A Revolution in Physics Education

In a recent article in American Journal of Physics, William Flannery asks 

• A revolution in physics education was forecast in 1989, why hasn't it happened? What will it take?

The article directly connects to the reform program for math/science education I have been working on since the 1980s as a synthesis of mathematical analysis, computation and application, with the following main insights:

• The computer revolution in physics education will have two striking effects, both of which will happen overnight: differential equations will be taught in introductory physics, and the number and types of physical systems that can be analyzed will explode.
• This will require rewriting the courses in classical physics, introductory to advanced.

I am happy to announce that such new course material is already available in the form of 

• Body and Soul Program 
• Leibniz World of Mathematics
• World of Computation
• + more on the blog side bar.

Read the article and compare with my reform program.

From End of Physics to New Beginning

Quanta has a long article on Contemplating the End of Physics addressing the following key questions: 

1. Has physics reached the limits of what we can discover? 
2. Or are the possibilities only just beginning? 

It seems that the answer to 1. can be yes in the sense that the small Planck scales of string theory can only be reached with a particle collider of the size of the Universe, thus beyond any comprehension or rationality.

The answer to 2. is also yes, in the sense that digital simulation of physics is just beginning and there the possibilities seem endless. It connects to this idea expressed in the article:

• The truth is, the realm of the smallest particles is not the only place you can find the fundamental laws of physics. They can also “emerge” out of the collective behavior of many constituents.

What digital simulation can do is exactly this: From simple laws by computation exhibit complex behaviour as emergence of complexity from simplicity. This is The World as Computation. 

The aspect of simplicity of basic laws and richness of phenomena connects to short computer codes with rich (long) output as a key element algorithmic complexity theory. 

What is the Difference between Macroscopic and Microscopic Physics?

Multiscale modeling with simple ordered microscale (atom) and ordered macroscale (car) connected by complex intermediate scales.

The standard view is that classical physics is useful to describe the macroscopic world, like the flow of air around an airplane or the formation of a galaxy,  while the microscopic world of atoms and molecules requires a fundamentally different form of physics named quantum mechanics.

The standard view is thus that the world is divided into a macroscopic world and a microscopic world supposedly governed by different physics. The standard view is that we as human beings with experience from the macroscopic world cannot fathom the microscopic world because it is so fundamentally different from the macroscopic world.

But is it really reasonable from a scientific point of view to divide the world this way? What is the dividing line? How does the microscopic world interact with the macroscopic world?
Is it possible to tell if a mathematical model in its typical form of a differential equation describes microscopic or macroscopic physics?

None of these questions has a good answer and it is then natural to seek the origin of the idea that microscopics is so different from macroscopics. The standard wisdom says that microscopics is described by quantum mechanics and macroscopics by classical mechanics and quantum mechanics is fundamentally different from classical mechanics and therefore macroscopics is fundamentally different from microscopics.

The standard wisdom according to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics is that the microscopic world is a strange world without causality and predictability functioning like a microscopic game of roulette. This strange idea comes from the insistence to describe microscopics by a multi-dimensional linear Schrödinger equation, which because of its many dimensions can only be given a probabilistic interpretation and not a physical realistic interpretation.

The multi-d linear Schrödinger equation is an ad hoc model which is not derived from basic principles and thus is accepted as a true mystery beyond comprehension of human minds and as such necessarily a correct description of microscopics.

But suppose, we do not take the incomprehensible (and uncomputable) linear multi-d Schrödinger equation as description of microscopics, because this lacks rationale. Suppose we seek instead a description in the form of field equations in three space dimensions plus time, in the form of Hartree models as non-linear coupled systems of one-particle Schrödinger equations, which have the same principal form as macroscopic continuum models.

Then there will be no fundamental difference between microscopics and macroscopics and all the problems arising from postulating such a difference will disappear. This must be a good case for Ockham's razor.

Note that claiming that microscopics functions like a game of roulette is contradictory, because a game of roulette requires microscopics, which leads to an infinite regression of microscopics upon microscopics. When I present this argument, which makes perfect sense to a classical physicist, in a discussion with a modern physicist, I get no response as if this argument is beyond what is allowed in modern physics. Is this reasonable?    

Crisis in Physics vs Computational Physics

The May14 issue of Scientific American asks the following questions:

• Does Physics Have a Problem?
• Crisis in Physics?

These questions naturally present themselves because modern theoretical physicists have driven themselves to search for the truth on scales which are either too small (string theory) or too big (cosmology) to be assessed experimentally. But theory without experiment may well be empty theory and that may be the meaning of the crisis. Of course, advocates of string theory like Lubos, forcefully denies that there is a crisis in physics. But there are other blog voices…and leading physicists show little hope..

But modern physicists have a new tool to use and that is computational physics, which offers an experimental laboratory without the scale limits of a physical laboratory. 

Computational physics needs computable models, but both quantum mechanics and general relativity are based on models which are not computable, and so there is a lot of work to be done. The question is if modern theoretical physicists have the right training to do this work.     

Wanted: Constructive Physics

                                     Wanted: Constructive version of Schrödinger's equation!

The book Constructive Physics by Y.I. Oshigov has an important message:

• Only in the rebuilding of the gigantic construction of the modern physics in the constructive manner can open doors to the understanding of the complex processes in the sense of exact sciences.
• The modern situation in physics looks like a crisis, and the genealogy of this crisis is the same as for the crisis in mathematics in the first third of the 20th century: this is the crisis in the axiomatic method.
• Today we possess the more exact kit of instruments of the constructive mathematics: algorithms must replace formulas.
• (The multidimensional wave function) harbors serious defects….it does not allow the computation of such functions already for a small number of particles, for example 10, let alone for the more complex systems.
• This complexity barrier is principal. We should not think then that the quantum theory for many bodies gives such reliable answers to questions as it was the case in one particle case.

In short, quantum mechanics based on Schrödinger's equation for a wave function in $3N$ space dimensions for $N$ particles (electrons or kernels) must be given a new constructive form. A real challenge! My answer is given as Many-Minds Quantum Mechanics.