[General] The New Aether

[John Williamson]

Hi John M,

I think you are confusing proof and disproof. There tends to a be a popular mis-conception that an experiment can "prove" a theory. Not so, an experiment may be consistent or inconsistent with a theory - no more. This means that a well-constructed experiment may, in a sense, disprove a theory, but not prove it. If an experiment is inconsistent with a theory - within the realm of validity of that theory - then that theory should, in the proper operation of the scientific method, be either modified or discarded.

Now you have raised some questions below, not of any of our models, but of science as it stands. Though this has little or nothing to do with the subject of the upcoming conference, I am going to try to help you by answering those questions, within the context of science-as-it-stands. I'm not then going to enter into further discussion to defend those theories for you - this is not my job and I have neither the time nor the energy for it. If you want to go deeper into this you can read the papers on it by Feynmann and others, or look into one of the many textbooks on QED. This is a one off. I will answer in blue.
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From: General [general-bounces+john.williamson=glasgow.ac.uk at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] on behalf of John Macken [john at macken.com]
Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2015 8:52 PM
To: 'Nature of Light and Particles - General Discussion'
Subject: Re: [General] The New Aether

Vivian and All.

I have been away and was not able to answer Vivian’s objections contained in her July 17 post dealing with my paper titled “Energetic Spacetime: the New Aether”.  On several of her points she demanded that I had to be able to show the experimental proof in order for a point to be valid.

This is not so. Viv was talking about a discrepancy with experiment.

  I must admit that as I read this comment I wondered why this demand was being directed at me.  Everyone in this group including Vivian and Chandra has offered theoretical models which lack experimental proof.

This mis-states the position of others.

In fact, most progress in physics happens when a theoretical prediction is made which initially lacks experimental proof.

Not so. It is discrepancy with the existing body of knowledge that usually drives folk to question. The initial driving discrepancy may not, indeed, correspond with what are later seen as "successes" of a model.

The experimental proof then follows as the idea matures.

No theory is ever "proven" by any one experiment.

For example, general relativity was purely theoretical until the bending of light by the sun’s gravity was experimentally measured in 1919.  The experiment would not have been performed without the theoretical prediction.

Oh yes it would. Photons would have been known to carry energy and momentum. there would have been an argument like that in Martin's "light is heavy" and someone would have looked at how these move in a gravitational field by now.

General relativity remains unproven. It is only the case that, to first order, General relativity is consistent with the facts.

Another problem is that objections were registered without also addressing the arguments I gave to support my conclusions.  The central point was that there is no support for my contention that vacuum energy has energy density in excess to 10-9 J/m3. However, before addressing this point, I want to discuss the competition to my model of particles and forces.  The competition has the electrostatic force being transferred by virtual photons.  There is absolutely no experimental proof that virtual photons transfer the electrostatic force.  In fact, there are numerous reasons to doubt this.

John, there is a theory called quantum electrodynamics (QED). It is consistent with a vast range of experimental phenomena. Have you ever studied it? I'm going to give some trite answers based on that theory - and which I could have answered as a postgrad back in 1980. I will not come back to defend them because I myself do not think QED is complete, but I have better things to do than to regurgitate things you could read from a big book. I recommend "Landau and Lifshitz - QED". Anyway, showing that someone else has a problem - even if you had done that which you have not - does not then prove that you are right.

For example: 1) How is attraction achieved?

As I have said before in many posts: virtual photons can carry negative 4-momentum squared.

2) How does an electric field achieve measurable energy density from “virtual” photons?

You have a lot of them.

3) What exactly is a virtual photon? (size, wavelength, frequency, etc.)

Stupid question. Any size, any wavelength , any frequency. Even "real" photons can do that.  A virtual photon is a theoretical construct in the theory of QED. Read the book.

  4) How does a virtual photon locate a distant electron?

Good point. This is relatively hard. It is dealt with in QED by assigning a probability to emit (based on the fine structure constant) and a probability to absorb (ditto). The primary interaction matrix element then goes as alpha- squared times some geometrical factors.  You need to understand as well that, as the distant electron becomes more and more distant the "virtual" photon becomes less and less virtual and more and more real. In fact, even for a few tens of wavelengths, the exchange photon is 99.9999 percent "real". There are higher order effects for exotic kinds of interactions (virtual photons!). These, if calculated - give pretty much exactly the effects observed in experiment.

To understand the deeper implied point better, however, you need to look first at Carver Mead's keynote talk at last years SPIE conference. Then look at Al Kracklauer's translation of Tetrode's paper (look on his website), then read Wheeler and Feynmann's paper then try to understand how this can still be consistent with causality (this is hard and may take you some time. Think - energy.).

  I could go on, but you get the point.

I could go on but you get the point.

Also, the competition says that the gravitational force is transferred by either the geometry of curved spacetime or by virtual gravitons. Both of these also have problems.  Curved spacetime is fine to explain a particle following a geodesic, but there is a real force when two masses are physically held apart.  Where does this force come from?

Easy: masses share the "bend". Many hands make light work. All that sort of thing.

Curved spacetime does not explain the gravitational force.

Oh yes it does. Do you think no-one would have noticed? Many others in the group ... Viv, David, Reg, Al ... know much more about this than I do. It would be good for you to talk to them at the conference.

In other words, there is no experimental proof that the geometry of spacetime can generate a force corresponding to the gravitational force. Also, gravitons have many of the same problems previously enumerated for virtual photons.  There is no experimental proof of gravitons.

True - as far as I know. Unless someone in the wider group, more specialist or widely-read than I knows better? David? Reg? Al? The fact that there is no proof for someone else's theory has little, or no, bearing on your own though. Also, while there is no experimental "proof" for gravitons there is no experimental disproof either. No inconsistency with experiment then. Also gravitons have absolutely nothing to do with the upcoming conference.

My explanation of both the electrostatic force and gravity is based on the idea that vacuum energy is real.  The uncertainty principle implies that the distance between points varies by ± Planck length (Lp) and perfect clocks in flat spacetime can differ by ± Planck time (Tp).  This simple insight is the basis for the wave-based energy density of spacetime.  This energy density has been calculated and shown to be vastly different from the observable energy density which averages10-9 J/m3. It is also the basis of everything in the universe – all particles, fields and forces. No extra dimensions are needed.  How come when people freely propose extra dimensions there is no chorus demanding experimental proof?  However, when energetic spacetime is assumed, then objections are heard even though there is numerous reasons to believe that the vacuum has energy density.

I think the main reason for this is that energies and masses on this scale are simply not observed. When people make up extra dimensions they do so usually in an area where they ought not to be observed - being very small or only manifesting at an absurdly large energy scale. You start in an area where such energies and masses - if they are energies and masses - should by easily observed by looking out of the window.

Unlike virtual messenger particles transferring forces, this wave-based particle model has real predictions which were easy to prove correct.

This statement is simply not true. QED predicts, it is true, but it also calculates. So far, with the possible exception of tiny discrepancies in the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon w.r.t. that of the electron, its calculations agree exactly with experiment. It calculates to many decimal places. Experiment is still catching up with extending those decimal places by further orders. Down at one part in a million or less. You have shouted a lot about your model - but the only actual number I have seen calculated from it -  the electron charge- is out by more than two orders of magnitude.

For example, the first set of predictions were that both the electrostatic force and the gravitational force were the result of waves generated by fundamental particles at the particle’s Compton frequency.  When these forces were expressed in the natural units of the particles, they would reveal that gravity was a nonlinear effect that scaled with wave amplitude squared and electrostatic effects scaled with wave amplitude to the first power.  In other words, it should be possible to prove or disprove whether this model was correct by doing either a calculation or an experiment which tested this relationship.  In the paper Spacetime Based Foundation of Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity equations 15 to 23 show that these predictions are correct.

I looked at this, but all you seem to have done, to me, is plugged in Newton's force law - and a set of other well-known relations in your equation 13, provided only that you also plug in a value of the electron charge which is more than two orders of magnitude out. This is not, in my a book, a prediction. Also, even after all of this, you seem to get no further than Newton's law of gravitation.

  I have subsequently generated other equations showing the close relationship between the gravitational force and the electrostatic force. This “foundation” paper was previously attached to my posts and is also available at http://onlyspacetime.com/QM-Foundation.pdf

<http://onlyspacetime.com/QM-Foundation.pdf>

Both the Newtonian gravitational equation and the Coulomb law equation have been experimentally verified.

To a first approximation. The Newton theory is modified, as you know in GR and the Coulomb law breaks down at short distances (the running coupling constant).

Therefore, showing how there equations are related by a square is the same as doing an experiment.

Oh no it isn't.

The fact they are related by an inverse square shows only that both are consistent, to first order, with being transmitted by a conserved fluid in 3D. No more and no less.

If you are looking for predictions which have not been experimentally verified, I have those also.  In chapter 9 of my book I discuss an electric field experiment  that should be possible but difficult. However, even then I am able to show that it is possible to verify the accuracy of the prediction with a thought experiment.  Suppose that it was possible to increase the intensity of a laser beam to arbitrarily large powers.  If the beam is focused to 1 wavelength in diameter, then the prediction is that it should be possible to reach a condition where the properties of spacetime would achieve 100% modulation of the vacuum energy density at the laser’s wavelength.  Spacetime should be incapable of transmitting more power than the predicted 100% modulation level through the focused spot.  Imagine that this experiment was performed by some advanced civilization.  At great expense, they would discover that this prediction was correct.  The 100% modulation level corresponds to the level that makes a black hole.  Once the black hole forms, no further light could be transmitted through this volume of spacetime – just as predicted.

Dear John, you seem quite safe to me for the time being with this experiment. I tried doing the sums. Perhaps I made a mistake so correct me if I am wrong. The poor old laser, if blue, would need a  power source rather larger than that which could be obtained by annihilating the entire universe with an equivalent antimatter universe- since the energy contained in a 200nm (Half the wavelength of blue light) cube in your model, to get to "the 100 percent modulation limit" far exceeds the energy of the energy of the entire universe by many many orders of magnitude. This is going to take some serious engineering. Do the sums.  Also, I would not recommend having a go at this as annihilating the whole of our universe, just to "prove" a theory would not necessarily be a good idea.

Finally, the “New Aether” paper contains a new calculation which gives the “interactive” density ρi,

The fact you put "interactive" in quotes is telling.

energy density Ui, mass mi and energy ei encountered by a gravitational wave with angular frequency ω and reduced wavelength λ.  Ignoring the numerical constant k, these equations are very simple:

ρi = ω2/G
Ui = Fp/λ2
mi = Zs/ω
ei = Fpλ

These are all explained in the aether paper.  I know that none of these will not be completely satisfying, but they are given because they imply that different frequencies encounter different amount of energy density.  Only Planck frequency encounters 10113 J/m3 energy density.

If interactive, these interactions are huge on a human scale. You should be able to feel them by waving your hand. You do not.

If you have no need for a higher frequency than the Compton frequency of the Higgs boson, then you need not concern yourself with energy density higher than about 1046 J/m3.  This also happens to be the energy density of the Higgs field from QED.

The Higgs field is not in QED. It is an additional part of the "standard model".  QED deals with just the interaction of light and (charged) matter.

John, a general comment. I have been putting a lot of effort and time into this for your benefit and for the benefit of others in the group. I like some of what you have done, and have been doing, and there is some serious content in some aspects of your ideas. Attacking others, especially physics-as-it-stands, is a waste of everyone's energy and talent. It is beginning to piss me off. Please stick to either developing your own ideas, or posting (preferably constructive) criticism of things that are actually in the theme of this conference.

John M.

Regards, John W.
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