Quantum mechanics

Quantum mechanics (QM; also known as quantum physics or quantum theory) including quantum field theory, is a fundamental branch of physics concerned with processes involving, for example, atoms and photons. In such processes, said to be quantized, the action has been observed to be only in integer multiples of the Planck constant, a physical quantity that is exceedingly, indeed perhaps ultimately, small. This is utterly inexplicable in classical physics.

Quantum mechanics gradually arose from Max Planck's solution in 1900 to the black-body radiation problem (reported 1859) and Albert Einstein's 1905 paper which offered a quantum-based theory to explain the photoelectric effect (reported 1887). Early quantum theory was profoundly reconceived in the mid-1920s.

The reconceived theory is formulated in various specially developed mathematical formalisms. In one of them, a mathematical function, the wave function, provides information about the probability amplitude of position, momentum, and other physical properties of a particle.

Dig Out Your Soul

Dig Out Your Soul is the seventh and final studio album by the English rock band Oasis, released on 6 October 2008 by Big Brother Records. It was recorded between August and December 2007 at Abbey Road Studios, and January and March 2008 at The Village Recorder. The first single, "The Shock of the Lightning", was released shortly before the release of the album, on 29 September 2008. In promotion of the album, the band embarked on a world tour, debuting in Seattle, Washington at the WaMu Theater, and continuing for eighteen months. In 2009, the tour concluded (due to Noel Gallagher quitting the band) with major dates at some of the UK's biggest stadiums, notably the new Wembley Stadium, Sunderland's Stadium of Light and Edinburgh's Murrayfield as well as Ireland's Slane Castle. They also performed three hometown shows at Manchester's Heaton Park.

Concept and sound

A January 2007 interview for NME, Noel Gallagher gave new details on his vision for the album: "All the tunes I've written recently have been on the kind of acoustic side, you know? But for the next record I really fancy doing a record where we just completely throw the kitchen sink at it," he explained. "We haven't done that since Be Here Now. I'd like to get, like, a 100-piece orchestra and choirs and all that stuff. I think since Standing on the Shoulder of Giants we've been trying to prove a point of just bass, drums, guitar and vocals and nothing fancy. But I kind of like fancy! I'd like to make an absolutely fucking colossal album. You know? Like literally two orchestras, stuff like that."

Nature

Nature, in the broadest sense, is the natural, physical, or material world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large part of science. Although humans are part of nature, human activity is often understood as a separate category from other natural phenomena.

The word nature is derived from the Latin word natura, or "essential qualities, innate disposition", and in ancient times, literally meant "birth".Natura is a Latin translation of the Greek word physis (φύσις), which originally related to the intrinsic characteristics that plants, animals, and other features of the world develop of their own accord. The concept of nature as a whole, the physical universe, is one of several expansions of the original notion; it began with certain core applications of the word φύσις by pre-Socratic philosophers, and has steadily gained currency ever since. This usage continued during the advent of modern scientific method in the last several centuries.

Fundamental interaction

Fundamental interactions, also known as fundamental forces, are the interactions in physical systems that do not appear to be reducible to more basic interactions. There are four conventionally accepted fundamental interactions—gravitational, electromagnetic, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear. Each one is understood as the dynamics of a field. The gravitational force is modelled as a continuous classical field. The other three are each modelled as discrete quantum fields, and exhibit a measurable unit or elementary particle.

The two nuclear interactions produce strong forces at minuscule, subatomic distances. The strong nuclear interaction is responsible for the binding of atomic nuclei. The weak nuclear interaction also acts on the nucleus, mediating radioactive decay. Electromagnetism and gravity produce significant forces at macroscopic scales where the effects can be seen directly in every day life. Electrical and magnetic fields tend to cancel each other out when large collections of objects are considered, so over the largest distances (on the scale of planets and galaxies), gravity tends to be the dominant force.

Fifth force

Modern physics describes physical reality in terms of four known fundamental forces. However, since physics has no accepted universal framework, occasionally physicists have postulated the existence of an additional fundamental fifth force. Most postulate a force of roughly the strength of gravity (i.e. it is much weaker than electromagnetism or the nuclear forces) and to have a range of anywhere from less than a millimeter to cosmological scales.

Experimental approaches

The idea of an additional fundamental force is difficult to test, because gravity is such a weak force: the gravitational interaction between two objects is only significant when one has a great mass. Therefore, it takes very precise equipment to measure gravitational interactions between objects that are small compared to the Earth. Nonetheless, in the late 1980s a fifth force, operating on municipal scales (i.e. with a range of about 100 meters), was reported by researchers (Fischbach et al.) who were reanalyzing results of Loránd Eötvös from earlier in the century. The force was believed to be linked with hypercharge. Over a number of years, other experiments have failed to duplicate this result.