# String Theory



## Maryjane (Dec 8, 2004)

_Getting closser to a universal theory of everything. Einstine must be smilling in his grave._

*Part one* 
String Theory, at 20, Explains It All (or Not)

December 7, 2004
By DENNIS OVERBYE 


ASPEN, Colo. - They all laughed 20 years ago. 

It was then that a physicist named John Schwarz jumped up
on the stage during a cabaret at the physics center here
and began babbling about having discovered a theory that
could explain everything. By prearrangement men in white
suits swooped in and carried away Dr. Schwarz, then a
little-known researcher at the California Institute of
Technology. 

Only a few of the laughing audience members knew that Dr.
Schwarz was not entirely joking. He and his collaborator,
Dr. Michael Green, now at Cambridge University, had just
finished a calculation that would change the way physics
was done. They had shown that it was possible for the first
time to write down a single equation that could explain all
the laws of physics, all the forces of nature - the
proverbial "theory of everything" that could be written on
a T-shirt. 

And so emerged into the limelight a strange new concept of
nature, called string theory, so named because it depicts
the basic constituents of the universe as tiny wriggling
strings, not point particles. 

"That was our first public announcement," Dr. Schwarz said
recently. 

By uniting all the forces, string theory had the potential
of achieving the goal that Einstein sought without success
for half his life and that has embodied the dreams of every
physicist since then. If true, it could be used like a
searchlight to illuminate some of the deepest mysteries
physicists can imagine, like the origin of space and time
in the Big Bang and the putative death of space and time at
the infinitely dense centers of black holes. 

In the last 20 years, string theory has become a major
branch of physics. Physicists and mathematicians conversant
in strings are courted and recruited like star quarterbacks
by universities eager to establish their research
credentials. String theory has been celebrated and
explained in best-selling books like "The Elegant
Universe," by Dr. Brian Greene, a physicist at Columbia
University, and even on popular television shows. 

Last summer in Aspen, Dr. Schwarz and Dr. Green (of
Cambridge) cut a cake decorated with "20th Anniversary of
the First Revolution Started in Aspen," as they and other
theorists celebrated the anniversary of their big
breakthrough. But even as they ate cake and drank wine, the
string theorists admitted that after 20 years, they still
did not know how to test string theory, or even what it
meant. 

As a result, the goal of explaining all the features of the
modern world is as far away as ever, they say. And some
physicists outside the string theory camp are growing
restive. At another meeting, at the Aspen Institute for
Humanities, only a few days before the string
commemoration, Dr. Lawrence Krauss, a cosmologist at Case
Western Reserve University in Cleveland, called string
theory "a colossal failure." 

String theorists agree that it has been a long, strange
trip, but they still have faith that they will complete the
journey. 

"Twenty years ago no one would have correctly predicted how
string theory has since developed," said Dr. Andrew
Strominger of Harvard. "There is disappointment that
despite all our efforts, experimental verification or
disproof still seems far away. On the other hand, the depth
and beauty of the subject, and the way it has reached out,
influenced and connected other areas of physics and
mathematics, is beyond the wildest imaginations of 20 years
ago." 

In a way, the story of string theory and of the physicists
who have followed its siren song for two decades is like a
novel that begins with the classic "what if?" 

What if the basic constituents of nature and matter were
not little points, as had been presumed since the time of
the Greeks? What if the seeds of reality were rather teeny
tiny wiggly little bits of string? And what appear to be
different particles like electrons and quarks merely
correspond to different ways for the strings to vibrate,
different notes on God's guitar? 

It sounds simple, but that small change led physicists into
a mathematical labyrinth, in which they describe themselves
as wandering, "exploring almost like experimentalists," in
the words of Dr. David Gross of the Kavli Institute for
Theoretical Physics in Santa Barbara, Calif. 

String theory, the Italian physicist Dr. Daniele Amati once
said, was a piece of 21st-century physics that had fallen
by accident into the 20th century. 

And, so the joke went, would require 22nd-century
mathematics to solve. 

Dr. Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in
Princeton, N.J., described it this way: "String theory is
not like anything else ever discovered. It is an incredible
panoply of ideas about math and physics, so vast, so rich
you could say almost anything about it." 

The string revolution had its roots in a quixotic effort in
the 1970's to understand the so-called "strong" force that
binds quarks into particles like protons and neutrons. Why
were individual quarks never seen in nature? Perhaps
because they were on the ends of strings, said physicists,
following up on work by Dr. Gabriele Veneziano of CERN, the
European research consortium. 

That would explain why you cannot have a single quark - you
cannot have a string with only one end. Strings seduced
many physicists with their mathematical elegance, but they
had some problems, like requiring 26 dimensions and a
plethora of mysterious particles that did not seem to have
anything to do with quarks or the strong force. 

When accelerator experiments supported an alternative
theory of quark behavior known as quantum chromodynamics,
most physicists consigned strings to the dustbin of
history. 

But some theorists thought the mathematics of strings was
too beautiful to die. 

In 1974 Dr. Schwarz and Dr. Joel Scherk from the École
Normale Supérieure in France noticed that one of the
mysterious particles predicted by string theory had the
properties predicted for the graviton, the particle that
would be responsible for transmitting gravity in a quantum
theory of gravity, if such a theory existed. 

Without even trying, they realized, string theory had
crossed the biggest gulf in physics. Physicists had been
stuck for decades trying to reconcile the quirky rules
known as quantum mechanics, which govern atomic behavior,
with Einstein's general theory of relativity, which
describes how gravity shapes the cosmos. 

That meant that if string theory was right, it was not just
a theory of the strong force; it was a theory of all
forces. 

"I was immediately convinced this was worth devoting my
life to," Dr. Schwarz recalled "It's been my life work ever
since." 

It was another 10 years before Dr. Schwarz and Dr. Green
(Dr. Scherk died in 1980) finally hit pay dirt. They showed
that it was possible to write down a string theory of
everything that was not only mathematically consistent but
also free of certain absurdities, like the violation of
cause and effect, that had plagued earlier quantum gravity
calculations. 

In the summer and fall of 1984, as word of the achievement
spread, physicists around the world left what they were
doing and stormed their blackboards, visions of the
Einsteinian grail of a unified theory dancing in their
heads. 

"Although much work remains to be done there seem to be no
insuperable obstacles to deriving all of known physics,"
one set of physicists, known as the Princeton string
quartet, wrote about a particularly promising model known
as heterotic strings. (The quartet consisted of Dr. Gross;
Dr. Jeffrey Harvey and Dr. Emil Martinec, both at the
University of Chicago; and Dr. Ryan M. Rohm, now at the
University of North Carolina.) 

The Music of Strings 

String theory is certainly one of the most musical
explanations ever offered for nature, but it is not for the
untrained ear. For one thing, the modern version of the
theory decreed that there are 10 dimensions of space and
time. 

To explain to ordinary mortals why the world appears to
have only four dimensions - one of time and three of space
-string theorists adopted a notion first bruited by the
German mathematicians Theodor Kaluza and Oskar Klein in
1926. The extra six dimensions, they said, go around in
sub-submicroscopic loops, so tiny that people cannot see
them or store old National Geographics in them. 

A simple example, the story goes, is a garden hose. Seen
from afar, it is a simple line across the grass, but up
close it has a circular cross section. An ant on the hose
can go around it as well as travel along its length. To
envision the world as seen by string theory, one only has
to imagine a tiny, tiny six-dimensional ball at every point
in space-time 

But that was only the beginning. In 1995, Dr. Witten showed
that what had been five different versions of string theory
seemed to be related. He argued that they were all
different manifestations of a shadowy, as-yet-undefined
entity he called "M theory," with "M" standing for mother,
matrix, magic, mystery, membrane or even murky. 

In M-theory, the universe has 11 dimensions - 10 of space
and one of time, and it consists not just of strings but
also of more extended membranes of various dimension, known
generically as "branes." 

This new theory has liberated the imaginations of
cosmologists. Our own universe, some theorists suggest, may
be a four-dimensional brane floating in some
higher-dimensional space, like a bubble in a fish tank,
perhaps with other branes - parallel universes - nearby.
Collisions or other interactions between the branes might
have touched off the Big Bang that started our own cosmic
clock ticking or could produce the dark energy that now
seems to be accelerating the expansion of the universe,
they say. 

Toting Up the Scorecard 

One of string theory's biggest triumphs has come in the
study of black holes. In Einstein's general relativity,
these objects are bottomless pits in space-time,
voraciously swallowing everything, even light, that gets
too close, but in string theory they are a dense tangle of
strings and membranes. 

In a prodigious calculation in 1995, Dr. Strominger and Dr.
Cumrun Vafa, both of Harvard, were able to calculate the
information content of a black hole, matching a famous
result obtained by Dr. Stephen Hawking of Cambridge
University using more indirect means in 1973. Their
calculation is viewed by many people as the most important
result yet in string theory, Dr. Greene said. 

Another success, Dr. Greene and others said, was the
discovery that the shape, or topology, of space, is not
fixed but can change, according to string theory. Space can
even rip and tear. 

But the scorecard is mixed when it comes to other areas of
physics. So far, for example, string theory has had little
to say about what might have happened at the instant of the
Big Bang.


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## Maryjane (Dec 8, 2004)

*Part two*

Moreover, the theory seems to have too many solutions. One
of the biggest dreams that physicists had for the so-called
theory of everything was that it would specify a unique
prescription of nature, one in which God had no choice, as
Einstein once put it, about details like the number of
dimensions or the relative masses of elementary particles. 

But recently theorists have estimated that there could be
at least 10100 different solutions to the string equations,
corresponding to different ways of folding up the extra
dimensions and filling them with fields - gazillions of
different possible universes. 

Some theorists, including Dr. Witten, hold fast to the
Einsteinian dream, hoping that a unique answer to the
string equations will emerge when they finally figure out
what all this 21st-century physics is trying to tell them
about the world. 

But that day is still far away. 

"We don't know what the deep principle in string theory
is," Dr. Witten said. 

For most of the 20th century, progress in particle physics
was driven by the search for symmetries - patterns or
relationships that remain the same when we swap left for
right, travel across the galaxy or imagine running time in
reverse. 

For years physicists have looked for the origins of string
theory in some sort of deep and esoteric symmetry, but
string theory has turned out to be weirder than that. 

Recently it has painted a picture of nature as a kind of
hologram. In the holographic images often seen on bank
cards, the illusion of three dimensions is created on a
two-dimensional surface. Likewise string theory suggests
that in nature all the information about what is happening
inside some volume of space is somehow encoded on its outer
boundary, according to work by several theorists, including
Dr. Juan Maldacena of the Institute for Advanced Study and
Dr. Raphael Bousso of the University of California,
Berkeley. 

Just how and why a three-dimensional reality can spring
from just two dimensions, or four dimensions can unfold
from three, is as baffling to people like Dr. Witten as it
probably is to someone reading about it in a newspaper. 

In effect, as Dr. Witten put it, an extra dimension of
space can mysteriously appear out of "nothing." 

The lesson, he said, may be that time and space are only
illusions or approximations, emerging somehow from
something more primitive and fundamental about nature, the
way protons and neutrons are built of quarks. 

The real secret of string theory, he said, will probably
not be new symmetries, but rather a novel prescription for
constructing space-time. 

"It's a new aspect of the theory," Dr. Witten said.
"Whether we are getting closer to the deep principle, I
don't know." 

As he put it in a talk in October, "It's plausible that we
will someday understand string theory." 

Tangled in Strings 

Critics of string theory, meanwhile,
have been keeping their own scorecard. The most glaring
omission is the lack of any experimental evidence for
strings or even a single experimental prediction that could
prove string theory wrong - the acid test of the scientific
process. 

Strings are generally presumed to be so small that
"stringy" effects should show up only when particles are
smashed together at prohibitive energies, roughly 1019
billion electron volts. That is orders of magnitude beyond
the capability of any particle accelerator that will ever
be built on earth. Dr. Harvey of Chicago said he sometimes
woke up thinking, What am I doing spending my whole career
on something that can't be tested experimentally? 

This disparity between theoretical speculation and testable
reality has led some critics to suggest that string theory
is as much philosophy as science, and that it has diverted
the attention and energy of a generation of physicists from
other perhaps more worthy pursuits. Others say the theory
itself is still too vague and that some promising ideas
have not been proved rigorously enough yet. 

Dr. Krauss said, "We bemoan the fact that Einstein spent
the last 30 years of his life on a fruitless quest, but we
think it's fine if a thousand theorists spend 30 years of
their prime on the same quest." 

The Other Quantum Gravity 

String theory's biggest triumph
is still its first one, unifying Einstein's lordly gravity
that curves the cosmos and the quantum pinball game of
chance that lives inside it. 

"Whatever else it is or is not," Dr. Harvey said in Aspen,
"string theory is a theory of quantum gravity that gives
sensible answers." 

That is no small success, but it may not be unique.


String theory has a host of lesser known rivals for the
mantle of quantum gravity, in particular a concept called,
loop quantum gravity, which arose from work by Dr. Abhay
Ashtekar of Penn State and has been carried forward by Dr.
Carlo Rovelli of the University of Marseille and Dr. Lee
Smolin of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
in Waterloo, Ontario, among others. 

Unlike string theory, loop gravity makes no pretensions
toward being a theory of everything. It is only a theory of
gravity, space and time, arising from the applications of
quantum principles to the equations of Einstein's general
relativity. The adherents of string theory and of loop
gravity have a kind of Microsoft-Apple kind of rivalry,
with the former garnering a vast majority of university
jobs and publicity. 

Dr. Witten said that string theory had a tendency to absorb
the ideas of its critics and rivals. This could happen with
loop gravity. Dr. Vafa; his Harvard colleagues, Dr. Sergei
Gukov and Dr. Andrew Neitzke; and Dr. Robbert Dijkgraaf of
the University of Amsterdam report in a recent paper that
they have found a connection between simplified versions of
string and loop gravity. 

"If it exists," Dr. Vafa said of loop gravity, "it should
be part of string theory." 

Looking for a Cosmic Connection 

Some theorists have bent
their energies recently toward investigating models in
which strings could make an observable mark on the sky or
in experiments in particle accelerators. 

"They all require us to be lucky," said Dr. Joe Polchinski
of the Kavli Institute. 

For example the thrashing about of strings in the early
moments of time could leave fine lumps in a haze of radio
waves filling the sky and thought to be the remains of the
Big Bang. These might be detectable by the Planck satellite
being built by the European Space Agency for a 2007
launching date, said Dr. Greene. 

According to some models, Dr. Polchinski has suggested,
some strings could be stretched from their normal
submicroscopic lengths to become as big as galaxies or more
during a brief cosmic spurt known as inflation, thought to
have happened a fraction of a second after the universe was
born. 

If everything works out, he said, there will be loops of
string in the sky as big as galaxies. Other strings could
stretch all the way across the observable universe. The
strings, under enormous tension and moving near the speed
of light, would wiggle and snap, rippling space-time like a
tablecloth with gravitational waves. 

"It would be like a whip hundreds of light-years long," Dr.
Polchinski said. 

The signal from these snapping strings, if they exist,
should be detectable by the Laser Interferometer
Gravitational Wave Observatory, which began science
observations two years ago, operated by a multinational
collaboration led by Caltech and the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology. 

Another chance for a clue will come in 2007 when the Large
Hadron Collider is turned on at CERN in Geneva and starts
colliding protons with seven trillion volts of energy
apiece. In one version of the theory - admittedly a long
shot - such collisions could create black holes or
particles disappearing into the hidden dimensions. 

Everybody's favorite candidate for what the collider will
find is a phenomenon called supersymmetry, which is crucial
to string theory. It posits the existence of a whole set of
ghostlike elementary particles yet to be discovered.
Theorists say they have reason to believe that the lightest
of these particles, which have fanciful names like
photinos, squarks and selectrons, should have a mass-energy
within the range of the collider. 

String theory naturally incorporates supersymmetry, but so
do many other theories. Its discovery would not clinch the
case for strings, but even Dr. Krauss of Case Western
admits that the existence of supersymmetry would be a boon
for string theory. 

And what if supersymmetric particles are not discovered at
the new collider? Their absence would strain the faith, a
bit, but few theorists say they would give up. 

"It would certainly be a big blow to our chances of
understanding string theory in the near future," Dr. Witten
said. 

Beginnings and Endings 

At the end of the Aspen celebration talk turned to the
prospect of verification of string theory. Summing up the
long march toward acceptance of the theory, Dr. Stephen
Shenker, a pioneer string theorist at Stanford, quoted
Winston Churchill: 

"This is not the end, not even the beginning of the end,
but perhaps it is the end of the beginning." 

Dr. Shenker said it would be great to find out that string
theory was right. 

From the audience Dr. Greene piped up, "Wouldn't it be
great either way?" 

"Are you kidding me, Brian?" Dr. Shenker responded. "How
many years have you sweated on this?" 

But if string theory is wrong, Dr. Greene argued, wouldn't
it be good to know so physics could move on? "Don't you
want to know?" he asked. 

Dr. Shenker amended his remarks. "It would be great to have
an answer," he said, adding, "It would be even better if
it's the right one." 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/science/07stri.html?ex=1103442729&ei=1&en=8ca03a782739d8f0


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## hodor (Dec 8, 2004)

I found that very interesting MJ. However, as I just woke up and my brain doesn't kick in until about 8am or so, I will have to wait till i get off work and give it another read.


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## Maryjane (Dec 8, 2004)

_Maybe this will be of help Hodor_

the putative death of space and time at
the infinitely dense centers of black holes. 

_This sounds very much like a theory I had come up with myself about holes in the fabric of time and space, just need to add, into infinity or (Aleph, if you are familiar with the qabala)  _

Our own universe, some theorists suggest, may
be a four-dimensional brane floating in some
higher-dimensional space, like a bubble in a fish tank,
perhaps with other branes - parallel universes - nearby.
Collisions or other interactions between the branes might
have touched off the Big Bang that started our own cosmic
clock ticking or could produce the dark energy that now
seems to be accelerating the expansion of the universe,
they say. 

_A colision of parallel universes. I also believe that fluctuations in the matrix of paralel universe can creat distortions and or warping of the fabric of time and space. These kind of anomelies can happen anywhere fluctuating in and out of our time and space continuum, creating time and space loops. Natural star gates._

at least 10100 different solutions to the string equations,
corresponding to different ways of folding up the extra
dimensions and filling them with fields - gazillions of
different possible universes. 

_The quantum levels of existance or quantum dimentions of realety_

The lesson, he said, may be that time and space are only
illusions or approximations, emerging somehow from
something more primitive and fundamental about nature, the
way protons and neutrons are built of quarks. 


_Yes time and space is in constantly in motion forever changing and recycling itself, born from the embodiment of eternity_


strings, under enormous tension and moving near the speed
of light, would wiggle and snap, rippling space-time like a
tablecloth with gravitational waves. 

_Same affect on the fabric of time and space as black holes have, Amazing how something so microscopicly minute can affect time and space. But then they are the harmonics of our universe._

_It is this affect also that can decieve an astronmers calculations on distances from here to a certain point in the universe. It would apear much closer then it realy is becaue the line of sight is straight toward the object but if one was to travel the crests and dips of the gravitatinal waves it would be a great deal further then had been anticipated. _

what appear to be
different particles like electrons and quarks merely
correspond to different ways for the strings to vibrate,
different notes on God's guitar? 

_Universal harmonics_


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## Alexa (Dec 8, 2004)

MJ, mine doesn't kick untils the 3th cup of coffee. The first one is not ready, so I'm afraid I'll read about string theory this evening. Hope you don't mind.


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## Maryjane (Dec 8, 2004)

_By all means Elexa, look forward to seeing you, Hope we make a connection tonight, I was just one step behind you last night. I was realy busy last night doing some research and part of it involved this post. between that and catching up on posts here and talking to my huny on the phone it was pretty hectic last night._


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## Alexa (Dec 9, 2004)

Do you have a point or this is in general about the string theory, MJ ?
I'm kinda dizzy with all those dimensions : four or ten or eleven ? All right, there are the superstring theories. Looks like an interesting and misterious theory.


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_The best way to understand dimentions is (this is my own version) you take a book and each page in the book is the membrane separating each dimention now compress all the pages of the book into on page in thickness with each individual dimentions or pages of the book is still within that one page, then roll that page into a tubular shape or scroll. In strings they say there are 9 dimentions in that one particular tubular shape but there could be as many as 26 dimentions in a string. Each string can vibrate or oscilate to a frequency that can create gravitational ripples similar to that of a black hole. Like ripples from a droped stone in a pond. Just imagine space as being liquid in nature to see this effect better. Now they theorise that the univers is filled with these tiny harmonic strings so therefor if there are other universes in existence outside this one then possibly these tiny harmonic strings are infinite filling eternity, a full eternity. _


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_Maybe I should have rewrote this whole article myself  _
_But I love this stuff this is the kind of stuff Alexa that I spend allot of nights on this kind of stuff burning the late night oil. _


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## Alexa (Dec 9, 2004)

In other words, if I am not happy in this dimension, I have better chances to succeed in another one. And with all eternity in front of me, there is no rush whatever may happen. Right ?


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_I think I finally untangled that last post _
_Yesssss Alixa, your right on the dollar.  My exact thoughts, I guess the old emapth stuff is sitill working_


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

there is no rush whatever may happen. Right ?

_No rush just do things sensibly and after so many years driving on the wrong side of the road you learn to drive on the right side of the road or end up just so much road kill, the later didn't apeal to me._


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_I think I need typing lessons I keep tending to type backwards, anoying._


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## TGirlPaula (Dec 9, 2004)

OK, how many dimensions do I know?

 Length, width, depth, weight, mass, time, distance (time and distance are integrated concept), resonant frequency, proximity of one particle to another.

 That's it.

 This universe is not eternal bugt merely infinite.  Infinity can change.  Eternity does not.


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_One litle dot in infinity, among an infinity of tiny dots that fill eternity and yes these are subject to constant change. And right on about the resonance frequencies especially in cosmic stings, actually the strings are the universal resonance frequancy. Anything made up of atoms also have varying resonance frequencies as well_


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## SilverLady (Dec 9, 2004)

Ok, I'm probably going to be very unpopular for this, but here goes:

I have heard and read quite a bit recently about "String Theory", but I have yet to be convinced of it's worthiness. It seems to me that as the theory can never be tested, it remains philosophy, and not science. While the idea is appealing, I do not think it can really be proved - which is what science is all about, right?


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## Alexa (Dec 9, 2004)

MJ, this not require empathie, but logic. I'm glad for you if this kind of stuff can keep you up at night. This doesn't work for me. It makes me sleepy. Sorry !


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_I am not dificult to get along with Silverlady, I'm not trying to sell any one anything, I quite agree it's not a prooven theory (yet) but with the new technology they have now with the aplication of nanotechnology as well in probs we can detect micro particles we could not detect before. So who knows. _


_I was kidin Alexa but what threw me for a loop is you came out with the same Idea I been discussing with my hunny since over a year ago nearly word for word! Well that was excelent logic anyway I must say, three stars for the lady crew member from the SS Enterprise. Knowing what someone is going to say before they say it or come up with the same idea at the same time, which happens from time to time, some times more frequent then not is one thing but keeping it to myself is quite another, especially when I think it's my own thought to start with. That can throw people for a loop to. _

_Maybe we should stick the the Empath post before someone runs us out of town with buckets of tar and feathers. I apreciate seeing somone come in and state an inteligent oppiion though instead of no body coming around at all _


_On the weekends my huny and I spend all nighters on the net dicussing these kind of theories like paralel universes and dimentions, cosmic strings black holes worm holes or natural star gates etc. like I mentioned here earlier in this post I think. It's all theories I agree but they are theories that oppen the mind to infinite potentialeties<--- one of Einsteins little pet sayings, another one of his pet sayings was, imagination goes light years farther the knowledge and fact._


_Today's science fiction, tomorow's scientific fact. Nighters all or morning_


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## Circus Cranium (Dec 9, 2004)

That's really interesting. And as we said before in the physics discussion, the knowledge of the universe is so slim that these theories open so many possibilities for fiction writers. In reality, I love this stuff, but I can think about it until my brain starts to tie itself in knots.


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

_Me to Circus Cranium. I'm up till the wee hours of the morning researching this stuff and I never get tired of it, awed amazed and astounded but never bored with it. Where the recorded proven data ends I countinue in imagaintion. So anything I may post here is subject to questioning as any field of sciene is, only a tiny portion is proven as fact the rest is theoretical at best and I am aware of that. Thank you._


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## Maryjane (Dec 9, 2004)

hmmmm I'm going to wring this darn rats neck yet


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## Alexa (Dec 10, 2004)

Maryjane said:
			
		

> _Today's science fiction, tomorow's scientific fact. _


I completely agree. It's one the reason I really appreciate SF writings.

Oh, I'll love to go through a stargate and see other planets !


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## Maryjane (Dec 10, 2004)

_Ya I would let Oneal put his army boots under may bed anyday he's a sweetheart. Don't wory I told this to my huny and just laughed. By the way I never did wring that darn rats neck, read the empath thread and you'll know what I mean (just imagine a smilly with griting teeth here.) My mom use to pampomime wringing imaginary chicken necks when she was ticked off.  I'm still hi as a kite tonight but at least the flipin psi peek I mentioned in the Empath thread has subsided. Like I say I'm all over that chart sometimes _


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## Alexa (Dec 11, 2004)

I wouldn't say no to Jack O'Neill either !


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## Maryjane (Dec 12, 2004)

They started the new episodes here for Star Gate just a couple weeks ago here Alexa. Wer'e still one season behind the US, when I was in Washington DC last January they had the series going that we have this year. It was the same thing with the Star Treck shows.

I have noted that much of the terminology they use for different spacial anomelies you will find in actual scientific theory, and the termenolegy for the technology used in sci fi shows is in actualety on the drawing board in actual astrophysics and aro space technological research


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## Alexa (Dec 12, 2004)

I watch them religiously.


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## Maryjane (Dec 12, 2004)

_I did like Andromada to but since they killed off Tyr I kind of lost interest, what a hunk he was._


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## Alexa (Dec 12, 2004)

I couldn't attach myself of Andromeda. It gave me the impression of another Star Trek, with other actors. I'm kinda stupid romantic, so once I'm fond of one thing I'll keept it till the end of my days.  

MJ, I have a question about those strings or dimensions. Let's say I am presently in dimension no.1, dimension determinated by my choices in the past. If I take a decision today which goes against all my believes in the past, this means I'll change to dimension no. 2 of my existance ? What do you think ?


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## Maryjane (Dec 13, 2004)

_I believe that all dymentions are replicas of the original one weather this one is the starting point or some other in a distant dimetion before this one but I think they all belong on the same eternal spacial continuuum just slightly more primitive or more advanced so that once your astral being leaves this realety it goes to another realety to relive ones life or another life in a different shell but inhabited by the same astral being, an astral being has no bulk or volume it takes up no space can be infinite in nature only when it is once more atached to a physical body does it regain the individualety containing in part of the infinite astral being. Think of the astrall being like a computer with every character and personalety you have lived and will live stored in it's memory banks. In other words we either progress to a higher plane of existance or a lower plane of existance depending on the progress and abilety for that corporeal beings life's need and desire to advance and will determine what level they will be at in the next level and also the need to want to correct the mistakes of the past lives. Past errors or mistakes are recalled possibly through dejah vue or gut instinct, could be called the conscience as well. I have been calling that my little voice for as long as I can remember. I believe all astrol beings have a chance at redemption and or at evolving to a higher existance accordingly to ones efforts here. This way all have a chance at redemption, and non is lost. Ever read Daunties inferno paradise and heaven? Imagin the levels in hell paradie and heaven as dimentions. _


_Of course This is just my own particular theory that I formulated from research of different religious belifes, spiritualty, egiption, greek mytholegy, the qabala etc. combined with science_


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## PERCON (May 31, 2005)

I don't really like coming into a lovely thread like this and putting in a negative post but here it goes: 

I think that the original idea was great but the theory got a bit distorted until people started talking about actual strings, like little hoops. I saw a program about the string theory and after a while decided that it couldn't be possible. Why? I don't really know how to explain in one day but it doesn't seem possible from what I've read of all the other theories. I do believe in there being many different dimensions and I can understand huge time spans and picture them neatly in my mind but the string theory and the many universes nestling near to each other seems like something someone has thought up and yet never imagined there being a time where it could be proved right. It is a wonderful idea but it is an idea so far fetched that we can hardly ever think of proving it right, which is a shame  . 

I stand by my own belief of the beginning of the universe, each death of the universe sparks up another new universe from the collision of the matter, a 'big bang' at the end of each universe which starts up another universe and it continues until the matter ceases to collide effectively enough to create a new universe. 

_PERCON_ - 'I'm a little bundle of innovative fun'


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## Maryjane (Jun 3, 2005)

*Hey dear it does say in the Bible in revelations at the end of days of this world or universal cycle in this case in the dust of the last one there will manifest or arise  a "new heavens and new earth" That can't be much more specific can it, unless it came complete with a picture uh.  *

*Love *

*Maryjane*


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## PERCON (Jun 3, 2005)

I don't live by the Bible so I've started afresh using just science to predict the beginning(s) of the Universe, this way I do not have to connect everything to the Bible, I can start with science and end with science. I do, however, respect the use of it by people for understanding things for it is a great book which, in so many ways, can contradict itself so that there is an answer for everything.
Although fond of humanity's attachment to religion I don't believe humans were created by choice, there IS another planet like this one and it is also the case that bipods are more likely to live on other planets because it is one of the most versatile type of creature. Aliens would be bipods, very thin though to enable a quicker absorbtion of the air around them, there may oneday be another 'Earth' the creatures on it, once they have the brain for it, will believe they are also created by choice and it is so for all creatures which are able to question why they're here and how they became what they are.

I am a scientist... 

...The future is science-based...

...Where the Bible has stated, we will describe, where the Bible has described, we will explain, where the Bible has explained, we will create...

_PERCON - _'Exists now, lives in the future.'


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## Alia (Jun 3, 2005)

Here's a question, and I will apologize because Percon your post is the only one I read...
Percon, do you think that the bible isn't science based?


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## Maryjane (Jun 5, 2005)

*My oppinion is that the Bible was written bysimple people in the days when science was almost none existance and much of the phenomanas therein descibed by these people were possible visions or observations of extraterestrial or routwordly phenomenas descibed by simple shepards using the envirionmment around them to describe what they saw. Just like today there are many phenomas that science cannot explain or their technology is limited for detecting such phenomenas yet these unforseen forces of energy stlil exist weather science can explain them or not. And I do believe there is inteligent life on other worlds out there the odds of their being life supporting planets out there are just to great, especially when one takes into consideration that if Mars did sustain life once, then two planets in one solar sytem containing life certainly would increase those oddsand one would be very neive to think we are the only ones. *

*Love*

*Maryjane*


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## Amber (Jun 5, 2005)

Not really relevant I suppose... but what if aliens were real... and also had the Bible


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## Alia (Jun 5, 2005)

Interesting point Amber... Took a religious class back in college, one pertaining to my own religion, not usually for the general public.  The teacher, a man with an open mind, said "It is very selfish of us to think that God did not create other people on other planets."  Yes, I believe that this universe is created by God and He would create other beings, after His own image.  I think too, that He would give them a bible, a means to guide themselves back to Him, but it for obvious reasons is written by other men with different stories in it.  But this is my theory, and not everyone, even in my own religion shares it with me.

Maryjane, I agree with you.  What I'm wondering if Percon thinks there is a seperation between science and the bible, or God?  I think God is a genious and is a math wizard and more... I think that God based His creations on scientific sound basis, all of which are perfect... we being of simple minds trying to figure everything out, don't see all the connections...
As I have often wondered why we have mosquitoes... nasty pests!


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## PERCON (Jun 6, 2005)

Hello everyone, it's me again Dr. PERCON...

I do not believe in God, but i do believe in the natural order of things, this I like call Mother Nature, it's used by many people as just being Earth and nature but I go a bit further.

 Now humanity, being a species of quite complex minds really when you think about it (Which proves me right really, the fact that you can think about thinking), cannot possibly comprehend their consequences on this Earth seriously because of that natural human phenomena of only considering their own lifespan and not considering the future. People 50 years ago sat there smoking away not considering and not knowing of the fact that we now in our lives are facing the consequences of their actions. 

Everything balances out, there may be a universal equilibrium at work. The damage to the atmosphere by the pollution put out there years ago has serious consequences, those of which are now unstoppable, we cannot stop climate change at all now, it has started and Mother Nature intends on finishing it. We will pay the price for our egotistical view on this planet with our own lives. Tsunamis being the major events of the future, earthquakes and floods being common and high temperatures will bring the mosquitoes with Malaria to every region of the world. Mother Nature doesn't like us at the moment and for the next century humanity will see some of the most drastic changes in it's history.

Luckily I'm going back to Braktoo before then, so no worries for me.  
As I've always lived by the saying "Respect those around you, for they wield the power to change the future", I know what's going on, well partially. No one knows what's going on, therefore no one can say there IS a God working away, no one can say there IS 'blah blah' going on out of our understanding because we don't know that. There MIGHT be, but we don't know that there IS. I'll stick by that and for that reason alone I don't believe in an all powerful God, if it ends up that there is one then those who believe in God were right those who said "there will never be a God" will be wrong but those who say that they don't believe in God cannot be proved wrong because at this moment in time they don't believe in an all powerful being, let's leave it that way...

So, Alia, would you say I've had a good ramble there?

_PERCON_


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## Alia (Jun 6, 2005)

Your a great Ramblier Percon, missing the more serious point I was asking.  





> I don't live by the Bible so I've started afresh using just science to predict the beginning(s) of the Universe, this way I do not have to connect everything to the Bible, I can start with science and end with science.


 I think the bible is a record, kept by a people who could explain of lot of things in scientific terms.  But... I think the bible could be explained in Science terms, or close, nowadays.  I think that God created with science, not magic or by miracles.... 
Hhhhmmm... my thoughts, yours? (on a more serious tone please)


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## PERCON (Jun 6, 2005)

I am very serious in everything that I say, well at least everything I say whenever I mention something people feel strongly about, since it's not my place to interfer with people's thoughts, I don't like that and respect other people's points of view. 

The people that wrote the Bible were great writers ahead of their time. I still however, do not believe in God, I don't think anyone can _use _science in such a way as to create a planet. This belief people have in something that controls them, bleats out insecurities in the minds of human beings, I'm not saying religious people are insecure because the fact is they're usually the opposite and very secure in their lives, but what I'm trying to say is that humanity has always looked for something more, something extra above us, which explains all the phenomena of our everyday lives. I believe solely in science, no extra things present, no religion either. I respect the fact that you are religious and believe in God, but at this moment in time I cannot believe it myself, I don't know whether I ever will but time will tell that to me. The Bible was a record, but what I still to this day don't understand about it is why weren't the earlier creatures mentioned, like the Dinosaurs in any specific detail. The Dinosaurs lived for millions of years, humans have lived for about one million years. The dinosaurs ruled this planet long before we were present, in my mind we aren't that amazingly special. Many of the Dinosaurs could out-think a human being easily, Veloceraptors had unique brains and had exceptional ambusing techniques never discovered anywhere else on land on this planet to this day. If they were still around we most certainly wouldn't be here. I don't believe that a God would create humanity, I believe that humanity was created, not from any special source but because bipedal creatures are very sucessfull beings and so humanity evolved this way, not through choice but through thousands of years of trial and error and working out what works well and what doesn't, not created from nothing but created by evolution over time. about 500 years ago people believed the Bible word by word as a true account, nowadays as science explains that we weren't the first intelligent life forms on this planet people are starting to interpret the Bible differently in order to not lose sight of their belief. In 500 yrs time, that very same belief may be stretched again, something's got to give at some point in time, it's what happens when it does that's facinating...

_PERCON_


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## Alia (Jun 6, 2005)

[




> This belief people have in something that controls them, bleats out insecurities in the minds of human beings, I'm not saying religious people are insecure because the fact is they're usually the opposite and very secure in their lives, but what I'm trying to say is that humanity has always looked for something more, something extra above us, which explains all the phenomena of our everyday lives.


 The God I believe in has given all FREE AGENCY, which means, He doesn't control us... I do not believe that God is the reason that explains all phenomena either. But these are my thoughts, I know there are others who disagree with me.



> I respect the fact that you are religious and believe in God, but at this moment in time I cannot believe it myself, I don't know whether I ever will but time will tell that to me.


 In life we must each find our own path... your path may not have a God involved in it. But regardless, I still believe that God formed this universe and created this planet and thus us. These are my beliefs and my path. Each to his own.



> I don't believe that a God would create humanity, I believe that humanity was created, not from any special source but because bipedal creatures are very sucessfull beings and so humanity evolved this way, not through choice but through thousands of years of trial and error and working out what works well and what doesn't, not created from nothing but created by evolution over time.


 I believe in the Darwin theory and can see how man has evolved over time, especially the last few hundred years. For it being a trial and error... it's more like survival of the fittest.


> about 500 years ago people believed the Bible word by word as a true account, nowadays as science explains that we weren't the first intelligent life forms on this planet people are starting to interpret the Bible differently in order to not lose sight of their belief.


 We aren't the first intelligent life forms on this planet? Please explain this to me.


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## PERCON (Jun 7, 2005)

I don't think we are the first intelligent forms of life on this planet.

I don't quite know how 'intelligence' is defined these days but to me Dolphins are very intelligent and they originated before humans and so now they may be more intelligent than us in their own little ways. Great white sharks are also very intelligent, very curious, they want to learn more about what they don't know. They are more curious towards things they've never seen before than the things they see everyday, kinda like us since we barely think about everyday processes. Back in the age of the Dinosaurs, yes I relate back to them again , 64 million years ago had a different type of intelligence, they had no real need to speak to each other although communication would most definately have taken place in one form or another. So they were, for the millions of years that they existed, very intelligent. Many other forms of life on this planet are intelligent. We are not the only intelligent forms of life and like it or not we most probably weren't the first. 64 million years ago the dinosaurs existed, we've existed for a million years or so. BIG gap, anything could have developed in that time, it doesn't take too long to see that evolution paved the way for life and intelligence developed in many different forms suiting the lifeforms. We developed communication through words after using grunts and noise of the like. Other animals communicate differently but I have no doubt that they must be intelligent in order to find a way to 'talk' to each other and to grow up knowing that that's the way to interact requires some intelligence in the first place.

_PERCON_


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## Maryjane (Jun 7, 2005)

[Percon]...Where the Bible has stated, we will describe, where the Bible has described, we will explain, where the Bible has explained, we will create...

*We have the abilety to create, we have just temporarlily forgoten and will someday again remember.*

*Love*

*Maryjane*


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## Amber (Jun 7, 2005)

Would it invalidate the Bible, if aliens also had a story about God's only son dying for them?

Surely it was unique...

[Btw I do believe in the Bible I just like asking odd questions ]


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## Leto (Jun 7, 2005)

Nope, can imagine a god running similar scenarii in every planet with sentient species to show the way to all his children. If the theme interest you Amber, have a look at _A Case of Conscience_ by James Blish.


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## Maryjane (Jun 7, 2005)

*I quite agree Leto, they wouldn't be shown the way by the same methods as us. Since some species would be much older then us in evolution they may have evolved into dicovering the truth on their own just as we will eventually. Jesus was the mesenger and they killed the mesenger but the way is oppen to us all we need do is seek it, the truth is within us all. We don't need misionaries sent to the more primitive sentient beiings on other planets to teach them the way, they're probably closer to the truth then we are.*

*Love*

*Maryjane*


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## Amber (Jun 7, 2005)

Leto said:
			
		

> Nope, can imagine a god running similar scenarii in every planet with sentient species to show the way to all his children. If the theme interest you Amber, have a look at _A Case of Conscience_ by James Blish.


 
Is that the short story about the priest going to another planet and he ends up being crucified?


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## Leto (Jun 7, 2005)

nope, don't think so. It's a novel. But it's a recurrent theme for Blish. It's also one of the subplot in Dan Simmons'_Hyperion_


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## Amber (Jun 7, 2005)

I'll definitly check them out. Thanks for mentioning it Leto


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## Maryjane (Jun 8, 2005)

*Mind and inteligence are woven into a fabric of our universe in a way that another surpasses our undertanding.*
*- Freeman Dyson*

*Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live life you've imagined. as you simplify your life, the law of the univesre will be simpler.*
*-H.D. Thoreau*

*Love *

*Maryjane*


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## dustinzgirl (Aug 8, 2005)

I am reanimated long dead threads, sorry guys.  
I just had a comment to make about the poster who said there were only a few dimensions on the first page.  If I remember correctly, there are 11 mathematically proven dimensions that we, by our very nature, are not physically able to see or feel.  String theory is quite plausible.  Also, in later news, the ability to examine super gravity has shed more light on string theory, which is well on its way to becoming factual.


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## dreamwalker (Aug 8, 2005)

Super Gravity 
Superstrings
Supersymetry

Its all just so super..
I've read about these thoeries and left with a vague but wider undertanding of how the universe really work.

For those of you who have problems undestanding more than 4 dimentions, I have a way of visualising them, which for all intensive purposes may not be completely accurate, but it sure as hll makes believing in sci fi easier.

Basically, you've all probably drawn the axis x and y on a maths text book - no problem
Then add another axis at any angle you like, call it Z - thats depth and it passes through the origin. 3 dimentions on a 2 dimentional surface already!
now you can add another axis, T or time - this can pass through the origin although it doesn't matter, but is completely independant and plots the instances of the XYZ axis.
Hard part over...

For the other dimentions draw small wavy or coiled lines, some of them overlapping, anywhere on the page. Those are dimentions A to G.
The way I think about 'super'dimentions and there relation to reality is the same way you'd think about calculus, a=bc is the eqivilant of c=a/b.
X:Y:Z (as in the dimensions) relates some how to A:B:C:E:F:G with a 'M' (being the theory of everything) linking them and then possibly allowing you to reform the axis on the aforementioned graph with A, B, C being the straight ones and everything else (even possibly time) being coiled in relation.
^^ Thats is a simplification ofcourse and it is possible to relativistic equations concering mutliple dimentions using parts of supergravity, superstrings and other theories which currently exist.
Someday, some E=mc^2 super star of an equation will come around and you'll be buying the T-shirts. 
My bet is on XYZ/T = ABCDEFG(M^-2e). heh

Anyway, hope thats helped anyone perpexed


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## Maryjane (Jul 27, 2008)

Hi all I been around for the past couple weeks probing to see if I could rise any attention, that attempt lasted for about as long as a flat tier. Anyway if anyone comes around to check I will be here. This thread appeared to have been of interest for some for a time. If not interested lets say we open a new thread for those girls who are interested in the bizarre, the mysterious and the enigmatic that comes from inner space. infinities of quantum physics.
Better eat your Wheaties, my sweeties, Maryjane is just as active cerebrally as she ever was, bionic brain knocks on noggin. "Hee, hee, hee."

Maryjane


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