A New Mind (Reconceptualization #2)

Paul admonishes us in Romans 12 to be 'transformed by the renewing of your mind.' It is with this goal in mind that I have sought to understand the basic tenets of quantum physics and Einstein's relativity. It has to do with our foundation of knowing. You see, we all see things from a particular perspective. We even see the Bible and God's instructions for our lives from our own perspective. So in order to 'renew my mind' and see God's word in a fresh light, I'm checking out other foundations of knowledge from which to see things. (Although truthfully, I'm starting to figure out that perhaps the best way is to not have any foundation, or perspective, at all- a really frightening thing when you think about it!)

So anyways- back to the physics. I'll continue my foray into E=mc2, trying not to get too deep into the technical aspects, but go just enough to glean some conclusions from it that will hopefully let us all see things a little clearer. As I mentioned before (see 'C-Blog' below) Einstein's famous equation reads Energy equals Mass times the Speed of Light squared. Again, doesn't sound too revolutionary but here's where we'll start to get into some of those 'dangerous' implications.

I'm sure everyone has heard of Sir Isaac Newton. Maybe you know he is often considered the father of Physics. Pretty much any physical science that you learned in school- things like momentum and motion and attributes such as mass and stuff like that- pretty much originated in the equations and laws of Newton. They seemed to explain everything- or at least provided the means to explain everything- and his equations always seemed to work. They worked for about 400 years. Then Einstein came along. (Incidentally, Newton's equations still work for the most part, which is why we're still learning them in school.) As indicated above by the italics, Newton's laws have much to do about the Mass side of the equation. And despite the heady designation of being 'physics', it appears to be mostly common sense because Newton's laws merely describe our everyday experiences with the objects around us. But what happens when our everyday experiences are....wrong?

Let's put that on hold for a second as we consider the energy side of the equation. For the longest time there was a sense of something called energy but it was always in separate forms. There was heat, there was light, there was magnetic attraction, there were electrical charges- but nobody saw these as related; nobody had a unified concept of 'energy.' Then this guy named James Clerk Maxwell came along and discovered that Magnetic energy and Light shared similar characteristics and were essentially different forms of the same thing called 'energy.'

So far so good? Ok- here's where it gets kinda crazy. Newton's laws didn't always work out quite right- but that was because Newton's laws were theoretical and based on what scientists refer to as an 'inertial frame of reference'- basically a place that doesn't move. You see, any experiment that we do on earth- is moving. We are spinning around an axis and careening along an eliptical path around the sun, at several hundred miles per hour. If only we could find the one place in the universe that did not move- or at least find our rate of speed in relationship to that 'still' place so we can adjust our equations to take that into account and then- voila- everything will fall into place.

Well, Maxwell's equations describing the properties of energy provided hope. One of the implications was that the speed of light was constant. Cool- we measure the speed of light going with our direction of movement (thinking that it would measure slower as the measuring devices would be moving away from the light) and compare it with the speed of light going perpendicular (sideways) to our direction of movement and the difference will tell us exactly how fast our earth is moving and we'll know what we need to factor into the equations. Right? No dice. It seems light was a little too constant- when they made the two different measurements, there was no difference. So either Maxwell's equations, which were only 20 years old at the time, were wrong, or matter, that hard, immovable stuff that we hang our shirts on or rest our drinks on or, heaven forbid, walk on (multiple stories off the ground, even) moves, shrinks, or expands in ways that would crumple Newton's laws, having lasted proof positive for 400 years, like a house of cards. Hmmm.... I wonder which one could be wrong?

Enter a new mind- Albert Einstein. He had the gall or the courage or the naivety to say, well, maybe everything we've thought all along is wrong. Maybe stuff isn't as hard and as immovable as we thought. Maybe everything is moving and there is no 'inertial frame of reference'- there is no single place where Newton's laws are absolutely correct because there is no place that is absolutely at rest. So after accepting this possibility and applying a uniform change to some equations that then implied matter changes with movement, he culled it down to a simple elegant expression : E=mc2

So let's look at what this means and then I'll extrapolate on some broader philosophical implications on my next post. First, one of the proofs that made Einstein famous. Light is a form of Energy. Now, according to his equation, Energy has mass. If light has mass, then it can be affected by gravity. So picture this... or look at the picture below: Light traveling from a star will 'bend' or 'curve' around the sun because of gravity and thus will appear to us to be in a different location.



This was proven to be the case during a solar eclipse in 1919- a full 14 years after Einstein theorized it!! The thing is, though, it is so difficult to perceive the amount of Mass for a given amount of Energy because of c-squared. With c being an astounding 187,000 miles per second and then you square that- we're looking at a HUGE number that you have to multiply with to get a relationship between Mass and Energy. So it explains why light, which is essentially pure energy, could behave like an object, a mass. But the reverse is also true- imagine how much energy would be contained in an object with a Mass great enough for us to measure. You can begin to understand how just one ounce of Uranium could cause the massive amount of destruction on Hiroshima in 1945. Yep- that was made possible through the understanding of E=mc2 and scientists figuring out how to release the enormous amount of energy contained in a lump of mass.