Re: Physics without energy

mobydikc_at_gmail.com
Date: 09/09/04 

Date: 9 Sep 2004 10:19:46 -0700

Bjoern Feuerbacher wrote:

> > If we needed energy before we knew
> > about particle physics, now that we have particle physics, and now
> > that we realize thermodynamics and electrodynamics deals with
little
> > bits of matter flying around,
>
> Neither thermodynamics nor electrodynamics deal only with "little
bits
> of matter flying around". Or do you call photons "matter"?

I'm calling photons matter.

We found out last century that photons are not immune to the effects of
gravity. In light of this experiment and in the spirit of unifiying
concepts in physics, thinking of bosons as matter does seem like a
natural step.

> > you think it would be time to do a
> > little house cleaning and say "energy can be derived from matter",
> > making matter a more fundamental player than energy in the
universe.
>
> Mass is not conserved. Energy is. So, what is more fundamental?

You are aware that HUP allowed the conservation of energy to be
violated for small amounts of time.

I would say that time is more fundamental than energy is, if only for
the reason that time is a unit of energy. So is mass. Mass is a
constituent of energy and therefore, it seems likely that mass is more
fundamental than energy.

Quantcast