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50 Year Old Quantum Physics Problem Solved
notsosilentbob writes "This story about a 50 year old unsolved Quantum Physics problem at Eurekalert.org is interesting, if just for the discussion about the computing power required (SGI/Cray machines).
Unlike the blowhard from BlacklightPower, this sounds like an important breakthrough. " The problem solved is that of the scattering effects of three charged particles. This is important, as this event occurs in everything from fluorescent lights to the ion etching of silicon chips.
This quantum mechanics thing is pretty crazy. I mean, we're all used to 0's and 1's for computers, but how would quantum computers work? I read somewhere that it's like a sorta-on and sorta-off, like fuzzy logic. But I'm no expert on physics. I'm only a soph in HS taking chemistry. And I hate it.
This is the kind of story that I like to see. Just when we think there is nothing new to know and that unsolved equals unsolvable, someone cracks an enigma like this and shows that a new perspective is often the only thing required to make significant breakthroughs.
It's just amazing the amount of computing power it takes to solve some of these problems...
I wonder when games with physics engines are going to be able to simulate the universe to this detail?
100 years? 1000 years?
It's just amazing how far we have come since the dawn of the information age!
here and here.
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Once the wave function has been calculated, it must be analyzed by computing the "quantum mechanical flux," a means of finding the distribution of probability densities that dates from the 1920s. This computationally intensive process can yield the probability of producing electrons at specific energies and directions from the ionized atom. (Because electrons are identical, there is no way to distinguish between the initially bound and initially free electron).
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Plenty of people out there would cheer this breakthrough, not for its obvious worth as a furthering of scientific thought, but as a further entrenchment of quantum physics as a dominant theory for the mechanations of the universe, because frankly, it suits their personal philosophies of how the universe should remain somehow mystical.
Newtonian physics and its euclidean geometries is far too cold, too exact, too exacting. Bring on the theories that tell us we live in worlds of probabilities: I want to win the lottery, dammit. My ancestors read the tea leaves before me, and soon I'll have a nice quantum computer in a cup of coffee. How much can anyone truly know for sure? Certainly I don't know much, so give me a theory that says no one else can be much more certain. Now that appeals to my insecurities and warms my cockles.
It's quite fitting that such breakthroughs be made on the threshhold of a new era of unprecedented cultural return to mysticism. I'm still betting in science's corner, myself.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I am trying to understand the importance of this discovery. Although the article mention the ionization process that lead to the grow of the flourenscent tubes, to the engraving of silicon chips, we have done all that WITHOUT understanding exactly how these things are done.
Can anyone tell me what this discovery for the "scattering problem" may yield, that is, apart from the Quantum Physics discipline?
Thanks in advance for any pointer.
Merry Christmas !!
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
I see you've been reading the Slashdot Karma HOWTO.
Unlike the blowhard from BlacklightPower, this sounds like an important breakthrough
You're editorialising again, Hemos! An assessment of the majority reaction to the Blacklight Power story might make it seem safe to do so on this occasion, but public opinion would change pretty quickly if Randall Mills was vindicated.
Mills' claims are certainly outrageous but he's only raised enough capital from hardened venture capitalists to fund his research, and is turning would-be investors away in droves. He's obviously not a fraud. Even his critics in the physics community don't deny he is at least sincere. And don't forget he appears to have a better grasp of maths, chemistry and physics than most people - he's not ignorant or even unqualified.
His enthusiasm for his own theory isn't really enough to warrant labelling him a blowhard. It's not as if he's gone around badmouthing everybody who disagrees with him. If you believed you'd made a breakthrough that would turn science on its head, wouldn't you have something to say about it? Would that make you a blowhard?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not jumping on Mills' bandwagon either (yet). But if his ideas were completely without credibility then he'd surely have been forced out of business by now. I think we ought to give him the benefit of the doubt until his work has been properly peer reviewed by people who are qualified to assess it.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
I don't really see a problem with /. editorializing. I mean, I come here expecting a news service with some sort of humans behind it, and I get it. If I don't agree with it, I say so in the comments. Leave the plain facts to the news services /. links to - here, I want opinions to knock down!
Windows 2000: Designed for the Internet. The Internet: Designed for UNIX.
Quantum particles used to store information ("Qubits") can be either on, off, or they can be in superposition between on and off. It's sort of hard to explain, but what it basically means is it's BOTH on AND off at the same time. Not sorta anything. Very weird stuff. I like to believe the Universe is a little more organized than that, but who knows...
The streets shall flow with the blood of the Guberminky.
Is this the sort of thing which could benefit from distributed computing? Or is it one of those things, like protein folding computations, which have to be done on special, ultra-powerful machines?
This being Xmas, I was home having an argument with my father today about Canada's adoption of metric 30 years ago. He (age 53) is rather offended by this still today. I was trying to come up with ways to convince him that his personal discomfort was not enough reason to stay Imperial -- and now I've found one.
This discovery has nothing to do with metric specifically, and (rather amusingly) happened in an Imperial (and imperious, sometimes) country. But it's still representative: countries using common systems (metric) allow many to work together, across borders, to solve problems that we could not work out alone. In this case it was three American schools, but in other cases it has been schools or researchers from separate continents.
Yes, NASA messed up the metric thing. But that was based on one country not matching *all* the others, right? So imagine if this discovery is recanted in 3 weeks: "Oops, we were using inches and gallons, not centimeters and litres." This happens too often (even once is too often).
I'm not sure what my point is. I think it's a combination of "cool" and "why isn't everyone metric yet?"
Cam
- Cam MacLeod
Nothing is impossible to solve/crack etc. given enough time. There are no absolutes! Absolutely!
Supposedly, EVERYTHING is chaos at the smallest levels in a 6 dimensional calabi-yau space. How order is build out of this is baffling.
Sir, this is in essence, better than a beowulf cluster. I do not wish to waste my time, or anybody else's- but a little explanation may be in order. A quantum processor would work in parallel with itself; checking as many possibilities as it has capacity for all at once- in a really short time. This could find the solution to an equation much faster by merely recognizing which state of the supposition is the correct answer rather than trying them all in sequence. You will not get a faster quantum processor- merely a bigger one. What would a cluster configuration do but split up the task and make the chips to talk to each other unnecesarily?
just my two cents
If you want to make a comment, put it in the forums with everybody else's and let moderation take it's course.
Thanks for the pointer.
Call me dumb as you must, but I do have difficulty connecting Quantum Computer with the solving of the "scattering" problem.
I thought someone have already prototyped some sort of "quantum" computer, before the "scattering" problem was solved.
That goes back to my original question - that we have done things like Flouresence tube and engraving chips with ion beams _before_ anyone have a definite answer to the "scattering" problem, and my original question is - what that discovery will yield for us, apart for making the Quantum Physicians feel much better?
Again, thanks for your pointer.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
My point is that perhaps the "discovery" of the "scattering solution" may not be yielding much practical effect, like the onet you have mentioned - distributed computing.
Perhaps the "discovery" itself may be used for predicting when and where the "scattering effect" may occur, and with the ability to predict, new branches of science may finally be able to mushroom.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Beowulf clusters need lots of power. By understanding these particle interactions better, physicists will understand plasma physics better. Greater knowledge of plasma physics will lead to affordable power from fusion. Affordable power will reduce the costs of operating beowulf clusters.
Yeah, it's a stretch, but you asked for it.
dood, eye am so eleet!! i solvd this problum wen i waz 3 yeers owld! i solvd tha awl tha0 problums in tha book!!! i hav tha unifyed theary, i hav tha quantim powurz, i hav tha new relativuty, i solvd uclyd's prewf, i beet tha last boss, i kiked mr t's arse, i bawt a furby, i hav awl 150 pokemon, i hav an amd athlon at 1500MHz, i smokd tha kronik, i fukd monika lewinske!!! itz awl me!!! so thar!!!!! i OWN JOO AWL!!!! HAHAHAHAH!!!
LATROZ DATROZ
Why is it that we need to do all this 'science' garbage anyways? You know, people are fooling themselves with this science. It's not doing anyone any good. What we need to do (as a whole) is to just read God's word. We won't need science any longer because all Truth is located within the holy bible! Let's get with it people, God's word is the only way we will *ever* understand anything!
why do you post these lame stories? this project is against open source and the linux revolution. i mean, why use sgi/crays?? a dual celeron beowulf cluster can smoke anything sgi/cray can make.
using closed source software/hardware in science is like molesting children, you satisfy a need while harming others in the process.
linux the choice of a GNU generation
This result is interesting because previously this problem has been treated by using approximations. The many different "solutions" given by wildly differing methods did not agree - and the errors introduced by the approximations also were impossible to find.
Numerical methods are very good in that you know the degree of error. Increase the number of grid points, and the error will decrease... (but the computation time will increase accordingly.) This one fact means that the results produced are meaningful - they can be compared with experiment.
Now why are these scattering events interesting? Well there is a slightly more complicated collision where the incoming electron knocks out an electron - leaving the atom in an excited state. The excited atom then de-excites itself by emitting yet another electron. (Auger emission.) You can't do this with hydrogen (not enough electrons.) - However, the nobel gases work well...
This second type of collision is very interesting, in that the distribution of outgoing electrons is related to the Fourier transform of the wavefunctions of the electrons in the atom... You can "map" the distribution of an electron in an orbital with this technique. This in turn provides tests on the quantum theory...
This also happens in ionisation events that form Aurora.
"Would you like a cold drink with that Sir? Yes, yes, for the sake, of the future, of all mankind, I will have, a sm
I start to wonder if the conclusion of that press release actually saying... we can simulate gas phase chemical reaction, just add more computing power, and little tweak of the equation, but the fundamental is solved. hah! who need chemistry when we got super computer. *g*
While you might be true in saying that we ought to improve on the "Feel" thing - in sinking the 8-ball or in other endeavors - but please do not disregard the _importance_ of feel.
There are times I have done thing by "feel" alone, and those are the times I could have done extensive calculations and such, but there is always that little voice (call it instinct if you may) that tells me to go by "Feel" - yea, sounds like Obiwan's "Feel the force, Luke" thing, doesn't it?
I have tried to explain what "Feel" is, but I just can't. It's something you gotta have within yourself.
Anyway, Merry Christmas !!
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
This is my own opinion - I personally do not think the journalist who wrote the piece actually gets it.
Most things that we have here, today, from gunpowder to electronic wonders, the ideas behind them all originated not from tweaking equations, but from intuition and inspiration.
Sometimes it requires "clicks" in the mind's eye to find a true "EUREKA!". Tweaking equations, IMHO, just doesn't make it.
After all, tweaking equations require _prior_ equations to exist, or there won't be anything to be "tweaked", right? And most of those prior equations owed their existence from the "clicks" of somebody's mind's eye.
Sorry, I've wandered to far out of topic. Gotta stop when I'm still able to.
Merry Christmas !
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Everyone knows God is dead. Video killed him.....or was it something else?
Anyways, give up religion before it is too late and die without enjoying life.
YOU DON'T KNOW THE POWER OF THE DARK SIDE
I'm confused by this, how did they find an exact solution to the scattering problem if they are using a finite version of the wave function? Wouldn't that be an approximation of the true wave function, which extends to infinity?
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
I understood the article somewhat. It seems to me somewhat that they solved a subset of the three body problem, which was made possible by cancelling out the infinities... Can someone with more knowlege tell me if this does or does not apply to the famouse three body problem? Thanks
..I just want to know if that damn cat is dead or alive.
Pretty impressive.
The BlackLight report by Village Voice was equally senseless, except for the in depth coverage of the international bankers and military big-whigs who are involved in dissing it, or "promoting" it.
Although slightly off topic, I believe the timing of these two articles on "reported events," is related. The BlackLight theory, i.e. a theory that quantum mechanics was flawed by an assumption that counting begins with 0 (0,1,2,.,n), and which offered that, below quantum level n=1, is a whole series of harmonic levels based on 1/n (so that in quantum mechanics counting should be 1/n,.,1/2,1,2,.,n), is a sensible one to me. It comes straight from platonic solids and probable distribution of expansive and contractive forces on a spheroid, and common sense, all dealt with by Kepler, Gauss and Reiman and for number theory Cantor. And, in the BlackLight website, the "bogus wildman" presented both his theoretical mathematical work, experimental examples, and an interesting resolution of a major astronomical anomaly on the functioning of our sun.
It is interesting that soon after the theory of this now /.smeared wildman was swarmed over with international bankers and military black-ops types, the name of his "1/n" energy device was changed to BlackLight, and many of its prototype devices were moved into the Naval Research Labs in Maryland, where under a pretext of functioning as a NASA engine from travel to Mars, this 1/n area of quantum physics will disappear into admiralty law for the next ten years. This much I know from personal knowledge because I was asked to do machine work on the devices at NRL, but I refused to sign the secrecy agreements.
Meanwhile, shortly after the blacklight-blackops piece, /. is serving up a total foofoo piece on Schroedinger's equation, and on the deep philosophical importance of endless number crunching, without any broadening or simplifying advance in quantum theory, from a lab which is famous for sending out disinformation pieces.
Which leads to the next question, is slashdot slowly devolving into a smear platform for the various fronts of the opensource movement, including both computing and physics. Ever since big money moved in, there has been a perceptible change.
Except that it tends to break down within schwartzchild singularities, and that problem's being worked on by people much smarter than I. My previous comment was much more facetious than others seem to recognize.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
I think its entirely unappropriate that you label Mills as a blowhard. I doubt you have actually looked into his background at all, nor his credentials, and I am quite sure you are not qualified to evaluate the cliams made by him or BlackLight. This type of commentary is slanderous, especially considering he is seeking VC money right now, and if I were him I would press charges considering this site is heavily visited, even sadly by the scientific community.
Sorry, QM is successful because of its breathtaking predictive power. And if you're familiar with experimental results like the Aspect Experiment, it should be clear to you that no theory with the "common sense" deterministic appeal of Newtonian Mechanics can correctly mirror reality. Your social scientific explanations for theories confirmed again and again by empirical results are, as US people like to say, way off base.
--
Xenu loves you!
Unfortunately, they have not solved the problem. They have solved a single instance of it: they "have used supercomputers to obtain a complete solution of the ionization of a hydrogen atom by collision with an electron, the simplest nontrivial example of the problem's last unsolved component." This is like the 3-body problem in gravity. A particular solution to a particular situation can be computed (slowly), but a general solution has never been found (some say it's impossible).
Quantum mechanics itself is still plagued by an inability to account for anything other than the hydrogen atom, and that only as an approximation. This new find will expand its capabilities, but more work needs to be done.
I recommend the excellent book Doubt and Certainty, which deals with some of these topics in depth (and can be handled by almost any audience). Don't let the PR people fool you, quantum mechanics is still a mystery.
The compute power required was large. They had to use Blue Pacific, probably the unclassfied machine, which has 1344 PowerPC604 CPUs. I wonder how much machine time was required, and how tightly coupled the computation is.
Notice that the "Blowhard" part is quoted.
It appears to me that this comment was actually made by the original submitter (notsosilentbob), not Hemos--he only relayed it.
Perhaps an apology is in order? Or at least a good flame of the real poster.
Also, on the Mills topic, Mills didn't go through peer review. An important aspect of Science is having other scientists beat on it (like OpenSource software). Ignoring that is a "bad thing".
And don't give me that "he's oppressed because he disagrees with the majority" crap. Hawking came through that quite nicely. If you're right, scientists start agreeing with you.
If you look again at the article, you'll see that the submitter used the 'blowhard' comment, not Hemos. If anything, Hemos is guilty of not editing out a derogatory comment.
It's been more than 10 years since the original Pons and Fleischmann anouncement of [sic] cold fusion. These guys (Blacklight) are one of the myriad branches from that bizarre root. Personally I find it amusing that they deny a relationship with cold fusion, while the cold fusion advocates point to them as a success story.
To paraphrase this post: I have nothing to say, but I'm annoying enough not to use a subject of "first post". I have no life, so I even wasted enough effort to create a SlashDot account rather than posting as an AC. I'm in high school, so I don't know anything about the content of the article, but that's ok, because I told everybody I'm in high school.