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What's
that?"
Me: "That would be the Higgs Boson."
Me: "Mr. Higgs' boson helps explain why mass-energy and space-time are not actually
separate entities but two ways of perceiving the unified field."
Jimmy: "...Ok three questions. What's a mass-energy, what's a space-time, what's a
unified field."
Me: "The unified field is what actually exists, and mass-energy and space-time are the
two concepts a Relativity theorist splits that into to explain their perceptions."
Jimmy: "No, what IS a mass-energy?"
Me: "Mass-energy is a union of the two Newtonian ideas of mass and energy. Similarly,
space-time is the union of the Newtonian ideas of space and time."
Jimmy: "You mean gravity? How does the mass of the Earth affect things it's not
connected to?"
Me: "Newton had no idea. He just wrote down what he saw. Then Mr. Einstein came
along and said mass and energy are not separate phenomena, they're just two
perceptions of the singular mass-energy. So everything I just said about mass also
applies to energy."
even if they're not near it. In other words the effect of gravity has unlimited range but it's
not a very noticeable effect unless the mass is high and the other objects are close."
Me: "Like when two particles interact with each other and then move to opposite sides
of the Earth. If you and a friend measure many such particles you'll find that your
measurements on one side of the Earth have a spooky correlation with your friend's
measurements on the other side."
Jimmy: "You mean like the particles were communicating with each other?"
Me: "Yeah, except the correlation is instantaneous- there's not enough time for any
signal to get from one side of the Earth to the other."
Jimmy: "So it's like gravity then, in that one object can affect another object without
touching it?"
Me: "That possibility is called non-locality. But Einstein said that if non-locality is true
then you can go back in time and kill me before you are born, thus preventing you from
preventing your birth, all within the same consistent timeline."
Jimmy: "Killing isn't right. And that logic is not only not right, it's not even wrong. It's just
nonsense."
Me: "Yeah, so non-locality is impossible. But Mr. Bell said there's another possibilitythat none of the particles we're perceiving are actually real."
Jimmy: "Nice."
Me: "Check it out online if you don't believe me- most physicists don't believe in realism
anymore. Specifically, they don't believe in counter-factual definiteness."
Jimmy: "Why are there so many long words for these things?"
Me: "You know a lot more words in total than you learned today. You're just noticing that
these words are all new. That's because everything you thought you knew is all just
perceptions and now you have to re-learn about what actually exists."
Jimmy: "Ok so what's a counter-factual?"
Me: "It's the result of a measurement that nobody made."
Jimmy: "Does that actually exist?"
Me: "Of course not. A result is the consequence of an action, and actions which are not
done don't have results. But as great a man as Einstein believed in counter-factuals."
Jimmy: "Why?"
Me: "Because if counter-factuals don't exist then nothing is real until we perceive it, and
Einstein said he liked to think the moon was still there even when nobody is looking at
it."
Me: "It exists subjectively when you measure it. And it exists abstractly when we
simulate it in a computer. But when you don't do either it's not there waiting to be
measured. Unmeasured results don't exist."
Jimmy: "So what does exist?"
Me: "The unified field."
Jimmy: "How do you know?"
Me: "The string theorists told me."
Jimmy: "But didn't Einstein say mass-energy and space-time are real?"
Me: "The string theorists say he was just perceiving their unified field in two subjective
ways."
Jimmy: "Just like Einstein said Newton was perceiving his space-time in two subjective
ways. Likewise for his mass-energy."
Me: "Similar to how you might think that brightness, temperature, or electric charge are
fundamental quantities, until you got schooled by Newton and shown how you're just
perceiving his mass, energy, space, and time in a multitude of different ways.
Jimmy: "Wait, if mass-energy and space-time depend on my brain, what is my brain
made of?"
Me: "Space-time and mass-energy."
Me: "That's just her perception. She's breaking down the unified field into all those
subjective parts, until she perceives you and me and herself to exist. I presume if she
cut your head open she would perceive a brain to be there too."
Jimmy: "Let's just say we did that one."
Me: "Yeah so subjectively you have a brain and I have a brain but objectively there's
just the unified field."
Jimmy: "So how can something that doesn't objectively exist break down the unified
field which does actually exist?"
Me: "Objectively the unified field does not consist of space-time and mass-energy, those
are both just in your head. Objectively it has no parts. But it seems to have a multitude
of parts (including thinking parts) to those thinking parts."
Me: "Before Mr. Higgs came along, all our equations for particles were symmetrical, so
the mass value on one side of the equation was always canceled by the value on the
other side. The Higgs field induces a spontaneous symmetry breaking, which leaves
mass on one side of the equation and not the other."
Jimmy: "But that's all just maths, isn't it? How does it really work?"
Me: "No, remember I said the Higgs boson exists subjectively when you measure it, and
it exists abstractly when we do maths with it. But when you don't do either it's not there
waiting to be measured. Unmeasured results don't exist."
Jimmy: "So it's all in my head?"
Me: "Yeah but your head's all in your head too."
Jimmy: "Damn."
Me: "..."
Jimmy: "The news is hard."