Large Hadron Atom Smasher Reaches Near Speed of Light

-- because space/time is finite. --

That's another one that is counterintuitive at best, and mind boggling for most. Given a universe with a finite mass, people naturally picture a universe (a finite volume, if you will), sitting in an otherwise empty and unlimited space of nothingness. Said another way, that the finite volume has an edge, as does the finite volume of a balloon, milk container, and any other three dimensional object. Get to "the edge of the universe," and all that's left is boundless empty space.

But space itself is not boundless, or "unlimited volume." There is no "edge of the finite universe," no way to get outside of the space of the universe and look back at it. We can't picture a finite volume without a boundary (such a thing can't be modeled in three dimensions), so have to rely on a 2 -> 3 dimensional analogy. The surface of the earth has a finite area (2 space), yet, there is no "edge" of the earth where the area runs out. One could explore the entire surface of the earth, every square millimeter, conclude that the surface is finite, but nowhere in that exploration would we find the "edge" of the surface. The two dimensional area of the earth is wrapped in a third dimension.

There is no "empty space nothingness" outside of the universe. And before the universe began (and also inside a black hole) not only is the notion of "empty space" without meaning, the notion of "time" does not exist either. No before, no after. Everything in our reality, space and time included, had a beginning.

-- I recall hearing of experiments in which light was made to slow down by a factor of 10 or more. --

The speed of light varies depending on the medium it is traveling in. Photons emitted at the center of the sun interact with atoms and electrons so often (absorbed and re-emitted), that it takes thousands of years for a photon to travel from the center to the surface of the sun. From there, 8 minutes through empty space to the earth.

AFAIK, all the "light slowing" experiments involve passing the light through a medium other than a vacuum.

-- I thought they'd decided that photos can have mass in some circumstances. --

Since energy and mass can be converted, one to the other, the energy in a photon does have an equivalent rest mass. But while it's a photon, it is purely energy, with no REST mass.

Photons entering and leaving a system or particles that do have rest mass (electrons, protons, neutrons, atoms, molecules), represents the conversion of energy to mass, and mass to energy. The mass of the system of particles that emits or absorbs a photon changes, the photon adds or subtracts mass by adding or subtracting energy.

The neutrino is a particle that is massless in some theories of physics, but most theories and some experiments indicate neutrinos have some (small) mass.

Thank you for sharing your insights!

But space itself is not boundless, or "unlimited volume." There is no "edge of the finite universe," no way to get outside of the space of the universe and look back at it.

Truly said. God, however, can see "all that there is" all at once.

-- God, however, can see "all that there is" all at once. --

True that. And in this vast but limited, amazing, violent, and bizarre universe of space, time, matter and energy, He's provided a safe environment for fragile life.

The details long gone from my memory, my college chemistry professor gave a lecture on the concurrent chemical happenings that make up a single cell organism. A protective shell (cell wall), means to convert "food" into other forms, means to replicate. While any one of these can happen randomly, the chances of all, in the same place, at the same time, arranged to effect living and reproducing in a sea of chemicals that tends to stop the process ... no matter how it came off, it is amazing.

And that's a single cell, far removed from the wonder of complex life-forms, and that removed from the wonder of possessing independent, rational thought. "Blessed" is a gross understatement.

And on this day we are reminded of another gift. The ultimate sacrifice of His own human life - that in conquering death, believers in Him might too.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.