Chapter Summary Of 'Will Turner' By Dr. Lederman
Will Turner
God Particle Rough Draft Summaries
Chapter 1: Dr. Lederman uses a metaphor of a soccer game with an invisible ball to show the process by which the existence of particles is worked out. This metaphor is useful to get a sense of the experience of a particle physicist as he or she conducts his or her experiments in the particle accelerator. This chapter Dr. Lederman gives a brief background story of what led him to particle physics.
Chapter 2: In a fictional dream, Dr. Lederman meets Democritus, an ancient Greek philosopher who lived during the Classical Greek Civilization and has a conversation with him. The conversation is actually in the form of a Socratic dialogue. The two have an informative dialogue about physics. …show more content…
Many of Democritus' ideas have tested true up to the present time. Dr. Lederman points out that Democritus was in the midst of an age of superstition with the Greek pantheon of gods. In Greek popular culture nature was believed to be originated from supernatural forces, the Greek gods. After their dialogue, Dr. Lederman tells the reader more about Democritus when he writes “Imagine, then the focus and integrity of a mind that could ignore the popular beliefs of the age and come up with concepts harmonious with quark and quantum theory.” This focus and integrity is summed up with two profound and insightful statements, which Dr. Lederman believes to be “two of the most scientifically intuitive quotes ever uttered by an ancient: “everything existing in the universe is the fruit of chance and necessity.’” These last Democritus quotes describe today's quantum mechanics.
Chapter 3: The chapter discussed mathematicians such as Vincenzo Galilei.
He was one of the most important mathematicians since he did something that was revolutionary for his time he experimented. He experimented so he could prove a point to his teacher, Gioseffo Zarlino that there were non-Pythagorean mathematical relationships in the musical scale. Galiliei’s experimenting was particularly important since his son was Galileo Galiliaei and witnessed all the experiments that his father performed which had a deep impact on the younger Galilei. Galileo Galilei became famous for his attention to the study of motion. Galileo realized he could study the free fall of objects with a ball and an inclined plane. This would allow the motion of the ball to be slowed enough to be observed and measured, rather than a quick free fall. He kept repeating this experiment with steeper inclinations until the ball rolled too fast for him too measure. He was able to use his measurements and observations to explain the motion of free fall. When he rolled the ball over stiff lute strings tied across a tilted board it would make a clicking sound. His musician's ear was able to detect the timing of the ball over the strings as it rolled over them. He discovered that a “falling object doesn’t just drop, but drops faster and faster and faster and faster over time.” This is where he concluded that an object's speed increases over time as it falls downward. He was the first to develop the formula s = At2, which is used to calculate the free fall of any object toward earth. Galileo was not only famous for his study of motion though. Galileo was also known for his study on atoms. Galileo believed that atoms were the smallest quanta of matter and that there are an infinite number of atoms separated by an infinite number of voids. Galileo is best known for his telescopes though. At the time, people were very dismissive and critical of his telescopes though. It was necessary to calibrate his telescopes
which worked fine with terrestrial object but not with planetary objects. The next astronomer that Dr. Lederman describes was Tycho Brahe, a Danish nobleman who devoted himself solely to physics. He was the most precise of astronomers and contributed to astronomy by making modifications to several important instruments that astronomers of that day used. He also catalogued the position of over 1000 stars. Although he was a great astronomer, he did not make any theories about his findings. It was his brilliant assistant, Johannes Kepler. Kepler was born into a Lutheran family at the time of the Counter Reformation. He was described to be frail, neurotic, and nearsighted qualities which he did not share with his great predecessors, Galilei and Brahe. When Brahe died, Kepler inherited all of his findings and data. Kepler rejected his tutor’s theory of the solar system and adopted the Copernican theory. His adoption of the Copernican theory paved the way for Newton because he was one of the first to promote the idea that a force is needed to make sense of the solar system. Dr. Lederman notes that Newton was born the same year that Galileo died and that "He was a scientist of transcendent importance." Somehow Newton realized that all objects were made of atoms. "Newton's impact on philosophy and religion was as profound as his influence on physics. All from that key equation F = ma."
Chapter 4: Chemists did a lot of experiments between 1600-1900 when physics at the time was stuck in a theoretical realm. The discoveries and intellectual leaps that these chemists made were incredibly important in advancing all fields of science. One major scientist was Evangelista Torricelli who discovered air pressure, by inventing the first barometer. Through various experiments he also created the first vacuum, and proved the idea of “a void” to the scientific community. Robert Boyle wa yet another great scientist who was refferrred to as “the father of chemistry.” He came up with Boyles Law which says that the volume of the gas varied inversely with the pressure on it. Antoine Laurent Lavoisier created the metric system which is used around the world in scientific inquiry. He was a fierce advocate of experiment procedure and demanded accuracy in his experiments. John Dalton who was described as a hermit like man, was barely recognized by his peers until he revealed his atomic theory of matter. What set his work apart was that the weight of the particles played a crucial role. Although he was wrong in saying that the chemical atom was the smallest particle, he established the reality of atoms, and because each of his atoms had a different weight, he inspired others to explore why this is. Dmitri Mendeleev was responsible for the periodic table of elements. He put all of the known elements on playing cards, with their mass and other known informantion, and played with their order until he noticed certain periodical trends, when there wasn’t a known element to follow the patterns, he left a blank, and as time passed these blanks filled into what became the modern periodic table of the elements. Between the years of 1820 – 18 70 there was a huge explosion of popularity surrounding electricity, and within that short time frame, many physicists including Coulomb, Micheal Faraday, Hertz and James Clerk Maxwell conducted countless experiments that led to a unified theory and understanding of electricity, magnetism and light. In 1898 J.J. Thomson unveiled years of work he conducted with cathode ray tubes that shattered the widely held belief that chemical atoms were the smallest unit of matter and were indivisible by “discovering” electrons. By proving that there were the smaller particle, Thomson sparked the interest in particle physics. This chapter is really interesting because it goes through the history of other fields of science and essentially gives the important points, while highlighting the relationships between various branches of science. It also went over the hardships that early chemists and the like had to face, a lack of knowledge, funds and equipment topping that list, it shows that these people had to be incredible intelligent and resourceful in order to make the types of intellectual leaps that they did.
Chapter 5: This chapter discusses the atom and its discovery by the leading physicists and atomists of from the 17th century. It also talks about how the periodic table was made by Gregory Mendelev and the naming of atoms. Some of the interesting things in this chapter is the personal relationships and background on these very famous physicists. For instance, Ernest Rutherford was a burly, 6 foot 4 inches tall New Zealander who had a knack for using small delicate lab equipment, that’s why J.J. Thomson hired him to work at Cambridge for him. After some years there, Rutherford transferred to McGill University where he made a name for himself for his work with radioactivity that won him the Nobel prize/ By the time Rutherford conducted his famous gold foil experiment, where he has lab assistants he was head of the Cambridge Lab. When the alpha particles were shot at the gold foil, and some actually bounced back he was astounded and said “It was as if you shot a 15-inch artillery shell at a piece of tissue paper and it bounced back at you”. He used this evidence to support the idea of a dense, positive nucleus found in the center of atoms. Usually when students in high school are taught about what a chemical atom looks like, the model teachers’ use is called the Bohr- Rutherford Model. Neils Bohr was the younger and was inspired by Rutherford’s new model of the atom, but he was not satisfied with how electrons were represented so we went to work to disprove parts of Rutherford’s model and fit in his own ideas. His idea was Quantum energy levels that electrons sit in surrounding Rutherfords Nucleus. When an electron gains energy, it can jump up to another energy level, and when it looses energy it call fall back down to its ground state. The amount of energy required was a certain amount, and only a certain number of electrons could fit in each energy level. Of course other very important physicists refined this model, adding to Quantum Theory, like Heisenburg’s theory of matrix mechanics which used spectral lines to define the radii of the orbits. Erwin Schrodinger is another famous physicist. He created an equation known as the wave function that gave the radii of Bohr’s energy levels without any fudging. He called it the theory of Wave Mechanics and it was a sensation. He created this entire theory in a few weeks, while on vacation in the Swiss Alps with his mistress. He said he just needed some new inspiration. His equation is easy to use, and it gives the probability of finding an electron at a specific point. This ease of use and useful and accurate information made it incredibly popular. Schrödinger hated this interpretation and ended up regretting creating it. Scientists of the time were known to try to better the other by creating or disproving other scientist’s theories. This can create some rivalry, and one that is very famous was between Neils Bohr and Albert Einstein. Einstien would create a thought experiment and Bohr would find a flaw, then Einstein would counter and so on and so forth. Most of their disagreements centered around weather or not Quantum Theory was complete. All of the work, the equations and theories can be applied to the Big Bang, and are what researchers are using to find the God particle. At the end of this chapter, Lederman states that he would rather stick to his particle accelerator then get involved in the raging debate around Quantum Theory, but he is glad other scientists are sticking with it.
Chapter6:
Dr. Lederman tells the reader that this chapter is about the process of getting particles to collide. Developing this theme, he writes about the development of the particle accelerator, formerly known as a cyclotron, and later the synchrotron. As he chronicles breakthroughs in the technologies of these machines, these names were no longer applicable. The circular ponds dissipate waste heat from the equipment. Powerful accelerators of today have two main purposes. One purpose is the production of new particles and the other is scattering. In 1909, particle scattering was made practical by Ernst Rutherford and two of his junior colleagues, with a natural source of radiation, to aim alpha particles at a piece of gold foil. The radioactive material was placed in a lead case with a narrow hole and this aimed the alpha particle beam. This led to the discovery of the structure of the atom; a nucleus surrounded by electrons. In May 1911 Rutherford published an article declaring the existence of the atom. Particle scattering is a method of determining what sub atomic particles look like and their properties. It is using the collision of energized particles to give a picture of the particle being studied. Observing the scatter pattern of the electrons, the shape of the charge distribution and size of the proton were revealed. Rutherford's idea of using particles to detect other particles directly led to the discovery of the top quark decades later. Dr. Lederman writes that Rutherford's set of particle collision experiments, from natural radioactive decay, has an energy of 5 million electron volts (1 electron volt [1 eV] is the equivalent of a single electron being raised by a potential difference of 1 joule, while 1 volt [1 V] is a measurement of 1 coulomb of electrons being raised by a potential difference of 1 joule). In contrast Fermilab, today, produces collisions at 2 trillion eV. In 1955 the Berkley Bevatron was at about 7 billion eV, In 1960, The Brookhaven AGS, was at 30 billion eV; in 1972 Fermilab was at 200 billion eV. In 1968, the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, also referred to as SLAC, repeated the Hofstadter experiment of bombarding protons with electrons but with a much higher energy - 8 billion electron volts to 15 billion electron volts (8 GeV to 15 GeV). This created a much sharper and clearer picture of the proton and it revealed that the proton contains "three rapidly moving, pointlike constituents". These constituents were the quarks postulated by Gell-Mann in 1964. In addition, the 1968 SLAC experiments were also a little more complicated than the Hofstadter and Rutherford experiments, even though in essence it was a scattering experiment. The electron coming in actually throws out a messenger photon, and if the photon has the right characteristics, it then, gets absorbed by the quark. The pattern of the incoming electron, after a successful pass and catch, can be interpreted only as the existence of a point-like particle within the proton, the quark. The other purpose of accelerators, is to produce new particles; that is, new in the sense of never before seen. The high powered accelerators of the 1950s and early 1960s produced literally hundreds of never before seen particles. Particle collisions began with protons in Rutherford's experiments, and then protons were used in the high powered accelerators because of their mass. Then the particle accelerators progressed to electrons; then muons, photons, and other specialized collisions.
Chapter 7:
Dr. Lederman uses the classification "A-tom" as a reference to Democritus' fundamental, particle. Today we understand these to be the electron and quark. The discovery of the quark is a story told in this chapter. It is part of the story of the Standard Model and Dr. Lederman chronicles and narrates the development of the Standard Model in this chapter. The component parts of the standard model are discussed such as the weak force, the strong force, and he discusses QCD and QED. The strong force is mediated by gluons (wavey). The strong force has three types of charges, the so called red charge, green charge and the blue charge. It is actually a type of charge, different from electromagnetism, and not really a color. Dr. Lederman opens the chapter contrasting the perspective of the late 1920s physicist, who was hesitant when discovering a new particle, with the physicists of the 1950s and 1960s, who were deluged with a downpour of newly discovered particles. The tradition of the scientific method made it difficult for scientists of the late 1920s to accept what could be postulated but not observed - such as the neutrino or the positron. They could see that the mathematical theory was accurate in its prediction, but going public without observation, seemed risky. For example, in 1927 Paul Dirac had trouble accepting the consequences of his new equation that predicted the positron before its discovery. And, in 1930, Wolfgang Pauli felt uncomfortably forced to propose the neutrino hypothesis in the weak interaction. By the 1950s, and 1960's however, this hesitant perspective was discarded in the face of the proliferation of hundreds of new particles, and the prediction of a new particle was accepted as the norm, if it was supported by a recognized theory. Along with the plethora of newly discovered particles, called hadrons, came the fear that a fundamental particle, an a-tom would never be found. Hadrons are particles that contain yet smaller, more fundamental particles. Particle physicists were having much better luck describing three out of four forces of nature: the electromagnetic force, the strong force, and the weak force. The first component of the Standard Model discussed by Dr. Lederman is the field theory of electromagnetism: Soon field theories were being developed. For example, the electromagnetic field is a physical field created by electrical - magnetically charged objects, most notably the electron. The field emanates out and around and can be measured. Propagation is the important function of the field - that is, the electromagnetic field spreads out in waves and affects an area. In addition, it affects the behavior of all objects which carry a charge that are in the vicinity of the field. In the late 1920s Paul Dirac quantized the electromagnetic field. In other words, he formulated the field as if it occurred in multiple independent packets. The measurable independent units are known as quanta. In addition, the measurable units are actually particles that create the field, and do other functions too, in the world of the infinitesimal particle. By the 1940s quantum theory and special relativity were successfully combined with the theory of the electron. This was developed into a quantum field theory of electromagnetism, known as QED. However, because infinities plagued the equations at that time some brilliant theorists came up with renormalization. When infinities occur in the equations or theories, this is a red flag to physicists. Renormalization is measuring the properties of the particles needed and plugging those values into the equation. For example, with some intense effort, the negative charge and mass of the electron became measurable in the late 1940s. If needed these values could be plugged into an equation. Dr Lederman writes that after renormalization, the infinities cancelled out and “the agreement between theory and experiment were sensational.” Richard Feynman, a cutting edge physicist and Nobel Prize winner, along with his fellow Laureate winners for QED, “proposed that whenever we see this dreaded infinity appearing, we in effect bypass it by inserting the known mass of the electron.” And this is how the infinities are cancelled out. The next component of the Standard Model discussed by Dr. Lederman is the weak force. This is the force that causes radioactive decay. The radioactive decay that we all know about is actually only one part in a process where one particle or element transforms into another, plus some by-products. For example, a neutron decays into a proton plus some by products. The weak force has its own “carrier particles” and this is fundamental to any field theory, because all field theories have actual “carrier particles” that do the work. These “carrier particles” are the quanta, or the measurable object, in any field theory – hence, quantum field theory. Another component of the Standard Model is the strong force. The strong force is the force that holds the nucleus of an atom together. The carrier particles of the strong force are gluons. Since the strong force is based on another field theory its quanta are gluons
Chapter 8:
This is one of the many anecdotes that are sprinkled into this chapter about what is known about the Higgs (The God Particle). Unification is an ongoing theme in this book, and according to the science history summarized by Lederman, a very popular goal in scientific fields for the last couple thousand years. The problem in the going theory at the moment is that when energies get really high, t stops working, the probabilities of certain particles being created during collisions exceed 100 % which is impossible. These screwy numbers show that there is something missing that would be affecting every particle and force that when taken into account would correct the current shortcomings and errors. One of the problems with Quantum theory is gravity. No one has been able to get gravity to conform to the theory; so far scientists are not quite sure where or how it fits in. The God Particle is also called interchangeably the Higgs Particle and the Higgs field, and so far physicists have pinned down what it does is it is responsible for mass. Yes that’s right, mass is not an arbitrary constant of a certain particle, like its spin or charge. Instead the Higgs field permeates everything, even the vacuum, influencing every particles interaction. The Higgs particle has essentially changed what I considered something that was constant. Mass is a property dependent on the particles interactions with other particles and its environment. The Higgs also has no direction, is a scalar quantity, this is why it still has an effect in “the void”. Another piece of the puzzle that is complicating the process of pinning down this particle is that the Higgs is destroyed by high energy. This means that during the Big Bang it wasn’t how it is now, but after a little bit of time and cooling, the Higgs kicked into gear and proliferated. The quest for the God Particle has changed physics and Lederman sums this up “before Higgs, symmetry and boredom, after Higgs, complexity and boredom.” The more energy that a given particle has, the faster it decays, this is because it has more options to decay into, that is more particles have less mass then them so in certain conditions they can decay into any of them. This prompt a change in the attitude towards accelerators in the late 80’s, they became particle factories, doing as many collisions as possible to create as many of these different “options”. The goal was to have a large number of each type of product to study, and make any correlations between certain particles and forces playing roles at certain energy levels etc… The reason why not all of the resources were poured into one collider to find the elusive God Particle is because at the time of the Big Bang, all of the various elementary particles were all of equal amount and of very high energy, so by seeing what the ratio of particles are now and their energies, it can give us very useful information about the cooling process the universe is going through.
Chapter 9:
The Big Bang Theory has been given a lot of flack in the media but in the scientific community have a strong foothold, and a majority acceptance. This is because there is a lot of evidence supporting it, from observations made by Edwin Hubble in 1929 when he compared spectral lines of light from all over the sky; he noticed that they were all moving away from him, in every direction. Other evidence is in the form of reminiscent radiation that can still be detected. Also the universe has a very constant temperature, that is, distant parts are within fractions of a degree of each other, this means that they at one time had the same amount of energy and were incredibly close to each other.GUTs is a collection of theories called the Grand Unification Theories, which attempt to unify both quantum chromodynamics (the variation found within quarks and leptons often referred to as their flavor or color) and the electroweak force. This window of unification is in the energy window of 10^15 GeV. The symmetry of the laws of nature are at a higher level. At this temperature there is only one particle and one force but an large amount of force carrying particle and gravity. There are many variations on this theory, not particularly strong, but cannot be experimentally disproved so are still floating around the scientific community. Another theory is SUSY, which stands for supersummetry. This theory unifies particles and force carriers. Everything has a supersymetrical partner but so far we haven’t seen them because they are super high energy and our particle accelerators cannot get their just yet. Susy theory would lead to a true quantum theory with no more holes!! First, those theoretical physicists just need to fix the holes. An open universe is one that is continuously expanded, growing colder, forever; this is caused by very little gravitational mass. A closed universe is where there is too much gravitational mass and the current expansion will reverse, resulting in a Big Crunch. In order to calculate the gravitational mass, you can count the stars, which have been done and say that it is an Open universe. But now it is thought that there is another type of matter, called Dark Matter that adds mass to the universe. Lucky for us, theoretical physicists believe that the total mass puts our universe in a great position, a Flat Universe, which has enough mass to not expand too big, but not too much that it will “crunch”. We are essentially expanding, at a slowly decreasing rate.
God Particle Rough Draft Summaries
Chapter 1: Dr. Lederman uses a metaphor of a soccer game with an invisible ball to show the process by which the existence of particles is worked out. This metaphor is useful to get a sense of the experience of a particle physicist as he or she conducts his or her experiments in the particle accelerator. This chapter Dr. Lederman gives a brief background story of what led him to particle physics.
Chapter 2: In a fictional dream, Dr. Lederman meets Democritus, an ancient Greek philosopher who lived during the Classical Greek Civilization and has a conversation with him. The conversation is actually in the form of a Socratic dialogue. The two have an informative dialogue about physics. …show more content…
Many of Democritus' ideas have tested true up to the present time. Dr. Lederman points out that Democritus was in the midst of an age of superstition with the Greek pantheon of gods. In Greek popular culture nature was believed to be originated from supernatural forces, the Greek gods. After their dialogue, Dr. Lederman tells the reader more about Democritus when he writes “Imagine, then the focus and integrity of a mind that could ignore the popular beliefs of the age and come up with concepts harmonious with quark and quantum theory.” This focus and integrity is summed up with two profound and insightful statements, which Dr. Lederman believes to be “two of the most scientifically intuitive quotes ever uttered by an ancient: “everything existing in the universe is the fruit of chance and necessity.’” These last Democritus quotes describe today's quantum mechanics.
Chapter 3: The chapter discussed mathematicians such as Vincenzo Galilei.
He was one of the most important mathematicians since he did something that was revolutionary for his time he experimented. He experimented so he could prove a point to his teacher, Gioseffo Zarlino that there were non-Pythagorean mathematical relationships in the musical scale. Galiliei’s experimenting was particularly important since his son was Galileo Galiliaei and witnessed all the experiments that his father performed which had a deep impact on the younger Galilei. Galileo Galilei became famous for his attention to the study of motion. Galileo realized he could study the free fall of objects with a ball and an inclined plane. This would allow the motion of the ball to be slowed enough to be observed and measured, rather than a quick free fall. He kept repeating this experiment with steeper inclinations until the ball rolled too fast for him too measure. He was able to use his measurements and observations to explain the motion of free fall. When he rolled the ball over stiff lute strings tied across a tilted board it would make a clicking sound. His musician's ear was able to detect the timing of the ball over the strings as it rolled over them. He discovered that a “falling object doesn’t just drop, but drops faster and faster and faster and faster over time.” This is where he concluded that an object's speed increases over time as it falls downward. He was the first to develop the formula s = At2, which is used to calculate the free fall of any object toward earth. Galileo was not only famous for his study of motion though. Galileo was also known for his study on atoms. Galileo believed that atoms were the smallest quanta of matter and that there are an infinite number of atoms separated by an infinite number of voids. Galileo is best known for his telescopes though. At the time, people were very dismissive and critical of his telescopes though. It was necessary to calibrate his telescopes
which worked fine with terrestrial object but not with planetary objects. The next astronomer that Dr. Lederman describes was Tycho Brahe, a Danish nobleman who devoted himself solely to physics. He was the most precise of astronomers and contributed to astronomy by making modifications to several important instruments that astronomers of that day used. He also catalogued the position of over 1000 stars. Although he was a great astronomer, he did not make any theories about his findings. It was his brilliant assistant, Johannes Kepler. Kepler was born into a Lutheran family at the time of the Counter Reformation. He was described to be frail, neurotic, and nearsighted qualities which he did not share with his great predecessors, Galilei and Brahe. When Brahe died, Kepler inherited all of his findings and data. Kepler rejected his tutor’s theory of the solar system and adopted the Copernican theory. His adoption of the Copernican theory paved the way for Newton because he was one of the first to promote the idea that a force is needed to make sense of the solar system. Dr. Lederman notes that Newton was born the same year that Galileo died and that "He was a scientist of transcendent importance." Somehow Newton realized that all objects were made of atoms. "Newton's impact on philosophy and religion was as profound as his influence on physics. All from that key equation F = ma."
Chapter 4: Chemists did a lot of experiments between 1600-1900 when physics at the time was stuck in a theoretical realm. The discoveries and intellectual leaps that these chemists made were incredibly important in advancing all fields of science. One major scientist was Evangelista Torricelli who discovered air pressure, by inventing the first barometer. Through various experiments he also created the first vacuum, and proved the idea of “a void” to the scientific community. Robert Boyle wa yet another great scientist who was refferrred to as “the father of chemistry.” He came up with Boyles Law which says that the volume of the gas varied inversely with the pressure on it. Antoine Laurent Lavoisier created the metric system which is used around the world in scientific inquiry. He was a fierce advocate of experiment procedure and demanded accuracy in his experiments. John Dalton who was described as a hermit like man, was barely recognized by his peers until he revealed his atomic theory of matter. What set his work apart was that the weight of the particles played a crucial role. Although he was wrong in saying that the chemical atom was the smallest particle, he established the reality of atoms, and because each of his atoms had a different weight, he inspired others to explore why this is. Dmitri Mendeleev was responsible for the periodic table of elements. He put all of the known elements on playing cards, with their mass and other known informantion, and played with their order until he noticed certain periodical trends, when there wasn’t a known element to follow the patterns, he left a blank, and as time passed these blanks filled into what became the modern periodic table of the elements. Between the years of 1820 – 18 70 there was a huge explosion of popularity surrounding electricity, and within that short time frame, many physicists including Coulomb, Micheal Faraday, Hertz and James Clerk Maxwell conducted countless experiments that led to a unified theory and understanding of electricity, magnetism and light. In 1898 J.J. Thomson unveiled years of work he conducted with cathode ray tubes that shattered the widely held belief that chemical atoms were the smallest unit of matter and were indivisible by “discovering” electrons. By proving that there were the smaller particle, Thomson sparked the interest in particle physics. This chapter is really interesting because it goes through the history of other fields of science and essentially gives the important points, while highlighting the relationships between various branches of science. It also went over the hardships that early chemists and the like had to face, a lack of knowledge, funds and equipment topping that list, it shows that these people had to be incredible intelligent and resourceful in order to make the types of intellectual leaps that they did.
Chapter 5: This chapter discusses the atom and its discovery by the leading physicists and atomists of from the 17th century. It also talks about how the periodic table was made by Gregory Mendelev and the naming of atoms. Some of the interesting things in this chapter is the personal relationships and background on these very famous physicists. For instance, Ernest Rutherford was a burly, 6 foot 4 inches tall New Zealander who had a knack for using small delicate lab equipment, that’s why J.J. Thomson hired him to work at Cambridge for him. After some years there, Rutherford transferred to McGill University where he made a name for himself for his work with radioactivity that won him the Nobel prize/ By the time Rutherford conducted his famous gold foil experiment, where he has lab assistants he was head of the Cambridge Lab. When the alpha particles were shot at the gold foil, and some actually bounced back he was astounded and said “It was as if you shot a 15-inch artillery shell at a piece of tissue paper and it bounced back at you”. He used this evidence to support the idea of a dense, positive nucleus found in the center of atoms. Usually when students in high school are taught about what a chemical atom looks like, the model teachers’ use is called the Bohr- Rutherford Model. Neils Bohr was the younger and was inspired by Rutherford’s new model of the atom, but he was not satisfied with how electrons were represented so we went to work to disprove parts of Rutherford’s model and fit in his own ideas. His idea was Quantum energy levels that electrons sit in surrounding Rutherfords Nucleus. When an electron gains energy, it can jump up to another energy level, and when it looses energy it call fall back down to its ground state. The amount of energy required was a certain amount, and only a certain number of electrons could fit in each energy level. Of course other very important physicists refined this model, adding to Quantum Theory, like Heisenburg’s theory of matrix mechanics which used spectral lines to define the radii of the orbits. Erwin Schrodinger is another famous physicist. He created an equation known as the wave function that gave the radii of Bohr’s energy levels without any fudging. He called it the theory of Wave Mechanics and it was a sensation. He created this entire theory in a few weeks, while on vacation in the Swiss Alps with his mistress. He said he just needed some new inspiration. His equation is easy to use, and it gives the probability of finding an electron at a specific point. This ease of use and useful and accurate information made it incredibly popular. Schrödinger hated this interpretation and ended up regretting creating it. Scientists of the time were known to try to better the other by creating or disproving other scientist’s theories. This can create some rivalry, and one that is very famous was between Neils Bohr and Albert Einstein. Einstien would create a thought experiment and Bohr would find a flaw, then Einstein would counter and so on and so forth. Most of their disagreements centered around weather or not Quantum Theory was complete. All of the work, the equations and theories can be applied to the Big Bang, and are what researchers are using to find the God particle. At the end of this chapter, Lederman states that he would rather stick to his particle accelerator then get involved in the raging debate around Quantum Theory, but he is glad other scientists are sticking with it.
Chapter6:
Dr. Lederman tells the reader that this chapter is about the process of getting particles to collide. Developing this theme, he writes about the development of the particle accelerator, formerly known as a cyclotron, and later the synchrotron. As he chronicles breakthroughs in the technologies of these machines, these names were no longer applicable. The circular ponds dissipate waste heat from the equipment. Powerful accelerators of today have two main purposes. One purpose is the production of new particles and the other is scattering. In 1909, particle scattering was made practical by Ernst Rutherford and two of his junior colleagues, with a natural source of radiation, to aim alpha particles at a piece of gold foil. The radioactive material was placed in a lead case with a narrow hole and this aimed the alpha particle beam. This led to the discovery of the structure of the atom; a nucleus surrounded by electrons. In May 1911 Rutherford published an article declaring the existence of the atom. Particle scattering is a method of determining what sub atomic particles look like and their properties. It is using the collision of energized particles to give a picture of the particle being studied. Observing the scatter pattern of the electrons, the shape of the charge distribution and size of the proton were revealed. Rutherford's idea of using particles to detect other particles directly led to the discovery of the top quark decades later. Dr. Lederman writes that Rutherford's set of particle collision experiments, from natural radioactive decay, has an energy of 5 million electron volts (1 electron volt [1 eV] is the equivalent of a single electron being raised by a potential difference of 1 joule, while 1 volt [1 V] is a measurement of 1 coulomb of electrons being raised by a potential difference of 1 joule). In contrast Fermilab, today, produces collisions at 2 trillion eV. In 1955 the Berkley Bevatron was at about 7 billion eV, In 1960, The Brookhaven AGS, was at 30 billion eV; in 1972 Fermilab was at 200 billion eV. In 1968, the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, also referred to as SLAC, repeated the Hofstadter experiment of bombarding protons with electrons but with a much higher energy - 8 billion electron volts to 15 billion electron volts (8 GeV to 15 GeV). This created a much sharper and clearer picture of the proton and it revealed that the proton contains "three rapidly moving, pointlike constituents". These constituents were the quarks postulated by Gell-Mann in 1964. In addition, the 1968 SLAC experiments were also a little more complicated than the Hofstadter and Rutherford experiments, even though in essence it was a scattering experiment. The electron coming in actually throws out a messenger photon, and if the photon has the right characteristics, it then, gets absorbed by the quark. The pattern of the incoming electron, after a successful pass and catch, can be interpreted only as the existence of a point-like particle within the proton, the quark. The other purpose of accelerators, is to produce new particles; that is, new in the sense of never before seen. The high powered accelerators of the 1950s and early 1960s produced literally hundreds of never before seen particles. Particle collisions began with protons in Rutherford's experiments, and then protons were used in the high powered accelerators because of their mass. Then the particle accelerators progressed to electrons; then muons, photons, and other specialized collisions.
Chapter 7:
Dr. Lederman uses the classification "A-tom" as a reference to Democritus' fundamental, particle. Today we understand these to be the electron and quark. The discovery of the quark is a story told in this chapter. It is part of the story of the Standard Model and Dr. Lederman chronicles and narrates the development of the Standard Model in this chapter. The component parts of the standard model are discussed such as the weak force, the strong force, and he discusses QCD and QED. The strong force is mediated by gluons (wavey). The strong force has three types of charges, the so called red charge, green charge and the blue charge. It is actually a type of charge, different from electromagnetism, and not really a color. Dr. Lederman opens the chapter contrasting the perspective of the late 1920s physicist, who was hesitant when discovering a new particle, with the physicists of the 1950s and 1960s, who were deluged with a downpour of newly discovered particles. The tradition of the scientific method made it difficult for scientists of the late 1920s to accept what could be postulated but not observed - such as the neutrino or the positron. They could see that the mathematical theory was accurate in its prediction, but going public without observation, seemed risky. For example, in 1927 Paul Dirac had trouble accepting the consequences of his new equation that predicted the positron before its discovery. And, in 1930, Wolfgang Pauli felt uncomfortably forced to propose the neutrino hypothesis in the weak interaction. By the 1950s, and 1960's however, this hesitant perspective was discarded in the face of the proliferation of hundreds of new particles, and the prediction of a new particle was accepted as the norm, if it was supported by a recognized theory. Along with the plethora of newly discovered particles, called hadrons, came the fear that a fundamental particle, an a-tom would never be found. Hadrons are particles that contain yet smaller, more fundamental particles. Particle physicists were having much better luck describing three out of four forces of nature: the electromagnetic force, the strong force, and the weak force. The first component of the Standard Model discussed by Dr. Lederman is the field theory of electromagnetism: Soon field theories were being developed. For example, the electromagnetic field is a physical field created by electrical - magnetically charged objects, most notably the electron. The field emanates out and around and can be measured. Propagation is the important function of the field - that is, the electromagnetic field spreads out in waves and affects an area. In addition, it affects the behavior of all objects which carry a charge that are in the vicinity of the field. In the late 1920s Paul Dirac quantized the electromagnetic field. In other words, he formulated the field as if it occurred in multiple independent packets. The measurable independent units are known as quanta. In addition, the measurable units are actually particles that create the field, and do other functions too, in the world of the infinitesimal particle. By the 1940s quantum theory and special relativity were successfully combined with the theory of the electron. This was developed into a quantum field theory of electromagnetism, known as QED. However, because infinities plagued the equations at that time some brilliant theorists came up with renormalization. When infinities occur in the equations or theories, this is a red flag to physicists. Renormalization is measuring the properties of the particles needed and plugging those values into the equation. For example, with some intense effort, the negative charge and mass of the electron became measurable in the late 1940s. If needed these values could be plugged into an equation. Dr Lederman writes that after renormalization, the infinities cancelled out and “the agreement between theory and experiment were sensational.” Richard Feynman, a cutting edge physicist and Nobel Prize winner, along with his fellow Laureate winners for QED, “proposed that whenever we see this dreaded infinity appearing, we in effect bypass it by inserting the known mass of the electron.” And this is how the infinities are cancelled out. The next component of the Standard Model discussed by Dr. Lederman is the weak force. This is the force that causes radioactive decay. The radioactive decay that we all know about is actually only one part in a process where one particle or element transforms into another, plus some by-products. For example, a neutron decays into a proton plus some by products. The weak force has its own “carrier particles” and this is fundamental to any field theory, because all field theories have actual “carrier particles” that do the work. These “carrier particles” are the quanta, or the measurable object, in any field theory – hence, quantum field theory. Another component of the Standard Model is the strong force. The strong force is the force that holds the nucleus of an atom together. The carrier particles of the strong force are gluons. Since the strong force is based on another field theory its quanta are gluons
Chapter 8:
This is one of the many anecdotes that are sprinkled into this chapter about what is known about the Higgs (The God Particle). Unification is an ongoing theme in this book, and according to the science history summarized by Lederman, a very popular goal in scientific fields for the last couple thousand years. The problem in the going theory at the moment is that when energies get really high, t stops working, the probabilities of certain particles being created during collisions exceed 100 % which is impossible. These screwy numbers show that there is something missing that would be affecting every particle and force that when taken into account would correct the current shortcomings and errors. One of the problems with Quantum theory is gravity. No one has been able to get gravity to conform to the theory; so far scientists are not quite sure where or how it fits in. The God Particle is also called interchangeably the Higgs Particle and the Higgs field, and so far physicists have pinned down what it does is it is responsible for mass. Yes that’s right, mass is not an arbitrary constant of a certain particle, like its spin or charge. Instead the Higgs field permeates everything, even the vacuum, influencing every particles interaction. The Higgs particle has essentially changed what I considered something that was constant. Mass is a property dependent on the particles interactions with other particles and its environment. The Higgs also has no direction, is a scalar quantity, this is why it still has an effect in “the void”. Another piece of the puzzle that is complicating the process of pinning down this particle is that the Higgs is destroyed by high energy. This means that during the Big Bang it wasn’t how it is now, but after a little bit of time and cooling, the Higgs kicked into gear and proliferated. The quest for the God Particle has changed physics and Lederman sums this up “before Higgs, symmetry and boredom, after Higgs, complexity and boredom.” The more energy that a given particle has, the faster it decays, this is because it has more options to decay into, that is more particles have less mass then them so in certain conditions they can decay into any of them. This prompt a change in the attitude towards accelerators in the late 80’s, they became particle factories, doing as many collisions as possible to create as many of these different “options”. The goal was to have a large number of each type of product to study, and make any correlations between certain particles and forces playing roles at certain energy levels etc… The reason why not all of the resources were poured into one collider to find the elusive God Particle is because at the time of the Big Bang, all of the various elementary particles were all of equal amount and of very high energy, so by seeing what the ratio of particles are now and their energies, it can give us very useful information about the cooling process the universe is going through.
Chapter 9:
The Big Bang Theory has been given a lot of flack in the media but in the scientific community have a strong foothold, and a majority acceptance. This is because there is a lot of evidence supporting it, from observations made by Edwin Hubble in 1929 when he compared spectral lines of light from all over the sky; he noticed that they were all moving away from him, in every direction. Other evidence is in the form of reminiscent radiation that can still be detected. Also the universe has a very constant temperature, that is, distant parts are within fractions of a degree of each other, this means that they at one time had the same amount of energy and were incredibly close to each other.GUTs is a collection of theories called the Grand Unification Theories, which attempt to unify both quantum chromodynamics (the variation found within quarks and leptons often referred to as their flavor or color) and the electroweak force. This window of unification is in the energy window of 10^15 GeV. The symmetry of the laws of nature are at a higher level. At this temperature there is only one particle and one force but an large amount of force carrying particle and gravity. There are many variations on this theory, not particularly strong, but cannot be experimentally disproved so are still floating around the scientific community. Another theory is SUSY, which stands for supersummetry. This theory unifies particles and force carriers. Everything has a supersymetrical partner but so far we haven’t seen them because they are super high energy and our particle accelerators cannot get their just yet. Susy theory would lead to a true quantum theory with no more holes!! First, those theoretical physicists just need to fix the holes. An open universe is one that is continuously expanded, growing colder, forever; this is caused by very little gravitational mass. A closed universe is where there is too much gravitational mass and the current expansion will reverse, resulting in a Big Crunch. In order to calculate the gravitational mass, you can count the stars, which have been done and say that it is an Open universe. But now it is thought that there is another type of matter, called Dark Matter that adds mass to the universe. Lucky for us, theoretical physicists believe that the total mass puts our universe in a great position, a Flat Universe, which has enough mass to not expand too big, but not too much that it will “crunch”. We are essentially expanding, at a slowly decreasing rate.