Think of this as a Weather Report, involving things like evaporation, sublimation, condensation, and perhaps nuclear transmutation, but not the kind of Weather Report we're used to - rather, one involving the "weather" inside protons, anti-protons, neutrons, neutrinos and other tiny little objects both real and theoretically imagined, or postulated as being real, but not yet confirmed as being so.
It raises all kinds of fascinating questions; Are we perhaps one-half of a parallel universe pair? Possibly one "frequency" of a "multiple-exposure" holographic image, with which you must be tuned to one version's correct "frequency" before it becomes three-dimensionally visible? Is our physical universe one huge example of radioactive decay in action, following that famous Big Bang? Is hydrogen our most common element in our universe because the Big Bang was a thermonuclear hydrogen device? Are our galaxies like super-sized protons? Fascinating questions. Mine, not Professor Susskind's. He would probably laugh me out of town.... But I really enjoyed his lecture. You should too!
Added later.......( Wednesday afternoon)
At between 30:00 and 43:00 minutes into this, discussing right and left electrons having different masses, dependent upon the rate of "flip" left to right to left, and at that "flip" point, emitting a "zilch" into the condensate, or perhaps absorbing a "zilch" from that condensate....... I'm imaging an alternating current sine wave, with the left electron and its "plus one" mass representing the "positive" or "above zero" half of that sine wave, while the right electron, with its "zero" or massless state represents the "negative" or "below zero" half of the sine wave, and the points of emission or absorption of that "zilch" occurring at the points where that sine wave crosses its "zero" or neutral reference line. So today's "Question Everything" is, "Have I screwed up the good professor's whole act?"
Or is that variable-density field named after Higgs, and preferential towards the heavier particles, actually a non-zero electrical potential of relatively weak or low voltage? In other words, something like our central nervous system's voltage levels. Hence, perhaps, that saying "All is but a dream in the mind of Allah?" Just maybe, there's a relationship.... truth being stranger than fiction, and all like that.... - see what happens when I start watching YouTube videos?
Later still.... (Wednesday Evening)
One of the many things that fascinated me about this was that the good professor takes particles or objects with which us unwashed masses thought we were halfway familiar, and gives them a whole new environment with entirely or almost entirely different parameters, and then has them doing acrobatics which are only partly or partially predictable, so that continued experimentation must be performed (a) to flesh out their full range of capabilities, and (b) confirm their behavior as being reliable under certain given conditions. A little like tossing a cat in the air repeatedly to verify that it does land on its feet nine times out of ten. Now, if only we could train bosons to do that.... instead of playing chameleons or birthing and eating their offspring. Seriously - I really did enjoy all that, and I sat through it, almost holding my breath in places. I should have stayed in school, instead of being so anxious to jump into a job which was automated right out of existence within 15 years when electric generating stations got those "little black boxes" which replaced shift operators.
After that, the only times we were asked to show off our skills at synchronizing manually a 266 Mw unit were times when the automatic start-up system failed and couldn't be fixed in time for the next peak load period. And by then, we former control room operators had been 'magically' converted to toolbox packing electrical maintenance types. A job none of us had ever intended to do when we first signed on, years previously.
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