Everything is made out of nothing?

[nix]

Okay, I am new so if what I am talking about makes no sense, be easy...i don't really know if it belongs in classical physics? but here goes: Everything is made up of something smaller than itself, right? Say a table...its made up of wood, wood is made up of numerous compounds, which are composed of elements. These elements have atoms with nucleuses, protons and neutrons...and the neutrons and protons are most likely made up of something smaller..and on and on. But at the end, there must be a particle which is not composed of anything else..what I am trying to get at is eventually something must be composed out of nothing. And if that is true...why when we hit a table don't we go through it?
Okay please explain this to me and feel free to correct me!

 

[Doc]

Hit a table hard enough and you WILL go through it. Sorry, couldn't resist. I'm not really up on this too much but I DO know that there are theories that suggest particles can pop in and out of existence. It may have been proven already.

 

[Gale]

it sort of seem like that race paradox thing that says a person will just keep going half the distance and half and half and so on, and so will never really finish the race. Of course, we know that he eventually finishes the race. I'm not sure how that's helpful, but your question sounds like that scenario sort of.

 

[chroot]

According to the standard model, the fundamental (indivisible) particles are the quarks and leptons.

- Warren

 

[nix]

That's exactly what i don't understand...i don't see how there can be fundamental or indivisible particles. How can they not be composed of something else? How can they just exist?

 

[Norman]

Nix,

Your question goes to the very heart of some heavy physics actually. No one really knows why they would be the smallest. But the basic assumption is that we want to get to the lowest level of matter and call that fundamental. Right now, they are fundamental because we haven't discovered anything smaller. This may be the reason we have issues with QCD, but I digress. Quarks were only recently discovered and it may very well be that they are made up of an even smaller particle. In fact, one of the deepest and most unknown questions in physics is why does mass occur? And by what process does something acquire mass? Hope this helped a little.
Cheers

 

[Arc_Central]

Interesting thread in that if you had a fundamental particle .. yer sort of forced to conclude there is nothing inside it.

I am so inclined to believe that there are only fields (closed fields) like a balloon where the material of the balloon is the field, and the inside is tantamount to nothing. The field can be deformed from the standard balloon shape by interaction with the speed limit and other fields. In one instance the field can be gravitational - while in another case an EM field. It's a matter of localized verses free ranging fields (captured or on the loose).

In other words - A particle is the wrapped up half of a number of fields (directed to a point) ... where the other half constitutes the gravitational aspect (an outward projection from a point). Interaction between particles (waves) is a purely mechanical phenomenon (like gears).

 

[Eyesee]

Originally posted by nix
Okay, I am new so if what I am talking about makes no sense, be easy...i don't really know if it belongs in classical physics? but here goes: Everything is made up of something smaller than itself, right? Say a table...its made up of wood, wood is made up of numerous compounds, which are composed of elements. These elements have atoms with nucleuses, protons and neutrons...and the neutrons and protons are most likely made up of something smaller..and on and on. But at the end, there must be a particle which is not composed of anything else..what I am trying to get at is eventually something must be composed out of nothing. And if that is true...why when we hit a table don't we go through it?
Okay please explain this to me and feel free to correct me!

Because the basic constituents, aka "nothings", don't have the same properties as their composite arrangements. It's like if you subtract
2 from 2 (both having the property of being even numbers) you get
0, which is either even or odd or both or neither. Or if you add 2 + 5, an even and an odd number, you end up with an odd number (and not
a number which has the properties of both constituents). To exist
in our universe then, you, me (and Bart Simpson) all have to
obey the same rules (that obtained by the special arrangements of
the basic constituents, "nothings"). The "nothings" themselves don't
have to obey any rules (they can become anything), but as long
as they take on a special arrangement, they do.

 

[zoobyshoe]

How do electrons figure into this question? Are electrons reducable to anything smaller?

 

[pelastration]

Originally posted by Arc_Central
I am so inclined to believe that there are only fields (closed fields) like a balloon where the material of the balloon is the field, and the inside is tantamount to nothing. ...
Interaction between particles (waves) is a purely mechanical phenomenon (like gears).

Arc Central
Check my website: http://www.mu6.com . It explains such system. Very simple, no math's needed ... just logic.

 

[Arc_Central]

pelastration

Not to diminish your drawings, but it looks like a cross section of a womans reproductive system. I can see some simplicity there, but it gets real complicated super fast. Yer going to need to draw up yer simplest architecture, and build from there in small increments with explanations of who, what, when, where, and why at each and every step. You seem to jump from conception to a full term baby in a blink of an eye.

The universe for the most part has some symmetry to it at each step. What you seem to suggest is that it all goes to hell in a hand basket once you reach this final level. What you would seem to want us to believe is orbitals from galaxies down to the atomic level wherein spaghetti is the next logical step beyond the level of the smallest known increment. This for me is hard to swallow.

 

[Eh]

Originally posted by nix
That's exactly what i don't understand...i don't see how there can be fundamental or indivisible particles. How can they not be composed of something else? How can they just exist?

This is philosophy in the classical physics form.

 

[eigenguy]

Originally posted by nix
That's exactly what i don't understand...i don't see how there can be fundamental or indivisible particles. How can they not be composed of something else? How can they just exist?

Since this is the classical physics section I will say something relevant to classical physics. According to special relativity indivisible particles must be zero dimensional so they have zero volume and are just a perfect geometric points. The reason is that if the particle did have a nonzero size then it must be deformable according to special relativity and therefore it must also be divisble. You understand this by noticing that if a force is applied at a point x on the particles body the force is transmitted at finite speed so the regions closer to x accelerate before regions further from x causing the particle to deform. Therefore in a particle picture elementary particles must be zero dimensional.

In the quantum picture I guess things are not so simple. For example in m-theory etc.

 

[chroot]

Originally posted by zoobyshoe
How do electrons figure into this question? Are electrons reducable to anything smaller?

Zoob,

The electron is the MVP of the Lepton Team. It is, according to the standard model, indivisible and fundamental.

- Warren

 

[zoobyshoe]

Originally posted by chroot
The electron is the MVP of the Lepton Team. It is, according to the standard model, indivisible and fundamental.

Thanks. So wouldn't the answer to the original question about why we don't go through a table when we hit it have more to do with electron properties and dynamics than those of nuclear particles?

 

[chroot]

zoob,

Very astute, as usual my friend. The only forces you'll every experience in day to day life are gravitation and electromagnetism. The reason you don't go through the floor is electrostatic repulsion.

- Warren

 

[zoobyshoe]

Originally posted by chroot
Very astute, as usual my friend. The only forces you'll every experience in day to day life are gravitation and electromagnetism. The reason you don't go through the floor is electrostatic repulsion.

Thanks, Warren. And thanks, also, to all the indivisible leptons who have worked so hard to prevent me from going through the floor.

-Zoob

 

[chroot]

Originally posted by zoobyshoe
Thanks, Warren. And thanks, also, to all the indivisible leptons who have worked so hard to prevent me from going through the floor.

-Zoob

That's an excellent strategy. If you garner the electrons' support, you'll surely win the election. Everyone knows the quarks won't even leave home to vote.

- Warren

 

[zoobyshoe]

LOL!

 

[Adrian Baker]

Originally posted by chroot
Everyone knows the quarks won't even leave home to vote.

- Warren

They will do, but only in pairs or threesomes!

 

[chroot]

Originally posted by Adrian Baker
They will do, but only in pairs or threesomes!

Mmmm... uud, my favorite way to play.

- Warren

 

[bdkeenan00]

don't forget the two quark particles the mesons.

A real odd couple(a quark and an antiquark).

 

[Eidnar1]

My thoughts is evrything is made of nothing. That nothing is space, a substance made of time and distance and the ratio of time to distance remains constant(speed of light). However, space is elastic and gravity descibes the stretchy nature of space. All things elastic have limits. Space has a compression limit and when reached space condenses to matter. So space/time is nothing but compresses to matter. Light is plucked space/time and it ripples (oscillating time and distance) at the edge of the dimension of space/time itself.