Lu, Toh-Ming (2023).   Me and the helpless universe,  In:  “Global Humanities and Liberal Arts”,  Wang, Lawrence K. (Editor) , Volume 2023, Number 3A,  2023(3A), March 2023; 40 pages, Lenox Institute Press, MA, USA. Lenox.Institute@gmail.com; lut@rpi.edu.   ...............ABSTRACT:  This electronic book contains a collection of oil paintings that I did over the years on my connection with the world surrounding me and my understanding of the universe. My curiosity of the nature of the universe has been the main driving force for me to pursue physics in an attempt to understand what it is, how it was formed and where does it go.  My perception of the universe evolved as I get older. In my grade school time, I thought the universe was flat. Later, I learned that the Earth was not the center of the universe. The Earth is one of the planets in the planetary system. Then you have Milky Way, Andromeda, etc.  Later, I learned the Big Bang Theory and the concept of a finite universe. And more recently, the dark energy, dark matter, and the accelerated expansion of the universe. I also imagine the future of the universe based on my understanding of physics, including the concept of entropy...........KEYWORDS:  Big Bang, expansion, dark matter, dark energy...........ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: I thank Astrophysicist, Professor Chun Ming Leung and Cosmologist, Professor Ethan Brown for valuable discussions and suggestion

Lawrence K Wang

Toh-Ming Lu

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“Me and the Helpless Universe” by Toh-Ming LuCitation: Lu, Toh-Ming (2023). Me and the helpless universe, In: “Global Humanities and Liberal Arts”,Wang, Lawrence K. (Editor) , Volume 2023, Number 3A, 2023(3A), March 2023; 40 pages, Lenox InstitutePress, MA, USA. Lenox.Institute@gmail.com; lut@rpi.edu. https://doi.org/10.17613/j2ay-4898“Me and the helpless universe”Toh-Ming Lu (https://homepages.rpi.edu/~lut/)Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, USABio sketches Dr. Toh-Ming Lu was born in Sibu,Sarawak, Malaysia in 1944. He earned a BS degreein physics in 1968 from Cheng Kung University,Tainan, Taiwan and  a PhD degree in physics in1976 from University of Wisconsin, Madison. Dr. Lujoined Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in1982. He had been the Ray Palmer BakerDistinguished Professor of physics until 2022 whenhe became an emeritus professor.He served as the Chairman of the Departmentof Physics, Applied Physics and Astronomy, RPIfrom 1992 to 1997. Dr. Lu published over 580papers, 9 books, 12 patents, and graduated 51 Ph.D.students, who have assumed leadership positions inmajor semiconductor companies.His research interest has been in the area ofsemiconductors for advanced electronics andenergy applications. His honors include MaterialsResearch Society Medal Award in 2004. He isFellow of four major societies: American PhysicalSociety, American Vacuum Society, AmericanAssociation for the Advancement of Sciences, andthe Materials Research Society.Dr. Toh-Ming LuDr. Lu is also interested in teaching andlearning pedagogy(https://doi.org/10.17613/jk0e-ph89). His otherinterests include cosmology and anthropology.His hobby includes oil painting:(https://doi.org/10.17613/k9f1-y534)AbstractThis electronic book contains a collection of oil paintings that I did over the yearson my connection with the world surrounding me and my understanding of theuniverse. My curiosity of the nature of the universe has been the main drivingforce for me to pursue physics in an attempt to understand what it is, how it wasformed and where does it go.My perception of the universe evolved as I get older. In my grade school time, Ithought the universe was flat. Later, I learned that the Earth was not the center ofthe universe. The Earth is one of the planets in the planetary system. Then youhave Milky Way, Andromeda, etc.  Later, I learned the Big Bang Theory and theconcept of a finite universe. And more recently, the dark energy, dark matter, andthe accelerated expansion of the universe. I also imagine the future of theuniverse based on my understanding of physics, including the concept of entropy.Key words: Big Bang, expansion, dark matter, dark energy.Acknowledgement: I thank Astrophysicist, Professor Chun Ming Leung andCosmologist, Professor Ethan Brown for valuable discussions and suggestions.Table of contentsPageBeyond the edge of the universe 1Wailing 3To where? 5andromeda, our great neighbor 7Sailing the heaven’s edge 9Beyond the universe? 11The falling sky 13Beyond the universe 15Curved space 17Time 19The Big Bang 21The great contraction 23Accelerated expansion! 25Dark Matter 27Dark Energy, Dark Matter, and Baryonic Matter 29The puzzle 31Destiny 33The great expansion 35“once upon a time” 37precious times 39beyond the edge of the universe—18”x24” (’00, oil on canvas)1When I was in grade school (probably in the 4th grade), I thought that the Earth was flat. Everything should be within the Earth. That include the Sun, the Moon, and all that. The Sun would rise from a very far distance from the Earth and set at a very far distance into the Earth. The Moon would do the same thing, except that it would rise during the night after the Sun set. At that time we have not learned the planetary system yet.That understanding did raise a question: if I went along one direction, would I hit the edge of the Earth? Would I fall down at the edge? Where would I fall to? What was beyond theEdge?2wailing—18”x24” (’00, oil on canvas)3I remember a 6th grader friend told me a shocking news that in his science class, his teacher told him that actually the Earth was not flat. It was, in fact, a round ball suspended in space. It was circulating around the Sun, which is also a big ball, much larger than the Earth!This information was, of course, shocking and unbelievable! If the Earth was suspended in space, it must be falling. But falling to where? If it was not falling, What holds it in space? This was so fascinating and frightening! 4to where?—22”x28” (’90, oil on canvas)5No, there was nothing holding the Earth! And it was not falling! This was bizarre. Where were we going? Later, we learned that the Sun had an attracting force acting on the Earth (and vice versa). This attractive force was the reason to keep the Earth circulating the Sun without running away. If the Sun had an attractive force acting on the Earth, whey didn’t the Earth crushed into the Sun?  (Circular motion under an attractive force is not a trivial problem to understand. I had been teaching this in our introductory physics course for many years. It is a great example on the success of Newton’s law of motion.) Also, our planetary system (solar system) revolves around the Milky Way, our galaxy.6andromeda, our great neighbor—20”x26” (’90, oil on canvas)7Our close neighbor, Andromeda galaxy, is about 2.5 million light-years away from us. (Light-year is a measure of a distance where light travels in one year. Light travels about 3 hundred million meters per second.)  It is believed that Andromeda and Milky Way will collide at some point--some five billions years in the future.89Ok, the Earth was not falling. Where does it go? The universe is huge. It was so large….But there must be an end to it. Where was the edge of the universe? And beyond that?10Beyond the universe?,  oil on canvas, 18”x24”, ‘1611I remember I often sat on our front stairs and looked into the sky. The sky looked like a giantwok. So, what was beyond the sky? 12the falling sky—30”x36” (’90, oil on canvas)13Now if we dug a hole in the sky, what would be outside the sky?14Beyond the universe—24x36 (’92, oil on canvas)15Well, maybe there was another sky beyond that….How about beyond beyond that? It was so frightening. An infinite universe is something I could not imagine and comprehend.16light lightCurved space17Actually the universe is not infinite. If we sent a light to one direction, it would come back from our back! This is because the space is curved due to gravitational field based on Einstein Theory of General Relativity. Another words, there is no such thing as straight line for light to travel (or for anything else to travel). The space itself is curved so that light can only follow the curved space and eventually coming back from your back. We learned from our math course that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. But if the space itself is curved, the straight line becomes a virtual or imaginary line that does not exist in real world.The diameter of the universe was estimated to be 93 billion light years.18Curved spaceTime19Another frightening thing is time. Like it or not, it keeps pushing forwards. Not like space, you can go forward or backward. For time, there is only one way—going forward. We cannotstop the time. Physics laws allow negative time solutions. But in the real world, we cannot go backward in time. But was there a beginning of time? Modern cosmology tells us, yes. There was a beginning oftime. Space and time were created together at the same time, call the Big Bang. 20https://sites.google.com/site/jazziestheoriesoftheuniverse/big-bang-theoryThe Big Bang21The Big Bang occurred some 14 billion years ago. It has been expanding to the present size of 93 billion light years. The further you see, the earlier it was. Well, it is puzzling why the size is not 14 billion light years. This is because ever since the universe was created, it has been expanding rapidly. (https://futurism.com/how-can-the-diameter-of-the-universe-the-age). In fact it is the space that is expanding. That includes the space in our body. That means, the molecules in our body are moving away from each other and we become “fatter”  as time goes on. But don’t worry, it happens very slowly.One may ask: “What happened before the Big Bang?”  Well, since time was not created yet, one cannot really ask the question “before” that. 22Mass 1 Mass 2Attractive force~1𝑟2The great contraction 23However, with the gravitational force, the expansion should stop at some point and the universe would  contract back to one point.24Accelerated expansion!Existence of repulsive dark energy (1998, Nobel)Dark energy25But NO! From the observed red shift of light (Doppler effect), the expansion is actually accelerating, going faster and faster! It is believed that in addition to the attractive gravitational force due to masses, there should be unknown energies in space that strongly repulse each other to give rise to the great accelerated expansion.  It is called “dark energy”.26https://phys.org/news/2015-04-dark-conspiracy.htmlDark Matter27There is one more thing: dark mater. The speed of the stars in spiral galaxies can be predicted based on the amount of matter in the galaxies. However, astrophysicists found that the speed of the stars in spiral galaxies is not consistent with the known matter in the galaxies. The speed appear to be always faster than expected at the outer regions of the spirals.This leads to the conclusion that there must be some extra mass called dark matterwithin the galaxies that is not visible to us. 28Dark energy: from expanding universeDark matter: from motion of galaxieshttps://public.nrao.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/darkmatterchart_squared.jpg29This is the percentage of dark energy, dark matter, and the baryonic matter (visible matter) in the universe. 30the puzzle—18”x24” (’00, oil on canvas)31The universe is the most puzzling thing we have. So far, we know a little bit of the past. What will be the future of the universe?  32destiny—18”x24” (’00, oil on canvas)33And the destiny of mankind?34e- the great expansion—18”x24” (’00, oil on canvas)35We do know one thing—the entropy of the universe is increasing. Entropy is a physical quantity that we use to measure the degree of disorder of a system. Based on the second law of thermodynamics, The entropy of the universe is increasing. This means the world is getting more and more disorder. There are lots of local fluctuations that give you local order (local reduction of entropy). For example, when you were born, you are more order with a smaller entropy. When you die, your entropy increases. When you create a crystal, you create a smaller entropy. When the crystal dies (lost its crystallinity), it becomes more disorder and the entropy increases.But these changes only occur locally. Overall, the entropy of the whole universe is still getting larger and larger, regardless of the local changes or fluctuations.As the universe expands, the density of matters become smaller and smaller. All matters will eventually disintegrate into elemental particles. No Earth, no Sun, no moon, no stars….But the universe will keep expanding. The universe will be cold and quiet with only elementary particles occasionally flying by…36“once upon a time”—18”x24” (’91, oil on canvas)37In any case we are so fortunate that we were brought into being. This is without and beyond our control. 38precious times—18”x26” (’89, oil on canvas)39We will treasure every second, every minute of the precious times that we have together.40

Me and the Helpless Universe

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Me and the Helpless Universe

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