The Two-Body Problem, Classical Version: given two objects/particles interacting according to a 1/r2 law, which means gravity or electricity, can we write and solve the equation of motion in closed form?
Tag Archives: universe
My Favorite Concept for How the Universe Fits into Everything
What’s outside the universe? What’s smaller than the smallest thing in the universe? What was before the universe started, and what will come after? Here’s a possibility…
The fundamental particles in our universe could themselves be whole universes, and our universe could be one of the smallest things in another universe one level up. That could go on forever in both directions.
Continue reading My Favorite Concept for How the Universe Fits into Everything
The Three-Body Problem
With two interacting bodies, interacting via the r-squared forces of gravity or electricity, and obeying classical mechanics, the equation of motion can be written down in closed form.
With three interacting bodies, the equation of motion can’t be written down in closed form.
So the three-body problem can’t be solved exactly (and this is just for classical mechanics and r-squared forces). Algebraic approximations or numerical simulations can do a good job, but they’re not exact.
So what’s it mean?
The Universe Doesn’t Think Like We Do
The Universe doesn’t care. Really what I mean is…
How the universe operates and how we understand and analyze it are entirely different.
The universe…
- doesn’t define or categorize things, like mammals vs reptiles, or life vs non-life
- doesn’t calculate things, like quantum mechanics or relativity or three-body problems
- can’t be divided into holistic vs reductionistic situations, or matter vs space
Holism vs Reductionism
Reductionism reduces everything to its parts. You know how the parts behave, then put them together, and thus you know how the whole thing behaves.
This could be for our knowledge in principle, for our knowledge in practice, and for how the universe does it (except the universe doesn’t, we just think it does).
Reductionism has been exceptionally successful in the last thousand years or so, first with the Arabs and then with the Europeans and their descendants.
The Universe
The Universe…
Is softly anthropic.
What does that mean – it listens to quiet piano music by the light of warm candles while meditating on self-awareness? Continue reading The Universe
Very Universe 