Why is there more matter than antimatter?
It’s a social question and I’d like to start a thoughtful discussion. The question is very old, but many scientists are still puzzled. Are you too? A related question would be: Do you expect the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) to help scientists find an answer?
Here’s a quite recent article about the subject (it’s not a Wikipedia link, mind you…) but it’s not very specific in terms of a real explanation in my opinion. What exactly is the new statistical approach?
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090325132855.htm
A classic explanation of course is: There is more matter than antimatter, because we humans are here. It’s called the anthropic principle. Some folks seem satisfied with this, but I’m not. Are you?
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The converse of the anthropic principle seems reasonable. The imbalance is not due to the existence of humanity; but humanity cannot coexist with large amounts of antimatter, and so one could say that humanity is due to the imbalance. If the local imbalance = A and the existence of humanity = B, then (not A) implies (not B), so B implies A, even though the chain of causality runs A allows B. Slightly more accurately, regardless of the general composition of the universe, the only part of the universe with which we an have direct contact is that part which has much more matter than antimatter. This accounts for why there must be more matter than antimatter in our local sector of the universe- better to say, in any sector that contains life, of which we must inhabit one. As for the actual mechanism by which the imbalance came to be, I have absolutely no idea.
Most simplistic answer: The balance is there, in equal ratio, it just cannot exist in this dimension. Like a photo Negative only in complete 4-D. Length,Width,Height,Time.
Actually, we might have more antimatter than matter. We just call it matter.
I don’t know off-hand—I’ll check Genesis and get back to you.
@ratboy You do that. I’m interested to hear what you have to say.
@ratboy – Ah, Genesis, yes lovely… and there was a huge swarm of subatomic particles dancing in the cosmic ballroom. And a curious electron saw a beautiful positron somewhere nearby. “Do you tango?” he asked, somewhat shyly. The positron smiled and she accepted the invitation, and so they began their dance. What a perfect match. The electron pulled her a little closer, enjoying the delicate touch. A photon was about to be born. Then God said, “Let there be light!” So there was light.
@Benny – What happened to all the electrons which never had a chance to tango?
I thought the same amount of each was created. It’s just that locally, it is almost all matter and minimal amounts of anti-matter. What’s to say that there is no anti-matter Earth on the other side of the universe?
Perhaps, if you subscribe to M theory (and I do), much of the anti-matter has “leaked” out into another universe, just as gravity may have leaked into this one.
How about: “Because if there were more anti-matter than matter in this part of the galaxy, then we would be calling what we now call anti-matter, matter, and vice versa”?
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