What Are the Latest Discoveries About Gravity and Its Mysteries?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around contemporary understandings of gravity, including its theoretical frameworks, recent discoveries such as gravity waves and the Higgs field, and speculative questions related to the size and movement of dinosaurs. Participants explore various aspects of gravity from both a theoretical and observational perspective.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Technical explanation
  • Conceptual clarification
  • Debate/contested
  • Homework-related

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants question whether gravity can still be understood as a function of the curvature of space-time as proposed by Einstein.
  • There is curiosity about the existence of "gravitons" and whether they are the same as the Higgs boson.
  • Participants seek clarification on what gravity waves are and their relationship with the Higgs field.
  • Some express interest in whether the Higgs field can be conceptualized similarly to the curvature of space-time.
  • A participant shares calculations regarding the mass gained by Earth from extraterrestrial bodies and its implications for understanding gravity in relation to dinosaur size.
  • There are references to recent studies on dinosaur gigantism and the challenges of understanding how such large animals could move.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

The discussion contains multiple competing views and remains unresolved, particularly regarding the nature of gravity, the Higgs field, and the implications of recent discoveries. Participants express differing opinions on how to frame these concepts and their interrelations.

Contextual Notes

Participants express uncertainty about the definitions and implications of various concepts, such as the relationship between gravity and the Higgs field, and the existence of gravitons. There are also limitations in the clarity of some questions posed, which may affect the depth of responses.

Who May Find This Useful

This discussion may be of interest to those curious about modern physics, particularly in the areas of gravity, particle physics, and paleobiology, as well as individuals looking to engage with speculative scientific inquiries.

scientepid
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Hello, I am new to this forum. I work at a major science museum in the US. I have been thinking a lot about gravity lately, and would like to start a general discussion on this topic, especially because of the recent discovery of gravity waves, the higgs field, as well as some of my own, less formal questions that I have been working on concerning how dinosaurs were able to grow so large. I am a layman, with no religious biases or beliefs, just a curious mind and a lover of good scientific analysis.
 
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I will reply immediately, to avoid all of you from thinking that I am a quack for tagging both dinosaurs and gravity. Simply put I work around giant dinosaur fossils everyday, and I began to wonder how they could have such long thin tails, how the could lift their own weight, or even lift up their long necks. I stumbled down a rabbit hole of numbers and calculations involving NASA estimates of average meteor impacts per day, which is about 1000 tons, and extrapolated this out over sixty five million years.

I also estimated the mass of the Chicxulub crater asteroid, and added these two very large numbers together to see how much weight the Earth had gained from extraterrestial bodies. The result was a disappointing 26 trillion tons; about 7 or 8 orders of magnitude less the the current mass of planet earth. This amount of mass gained would be absolutely negligible.

Further more I found a study that stated almost exactly my yearly estimate of the Earth gaining 40,000 tons per year from space debris, but sight as much as 50,000 tons of helium and hydrogen escape of gravity each year; hence the Earth is losing weight, suggesting that if anything there may have been slightly more gravity 65 million years ago.

It was an interesting thought experiment, but ultimately fruitless. Still I cannot imagine how an animal this large even moved around. There are physical limits to size and strength that pertain to the smallest shrew to the largest elephant.

If anyone has any ideas, I would love to hear them. Please, facts and figures, science and math, no quack theories.

Thanks.
 
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I started this thread to become a general forum about the contemporary state of gravitation, and our understanding of it. I do have a few basic questions about how to think about gravity, or at least how to frame it in a modern context.

1) Can gravity still be thought about as a function of the curvature of space-time as postulated by Einstein? i.e. bowling ball on a trampoline.
2) Is there such a thing as a "graviton", and if so, is it the same as the Higgs boson?
3) What exactly are gravity waves, and do they propagate within the higgs field?
4) Can the Higgs field be thought about in the same way as the curvature of space-time?

Any clarification would be appreciated. I am part of the science learning division, and simple answers are easier to reply to. I consider myself a layman, in fact what I like to say I am a "scientician" that is, someone who works for a science museum that is not a real scientist.
Thanks, for reading.
 
Welcome scientipid,

Please be sure to read our guidelines, the link is in the same e-mail that lead you here, or under "info, in the top right corner. Questions are welcome, but personal theories are not since we only discuss known mainstream science. :smile:
 
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I found this, but I do not see links to the individual papers. I will continue searching, but the people here are awesome.

http://phys.org/news/2013-10-necks-biggest-dinosaurs-big.html

Necks question... how did the biggest dinosaurs get so big?

Today saw the release of a collection of 14 papers under the banner Sauropod gigantism: A cross-disciplinary approach and published in the online open access journal PLOS ONE.

I am a big dinosaur fan

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-10-necks-biggest-dinosaurs-big.html#jCp
 
Thanks,
But like you said the link didn't work.
No worries, I thought I was kicked out immediately for some reason.
How about some info on the Standard Model and Gravity?
T.
 
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Hi Scientipid,

If you want to ask about things like the Higgs Boson, you should start a thread in Particle Physics, be sure to make sure that your questions are clearly thought out and it would help if you could link to what you've been reading about that caused your questions so that members can see what your questions are based on. I'll close this thread off.
 

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