Chapter 18 DS summary

It is the job of every standards bureau to keep an exact measurement of everything and the international standard for this is right outside of Paris. One of the jobs of the BIPM is keeping the International Prototype Kilogram - the world's official kilogram made platinum and iridium. But because of the ridiculous nature of having standards set by physical objects that can be damaged or lost of gain a few atoms here or there, the standards for measurements have shifted towards things that can be emailed. Like a mater if now 1,650,763.73 wavelengths of light in any vacuum rather than a metal rod. And time is kept by a cesium clock that relies on separating and timing electrons falling between energy levels rather than a hypothetical distance around the sun. Although the scientific constant alpha, which is responsible for how closely bound electrons are, seems to not only be completely arbitrary and unexplainable as well as being responsible for the presence of life, but some scientists think that there may be evidence that it is actually changing. The idea that alpha may not actually be a constant completely changes the way scientists view the universe, especially in the context of the possibility of other life.