Fun Science FRIEDay – The Universe Sings a Song, and Humans Can Finally Listen

(Photo Credit: Underwood & Underwood / Corbis / Kara Gordon / The Atlantic)

The  interwebs have been going crazy the past few days with the recent announcement that scientists have for the first time detected gravitational waves, the ripples in the fabric of space-time that Einstein predicted a century ago. In terms of scientific advancement, to quote Joe Biden, “This is a big fucking deal!” Bigger than the discovery of the subatomic Higgs boson particle (i.e., the god particle), and it has been suggested this discovery is comparable only to “Galileo taking up the telescope and looking at the planets.” – Penn State physics theorist Abhay Ashtekar

Photo credit: The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory

Photo credit: The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory

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Fun Science FRIEDay – Theory of Relative… easiness??

This week’s FSF is a bit different. Instead of talking about some relatively new discovery or research endeavor, we are going to focus on an old adage, the Theory of Relativity.  The Theory of Relativity is one of those concepts that is hugely important but very poorly understood outside of the physics community. Instead of me befuddling this really important concept, I am going to share one of the more concise and readily understandable explanations to Einsteins hugely important Theory.

This kid and his explanation is already blowing up the inter-webs, and he does an amazing job of taking a really complicated concept and making it easily digestible, so I needn’t say anymore. Enjoy!

 

HAPPY FSF!!!