2010-06-04T16:42:00.000-07:00

I think I can safely say that no one understands quantum mechanics Richard Feynman

2010-06-04T16:41:00.000-07:00

NO MATTER HOW hard you try you will never be able to grasp just how tiny, how spatiallyunassuming, is a proton. It is just way too small. A proton is an infinitesimal part of an atom, which is itself of course an insubstantial thing.Protons are so small that a little dib of ink like the dot on this i can hold something in theregion of 500,000,000,000 of them, rather more than the number of seconds contained in halfa million years. So protons are exceedingly microscopic, to say the very least. Now imagine if you can (and of course you can’t) shrinking one of those protons down to abillionth of its normal size into a space so small that it would make a proton look enormous.Now pack into that tiny, tiny space about an ounce of matter. Excellent. You are ready to starta universe. I’m assuming of course that you wish to build an inflationary universe. If you’d preferinstead to build a more old-fashioned, standard Big Bang universe, you’ll need additionalmaterials. In fact, you will need to gather up everything there is every last mote and particle ofmatter between here and the edge of creation and squeeze it into a spot so infinitesimallycompact that it has no dimensions at all. It is known as a singularity. In either case, get ready for a really big bang. Naturally, you will wish to retire to a safeplace to observe the spectacle. Unfortunately, there is nowhere to retire to because outside thesingularity there is no where. When the universe begins to expand, it won’t be spreading outto fill a larger emptiness. The only space that exists is the space it creates as it goes. It is natural but wrong to visualize the singularity as a kind of pregnant dot hanging in adark, boundless void. But there is no space, no darkness. The singularity has no “around”around it. There is no space for it to occupy, no place for it to be. We can’t even ask how longit has been there—whether it has just lately popped into being, like a good idea, or whether ithas been there forever, quietly awaiting the right moment. Time doesn’t exist. There is no pastfor it to emerge from. And so, from nothing, our universe begins.(Bill Bryson, A short history of nearly everything.)

2010-05-15T20:57:00.000-07:00

My mind is riddled with mystery.

and crazy friends

DNA

2009-04-01T06:51:00.000-07:00

The Inner Life of The Cell

The Bunch

DNA