World's most powerful laser to tear apart the vacuum of space

[Chairman Risus]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/8857154/Worlds-most-powerful-laser-to-tear-apart-the-vacuum-of-space.html

Capable of producing a beam of light so intense that it would be equivalent to the power received by the Earth from the sun focused onto a speck smaller than a tip of a pin, scientists claim it could allow them boil the very fabric of space – the vacuum.

http://news.discovery.com/space/a-laser-to-rip-apart-spacetime-create-ghosts-111102.html

What's more, by giving spacetime a hernia, it is hoped that theorized "ghost particles" may spill from the fissure, providing evidence for the hypothesis that extra-dimensions exist and the vacuum of space isn't a vacuum at all -- it is in fact buzzing with virtual particles.

[Don Coyote]

I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!!!!!!

[Rumckle]

I saw this the other day, it's pretty cool (even if we have a while to wait). However, I don't quite understand how this will provide evidence for extra dimensions, as far as I understand it the theory of quantum fluctuations in a  vacuum doesn't require extra dimensions, or am I mistaken? Anybody with a better understanding of quantum theory wish to enlighten me?

[Pæs]

SCIENTISTS ACCIDENTALLY DECLARE WAR ON MANY-ANGLED BEINGS.
HERE'S TOM WITH THE WEATHER.

[rong]

[Luna]

I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!!!!!!

[Faust]

I'm very sceptical of trying to create a virtual particle separation using a laser, I'm even more sceptical of how well we can detect them.

[Telarus]

I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!!!!!!

[Pæs]

I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!!!!!!

Also, this.

[The Wizard Joseph]

So.. the article said they think this may prove the existence of other dimensions if successful.  I'm not sure it would be wise to perform such an experiment on our own planet.  Perhaps in every galaxy there's a species that tries this sooner or later and sets an object example for the other lifeforms.

REALLY hoping it'll just prove to be a waste of billions in cash.

[Kai]

I ATTACK THE DARKNESS!!!!!!

Also, this.

I literally tweeted this as "Physicists fire "magic missile" at "the darkness"!" 

[Kai]

I saw this the other day, it's pretty cool (even if we have a while to wait). However, I don't quite understand how this will provide evidence for extra dimensions, as far as I understand it the theory of quantum fluctuations in a  vacuum doesn't require extra dimensions, or am I mistaken? Anybody with a better understanding of quantum theory wish to enlighten me?

The idea is that the fabric of space time is actually composed of uncountable virtual particles popping in and out of existence. It's believed that it was these quantum fluctuations that actually started the big bang, something from nothing literally. So, considering there's more potential energy in a tiny bit of spacetime than in the entire universe, scientists are attempting to set off some of that and get some more information about spacetime by boiling it a bit. I don't see how this is going to reveal extra dimentions, but it may reveal all sorts of short lived particles for the first time; quantum fluctuations don't require more than 4 dimensions.

[Rumckle]

I saw this the other day, it's pretty cool (even if we have a while to wait). However, I don't quite understand how this will provide evidence for extra dimensions, as far as I understand it the theory of quantum fluctuations in a  vacuum doesn't require extra dimensions, or am I mistaken? Anybody with a better understanding of quantum theory wish to enlighten me?

The idea is that the fabric of space time is actually composed of uncountable virtual particles popping in and out of existence. It's believed that it was these quantum fluctuations that actually started the big bang, something from nothing literally. So, considering there's more potential energy in a tiny bit of spacetime than in the entire universe, scientists are attempting to set off some of that and get some more information about spacetime by boiling it a bit. I don't see how this is going to reveal extra dimentions, but it may reveal all sorts of short lived particles for the first time; quantum fluctuations don't require more than 4 dimensions.

That's what I thought, but I wasn't certain.

I'm always a bit skeptical of claims involving extra dimensions, but I don't know enough about the theory behind it, perhaps that is something I should look at over the summer.

[LMNO]

From what I understand, "dimension" in this case simply indicates a measurement required to define something.

The idea of time as a fourth dimension passed quickly into popular culture and language, perhaps too quickly. Today we use the word dimension to speak of the number of quantities required to specify something. For example, we may need to ask questions in seven categories to get a good idea of a person's intelligence, in which case we might speak of intelligence as having seven dimensions. We speak of the dimensions of a spreadsheet for accounting, and of the "parameter space" of a machine like a robot arm whose actions need to be programmed... the multiplicities discovered in the particle spectrum require new geometrical features to describe microscopic nature.

It was luck that the two-ness of optical spectra could be explained by something as visualizable as electron spin. Spin occurs in ordinary three dimensional space. Dirac's work showed that the anti-particles too result from considering 'spin', but in the four dimensions of space-time (it is just a coincidence that the number of components of the electron wave function – four – equals the number of space-time dimensions). So physicists did not need to expand their notion of nature's microscopic geometry to accommodate these new features. In the particle spectrum, however, new multiplets appear that suggest "motions" that cannot be accommodated in the familiar space-time geometry of Einstein and Minkowski, even when augmented by quantum phase.

[Triple Zero]

From what I understand, "dimension" in this case simply indicates a measurement required to define something.

The idea of time as a fourth dimension passed quickly into popular culture and language, perhaps too quickly. Today we use the word dimension to speak of the number of quantities required to specify something. For example, we may need to ask questions in seven categories to get a good idea of a person's intelligence, in which case we might speak of intelligence as having seven dimensions. We speak of the dimensions of a spreadsheet for accounting, and of the "parameter space" of a machine like a robot arm whose actions need to be programmed... the multiplicities discovered in the particle spectrum require new geometrical features to describe microscopic nature.

It was luck that the two-ness of optical spectra could be explained by something as visualizable as electron spin. Spin occurs in ordinary three dimensional space. Dirac's work showed that the anti-particles too result from considering 'spin', but in the four dimensions of space-time (it is just a coincidence that the number of components of the electron wave function – four – equals the number of space-time dimensions). So physicists did not need to expand their notion of nature's microscopic geometry to accommodate these new features. In the particle spectrum, however, new multiplets appear that suggest "motions" that cannot be accommodated in the familiar space-time geometry of Einstein and Minkowski, even when augmented by quantum phase.

This is the most tricky thing ... people believing that a dimension [in this context] is somehow like a parallel universe or "shadow reality" or something like that. And then when you explain what it actually is (a reasonably straightforward mathematical term), it is so boring and they forget it immediately.

Another good example is to describe the orbit of an object around a planet fully, you require six dimensions. One way to do this is using its (x,y,z) position in space and its (vx,vy,vz) velocity in space. These are six numbers, and sufficient to fully describe the orbit. As Neal Stephenson explained in Anathem this way of representing an orbit happens to be not very intuitive, and the six numbers are often transformed to a different set of six numbers which better describe things like angular velocity, eccentricity and other sorts of things you'd be interested in with orbits--Dimo can probably explain the details. The point however, is that they are still six numbers, because it's the same object in orbit so it has the same amount of degrees of freedom.

That's another good way to think about dimension btw--Degrees of freedom

I do wonder where the other concept of dimension came from, because the regular language meaning of the word, in "the dimensions of a table" refer to its width height and depth, which are analogous to its mathematical (Euclidian) dimensions. The above text seems to suggest the alternate interpretation followed from "the fourth dimension as time" passing into popular culture, but that's still quite a few steps away from how an alien brain named Krang can build a Technodrome in a place called "Dimension X".