The Mind of a Physicist

Most people who genuinely like studying physics and getting into the deep dark questions about the universe, myself included, can be a little quirky. Again, myself included. This isn't meant as an insult in the slightest, its truly a huge compliment. Being quirky is what makes people themselves and what makes them interesting. This being said, physicists are some of the quirkiest, most interesting people you will ever meet. 

Being an aspiring physicist, this makes me think about what I must be like... and I definitely fit in the overly quirky category. I must be honest though it makes life more interesting, at least in my own head. But physics isn't a subject for the faint of heart, and thats where these quirks come in handy, and in my case I think I'll be able to survive undergraduate physics. I hope may be a better phrase...

In the first Physics Club meeting at uWaterloo today, filled with primarily first year students such as myself, many upper year students were less than optimistic with their predictions for how us Frosh will do in our upcoming studies. They said at least 70% of the students in the Physics Department will drop out of the program by the end of first year. Thats more than 2 of every 3 kids. So sitting in a lecture hall in between 2 people, both of them won't be here in a years time. A little depressing for an enthusiastic 17 like me.

But then I looked around the room at the upper year students who were still fighting for their undergrad, seeing how they acted and taking in some of their tendencies. Then I listened to them for a while, for how they spoke in general and to each other. And while doing these observations I noticed something: these people who are actually making it through physics, in the lucky 30%, have just as many quirks as I do. They have similar interests, similar dialects and even similar idiosyncrasies. Based on this I told myself, hey maybe I'm one of the lucky 30% too. I fit the image, I have the drive, and I want to be where they are in a few years so why not.

So, by being a good scientist and observing my surroundings, making connections, and drawing conclusions I figured out that I'm exactly where I should be. Thats a very good feeling to have at such a young age, and I know I'm lucky for that, even if I'm not in that elusive 30%. I know there are people that go their whole life and don't have this feeling of total content, knowing you are exactly where you should be and you're doing exactly what you should be. And even though it will be a lot of extremely hard work I'm extremely grateful to have the opportunity that I do to explore the universe and do exactly what I want to.

There are a lot of people, at any age, but especially at mine who don't have this feeling, who are just uncomfortable doing what they're doing. And I encourage these people to never give up when it comes to finding your niche, to always be open minded and to not be scared of change. Because sometimes you never know when you're going to find the thing thats perfect for you, so take a chance and go find it. Take it from someone with more than their fair share of quirks, finding something that fits you is the most worth it and fulfilling thing you can do and the more work you put into the pursuit the more rewarding your happiness will be.

An Infinite Number of Yous

This week for many people my age marks the first week of freedom in their young lives, their first university classes, and the first time meeting friends they'll keep for the rest of their lives. Its a very exciting time for us youngsters. But it also gives us the opportunity to think about if things were different. Theres an endless number of things that could be different for us right now, and really for anyone at any point in their life. But your life is the way it is for a reason... or so we think.

In quantum mechanics, everything is based off probabilities of certain situations happening, or not happening. A simple example of this is concept is flipping a coin. When you are about to flip a coin there are two possible outcomes, before you even start. They are heads or tails. Once you flip the coin, you observe one or the other probability occurring, either heads or tails. But what happens to the other probability?  Does it not occur, does it go somewhere else? What exactly happens? 

According to the Many Worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, if our universe is infinite, every probability that could occur, DOES occur somewhere in the universe. This can be a difficult concept to wrap your head around. In our coin example this would mean that even though you may have seen your coin land on heads, somewhere in the universe the same exact situation played out and it landed on tails. I know its not that easy to visualize.

Think about the word infinity. This basically means there is no end, whatever it is being referenced to goes on forever. So in the case of the universe, this means its spatial and time expanses never end, they goes on forever. If you could see infinitely in every direction it would never stop. In most occurrences in life, which take place within our "infinite universe", there are only a finite number of possible outcomes. Finite would mean there are only a certain number of things, whereas infinite means the list of things that could happen never end. So, in our infinite universe, when there are only a finite number of things that could happen, the finite list will run out before the infinite. Since something has to be filling this space, this means the list of finite things will repeat eventually, but only after every possible outcome has occurred. For our coin example, after you flip heads, somewhere in the infinite universe you flipped tails. 

While trying to explain this concept, which you may still not be getting which is completely understandable (were talking about infinity which is never easy), I have only eluded to our universe being infinite. The other side of the many worlds theory is that there are and infinite number of universes where in each one a different outcome occurs. This is intriguing because in every universe everything could be exactly same except for one small difference. For example in one universe you are a dog and that is the only difference. Or in one universe every person has 5 eyes but everything else is exactly the same. If the many worlds theory is correct, this would mean every one of these possibilities does happen. Every movie you've ever watched, book you've ever read, or even dream you've ever experienced does happen. So Star Wars actually happened, Star Trek will happen, and the Leafs are the defending Stanley Cup Champions. Yes some of these are far fetched but if quantum mechanics is right this is a reality.


This idea can make you feel really small. It essentially says that every good thing you want to happen does happen somewhere, just maybe not to you. To me its humbling. It shows me that nothing in this life is that important, nothing matters at all in the grand scheme of things, unless you make it matter. Everything we do as individuals has no real meaning at all, even as a society. The universe will keep expanding, time will continue on. I don't mean to sound like a defeatist, but my message is this: make sure that whatever you do in life matters to you and you're doing what you enjoy, because when it all comes down to it you're only one of an infinite you's and whatever you do is only important for you. Live life for you and do what makes you happy.

Living the life of Star Wars may be closer than you think

Since moving in on Sunday morning, I have now been a resident of Waterloo for a full 3 days. 3 days of finding my classes, meeting new students, and all around getting orientated with my new home. I guess thats why they call it orientation week. What these three days has done most however, is get me more excited for what the rest of university will be like. After all the meeting and greeting is over this coming saturday, I can't wait to see what its like being in a lecture hall and actually learning what I'm here to learn. Wandering through the library earlier this morning I saw more books than I could imagine all about science and math. Things like this are bringing out the real school nerd in me and I could not be more happy.

I apologize for the life anecdotes of late, but this is WATERLOO Physics so things about the University will come up from time to time. I will be getting back to more physicsy posts in the coming days because I know you all miss them. For a little bit of physics to brighten your day for now, I have this for you.

Researchers at MIT have found a state of energy, or light, that when manipulated in a certain way behaves like matter. In normal terms this basically means lightsabers, which I think will make every part of life better because whats not better with a lightsaber. I'll go more in depth with this topic in the future but I thought you might all like to know that the greatest movies of all time, Star Wars, may soon become a reality.