Weird electron behavior

[Rich, Under the Affluence]

.

I'm not sure what faster-than-light speeds would require.
Mathematically, it might require that the mass is an imaginary number.

Well, how duh! Us lunatics have known that since imaginary numbers
were discovered! e ^ (i * pi) = 0, and all that.

Cheers!
Rich]

 

[Ignoramus14135]

Actually, there are situation when regular particles, such as
electrons, can move faster than local speed of light. I am not
kidding. It is called "cherenkov effect".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_effect

i

 

[Richard the Dreaded Libertarian]

The fact that tachyons are represented by *complex* numbers has zero
releveance to wheather they are a viable (existance) concept or not.

This "imaginary" number bit has an amazing amount of bad press. The name
should never have been used in the first place in mathematics. Its why I
never use the term. I use the term "complex". *All* numbers are
imaginary. We represent *all* physical entities with numbers. The fact
that this representation may be with ordered pairs, triplets, 2nd order
tensors, twisters etc, has no baring on the reality of a physical
object. The numbers are just a way of describing the object, they are
not the object itself.

Yes. Education is the process of inserting abstract thoughts into
concrete heads.

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Richard the Dreaded Libertarian]

Tachyons have complex mass, i.e. of the form, jm or im, depending on
whether you are a an engineer or a mathematician.

Have you ever heard of the time they put an engineer and a mathematician
on one side of a room, and a hot babe on the other, and said, "Here are
the rules. You can take as many steps as you wish to get across the room,
as quickly as you wish, but each step must be exactly half the length
of the previous step. Your first step is allowed to extend exactly half-
way across the room, and from there, take as many steps as you wish,
each being half as long as its predecessor."

The engineer is satisfied with this specification, strides across the
room, and scoops up the babe, while the mathematician is still doing
the series in his head. ;-)

Hint: "as many steps as you wish" includes infinity, if you wish. ;-P

It certainly approaches it as a limit, and we bump up against limits
annoyingly often, out here in real life. ;-)

Cheers!
Rich

 

[Phil Hobbs]

Actually, there are situation when regular particles, such as
electrons, can move faster than local speed of light. I am not
kidding. It is called "cherenkov effect".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherenkov_effect

i

Right, but this only happens inside dielectrics. It's the speed of
light *in vacuo* that's the relativistic limit. Optical propagation in
dielectrics is calculated using mean-field theory, which allows us to
smear out the individual effects of 10^22 molecules per cm^^3. Its main
effect in dielectrics is to change the effective speed of light in the
material. No relativistic funny stuff is involved.

Cheers,

Phil

 

[Ignoramus14135]

Right, but this only happens inside dielectrics. It's the speed of
light *in vacuo* that's the relativistic limit. Optical propagation in
dielectrics is calculated using mean-field theory, which allows us to
smear out the individual effects of 10^22 molecules per cm^^3. Its main
effect in dielectrics is to change the effective speed of light in the
material. No relativistic funny stuff is involved.

correct.

i

 

[Ken Smith]

Okay, all electrons are identically weird. This doesn't help you when
you want to explain why they are behaving oddly in a particular
situation.

Sure it does. You just say "they're weird" and it explains it all.

More to the point. Electrons are not required to behave in ways that we
call common sense. When things are on that scale, common sense isn't very
trustworthy. Common sense is what we expect from seeing things in the
macro scale.

I know you'll like this:
God is really a 13 year old boy playing SimUniverse in some vast computer.
When you have a large number of particles in consideration, the limited
resolution of the numbers is washed out. In the very small case, the
effects of the limited number of bits becomes obvious.

This computer may be vast, but I think the theory is only half vast.

 

[[email protected]]

[...]
Well, what I'm going to do is start by sorting out your thinking. No
electron is weird.

No, all electrons are weird.

Okay, all electrons are identically weird. This doesn't help you when
you want to explain why they are behaving oddly in a particular
situation.

Sure it does. You just say "they're weird" and it explains it all.

The "intelligent design" approach to explanation - full marks for
compelteness, but zero for predictive power.

More to the point. Electrons are not required to behave in ways that we
call common sense. When things are on that scale, common sense isn't very
trustworthy. Common sense is what we expect from seeing things in the
macro scale.

Try reading more of the thread before you post a response - this was
the gist of my first contribution to the thread, though I did manage to
work in a reference to a "two-dimensional electron gas" which s a
phrase that generates 161,000 google hits. Adding in "single-layer" and
"graphite" still leaves 1220. Your formulation is less helpful.

I know you'll like this:
God is really a 13 year old boy playing SimUniverse in some vast computer.
When you have a large number of particles in consideration, the limited
resolution of the numbers is washed out. In the very small case, the
effects of the limited number of bits becomes obvious.

This computer may be vast, but I think the theory is only half vast.

IThis is cute, but scarcely original - science fiction has been using
the idea for some thirty years now. In Ian M. Banks' latest book - "The
Algebraist" - the idea is the basis of the sole remainng established
religion.