In my Jesuit (read: Catholic) high school, my religion teacher (great guy) liked to use String Theory to think about God. String Theory is this horribly advanced physics theory that attempts to explain everything. While not proven, many say it's our best candidate theory so far. Among other things, String Theory states that our universe doesn't have just 4 dimensions (3 of space, 1 of time), but 11 dimensions. My teacher suggested that, like the strings in String Theory, God is hidden in extra dimensions.
My initial reaction was, "Why bring up String Theory?" Sure, maybe God is hidden in extra dimensions. I could have told them that before String Theory existed. Extra dimensions, while difficult to visualize, are actually a very simple mathematical concept. In three dimensions, you describe position with three numbers: <x,y,z>. For eleven dimensions, you simply give 8 more numbers, nothing to it.
It doesn't matter whether String Theory is true or not; you can posit extra dimensions just for God either way. Because you can posit extra dimensions either way, I think it's equally likely either way. If you think it's unlikely that God is in an extra 5th dimension, why should it be any more likely that he's in an extra 12th dimension? String Theory suggests the idea of extra dimensions beyond the physical world, but does not really support it.
But all of this is fine, because I realize it wasn't meant to be an argument for God. It's just food for thought. But I feel one problem remains: this idea is abusing science.
As far as I can tell, there are two possible answers to "Why bring up String Theory?"
The first possibility is to invoke science's authority. This is an abuse because scientific authority, contrary to popular opinion, does not derive from fancy words or difficult math. Scientific authority derives from empirical evidence and inductive reasoning. There is no such reasoning to actually connect String Theory to God's extra dimensions. Inserting the words "String Theory" into an idea gives a false appearance of authority. Besides, as far as theories go, they didn't even pick a very authoritative one.
The second possibility is that String Theory is a metaphor for understanding the concept. I am not necessarily against the use of metaphors. I like to analogize lots of things to physics myself (though it usually only helps the physicists understand). But there is just no point in drawing analogies to a theory so horribly complicated as String Theory. Analogizing to String Theory does not simplify things, but obfuscates them. What is the topology of God's extra dimension? Are the rest of us confined to some sort of 11-dimensional brane? Such a metaphor will only end up distorting String Theory, and obscuring its own philosophical flaws in pseudo-technical language. Also, if it's a metaphor, it should be explicitly a metaphor, so as not to mislead people.
What they're doing with String Theory is not too far off from how Deepak Chopra abuses Quantum Mechanics. When asked by Richard Dawkins, Chopra admits that Quantum Mechanics is simply a metaphor* for his theory of consciousness. But the rest of the time, he acts as if it is something more. He puts it all together in a confusing mess, doing violence to both quantum mechanics and psychology. The analogy with String Theory isn't quite as bad as Deepak Chopra's analogy, but it's only one step away.
My advice: If you want to talk about extra dimensions, leave talk of String Theory behind. String Theory doesn't actually support your ideas, nor does it elucidate them. Seriously, if you try bringing up String Theory to any normal person, you'll get lots of comments like, "I'll never understand it!" and never anything like, "Oh, so that's how extra dimensions work! It's just like in String Theory!"
*For those who watch the video, I should note that Chopra gets everything completely wrong. "Observer effect" is the only real science I heard in there, but, contrary to popular belief, it is not quantum mechanics. "Discontinuity", as far as I know, is not a term used in quantum mechanics, but rather, an ill-defined scientific-sounding notion Chopra made up. Also, Hillary Clinton is a follower? *shudder*
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
2007 TU24 and the magnetosphere
Today, the asteroid called 2007 TU24 narrowly missed us. By "narrow," I mean about 85 earth radii--1.4 times the distance of the moon. Of course, there are some doomsayers who think this will somehow negatively affect us. They're wrong (duh). Bad Astronomy made an awesome debunking video.
The closest approach has already occurred, but the people at tu24.org don't seem to be letting up. They say they never thought it would hit the earth, and instead think it will cause magnetic disturbance. As it happens, the magnetosphere* is my area of study (mind you, undergraduate research only), and I declare bunk.
They claim that the asteroid traverses the magnetosphere. Well, this is difficult to confirm, since the magnetosphere is constantly changing shape. The magnetosphere extends roughly 15-25 earth radii from the earth, but there is also a very long tail that extends away from the sun. The asteroid just might be in the tail region, but I don't see them actually substantiating such a claim with anything other than this diagram they put together.
In any case, if it did traverse the magnetosphere, this would be of no consequence. Contrary to their claims, the asteroid is electrically neutral, like all large objects. If it had an overall negative charge, then all the surrounding positive ions in interplanetary space would very quickly be attracted to it until it no longer had a charge. So I just don't know how this rock could possibly have a noticeable effect on the magnetosphere. Furthermore, if it did have an effect, we already would have seen it. It doesn't take that long for waves to travel across the magnetosphere--maybe twenty minutes at most.
They throw around ideas like "magnetic reconnection", which is a real phenomenon. But guess what? It's a very common phenomenon that happens all the time even when there is no magnetic activity. Speaking of activity, there was a magnetic storm on November 20. This storm was not, and could not have been caused by a rock. Usually, storms are caused by solar flares and coronal mass ejections. These phenomena are far larger than Earth, and they really do have magnetic properties, since they're made of ionized gas. This gas has no overall electric charge; there are an equal number of positive and negative charges. And yet, do you remember anything happening on November 20? I didn't, and I study this stuff! I only know about it because I checked SpaceWeather.
Really, magnetic storms can have negative effects (see Wikipedia), which is why we need to study it. But mostly they just make pretty lights for the people in auroral regions. And these lights are caused by processes that are far less trivial than 2007 TU24.
*pronounced "mag (as in magnet)-KNEE-toe-sphere"
The closest approach has already occurred, but the people at tu24.org don't seem to be letting up. They say they never thought it would hit the earth, and instead think it will cause magnetic disturbance. As it happens, the magnetosphere* is my area of study (mind you, undergraduate research only), and I declare bunk.
They claim that the asteroid traverses the magnetosphere. Well, this is difficult to confirm, since the magnetosphere is constantly changing shape. The magnetosphere extends roughly 15-25 earth radii from the earth, but there is also a very long tail that extends away from the sun. The asteroid just might be in the tail region, but I don't see them actually substantiating such a claim with anything other than this diagram they put together.
In any case, if it did traverse the magnetosphere, this would be of no consequence. Contrary to their claims, the asteroid is electrically neutral, like all large objects. If it had an overall negative charge, then all the surrounding positive ions in interplanetary space would very quickly be attracted to it until it no longer had a charge. So I just don't know how this rock could possibly have a noticeable effect on the magnetosphere. Furthermore, if it did have an effect, we already would have seen it. It doesn't take that long for waves to travel across the magnetosphere--maybe twenty minutes at most.
They throw around ideas like "magnetic reconnection", which is a real phenomenon. But guess what? It's a very common phenomenon that happens all the time even when there is no magnetic activity. Speaking of activity, there was a magnetic storm on November 20. This storm was not, and could not have been caused by a rock. Usually, storms are caused by solar flares and coronal mass ejections. These phenomena are far larger than Earth, and they really do have magnetic properties, since they're made of ionized gas. This gas has no overall electric charge; there are an equal number of positive and negative charges. And yet, do you remember anything happening on November 20? I didn't, and I study this stuff! I only know about it because I checked SpaceWeather.
Really, magnetic storms can have negative effects (see Wikipedia), which is why we need to study it. But mostly they just make pretty lights for the people in auroral regions. And these lights are caused by processes that are far less trivial than 2007 TU24.
*pronounced "mag (as in magnet)-KNEE-toe-sphere"
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