Our Antimatter, Mirrored, Time-Reversed Universe

January 16th, 2019

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The foundations of quantum theory rests on its symmetries. For example, it should be impossible to distinguish our universe from one that is that is the perfect mirror opposite in charge, handedness, and the direction of time. But one by one these symmetries were found to be broken, threatening to break all of physics along with them.

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In his famous lectures on physics, Richard Feynman talks about what it means to expect the universe to be identical in the mirror. For it to be parity-symmetric. He invites us to imagine a clock in a mirror reflection – numbers are backwards, components are all flipped left to right, and it ticks counterclockwise. And then we imagine building that mirror clock in reality. Everything is constructed as though reflected. Numbers get painted backwards. Every screw with right-handed thread or right-spiraling coil is replaced with a left-handed version. Our intuition tells us that the mirror clock should tick in exactly the same way, except counter-clockwise. Our intuition would be wrong.

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Spinning Black Holes

January 11th, 2019

A pulsing black hole in the centre of a distant galaxy sheds light on black hole and galaxy formation. How fast are black holes rotating and how does that rotation change over its life-span?

Huge thanks to Prof. Geraint Lewis and study author Dr. Dheeraj Pasham.

A loud quasi-periodic oscillation after a star is disrupted
by a massive black hole
https://ve42.co/pasham

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Music from http://epidemicsound.com “Colorful animation 4” “serene story 2” “To the stars 01” “Black Vortex

Animations by Alan Chamberlain and courtesy of NASA


Are Dark Matter And Dark Energy The Same?

January 9th, 2019

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Astronomers are the worst at naming things. Dark energy AND dark matter? Who can remember which is which. But perhaps one astronomer has just fixed it, with a theory that says perhaps actually they are they same stuff.

Space Time Journal Club digs into “A Unifying Theory of Dark Energy and Dark Matter” by J. Farnes, 2018
https://arxiv.org/abs/1712.07962

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Jamie Farnes, astrophysicist at Oxford just published a paper suggesting that both dark energy and dark matter may result from the same phenomenon. And it’s pretty wild: negative mass particles continuously popping into existence between the galaxies. This rather extravagant claim resulted in a hysterical response from the media. Our viewers’ perfect blend of bright-eyed curiosity and cynical skepticism led to many MANY requests for us to do an episode on this new result. You got it. Today on Space Time Journal Club, let’s pick apart J.S. Farnes 2018, “A unifying theory of dark energy and dark matter: Negative masses and matter creation within a modified Lambda-CDM framework”.

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The Best Test of General Relativity (by 2 Misplaced Satellites)

December 23rd, 2018

A launch mishap led to the best experimental confirmation of gravitational redshift. Get a free audiobook with a 30-day trial of Audible: http://audible.com/VERITASIUM or text VERITASIUM to 500500

Huge thanks to
Dr. Pacome Delva: https://ve42.co/pacome
Dr. Sven Herrmann: https://ve42.co/sven
Gravitational Redshift Test Using Eccentric Galileo Satellites: https://ve42.co/GRtest

Disclaimer: It is arguable what is THE best test of general relativity because there are different ways to test the theory. This is the best confirmation of gravitational redshift, which is one of the three original tests proposed by Einstein.

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Animations and editing by Alan Chamberlain

Music from http://epidemicsound.com “Subtle Substitutes 2” “A sound Foundation 1” “Cell Research 1” “Particle Attraction 1”


Why String Theory is Wrong

December 20th, 2018

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There’s this idea that beauty is a powerful guide to truth in the mathematics of physical theory. String theory is certainly beautiful in the eyes of many physicists. Beautiful enough to pursue even if it’s wrong?

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Previous Episode: Quantum Physics in a Mirror Universe
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyTqgnKD3sw&t=5s

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Hermann Weyl once said, “If I have to choose between beauty and truth, I choose beauty.” It was in reaction to a rebuke by Einstein. Weyl had tried to explain electromagnetism by imposing on Einstein’s general theory of relativity very first gauge symmetry, Weyl invariance. Einstein pointed out it the proposal led to some absurd results, and so the idea went down in flames. It just couldn’t be true, despite the elegance of the math. But sometimes it can be hard to let go of the sense that a beautiful theory must be right. Could this also be the case with string theory?

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Quantum Physics in a Mirror Universe

December 12th, 2018

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When you look in mirror, and see what you think is a perfect reflection. You might be looking at universe whose laws are fundamentally different.

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Previous Episode:
Did Life on Earth Come from Space?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REl20rlZGTw

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When we think about symmetry, the first thing that comes to mind is mirror symmetry. Butterflies, Rorschach tests, and classically attractive faces all look the same when flipped left-to-right. In physics, a symmetry is when the laws of physics are unchanged due to some transformation of coordinates. We’ve seen examples where it is – the universe is symmetric to coordinate shifts in space, time, and even the rather abstract phase of the wave function. So it might be surprising to learn that with all the weird ways in which the universe IS symmetric, it’s NOT entirely symmetric under this most intuitive one. The laws of physics work differently in the universe of the mirror.

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Did Life on Earth Come from Space?

December 6th, 2018

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How did life on Earth get started? Did life on Earth originate on another planet? Either Mars, or in a distant solar system? Could Earth life have spread to have seeded life elsewhere? Let’s see what modern science has to say about the plausibility of panspermia.

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Previous Episode:
‘Oumuamua Is Not Aliens
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wICOlaQOpM0&t=455s

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Life existing on Earth is odd. The oldest fossils are now dated to only a few hundred million years after the moment Earth first became habitable. Is it really reasonable to imagine that evolution turned an unliving chemical soup into the first true living cells in that geological eye-blink? Well, maybe. But the discovery of the early appearance of life on Earth was definitely a big “huh, that’s weird” moment. And it’s inspired some creative thinking. For example, what if the first genesis of life – abiogenesis – is actually incredibly unlikely – so unlikely that it only happened once in the entire galaxy. And that “once” was not on Earth. What if primitive life arrived on Earth after having traveled vast distances across the Milky Way. Some scientists think this is the case. This is the Panspermia hypothesis.

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Five Firsts for Mars InSight

November 26th, 2018

Mars InSight will be the first to detect seismic activity on Mars’ surface, first to measure rate of heat transmitted from interior, first to dig nearly 5m down, first to measure magnetic fields on Mars’ surface, and first to use a robotic arm to place instruments on the surface of Mars (assuming it lands of course…)

If you want to watch the InSight landing “live” (with 4-minute speed of light time delay), go to: https://ve42.co/insight

Special thanks to Patreon supporters:
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Animations courtesy of NASA

Script and Filming with Raquel Nuno

Editing and graphics by Ignat Berbeci


‘Oumuamua Is Not Aliens

November 21st, 2018

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To repeat the space time maxim: it’s never aliens … until it is. So let’s talk about ‘oumuamua.

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Previous Episode:
Are Virtual Particles A New Layer of Reality?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztFovwCaOik

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Bialy & Loeb (2018)
https://arxiv.org/pdf/1810.11490

Micheli et al. (2018)
https://go.nature.com/2A9FncQ

Last year a visitor came to our inner solar system. To us it looked like a faint spot of light, moving quickly relative to the fixed stars. We’d seen similar things countless times before – lonely rocks, remnants from the formation of our solar system, drifting on their endless orbits around the sun and faintly glimmering with its reflected light. Nothing unusual about such asteroids and comets, but what made this object special was its trajectory. It was not in orbit around the Sun at all. Rather, it appeared to have fallen in from interstellar space, and was on its way back out again. The object is 1I/2017 U1, better known as ‘Oumuamua. It’s the first chunk of interstellar space debris we’ve ever spotted passing through our solar system. It caused a justifiable stir at the time. Hell, WE even did an episode on it.

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The kg is dead, long live the kg

November 15th, 2018

The kilogram, mole, kelvin, and ampere will be redefined by physical constants. For a limited time, get 3 months of Audible for just $6.95 a month: http://audible.com/VERITASIUM or text VERITASIUM to 500500

Will this be the last video I make about SI units? Quite possibly. There’s something about being so precise and defining the systems within which science works. When we can more accurately and routinely measure a kilogram, a mole, a kelvin and an ampere, then we can make better observations, we can better detect anomalies and improve our theories. That is why this is so important to me.

Special thanks to Patreon supporters:
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Special thanks to NIST: http://nist.gov

Additional graphics by Ignat Berbeci

Music from http://epidemicsound.com “Experimental1”