Reality Can Be Whatever I Want

Natural units Planck constant Theoretical physics Unit-systems Quantum mechanics Constants

Physics Math Science

10 hours ago 6,048 views 0 shares

Reality Can Be Whatever I Want

physics-memes, natural-units-memes, planck-constant-memes, theoretical-physics-memes, unit-systems-memes | ScienceHumor.io

Welcome to physics, where we just casually redefine fundamental constants to make our equations prettier. The top panel shows the proper relationship where Planck's constant (ℏ) equals angular frequency (ω) times mass (m) equals 1—a perfectly reasonable unit system. But then some physicist woke up and decided "you know what? Let's make ω = 2m instead" because apparently consistency is for people who don't have tenure.

This is basically every theoretical physicist's approach to natural units: just set everything equal to 1 until the math becomes tolerable. Speed of light? 1. Boltzmann constant? Also 1. Your dignity as you explain this to undergrads? Definitely not 1, more like approaching zero.

The beauty is that both systems are technically "correct" depending on which units you choose, which is just a fancy way of saying physicists will bend reality itself to avoid dealing with annoying conversion factors. And honestly? Can't blame them.

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