What does a proton look like? The simple answer: Don’t ask. As with other subatomic particles, a proton is thought to be a complex of quantum wave functions—one for each of its quarks—distributed probabilistically through space. There is no “physical thing,” understood in realistic, everyday terms to which one could point and say, “There’s a […]
The Substance of Spacetime, New book by Andrew M. Ryan
The Substance of Spacetime: Infinity, Nothingness, and the Nature of Matter by Andrew M. Ryan is the second edition of Ryan’s work of theoretical physics and is now available where books are sold. This iteration of the book has been fully revised with a completely new final chapter that considers several of the current puzzles […]
Why Nothing Matters
Reflections on A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather than Nothing by Lawrence Krauss In his new book, A Universe from Nothing, Lawrence Krauss explicitly acknowledges that, to fully understand the genesis of our cosmos, we have no choice but to face the nothingness that preceded it. But, in so doing, he inadvertently […]
Our Better Angels: Altruistic or Apathetic?
Reflections on The Better Angels of our Nature by Steven Pinker There can be little doubt that the increased use of reason has, throughout history and particularly over the past few centuries, dramatically decreased violence around the globe. Yet this decrease in violence has gone hand in glove with an equally precipitous drop in birth rates. […]
The Labbitt Halsey Protocol, a novel by Andrew M. Ryan
What choice did she really have? With the perfection of Labbitt Halsey Genomics’ groundbreaking XEN protocol, no conscientious parent could deny the tantalizing possibilities. At least that’s what Ann Franklin’s husband convinced her of at the time they chose to conceive. Her son was to be one of the children of the future, whose unprecedented […]