Thinking About E = mc²
The equation E = mc2 says that anything that has a mass will also have an amount of energy associated with it as well.
The two quantities are linearly related to each other with a very large conversion factor that is the speed of light squared. Since the speed of light is 300,000,000 metres per second the amount of energy stored in a lump of matter is very large indeed.
In my post One Gram Killed Hiroshima, I worked out that about 1 gram of matter was converted into energy to produce the explosion seen in the Hiroshima bomb. This is a vivid example of just how astounding that mass-to-energy conversion factor truly is.
Now on to the implications of this profound equation.
Should It Really Be An Equal Sign?
The equation is written with an equals sign ('=') but should it really be written with a conversion sign (↔) instead? As in:
The difference may be just semantic but it seems to me that the common version of the equation is saying that energy and mass are the exact same thing which is weird.
When I read about ideas like string theory they are saying that the subatomic particles that make up matter and ultimately you and me are all made up of strings.
Just what are these strings made up of? I interpret it to mean that these strings are just bits of curled up space (or curled up space-time).
This might mean that what we think of as 'matter' is just nothing but curled up bits of nothingness and the c2 factor in the equation is telling us that they are very, very tightly coiled up bits of spacetime indeed.
They are so tightly in fact that when they do unwind the velocities they impact to neighbouring interacting particles is huge (i.e. enough to power a star).
The Actual Full (Real) Equation
E = mc2 is the common way the equation is communicated but it is not the proper full equation which actually is:
where ,
E is energy,
m0 is the rest mass (i.e. a chunk of matter that it not moving),
p is the momentum of that chunk of matter, if it has a velocity then 'p' will be greater than zero, and of course
c is the speed of light.
This full equation is needed in order to fully explain why something like a photon which is said to have zero rest mass can be affected by a gravitational field.
The Antimatter Implication
The equation is even more interesting than that. If we set the momentum in the full equation above to zero (i.e. all this means is that it is not moving) then the equation becomes:
This implies that E can be either positive or negative and the equation will still work!
Paul Dirac noticed this and interpreted the negative energy solution to predict the existence of antimatter which was discovered several years later.
That is impressive indeed, knowing that the solution to a squared quantity can be either positive or negative lead to the prediction of a whole new form of matter.
The Practical Ramifications
The discovery of this equivalence principle enabled astronomers for the first time to understand how stars are powered.
Previously they tried to explain the Sun and other stars using chemical energy equations and always fell well short of the energy requirements needed to explain the very long lifetime of these powerful objects.
This equation also has made possible both the peaceful (and not so peaceful) use of fission power and fusion power in power generators (and weapons).
Closing Words
So there we go, to sum things up:
- E = mc2 is not actually the full equation. Now you know that.
- It may also mean that matter is just bits of really tightly coiled up spacetime and that the equals sign really should be a conversion sign.
- It can be used to predict a whole other form of matter (anti-matter to be pedantic) and,
- It explains how the Sun and stars can burn for billions of years without running out of fuel.
That is a lot of work for one little equation.
Thank you for reading my post.
Post Sources
Equations in this post created using the Codecogs LaTex equation editor.
[1] E = mc2 is wrong?
[2] Mass-Energy Equivalence.
[3] One Gram Killed Hiroshima.
[4] Super String Theory.
[5] String theory - Wikipedia article.
[6] Paul Dirac
[7] Energy-Momentum relation.
[8] Anti-matter.
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Cows are actually cubes and the Earth is also flat. The Free Masons are trying to trick us.
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This is well condensed piece on one of the world's profound equations E=MC2. And your argument is an fascinaing one as it holds water.
I have a lot of reading up to do to fully understand some of the concepts here.
There is a lot more to it than what I wrote about but you can only go so deep in a blog post before people will click away to something else.
Awesome job on this one @procrastilearner! One visual concept that really gives credence to string theory or what I feel is really a fractal universe is how Electron Microscopes can show a large picture but can not zoom in. The amount of detail shown in some of those photos is amazing and really begs one to want to delve further.
And another wonderful piece of trivia in my pocket. I have always been too lazy to read up on that equation. Very nice to have it condensed.
I was shocked that there is something more basic than mass. I always thought the distinction between weight and mass is all there is. So a quick google search revealed to me that there are five types of mass... I clearly have a lot to learn...
Thanks for opening this new knowledge to me :)