[General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

Sat Jul 4 16:39:38 PDT 2015

Just for the record, as he says, Indeed i do completely agree with John W.,
Best to all, Martin

Verstuurd vanaf mijn iPhone

Op 5 jul. 2015 om 01:34 heeft John Williamson <John.Williamson at glasgow.ac.uk<mailto:John.Williamson at glasgow.ac.uk>> het volgende geschreven:

________________________________
Martin (and all)
   You say at the end of “Light is Heavy”: "If the photon would be put to rest, its gravitational mass would equal its rest mass, and hence vanish.”  I think we can agree that the closest light can be to “rest” in a vacuum is if it traveling at light-speed in a closed circle (or at light-speed in a helix as seen from a moving frame) as in our electron models. I think the question “Does such a photon have a rest mass?” is fundamental to our electron models and I think it would be good if we were able to  agree on a consistent answer that can be backed by rational arguments. I claim that this circulating (circularly or helically-moving) photon does have a constant rest mass (that of the electron) since it has energy E=gamma mc^2 but its average linear momentum is zero for a resting electron or p=gamma mv in the case of an electron moving with speed v (leading in either case to a calculation of rest mass m from the relativistic energy momentum equation E^2 = p^2 c^2 +m^2 c^4).

This is true.

Plus we know that an electron has a rest mass m

Yes

so that the hypothetical photon composing the electron also must have the same rest mass m, whether the electron is moving or not.

No. This does not follow. It is the whole system that exhibits a rest mass. Photons, in and of themselves are DEFINED such that they have no rest mass. This is not a contradiction. Do the maths.

John W has indicated earlier (as I understood him)

No Richard you are misunderstanding what I am saying. Martin and I do not disagree at all on this. We are just having a very great deal of trouble getting you (and many others) to understand it.

that this photon would not have a rest mass because the photon is moving at light-speed, but its confinement due to a pivot

No - it has rest mass with or without a pivot - if it is confined. It is not the concept we need to understand, but how it is confined. That is the relevant question. You understanding what rest mass is will take us no closer to understanding how it is confined. This is the essential question - other things are a distraction and an argument about the meaning of words. If you define a photon as having no rest mass (as I do), then it has no rest mass (obviously). If you define it as having a rest mass, then it is not a photon for me. Nonetheless light confined in a box (for me) has rest mass. If you think I am contradicting myself you are wrong. You are not alone in not getting this. Most people would think this complete nonsense. It is not though. Once you get it you will see the light.

produces the rest mass of the electron.

All confined stuff contributes to what it weighs on a scale.

Martin seems to be saying in “Light is Heavy" that this circulating photon has a non-zero rest mass due to its self-confinement and so it is heavy.

No .. you are misunderstanding this too. You are confusing (at least) two things. Light has energy. Any energy stuck in box on a scale weighs something. Confinement is not, itself positive mass, it may be negative mass (under certain circumstances). The fact that the energy is stuck onto the scale (by the confinement- whatever that is) means that it weighs something. If you define "rest mass" as you do above, as the square root of squared p fourth minus c squared p squared and sum it up over all the bits you will get a positive number which may be weighed on a scale. Light in a box has a different value because you must ADD the bits going leftwards and rightwards and THEN square and sum. This gives a different value than if you are going only left or only right. You can not point to the "rest mass" bit and isolate it , even though I know you want to do this. For example, you cannot point to the bit that has the "temperature" but kT will also contribute to the "rest mass" . If you make the bits jiggle about and do a dance in the box the box will get heavier. You are just not thinking clearly enough yet. There is nothing to be learned here. When you do get it we will be no further. We will still (collectively) need to understand how and why light (or whatever it is) shuts itself up into an electron.

 Are these two positions really different?  Could both of you make a brief clarifying statement about this point, briefly summarizing your reasons, so we can see the level of our agreement or disagreement on this point?

Richard, this has been explained many times - but you are just not getting the essential point. These are not our reasons - they are just physics as it is, properly understood. Rest mass is not a thing .It is a property that you can measure. You can define it as the square root of the difference between two terms. It does not have an existence independent of your thinking. It is no more or less than this. There is no disagreement - only a lack of understanding for yourself of just what you mean by "the rest mass". This is not a bad thing. Most people do not get it and that is ok.

 Also Chip, John D, John M, Vivian, Andrew?
     Richard

Regards, John.
On Jul 4, 2015, at 6:24 AM, Chip Akins <chipakins at gmail.com<mailto:chipakins at gmail.com>> wrote:

Thank you John D and Martin

This is what I also thought.  Light must have a very small contribution to the universal gravitational field.  After all, it is made of the same “stuff” as everything else.

Chip

From: General [mailto:general-bounces+chipakins=gmail.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] On Behalf Of Mark, Martin van der
Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2015 8:13 AM
To: Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
Subject: Re: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

Hi Chip,
Yes it does, but the total mass in all the radiation in the universe is far less than that of matter, in the present era. In the first 300.000 years after the big bang (whatever that was), the universe was plasma and radiation dominated. I would have to look into the details again to tell you more.
As I am typing this I see John D giving a good answer as well.
Cheers, oh and thanks for the compliments about my paper. I will remove some typo’s and deal with some questions in a later edition this week.
Martin

Dr. Martin B. van der Mark
Principal Scientist, Minimally Invasive Healthcare

Philips Research Europe - Eindhoven
High Tech Campus, Building 34 (WB2.025)
Prof. Holstlaan 4
5656 AE  Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 40 2747548

From: General [mailto:general-bounces+martin.van.der.mark=philips.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] On Behalf Of Chip Akins
Sent: zaterdag 4 juli 2015 14:38
To: 'Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion'
Subject: Re: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

Hi Martin

Energy in space, which comprises light, has momentum, is affected by gravity, and when confined, can demonstrate all the observable effects of mass that fermions display.

Light is affected by gravity, but a question for you, do you think that light also creates a gravitational field?  Does light contribute to the gravitation of the universe?

Chip

From: General [mailto:general-bounces+chipakins=gmail.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] On Behalf Of Mark, Martin van der
Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2015 7:18 AM
To: David Mathes; Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
Cc: jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk<mailto:jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

Dear David,
thanks for the reply.
You have a preference regarding mass and energy that, indeed,  I definitely do not share.
The essence is in fully grasping “light is heavy”. After that one will never accuse the photon of being massless and still having momentum, as if it were a mystery.
You provide me with even more evidence that “light is heavy” is a paper that I should try to publish in a real Journal, not just a conference. It is, implicitly, the very basis of ALL the electron models people are proposing in this discussion group. By the way you are in the same league with Frank Wilzcek, regarding this point at least.

For the coupling, I am sorry to let you down a bit, but you may have noticed the announcement of my second paper on topological solutions and 4-current. That will bring it closer.
Actually, one of the things required for the knots to be stable is some form of self-interaction that could be calculated from Hamilton’s principle, as a starting point see paper: http://arxiv.org/abs/1211.6072, another essential ingredient for particles made out of pure fields.
Then of course it is perfectly well allowed to come up with your own idea, and I would be very interested. The answer remains elusive, still …
Very best regards,
Martin

Dr. Martin B. van der Mark
Principal Scientist, Minimally Invasive Healthcare

Philips Research Europe - Eindhoven
High Tech Campus, Building 34 (WB2.025)
Prof. Holstlaan 4
5656 AE  Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 40 2747548

From: General [mailto:general-bounces+martin.van.der.mark=philips.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] On Behalf Of David Mathes
Sent: vrijdag 3 juli 2015 19:58
To: Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
Cc: jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk<mailto:jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk>
Subject: Re: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

Martin

A very stuffy paper.

Mass and energy equivalence in this paper seems a bit one sided as if mass dominates the universe, a thoroughly Machian view. Except Machian is not a local view.  While I enjoy the Machian view that this paper and Rañada's work provide , the difficulty is the mass-energy relationship you have proposed seems a bit one sided as if mass reigned supreme above energy.

p. 2  all energy has the same “essence”: it is mass 𝑚

I prefer to thing the opposite. All mass has the same essence which is energy, not that all energy has mass. Mass is simply a special case of energy density or energy-momentum. After all, a massless photon has momentum.

The flavors of mass need some clarity not addressed - gravitational, inertia, EM, and quantum. If one insists on using the strong force for an an example, then add strong mass. As to coupling, I was hoping that the level and type of coupling would have been addressed if only as a prelude to working with multiphysics programs such as COMSOL.

David
________________________________
From: "Mark, Martin van der" <martin.van.der.mark at philips.com<mailto:martin.van.der.mark at philips.com>>
To: David Mathes <davidmathes8 at yahoo.com<mailto:davidmathes8 at yahoo.com>>; Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion <general at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org<mailto:general at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org>>
Cc: "jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk<mailto:jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk>" <jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk<mailto:jgw at elec.gla.ac.uk>>
Sent: Thursday, July 2, 2015 8:44 AM
Subject: Re: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

David,
As promised, my paper. This is the philosophical one.
Protons and electrons are built from a continuous light-speed circulation of energy. That energy must take part in at least the electromagnetic interaction. Perhaps it is just  knotted light? In any case, quarks, gluons, strings, super-symmetrical particles, Planck-scale physics: all bullshit…well not entirely; the quark symmetry is there and should be there.

The other one paper is pure mathematics and it shows how Maxwell’s equation support topological solutions (knots of fields) that may be charged, and how the knots are behaving as quantum mechanical objects (the knots are also solutions to the Dirac or Klein-Gordon equation), I am in the process of drafting the text around it. A non-linear condition makes that the solutions must also obey a null-condition (invariant, being a proper spinor). All that together with the winding numbers of the knots should give enough conditions to select out only a minor number of possibilities to survive…haven’t proven that yet.
I will sent this second one in a few weeks time… actually it should be ready in two…
Cheers, Martin

Dr. Martin B. van der Mark
Principal Scientist, Minimally Invasive Healthcare

Philips Research Europe - Eindhoven
High Tech Campus, Building 34 (WB2.025)
Prof. Holstlaan 4
5656 AE  Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Tel: +31 40 2747548

From: General [mailto:general-bounces+martin.van.der.mark=philips.com at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] On Behalf Of David Mathes
Sent: donderdag 2 juli 2015 2:59
To: Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion
Subject: [General] Physics in 100 years according to Wilczek

All,

As I look at all these different models of the electron, we have all carefully grasped the elephant somewhere on the outside in an attempt to figure out what's on the inside. In our quest to determine the heart of the electron, we have compared present day notes in hopes of future results. So any description of the elephant called electron can be reduced to a series of experimental results that already exist and a limits can be placed to confine any model to reasonableness.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest...oh, forget that. What I want to know...what does the future hold for quantum and quanta and is there at least a roadmap in physics.
Specifically, what does the future hold in terms of photon models and photon-based electrons?

That is a question open to interpretation but Wilczek at least provides a framework with a few directions in his paper published in March 2015.Summarized in a brief article on PBS website, Wilczek came out with a rather bold paper on musings and wishes available on Arxiv.

A quick article from PBS...from
How Physics Will Change—and Change the World—in 100 Years — NOVA Next | PBS<http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/physics/in-100-years/>

The full paper....
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1503.07735.pdf

The paper was a fun read in spite of the physics and mathematics involved. Here is one of my favorite quotes:

"When Leon Cooper, on behalf of Brown University, asked me to contribute to their 250th anniversary by giving a talk
about the next 250 years of physics, I of course accepted immediately. Then I thought about it. I soon realized that
I’d taken on a task that is way beyond me, or (I suspect) anyone else.  So as a first step I renormalized 250 → 100."

"Here I indulge in wide-ranging speculations on the shape of physics, and technology closely related to physics, over the next one hundred years.
Themes include the many faces of unification, the reimagining of quantum theory, and new forms of engineering on small, intermediate, and large scales."

My take is that given the rapid advances in quantum computing, and Kurzweil's pending Singularity, we should  consider the Wilczek paper a roadmap good for at least 20 years. We should also consider this paper somewhat as guidance to modeling photon and electron.

Before looking forward, Wilczek summarizes the history of physics and mathematics where there has been unification. In the computer industry including Apple, HP, IBM and Microsoft, unification is also called integration. And in finance, mergers and acquisitions. But I digress.

From history, Wilczek provide a summary of unification in specific fields. I'm sure there are others but these will do.

"Names are attached not as credit but a shorthand for developments:

– Unification of algebra and geometry (Descartes)
– Unification of celestial and terrestrial physics (Galileo, Newton) – Unification of mechanics and optics (Hamilton)
– Unification of electricity, magnetism, and optics (Maxwell)
– Unification of space and time (Einstein, Minkowski)
– Unification of wave and particle (Einstein, de Broglie)
– Unification of reasoning and calculation (Boole, Turing)

end"

So he continues on the theme of unification with the Standard Model and eventually leads us into Supersymmetry (SUSY).

"For reasons I’ve detailed in an Appendix, I think the most sensible procedure is to use “Standard Model” in its original sense, to mean the electroweak theory only. "

That's interesting since most of the electron models don't even mention electroweak and prefer classical or semi-classical form of EM. However, there are couple models that have the guts to go GUT and encompass the four basic forces (or five if one treats the B field separate from E) as well as declare there is a bottom, and it is spacetime. As background, note that the Standard Model can typically be summarized using symmetry groups as

SU(3) × SU(2) × U(1) × SO(3,1)

Keep in mind that Barrett using the appropriate extensions to Maxwell's equations (Maxwell 20)  confines his "Topological Electromagnistim" to

EM only ... SU(3) × SU(2) × U(1)

Topological Foundations of Electromagnetism
http://aflb.ensmp.fr/AFLB-26j/aflb26jp055.pdf

I have two noteworthy additions to the SM.  Electrons can be spin coupled, and there is the question of phat photons, So I've wondered if the proper investigative path might be

N^2 hv == SU(4) X SU(3) × SU(2) × U(1) × SO(3,1)

Any comment or correction on this view may be of help. And yes, I have seen the equations of the universe.

From Sean Carroll
The World of Everyday Experience, In One Equation<http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2013/01/04/the-world-of-everyday-experience-in-one-equation/>

[image]<http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2013/01/04/the-world-of-everyday-experience-in-one-equation/>

The World of Everyday Experience, In One Equation<http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2013/01/04/the-world-of-everyday-experience-in-one-equation/>
Longtime readers know I feel strongly that it should be more widely appreciated that the laws underlying the physics of everyday life are completely understood. (If...

View on www.preposterousuni...<http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2013/01/04/the-world-of-everyday-experience-in-one-equation/>

Preview by Yahoo

So as I look at the various models for this SPIE conference, I wonder what is the next unification?

Could Unification of the photon and electron be next?

Perhaps a topological description of inside the electron? Or could it be the unification of spacetime and waves that provides the key insight and breakthrough?

Could it be we need to rethink how we think about things, and perhaps relearn a new way on how we learn how to learn?

And what is inside the photon?

Best Regards,

David

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