Three 'lil questions

[Drosera]

Hi.

 

I know these questions are simplistic, but I *ain't* as smart as the rest of you. :evil:

 

1: I have a laymen's understanding of what particles and waves are. I'm even comfortable with the idea that space is a measurable nothingness. (Though I see from the thread "What Is Space?", that some people believe otherwise)

 

But I do have a problem conceptualizing fields. Are they really just warps in the fabrics of spacetime? Or is there more to them, in simple words, than that? If they are warps, they are created be 'exchange' particles, correct? Except EM radiation, which is the warp/field?

 

2: I have virtually no understanding of sub-atomic particles, or sub-sub-atomic ones, beyond the obvious ones like protons, electons, neutrinos, etc. Does anyone know of a nice website that lists them, in short, more encyclopedic format, along with such information as their values, decay products, etc?

 

3: Does anyone have a link to a site that has Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity equations? No, I don't pretend I'll understand it, but I'd like to see it. Perhaps in time, I'll develop some kind understading on it, with the help of folks here of course. :eek:

 

Take care!

[sergey500]

Well i am sorry that i won't answer your questions, i just felt like I wanted to say a few things. Yay, i am happy my post was mentioned "What IS space?", i believe space can not be nothing, as for your question...i kinda forgot (too lazy to research, sorry) . Hm, my post i just mentioned named quite few basic ones you did not mention, google will help you otherwise (that was stupid of me to say, everyone would think of google). Final question is something i would want to see too. I always wanted to know, how can you arrive at answered like einstein did through so many equetions, i want to see them too.

[Bo]

1) A field is not a perturbation of space time (however, if concerning gravity, you could consider s-t to be a field). The field is the medium carying the information. So for gravity it is space-time, for electromagnetism it is radiation, etc.

 

2) http://particleadventure.org/ is very nice and pedagogical, http://pdg.lbl.gov/pdg.html is the homepage of the particle data group, giving state of the art tables etc.

3) http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/hframe.html is nice for elementary physics. (proably does not cover general relativity)

http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/9712019 are in my opinion the best notes available on general relatity.

 

Bo

[C1ay]

Does anyone have a link to a site that has Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity equations?

Have you read his book, "Relativity, The Special and General Theory" by Albert Einstein? It should provide a good start.

[Drosera]

Thanks for your answers, though Bo, unfortunately your answer game me more questions. B)

 

Thanks for the links too. I had always wanted to avoid reading Einsteins whole book, but maybe this was wrong thinking of me. I'll try to give it a looksee.

 

Take care!