are strings really fundamental?

[gib65]

According to one popular theory, strings are supposed to be the most fundamental thing in the universe. But in thinking about this, I came to the conclusion that strings, if they vibrate, must have components. If they vibrate as waves, they must have peaks and troughs. If they don't, well, they still must have parts - tops and bottoms, left ends and right ends, or whathaveyou. Even if these parts can't be physically separated from the whole, they are still there (such that you must say of one part that it is not any of the other parts). Does this make sense, or do the string theorists have a way around this?

[bascule]

I believe M-theory sees them as small slices of higher p-dimensional membranes (p-branes) which vibrate in higher dimensional space. As far as I understand it, they are modeled as curved one dimensional lines in the same way quantum theory models particles as points, but as to what specifically the entities the theory is modelling are composed of I don't think it begins to speculate (just as quantum does not speculate what the point entities of the fundamental particles are composed of)

 

Of course, I am not a physicist, so you're probably better off assuming everything I just said was wrong.

[DV8 2XL]

Not bad bascule, that just about sums it up.