Re: Law of Conservation of Baryon Number

Reena wrote:

Hi,
I'm a high school student, and I constantly study all types of science.
Over the summer I've been focusing on atomic theory and read about the
law of conservation of baryon number, explaining why protons are
stable.

It seems to me there is no support for this (I hesitate to say "proof"
since you can't really prove anything in science), and no reason to
easily accept it besides that it seems to work. You might as well say
"God makes the protons stable" or something like that.

Usually I don't tend to be too skeptical of things, but this one seems
ridiculous - randomly assigning numbers.

Spin, too, just seems to work. It's not something you can easily
describe or detect.

I was wondering if there are any other theories regarding why protons
are stable, or if anyone has any other commentary on this?

Any replies would be appreciated.
Thanks.

Google
"proton decay" Kamiokande 65,000 hits
No empirical proton decay

For every symmetry in physics continuous in time or approximated by a
Taylor series there is a conserved propertry in physics, and
vice-versa. This is enforced by Noether's theorems.

http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/lajos.htm#b5

A symmetry can be broken explicitly - a term in the action or
equations of motion may not be invariant. A symmetry can be broken
anomalously - not all classical theory symmetries exist in the
corresponding quantum theory. Quantum field theory anomaly spoils
renormalizability. Anomaly absence in the Standard Model is crucial.
A symmetry can be broken spontaneously if it is an exact symmetry of
the equations of motion but not of a particular solution therein.
Noether's theorems hold if the symmetry is not broken explicitly.
Conservations can be relaxed in subsystems displaying reduced symmetry
(Born scattering approximation, Fermi's golden rule, Snell's law).

A classical field theory conserved quantity does not demand a quantum
field theory conserved quantity in kind. The only symmetry with
wiggle room is parity. Parity is an absolutely discrete symmetry that
cannot be approximated by a sum of infinitesimals. Mathematical
parity coupled to geometric parity is not Notherian but it is enforced
by other relationships.

There ya go, Pilgrim.

--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
(Toxic URL! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/qz3.pdf

.

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