WEBVTT - Is Anti-Gravity Technology Possible? 0:00:07.480 --> 0:00:10.440 Hey, Daniel, you know I'm a comic person, so I'm 0:00:10.440 --> 0:00:14.560 curious to know what would be your superpower if you're 0:00:14.560 --> 0:00:17.200 a superhero. It would be what superpower would you pick? 0:00:17.520 --> 0:00:20.720 I might have to decide between laser beams from the eyes, 0:00:20.960 --> 0:00:23.760 which seems very useful for like cracking safes and when 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:27.080 you lose your keys and stuff, or flying. Flying is 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:29.840 always seemed to me like a majestic, amazing thing I 0:00:29.840 --> 0:00:32.720 wish we could do. Yeah, that's my favorite one too, flying. 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:36.239 I would love to fly. The problem is gravity, that's right. 0:00:36.360 --> 0:00:40.120 It's all about conquering gravity, being anti gravity, that's right. 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.800 I always wonder how Superman does it, you know, the 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:47.960 Superman push himself up or a c somehow canceling the 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:50.360 force of gravity. Oh well, we have him scheduled to 0:00:50.360 --> 0:00:51.800 be a guest on the podcast in a few weeks, 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:54.800 so you can ask him directly. Good good, I look 0:00:54.840 --> 0:00:58.320 forward to talking. I thought. We also had this interview 0:00:58.360 --> 0:01:01.960 with this reporter called can't didn't we al scheduled with you? 0:01:02.080 --> 0:01:03.639 We have to cancel that one because we can get 0:01:03.640 --> 0:01:06.560 Superman instead. Okay, all right, that's kind of suspicious, but 0:01:06.640 --> 0:01:11.080 all right. They said they wouldn't appear together. So what 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:31.240 are you gonna do? Hi, I'm and I'm Daniel. Welcome 0:01:31.240 --> 0:01:34.600 to our podcast. Daniel and Jorge explain the universe, in 0:01:34.640 --> 0:01:36.800 which we take things in the universe, pulled them apart, 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:39.400 and explain them to you, including how you might be 0:01:39.440 --> 0:01:43.160 able to cancel some of them. Yeah, we are pro 0:01:43.520 --> 0:01:47.240 universe and also anti universe in this podcast. Yeah, exactly. 0:01:47.280 --> 0:01:50.640 Today we want to talk about the concept of getting 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:54.000 rid of gravity. Is it possible to escape the shackles 0:01:54.000 --> 0:01:56.200 of the Earth not just by pushing up against it, 0:01:56.200 --> 0:01:59.080 by climbing out of that gravity well, but by actually 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:02.440 negating it, by turning off Earth's gravity somehow, so we 0:02:02.480 --> 0:02:06.000 could float through the atmosphere and even escape into into space. 0:02:06.320 --> 0:02:15.680 That's right. Today's topic is anti gravity? Is it possible? 0:02:16.280 --> 0:02:20.399 What is it? Will anti gravity technology ever work? Will 0:02:20.480 --> 0:02:23.440 you or your children or your children's children ever get 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:26.880 that flying skateboard so you can just float around and 0:02:26.919 --> 0:02:30.240 avoid traffic and get wherever you want? Is that actually 0:02:30.240 --> 0:02:32.160 something that's going to happen or is it always going 0:02:32.200 --> 0:02:34.320 to be in the realms of science fiction? Yeah? Do 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:38.160 you think it's possible to make something that somehow is 0:02:38.200 --> 0:02:42.240 anti gravity? You know? That it's somehow not affected by gravity. 0:02:42.400 --> 0:02:45.760 That's the idea, right, yeah, exactly, that would be the idea. Um. 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:48.840 So that's the question of today's podcast, and as usual, 0:02:48.960 --> 0:02:51.040 before we dig into it, we thought, let's go out 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:53.680 and see what people think. Is this something people imagine 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:56.640 it's possible or people think is ridiculous and absurd? Do 0:02:56.680 --> 0:03:01.120 you think anti gravity technology will ever work? Here's what 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:03.960 people had to say. Yeah, I think that might be possible. 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:08.560 Probably not, okay, yes, yes, what is that? Um? I 0:03:08.680 --> 0:03:12.679 just think as technology progresses, it's just something that can 0:03:12.760 --> 0:03:16.880 become possible. Speaking of really anti gravity, which like we're 0:03:16.919 --> 0:03:20.840 completely removed gravity, and I don't think that's possible at 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:24.560 least from my imagination in the really short period of time. Okay, 0:03:24.600 --> 0:03:27.840 I have no idea. Probably yeah, why do you think so? 0:03:28.240 --> 0:03:31.200 Mean it's probably too expensively build, but we know that 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:35.720 it's theoretically possible. Okay, yeah, yeah, what gives you so 0:03:35.800 --> 0:03:37.800 much faith? I don't know. I just have a lot 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:42.640 of faith, um that with enough effort and people working together, 0:03:42.680 --> 0:03:47.040 that we can figure it out. All right. So, as usual, 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:50.520 I am impressed and slightly scared by the faith people 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:55.000 have in scientists to basically accomplish anything technological. Yeah, but 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:58.200 a lot of people are saying that, yeah, it's possible 0:03:58.240 --> 0:04:03.839 that that they have high confident ends in people like you. Well, yeah, 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:06.120 that's because they don't know me very well. But I 0:04:06.120 --> 0:04:09.680 think this is general sense that once an idea about 0:04:09.760 --> 0:04:12.480 something is made, comes up in science fiction or somewhere else, 0:04:12.720 --> 0:04:14.760 that eventually will figure it out. That it's just sort 0:04:14.800 --> 0:04:18.039 of like on the queue of stuff scientists got to 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:20.279 get done, and maybe not this week or next week, 0:04:20.279 --> 0:04:24.360 but eventually technology always achieves these things. That seems to 0:04:24.400 --> 0:04:26.600 be the sense people have. Yeah, it seems that they 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:30.040 have the impression that it's just a hard technical problem, 0:04:30.080 --> 0:04:32.440 you know, like it's possible, they just have to figure 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:34.839 out how. Yeah, and I think this must be a 0:04:34.880 --> 0:04:37.359 new sensation, you know, the feeling that the world is 0:04:37.400 --> 0:04:40.960 constantly changing, that in a year or ten years or 0:04:41.000 --> 0:04:44.120 in fifty years, technology will be available that makes the 0:04:44.200 --> 0:04:46.480 everyday experience really different. Whereas you know, if you think 0:04:46.480 --> 0:04:49.640 about like a thousand years ago, everybody's life was basically 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:52.040 like their grandparents life and their great grandparents life, and 0:04:52.080 --> 0:04:55.040 the general sense was nothing will ever change because the 0:04:55.080 --> 0:04:58.000 pace of change was so slow. Is basically invisible, whereas 0:04:58.040 --> 0:05:00.520 now people expect that their kids grow up in a 0:05:00.520 --> 0:05:03.479 different world and their grandkids wouldn't even recognize their world. 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:06.719 So that's kind of amazing. Yeah, I guess people expect 0:05:06.720 --> 0:05:11.640 their grandkids to be floating around flying, that's right. They 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:14.240 have to visit their their great grandkids up in the 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:16.760 clouds somewhere. Yeah, but you're right. I think maybe even 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:21.040 just fifty years ago or seventy years ago, this feeling 0:05:21.080 --> 0:05:25.000 probably wasn't there, you know. Yeah, and us accurate. Right, 0:05:25.080 --> 0:05:28.040 the pace of change is accelerating, like things are changing 0:05:28.080 --> 0:05:30.480 faster and faster. Uh. Somebody said the other day I 0:05:30.480 --> 0:05:33.680 thought was really insightful. They said, Um, nobody lives in 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.520 the world they grew up in. Whoa, because the world 0:05:36.560 --> 0:05:38.600 you get used to when you're a kid is not 0:05:38.680 --> 0:05:40.920 the world anymore when you're an adult, Right, so you're 0:05:40.960 --> 0:05:44.480 always prepared to live in an older, more antique world 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:47.280 than you grew up in. Interesting. When do you think 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:49.520 that started? I mean even at the turn of the 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:52.880 twentieth century. I mean people were going through these huge changes, right, 0:05:52.920 --> 0:05:56.280 cars and radio and television. Yeah, I think around then, 0:05:56.320 --> 0:05:59.640 you know, industrial revolution is when things started to pick up. 0:05:59.640 --> 0:06:01.760 But I've gets after World War Two the things really 0:06:01.760 --> 0:06:04.000 started to get crazy, you know, as the development of 0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:07.039 electronics and computers and and all that kind of stuff 0:06:07.080 --> 0:06:11.839 that really accelerated the pace of technological change. Um, now 0:06:11.839 --> 0:06:15.480 we're on this like very steeply moving curve that's accelerating 0:06:15.520 --> 0:06:17.960 to who knows where. Right, it's so difficult to predict 0:06:18.000 --> 0:06:20.320 what technology will have in just a few years. So 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:25.359 surely something's easy as anti gravity should be done in 0:06:25.400 --> 0:06:28.880 a couple of years, right, Well, that's the thing. It's 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:31.120 just because it's on people's wish list doesn't mean that 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:34.080 it's possible, right, And it doesn't mean that it's easy, 0:06:34.120 --> 0:06:36.120 and it doesn't mean that it's imminent. People have been 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:38.280 waiting for flying cars for a while now, and I 0:06:38.320 --> 0:06:40.560 don't see any, you know, on the street. What do 0:06:40.560 --> 0:06:46.640 you we have them? They're called helicopters or airplanes or drones. Yeah, 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:49.800 that's true, that's true. Yeah, Um if they haven't really 0:06:49.839 --> 0:06:52.160 replaced your your car yet. I mean, I don't think 0:06:52.160 --> 0:06:56.120 do you have a helicopter warhead? No? Old, come on, 0:06:56.240 --> 0:07:00.400 I have three? Great, Um, I'd like to sorrow your 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:09.920 helicopter by the way. Okay, So let's get into it. Um, 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:12.240 So what do you think it means for something to 0:07:12.280 --> 0:07:15.600 be anti gravity or for to achieve anti gravity, or 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.880 to make something that allows you to be anti gravity? 0:07:19.000 --> 0:07:21.600 So in my mind, there's something of an important distinction here. 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:25.280 There's a difference between opposing gravity, Like what does a 0:07:25.360 --> 0:07:29.120 rocket do. A rocket pushes back against gravity. Gravity is 0:07:29.160 --> 0:07:31.720 pulling you down. The rocket is pushing up so you 0:07:31.720 --> 0:07:34.920 can overcome gravity. You can oppose gravity. That we can 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:38.280 do for sure. Everybody here can jump, right, you're defeating 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:40.080 the gravity of the Earth every time you take a leap. 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:42.640 But that's not what we're talking about. I think we're 0:07:42.680 --> 0:07:46.600 talking about effortless floating. We're talking about negating gravity. We're 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:50.320 talking about turning it off or something like shielding ourselves 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:54.120 from the Earth's gravitational field. Right. I think people imagine 0:07:54.160 --> 0:07:57.160 it to be that you're floating, but you're not really 0:07:57.200 --> 0:08:00.520 doing much, right, Like if you're floating but you're burning 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:04.680 explosive rocket fuel, or you're floating but you're whipping around 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:08.680 this helicopter blade. But then that's that doesn't really feel 0:08:08.720 --> 0:08:12.160 like anti gravity, right, that's right because it cost energy, right, 0:08:12.320 --> 0:08:16.440 costum time and money and energy to do with the 0:08:16.560 --> 0:08:19.400 idea of the whole content effort. Yeah, the whole concept 0:08:19.440 --> 0:08:22.920 of anti gravity is effortless floating, effortless flying, So it 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:25.559 doesn't take a huge amount of energy, right, And also 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:27.720 it's nice and quiet and calm, and you know, you 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:30.880 can you can read your magazine or whatever. So there's 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:34.360 a concept there of of avoiding the cost of climbing 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:38.080 out of the gravity. Well, right, it's not pushing against gravity. 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:42.000 It's like the idea is canceling gravity somehow, Yeah, exactly, 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:45.319 shielding yourself somehow. And the amazing thing is that this 0:08:45.600 --> 0:08:50.200 is possible for the other forces, right, like electromagnetism, for example, 0:08:50.440 --> 0:08:53.160 that's something you can shield yourself from. You can cancel 0:08:53.640 --> 0:08:56.760 um the influence of electric and magnetic fields. What do 0:08:56.800 --> 0:09:00.400 you mean, like a shield? Exactly like a shield. And if, 0:09:00.400 --> 0:09:02.680 for example, you've ever heard of a Faraday cage, a 0:09:02.679 --> 0:09:05.440 Faraday cage is just a box made out of metal. 0:09:05.679 --> 0:09:08.840 It doesn't even have to be complete, The sides don't 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:10.280 even have to be complete. It can be like chain 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:13.280 link fence, a box made out of metal. It's almost 0:09:13.280 --> 0:09:15.840 impossible to make a cell phone call from right, like 0:09:15.880 --> 0:09:19.360 you're in an elevator, you lose coverage. Why because the 0:09:19.600 --> 0:09:21.840 elevator is a box made of metal, and a box 0:09:21.880 --> 0:09:27.360 made of metal will shield you from electromagnetic fields. So 0:09:27.440 --> 0:09:30.640 all those mixed martial arts art is fighting in a cage, 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:35.439 they're all imprevious to electromagnetic radiation. That's right. They can't 0:09:35.520 --> 0:09:37.480 call their coach and say what should I do? Now? 0:09:37.480 --> 0:09:41.280 Should I kick them in the head? And that's why 0:09:41.679 --> 0:09:43.760 that's right, That's why they're not on their phones because 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:46.600 they just don't work. Um. And the reason that's possible 0:09:47.200 --> 0:09:50.439 is because there's two kinds of electromagnetic charges, right, this 0:09:50.600 --> 0:09:53.760 positive in this negative. So electrons are negative and protons 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:56.560 are positive, for example. And what happens when you put 0:09:56.600 --> 0:10:00.040 a metal box inside an electromagnetic field is that it 0:10:00.320 --> 0:10:03.640 pulls the the positive negative charges apart in just such 0:10:03.679 --> 0:10:06.520 a way that it cancels itself inside the box. What 0:10:06.559 --> 0:10:09.480 do you mean, it pulls him apart in the box. 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:13.559 It's material like in the metal, Yeah, yeah, in metal. 0:10:13.600 --> 0:10:15.840 Metal is that is a conductor, which means that there's 0:10:16.080 --> 0:10:19.400 negative charges all around um which can be moved, right. 0:10:19.720 --> 0:10:23.080 And what happens is that you have the electromagnetic field 0:10:23.120 --> 0:10:25.480 and that moves the charges around. It responds to the 0:10:25.480 --> 0:10:28.920 electromagnetic field and just the right way to produce the 0:10:28.960 --> 0:10:32.480 opposing electromagnetic field, which essentially cancels it. Right. It sort 0:10:32.480 --> 0:10:36.800 of absorbs the forces of from electromagnetic magnetism. Yeah, it 0:10:37.000 --> 0:10:39.480 or it makes a shield. Right, It's like having the 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:43.040 opposite field at the same time, so the two things 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:46.959 really are canceled, kind of like soundproofing a little bit, 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:50.520 like it absorbs the impacts, you know, like it absorbs 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:53.080 the energy. I think it's a better analogy is more 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:56.680 like noise canceling headphones. Right. Noise canceling headphones don't just 0:10:56.720 --> 0:11:01.319 block the sound, They produce sound which distr recatively interferes 0:11:01.640 --> 0:11:05.080 with the sound waves to cancel them out. So that 0:11:05.080 --> 0:11:06.920 would be cool if you can somehow get into a 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:11.080 box that somehow shields you from the force of gravity. 0:11:11.120 --> 0:11:14.040 You would basically be inside and you would float, right. 0:11:14.080 --> 0:11:16.280 That would be cool. That would be pretty cool. It 0:11:16.320 --> 0:11:18.839 would be pretty cool. I would like that. But I mean, 0:11:18.840 --> 0:11:21.160 that's the idea, right, get into it? Is it? We're 0:11:21.200 --> 0:11:24.200 looking for a way to cancel out the forces of 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:26.720 gravity that would normally get to you and pull you. 0:11:26.880 --> 0:11:29.839 That's right, And You can do that for electromagnetism because 0:11:29.840 --> 0:11:33.000 there's a positive and negative charge. The thing with gravity 0:11:33.080 --> 0:11:35.960 is that there's only positive charges, right. Gravity is a 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:39.560 force that acts between any objects that have mass, and 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:42.000 as far as we know, there's only positive mass, which 0:11:42.000 --> 0:11:44.960 means it's only attractive gravity. So there's no way to 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:48.360 build something that cancels the gravity or you know, no, 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:50.880 there's no way for a box to arrange itself in 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:53.480 such a way that it negates gravity because there is 0:11:53.520 --> 0:11:56.280 no other kind of charge. There's no other kind of mass, 0:11:56.360 --> 0:11:59.559 is no negative mass you can use to newgate gravity. 0:11:59.600 --> 0:12:04.680 That's why anti gravity is much trickier than anti electromagnetism. 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:08.400 So in a metal box, there are positive and negative 0:12:08.440 --> 0:12:14.720 particles that cancel out the fours that normally would go through. 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:17.320 But you're saying that with gravity, we can't do that 0:12:17.400 --> 0:12:22.319 because there's only one kind of gravity charge. Yeah, exactly, 0:12:22.559 --> 0:12:24.080 And that's why it has to be a metal box. 0:12:24.120 --> 0:12:26.400 So the metal box has those charges that can move around. 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:28.440 If you're in a wooden box, then it doesn't have 0:12:28.480 --> 0:12:31.200 extra electrons which can be rearranged to cancel out the 0:12:31.240 --> 0:12:34.200 electromagnetic field that's coming from the outside. That's why a 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.000 Faraday cage has to be made out of metal. So 0:12:37.080 --> 0:12:39.040 if you don't want the government to snoop on you, 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:40.760 or you don't want able to listen to your cell phone, 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:43.840 then you can just get into a chain link box, right, 0:12:44.040 --> 0:12:46.840 make yourself offense, or find your dog kennel or something 0:12:46.920 --> 0:12:49.440 right where you keep your dog at night and crawl 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.640 into there and nobody can snoop on your cell phone. 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:55.080 You can't get any cell phone calls right, right. Well, 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:56.840 when you have to ground, you have to ground it, right, 0:12:56.960 --> 0:12:59.480 like you have to connected to electrical round. Yeah, it 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:02.400 has to be ounded you all right, Well, let's think 0:13:02.400 --> 0:13:06.600 about what are other ways that you could make anti gravity? Right? So, 0:13:06.880 --> 0:13:09.560 how could anti gravity actually work? Let's talk about that, 0:13:09.600 --> 0:13:24.800 but first let's take a break. Okay, So anti gravity 0:13:24.880 --> 0:13:29.680 the idea of making something that is not affected by gravity, 0:13:29.920 --> 0:13:35.120 or creating a space that is not affected by gravity 0:13:35.160 --> 0:13:38.120 where gravitational forces can get to you. That's right, you 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:40.880 have to come up with some way to negate gravity. 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:43.720 And um, you know it sounds pretty difficult, and what 0:13:43.760 --> 0:13:46.200 I said earlier about not having any negative mass make 0:13:46.280 --> 0:13:49.160 this sound pretty hard. Um, but you know there are 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:51.520 some possibilities. There are some things people are working on, 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:55.160 something ways people think about that one day might eventually 0:13:55.280 --> 0:13:57.760 lead to anti gravity. Okay, so what are what are 0:13:57.760 --> 0:14:00.719 these possibilities? Well, one of them has to do with antimatter. 0:14:00.840 --> 0:14:03.720 We talked about antimatter in another podcast and for those 0:14:03.720 --> 0:14:05.760 of you who haven't listened to it yet, antimatter is 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.320 a form of matter where most of the things are flipped. So, 0:14:09.440 --> 0:14:13.120 for example, the opposite of an electron is a positron. 0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:16.000 Instead of having a negative charge, it has a positive charge. 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:19.640 So the positron is the antimatter version of the electron. 0:14:20.160 --> 0:14:22.440 And we don't understand a lot of things about antimatter, 0:14:22.520 --> 0:14:24.880 like why it exists at all, but why there's very 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:27.040 little of it, why the universe is matter of matter 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:30.520 or not antimatter. But antimatter is a real thing, and 0:14:30.520 --> 0:14:32.400 we can create in the laboratory. We do it as 0:14:32.400 --> 0:14:34.800 certain all the time, and we can play with it. 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:38.040 And one of the interesting things about antimatter is that 0:14:38.080 --> 0:14:40.960 we don't know what kind of gravity it feels like. 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:44.800 We know that antimatter has the opposite electric charge of matter, 0:14:45.080 --> 0:14:49.080 so it feels electromagnetism the opposite way. What does it 0:14:49.120 --> 0:14:52.320 feel about gravity. We know it has positive mass, but 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:54.560 there's some theories of physics that say it could have 0:14:54.960 --> 0:14:59.480 negative gravity, negative meaning it responds to gravity in the 0:14:59.520 --> 0:15:02.520 opposite way. Exactly. There could just be a minus sign there, 0:15:02.840 --> 0:15:05.560 because antimatter has a lot of minus signs where normal 0:15:05.600 --> 0:15:09.000 matter has positive signs. And so it's entirely possible that 0:15:09.040 --> 0:15:13.960 antimatter feels um gravity the other way that it's a 0:15:14.120 --> 0:15:16.960 for antimatter, gravity is not an attractive force, but a 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:21.760 repulsive force against everything else, that's right, Yeah, against everything 0:15:21.800 --> 0:15:24.120 that has mass. And so, for example, if you brought 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:27.560 matter and antimatter together, if they were electrically neutral, so 0:15:27.600 --> 0:15:30.960 there are no other forces, then um, you know, one 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:33.760 would be the matter would be attracted to the antimatter, 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:37.160 but the antimatter would be repulsed from the matter. What, 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:42.800 so they would be continually chasing each other. Yeah, exactly, 0:15:42.800 --> 0:15:47.520 that would be pretty crazy, right, Well, what, yeah, it's 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:50.000 it's it sounds ridiculous. It sounds like I'm making this up. 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:52.160 It sounds like I've been smoking too many of ann appeals. 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:55.240 But it's honestly a real possibility. Now, in order to 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:57.600 investigate this, we've been studying it. We've been trying to 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:00.560 make antimatter and we have. We've made peak grams of 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:03.680 antimatter in the lab in order to study it and see, like, 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:06.200 is antimatter the same as matter except for having these 0:16:06.240 --> 0:16:09.720 flipped charges. And we've answered all those questions. But the 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:12.120 problem is that we haven't made enough anti matter. It's 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:14.440 pretty tricky to make anti matter to hold it and 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:16.800 to do experiments with it, and you need a lot 0:16:16.800 --> 0:16:19.480 of antimatter to test these theories just because gravity is 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:22.200 so weak. Right. Remember gravity is the weakest force in 0:16:22.240 --> 0:16:25.320 the universe by a huge amount. So to test the 0:16:25.320 --> 0:16:27.840 theory of gravity, you need like a chunk of the stuff. 0:16:28.120 --> 0:16:31.320 And we've made pico grams of it. Wow. So I'm 0:16:31.360 --> 0:16:33.560 just I'm still trying to wrap my my head around 0:16:33.560 --> 0:16:37.440 this idea of something having anti gravity instead of having 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:40.760 positive gravity. I know now you're excited, right you started 0:16:40.760 --> 0:16:42.920 off this podcast You're like this is crazy, and then 0:16:42.920 --> 0:16:46.280 you're like, wait, this is a great idea. So, like 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:50.120 a little ball of this antimatter would just not it 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:52.400 wouldn't fall down to the Earth. It would try to 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:55.000 leave the Earth as quickly as possible. Yeah, it would 0:16:55.040 --> 0:16:58.600 feel the Earth's gravitational field the opposite way, right, Yeah, 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:02.440 would it would would stay together, Like would an antimatter 0:17:02.560 --> 0:17:06.560 particle be attracted to another antibioto particle through gravity? Well, 0:17:06.560 --> 0:17:10.000 that's a great question. If they both have negative gravity, 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:13.560 then if they then two negative charges would probably attract 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:16.640 each other and a positive negative would repel each other. 0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:20.320 So you could have a whole planet of anti gravity stuff, 0:17:20.960 --> 0:17:23.320 but it would just being It would just constantly be 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:27.400 trying to be as far away from everything else as possible. Yeah, exactly. 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.000 And you know, there's another really tricky question there, which 0:17:31.200 --> 0:17:34.959 is about the kind of about what we mean by mass, 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:38.199 right with it's actually two definitions of mass. What is 0:17:38.320 --> 0:17:42.240 gravitational mass, which means how are you affected by gravity? Right, 0:17:42.560 --> 0:17:45.000 you are pulled down by the Earth because you have mass. 0:17:45.000 --> 0:17:48.000 That's the gravitational mass. But there's a whole other concept 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:50.879 of mass called inertial mass, and this has to do 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:54.520 with F equals m. A force is mass times acceleration. 0:17:54.920 --> 0:17:57.439 It says how much do you move when you're pushed? 0:17:57.880 --> 0:17:59.880 So if you get a big push, you move more. 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:02.159 You get a little push, you move less. Right, But 0:18:02.200 --> 0:18:04.639 it's also this question of mass that's the M and 0:18:04.760 --> 0:18:07.920 F equals m A. If you push something really small 0:18:07.960 --> 0:18:10.320 like a ping pong ball, it goes pretty far. If 0:18:10.359 --> 0:18:13.119 you push something really heavy, like a boulder, it doesn't 0:18:13.119 --> 0:18:16.919 go as far right, so the mass affects it. And 0:18:16.960 --> 0:18:19.080 for most things in the universe that we've ever studied, 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:21.920 those two things are exactly the same. They're different concepts, 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:24.840 but they're identical when we measure them. Right, everything we've 0:18:24.840 --> 0:18:28.040 ever seen has the same gravitational and inertial mass. But 0:18:28.760 --> 0:18:32.000 it would be really weird if antimatter had the opposite 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:35.840 gravitational mass but like the same inertial mass, or even 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:39.400 weirder would be have opposite inertial mass, which would mean, 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:43.320 like you push it left and it goes right. What, Yeah, 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:46.040 if you had opposite if you had negative inertial mass, 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:50.400 it seems impossible. Well, that's just because it's unfamiliar. Right now, 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:52.000 this is the kind of thing we've actually tested. So 0:18:52.040 --> 0:18:54.239 we've done experiments with antimatter. We know that they have 0:18:54.440 --> 0:18:58.360 positive inertial mass because we can manipulate it, right. We've 0:18:58.400 --> 0:19:01.800 even built accelerators like the a Tron collider at Fermilab 0:19:02.320 --> 0:19:05.320 used anti protons, and so we know what happens when 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:07.119 you push a piece of anti matter. We know it 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:10.119 has positive inertial mass. You can't tell if it's falling 0:19:10.119 --> 0:19:12.040 down to the Earth, like you can't tell if you 0:19:12.080 --> 0:19:14.200 need to hold it up for it to be there. Yeah, 0:19:14.240 --> 0:19:16.440 because what is the gravitational force on a proton? It's 0:19:16.480 --> 0:19:19.600 so tiny, because the massive proton is so tiny, all 0:19:19.640 --> 0:19:22.520 the other forces are thousands and millions and billions of 0:19:22.560 --> 0:19:26.040 times stronger. So it's almost impossible to measure the gravitational 0:19:26.080 --> 0:19:28.919 force on a proton because it's so close to zero. Right, 0:19:28.960 --> 0:19:31.200 But if you just left it alone, wouldn't it fall 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:33.760 up or fall down? Yeah? But if you have an 0:19:33.760 --> 0:19:36.280 anti proton and you just leave it alone, it's going 0:19:36.359 --> 0:19:39.679 to interact with everything around it. Right. It's it's almost 0:19:39.680 --> 0:19:42.639 impossible to have an anti proton and have it be 0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:46.240 nowhere near any other matter and have no electric magnetic 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:48.920 fields at all, so that you cancel everything else out. 0:19:49.400 --> 0:19:51.800 That's a pretty difficult experiment to do. And so I 0:19:51.800 --> 0:19:53.159 mean they're trying to do that kind of thing, and 0:19:53.160 --> 0:19:55.640 they've they've built blobs of matter to play with them 0:19:55.680 --> 0:19:58.480 at cern, but they don't have enough where they can 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:01.800 register the gravitational force on an antiparticle. That's just not 0:20:01.920 --> 0:20:04.800 something we know yet. And it's amazing when such a 0:20:04.800 --> 0:20:08.120 basic question about antimatter, like which way does it feel gravity, 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:10.439 we just don't know the answer because we don't have 0:20:10.560 --> 0:20:12.119 enough of it. We haven't been able to do the 0:20:12.160 --> 0:20:14.720 experiment yet. We haven't been able to ask the universe 0:20:14.760 --> 0:20:17.399 that question, so that answer is out there waiting for us. 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.240 So you're saying that we as humans can make stuff 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:24.280 that might possibly be anti gravity. We can make antimatter 0:20:24.440 --> 0:20:29.320 which might be anti gravity, might float naturally. That's right. Yeah. Um, 0:20:29.359 --> 0:20:31.359 The problem, of course is that we can't make a 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:34.400 lot of it. It's pretty difficult, which makes it pretty 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:36.960 which means you know, making your hoverboard is gonna be 0:20:37.000 --> 0:20:39.479 pretty far down the list. And the other problem is 0:20:39.920 --> 0:20:42.040 if you make an anti matter hoverboard, like, you're not 0:20:42.040 --> 0:20:43.920 gonna want to stand on it unless you're made of 0:20:43.960 --> 0:20:47.000 anti person, unless you're an anti person made of antimatter, 0:20:47.119 --> 0:20:51.560 because if normal matter stands on anti matter hoverboard, kaboom, Right, 0:20:52.160 --> 0:20:54.680 that's the trope from science fiction, which is actually true 0:20:54.800 --> 0:20:58.800 matter meeting anti matter big explosions. So anti matter would 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:01.280 be even if it was anti gravity, it would be 0:21:01.320 --> 0:21:04.760 a bad idea to make stuff out of it. Yeah, 0:21:04.760 --> 0:21:07.960 I wouldn't recommend it. And I also wouldn't recommend investing 0:21:08.000 --> 0:21:10.960 in your friends venture capital firm which is investing in 0:21:10.960 --> 0:21:14.119 an anti gravity technology based on anti matter not likely 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:19.600 to succeed. Not for your safety, just for your bank account. 0:21:19.760 --> 0:21:22.360 That's right. Free financial advice from a physicist who knows 0:21:22.400 --> 0:21:24.960 nothing about finance, that's right. Don't invest in things that 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:29.879 might explode or destroy the universe unless they're designed to explode, 0:21:29.920 --> 0:21:33.240 in which case, invest away, right, right, But then you 0:21:33.320 --> 0:21:40.560 have blood in your hands, that's right. You know that 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:43.280 brings us to another way to think about gravity, because 0:21:43.680 --> 0:21:46.000 you know, we've been talking about gravity sort of in 0:21:46.040 --> 0:21:49.439 the context of Newton's ideas about gravity, where you have 0:21:49.520 --> 0:21:51.480 two blobs and you think of gravity is like a 0:21:51.560 --> 0:21:55.720 force between those blobs, right, negative mass, positive mass, negative 0:21:55.760 --> 0:21:58.159 forces whatever. But you know, we have a more modern 0:21:58.200 --> 0:22:01.560