And does any other substance come close?

(Forgive my ignorant and inexact language.) Electrons clearly behave like particles (they have mass, they bounce and ricochet) even though I understand they are really regions of probability, and EM radiation is observed to be quantized, so each quanta might be considered a particle? And photons are blocked, reflected, etc. as if they were particles.

And I'm realizing I thought gravitons might convey gravitational force, when really they might convey CHANGES in gravitational fields?

Please shine a beam of light into my slough of ignorance!

I always feel like this gets skipped. It would make everything else derived from it make much more sense.
The story is always about Einstein but I think that a constant (if not calculated) speed of light was already established? Maxwell? If so what was he up to?

It’s a plot hole. We go from Newton to Einstein in popular physics, with no exposition of the origin of a central plot point.

Hi guys, I am having trouble understanding Time as a 4th dimension. Is it truly regarded as a 4th one if so how is it represented?

Hi! I wanted to ask a few questions, and I’d really appreciate it if someone knowledgeable could answer.
I’m really passionate about mathematics, physics, and everything related to the universe, especially quantum physics. I’m currently considering pursuing a Bachelor’s, Master’s, and PhD in physics or mathematics, but I’ve started to realize that I might actually enjoy the academic path itself more than the careers that come after it.
I genuinely love solving problems, doing calculations, and struggling with difficult equations until I finally understand them. However, from what I’ve read, careers in astrophysics, quantum mechanics, research, etc. don’t necessarily offer great financial prospects, especially compared to some other fields.
So I’d love to hear from people who actually work or study in these fields: What career options are realistically available after a Bachelor’s, Master’s, or PhD in physics or mathematics? What does the career path look like, and how financially sustainable is it?
I’m mainly interested in hearing about the academic/research side of these fields rather than switching to something like finance or business just for the money.
Any advice or personal experiences would be really appreciated!

Of course this has been thought many times. This isn't a "I am very smart" moment I promise. I'm genuinely curious as to why scientists think that something is happening to the matter inside a black hole. What if it's just there, but thanks to the extreme gravity, the matter and the information the matter contains become impossible for anything outside the black hole to interact with it? I guess what I'm asking is, what if we're overthinking it?

As an exercise, I attempted to determine why the eigenvalue is in this peculiar form and I sort of get it. When you use the separable solutions ansatz and assume the eigenvalue is ℓ and you solve the radial equation, the solution becomes an ugly mess:

R(r) = A * r^[(-1 + sqrt(1+4ℓ)/2] + B* r^[(-1 - sqrt(1+4ℓ)/2]

And if you introduce a change of variables, then the equation is much nicer if the eigenvalue is of the form ℓ(ℓ+1) because then your solution is:

R(r) = A * r^ℓ + B/r^(ℓ+1)

However, it bugs me to no end how authors just say "because it's convenient lol pls just go with it". Do you guys know of any textbooks or resources that doesn't assume things like this a priori and builds up the logic/math from the ground up?

Hi everyone! Little backstory. I left the automotive industry after 8 years to become an electrician apprentice. I did that for 1.5 years and was subsequently furloughed for an indefinite amount of time; by this point, I will assume I am not being re-hired by this company. Huge bummer, but I will survive.

This whole time, I have been keeping up with astrophysics, astronomy, theoretical physics, etc. I am well read, and consider my knowledge to be pretty decent (if not above average). I am now 30 years old, and have always wanted to take up a teaching position, either as a high school teacher or college professor teaching one of the astronomy related subjects, but have been afraid of the time it takes to accomplish this, and even more afraid of the oversaturation in the field/being unable to find a job after all that time and money (holy run on sentence, Batman!) I just had a baby at the same time I was furloughed, so I suddenly have some time to figure things out as a stay-at-home father. I want to make the most of my time here, and I'm wondering if electrical is the path I want to continue on, or if I should follow my life-long dream of entering a STEM field. So any help or suggestions are welcome.

My question: is there some sort of intersectionality between astronomy and electrical? Are there specialized positions I could find incorporating mathematics, electrical, and astronomy? Repairing or installing telescopes, say, or modifying motor controls. I am open to all suggestions. It just needs to fit general but highly important criteria:

1. I will have to work with my hands. I do not care if it is dirty or tedious work.

2. I will have plenty of opportunities to learn.

3. I will have the opportunity to teach.

4. The money is worthwhile.

Thank you all in advance. I will be posting this in a few different subs, because I don't know exactly what sub will accept this type of post.

Imagine the graviton carnival ride, set it to some random speed, clockwise or counterclockwise. Then set up something to measure the centrifugal force, accelerating one way increases the force and the other decreases.

If you go towards the lesser force will get you to no spin, if you continue your acceleration, the force increases.

This means that there is a spot between the two directions of spin, no spin.

But what is that spin relative to? It can't be local like linear motion, where if you accelerate, then stop accelerating you feel stationary. Once at a certain rpm, you're stuck to the walls even if it stays at the same speed.

What if you had two gravitons next to each other in space, if you get them to choose a speed of 0 independently, isolated of viewing outside and each other, they'd be near synced with each other's spin once revealed.

So what is making them sync? To me it has to be the space they inhabit, or the local space, since it bends and stuff.

That's why we can have two trains fly by each other with the passengers feeling stationary, but two gravitons can't.

Or if there was no uranium at all, only thorium.

I’ve been wondering a lot about what the fundamental aspect of waves are. Essentially a wave is a propagation. But can something propagate without time?

What is research in quantum computing particularly from the theoretical viewpoint like? As far as I know, quantum information theory is quite math heavy and there everything is about theorem proving. It probably depends on the respective area of quantum computing but I am just generally interested in this area as someone from a different field of physics and I am wondering if the explicit work there would still be exciting

Hi im new to this im taking Physics 4B in college and im completely not understanding this stuff. My teacher is very nice but also in his 80s and I cannot understand with the way he teaches we have exams and I understand the topics I actually do pretty well on the discussion questions what gets me is the equations and formula questions. Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should look at to fully understand and be able to do questions on my own without any help?

Does anyone talk about using heat pumps in space for the purpose of reducing radiator panels mass? Thermal radiaton, from equations I've seen online, scales extremely well with temperature (T^4). So if you were to use heat pumps with various refrigerants optimized for high temperatures, you could make the radiators kick off more heat per unit area, allowing for more power usage with less mass.

EDIT: To clarify, the goal is mass reduction on space craft, not raw energy efficiency. It will be less energy efficient if you are just sitting there and aren't trying to use any form of forced acceleration. And the plan is using radiators akin to the ones on the ISS that are already in use and cooling their equipment.

I’m currently in community college majoring in math and physics but plan on transferring this year. I felt horrible because I wanted to transfer to University of chicago, but my stats aren’t where they need to be. During my panic, I just had to pause and ask myself why going to a more prestigious university even mattered. My state school is just fine (UMD). I just wanted to ask, if you’ve worked with anyone who has attended a top 20 university, have you felt like they were on a completely different level than you? I know it seems like a dumb question but I’m actually curious.

It’s just that I’m also considering grad school, but I don’t think what undergraduate school you went to matters much, but I could be wrong.

The theory that universe is expanding, forming, dying and collapsing again and again as if a spring swings in a fashion of a sinus function? So if there is a determinism in in physical rules, the concept of cyclic universe guarantees that we had lived our lives infinitely and will re-live it eternally?

Consider a 1D simple harmonic oscillator with mass m and spring constant k. Consider the Hamiltonian of the system in the coordinates (q, p) where p is the kinetic momentum.

1) Verify that the transformation Q = kq, P = p/k is canonical and write the new Hamiltonian in the new variables.

2) Consider the coordinate transformation r = sqrt(P^2 + Q^2), phi = arctan(P/Q). Write the equations of motion for r, phi and solve them.

I’ve done 1), but for 2) the equations of motion for r, phi I get a mess that’s not easily solvable, so maybe I’m doing something wrong.

I simply computed r-dot and phi-dot with the chain rule using the definition of r and phi in terms of Q and P, substituting in place of P-dot and Q-dot, respectively, -Q/k and k^2 P/m (obtained through Hamilton’s equations of motion from the Hamiltonian written in (Q, P) found solving the previous point), and then substituted in place of P and Q, respectively, r sin(phi) and r cos(phi) from the inverse transformation of the one given by the question.

I get r-dot = … a mess and phi-dot = … a mess, and they’re not easily solvable in the slightest. What’s my mistake?

Study material says that it is not practical. When we do this experiment with dichromatic light we do get a fringe corresponding to the light of the source when the maxima of individual characteristic light overlaps. But why is it not practical if 7 different wavelengths are present?

Thanks in advance

With our current models describing them both as elementary particles, it seems a bit odd that quarks would come with charges of -2/3s and 1/3s of that of electron, and then just happen to also combine together in groups of 3 in such a way that those total out to being exactly 0 or -1 that of the electrons charge. Is there some deeper reason that causes both these things to happen?

Sound travels in waves, and certain frequencies paired together can be really jarring (like a root note and a minor 2nd). If I remember correctly light is like… kind of a wave? But also a particle? Can light be dissonant in the same way that sound is? If so, what does it look like?

Why does the formula of Joule's Law of Heating H=I²Rt not give the actual electric energy flowing through the resistor but only the heat energy made by it.