: trying to describe the unknown in terms of the known, 341 00:17:38,840 --> 00:17:41,959 Speaker 1: and so we're making analogies where maybe it's like a string, 342 00:17:42,400 --> 00:17:45,960 Speaker 1: maybe it's like a tiny little grain of matter, maybe 343 00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:48,640 Speaker 1: it's like waves in the ocean, and all of these 344 00:17:48,680 --> 00:17:52,240 Speaker 1: analogies fail because particles or whatever it is that makes 345 00:17:52,320 --> 00:17:55,199 Speaker 1: up the universe are fundamentally different from anything we know. 346 00:17:55,280 --> 00:17:57,800 Speaker 1: And so you know, they're all like successful in one 347 00:17:57,920 --> 00:18:00,920 Speaker 1: respect and unsuccessful in an another. And if we ever 348 00:18:01,000 --> 00:18:04,119 Speaker 1: do gain a true deep understanding of the nature of 349 00:18:04,200 --> 00:18:06,480 Speaker 1: the universe at its lowest scale, we're going to discover 350 00:18:06,920 --> 00:18:09,520 Speaker 1: why that is. Like, oh, it's this other weird thing. 351 00:18:09,560 --> 00:18:11,959 Speaker 1: And sometimes it does look like a particle, and sometimes 352 00:18:11,960 --> 00:18:14,040 Speaker 1: it does look like a field, and sometimes it does 353 00:18:14,119 --> 00:18:16,359 Speaker 1: look like a string. Sometimes it does look like something 354 00:18:16,359 --> 00:18:19,119 Speaker 1: that's none of those things. So I look forward to 355 00:18:19,160 --> 00:18:21,760 Speaker 1: the day that we have a deeper understanding of the 356 00:18:21,880 --> 00:18:24,359 Speaker 1: nature of the universe and we discover how all of 357 00:18:24,400 --> 00:18:27,720 Speaker 1: these ideas fit together into that larger picture. Yeah, and 358 00:18:27,720 --> 00:18:29,680 Speaker 1: you might be right and wrong at the same time. 359 00:18:30,320 --> 00:18:34,119 Speaker 1: It sounds like a pretty indefensible position. I'll be quantum right. 360 00:18:34,200 --> 00:18:36,200 Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's get into whether or not matter 361 00:18:36,680 --> 00:18:40,800 Speaker 1: can be made out of not particles and whether or 362 00:18:40,800 --> 00:18:43,760 Speaker 1: not we know that any such matter exists. But first 363 00:18:43,840 --> 00:18:59,520 Speaker 1: let's take a quick break. All right, we're asking the question, Daniel, 364 00:18:59,640 --> 00:19:03,840 Speaker 1: whether not matter cannot be made out of particle This 365 00:19:03,880 --> 00:19:06,840 Speaker 1: is a really strange question to ask Grammatically, I guess, 366 00:19:07,960 --> 00:19:11,480 Speaker 1: can matter be made out of non particles? Or can 367 00:19:11,560 --> 00:19:14,119 Speaker 1: matter and not be made out of particles? It's a 368 00:19:14,200 --> 00:19:17,200 Speaker 1: strange grammatical conundrum. How we're going to answer the science 369 00:19:17,280 --> 00:19:20,440 Speaker 1: question If we can't even get past the grammar question, right, Well, 370 00:19:20,640 --> 00:19:24,200 Speaker 1: we can just say we're right and wrong. It's both 371 00:19:24,200 --> 00:19:28,960 Speaker 1: grammatical and ungrammatically. We span the space of all possible answers. Yeah, now, 372 00:19:29,000 --> 00:19:30,680 Speaker 1: this is a really fun idea. I like to think 373 00:19:30,680 --> 00:19:34,320 Speaker 1: about it as non particle matter or not particle matter. 374 00:19:34,560 --> 00:19:36,560 Speaker 1: But it's actually a phrase for it now in the 375 00:19:36,560 --> 00:19:41,680 Speaker 1: theoretical physics community, they call it unparticle matter. And how 376 00:19:41,760 --> 00:19:44,720 Speaker 1: is that different than non particle matter? I don't know. 377 00:19:44,760 --> 00:19:46,440 Speaker 1: I think it's just fun to use the word. And 378 00:19:47,000 --> 00:19:49,919 Speaker 1: it sounds like the opposite, or like it's anti in 379 00:19:49,960 --> 00:19:53,520 Speaker 1: another way, different from anti matter. I see you sound hipper, 380 00:19:54,960 --> 00:19:56,919 Speaker 1: you know, when they make the science fiction movie about it, 381 00:19:56,920 --> 00:19:58,760 Speaker 1: I think the focus groups are gonna think that's got 382 00:19:58,800 --> 00:20:01,840 Speaker 1: like more of an edge to it. It's like conscious uncoupling. 383 00:20:02,640 --> 00:20:05,800 Speaker 1: It just sounds you know, more inspired or trendy. Yeah, 384 00:20:05,880 --> 00:20:08,520 Speaker 1: or it's just more mysterious. But it's a fun idea 385 00:20:08,560 --> 00:20:10,439 Speaker 1: and it's something people have been thinking about for like 386 00:20:10,480 --> 00:20:13,680 Speaker 1: the last and fifteen years seriously, Like, can we figure 387 00:20:13,720 --> 00:20:16,120 Speaker 1: out a way to talk about matter so that it's 388 00:20:16,160 --> 00:20:18,359 Speaker 1: not made out of particles? I guess maybe a first 389 00:20:18,400 --> 00:20:22,800 Speaker 1: question is what would make something qualify as matter in 390 00:20:22,840 --> 00:20:25,119 Speaker 1: the first place? Is it that it has mass or 391 00:20:25,160 --> 00:20:28,160 Speaker 1: that it feels gravity? What would be the specific definition there? 392 00:20:28,320 --> 00:20:30,359 Speaker 1: Boy man, this is a deep episode. If we're going 393 00:20:30,400 --> 00:20:32,919 Speaker 1: to talk about what matter even means, I think it 394 00:20:32,960 --> 00:20:36,040 Speaker 1: needs to be some sort of localization of energy. And 395 00:20:36,080 --> 00:20:38,360 Speaker 1: you know, I would say mass, because usually that implies 396 00:20:38,400 --> 00:20:41,360 Speaker 1: having a mass, but a photon, for example, is a particle. 397 00:20:41,600 --> 00:20:43,479 Speaker 1: I don't know if you would actually call a photon 398 00:20:43,520 --> 00:20:45,879 Speaker 1: to be part of matter, but it has energy and 399 00:20:45,920 --> 00:20:48,200 Speaker 1: it's you know, it's a localization of energy that moves 400 00:20:48,240 --> 00:20:51,720 Speaker 1: through the universe. It's consistent, it's discrete, it transformed in 401 00:20:51,760 --> 00:20:53,960 Speaker 1: ways that makes sense. But here I think we're trying 402 00:20:54,000 --> 00:20:55,800 Speaker 1: to talk about matter in the sense of things that 403 00:20:55,880 --> 00:21:00,000 Speaker 1: have mass, because really this is motivated by not understand 404 00:21:00,040 --> 00:21:02,040 Speaker 1: ending where most of the mass in the universe is 405 00:21:02,080 --> 00:21:04,440 Speaker 1: coming from, what it's made out of. So I think 406 00:21:04,440 --> 00:21:06,520 Speaker 1: we should talk about, you know, stuff, things that have 407 00:21:07,240 --> 00:21:10,959 Speaker 1: mass to them, that have substance, that have gravitational energy. 408 00:21:11,160 --> 00:21:13,199 Speaker 1: So I guess that would be a good definition. Is 409 00:21:13,240 --> 00:21:16,600 Speaker 1: that it feels gravity or are you talking about like 410 00:21:16,720 --> 00:21:20,520 Speaker 1: whether it's hard to move or to push it or both? Yeah? Both. 411 00:21:20,560 --> 00:21:23,440 Speaker 1: I mean, I think we can accept Einstein's equivalence principle 412 00:21:23,680 --> 00:21:27,959 Speaker 1: and suggest that inertia and gravitational energy are related. And 413 00:21:28,000 --> 00:21:30,800 Speaker 1: so we're looking for how to build some stuff something 414 00:21:30,840 --> 00:21:33,280 Speaker 1: that has mass to it that changes the shape of 415 00:21:33,320 --> 00:21:35,840 Speaker 1: space around it, but it is somehow not made out 416 00:21:35,840 --> 00:21:39,280 Speaker 1: of tiny little particles like a blob. When you look 417 00:21:39,280 --> 00:21:42,520 Speaker 1: at it closer, it doesn't resolve into little bits, like 418 00:21:42,560 --> 00:21:45,680 Speaker 1: it's just stuff that's there, but it has mass exactly. 419 00:21:45,680 --> 00:21:48,800 Speaker 1: And the technical phrase for this is that it's scale invariant, 420 00:21:48,880 --> 00:21:51,160 Speaker 1: and what that means is that as you zoom in, 421 00:21:51,400 --> 00:21:54,720 Speaker 1: it never looks different, like you look at matter under 422 00:21:54,760 --> 00:21:57,520 Speaker 1: the microscope. And if you imagine cranking of a microscope, 423 00:21:57,520 --> 00:22:00,040 Speaker 1: you have some super powerful one. You could crank it 424 00:22:00,119 --> 00:22:03,719 Speaker 1: up really powerfully. You would eventually see that the cookie 425 00:22:03,840 --> 00:22:06,600 Speaker 1: or whatever it is that's under your microscope is not smooth, 426 00:22:06,640 --> 00:22:08,639 Speaker 1: but it's made out of tiny little bits. You can 427 00:22:08,680 --> 00:22:10,960 Speaker 1: actually see the shape of the atoms and the crystal 428 00:22:11,000 --> 00:22:14,960 Speaker 1: lattice that formed them. But non particle matter or unparticle matter, 429 00:22:15,040 --> 00:22:18,080 Speaker 1: whatever this is, this blob would always look the same 430 00:22:18,200 --> 00:22:20,600 Speaker 1: under your microscope, no matter how much you zoomed in. 431 00:22:20,760 --> 00:22:23,040 Speaker 1: It would always look kind of fuzzy, I guess, like 432 00:22:23,080 --> 00:22:25,640 Speaker 1: a liquid. It would always look kind of smooth. If 433 00:22:25,640 --> 00:22:27,879 Speaker 1: you like mathematics, you can think of this as related 434 00:22:27,920 --> 00:22:30,960 Speaker 1: to fractals. You know, fractals are these patterns which have 435 00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:34,159 Speaker 1: structure to them. They're not totally smooth, but as you 436 00:22:34,240 --> 00:22:36,520 Speaker 1: zoom in you just see more and more of the 437 00:22:36,600 --> 00:22:39,159 Speaker 1: same structure. It's not like you zoom in past a 438 00:22:39,200 --> 00:22:41,600 Speaker 1: certain scale and then that's it. You found, like the 439 00:22:41,640 --> 00:22:44,280 Speaker 1: base lego unit it's made out of As you zoom in, 440 00:22:44,320 --> 00:22:47,760 Speaker 1: you just keep seeing more and more structure. All right, 441 00:22:47,800 --> 00:22:51,120 Speaker 1: So then what are some ideas for this, Like theoretically, 442 00:22:51,520 --> 00:22:54,920 Speaker 1: what are some possibilities for having matter that's not made 443 00:22:54,920 --> 00:22:57,159 Speaker 1: out of particles? So in two thousand and seven there 444 00:22:57,200 --> 00:22:59,159 Speaker 1: was this guy at Harvard, Howard George, I is a 445 00:22:59,200 --> 00:23:02,199 Speaker 1: famous particle of exist He had an idea theoretically for 446 00:23:02,240 --> 00:23:05,840 Speaker 1: how you could like build this thing out of weird fields. 447 00:23:05,880 --> 00:23:08,000 Speaker 1: So you take fields which are like the things that 448 00:23:08,160 --> 00:23:11,119 Speaker 1: fill space currently. You know, we have the electromagnetic field. 449 00:23:11,480 --> 00:23:14,000 Speaker 1: We have fields for all the particles, the quarks and 450 00:23:14,000 --> 00:23:16,600 Speaker 1: the electrons. He said, what if we have a new field, 451 00:23:16,880 --> 00:23:19,040 Speaker 1: but the energy in this field is sort of different, 452 00:23:19,320 --> 00:23:21,760 Speaker 1: and that it doesn't come together to make a particle. 453 00:23:22,040 --> 00:23:25,280 Speaker 1: It never sort of coalesces into these discrete units with 454 00:23:25,400 --> 00:23:28,520 Speaker 1: fixed mass that you can treat as particles. So he 455 00:23:28,560 --> 00:23:31,080 Speaker 1: wrote this paper and he called it un particles, and 456 00:23:31,080 --> 00:23:33,679 Speaker 1: it sort of set the theoretical world on fire for 457 00:23:33,720 --> 00:23:36,000 Speaker 1: a few years. Really what does that mean? He burned 458 00:23:36,040 --> 00:23:40,000 Speaker 1: down the house, people freaked out, and also was his 459 00:23:40,080 --> 00:23:43,760 Speaker 1: far made out of particles? Well, theoretical physics can be 460 00:23:43,840 --> 00:23:46,200 Speaker 1: a little bit driven by fads. You know, somebody gets 461 00:23:46,200 --> 00:23:48,640 Speaker 1: an idea that people are excited about it, so other 462 00:23:48,640 --> 00:23:51,119 Speaker 1: people write papers and like, oh, that's exciting, and then 463 00:23:51,160 --> 00:23:52,960 Speaker 1: they write papers and the whole community sort of like 464 00:23:53,119 --> 00:23:55,200 Speaker 1: moves off in a new direction for a while because 465 00:23:55,200 --> 00:23:58,399 Speaker 1: they think, oh, somebody's cracked open a new idea we 466 00:23:58,440 --> 00:24:00,720 Speaker 1: can build on and we can come up with something new, 467 00:24:01,280 --> 00:24:03,720 Speaker 1: because you know, they're in a little bit stuck, like 468 00:24:04,080 --> 00:24:06,760 Speaker 1: particle physics has not figured out what the universe has 469 00:24:06,800 --> 00:24:08,880 Speaker 1: made out of. We've been sort of going in circles 470 00:24:08,920 --> 00:24:10,600 Speaker 1: a little bit for the last ten or twenty years. 471 00:24:10,600 --> 00:24:13,240 Speaker 1: Their folks out there who think everything we're doing is wrong, 472 00:24:13,720 --> 00:24:16,439 Speaker 1: we're barking up the wrong tree. And so anytime somebody 473 00:24:16,480 --> 00:24:19,479 Speaker 1: comes up with something that seems really fresh, something novel, 474 00:24:19,760 --> 00:24:22,640 Speaker 1: that's like creates a whole new area where you can play, 475 00:24:22,680 --> 00:24:24,840 Speaker 1: like a new kind of toy to add to your 476 00:24:24,880 --> 00:24:28,439 Speaker 1: mathematical toolkit. Then it's fun. And so people started writing papers, 477 00:24:28,440 --> 00:24:30,679 Speaker 1: and they were like hundreds of papers written about un 478 00:24:30,720 --> 00:24:34,760 Speaker 1: particles for a few years. Were they interesting or uninteresting? 479 00:24:35,520 --> 00:24:37,520 Speaker 1: They were pretty interesting, and they built on each other, 480 00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:40,959 Speaker 1: you know. They had unparticles and they had on resonances 481 00:24:41,040 --> 00:24:45,000 Speaker 1: and unmatter and un protons. Basically they attacked an unto 482 00:24:45,080 --> 00:24:47,960 Speaker 1: everything and everybody got a paper out of it. It 483 00:24:48,040 --> 00:24:51,639 Speaker 1: was like the I mac and iPad of the nineties. 484 00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:56,840 Speaker 1: Crazy exactly, the I particle. All right, well, what's the 485 00:24:56,880 --> 00:25:00,200 Speaker 1: basic idea? Is it like like a field that can 486 00:25:00,200 --> 00:25:02,399 Speaker 1: wiggle in any way, it doesn't have to wiggle and 487 00:25:02,600 --> 00:25:05,959 Speaker 1: little clumps. Yeah, exactly. And these are still quantum fields, 488 00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:09,200 Speaker 1: and so they should still have discrete units of energy 489 00:25:09,280 --> 00:25:12,359 Speaker 1: in them, and so you still have blobs of energy 490 00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:14,560 Speaker 1: that move around in the field. But you can't call 491 00:25:14,600 --> 00:25:18,240 Speaker 1: them particles because they don't have definite masses. Like all 492 00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:20,399 Speaker 1: the particles are we familiar with. We don't really know 493 00:25:20,440 --> 00:25:22,560 Speaker 1: what a particle is. But one thing we do know 494 00:25:22,640 --> 00:25:24,719 Speaker 1: is that particles all have the same mass. Like an 495 00:25:24,760 --> 00:25:28,680 Speaker 1: electron here is an electron there. Every electron has exactly 496 00:25:28,720 --> 00:25:31,320 Speaker 1: the same mass, and that's sort of like the identity 497 00:25:31,400 --> 00:25:34,280 Speaker 1: of the electron. So what makes the electron different, for example, 498 00:25:34,400 --> 00:25:37,280 Speaker 1: from the muan, which is very closely related but has 499 00:25:37,400 --> 00:25:39,800 Speaker 1: more mass. It's what makes the up and the charm 500 00:25:39,800 --> 00:25:42,600 Speaker 1: and the top corks different, that they have different masses. 501 00:25:43,080 --> 00:25:45,720 Speaker 1: And so for particles they have a fixed mass. That's 502 00:25:45,720 --> 00:25:50,159 Speaker 1: something everybody can agree on. These unparticles, they are little 503 00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:52,679 Speaker 1: wiggles in some new field that they don't have a 504 00:25:52,680 --> 00:25:55,399 Speaker 1: definite mass. You can have one of any mass, and 505 00:25:55,440 --> 00:25:59,040 Speaker 1: the mass of an individual one of these unparticles can 506 00:25:59,119 --> 00:26:03,200 Speaker 1: change as it was around And is that theoretically possible? 507 00:26:03,240 --> 00:26:05,320 Speaker 1: Like does it work with the math? Like can you 508 00:26:05,400 --> 00:26:09,760 Speaker 1: make us such a feel that has varying anything and 509 00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:13,760 Speaker 1: still sort of fit or play with the other fields 510 00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:16,240 Speaker 1: in your physics equations? Yeah, and that's what they got 511 00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:18,800 Speaker 1: so excited about because Howard georgia I sort of figured 512 00:26:18,800 --> 00:26:21,879 Speaker 1: out the fundamental theoretical basis for this. He put together 513 00:26:21,920 --> 00:26:25,600 Speaker 1: a field that exactly had those properties that had either 514 00:26:25,720 --> 00:26:28,080 Speaker 1: particles with varying mass or you can also think about 515 00:26:28,080 --> 00:26:31,320 Speaker 1: it as like particles with all possible masses, like a 516 00:26:31,440 --> 00:26:34,719 Speaker 1: spectrum of masses instead of having discrete masses like this 517 00:26:34,840 --> 00:26:38,320 Speaker 1: number and that number have a whole different set of masses. 518 00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:41,359 Speaker 1: And so yeah, he figured out like the fundamental theoretical 519 00:26:41,440 --> 00:26:43,560 Speaker 1: mechanics of how to make that work, how to do 520 00:26:43,600 --> 00:26:47,440 Speaker 1: the calculations, and think about like, well, can unparticles interact 521 00:26:47,520 --> 00:26:49,840 Speaker 1: with particles? What does that look like? What does the 522 00:26:49,920 --> 00:26:52,720 Speaker 1: force look like where it's admitted by a particle and 523 00:26:52,720 --> 00:26:55,480 Speaker 1: then absorbed by an unparticle. And so he sort of 524 00:26:55,560 --> 00:26:58,439 Speaker 1: laid the groundwork, and everybody else went off scurrying to 525 00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:00,960 Speaker 1: follow up on it and build other ideas on top 526 00:27:00,960 --> 00:27:05,760 Speaker 1: of it. Everyone's like, Wow, that's unbelievable. But you know, 527 00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:08,000 Speaker 1: I guess it's sort of almost feels like a more 528 00:27:08,200 --> 00:27:11,119 Speaker 1: natural idea. Like when I think of a field or 529 00:27:11,520 --> 00:27:13,720 Speaker 1: a field of energy, it sort of makes sense that 530 00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:16,439 Speaker 1: it can wiggle anyway at once, it can have any value. 531 00:27:16,840 --> 00:27:20,280 Speaker 1: It's almost like the weird part is that regular quantum 532 00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:24,159 Speaker 1: fields behave with particles. Why would feel that premious? The 533 00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:28,120 Speaker 1: entire universe be constrained to only have, you know, bumps 534 00:27:28,160 --> 00:27:30,760 Speaker 1: that look like electrons, and all of them should look 535 00:27:30,800 --> 00:27:34,800 Speaker 1: the same. Why couldn't you have electrons of different masses? Yeah? Absolutely. 536 00:27:34,960 --> 00:27:36,959 Speaker 1: I got two things to say to that. One is, 537 00:27:37,040 --> 00:27:40,760 Speaker 1: I totally agree particles are a weird idea, And I imagine, 538 00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:43,760 Speaker 1: you know, what was it like when Democratus proposed that 539 00:27:43,920 --> 00:27:46,720 Speaker 1: the universe was made out of Adams thousands of years ago. 540 00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:49,880 Speaker 1: Did the Greeks hear that idea and they think that's bonkers, man, 541 00:27:50,000 --> 00:27:52,919 Speaker 1: that's ridiculous and just sort of discarded because it seems 542 00:27:52,920 --> 00:27:56,640 Speaker 1: so weird and so counter to their experience. Right, And 543 00:27:56,920 --> 00:27:59,480 Speaker 1: so you're right, particles are weird. But the second thing 544 00:27:59,520 --> 00:28:01,280 Speaker 1: I have to say to that is that the universe 545 00:28:01,400 --> 00:28:04,080 Speaker 1: is weird. Right. A lot of times we've discovered things 546 00:28:04,080 --> 00:28:05,679 Speaker 1: in the universe that don't make sense to us, that 547 00:28:05,760 --> 00:28:08,760 Speaker 1: don't seem natural. We shouldn't just be on the lookout 548 00:28:08,800 --> 00:28:12,320 Speaker 1: for natural solutions to our questions, because the reason we're 549 00:28:12,320 --> 00:28:14,960 Speaker 1: doing sciences have a rigorous way to figure out what 550 00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:17,960 Speaker 1: the actual answers are, regardless of whether they're what we 551 00:28:18,040 --> 00:28:21,320 Speaker 1: expected or even really know how to understand. So we've 552 00:28:21,320 --> 00:28:23,879 Speaker 1: got to open our minds all sorts of different kinds 553 00:28:23,880 --> 00:28:26,480 Speaker 1: of ideas. It might be particles, it might be unparticles, 554 00:28:26,520 --> 00:28:29,560 Speaker 1: it might be something totally different. Are you saying the 555 00:28:29,640 --> 00:28:34,320 Speaker 1: universe is unnatural? It's unexpected on universe that would be 556 00:28:34,320 --> 00:28:39,600 Speaker 1: too unun in one word, the universe exactly that cancels 557 00:28:39,600 --> 00:28:43,680 Speaker 1: out to just the verse Yeah, we're dropping verses here, 558 00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:47,040 Speaker 1: folks were freestyle and physics, right, we are the eminem 559 00:28:47,200 --> 00:28:51,440 Speaker 1: of physics here the d n J and yeah, so 560 00:28:51,520 --> 00:28:55,200 Speaker 1: we had this new theoretical tool and nobody really understood, like, well, 561 00:28:55,240 --> 00:28:57,120 Speaker 1: what does it mean and what would it be like? 562 00:28:57,560 --> 00:29:00,120 Speaker 1: Can we figure out if these things are real? And 563 00:29:00,120 --> 00:29:02,360 Speaker 1: so then it sort of moved over to the experimental 564 00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:04,560 Speaker 1: side of the question. People started trying to play with like, well, 565 00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:07,000 Speaker 1: how would we find these things? What would they look like? 566 00:29:07,400 --> 00:29:10,040 Speaker 1: I can isolate them with experiments, and so that was 567 00:29:10,080 --> 00:29:11,920 Speaker 1: a lot of fun to think about. All right, well, 568 00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:16,560 Speaker 1: let's get into this idea of a particle matter and 569 00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:19,080 Speaker 1: whether or not it can even exist and whether we 570 00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:22,680 Speaker 1: have even any evidence that it can or does exist. 571 00:29:23,360 --> 00:29:38,120 Speaker 1: But first let's take another quick break. All right, we're 572 00:29:38,160 --> 00:29:41,640 Speaker 1: talking about matter that is not made out of particles. 573 00:29:41,840 --> 00:29:44,760 Speaker 1: Is that even possible? Could you have matter out their 574 00:29:44,960 --> 00:29:48,880 Speaker 1: fields of energy that can take any former shape or 575 00:29:48,920 --> 00:29:54,840 Speaker 1: any level of matterness? And if it even exists, Daniel, 576 00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:57,120 Speaker 1: does it even exist? We have any clues about whether 577 00:29:57,120 --> 00:29:59,400 Speaker 1: it exists or how could we even look for matter 578 00:29:59,520 --> 00:30:01,680 Speaker 1: that doesn't looked like particles? Yeah, we don't have a 579 00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:04,240 Speaker 1: lot of clues that it does exist, except that we 580 00:30:04,320 --> 00:30:08,160 Speaker 1: have a big unsolved mystery, right, And that's what a 581 00:30:08,200 --> 00:30:10,920 Speaker 1: lot of our listeners were referring to in the questions 582 00:30:10,920 --> 00:30:13,880 Speaker 1: on the street, and that's this question of dark matter. 583 00:30:14,360 --> 00:30:16,840 Speaker 1: You know, we know that the matter we've been studying 584 00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:19,440 Speaker 1: for hundreds of years is made out of particles, and 585 00:30:19,480 --> 00:30:21,920 Speaker 1: it's very well explained in terms of particles. And so 586 00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:24,720 Speaker 1: this particle picture of the universe has been sort of 587 00:30:24,760 --> 00:30:27,520 Speaker 1: like transcendent. It's like taken over the way we think 588 00:30:27,560 --> 00:30:30,920 Speaker 1: about physics and the universe and everything. But remember that 589 00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:34,120 Speaker 1: it just describes the tiny little slice of the pie. 590 00:30:34,680 --> 00:30:37,280 Speaker 1: And we've made this mistake many times in the history 591 00:30:37,320 --> 00:30:40,640 Speaker 1: of science of over generalizing, of understanding one thing and 592 00:30:40,640 --> 00:30:43,360 Speaker 1: then assuming that everything is the same way. I mean, 593 00:30:43,400 --> 00:30:47,080 Speaker 1: even the original discovery of particles that happened. Remember J. J. Thompson. 594 00:30:47,320 --> 00:30:49,840 Speaker 1: He discovered the electron and he thought, oh, well, maybe 595 00:30:49,920 --> 00:30:52,760 Speaker 1: this is the only particle. Maybe everything is just made 596 00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:55,480 Speaker 1: out of electrons. And that seems ridiculous to us. Now 597 00:30:55,520 --> 00:30:57,080 Speaker 1: we know there's lots of particles, and now I'll have 598 00:30:57,120 --> 00:30:59,240 Speaker 1: to come together. But that was just an example of 599 00:30:59,280 --> 00:31:02,040 Speaker 1: over general line thing. And it's the same over generalization 600 00:31:02,080 --> 00:31:04,360 Speaker 1: to say, look, we have all these particles. They describe 601 00:31:04,400 --> 00:31:07,480 Speaker 1: five percent of the universe. Maybe they describe everything. It 602 00:31:07,600 --> 00:31:10,560 Speaker 1: just seems like a really sort of leveraged bet. And 603 00:31:10,600 --> 00:31:13,480 Speaker 1: the other chunk of the universe is dark matter. We've 604 00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:16,040 Speaker 1: tried to describe in terms of particles and figure out 605 00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:19,280 Speaker 1: what that particle is, but so far we've failed over 606 00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:21,920 Speaker 1: and over and over and over again. We're well past 607 00:31:22,000 --> 00:31:24,240 Speaker 1: the point where we thought we would figure out what 608 00:31:24,280 --> 00:31:27,160 Speaker 1: the dark matter particle would be. So it's a good 609 00:31:27,200 --> 00:31:29,800 Speaker 1: idea to think about other kind of matter that dark 610 00:31:29,840 --> 00:31:33,080 Speaker 1: matter might be. Yeah, I guess there's a whole bunch 611 00:31:33,080 --> 00:31:35,600 Speaker 1: of matter out there in the universe that doesn't seem 612 00:31:35,640 --> 00:31:37,480 Speaker 1: to play with our kind of matter. So is that 613 00:31:37,520 --> 00:31:40,040 Speaker 1: sort of a clue. Does the theory sort of suggested? 614 00:31:40,480 --> 00:31:42,840 Speaker 1: Maybe a reason that we haven't seen it with our 615 00:31:42,880 --> 00:31:46,200 Speaker 1: particles is the fact that it's not made out of particles. Yeah, exactly. 616 00:31:46,240 --> 00:31:48,880 Speaker 1: That is definitely one explanation, and you know, we shouldn't 617 00:31:48,880 --> 00:31:51,200 Speaker 1: poop on it too much. Like there is a theory 618 00:31:51,360 --> 00:31:54,560 Speaker 1: of dark matter made out of particles, which still works. 619 00:31:54,880 --> 00:31:57,880 Speaker 1: It makes sense and and it's very well tested, but 620 00:31:57,960 --> 00:32:00,760 Speaker 1: we haven't found that particle. Yet and remember what we 621 00:32:00,800 --> 00:32:02,920 Speaker 1: know about dark matter. We know that there's a lot 622 00:32:02,960 --> 00:32:05,960 Speaker 1: of it, right of the matter in the universe and 623 00:32:06,760 --> 00:32:09,520 Speaker 1: all the energy and the universe is dark matter. So 624 00:32:09,560 --> 00:32:13,120 Speaker 1: we know that it creates gravity, and it holds galaxies together, 625 00:32:13,240 --> 00:32:16,160 Speaker 1: and it's shaped the whole structure and formation of the 626 00:32:16,160 --> 00:32:18,560 Speaker 1: shape of the universe. We also know a lot about 627 00:32:18,640 --> 00:32:21,480 Speaker 1: like it's temperature. We know that it flows through the universe, 628 00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:24,000 Speaker 1: but it's not moving really really fast because I would 629 00:32:24,080 --> 00:32:26,280 Speaker 1: change the whole structure of the universe if it flowed 630 00:32:26,320 --> 00:32:29,160 Speaker 1: around and got really smooth. And we know that it 631 00:32:29,240 --> 00:32:31,880 Speaker 1: sort of acts like this fluid. It's like a fluid 632 00:32:31,880 --> 00:32:34,240 Speaker 1: with no pressure, with no viscosity, because we think it 633 00:32:34,280 --> 00:32:37,560 Speaker 1: doesn't like bump into itself. So we have this picture 634 00:32:37,920 --> 00:32:41,520 Speaker 1: which explains everything we see if dark matter was made 635 00:32:41,560 --> 00:32:44,520 Speaker 1: out of a massive little particle. But we can't seem 636 00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:47,760 Speaker 1: to find that particle. We keep doing experiments looking for 637 00:32:47,800 --> 00:32:51,120 Speaker 1: that particle, you know, experiments like waiting for dark matter 638 00:32:51,240 --> 00:32:55,720 Speaker 1: to bump into a big, heavy, quiet blob of xenon underground, 639 00:32:56,280 --> 00:32:59,560 Speaker 1: or creating dark matter and colliders, or waiting for dark 640 00:32:59,600 --> 00:33:01,800 Speaker 1: matter to mash into itself and give off a tiny 641 00:33:01,800 --> 00:33:04,480 Speaker 1: little flash of light, and we haven't ever seen any 642 00:33:04,560 --> 00:33:07,560 Speaker 1: of those things. And all the theories we had about 643 00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:09,960 Speaker 1: this dark matter particle, a lot of them predicted we 644 00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:12,040 Speaker 1: would have seen it by now. So we're sort of 645 00:33:12,040 --> 00:33:14,600 Speaker 1: trying to get more creative about the kind of particle 646 00:33:14,760 --> 00:33:17,680 Speaker 1: it could be that explains all this stuff and all 647 00:33:17,720 --> 00:33:20,480 Speaker 1: hangs together. But a definitely an important idea to keep 648 00:33:20,480 --> 00:33:23,640 Speaker 1: considering is that maybe it's not a particle at all, right, 649 00:33:23,760 --> 00:33:26,560 Speaker 1: but maybe you know, just because we haven't seen it 650 00:33:26,680 --> 00:33:29,360 Speaker 1: or interactive with it, doesn't mean that it's not made 651 00:33:29,360 --> 00:33:31,920 Speaker 1: out of particles, right like it, it could be a particle. 652 00:33:31,960 --> 00:33:34,600 Speaker 1: It's just a particle that doesn't like our kind of 653 00:33:34,600 --> 00:33:37,760 Speaker 1: particle or that doesn't field all the other forces. Absolutely, 654 00:33:37,840 --> 00:33:40,400 Speaker 1: it's still very much could be a particle. It could 655 00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:42,920 Speaker 1: just be a particle that feels and no other forces 656 00:33:43,000 --> 00:33:46,320 Speaker 1: other than gravity and so basically just ignores us. You know, 657 00:33:46,400 --> 00:33:48,440 Speaker 1: we have this great question on the podcast last week 658 00:33:48,520 --> 00:33:50,240 Speaker 1: or so, somebody said, what would you do if you 659 00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:52,880 Speaker 1: had a box of dark matter? And I said, you know, 660 00:33:52,880 --> 00:33:54,760 Speaker 1: I would shoot particles at it because I would want 661 00:33:54,760 --> 00:33:57,920 Speaker 1: to see do those particles bounce back at all? And Essentially, 662 00:33:57,960 --> 00:33:59,480 Speaker 1: that's the way of trying to like probe it, trying 663 00:33:59,480 --> 00:34:01,400 Speaker 1: to like zoom me in on what it is. Because 664 00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:04,800 Speaker 1: shooting tiny particles that's something is sort of like using 665 00:34:04,800 --> 00:34:07,480 Speaker 1: a microscope to study it. That's what the most powerful 666 00:34:07,480 --> 00:34:12,240 Speaker 1: microscopes are anyway. They're like scanning electron microscopes. They shoot 667 00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:14,960 Speaker 1: little beams of particles. It's something to try to understand 668 00:34:15,000 --> 00:34:17,600 Speaker 1: the shape of its surface based on how things bounce 669 00:34:17,640 --> 00:34:20,759 Speaker 1: off of it. And that's how the original particles were discovered, right, Like, 670 00:34:20,880 --> 00:34:23,799 Speaker 1: how did we figure out that matter had nuclei in it? 671 00:34:24,160 --> 00:34:27,640 Speaker 1: Rutherford shot particles at something and saw that occasionally they 672 00:34:27,680 --> 00:34:29,920 Speaker 1: bounced back. So that's how you sort of like zoom 673 00:34:29,920 --> 00:34:33,000 Speaker 1: in on something and understand its nature. So we're trying 674 00:34:33,040 --> 00:34:34,879 Speaker 1: to do that with dark matter, but we haven't sort 675 00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:38,160 Speaker 1: of found anything that bounces back. It hasn't interacted with 676 00:34:38,200 --> 00:34:40,920 Speaker 1: our particles yet. But yeah, it could still just be 677 00:34:41,000 --> 00:34:44,440 Speaker 1: sort of a snobbish particle that ignores all of our particles. 678 00:34:45,600 --> 00:34:49,480 Speaker 1: In your theory, Daniel, that's not particle. Maybe it just 679 00:34:49,480 --> 00:34:51,480 Speaker 1: doesn't want to interact because the pandemic, you know, it's 680 00:34:51,520 --> 00:34:57,040 Speaker 1: just following good social distancing. Socially responsible particle. Yeah, but 681 00:34:57,160 --> 00:35:00,239 Speaker 1: the other explanation is that maybe it's not made out 682 00:35:00,239 --> 00:35:03,400 Speaker 1: of particles. And the reason that you know, this imagined 683 00:35:03,400 --> 00:35:05,719 Speaker 1: experiment where you're shooting a beam of particles at a 684 00:35:05,719 --> 00:35:08,359 Speaker 1: blob of dark matter, the reason that you don't see 685 00:35:08,400 --> 00:35:11,200 Speaker 1: anything is because it's made out of this field. Dark 686 00:35:11,239 --> 00:35:13,920 Speaker 1: matter is made out of this field of unparticles, and 687 00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:17,520 Speaker 1: so there aren't like these discrete units, these lego bricks, 688 00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:20,200 Speaker 1: which if you shoot particles at the right energy you 689 00:35:20,239 --> 00:35:22,960 Speaker 1: sort of find the gaps between them, because in the 690 00:35:23,200 --> 00:35:25,919 Speaker 1: un particle field, there are no gaps between them. There's 691 00:35:25,920 --> 00:35:29,080 Speaker 1: like an infinite number of kinds of unparticles in there, 692 00:35:29,320 --> 00:35:31,719 Speaker 1: all with different masses and sort of like filling it 693 00:35:31,760 --> 00:35:34,000 Speaker 1: up and to make a sort of a smooth, continuous 694 00:35:34,040 --> 00:35:36,799 Speaker 1: shape that you can't probe using particles. Wait, so how 695 00:35:36,840 --> 00:35:40,400 Speaker 1: would dark matter being not made out of particles explain 696 00:35:40,440 --> 00:35:43,560 Speaker 1: why we can't interact with it? Like, wouldn't there still 697 00:35:43,640 --> 00:35:47,400 Speaker 1: be energy and mass there for our particles to bump into. 698 00:35:48,239 --> 00:35:50,160 Speaker 1: Or are you saying that it's kind of like it 699 00:35:50,239 --> 00:35:52,520 Speaker 1: could be there and there could be energy and mass, 700 00:35:52,520 --> 00:35:55,520 Speaker 1: but it's so kind of spread out and smooth that 701 00:35:56,000 --> 00:35:58,200 Speaker 1: our particles don't really know what to do with it. Yeah, 702 00:35:58,239 --> 00:36:00,360 Speaker 1: it has to do with the other interaction that this 703 00:36:00,400 --> 00:36:03,759 Speaker 1: stuff has. Because remember, while dark matter has energy and 704 00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:06,839 Speaker 1: mass and so it feels gravity, that's basically something that's 705 00:36:06,920 --> 00:36:10,440 Speaker 1: negligible of the particle level, Like the gravitational pull of 706 00:36:10,520 --> 00:36:13,640 Speaker 1: dark matter on any particle is basically zero. And because 707 00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:16,800 Speaker 1: particles have such small masses and gravity is so weak 708 00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:19,960 Speaker 1: that we can't even understand like the gravitational effect on 709 00:36:19,960 --> 00:36:22,640 Speaker 1: a single particle. And also we don't even have a 710 00:36:22,680 --> 00:36:25,239 Speaker 1: theory of gravity that works for particles. Our theory of 711 00:36:25,239 --> 00:36:27,759 Speaker 1: gravity only works for sort of like larger objects. We 712 00:36:27,800 --> 00:36:30,480 Speaker 1: have no quantum theory of gravity, so you can't really 713 00:36:30,480 --> 00:36:34,080 Speaker 1: interact with dark matter on the particle level using gravity, 714 00:36:34,200 --> 00:36:35,960 Speaker 1: which is the only way we know how to interact 715 00:36:36,040 --> 00:36:38,640 Speaker 1: with dark matter. So all of these studies where we're 716 00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:41,320 Speaker 1: trying to probe the nature of dark matter are assuming 717 00:36:41,480 --> 00:36:44,479 Speaker 1: or hoping that there's some other kind of interaction, there's 718 00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:47,440 Speaker 1: some new interaction between the particles were shooting at the 719 00:36:47,520 --> 00:36:51,239 Speaker 1: dark matter and the dark matter itself. And so if 720 00:36:51,280 --> 00:36:53,879 Speaker 1: that's not true, if there's no interaction, that doesn't really matter. 721 00:36:53,920 --> 00:36:57,040 Speaker 1: If it's particles or unparticles or zoom particles or zim particles. 722 00:36:57,320 --> 00:37:00,320 Speaker 1: You just can't probe it using particles if it doesn't 723 00:37:00,360 --> 00:37:03,120 Speaker 1: interact with those particles at all. So it's kind of 724 00:37:03,160 --> 00:37:05,560 Speaker 1: two things. That could be an unparticle and it could 725 00:37:05,600 --> 00:37:10,000 Speaker 1: also separately just be ignoring us. There's almost like two 726 00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:12,319 Speaker 1: problems there, yeah, exactly, and we we sort of set 727 00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:14,920 Speaker 1: aside the is it just ignoring us one because if 728 00:37:14,920 --> 00:37:17,440 Speaker 1: that's the case, the whole field is hopeless. Like if 729 00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:21,080 Speaker 1: dark matter is something new particle or un that just 730 00:37:21,200 --> 00:37:24,759 Speaker 1: has no interactions with us other than gravity, will never 731 00:37:24,800 --> 00:37:26,960 Speaker 1: really figure out what it's made out of because gravity 732 00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:29,680 Speaker 1: is just so weak it's so difficult to use as 733 00:37:29,719 --> 00:37:32,799 Speaker 1: an instrumental tool to understand what dark matter is made 734 00:37:32,800 --> 00:37:35,040 Speaker 1: out of that this question of like what dark matter 735 00:37:35,080 --> 00:37:37,000 Speaker 1: is made out of is basically hopeless. So we sort 736 00:37:37,040 --> 00:37:39,359 Speaker 1: of set that aside because it's impossible, and we say, 737 00:37:39,760 --> 00:37:42,520 Speaker 1: let's assume dark matter has some kind of way to 738 00:37:42,560 --> 00:37:45,480 Speaker 1: interact with us, and let's try to look forward that 739 00:37:45,520 --> 00:37:47,680 Speaker 1: way to interact and then use that to figure out 740 00:37:47,960 --> 00:37:49,480 Speaker 1: is it made out of this kind of particle or 741 00:37:49,480 --> 00:37:53,200 Speaker 1: that kind of particle or an unparticle. Well, I feel 742 00:37:53,239 --> 00:37:55,760 Speaker 1: like maybe you're sort of saying that maybe there's stuff 743 00:37:55,760 --> 00:37:59,719 Speaker 1: out there that could just be like pure energy almost right, 744 00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:04,040 Speaker 1: because energy also sort of has mass, right, energy is mass? 745 00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:07,680 Speaker 1: Energy does bend space like mass does. And are you 746 00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:11,080 Speaker 1: saying that maybe this on particle matter is basically just 747 00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:14,560 Speaker 1: like a buzz of energy or localized energy. Yeah, exactly, 748 00:38:14,840 --> 00:38:17,799 Speaker 1: It's more smooth and continuous than localized. If you like 749 00:38:17,880 --> 00:38:20,440 Speaker 1: to think about particles, you can imagine as made out 750 00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:23,279 Speaker 1: of lots of particles, all of different sizes, and so 751 00:38:23,320 --> 00:38:25,399 Speaker 1: that no matter how you zoom in, it always sort 752 00:38:25,440 --> 00:38:28,320 Speaker 1: of looks the same. But you can't really like break 753 00:38:28,320 --> 00:38:30,880 Speaker 1: off a piece and say here, I have one of them, right, 754 00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:34,080 Speaker 1: The mass of the particles themselves sort of always changing, 755 00:38:34,719 --> 00:38:36,600 Speaker 1: and so yeah, it could be that dark matter is 756 00:38:36,640 --> 00:38:38,560 Speaker 1: made out of this new, weird kind of stuff that 757 00:38:38,640 --> 00:38:41,560 Speaker 1: can't be broken off into these separate lego pieces, but 758 00:38:41,640 --> 00:38:44,239 Speaker 1: instead is made out of these like weird kinds of 759 00:38:44,400 --> 00:38:48,800 Speaker 1: bits of stuff that are constantly changing what their mass is. Wow, 760 00:38:49,040 --> 00:38:53,359 Speaker 1: it's undecided. It's difficult to grapple with. And I can't 761 00:38:53,360 --> 00:38:56,120 Speaker 1: tell if that's because we've spend so much time thinking 762 00:38:56,160 --> 00:38:58,879 Speaker 1: about the universe has made of particles that it's hard 763 00:38:58,920 --> 00:39:02,200 Speaker 1: to think about something made of anything different, or if 764 00:39:02,239 --> 00:39:05,560 Speaker 1: it's just because it's difficult to think about mathematically cool, 765 00:39:05,680 --> 00:39:08,160 Speaker 1: Well all right, well, so where is the field right now? 766 00:39:08,280 --> 00:39:11,160 Speaker 1: Like you said, it was popular back in the early 767 00:39:11,400 --> 00:39:14,239 Speaker 1: two thousand's and there was a lot of buzz and 768 00:39:14,239 --> 00:39:16,279 Speaker 1: a lot of people were blown away. But where is 769 00:39:16,320 --> 00:39:19,480 Speaker 1: it now? Do we have any progress or results? I 770 00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:21,840 Speaker 1: guess you could say we have some un results. People 771 00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:25,759 Speaker 1: have figured out how unparticles could be made in colliders. 772 00:39:25,800 --> 00:39:29,440 Speaker 1: So you smash two protons together, and if those protons 773 00:39:29,480 --> 00:39:33,200 Speaker 1: have some interaction with this unparticle field, then it could 774 00:39:33,239 --> 00:39:36,160 Speaker 1: deposit some of that energy into that field. And you know, 775 00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:39,479 Speaker 1: particle colliders were used to making new particles. In this case, 776 00:39:39,520 --> 00:39:42,879 Speaker 1: we'd be depositing the energy into the unparticle field. Make 777 00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:45,799 Speaker 1: this like you know, localized blob of stuff which you 778 00:39:45,880 --> 00:39:48,799 Speaker 1: can't call a particle, but you might still sort of 779 00:39:48,960 --> 00:39:52,000 Speaker 1: get a clue that it exists in our detector in 780 00:39:52,040 --> 00:39:54,480 Speaker 1: the same way that you can see invisible stuff in 781 00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:57,840 Speaker 1: our detector. Because it bounces off of visible stuff. You 782 00:39:57,920 --> 00:40:01,520 Speaker 1: might like create some particle and some un particles and 783 00:40:01,520 --> 00:40:04,480 Speaker 1: they shoot off in opposite directions, and by seeing the particles, 784 00:40:04,520 --> 00:40:07,400 Speaker 1: you can infer by a conservation of momentum that the 785 00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:10,440 Speaker 1: particles must have been there. So people figured out a 786 00:40:10,440 --> 00:40:13,040 Speaker 1: way that this could be produced in colliders and you 787 00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:15,200 Speaker 1: might be able to get a clue that it had happened, 788 00:40:15,239 --> 00:40:18,440 Speaker 1: even if you can't see the unparticles directly. And we 789 00:40:18,520 --> 00:40:20,960 Speaker 1: looked for them and we didn't see them, so so 790 00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:24,279 Speaker 1: far there's no experimental evidence that particles are a thing 791 00:40:24,840 --> 00:40:28,239 Speaker 1: or that they exist at all. And theoretically the field 792 00:40:28,320 --> 00:40:30,960 Speaker 1: sort of moved on. There was this like big flurry 793 00:40:30,960 --> 00:40:32,920 Speaker 1: of papers in two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight, 794 00:40:32,920 --> 00:40:35,319 Speaker 1: two thousand nine, and then everybody sort of got tired 795 00:40:35,320 --> 00:40:37,760 Speaker 1: of the idea and they moved on to some new idea, 796 00:40:38,080 --> 00:40:39,799 Speaker 1: and there haven't really been a lot of papers about 797 00:40:39,800 --> 00:40:42,360 Speaker 1: it recently. I guess you would expect to see it 798 00:40:42,400 --> 00:40:45,600 Speaker 1: in a collider, like if you collide to particles and 799 00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:49,200 Speaker 1: some energy just kind of magically disappears, right or like 800 00:40:49,280 --> 00:40:53,520 Speaker 1: you know, if energy disappeared in varying quantities, because I 801 00:40:53,520 --> 00:40:55,920 Speaker 1: think right now, when you smash particles you always get 802 00:40:56,000 --> 00:40:59,760 Speaker 1: kind of these discrete or you can account for everything, 803 00:40:59,800 --> 00:41:02,600 Speaker 1: and everything seems to fall into these neat boxes. But 804 00:41:02,640 --> 00:41:04,960 Speaker 1: if you found it, you know, energy sort of disappeared 805 00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:07,959 Speaker 1: at weird grates, then you may be like, oh, maybe 806 00:41:07,960 --> 00:41:10,560 Speaker 1: there is a field out there that can absorb these 807 00:41:10,680 --> 00:41:14,160 Speaker 1: varying energies. Yeah, that's exactly right. And so we're looking 808 00:41:14,200 --> 00:41:17,000 Speaker 1: for is something out there which is invisible, right, but 809 00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:20,640 Speaker 1: absorbs our energies to the energies you say, seems to disappear, 810 00:41:20,960 --> 00:41:23,279 Speaker 1: and it would operate differently from other fields that we 811 00:41:23,320 --> 00:41:26,279 Speaker 1: know about their invisible, like neutrinos or or other things 812 00:41:26,280 --> 00:41:29,080 Speaker 1: where we know energy can disappear into because as you say, 813 00:41:29,320 --> 00:41:32,040 Speaker 1: those are particles and so they're discrete in a certain way, 814 00:41:32,040 --> 00:41:34,880 Speaker 1: and sort of the statistical spectrum of what these results 815 00:41:34,920 --> 00:41:38,720 Speaker 1: would look like is different for un particles and for neutrinos, 816 00:41:38,760 --> 00:41:41,560 Speaker 1: just for that reason. All right, Well, it sounds like 817 00:41:42,320 --> 00:41:45,960 Speaker 1: we have no evidence for un particle matter, but we 818 00:41:46,080 --> 00:41:48,680 Speaker 1: can completely rule it out yet, right, that's right, we 819 00:41:48,719 --> 00:41:51,359 Speaker 1: can't completely rule it out. And I think theoretically it's 820 00:41:51,360 --> 00:41:53,280 Speaker 1: a great exercise. It's the kind of thing we should 821 00:41:53,320 --> 00:41:56,000 Speaker 1: be doing, stretching our minds and making sure that we're 822 00:41:56,000 --> 00:41:59,160 Speaker 1: not too focused on one sort of category of ideas. 823 00:41:59,560 --> 00:42:01,520 Speaker 1: It could be that we look back on physics and 824 00:42:01,640 --> 00:42:04,000 Speaker 1: a hundred years and say, man, those guys spend a 825 00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:06,439 Speaker 1: lot of time going down, you know, a wild goose 826 00:42:06,480 --> 00:42:09,279 Speaker 1: chase and looking for the wrong thing before somebody sort 827 00:42:09,280 --> 00:42:10,839 Speaker 1: of pulled their head out of the stand and said, 828 00:42:10,880 --> 00:42:13,200 Speaker 1: hold on a second, what about this other idea we 829 00:42:13,239 --> 00:42:15,480 Speaker 1: haven't thought about in a couple hundred years. Has anybody 830 00:42:15,480 --> 00:42:17,680 Speaker 1: really worked on that? Yeah, but that's kind of how 831 00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:21,120 Speaker 1: science works, right, Like you have to you know, follow 832 00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:24,320 Speaker 1: your gut for a while, sometimes in one direction, before 833 00:42:24,360 --> 00:42:26,600 Speaker 1: you either find out that it's a dead end or 834 00:42:26,640 --> 00:42:29,600 Speaker 1: that you were onto the right thing. Yeah. Absolutely, And 835 00:42:29,640 --> 00:42:31,880 Speaker 1: that's why sort of at the highest level, science needs 836 00:42:31,880 --> 00:42:34,360 Speaker 1: to have diversity of ideas. You know, we need people 837 00:42:34,760 --> 00:42:37,680 Speaker 1: following the hottest, sexiest, best idea we have so far, 838 00:42:37,719 --> 00:42:41,200 Speaker 1: but we also need people nurturing crazy ideas, stuff of 839 00:42:41,239 --> 00:42:45,480 Speaker 1: the fringe, stuff which might eventually become something mainstream and 840 00:42:45,560 --> 00:42:48,360 Speaker 1: really useful, but today is sort of like, I don't know, 841 00:42:48,440 --> 00:42:50,399 Speaker 1: what does that really work? And so that's why it's 842 00:42:50,400 --> 00:42:52,640 Speaker 1: important to sort of have breadth in our ideas as 843 00:42:52,680 --> 00:42:56,360 Speaker 1: well as depth of exploration. Yeah, well my money is 844 00:42:56,400 --> 00:42:59,320 Speaker 1: still on sucks Daniel, Although I have a new theory 845 00:43:00,120 --> 00:43:04,880 Speaker 1: on socks or non socks. Socks. Yeah, next time I 846 00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:06,560 Speaker 1: tell my kids to put socks on, they're gonna say, 847 00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:09,279 Speaker 1: I'm already wearing in socks. What do you need? There? 848 00:43:09,320 --> 00:43:13,600 Speaker 1: You go, it's the original sock. All right. Well, that 849 00:43:13,680 --> 00:43:16,960 Speaker 1: was pretty interesting and it sort of makes you question 850 00:43:17,320 --> 00:43:20,719 Speaker 1: the nature of matter in existence itself, you know, like 851 00:43:20,760 --> 00:43:23,560 Speaker 1: what we think of as things we know and what 852 00:43:23,640 --> 00:43:25,680 Speaker 1: we know what they're made out of, could not be 853 00:43:25,719 --> 00:43:27,680 Speaker 1: true for maybe the rest of the universe. We are 854 00:43:27,719 --> 00:43:30,160 Speaker 1: still just in a small corner of it. Yeah, And 855 00:43:30,200 --> 00:43:32,719 Speaker 1: that's the exciting thing about exploring the universe is the 856 00:43:32,800 --> 00:43:36,279 Speaker 1: surprises is discovering the universe works differently from the way 857 00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:39,560 Speaker 1: you expected that. There's a whole new way of thinking 858 00:43:39,600 --> 00:43:41,800 Speaker 1: about the very nature of matter and how the universe 859 00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:44,960 Speaker 1: is put together. That's in our future. Maybe it's five 860 00:43:45,040 --> 00:43:47,080 Speaker 1: years from now, maybe it's fifty years from now, but 861 00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:49,400 Speaker 1: eventually we will figure this out and we'll have a 862 00:43:49,440 --> 00:43:51,920 Speaker 1: new way of thinking about our place in the universe. 863 00:43:52,200 --> 00:43:54,560 Speaker 1: It's like many people who don't wear socks, You're like, what, 864 00:43:54,840 --> 00:43:58,399 Speaker 1: how's that even possible? Don't your shoes smell after a while? 865 00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:02,600 Speaker 1: Who knows. Yeah, we're in southern California, sandal wearing people. 866 00:44:02,640 --> 00:44:07,520 Speaker 1: We don't even buy socks. You go all right, Well, 867 00:44:07,560 --> 00:44:10,399 Speaker 1: thanks for joining us. We hope you enjoyed that. See 868 00:44:10,400 --> 00:44:20,920 Speaker 1: you next time. Thanks for listening, and remember that Daniel 869 00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:23,480 Speaker 1: and Jorge Explain the Universe is a production of I 870 00:44:23,719 --> 00:44:27,120 Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Or more podcast from my heart Radio, visit 871 00:44:27,160 --> 00:44:30,680 Speaker 1: the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you 872 00:44:30,760 --> 00:44:32,240 Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.