Science-based criticisms of Farsight's Theories

[swansont]

Captain: here are my answers to the questions you listed.

 

 

 

Because a photon isn't an indivisible "particle" like the electron. It can be divided, as evidenced by pair production and subsequent annihilation which transforms one gamma photon into two. A photon can be viewed as a transverse wave in an "elastic medium" that we call space, with an energy of 1022KeV or 511KeV or any other value. A free electron moving at non-relativistic or very low velocity has an energy of 511KeV, and can be viewed as a moebius soliton configuration of a 511KeV photon accounting for both charge and mass. An electron's charge is not something that is possessed by a billiard-ball point particle. It is part of what the electron is. The mass is simply a measure of the 511KeV when momentum is re-presented as inertia by virtue of tying the photon to one location.

 

A bound electron can be viewed as a stretched elastic loop, and changes in the degree of stretch are achieved via the transmission of photons. In this geometrical model, there are no billiard-ball particles, and no solid surfaces. There are only waves, and stable soliton configurations of those waves. There is nothing other than waves to effect a change in the bond of the stable soliton we call an electron.

 

Why no excited state of an electron, if this is just a photon going around a circle? Surely you can make it go an additional wavelength or half wavelength? Or just use a different wavelength?

 

How does all of this stay consistent with Maxwell's equations?

 

But note that this thread is a Science-based criticism of Farsight's theories. And yet it has pointedly avoided the very topic it pretends to address.

 

...

 

Yes, I class this essay as a speculation, because it isn't in accord with accepted theory. But can we have a science-based criticism of it please? Can somebody show, using a rational argument, why this essay is wrong and why time travel is possible?

 

You have been given loads of science-based criticism, starting with "you need to make it predictive so it can be tested. (i.e. where's the math?)" The split was precipitated by your claim that everything is made of photons, and what followed were a whole bunch of objection based on scientific theories and observations. It is exceedingly apparent that you are using a different definition of that phrase than most of the rest of us.

[Reaper]

A bound electron can be viewed as a stretched elastic loop' date=' and changes in the degree of stretch are achieved via the transmission of photons. In this geometrical model, there are no billiard-ball particles, and no solid surfaces. There are only waves, and stable soliton configurations of those waves. There is nothing other than waves to effect a change in the bond of the stable soliton we call an electron.

[/quote']

 

If I'm understanding you correctly, you're now saying that it is geometry that is responsible for a particles existence, not photons. So first, which is it? Second, how does a photon transmit photons? Is it transmitting itself? Third, a photon has no charge, so how do you possibly get a particle with charge -1 from a particle with charge 0?

 

A photon is a boson, which is a transmitter of packets of energy, more specifically responsible for the electro-magnetic force. The energy of a photon itself varies, but it carries discrete packets of energy.

 

 

And if there are only waves, then how do you explain the photoelectric effect? The photoelectric effect occurs because particles (i.e. photons) with specific energies are knocking electrons right off, which is where we get E(photon) = hv. Red light, for instance, will never be able to eject any electrons no matter the intensity, while if you shine a violet light a few electrons are knocked off but have much greater energies.

[Norman Albers]

Starting in 2001, I looked at all the ways you could try to put two halves of a sinusoidal form around a loop. I actually looked at energy densities of these tested forms. Notice that in my electron theory I hypothesize a near-field current circulation, a thing which QM sidesteps. Investigating [math]A_r [/math] and [math]A_\theta[/math] forms always yielded something untenable, geometrically if not energetically. There were alternating quadrants of +/- infinite density, so I moved on to work with [math]A_\phi[/math] and this does yield reasonable near-fields. If there is circulation as I propose, the revolution equals phase precession which would be expected, so you produce a consistently outward (or inward) electric field, one of the same phase all around. For a few months in 2003 I walked around exclaiming "Moebius doughnuts!" to wondering friends. I have not shown why electron spin is 1/2-bar. You can imagine remnants of the form of photon going around in "frozen phase" but I rather see it as a different stable state of the same energy of photons which underwent interaction. This should not raise eyebrows because we work with conservation of energy, no? I am working to form a theoretic vision where we realize all the phenomena we speak of as manifestations of the vacuum polarizability. I do find Farsight romantic and mathematically wanting, and stuck on preserving individual photons. I am doing something more subtle.

[BenTheMan]

It can be divided, as evidenced by pair production and subsequent annihilation which transforms one gamma photon into two.

 

Great. The photon can be divided. Then why do we exist? Why is there matter? Photons are obvioulsy the lowest energy state, and the second law of thermodynamics demands that the universe should be filled with only photons?

 

A photon can be viewed as a transverse wave in an "elastic medium" that we call space, with an energy of 1022KeV or 511KeV or any other value.

 

This idea is called the ether, and has been disproven by experiments before 1900. You are a bit late with this revelation.

 

A free electron moving at non-relativistic or very low velocity has an energy of 511KeV, and can be viewed as a moebius soliton configuration of a 511KeV photon accounting for both charge and mass.

 

Two things. First, how can a transverse wave be put into a ``moebius soliton configuration''? You haven't specified a mechanism, only waved your hands and said ``This CAN happen and this CAN happen''.

 

Secondlt, the extreme irony in all of this is, of course, you are describing something which looks very much like string theory. Fundamental particles are just excitations of the most fundamental object, the string. This is quite hillarious, because we all remember this:

 

You're paid to do String Theory. It isn't a theory and strings are long gone. It's The Trouble with Physics remember? ... But whatever else would I expect from a String Theorist?

 

Either way, you will deny this, because you don't understand string theory, and you seem to have only read page 105 of Lee Smolin's book. This was quite a nice laugh for me this afternoon, Farsight, so I will thank you for it.

 

Back to your response:

 

An electron's charge is not something that is possessed by a billiard-ball point particle. It is part of what the electron is.

 

This statement is void of any meaning. Sure, charge is part of what an electron is. But you haven't explained what this statement means, or how one can home to get charge from a photon. You have said something akin to ``Just believe what I say, because I am right.'' You will no doubt point me to ``Charge Explained'', which I will no doubt not read.

 

The mass is simply a measure of the 511KeV when momentum is re-presented as inertia by virtue of tying the photon to one location.

 

In whos frame? Inertia, as you surely know, is a frame dependant quantity.

[Norman Albers]

Harking back to pair production from high-luminosity light-fields, check out this reference to DESY free-electron laser plans, and the mention of Schwinger pair production. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6TVN-43856N6-F&_user=10&_coverDate=06%2F21%2F2001&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=0d6b1d20cfa94bb0c16b9fc52cbb4a90 ........Good suggestion from BenTheMan; we certainly know Maxwell's equations fail on the level of quanta, but I offer a path here and hope to publish with solidspin a furthering of the Schroedinger equation. Someone with your knowledge could certainly help, Ben. Further question: why is there an energy ceiling on photons as you mentioned? Do higher-energy bosons take over the scenario?

[BenTheMan]

Further question: why is there an energy ceiling on photons as you mentioned? Do higher-energy bosons take over the scenario?

 

Absolutely. We only have photons because they are left over from electroweak symmetry breaking, which happens at 10^-12 seconds after the big bang. So before this, there are no photons, plain and simple. Before this time, the universe is filled with a quark-gluon plasma. The electro-weak symmetry breaking gives mass to three of the four electroweak bosons. Only the photon remains massless. Again, we know that this is experimentally the case because the electroweak force is a short range force, which means that the gauge bosons which mediate the force MUST be massive. We can even measure the distances and we get exactly what we expect---the electroweak force is only important on distances equivalent with the compton wavelength of the massive Z boson (mass=91 GeV or so). And the mass of the Z boson is the most accurately measured parameter in the standard model. In physics, we say that the electro-weak force is spontaneously broken to electromagnetism.

 

You can look at the wiki entry for the big bang timeline if you'd like:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_timeline#The_electroweak_epoch

 

So in Farsight's proposal, the quarks and gluons are MADE of particles that don't even exist yet, in terms of the early universe. My guess is that he has some alternative explanation to the big bang as well.

 

This is an important point, and it is my next argument against farsight's ideas. It is a bit weaker than the first argument, because we know very well how pions decay, and we haven't observed the higgs boson yet (although keep your ear to the ground for news from FermiLab). As of yet, however, Farsight still hasn't answered satisfactorily any of the questions that anyone has posed him in this thread.

[Norman Albers]

Thank you for very helpful teachings, BenTheMan. Just considering wave packets from my perspective, with higher and higher frequency, the intensity of field strength in a photon gets hugely higher. If you assume there is conformal shrinking with higher k, as I do using a "number of cycles", or rather an envelope parameter of a certain strength (the FSC) dictated by the vacuum response, then fields must rise by the fourth power. It's clear to me that at some point you are going to hit a fundamental phase change and you describe how we are in a further regime. I figured we are around muon mass-energy, but you put the whole enchilada right in my face.

[Reaper]

This is an important point, and it is my next argument against farsight's ideas. It is a bit weaker than the first argument, because we know very well how pions decay, and we haven't observed the higgs boson yet (although keep your ear to the ground for news from FermiLab). As of yet, however, Farsight still hasn't answered satisfactorily any of the questions that anyone has posed him in this thread.

 

Be patient BenTheMan. We will knock him right out soon enough. Give him time to prepare.........

[elas]

Farsight

 

Hi elas. We are barking up the same tree. These guys have never seen CHARGE EXPLAINED. And if they did, they wouldn't read it.

 

Personal circumstances greatly limit the time I can spend on my theory and I missed your comment earlier, hence the delay in replying.

My work has twice been rejected as being to confusing without any detailed explanation. I have got around these rejections by re-writing my theory using only the three main sequences of Hall fractions (Jain, Laughlin and pseudo fractions). This turned out to be a worthwhile change because it has enabled me to show that the same structural theory can be applied to atomic structure.

At present I am working my way through a final check, but the uncorrected work is on:

http://69.5.17.59/clf4.pdf

The one glaring error discovered so far, is the statement on Energy which should be correct to read:

Energy changes in inverse proportion to the change in particle fraction

regards

elas

[Farsight]

How do you get to this equation? I'd quite like to see a rigourse mathematical approach instead of "it can be viewed as x"

 

I can't show you a rigorous mathematical approach. I don't know how, and it isn't easy: check out the moebius strip and how it's been a mathematical problem for decades.

 

See above. How does either of these situations match the predictions of quantum mechanics?

 

An entity like an electron exhibits wave/particle duality because it's a soliton. It isn't some billiard ball nugget that has "got" charge, the charge is part of the topological defect that the electron is. It doesn't have a surface, and you can only detect it with something just like it. You end up with just waves and geometry, and the closest analogy I can give is that the wave function is what it is.

 

Also it's very difficult to scientifically critisis something that claimes to be science yet makes no mathematical predictions.

 

And I'm still not seeing any scientific criticism that actually refers to my "theories". Even now, nobody is asking me questions about TIME EXPLAINED, which is the issue that brought us here.

 

**************************************

Yes, asking how a photon can be turned into an electron, but Farsight hasn't addressed it (yet). All I've seen is some bit about how the photon becomes a loop of some sort, but that doesn't explain anything.

 

I've addressed it in CHARGE EXPLAINED. If you'd like to refer to it and challenge some aspect of it, no problem. But I'm seeing a continued refusal to even read my essays, which IMHO makes a mockery of Science-based criticism of Farsight's Theories.

 

*************************************

Why no excited state of an electron, if this is just a photon going around a circle? Surely you can make it go an additional wavelength or half wavelength? Or just use a different wavelength?

 

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dielectric_relaxation. If the loop isn't just sitting there as a free electron it isn't being stretched and it isn't relaxing. No you can't make it go round an additional wavelength or just use a different wavelength.

 

How does all of this stay consistent with Maxwell's equations?

 

How? I don't know. But if you read CHARGE EXPLAINED you might learn more.

 

You have been given loads of science-based criticism, starting with "you need to make it predictive so it can be tested. (i.e. where's the math?)" The split was precipitated by your claim that everything is made of photons, and what followed were a whole bunch of objection based on scientific theories and observations. It is exceedingly apparent that you are using a different definition of that phrase than most of the rest of us.

 

Here we go again, no actual reference to "Farsight's Theories" but plenty of criticism.

 

*****************************************

If I'm understanding you correctly, you're now saying that it is geometry that is responsible for a particles existence, not photons. So first, which is it?

 

The photon is not some little billiard ball particle. Do you remember I used

quotes around the word "particle" when I was talking about photons? A photon is a transverse wave. It's just geometry.

 

Second, how does a photon transmit photons? Is it transmitting itself? Third, a photon has no charge, so how do you possibly get a particle with charge -1 from a particle with charge 0?

 

What do you mean how does a photon transmit photons? You can't get a particle with charge -1 from a particle with charge zero. You have to use pair production, and then you get a particle with charge +1 and another with charge -1. This is obvious. The fact that nobody has responded to you on this makes me think that this thread is dishonest.

 

A photon is a boson, which is a transmitter of packets of energy, more specifically responsible for the electro-magnetic force. The energy of a photon itself varies, but it carries discrete packets of energy. And if there are only waves, then how do you explain the photoelectric effect? The photoelectric effect occurs because particles (i.e. photons) with specific energies are knocking electrons right off, which is where we get E(photon) = hv. Red light, for instance, will never be able to eject any electrons no matter the intensity, while if you shine a violet light a few electrons are knocked off but have much greater energies.

 

Red light doesn't shake hard enough.

[YT2095]

just an observation here, but you`ve wasted so much time and keyboard ink on Complaining about this thread, you may as well have just answered the questions that were asked you in the 1`st place.

 

Don`cha think?

[Farsight]

Great. The photon can be divided. Then why do we exist? Why is there matter? Photons are obviously the lowest energy state, and the second law of thermodynamics demands that the universe should be filled with only photons?

 

Why do we exist? Go ask a philosopher.

 

Why is there matter? Because stable solitons are knots.

 

Photons are obviously the lowest energy state? No, they're just the simplest.

 

This idea is called the ether, and has been disproven by experiments before 1900. You are a bit late with this revelation.

 

It's space. And you still haven't read TIME EXPLAINED, or you would have noticed the 1920 Leyden address quote from Einstein:

 

"According to the general theory of relativity, space is endowed with physical qualities; in this sense, therefore, there exists an ether. According to the general theory of relativity space without ether is unthinkable; for in such space there not only would be no propagation of light, but also no possibility of existence for standards of space and time (measuring-rods and clocks), nor therefore any space-time intervals in the physical sense. But this ether may not be thought of as endowed with the quality characteristic of ponderable inedia, as consisting of parts which may be tracked through time. The idea of motion may not be applied to it".

 

Two things. First, how can a transverse wave be put into a "moebius soliton configuration''? You haven't specified a mechanism, only waved your hands and said "This CAN happen and this CAN happen''.

 

Here's how it works. I explain it. You don't read it. Then you give your Science-based criticism of Farsight's Theories and say I'm waving my hands.

 

Secondly, the extreme irony in all of this is, of course, you are describing something which looks very much like string theory. Fundamental particles are just excitations of the most fundamental object, the string. This is quite hillarious, because we all remember this:

 

No chance. There's not a string in sight. RELATIVITY+ is geometry in 3+1 dimensions.

 

Either way, you will deny this, because you don't understand string theory, and you seem to have only read page 105 of Lee Smolin's book. This was quite a nice laugh for me this afternoon, Farsight, so I will thank you for it.

 

Captain: can we have a little moderation here?

 

This statement is void of any meaning. Sure, charge is part of what an electron is. But you haven't explained what this statement means, or how one can home to get charge from a photon. You have said something akin to "Just believe what I say, because I am right.'' You will no doubt point me to "Charge Explained'', which I will no doubt not read.

 

It's somewhat rich for you to claim I don't explain something such as charge when you refuse to read my essay CHARGE EXPLAINED.

 

In whose frame? Inertia, as you surely know, is a frame dependant quantity.

 

In the frame of somebody comoving with the electron. I've got an essay on REFERENCE FRAMES too.

 

********************************************************

just an observation here, but you`ve wasted so much time and keyboard ink on Complaining about this thread, you may as well have just answered the questions that were asked you in the 1`st place.

 

Don`cha think?

 

What questions? A scattergun of red herrings covering the whole Standard Model and any other mendacious distraction anybody can think up?

 

I'm still not seeing any Science-based criticism of Farsight's theories here This thread was spun out of the time travel and wormholes thread, where I said time travel is impossible. And still nobody will actually read TIME EXPLAINED where I explain why. Groan. People would rather believe in time travel than read why it is not possible.

 

Nor will they read ENERGY EXPLAINED, or MASS EXPLAINED or CHARGE EXPLAINED and ask me direct challenging and relevant questions on the contents therein. Ben's comment above says it all. He effectively says Farsight doesn't explain, and simply will not admit that We don't want to know.

 

Now, if you'll excuse me, the sun is shining and I've got things to do.

[YT2095]

Captain: can we have a little moderation here?

 

Wait a minute here you`re asking for Moderators, after saying THIS:

 

 

Or will you go squealing to the moderators to get it kicked into pseudoscience, and you do not even need to read it because you know it's wrong? LOL, you pseudoscientist string-theory quack.

 

I love the Irony

[Klaynos]

I can't show you a rigorous mathematical approach. I don't know how, and it isn't easy: check out the moebius strip and how it's been a mathematical problem for decades.

 

Ok, then, how do you know it's true? This as as much scientific integrity as me saying that it's small goblins doing it all.

 

An entity like an electron exhibits wave/particle duality because it's a soliton. It isn't some billiard ball nugget that has "got" charge, the charge is part of the topological defect that the electron is. It doesn't have a surface, and you can only detect it with something just like it. You end up with just waves and geometry, and the closest analogy I can give is that the wave function is what it is.

 

You need to explain HOW you come to these conclusions, which are predictions and therefore should be mathematical . It seems to me that you're just plucking ideas out of the air, which is not science.

 

We can't critise your ideas as science, because they are NOT science.

[elas]

swansont

 

You failed to mention that the photon shown in the standard neutron decay diagram, has never been observed experimentally. Or that the rarely observed alternative is electron and positron instead of electron and anti-neutrino; both results are needed to produce an interpretation.

[BenTheMan]

Why do we exist? Go ask a philosopher.

 

Why is there matter? Because stable solitons are knots.

 

Photons are obviously the lowest energy state? No, they're just the simplest.

 

If photons make up matter, via these stable configurations, then there must be some energy in binding them---that is, it should take some energy to force it from its classical path (i.e. a geodesic) into a closed loop. In order to create different particles, the photon in the loop has to have a different frequence. (Again I point out to the exprets---not to Farsight---that this is exactly the same situation in string theory.)

 

So in a sense you can excite different particles by adding energy to the loop. The problem is, however, that the act of exciting things requires energy, so there are some states that have higher energy than other states. This COULD explain why pions are not stable (if it weren't for the other problems when it comes to pions, that you STILL haven't addressed)---they are not a lowest energy configuration.

 

The point of all of this is, though, that the lowest energy configuration of a photon IS a photon, and not an electron, because making an electron by forming a little loop out of a string, (sorry, photon), costs energy. The second law of thermodynamics (which I'll assume you believe)says that things tend to their lowest energy states. Why, then, does matter exist?

 

If you believe the validity of the second law of thermodynamics, shouldn't the universe be filled with photons, and NO matter?

 

If you say that there is NO energy required in binding the photon, then the entire universe should be in equilibrium with ALL particles. But there are clearly more photons than anything else.

 

Here's how it works. I explain it. You don't read it. Then you give your Science-based criticism of Farsight's Theories and say I'm waving my hands.

 

I have, as of yet, seen NO explanation of this here.

 

"According to the general theory of relativity, space is endowed with physical qualities; in this sense, therefore, there exists an ether. According to the general theory of relativity space without ether is unthinkable; for in such space there not only would be no propagation of light, but also no possibility of existence for standards of space and time (measuring-rods and clocks), nor therefore any space-time intervals in the physical sense. But this ether may not be thought of as endowed with the quality characteristic of ponderable inedia, as consisting of parts which may be tracked through time. The idea of motion may not be applied to it".

 

Einstein is saying that the ether is frame independant, and very much an abstract idea. This may be what you were saying earlier, you never really clarified the point. I always hear...alternative scientists...using this quote when talking about their ideas. This and ``Remeber Gentlemen---we haven't shown that the ether doesn't exist, we have only shown that we don't need it for calculations.'' Either way, both of these quotes are out of context.

 

No chance. There's not a string in sight. RELATIVITY+ is geometry in 3+1 dimensions.

 

I will ask, do you derive the number of space-time dimensions, or just put it in? You will be forced to answer (as will ALL non-string quantum gravity people) that you just put it in. I will ask, wouldn't it be nice if we could DERIVE 3+1 dimensions from some fundamental theory? The correct answer is yes. Then I will point to the fact that the requirement for ghost cancellation (i.e. quantum consistency) in string theory GIVES a prediction for the dimension of space-time.

 

Terribly sorry for the digression there, but I have spent several years studying the subject, and you appear to get all of your information from Lee Smolin. Either way, what you are describing is very similar to string theory, whether you like it or not.

 

Farsight, you continue to whine about nobody reading your work. I ask you---if you were sitting next to Einstein, wouldn't you rather have him explain things to you personally, than have to read it written in a book that is intended for a wide audience? I read mass explained and time explained once, and I found it very vague, with quotes like ``Do you think you understand time? You don't. I do''. This is one of the reasons that I haven't read any of your other essays---I have learned more about your ideas by talking to you. Plus there are no equations, and I rarely ever read the words in a physics paper anyway, unless the guy who wrote it is a good writer.

 

And I'm still not seeing any scientific criticism that actually refers to my "theories".

 

When I say ``Your theories'', I am specifically referring to the ansatz that all particles are some topological excitations of photons. As of yet I have seen no acceptable clairfications of the following (``scientific'') points.

=>Why do pions decay into different numbers of photons?

=>How do you explain neutrinos, which have no observed decays into photons?

=>Why is the universe not filled with photons?

=>How can one force a photon from its classical path (a geodesic) into a closed loop?

 

These are four experimental results which challenge your theories, namely

=>Pions decay into 2, 3, or four photons, see http://pdg.lbl.gov/

=>Neutrinos don't couple to photons, see above.

=>The universe contains matter.

=>Photons always travel along geodesics, a well-known result from GR.

 

This entire post, I hope you realize, has been a ``science-based'' challenge to the idea that all particles are made of photons.

[swansont]

swansont

 

You failed to mention that the photon shown in the standard neutron decay diagram, has never been observed experimentally. Or that the rarely observed alternative is electron and positron instead of electron and anti-neutrino; both results are needed to produce an interpretation.

 

^{[math]n \rightarrow e^+ + e^-[/math]} ? Do you have a cite for this? Baryon number isn't conserved. What happened to all the quarks?

[BenTheMan]

Yeah I read that and didn't quite understand what he was talking about. It is not so hard to confuse me about these things

 

Nearest I can figure is that he means this

 

 

where he's calling the wavy line a photon. But it's not a photon, it's a W boson. And it isn't observed in this reaction because it's virtual. It's always virtual (and off-shell) because it is massive, which ALSO explains why the weak force is a short range force, which ALSO explains why we need a higgs boson. But, you know, I am easily confused about these things.

[iNow]

I can't show you a rigorous mathematical approach. I don't know how, and it isn't easy...

Farsight, it's blaringly obvious by now that you will not be taken seriously until you learn the math. Even Einstein had to spend a few years working out the geometries... I'd say you make this your next great endeavor then come back when you are done.

[someguy]

 

OK. In the light of Lorentz Invariance and my post responding to pion decay, which of the two options below sounds like the least crackpot thing to believe?

 

1. We're made out of light or

2. Time Travel.

 

Time travel in the forward direction most certainly is possible. and in fact for there to be any time at all there must be time travel. that's what time is. going in reverse is different.

 

whether or not we are made of light possibly depends on how you look at it. plants go through photosynthesis, i eat plants. does that mean i am made of light? maybe you could say light enters a plant and changes configuration and then i eat the plant. since i am made of the food i eat, and so are the animals that provide the meat for me to eat, you could say i am made of light.

 

the point is that you can say we are made of anything, everything in the end is energy. you can convert anything into anything. The only thing is for going from one substance to another may be a long detour trip, or may require huge amounts of energy. when you get into the quantum world there are much less things that exist. but still in one way or another all these things are interchangeable, they are all convertible one to the other. perhaps not directly but that doesn't really matter.

 

so in a way to say that particles are composed of light or are certain configurations of light doesn't really make sense, it's kind of useless information that anyone can see if they read the right page of wikipedia. if you are talking about how the light is produced, or where the mass comes from , or what the configuration is and how it was produced, now you're saying something, but you need to show why it MUST be that way also, not just that it could be. when light is used by quantum interactions. the thing isn't light anymore. light was used to make it perhaps. or light was produced by it perhaps. part of its energy comes from light. just like plants. but i wouldn't really say i am made of light because that statement could in the end be true about anything in the universe since all things are just different configurations of energy.

 

your argument seems to me like you must believe that electricity is made of light. clearly you can see that when light enters a solar panel the result is electricity. therefore electricity must be composed of light or must be a certain configuration of light. this is the same argument i have seen you propose. but we know that electricity is not made of light. however they are both, like everything else in the universe, energy and therefore one can produce the other. you could say that they are different configurations of each other, but not in a deeper sense than saying all energy is just different configurations of itself. and that means that since it is already known that all sorts of energy are interchangeable and are different configurations of the same thing, when you say that particles are made of light, you haven't really said anything at all.

[BenTheMan]

Someguy---

 

Farsight has set up a dichotomy that doesn't exist. Just because I think he is wrong doesn't preclude me from believing that people who build time machines are crackpots, too. Likewise, even if I did believe that matter was made of light (and I want to make it clear that that certainly isn't the case), there are still ways to travel in time---i.e. along a closed timelike curve.

 

Time travel is probably not possible for other reasons, and I have never said that time travel is a literal possibility (unless it was to piss Farsight off), only a physical one---i.e. Einstein's equations (as pointed out TO Einstein BY Goedel) admit closed time-like curves. This was much to Einstein's chagrin, I should add---he had claimed that GR only contained physically realizable solutions.

 

If Farsight claimed to have an easy way to travel in time, his ideas would be met with no less skepticism from me, at least. The idea that we are made out of light, however, is just plain wrong, as we have demonstrated many times here, and will continue to demonstrate untill Farsight gets banned, or declares victory and pulls out of Baghdad, which ever comes first.

[Norman Albers]

If there is a near-field permittivity that increases as inverse-square radius, then radiation will go in a circle. If the parameters of such a singularity are right, then rotation and precession cancel helicity and you get frozen phase.

[Reaper]

I can't show you a rigorous mathematical approach. I don't know how, and it isn't easy: check out the moebius strip and how it's been a mathematical problem for decades.

 

Congrats for explicitly revealing that you don't understand science. You can't prove anything until you have a mathematical basis for it.

 

The photon is not some little billiard ball particle. Do you remember I used

quotes around the word "particle" when I was talking about photons? A photon is a transverse wave. It's just geometry.

 

1. Technically, a photon is a point like particle. I don't know where you got the idea that they were balls. In all the literature, even pop science, that I have read, there was never any mention of particles being like billiard balls.

 

2. A photon is both a particle and a wave. It's wavelength is defined by

"Lambda" = h/p, where "p" is momentum and h is Plank's Constant. A wave function, however, is not necessarily geometry.

 

3. If a photon is really just "geometry", first what are the implications of this, and second you just contradicted yourself because your idea is very similar to, gasp! STRING THEORY.

 

 

 

 

What do you mean how does a photon transmit photons? You can't get a particle with charge -1 from a particle with charge zero. You have to use pair production, and then you get a particle with charge +1 and another with charge -1. This is obvious. The fact that nobody has responded to you on this makes me think that this thread is dishonest.

 

Those points were in response to your earlier statements right here:

 

A bound electron can be viewed as a stretched elastic loop' date=' and changes in the degree of stretch are achieved via the transmission of photons. In this geometrical model, there are no billiard-ball particles, and no solid surfaces. There are only waves, and stable soliton configurations of those waves. There is nothing other than waves to effect a change in the bond of the stable soliton we call an electron.

[/quote']

 

You can't just conveniently ignore my last point, because it is important. Photons have no charge, but at the same time you claim that it does have one when you proposed that photons are responsible for the existence of various particles.

 

Red light doesn't shake hard enough.

 

Thank you for showing me that you truly don't understand what you are talking about.

[someguy]

Someguy---

 

Farsight has set up a dichotomy that doesn't exist. Just because I think he is wrong doesn't preclude me from believing that people who build time machines are crackpots, too. Likewise, even if I did believe that matter was made of light (and I want to make it clear that that certainly isn't the case), there are still ways to travel in time---i.e. along a closed timelike curve.

 

Time travel is probably not possible for other reasons, and I have never said that time travel is a literal possibility (unless it was to piss Farsight off), only a physical one---i.e. Einstein's equations (as pointed out TO Einstein BY Goedel) admit closed time-like curves. This was much to Einstein's chagrin, I should add---he had claimed that GR only contained physically realizable solutions.

 

If Farsight claimed to have an easy way to travel in time, his ideas would be met with no less skepticism from me, at least. The idea that we are made out of light, however, is just plain wrong, as we have demonstrated many times here, and will continue to demonstrate untill Farsight gets banned, or declares victory and pulls out of Baghdad, which ever comes first.

 

what is a time-like curve and how could you bend time? I've heard physicists speak of bending time into loops so that you could go back in time. but time does not seem to me to be bendable. let us suppose you bent space to any configuration. you would need to age at the same rate i think we could all agree with that. but if you're talking of arriving back at earth before you left, this seems impossible because in order for that to happen there would either need to be another earth somewhere, and in fact an infinite amount of earths or everybody on earth would need to age in reverse. certainly bending the space i'm travelling in cannot make everyone on earth age in reverse. however, if you could somehow warp space in a manner which you can reach a distant point in the universe in much less time than the speed of light could take you then, in a sense you could say you managed to travel back in time... in a sense. bending time sounds so difficult and impossible. time and motion are virtually the exact same thing. in order to bend time then you would need to be bending motion. we are only able to bend space by virtue of the existence of time, allowing us to manipulate our environment. perhaps bending time/motion, would require a fifth dimension we have yet to observe. if that was the case then perhaps unmoving would be possible. i think that certainly for unmoving we would need more dimensions, if it were possible at all. but personally i have no reason to believe there are more dimensions, certainly the ability to travel back in time is not a good reason since it is full of difficulties and paradoxes to begin with. perhaps equations show that time is bendable, but it is also possible that reality does not allow those solutions.

[BenTheMan]

what is a time-like curve and how could you bend time? I've heard physicists speak of bending time into loops so that you could go back in time. but time does not seem to me to be bendable.

 

Two things: First you are falling into the dangerous trap of trying to use your intuition on things that humans inherintly have no experience with. We don't get to tell Nature about the properties of space-time, so if it ``seems'' like it shouldn't work, it may be an artifact of our limited experiences as humans. Saying ``it doesn't seem like we should be able to bend time'' is imposing some prior onto the problem: namely that everything that ``seems reasonable'' happens in Nature, and nothing that doesn't ``seem reasonable'' doesn't happen. Without the framework of physics, and a mathematical language to describe it with, we have nothing. So if math DOESN'T describe Nature, at least approximately, we are in real trouble, and science will be effectively dead.

 

If you don't believe me, think of this: for hundereds of years (since Aristotle), people believed in an idea called impetus. This idea basically states that something is kept in motion by some invisible outside force. This is clearly wrong (cf conservation of energy), but even today, when pysics undergraduates are given quizes BEFORE learning physics, they think of things in terms of impetus. This means that most people in the world, who have never taken a physics class, when applying their ``common sense'' to a problem, come up with a solution that is directly disproven by experiment.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_impetus

 

Hopefully you see some parallels between the preceding two paragraphs and the preceding five pages of discussion

 

Second, think of it in terms of four dimensions. Time is a dimension, just like space. When you solve GR equations, you get configurations of space-time. You can think of these configurations as hyper-surfaces. If you are, say, a beam of light, you must travel in geodesics along space-time. If you happen to find a closed time-like curve, then you will be travelling mostly along the time direction (as opposed to traveling equally along space and time directions normally).

 

Hopefully that made SOME sense.

 

but if you're talking of arriving back at earth before you left, this seems impossible because in order for that to happen there would either need to be another earth somewhere, and in fact an infinite amount of earths or everybody on earth would need to age in reverse.

 

We're not talking about actually building a time machine here. These are pretty abstract ideas.

 

if it were possible at all. but personally i have no reason to believe there are more dimensions, certainly the ability to travel back in time is not a good reason since it is full of difficulties and paradoxes to begin with.

 

Again, you are imposing a prior on the situation. No offense, but who are you to assume that Nature should behave in exactly the way you think? How many times have you seen or preformed an experiment that has a strange result?

 

perhaps equations show that time is bendable, but it is also possible that reality does not allow those solutions.

 

Again, closed time-like curves are fully consistent solutions to Einstein's equations. This means that if you believe GR, you HAVE to admit that the idea of time travel is possible, at least in principle. If you don't believe GR, then fine---find some way to modify it or some new theory which doesn't predict time travel. But I will stress that CTC's are mathematically realizable solutions of GR, like it or not (Einstein hated it, but had to accept it). See this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del_metric#Closed_timelike_curves

 

Finally, I want to highlight one scentence from the Wiki article above, for no reason whatsoever:

A more rational interpretation of Gödel's motives is that he was striving to (and arguably succeeded in) proving that Einstein's equations of spacetime are not consistent with what we intuitively understand time to be (i.e. that it passes and the past no longer exists)...

I would say that this should be changed to

A more rational interpretation of Gödel's motives is that he was striving to (and arguably succeeded in) proving that Einstein's equations of spacetime are not consistent with what physicists intuitively understood time to be (i.e. that it passes and the past no longer exists)...

Now we are quite comfortable with time as the fourth dimension.