We saw in "Magnetism As Information", section 30) in the compound posting on this blog "The Theory Of Complexity" August 2017, how it cannot be a coincidence that the three elements associated with magnetism, nickel, cobalt, and especially iron, are right in a row on the Periodic Table of the Elements and also have the most stable nuclei of all elements.
In other words, these elements are at the top of what is known as the Binding Energy Curve. This is the curve formed when we chart the binding energy per nucleon in the atoms of each element. The curve reaches a peak at iron, and then declines.
Iron is thus the atom with the most stable nucleus. This makes it the most difficult to break apart during nuclear fusion in stars, into the plasma state so that more smaller atoms can come back together into fewer larger ones. In fact breaking the iron nucleus requires a net input of energy. This is why the ordinary fusion process in stars only goes as far as iron.
The result of this is how common iron is in the inner Solar System, Mercury is known as the "Iron Planet" and iron is the most common element on earth by mass. The sun and planets originated with the explosion in a supernova of a large star and some of it's matter, that which forms the sun and Solar System, came back together by gravity.
Elements heavier than iron require a net input of energy to form, and are formed only during the brief time that a supernova explosion is actually taking place, which provides the necessary input of energy.
This is why elements up to iron are exponentially more common than elements that are heavier than iron. Some of the heavier elements that are forced together by the energy unleashed in the supernova are less-than-stable. These heavy atoms gradually give off particles or radiation in an effort to seek a more stable state. These emissions are known as radioactivity.
But magnetism has to do with the lining up of unpaired electrons in atoms, so that the atom exerts a net electromotive force. Electrons usually exist in pairs, one with up and the other with down spin. However there are unpaired electrons and, in some materials, their orbitals can be lined up to create a magnet.
It is true that magnetism is based on the electron orbitals, and apparently have nothing to do with the nucleus. But the entire atom is also a unit of information, and that is why it is no coincidence that the elements with the most stable nuclei are also those that can be turned into magnets.
Both magnetism and the stability of the nucleus are information. An atom with the orbitals of it's unpaired electrons lined up has one side of the atom defined as the north magnetic pole and the other as the south pole. Thus a material with the unpaired orbitals lined up is in a higher information state than a material that doesn't.
An equation is always a lower information state than an inequation because an equation only contains one piece of information while an inequation contains two. A = A has only one piece of information while A does not equal B has two.
But according to my information theory, "The Theory Of Complexity", information cannot just be lost. When an iron atom forms in a star by nuclear fusion a nucleus with a more stable, thus lower, information state is formed from smaller atoms with a higher, less stable, information state being crunched together by the heat and gravity in the center of the star.
But this means that information is being lost. Information cannot just be lost, it has to go somewhere. So, although magnetism apparently has nothing to do with the nucleus, the atom is still an informational unit. The information goes to the electrons, creating a higher informational state with one side being defined as the north magnetic pole and the other as the south pole.
Today I would like to point out a similar example of how information is manifested in the electrons of an atom because of greater stability, which is a lower in state, in the nucleus.
This similar example is Hydrogen Bonding. Hydrogen Bonding is extremely important to us because it is why water can exist in a liquid, as well as ice, form. Without Hydrogen Bonding water would only exist in the form of vapor.
A water molecule consists of one oxygen atom and two hydrogen atoms, with the familiar chemical formula H2O. But the oxygen atom is much larger than the hydrogen atoms, which both attach to the same side of the oxygen atom.
What this does is makes one side of the water molecule more positively-charged and the other side more negatively-charged. Since opposite charges attract, water molecules tend to line up negative-to-positive. This is known as Hydrogen Bonding and water would only be able to exist as a vapor without it.
Water is lighter than air by molecule, which is why water evaporates, but with Hydrogen Bonding holding the molecules together, liquid water is about 800 times as heavy as air at sea level. Water is not the only compound in which Hydrogen Bonding takes place, but it is by far the most familiar and important to us.
Hydrogen Bonding is actually similar in principle to magnetism. But where magnetism works by atom, Hydrogen Bonding works by molecule. Whereas magnetism is the result of the special nature of iron, Hydrogen Bonding is the result of the special nature of oxygen.
But the special natures of both of these elements are rooted in the exceptional stability of their nuclei, but shows up in the electron orbitals in ways that, according to my information theory, transfers the lower information state of the nucleus, due to it's increased stability, to produce a higher information state in the electron orbitals due to creating defined dimensions, such as the north and south magnetic poles, which wouldn't exist otherwise.
We usually think of oxygen as a special element due to it's reactivity. This makes it suitable as an oxidizer for burning and digestion, and we are completely dependent on it to live.
But reactivity is not the reason that oxygen is important in my information theory. The reason is the same as for iron, the stability of it's nucleus. In both elements, this exceptional stability of the nucleus represents a lower information state. But information cannot just be lost and is transferred to the electron orbitals. This additional information in the orbitals shows up as defined dimensions, a north and south pole in magnetism and one side of the water molecule being more positive and the other more negative in Hydrogen Bonding.
The exceptional stability of the iron nucleus is that it has the highest binding energy per nucleon of all elements. The exceptional stability of the oxygen nucleus is that it requires the lowest neutron-to-proton ratio of all atoms except hydrogen, which has no neutrons.
As we might expect, this additional stability should make both iron and oxygen very abundant. Indeed iron is very common in the inner Solar System and is the most common element on earth by mass. Oxygen is the most common element in the universe, by mass, after hydrogen and helium. Oxygen also makes up so much of the earth, not only in air and water molecules but rock is basically a compound of silicon and oxygen.
In the fusion taking place in the centers of stars, light atoms are being crunched together by the tremendous heat and pressure into heavier atoms. Heavier atoms generally require more neutrons per proton, to convey the binding energy which holds the positively-charged protons together against the mutual repulsion of like charges. Neutrons are created in fusion by crunching an electron and a proton together, the process known as K-capture.
If a nucleus, such as that of iron or oxygen, has more stability than the two or more lighter nuclei that were crunched together to create it, that represents a loss of information since stability is a lower information state than instability. This information cannot just be lost so, although neither magnetism or Hydrogen Bonding seems to have anything to do with the nucleus, the entire atom is still an informational unit and the missing information gets transferred to the electron orbitals and shows up as the defined dimensions of magnetism in iron and Hydrogen Bonding in water molecules.
Both iron and oxygen have two elements next to it on the Periodic Table that also undergo magnetism or Hydrogen Bonding. Cobalt and nickel, next to iron, also undergo magnetism. Fluorine and nitrogen, next to oxygen, can also undergo Hydrogen Bonding.
This exceptional stability of the oxygen atom is also part of my cosmology theory, but for a different reason than in this information theory. In the cosmology theory, "The Theory Of Stationary Space", the matter of our universe is scattered over four dimensions of space, one of which we perceive as time. There are two opposite directions in each dimension. This means that the oxygen nucleus, with eight protons, fits neatly into the space, one proton to each direction, and space itself contributes to holding the nucleus together and making it require fewer neutrons. This is described in 1g) of "The Theory Of Stationary Space", July 2017.
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