[General] Predictions

Tue May 5 20:50:43 PDT 2015

Hello John M and everyone,

I think, in general, we need to make a distinction between hypotheses and "predictions". Hypotheses are a starting point, predictions are those things that flow from that. It seems to me that most of the items below fall into the former, rather than the latter, category.

I will go blue.
________________________________
From: General [general-bounces+john.williamson=glasgow.ac.uk at lists.natureoflightandparticles.org] on behalf of John Macken [john at macken.com]
Sent: Tuesday, May 05, 2015 11:34 PM
To: Nature of Light and Particles
Subject: [General] Predictions

Hello Everyone,

Richard and I had an email exchange in which Richard wrote the following:  ¡°I have noticed that some of your predictions are about previously known facts like black holes. This kind of result is important but not conclusive for your hypothesis (I won¡¯t call it a theory) as you know. Your hypothesis should predict new results that are in the realm of testability. I am concerned that your defining the uncertainty principle in terms of Planck lengths and times is quite out of the range of present testability. It would help (maybe you have done this somewhere) if you made a list of experimentally testable new predictions from your approach, and shared that with the e-mail discussion group.¡±
I decided to make such a list, but first I want to make the following comment. It is true that a prediction that can be proven by a plausible experiment is the gold standard of a physics theory.  Most of my predictions do not reach that gold standard, but they are predictions and perhaps qualify for a silver or bronze standard.  Here is a list of some of my predictions.  The first two points below are predictions which are fundamentally unprovable by direct experiment.  However, they are mentioned because they form the background for the other predictions.
1)    Unprovable prediction #1:  My spacetime-based model of the universe ¡°predicts¡± that the basis of all particles, fields and forces are dipole waves in spacetime which produce ¡À Planck length modulation of space and ¡À Planck time modulation of the rate of time. These waves fill all of space and give the vacuum its physical properties. These waves are fundamentally undetectable as individual waves but the effects of their presence are everywhere.

That these are dipole waves in space-time is derivative to and in in addition to your fundamental starting hypothesis. Is it not?  That they are, further, "fundamentally undetectable" is a second hypothesis. This is the point I am least happy with. If it cannot be detected it cannot be disproved.

2)    Unprovable prediction #2:   Fundamental particles are units of quantized angular momentum which result in a dipole wave in spacetime circulating at the speed of light in a volume with radius equal to the particle¡¯s reduced Compton wavelength.  This activity creates a disturbance in the surrounding volume of dipole waves.  This disturbance involves standing waves at the particle¡¯s Compton wavelength.  Nonlinearities create non-oscillating effects in spacetime which we know as the particle¡¯s electric and gravitational fields.

This seems to contain a set of hypotheses: firstly that particles are "quantised angular momentum". Why not just start with quantised angular momentum and ditch the superstructure? Second, that particles are a ¡°disturbance¡± in a dipole medium ¨C though the nature of that disturbance seems not fully specified. Third, there are a set of non-specified "nonlinearities" which give rise to the actual measureable effects observed. What are these and how do they work? Differential equations would be nice.

3)    The dipole waves in spacetime exhibit what I call an ¡°interactive energy density¡± which means that other waves in spacetime which are less than Planck frequency can only interact (only couple) with a portion of the 10113 J/m3 total energy density of the dipole waves.  The predicted energy density equation is Ui = k Fp/¦Ë2.  Even though this is a quantum mechanical concept, I have supported this prediction using gravitational wave equations from general relativity. At this time I cannot suggest an experiment, but the presence of this energy density should be experimentally provable by its effect on light and physical objects.  Therefore, it is plausible that others can devise an experiment.

Again there is no prediction here. This is an extra presumption, derived from existing quantum mechanics, that you have put in. Setting the scale for an ¡°interactive energy density¡±reduces the magnitude of the fundamental problem - but the energies and masses you come up with are still very large indeed even for this reduced energy scale.

4)    I have predicted that both the gravitational force and the electrostatic force fundamentally scale with a particle¡¯s reduced Compton wavelength.  When these forces are expressed in terms of the number of reduced Compton wavelengths separating them, then the prediction was that the gravitational force and the electrostatic force are related by a simple difference in exponent.  This prediction has been shown to be correct.  The fact that it did not require an experiment has caused some to discount the importance of this prediction.  However, this relationship was previously unknown, so it has fulfilled the ultimate goal of expanding knowledge. When Maxwell developed his equations, the one that caught everyone's attention was: c =   This did not require an experiment to prove correct. At the time it was considered to be an important ¡°prediction¡± (new insight) which supported the validity of his other equations.

I do not understand this one. The gravitational force is, experimentally, inverse square with the mass, the electrostatic force inverse square with the charge. Different particles (e.g. electron and muon) have different masses, yet the same charge. The only way to make these the same difference is to divide out the mass (inversely proportional to the reduced Compton wavelength). Is this what you mean?

5)    I have proposed a new constant of nature which I call the ¡°charge conversion constant¡±. This changes any terms containing ¡°coulomb¡± into a distortion of spacetime with units of length.

This is just another constant replacing the charge with one (inversely) proportional to it.

One of the predictions resulting from analysis using this constant is the impedance of free space Zo ¡Ö 377 ¦¸ converts to the impedance of spacetime Zs = c3/G.

One can always find a constant converting one impedance to another. If a = cb then a/b =c. The conversion constant here has dimension and magnitude. You cannot then say these are the same.

This predicts that photons propagate in the spacetime field just like gravitational waves.
Is this not the other way round ¨C if you want the gravitational waves in your model to travel at lightspeed, then they must have those properties.
The spacetime field becomes the new quantum mechanical version of the aether.  Quantization of photons and the constant speed of light become conceptually understandable.
How?
 This should produce experimentally measurable results, but the experiments that I can imagine produce an effect that is about a factor of 100 too small to measure with current technology. However, when I extrapolate this effect to the limiting condition of 100% distortion of the properties of spacetime, then the prediction is that there is a limit to the intensity of light which can be transmitted by spacetime. At the time that I first made this prediction, this seemed like an impossibility.  I was very surprised and relieved when the condition which produced 100% modulation of spacetime also turned out to be the condition which formed a black hole.  Since the black hole would block any further transmission of light, this was a correct prediction.

Is this not just simply related to the usual Planck- scale problems?

6)    I have also made predictions about experiments involving the distortion of spacetime produced by static electric or magnetic fields.  Again the predicted results from experiments that I have analyzed are too small to be measured with current technology. However, more advanced experiments should be able to measure this result.  However, again the model predicts that there should be a maximum voltage for any ¡°cubic¡± vacuum capacitor.  This prediction is confirmed because the predicted maximum voltage would make a black hole.

The whole point of the Planck scale is it is that scale at which the QM scale meets the black-hole radius. Is this a surprise? Anyway your view of experimental confirmation differs from mine. For me, experiments are things you can do not things you can¡¯t do. Practically, space breaks down and electrons jump at far lower voltages than is required to make a black hole. The fact that one cannot do an experiment in principle does not confirm a theory - merely makes it untestable in that respect.

7)    The spacetime-based cosmological model of the universe makes several predictions. The first is that the universe did not start from a singularity but started as the highest possible observable energy density that spacetime allows.

Your starting presumption is, is it not, that all of space is full of this high energy density. Why, then is it not big-banging (like) all of the time?

The transformation that follows looks like the Big Bang. The first cosmological prediction is that what we perceive as the expansion of the universe is actually a transformation of the properties of spacetime. In this transformation, the rate of time in the universe is continuously decreasing and the proper volume of the universe is increasing. In this model, the rate of time and volume are inversely connected.  If we could compare the rate of time today to the rate of time a billion years ago, our rate of time today would be slower.

This may be so

The apparent expansion is actually the result of spacetime changing in a way that we and our instruments are shrinking.  The redshift of distant galaxies is an observable fact.

Muddied by the experimental observation of Arp-type objects

  However, the expansion of the universe is merely a theoretical interpretation of the redshift, not an experimentally observable fact.  We only observe a redshift and interpret this as an expansion of the universe.

True.

The spacetime-based model gives the same redshift but the interpretation is different.  The experimental conformation of the predicted model of the universe will have to come from astrophysicists interpreting data differently.

You will still have to deal with Arp type objects

8)    According to the commonly accepted model of the universe, galaxies with redshift beyond z = 1.8 are currently crossing our particle horizon and moving away from us at faster than the speed of light. That model predicts that distance galaxies will eventually disappear from our view because their faster than light expansion will carry them beyond our particle horizon.  The spacetime-based model makes a different prediction.  This model predicts that the currently visible distant galaxies will not disappear from our view.  Instead, the counter intuitive prediction is that in the future those distant galaxies will appear to be more distant, but they will also have a smaller redshift.  Furthermore, other galaxies currently beyond our particle horizon, will become observable in the future.  This prediction takes a lengthy explanation.  The prediction¡¯s accuracy should become obvious in a million years or so. However, theory and observation can probably be combined to verify this prediction sooner.

Two observations: we do not currently observe galaxies with many millions of light years of the (then) lightspeed edge, as they are redshifted almost to oblivion (and they were pretty far away anyway). There are anyway other theories (like Hoyle's) with similar properties - one does not need a huge energy density in background space for this.

There are actually more predictions that are not included here because they require a more lengthy explanation and the means of verification is not obvious.

John M.

I really like the fundamental idea that ¡°everything is made of spacetime¡±. I do not see why, however, you feel the need to start at the point where quantum theory and general relativity break down. For the description of photons and electrons, why not just start with quantised angular momentum if you are just putting that in anyway and it does not follow from your model of space? I¡¯m confused: what is the added value?

For me, and for many in this group, particles are made from fields. Fields are something you can measure and observe. The underlying space-time you propose cannot, by hypothesis, be measured or observed. You dismiss the models we are proposing as being made of ¡°castles in the air¡±, and this may be so, but at least the ¡°air¡± in which those models are being proposed is an observable ¡°air¡±. Not un-measureable in principle.

In conclusion, my own feeling is that the particular model you propose for the nature of space-time has, at present, more going into it in the way of hypotheses than is coming out of it in terms of predictions.

Regards, John W.

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