You can find formula after formula describing how things move in any physics book. Behind each formula there could be factors that aren't immediately obvious.
A new artificial intelligence program developed by researchers at Columbia University appears to have found its own physics.
After watching videos of physical phenomena on Earth, the artificial intelligence came up with new variables to explain what it observed.
This doesn't mean that our current physics are flawed or that there is a better model to explain the world. Einstein's laws were built on a pre-existing 'language' of theory and principles that have existed for hundreds of years.
Wouldn't we still frame the mechanics that explain our Universe in the same way if we could look at the problems in a different way?
Even with new technology, these laws have held up time and time again.
The new artificial intelligence only looked at videos of a few physical phenomena, so it's not in a position to come up with new physics or try to best Einstein. The goal was not this one.
If we ever met an intelligent alien race, would they have discovered the same physics laws as we have, or a different way of describing the Universe?
The number of variables was the same for each restart, but the specific variables were different. It is possible that our choices aren't perfect and that there are other ways to describe the Universe.
The team wanted to know if artificial intelligence could find new variables and explain new phenomena that we don't currently understand.
New data coming from giant experiments that hint at new physics can be seen here.
"If we don't have the variables, what other laws are we missing?" asks the mathematician.
How does an artificial intelligence find new things? The team fed the system raw video footage of phenomena they already understood and asked the program a simple question: What are the minimum fundamental variables needed to describe what's happening?
In the first video, there was a swinging double pendulum that has four state variables in play.
The artificial intelligence pondered over the footage and the question for a few hours and then came up with a solution.
It was close to the four we know of, but it didn't explain what the variables were.
The team tried to match up the known variables with the variables the artificial intelligence chose. Two of them were similar to the angles of the arms, but the other two variables were a mystery. The team thought the artificial intelligence must have been onto something because it could make accurate predictions about the system's next moves.
Boyuan Chen is an assistant professor at Duke University and is the leader of the work.
We don't know the mathematical language it is speaking.
The first video was about an air dancer blowing in the wind. Eight variables were created by lava lamp footage. There was a video clip of flames.
The variables were different every time.
The researchers wrote in their paper that they did not have any knowledge of the underlying physics.
In the future, artificial intelligence may be able to help us identify variables that underpin new concepts we are not aware of. This is the time to watch.
The research was published in a scientific journal.
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