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Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by lazide on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @04:50PM (#39376017)
If the universe is old, then how do you expect atoms to exist if this was not the case?
Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by pdabbadabba on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @04:55PM (#39376078)
Couldn't there be a different physics where protons had a charge of 0.5 and, therefore, every atomic nucleus would have twice as many protons as electrons? Or pick any other ratio you like.

Or course, I don't mean to hand-wave away the potential implications of this. Maybe there would be no atomic nuclei in such a universe, for all I know. But if not, why not?

Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by yifanl on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @05:06PM (#39376237)
How would we ever distinguish what half-a-proton is in a universe where all protons ever are _always_ paired off?
Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by derefr on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @05:11PM (#39376304)
Presumably the same way we distinguish individual quarks: by smashing the atoms up.

(The more interesting question would be the opposite: what if it was two electrons per proton? Then you could throw around some photons and end up with a half-proton negatively-ionized molecule. What would that look like?)

Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by selecsosi on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @05:32PM (#39376509)
You are going down the path of theoretical particle physics! It is the ultimate question of that to answer what is the fundamental element that makes up matter and what should we "name" that has a useful property that can either be used or helps to explain how other things work.

In reality, "protons" do not "exist" but are semi(very) stable collections of energy that interact in an interesting enough way in a group that it is useful for us to retain the name, rather than refer to it by its constituents.

Electrons don't really glob up into things like atoms due to repulsion (no moderation by the stron/weak nuclear forces) so we don't have a really useful reason to keep going beyond the definition of the electron so we just stop trying to find additional constituent parts.

Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by Dylan16807 on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @09:53PM (#39378567)
We see naked protons and mismatches between nuclei and electrons all the time, so I don't see why half-charge protons would be "_always_" paired off.
Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by lazide on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @08:28PM (#39378044)
Sure. Some interesting thoughts in sibling comments too.

Personally, I find the taste of hot chocolate just as nice regardless of the exact mix of quarks composing its constituent elements.

Re:Inside the proton, the ‘most complicated thing you could ... by lagadu on Thursday February 15, 2024 @02:53PM (#39387703)
If that were to be the case, we'd have to change the values of the other forces that these charged particles interact with, such as the strong force.

Not that it wouldn't necessarily be possible, but it would require everything we know about physics to be remodeled because the consequences are vast, fundamental even. So yes, with an entirely different model of the universe that would likely be possible.