2

Considering the information found from the LIGO experiment. The gravitational wave causes a contraction(In horizontal direction) and expansion(In vertical direction). Can this be a source of energy. I am thinking in Planck Scale(tho there may be a smaller scale that may be a constant length), what happens to these constant units of length? Maybe everything is compressible?

To make an analogy to better explain my line of questioning, lets think of the smallest indivisible constituent of matter and relate that to the smallest discrete unit of length. I am presupposing the amount of energy to compress these either would be not feasible when it comes to scaling. So what happens to this unit of length, is it loss or is it truly compressible? What it suggest to me that gravity leans more to an Entropic principle.

Qmechanic
  • 201,751
Ed Yablecki
  • 561
  • 4
  • 13
  • You would spend far more energy detecting gravity , than you would expend by utilising it, unless you were near a very strong force. I don't know what you mean by maybe everything is compressible, what substance is not compressable, given sufficient pressure? Regards –  Oct 28 '16 at 00:34
  • I am theorizing here that there is a length that is the end length in shortness, kind of analogous if we come up with the end constituent of matter. I am thinking can these both be compressible. Thank you for the input CountTo10, it helps me clarify my thinking. – Ed Yablecki Oct 28 '16 at 00:46
  • Yes, I just though I had I had it wrong when your comment came in, I was thinking in material terms, so my apologies. What you seem to be saying is that space is discrete, which would cure a lot of headaches for cosmologists, but we have probed to pretty short distance lengths and it still looks frustratingly :) smooth. But space is expandable, I think we are pretty sure of that, and just after the big bang, it sure was compressed, so these are still open questions. Look around the site, there are a lot of related questions. All the best. –  Oct 28 '16 at 00:55
  • Would I be wrong to think space is expandable, not by change in the discrete units length but creating more units? Can we lose units and this is a source of energy or lead to an Entropic explanation of Gravity? – Ed Yablecki Oct 28 '16 at 01:12
  • 1
    Ed, I honestly don't have the background to answer you on that. On a positive note, I could say I think you are now more focused on what you want to ask and obviously it's your post, but I would refine it hopefully in the light of the above and try again. If I see it, I will up vote it. I usually have to resubmit the same question, with tweaks, at least 3 times..... –  Oct 28 '16 at 01:26

1 Answers1

1

Yes, they do! And this was actually one of the strongest arguments used to convince people that gravitational waves should actually exist, and should carry energy (called the 'sticky bead argument'). The total amount of energy in gravitational waves, permeating the universe, is quite small (compared to, e.g. the energy in the CMB, etc).

It's not clear how you're going from gravitational waves to small length scales... Because gravity is such a 'weak' force, the expansion/contraction has little effect on 'rigid' bodies (like atoms, molecules, solids) and more so on the spaces between them. Perhaps these cosmology questions on where expanding space comes from and what is it exactly that expands might be helpful.

Community
  • 1
DilithiumMatrix
  • 14,136