Sometimes, asking a question opens a can of worms as empty as true. If everything is made up of atoms, and atoms are 99.9999999999996% empty space, aren’t we and everything around us just as vacant? So, why does reality look like it does?
Edited by David Stone
Atoms: Empty Spaces Full of Potential.
Atoms, the building blocks of matter – of you, me, rocks, trees and George Santos – are mostly empty space. An atom is a tiny, dense nucleus surrounded by a cloud of electrons whizzing around it. The thing is, by cloud, scientists really mean potential, that is, vacancies waiting to perk up into a universe.
The traditional model of the atom is often compared to a mini solar system, with the nucleus as the sun and the electrons as planets. But that’s where things get mind-boggling. If the nucleus were the size of a peanut, the electron would be about as far away as the nearest star, and all the space in between would be a blank.
Bring in Quantum Physics
Hold onto your hats because things get even weirder. Quantum mechanics, the theory that describes the behavior of particles on the smallest scales, tells us that these electrons aren’t just whizzing around in empty space. Instead, they exist in a kind of fuzzy, uncertain “cloud.” Only the probability of finding an electron resides in any given place.
It’s not even a glass half-empty or half-full dilemma. It ain’t either, but it could be both.
This quantum cloud fills up the empty space inside any atom. Even though the electron might not be in any one place at any one time, the places where it could be add up to fill the atom.
Now, that’s clear as a bell, isn’t it? No, of course, it isn’t. That’s why it’s a theory, one that best explains the unexplainable, but not a fact.
And, so…
This theory tells us we can’t just pass through walls even though they’re 99.99% empty space. The electron clouds inside the atoms in our bodies repel the electron clouds of the atoms in the wall.
In other words, what seems like emptiness is actually filled with the potential presence of electrons. So, while it’s true that atoms are mostly empty space, that space isn’t truly empty – it’s filled with a whole lot of quantum weirdness.
PS: No one really understands this, but it pans out as true in practice. If you want to give it a go with the nearest wall, please do it at low speed.
You Can FOIL* It
On April 15, at the Steam Plant Demolition Town Hall, a simple exchange revealed something far more consequential than anything formally presented that evening.
