Matter-Antimatter Inequality: Short Film & Comment

Environmental & Science Education
STEM
Cosmology
Edward Hessler

The universe is dominated by matter, the "stuff" of everything.

A puzzle to physicists is why the absence of antimatter. Current theory says both matter and antimatter should have been produced by the Big Bang in equal amounts. An experiment in Japan may contribute to our understanding of this difference. (my emphasis)

It is all explained by reporter Elizabeth Gibney in a short video (3 m 55 s) from the science journal Nature.

Physicist Dr. Sabine Hossenfelder takes exception. She published a post on her blog Back Reaction April 28 about those recent T2K results, writing that it is for aesthetic reasons that we want equal amounts of matter and antimatter, at least at the "beginning." By this she means "physicists...trying to prettify the laws of nature"think  that"it would have been nicer if there was an equal amount of matter and antimatter in the early universe."  An assumption.


Here's the deal: There are two hypothesis on the table. About them she writes “The universe started with a ratio X of matter to anti-matter and the outcome is what we observe.” The other explanation is “The universe started with a ratio Y of matter to anti-matter, then many complicated things happened and the outcome is what we observe.” Neither of these theories explains the value of X or Y. If anything, you should prefer the former hypothesis because it’s clearly the simpler one. In any case, though, as I said, this type of theory cannot explain their own initial value."

What we are doing, according to her, is stop asking theories to explain the initial values themselves, something they can't do.

Read it here.