Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Now THAT Is Small
I don't blog specifically about science much because, frankly, I think most people are bored with it, but the NYTimes story is just too cool to let pass. Some IBM guys, masters of the miniature those IBM researchers, have measured the force it takes to move one single solitary cobalt atom across the surface of platinum and copper.
But here is the real thing - most people think science is dislocating, replacing, or competing with knowledge of the Almighty. I have precisely the opposite reaction. Most real cutting edge science now happens in the extremes of size. Either the incredibly small like this, or the incredibly large in cosmology. The more zeros go into the numbers, on either side of the decimal point, the more incredibly inconceivable God becomes to me.
Consider this now aging bit of video which takes us from a universal viewpoint to a nuclear one.
Not only do we worship a God that created all that incredible complexity, and order, on all those scales, but He crowned that creation with a being capable of glimpsing and understanding His handiwork. God, I believe, wants us to have at least some understanding of His creations for it creates in us both admiration and it should generate worship.
How dare we confuse the roles of understanding complexity and creating it. Think about this - almost anyone can operate a motor vehicle. Many people have a rudimentary understanding of how it works. Less people still are capable of repairing or improving its function. Fewer people still are capable of building a car from scratch, and no one, I repeat no one, can take the construction process from mining metal and pumping oil through refinement into raw materials which are then transformed into parts which are then assembled into the vehicle - NO ONE!
And yet, a motor vehicle is, compared to the universe a child's push toy carved from wood with simple turning wheels.
The most mind boggling thing in all this is our arrogance.
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About one-130-millionth of an ounce of force pushes a cobalt atom across a smooth, flat piece of platinum.For the uninitiated, reactions to that probably range from "Huh?" to "cool..." to "Fascinating, Captain" - but I find it down right exciting. The reasons for my excitement range from awe to admiration. To treat a single atom in such a purely corpuscular manner, when it is really something between matter and energy is freaky, but despite the reference to everyday watch tuning forks, this is an extraordinary technological achievement.
Pushing the same atom along a copper surface is easier, just one-1,600-millionth of an ounce of force.
[...]
In the experiment, Dr. Heinrich and his collaborators at Almaden and the University of Regensburg in Germany used the sharp tip of an atomic force microscope to push a single atom. To measure the force, the tip was attached to a small tuning fork, the same kind that is found in a quartz wristwatch. In fact, in the first prototype, Franz J. Giessibl, a scientist at Regensburg who was a pioneer in the use of atomic force microscopes, bought an inexpensive watch and pulled out the quartz tuning fork for use in the experiment.
The tip vibrates 20,000 times a second until it comes into contact with an atom. As the tip pushes, the tuning fork bends, like a diving board, and the vibration frequency dips.
But here is the real thing - most people think science is dislocating, replacing, or competing with knowledge of the Almighty. I have precisely the opposite reaction. Most real cutting edge science now happens in the extremes of size. Either the incredibly small like this, or the incredibly large in cosmology. The more zeros go into the numbers, on either side of the decimal point, the more incredibly inconceivable God becomes to me.
Consider this now aging bit of video which takes us from a universal viewpoint to a nuclear one.
Not only do we worship a God that created all that incredible complexity, and order, on all those scales, but He crowned that creation with a being capable of glimpsing and understanding His handiwork. God, I believe, wants us to have at least some understanding of His creations for it creates in us both admiration and it should generate worship.
How dare we confuse the roles of understanding complexity and creating it. Think about this - almost anyone can operate a motor vehicle. Many people have a rudimentary understanding of how it works. Less people still are capable of repairing or improving its function. Fewer people still are capable of building a car from scratch, and no one, I repeat no one, can take the construction process from mining metal and pumping oil through refinement into raw materials which are then transformed into parts which are then assembled into the vehicle - NO ONE!
And yet, a motor vehicle is, compared to the universe a child's push toy carved from wood with simple turning wheels.
The most mind boggling thing in all this is our arrogance.
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