Cern expected to announce Higgs boson evidence...

[kram1032]

Well...
For one thing, that level of physics is in a way a single iterated fractal system. Even with fairly simple structures, you get complex dynamics that probably soon become strange attractor - like
In the end, all the fractals we see are made up of those tiny particles.

Though look on page 5 of this
http://users.cms.caltech.edu/~keenan/pdf/spinxform.pdf
They aren't quite directly fractals - they mostly look like spherical harmonics of sorts, but there is some kind of self-similarity going on there.

[LhoghoNurbs]

Yes, thanks. I had a look at this paper earlier today. And the image at page 5 was the one that provoked my question.

My line of thought is the following. Clouds and mountains are complex structures. We can investigate their substructure and the substructure of that substructure ... and so on at least a few generations. And from the similarities of these generation we can assume some fractal behaviour.

The elementary particles are at the current bottom of the Nature. We cannot go deeper even one generation. How do we find any fractality in them or in their properties (assuming their properties are very very discrete)?

My best shot so far is the diagrams (photos) of spiral traces of particles (something like this: http://theputnamprogram.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/bubble-chamber-bwt1-s2.png). They are nice and fractalish, but maybe they are not fractals. Or maybe if we overlap the traces of thousands of particles we will finally get something fractal-like? This is like this: a single pixel is not a fractal image, but a collection of pixels picturing the Mandelbrot set is a fractal image. In this respect, individual particles might be the pixels, but in what is the picture?

[kram1032]

Hmm... I see your trani of thought but I'd think differently about it.

For instance, look at a planetary system.
If you take two planets, their traces are easily predictable. But go up to three and almost any configuration will lead to deeply chaotic behavior.

Apply the same thing to particles. Any two particles that are able to interact with each other, probably lead to quite predictable paths. But take three or four and it'll soon become a huge, complicated mess.
However, because many such particle configurations decay quickly, in the end only the stable configurations stay for an extended amout of time.
Although the instable versions often give you transitional states. Like the Strong and Weak forces which have Protons and Neutrons not burst appart (despite their sub-elements that would strongly repell each other), Protons both repell each other AND keeping them together (Which ultimately gives a Nucleus its volume AND stability) and protons and neutrons change into each other (which happens once a neutrino flys through the nucleus, interacts with a neutron, becomes itself an Electron and turns the neutron into a proton, etc.)

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Yv3EMq2Dgq8&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/Yv3EMq2Dgq8&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1</a>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/BNDOSMqGLlg&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/BNDOSMqGLlg&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1</a>
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/cnL_nwmCLpY&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/cnL_nwmCLpY&rel=1&fs=1&hd=1</a>

[Sockratease]

Here's my contribution to this discussion :



I actually have a lot to say on this and many other current discussions - but am still typing without a keyboard!  (on-screen thing sucks!)  (typing with a mouse is tedious).

So LOL-Cats is it for now...

[kram1032]

Is there supposed to be a video in there or something? Because I see nothing...

[Sockratease]

Is there supposed to be a video in there or something? Because I see nothing...

Yeah, just a joke picture found here:  http://chzlolcats.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/funny-cat-pictures-well-those-physics-lessons-were-a-waste-of-time-then.jpg

It shows from my place, and the site does allow hotlinking, so not sure why you wouldn't see it  (unless you're addressing a different post?)

[taurus]

must have been schrödinger's cat, before vanishing in the box, beeing half dead / half alive 

[Alef]

There it reads:

- This is higgs boson!
- We found it!

[kram1032]

Oh I see the image now. I wonder what went wrong yesterday^^