[Twisted29]

This is gong to be the last physics-related thing I put, here..just before I comfuse myself. This is what I was trying to say earlier, thank Hawkins.

The first step towards this advance came two years ago when Witten and Paul Townsend of the University of Cambridge showed that Type IIa string theory in 10 dimensions was equivalent to M-theory in 11 dimensions with one dimension curled up. Since then, all five theories have been shown to be equivalent. So at last physicists know where superstrings come from: they originate in the 11th dimension from M-theory.

M-theory also predicts that strings coexist with membranes of various dimensions. For example, a particle can be defined as a zero-brane (zero-dimensional object). A string is a one-brane, an ordinary membrane like a soap bubble is a two-brane, and so on. (Using p to represent the dimension of the object, one wag dubbed this motley collection "p-branes".) When these p-branes vibrate or pulsate, they create new resonances, or particles, which were missed in earlier formulations of superstrings. The name "M-theory" was coined by Witten: M. perhaps stands for "membrane", or the "mother of all strings", or possibly "mystery". Take your pick.

To see how this all fits together, imagine three blind men hot on the trail of Einstein's lion. Hearing it race by, they give chase and desperately grab at it. Hanging onto the tail for dear life, one feels its one-dimensional form and loudly proclaims, "It's a string. The lion is a string." The second man grabs the lion's ear. Feeling a two-dimensional surface, he calls out "No, no, the lion is really a two-brane." The third blind man, hanging on to the lion's leg, senses a three-dimensional solid, and shouts, "You're both wrong. The lion is a three-brane" They are all right. Just as the tail, ear and leg are different parts of the same lion, the string and various p-branes appear to be different limits of M-theory. Townsend calls it "p-brane democracy".

The acid test for any theory is that it must fit the data. No matter how original and elegant superstring theory is, it will stand or fall on whether it describes the physical Universe. Either it is a Theory of Everything, as its advocates hope, or it is a theory of nothing. There is no in-between. So theoretical physicists must answer the second question: is our Universe, with its strange collection of quarks and subatomic particles, among the solutions of superstring theory? This is where it runs into an embarrassing problem, which is that physicists have been unable to find all its four-dimensional solutions. The mathematics have been fiendishly difficult - too hard for anyone to solve completely.

In general, there are two types of solutions. So far, only the first class, called "perturbative" solutions, have been found. Across all branches of physics, theorists faced by an equation they cannot solve reach for well-established ways to find approximate solutions. In superstring theory, millions of these perturbative solutions have been catalogued. Each one corresponds to a different way in which to curl up 6 of the 10 dimensions. However, none of them precisely reproduces the pattern of quarks, leptons and bosons in the Standard Model, although some come close.

So, many believe that the Standard Model may be found among the second class of solutions, the "non-perturbative" solutions. But non-perturbative solutions are generally among the most difficult of all solutions in physics. Some physicists despaired of ever finding nonperturbative solutions of superstring theory; after all, even the non-perturbative solutions of simple four-dimensional theories are completely unknown, let alone those of a complicated 10-dimensional theory.
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I'm really quite Non-Twisted... (but don't tell anybody!)

Long live the Ville!!!!

[FingerDemon]

Well, you appear to be quoting from some pretty smart people, Twisted and Goldom. But at least we yokels at the Ville know how to spell "brain". Brane? for cryin out loud!! No, Nobel prize for bad spellers.

And I know there's a Florida election joke in that "P-brane democracy" reference, but I don't have the energy to refine it.

Anyway, interesting discussion. I'm an avid reader of Scientific American myself even though I never did really study heavy duty physics like you are talking about. I may have to go through some back issues to follow this thread.

Happy Independence Day all!!!

<TVB>FingerDemon-VS

[Warhammer]

[KopiKat]

Wait a sec... Hmm I think I have my Quantum Collapse and Chaos theory's confused here... Quantum Collapse theory is when two high energy cosmic rays collide and create a "true" vaccume which consumes our false vaccume and makes an ever widening expanse of nothing(which increases at the spead of light)...but im not sure what Chaos theory is....could someone enlighten me?

-KK
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[Goldom]

the simple explanation of chaos theory:

stuff happens because other unrelated stuff happened.