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Article #4439

Re: Solid-state doesn't use QED! (Was Re: Particle Research)

#4439
From: Matt Austern
Date: Sun, 08 Nov 1992 22:55
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In article <23767@galaxy.ucr.edu> baez@ucrmath.ucr.edu (john baez) writes:

> In solid state you have
> quite a bit of choice in terms of finding systems that have roughly some
> Lagrangian or other, so you can really test your mathematical notions to
> some extent.  (Typically, of course, the real condensed matter system is
> more complicated than the Lagrangian you guessed for it, so these "tests"
> are always suspect.)

Oh, but that's the whole point of a renormalization group analysis,
right?  You just show your Lagrangian includes all of the relevant
parameters.

In a sense, I think that the renormalization group justifies, in
retrospect, a lot of what physicists have done for over a century:
modeling a very complicated system by a simple mathematical
description.
--
Matthew Austern                   Just keep yelling until you attract a
(510) 644-2618                    crowd, then a constituency, a movement, a
austern@lbl.bitnet                faction, an army!  If you don't have any
matt@physics.berkeley.edu         solutions, become a part of the problem!
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References: <BxA2GC.6yE@wsrcc.com> <1992Nov6.233219.15750@galois.mit.edu> <1992Nov7.034453.2080@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> <23767@galaxy.ucr.edu>

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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!sparky!uunet!haven.umd.edu!darwin.sura.net!spool.mu.edu!agate!agate!matt
From: matt@physics16.berkeley.edu (Matt Austern)
Newsgroups: sci.physics
Subject: Re: Solid-state doesn't use QED! (Was Re: Particle Research)
Date: 8 Nov 92 22:55:53
Organization: Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (Theoretical Physics Group)
Lines: 22
Message-ID: <MATT.92Nov8225553@physics16.berkeley.edu>
References: <BxA2GC.6yE@wsrcc.com> <1992Nov6.233219.15750@galois.mit.edu>
 <1992Nov7.034453.2080@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> <23767@galaxy.ucr.edu>
Reply-To: matt@physics.berkeley.edu
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In-reply-to: baez@ucrmath.ucr.edu's message of 8 Nov 92 23:20:21 GMT