Posts Tagged ‘alpha’
Think you’ll be picking up a Prius V in the USA this autumn?
Prius V – American name for Toyota’s Prius station wagon
File this one under the category of unexpected. According to Integrity Exports, Toyota logged an outrageous 52,000 orders for its Prius Alpha hybrid over in Japan since the vehicle launched on May 13th. That’s astronomical considering that Toyota set a monthly sales target of just 3,000 units for the gas-electric MPV.
Toyota says that it will ramp up production of the Prius Alpha in response to soaring demand, but boosting output from 3,000 to 5,000 vehicles per month (Toyota’s modified production levels) by summer’s end still doesn’t seem like it’ll be enough.
Despite Toyota promising that the enormous demand for the Prius Alpha won’t affect the launch of the Prius V here in the States, Integrity Exports begs to differ…
Even my barely functional remembrance of things mathematical tells me this critter ain’t landing on time in the United States. Unless Toyota decides to [1] stop taking orders in Japan, right now, and [2] decides to screw some of the people with orders already in-house in Japan.
Astrophysicists suggest laws of Physics vary throughout universe
A team of astrophysicists based in Australia and England has uncovered evidence that the laws of physics are different in different parts of the universe.
The report describes how one of the supposed fundamental constants of Nature appears not to be constant after all. Instead, this ‘magic number’ known as the fine-structure constant – ‘alpha’ for short – appears to vary throughout the universe.
“After measuring alpha in around 300 distant galaxies, a consistency emerged: this magic number, which tells us the strength of electromagnetism, is not the same everywhere as it is here on Earth, and seems to vary continuously along a preferred axis through the universe,” Professor John Webb from the University of New South Wales said.
“The implications for our current understanding of science are profound. If the laws of physics turn out to be merely ‘local by-laws’, it might be that whilst our observable part of the universe favours the existence of life and human beings, other far more distant regions may exist where different laws preclude the formation of life, at least as we know it.”
“If our results are correct, clearly we shall need new physical theories to satisfactorily describe them…”
“It varies by only a tiny amount – about one part in 100,000 – over most of the observable universe, but it’s possible that much larger variations could occur beyond our observable horizon,” Julian King said.
The discovery will force scientists to rethink their understanding of Nature’s laws. “The fine structure constant, and other fundamental constants, are absolutely central to our current theory of physics. If they really do vary, we’ll need a better, deeper theory,” Dr Michael Murphy from Swinburne University said.
“While a ‘varying constant’ would shake our understanding of the world around us extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. What we’re finding is extraordinary, no doubt about that.”
“It’s one of the biggest questions of modern science – are the laws of physics the same everywhere in the universe and throughout its entire history? We’re determined to answer this burning question one way or the other.”
Wow! Burning question? You betcha.
Perhaps not to those who consider criticism of deficit spending the single most important issue in modern society – or counting angels on pinheads as appropriate to adult focus.
Advancing our species’ understanding of how this small ball of mud we call Earth got here and eventually became a pressure cooker producing all sorts of individual critters – is indeed a useful if not critical question.
