Ideas of New Scientist writers, by Theme

[British, fl. 2013, Weekly British science magazine (with many authors)]

green numbers give full details    |    back to list of philosophers    |     expand these ideas
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 5. Reason for Existence
19482 Current physics says matter and antimatter should have reduced to light at the big bang
19483 CP violation shows a decay imbalance in matter and antimatter, leading to matter's dominance
14. Science / A. Basis of Science / 4. Prediction
19737 A system can infer the structure of the world by making predictions about it
15. Nature of Minds / C. Capacities of Minds / 3. Abstraction by mind
19736 Neural networks can extract the car-ness of a car, or the chair-ness of a chair
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 5. Rationality / a. Rationality
16419 No one has yet devised a rationality test
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 7. Intelligence
16417 About a third of variation in human intelligence is environmental
16418 People can be highly intelligent, yet very stupid
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 1. Psychology
19484 Psychologists measure personality along five dimensions
27. Natural Reality / A. Classical Physics / 1. Mechanics / d. Gravity
21167 Gravity is unusual, in that it always attracts and never repels
27. Natural Reality / A. Classical Physics / 2. Thermodynamics / d. Entropy
19950 Entropy is the only time-asymmetric law, so time may be linked to entropy
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / b. General relativity
21176 In the Big Bang general relativity fails, because gravity is too powerful
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / a. Electrodynamics
19478 Light moves at a constant space-time speed, but its direction is in neither space nor time
21155 Photons have zero rest mass, so virtual photons have infinite range
21147 Quantum electrodynamics incorporates special relativity and quantum mechanics
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / b. Fields
21161 In the standard model all the fundamental force fields merge at extremely high energies
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / c. Electrons
21146 Electrons move fast, so are subject to special relativity
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 2. Electrodynamics / d. Quantum mechanics
19473 The Schrödinger equation describes the evolution of an object's wave function in Hilbert space
19474 Quantum states are measured by external time, of unknown origin
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 3. Chromodynamics / a. Chromodynamics
21148 The strong force is repulsive at short distances, strong at medium, and fades at long
21152 The strong force binds quarks tight, and the nucleus more weakly
21151 Gluons, the particles carrying the strong force, interact because of their colour charge
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 3. Chromodynamics / b. Quarks
21143 Quarks in threes can build hadrons with spin ½ or with spin 3/2
21142 Classifying hadrons revealed two symmetry patterns, produced by three basic elements
21150 Three different colours of quark (as in the proton) can cancel out to give no colour
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / b. Standard model
21145 The four fundamental forces (gravity, electromagnetism, weak and strong) are the effects of particles
21153 The weak force explains beta decay, and the change of type by quarks and leptons
21156 The weak force particles are heavy, so the force has a short range
21164 Why do the charges of the very different proton and electron perfectly match up?
21170 The Standard Model cannot explain dark energy, survival of matter, gravity, or force strength
21154 Three particles enable the weak force: W+ and W- are charged, and Z° is not
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / c. Particle properties
21149 Quarks have red, green or blue colour charge (akin to electric charge)
21157 Particles are spread out, with wave-like properties, and higher energy shortens the wavelength
21140 Spin is a built-in ration of angular momentum
21158 Fermions, with spin ½, are antisocial, and cannot share quantum states
21165 Spin is akin to rotation, and is easily measured in a magnetic field
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / d. Mass
21163 The mass of protons and neutrinos is mostly binding energy, not the quarks
21168 Gravitional mass turns out to be the same as inertial mass
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / e. Protons
21138 Neutrons are slightly heavier than protons, and decay into them by emitting an electron
21144 Top, bottom, charm and strange quarks quickly decay into up and down
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / f. Neutrinos
21141 Neutrinos were proposed as the missing energy in neutron beta decay
21169 Only neutrinos spin anticlockwise
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 4. Standard Model / g. Anti-matter
21166 Standard antineutrinos have opposite spin and opposite lepton number
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 5. Unified Models / a. Electro-weak unity
21171 The symmetry of unified electromagnetic and weak forces was broken by the Higgs field
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 5. Unified Models / b. String theory
19954 It is impossible for find a model of actuality among the innumerable models in string theory
19476 String theory needs at least 10 space-time dimensions
19953 In string theory space-time has a grainy indivisible substructure
21175 String theory might be tested by colliding strings to make bigger 'stringballs'
21177 String theory offers a quantum theory of gravity, by describing the graviton
21178 String theory is now part of 11-dimensional M-Theory, involving p-branes
21179 Supersymmetric string theory can be expressed using loop quantum gravity
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 5. Unified Models / c. Supersymmetry
21159 Supersymmetry has extra heavy bosons and heavy fermions
21172 The evidence for supersymmetry keeps failing to appear
21162 Only supersymmetry offers to incorporate gravity into the scheme
21173 Supersymmetry says particles and superpartners were unities, but then split
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 2. Space
19947 Hilbert Space is an abstraction representing all possible states of a quantum system
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 4. Substantival Space
21160 The Higgs field means even low energy space is not empty
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 6. Space-Time
19475 Relativity makes time and space jointly basic; quantum theory splits them, and prioritises time
19955 Space-time may be a geometrical manifestation of quantum entanglement
19948 Einstein's merging of time with space has left us confused about the nature of time
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / d. Time as measure
19949 Quantum theory relies on a clock outside the system - but where is it located?
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / g. Time's arrow
19951 Entropy is puzzling, so we may need to build new laws which include time directionality
27. Natural Reality / E. Cosmology / 7. Black Holes
19477 General relativity predicts black holes, as former massive stars, and as galaxy centres
19952 Black holes have entropy, but general relativity says they are unstructured, and lack entropy
27. Natural Reality / E. Cosmology / 8. Dark Matter
16420 84.5 percent of the universe is made of dark matter
21174 Dark matter must have mass, to produce gravity, and no electric charge, to not reflect light
27. Natural Reality / F. Chemistry / 1. Chemistry
17604 We are halfway to synthesising any molecule we want
27. Natural Reality / F. Chemistry / 3. Periodic Table
17603 Chemistry just needs the periodic table, and protons, electrons and neutrinos