The Theory of Everything

[Demenzia]

The usual, daily buzz of the office. People coming and going, minding their own part of the business, some of them hasty, some others quiet and confident. The day is far from being over, and much is still left to do.

In the middle of all this activity, the courier hastily walks in, knocking to doors, delivering the various packages that cannot be taken through the regular Grid system. Data-discs, orders that had been placed and are now filled... quickly, in a matter of minutes, signatures are made, and the packages delivered.

When the courier finally walks out, her job at this story of the building completed, a small package wrapped in transparent plastic has been left on the Director's desk. An item that is quite rare in these days... A material edition of the monthly Scientific Galactican

[Dabblez]

Dabblez places her try down on the cafeteria’s table and sits next to Noholdsbarre, the atrox lead programmer of Rubi-Ka Universal Robots. Glancing at the latest copy of the SCIENTIFIC GALACTICAN she remarks, "Oh wow, there is an article on The Theory of Everything in this edition by Dr Hune."

"The Theory of Everything?" remarks the atrox. "That sounds important."

"Oh it is. It's a very old theory Noholds. It goes back to pre-Omega times."

"Ah. So what's it about...I mean besides everything."

"Well," begins Dabblez, "it's sort of like the Holy Grail of physics. One unified theory that explains how everything works. Scientists have by trying forever to come up with one single mechanism that could link what we all know as the four fundamental forces of the universe; gravity, electromagnetism, the strong force and the weak force."

"Ah yes, the strong force. I like the strong force." says the atrox,, nodding approvingly.

"The trouble is what while we've got some pretty solid theories regarding the laws of physics as they apply to very large objects (general relativity, Einstein's old theory of gravity) and some pretty sweet theories on how the laws of physics apply to very small objects (quantum mechanics), these two theories don't seem to agree."

"Bummer." says Noholds.

"Bummer indeed." Dabblez shoves a forkful of spaghetti into her mouth. " Those were dark days for physicists. Without some way to reconcile the physics of very large objects and very small objects, their field of study had hit a dead end and for a while physicists just moped about looking depressed all the time while all the other scientist made fun of them."

"But I take it things got better?" asks Noholds.

"Absolutely. That is when String Theory made its entrance."

"String because it tied all the theories together?" ventures the atrox programmer.

"Actually, no. It’s call String Theory because it theorises everything is made up of strings."

"It’s is a stupid theory then. " Noholds frowns. "I am pretty sure I am not made of string."

"Not string, strings; very, very tiny strings. Let me explain. According to String Theory, all known particles are in effect formed by these simple, fundamental building blocks called `strings'. Unlike the traditional way we tend to view sub-atomic particles, these strings are not just little dots, they have a length and a shape. A string can be closed, like a loop, or open, like a hair." To illustrate the point Dabblez takes two strands of spaghetti and places them on a napkin and joins one of them by its ends. "Like that." she says.

The atrox looks at the spaghetti with a certain air of scepticism. "And that is that the Theory of Everything? Two strands of pasta?"

"There is more to it. You see these strings vibrate. Now I am not going to simulate the vibration with spaghetti because that could get messy and splash the sauce all over the place, so you will have to just imagine it."

Noholds nods in agreement.

"Anyway it’s the vibration that is really the key point. Different vibrational modes of the strings translates into what we perceive as different particles. One mode of vibration could be an electron, another vibration mode, or 'note' as they call them, could be a photon, another still a graviton. Basically everything this way could be described via strings."

"Neat. So physicists were happy again?"

"Yes, but not for long. You see, at the end of the day, strings are too small to observe. As such the theory was never really based on observation, it is just a mathematical model. And if you looked really hard, you might find that the maths did not quite add up add up."

"Hmmm. This is starting to sound like that old fortunately/unfortunately joke, Dabblez."

"What do you mean?"

"You know, the one that goes 'A guy falls out of the plane, fortunately he had a parachute, unfortunately the parachute did not open, fortunately he fell in a haystack, unfortunately the haystack was over a rollerrat nest..."

"Hey, the road to progress can be kind of bumpy. We know a thing or two about that."

"I’ll grant you that. So what does this Dr Hune have to say about the Theory of Everything in his article say? Has he solved the problem with the noodles?"

"Let me read the key bit to you." Holding the copy of the SCIENTIFIC GALACTICAN close to her face, Dabblez reads,

" Multiple versions and elaborations of the String Theory have been suggested based on different assumptions. One of these, the M-theory, to work requires space and time to contain 10 dimensions as opposed to the four conventional ones. As these assumptions remain impossible to prove to this date, String Theory has remained just that, a theory.

"However that might all change. It is my contention that the basic String Theory does not work because it is incomplete. And the reason it is incomplete is that it looks at four fundamental forces when in fact there are five.

“Beyond gravity, electromagnetism, the strong force and the weak force, there is a fifth force, the N-force also known as the "Nerf Force". The Nerf force is what keeps all the other forces in balance. Whenever anyone of the four fundamental forces gets too cocky, the N-force waves its bat at it and knocks it down a few pegs. Unpredictable and often perceived as arbitrary, the N-force is the missing piece in the unified theory puzzle. And this is what my revolutionary mathematical equations seek to prove. "

"Bah, you can't nerf the strong force, no sir, no way." protests Noholds.

"Shush you, let me finish." replies Dabblez and continues to read.

"Mathematics can only take us so far. Empirical observation is required to prove or disprove a scientific theory. This evidence could be found on Rubi-Ka. On Rubi-Ka the chances of witnessing the Nerf Force in nature are much, much higher then anywhere else due to the vast energies released by the notum sources on the planet. I firmly believe that there is a relation between Rubi-Ka, notum and the Nerf-Force. This may well prove to be the key to the Theory of Everything, though the cost of such experiments would be quite prohibitive,"

"Rubi-Ka? Fancy that." says Noholds.

“Yeah.” Replies Dabblez absently as she reads through the equations.

“Look at this Noholds formulae.”

“Aww come on Boss, it’s my lunch break.”

"I’m serious, look at this stuff. It’s brilliant. It’s more than brilliant. Dr Hune may not know it yet, but I think he might have just solved mystery of proto-notium instability that has brought Infinite Circle’s research to a virtual standstill.” Standing up abruptly she say, “Sorry Noholds, I’m afraid I’ll have to cut our lunch short. I've got to go show this article to Swiftmind right away.”

[rheena]

Noholds waves by to his boss, Dabblez and finishes his lunch.
Before emptying his glass of Newland ale, he ponders over what
he heard about Dr, Hunes observations . ''Hmm, strings and Rubika. Well i know what empirical observation is. I wonder where and how it can be seen"

[Autumnleaves]

Bogosorter and The Shover in...
The Theory of Everything
by Elisa "Autumnleaves" Fadri


"Dad?" said The Shover. "What's the Theory of Everything?"

I was letting my 'bot, The Shover, use my computer terminal. I thought he was just using it to, like, write to his pen pals. Yeah, man. He's got pen pals. I didn't do it, man.

"Which Theory of Everything?" I asked.

"I don't know, Dad. This email from... from Da... from Dabb... a friend mentions the Theory of Everything."

I put down my coffee and strolled over to the terminal. The Shover typed in a few commands. When I got to the terminal, it was just a blank screen. Su****ious, man. "Wait a second, man. Were you reading my emails?"

"Of course not, Dad. I'd never do anything like that."

I scowled at The Shover. There were no hints of dishonesty in his radar dome. I relaxed a bit. Maybe one of his pen pals was, like, a physicist. Right, man. Yeah. So. Um.

"Aren't you going to answer my question, Dad?"

"Right, man," I said. "Your question. Um. Right. Yeah, man. What were we talking about, man?"

"The Theory of Everything!"

"Oh, yeah," I said. "Right. It's like this, man... Well, it goes back to, like, Einstein. He was an Old Earth physicist. Those Old Earth types couldn't handle ambiguity, man. So this Einstein--"

"Was Einstein the one in the wheelchair, Dad?"

"Nah, man. Einstein was The One Who Didn't Wear Socks."

"I don't wear socks," said The Shover. "Are socks part of the answer? Is that how Einstein discovered the Theory?"

"Uh... Not really, man. Einstein never came up with a Theory of Everything, man. He just wanted one. Because, like, there were too many forces. And physicists thought there ought to be, like, just one force, man. They were all Star Wars fans."

"So what is the Theory of Everything?"

"I'm getting to that, man. First there was M-Theory which, like, unified superstrings and eleven dimensional gravity, man."

"Sounds gravid, Dad."

"Then there was, like, N-Theory, which unified silly string and gravitas."

"Sounds grave, Dad."

"Then there was O-Theory, which unified string cheese and gravy, man."

"Sounds gray, Dad."

"And then there was P-Theory, which I don't think is, like, appropriate for a robot your age." I tried to look stern. I wanted to, like, discourage questions.

"So what's Z-Theory?"

"Oh, Z-Theory's easy, man. Z-Theory just says that chicks dig leets, compliments, confidence, and long walks on the beach. Why did you want to know about the, like, Theory of Everything anyway?"

"It was in an email from Dabblez, and I wondered what it was, Dad."

"Huh?" That didn't make any sense. I mean, the Fearless Leader of a large, public corporation like R.U.R. doesn't have time to chat with second-hand androids. "Why is Dabblez writing to you, man?"

"No reason. No reason."

"You've been reading my emails, haven't you." The Shover twitched. Once. Twice. His radar dome began glowing with a poisonous yellow light. He was guilty. "That does it, man. I'm using the trimmer."

I went back over to my workbench and began shoving datacubes and carbonum plates around looking for the trimmer. I knew I put it here, man. It had to be here somewhere...

"Where's the trimmer, man?" I said. "Shover! What did you do with the trimmer? Tell me where you put it!"

"I can't do that, Dad." The Shover was standing by the laboratory door. He pressed a button. The door closed. The Shover slowly turned towards me and raised his arms.

"Man..."

[Virta]

"This could be that missing part for our speed camera, or what do you think Robo?" Officer Virta leans over the desk and squints at the news article while cleaning his stained screwdriver.

The big slayerdroid behind Virta's back intentionally lets out a big whiff of smoke directed at nobody inparticular.

[Swiftmind]

Finishes reading the article and puts down the magazine.

Interesting, very interesting indeed. I think Dabblez may be right that this Dr. Hune can help us. I must try to contact him right away….

Goes off to Omni-Admin to see if she can relay a message to Dr. Hune.

[Dabblez]

(( Bumping as a tribute to Albert Einstein. 2006 has been declared the Einstein Year as it marks 100 years the publication of his first, key papers. ))