The matter of Energy

[LaPalida]

Hey. I had a discussion with a friend about matter and energy. I was under the impression that:

- that matter and energy are fundamentally made out of the same stuff.

- atoms are made of certain particles (electrons, protons, neutrons) which are actually exactly the same just in different states or made up of the same quarks etc.

- electricity is energy that is made out of free floating electrons.

Energy can be converted to matter and vice verse. We have all sorts of particles... but aren't they all fundamentally the same just are in different states? Or is this wrong? Hope this makes sense.

 

[fuelair]

energy is not made out of particles - particles have mass, energy doesn't (that is part of why a small amount of matter makes a gigantic quantity of energy (if completely converted to energy). Particles can carry/transfer energy but that's not at all the same thing. Suggest you read first one or two chapters of an HS Chem or Integrated Science text for the basics on this.

 

[Iamme]

The biggest question of all is 'where did the energy come from?'

 

[Ben Tilly]

Hey. I had a discussion with a friend about matter and energy. I was under the impression that:

- that matter and energy are fundamentally made out of the same stuff.

I really like Richard Feynman's way of looking at this which is that E=mc2 means literally that energy is mass and mass is energy (just in different units). And the extra mass that an object has because it is moving is just the mass of its kinetic energy. (See The Feynman Lectures on Physics.) Unfortunately the way that most physicists look at this is that energy can be converted into mass and vice versa. Since energy and mass are human labels, consensus wins.

The issue here is that Feynman's approach provides a conceptual elegance, but as a practical matter it is easier for particle physicists to think in terms of a particle's mass being its rest mass.

- atoms are made of certain particles (electrons, protons, neutrons) which are actually exactly the same just in different states or made up of the same quarks etc.

Well a proton is not the same as an electron. But any 2 protons are the same, ditto any two electrons.

- electricity is energy that is made out of free floating electrons.

Electricity is the flow of charge. But when a current flows from A to B, it is very unlikely that any given electron goes from A to B. Rather an electron comes out of an atom, moves a little distance, gets absorbed, kicks another one out, etc.

This is not, however, universally true. For instance in some materials an atom without an electron absorbs one from the atom next which absorbs one from the atom behind it and so on. So it is really a charged "electron hole" which is moving. The difference sounds esoteric but is actually very important - carefully arranged junctions between materials where electricity flows in different ways are the basis of transistors.

Electricity can be made of many other things as well. For instance current goes through batteries by moving charged atoms around. But the key is that, somehow, charge must move.

Energy can be converted to matter and vice verse. We have all sorts of particles... but aren't they all fundamentally the same just are in different states? Or is this wrong? Hope this makes sense.

Yes. We are the result of fundamentally simple building blocks which combine and recombine again in many different ways.

Cheers,
Ben

 

[DanishDynamite]

Hey. I had a discussion with a friend about matter and energy. I was under the impression that:

- that matter and energy are fundamentally made out of the same stuff.

No one knows. All that we know is that matter can be converted to energy and vice-versa. Clearly, a particular particle of matter, say an electron, is not the same as a given amount of energy as they have different properties.

- atoms are made of certain particles (electrons, protons, neutrons) which are actually exactly the same just in different states or made up of the same quarks etc.

Yes, atomic particles are in fact made up of even more fundamental particles - quarks.

- electricity is energy that is made out of free floating electrons.

Electricity is the flow of charge.

Energy can be converted to matter and vice verse. We have all sorts of particles... but aren't they all fundamentally the same just are in different states? Or is this wrong? Hope this makes sense.

Depends what you mean by "fundamentally the same". The fundamental nature of matter is, as far as I know, unknown.

 

[lenny]

The biggest question of all is 'where did the energy come from?'

really? is that question bigger than the question "is there really any energy?"

(i guess if the answer to my question is yes, then yours wins)

 

[lenny]

Yes, atomic particles are in fact made up of even more fundamental particles - quarks.

Should a skeptic believe in "things" whose existance can only be infered soooooooo indirectly?

 

[Eos of the Eons]

FSTDT! Post of the Year for 2005

"One of the most basic laws in the universe is the Second Law of Thermodynamics. This states that as time goes by, entropy in an environment will increase. Evolution argues differently against a law that is accepted EVERYWHERE BY EVERYONE. Evolution says that we started out simple, and over time became more complex. That just isn't possible: UNLESS there is a giant outside source of energy supplying the Earth with huge amounts of energy. If there were such a source, scientists would certainly know about it. [emphasis added]"

http://www.fstdt.com/top100.asp

 

[jmercer]

Yes, atomic particles are in fact made up of even more fundamental particles - quarks.

Should a skeptic believe in "things" whose existance can only be infered soooooooo indirectly?

Ah, but quarks have not only been inferred, but observed.

In fact, so-called "cosmic rays" are actually quarks... so, yes, we can safely believe in quarks as skeptics.

 

[Jeff Corey]

http://www.fstdt.com/top100.asp

Yes, NASA plans to send a spacecraft to land on that big, giant source of energy. Of course, they'll have to do it at night.

 

[LaPalida]

Heh, yeah I remember that FSTDT during my Evolution vs. ID phase. I posted this quesion to other boards... there are alot of contradicting replies. Anyway I goofed. I treated energy like a thing... thanks to my friend for confusing me (he believes that ghosts and souls are intelligent energy) and me for thinking that since an electron is negatively charged... means it's energy. Thanks guys for your help in setting me straight. Dunno what the hell I was thinking... must have been tired. Still I do have some questions:

1. If I had a jar full of electrons... what would the substance be?

2. If I could accelerate an object like a car to the speed of light... does it become energy? Or does the universe collapse? Or what happens?

3. Does acceleration of said object has to be in a vector or can you spin an object at the speed of light?

 

[Alkatran]

A jar full of electrons is just that: a jar full of electrons. I suppose the jar would explode in a blast of "lightning" from the force of all those electrons pushing on each other.

If you accelerated arbitrarily close to the speed of light (you can't actually reach it if you have mass) the main thing you'd notice is being fried by high intensity radiation due to the Doppler effect (harmless light gets blue shifted all the way to and past gamma rays).

Yes, you can rotate something at the speed of light, but you would get all sorts of weird effects such as the outside having a lower angular speed than near the center, because it can't exceed the speed of light. I can't imagine any practical object withstanding this for very long.

 

[Jarom]

Heh, yeah I remember that
1. If I had a jar full of electrons... what would the substance be?

2. If I could accelerate an object like a car to the speed of light... does it become energy? Or does the universe collapse? Or what happens?

3. Does acceleration of said object has to be in a vector or can you spin an object at the speed of light?

1. You'd have a jar full of electrons. This isn't a naturally occurring substance, nor would it be stable. It would have such a massive negative charge that it would quickly push electrons in nearby substances away. I haven't done any calculations yet, but intuitively I would not expect any living thing within a few meters to survive.

2. The same thing would happen that happens when you draw a triangle with four sides. Although all the words in your sentence make sense individually, your question doesn't have any meaning in this universe.

3. See answer 2.

 

[Walter Wayne]

- atoms are made of certain particles (electrons, protons, neutrons) which are actually exactly the same just in different states or made up of the same quarks etc.

Electrons are not the same as protons or neutrons by a long shot. Electrons are a fundamental particle, not made up of quarks. Electrons are in the class of fundamental particles called leptons (which include the electron, muon, tau, and a neutrino corresponding too each).

The proton and neutron are each made up of 3 quarks.

But most of the observable matter around us is made up from 3 fundamental particles, electrons, as well as up quarks and down quarks which are the type of quarks that make up protons and neutrons.

 

[MortFurd]

1. If I had a jar full of electrons... what would the substance be?

You'd have one of these or the business end of one of these.

A literal "jar full" would be just about impossible. The charge of the electrons (as others have mentioned) would make them all repel each other, and you'd likely never get that many together in one spot.

The "substance" would be electrons.

2. If I could accelerate an object like a car to the speed of light... does it become energy? Or does the universe collapse? Or what happens?

As I understand things, you'd never be able to accelerate the car to light speed. As you approach the speed of light, it takes more and more energy to accelerate and the car becomes more massive (or one or the other - I think those are both alternative ways to say the same thing.) Regardless, you can't accelerate an object with mass to the speed of light.

3. Does acceleration of said object has to be in a vector or can you spin an object at the speed of light?

Have you considered the mechanics of spinning something at the speed of light? A quick calculation (with possible errors) gives me an acceleration of 1.8E12 G. That's (enormous freaking number) times the acceleration due to gravity (G) on the earth's surface. That's for a disk 10 kilometers in diameter. Acceleration gets higher with a smaller disk, and lower with a larger disk.
Either you have a disk as big as a galaxy that you have to get rotating, or you have an acceleration so high that nothing will stay put together.

All of this ignores entirely any relatavistic effects. I don't have any desire to go through the gyrations it'd take to account for the varying time rates across the width of the disk.

 

[jmercer]

The biggest question of all is 'where did the energy come from?'

Hm. Interesting question. Let's see... well, the initial release of the energy would have had to have been enormous. And it would have to have been very, very, very long ago, or we (and matter) couldn't exist today. There should be some residual effect, some kind of glow remaining of the release that should be detectible at very low levels... I suppose that the universe should be expanding from such a violent process, too.

Now, I wonder what possible event could meet that unlikely criteria?

 

[adi]

No one knows. All that we know is that matter can be converted to energy and vice-versa. Clearly, a particular particle of matter, say an electron, is not the same as a given amount of energy as they have different properties.

Yes, atomic particles are in fact made up of even more fundamental particles - quarks.

Electricity is the flow of charge.

Depends what you mean by "fundamentally the same". The fundamental nature of matter is, as far as I know, unknown.

Well lets not forget about the dualety of Mater, meaning that Electron is alsow a EM wave and not just a particle.

 

[Cuddles]

1. If I had a jar full of electrons... what would the substance be?

In fact, what you would have is a plasma. A very highly charged one that would be almost impossible to contain. If you ignore all the pesky planets, this is exactly what most of the Solar System is full of.

3. Does acceleration of said object has to be in a vector or can you spin an object at the speed of light?

Acceleration is always a vector, whether it is linear or angular. Spinning something at the speed of light simply does not make sense. Spinning something so that particles in it's outer edge does make sense, but is not possible, for the same reasons already given for point 2.

 

[Cuddles]

Well lets not forget about the dualety of Mater, meaning that Electron is alsow a EM wave and not just a particle.

No. EM waves are photons, not electrons. Electrons can also act as waves, but they are not electro-magnetic.

 

[Ben Tilly]

1. You'd have a jar full of electrons. This isn't a naturally occurring substance, nor would it be stable. It would have such a massive negative charge that it would quickly push electrons in nearby substances away. I haven't done any calculations yet, but intuitively I would not expect any living thing within a few meters to survive.

Um, yeah. It would not be safe to be within a few meters. In fact I wouldn't want to be within a few thousand meters!

Think of it as a super-effective nuclear bomb. Then add the truly insane static discharge. It would be very spectacular, from a distance. In fact, I'd prefer it at a distance. Like..on another planet.

Cheers,
Ben