Really, Really, Really Confusing Stuff

[Ash]

Ever read about something that just doesn't make any sense?
No matter how much you read into it, understanding the basics of it seem extremely complicated.

Like String Theory.
I've tried to read about it and 99.999% of it just goes over my head.
Can someone explain it to me in layman's terms?

Got any other topics that are really, really, really confusing?

[zombie no.one]

Got any other topics that are really, really, really confusing?

cattle mutilation - done loads of research into this on the net, there's loads of info but none of it can possibly make sense. too long to go into here but seriously freaky.

crop circles is another one

I suppose they're both kind of confusing in a 'WTF?' type way, perhaps not really what you're talking about which I guess is understanding a scientific concept put forward by someone else. can't help you with string theory but I'll check the link when Ive got a minute, sounds interesting.

[AndyC]

Thanks Ash. That link kept me up reading a chain of related articles ending with the Standard Model of particle physics. Now I'm going to bed with a headache and feeling dumb as a stump. Hope you're happy.

[Kester Pelagius]

This is what I love about the Internet.  Just when you think the most recent rant you post somewhere seems so deep and/or relevent to whatever you wander into a thread in a forum that makes you realize just how insignificant and nonsensical the things that you post rants about really are.

String Theory & Cattle Mutilation.

I don't think either can be easily explained.  They're sort of like bad movies.  No one really gets them they just know they're bad and find, despite the near incoherence of them, that you just have to accept them for what they are even when they don't always make sense.  Or try to.   

[Eyesore]

Years ago, I read an article by Brian Greene in Popular Mechanics that dumbed it down to a level that I could somewhat understand. Basically, everything in the universe (particles and forces included) is made up of vibrating strings. The differences in matter, (a chunk of rock vs a beam of light) are according to the resonance of the strings, but at a sub atomic level. What string theory does is break down even the smallest of particles to ever smaller particles, and at the bottom of it all; Well it's all just a bunch of vibrating strings! For this theory to be cohesive though, it would mean that thre are 11 dimensions, which has been proven mathematically, and all of these dimensions are seperated by an extremely thin membrane. Another theory seeks to prove that this membrane exists by asserting that for some reason, gravitons travel freely between membranes, and that is why they are often missing in this dimension, when nothing else can disappear entirely.

I don't pretend to understand all this stuff, but this has stuck in my mind over the years.

[Jack]

I sort of get the impression that string theory is just a possible explanation that seems to work mathematically, but of course there are numerous possible explanations that seem to work mathematically.  As long as there's no way to actually prove or disprove it, and it offers no predictions about the outcome of experiments that might be performed, it's little more than a brain teaser.  Apparently they'll be able to somewhat test a certain aspect of the theory with the Large Hadron Collider, but seeing as string theory is actually a whole pile of theories, I imagine that no matter what the results, it won't really accomplish much.

[Eyesore]

  Apparently they'll be able to somewhat test a certain aspect of the theory with the Large Hadron Collider, but seeing as string theory is actually a whole pile of theories, I imagine that no matter what the results, it won't really accomplish much.

Maybe they'll be able to determine where the gravitons go?

[Jack]

I think string theory predicts the existence of certain very large particles, which they're expecting to see when the Collider is up and running.  Other than that, it's all over my head 

[trekgeezer]

Thanks Ash. That link kept me up reading a chain of related articles ending with the Standard Model of particle physics. Now I'm going to bed with a headache and feeling dumb as a stump. Hope you're happy.

Hey Andy, when I read that response I almost fell out of my chair! It was perfect for an Ash post!

[Rev. Powell]

The Rule Against Perpetuities (which governs wills and trusts): "an interest in property will vest no later than 21 years after some life in being at the creation of the interest."  It doesn't sound so complicated, but in practice it's nearly impossible to apply.  In any particular case it's a tangled riddle, and you have to consider legendary characters like "the fertile octogenarian" and "the unborn widow" in order to solve it.  It's an olde English common law rule and you're required to learn it in law school even though the rule is abolished in most states, and is almost never tested on bar exams except in the simplest form. 

[zombie no.one]

ok, I'll throw this one out there...

Darwin's theory of evolution apparently disproving the existence of God.

why?

If God created everything, then why would analysing the growth and evolution of everything he created apparently suggest that God doesn't exist? Isn't that the same as looking at a painting by Da Vinci, for example, then putting it under a microscope and saying "sorry, this can't be a genuine Da Vinci, because it's just paint on canvas".

[Ed, Ego and Superego]

Locks.  I'm pretty mechanical, but locks elude me. 
-Ed

[ghouck]

Chemistry: I never could figure out how to predict what will become of combining two chemicals. In school, it was presented to me like math, but it doesn't work out that way, and I never saw how.

[Javakoala]

Here's a list that'll have me toasting in Hell:

Women

Women's magazines (one article tells you how to be independent and the next tells you how much you suck because you don't have a man.)

Why janitors cannot get the concept of loading toilet paper/ hand towel dispensers correctly

Why do electrical things have warnings about NOT using them while standing in water

Love for "reality" programming

Why we allow people who LOVE "reality" programming to both live and reproduce

Why we steal TV show ideas from a country we fought to be divided from

Oprah  Huh?  Am I the only one here?

Pat from Saturday Night Live

Buy one, get one free (if one is free, just give me the free one and you can sell the other to some idiot)

Okay, I'll shut up for now

[Jack]

Women's magazines confuse the hell out of me as well.  You flip through 20 pages of ads, then you find the index.  Thirty more pages of ads and you hit the back cover.  Am I missing something here?