SecondKindOfImpossible

The Second Kine of Impossible (Paul Steinhardt)

  • Very entertaining. Fast read. Will gift to Reinhard.
  • Two kinds of impossible:
    • Something out of the question 1+1=3 IT never makes sense to pursue those ideas
    • Judged impossible based on assumptions that could be violated under certain circumstances that have never be considered before.
  • If one can expose the underlying assumptions and find a long-overlooked loophole, the 2nd kind of impossible is a potential gold mine that can offer scientists a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
  • Three simple principles are the foundation of modern crystallography
    1. all pure substances form crystals
    2. All crystals are periodic arrangements of atoms
    3. Every periodic arrangement of atoms can be categorized according to its symmetries, and there is a finite number of possible symmetries.
  • The remarkable correspondence between the abstract mathematical crystal patterns and the real crystals found in nature was indirect but compelling evidence that matter is composed of atoms.
  • A sequence copmosed of two elements that repeat at different frequencies, the ratio of which is an irrational number, is called quasiperiodical.
  • The second kind of impossible: Physicists were assuming without proof that all orderly arrangement of atoms are periodic.
  • The crystal Khatyrkite both include metallic aluminum. Aluminum has a very strong affinity for oxygen. There is plenty of aluminum on the Earth, but it is not metallic. Its all bonded to oxygen. No sample of metallic aluminum or any alloy containing aluminum metal has ever been seen in nature.

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