Extending Relativity to EM-like interactions ????

[Widdekind]

In the standard rubber-sheet analogy, a 'gravity hyper-force' pulls down on matter placed upon the rubber-sheet, which represents the fabric of spacetime. When multiple masses near each other, that 'gravity hyper-force' draws those masses together, since, when combined, the resulting larger mass sags down deeper, deeper down into the 'gravity hyper-force potential' (as it were). This qualitatively describes the 'like attracts like' effects of gravity interactions.

 

Q: Is it legitimate, to try to extend GR, to EM-like interactions (like repels like, opposites attract), by 'reversing' the 'direction' of the 'hyper-force', from the amplifying & exaggerating gravity-like case, to a restoring center-seeking 'hyper-force', for the EM-like case? By reversing the direction of the hyper-force, and turning tensions into compressions in spacetime, 'like repels like' can be qualitatively constructed... correct ?? And, assuming that opposite charges 'bulge' in 'opposite directions', 'opposites attract' can be qualitatively constructed, yes???

 

Would there be anyway, of combining both the Gravity-like case, with the EM-like case, in a single picture?? Perhaps gravity represents a 'bulge amplifying, center-fleeing' effect, whereas EM represents a restoring, center-seeking effect ?? (Note that the EM-like, 'center-seeking' case would seemingly 'squash' matter, like batter spreading down & out on a griddle. Electrons do, QM, spread out with time, but the Color Force, being significantly stronger than even the EM force, can keep nucleons bound in bundles. How is this inconsistent with these conjecturings??)

[lemur]

I can't figure out whether you're talking at the atomic level or the astronomical level. Are you saying that EM force counteracts the compression of gravitational attraction?

[imatfaal]

Widdekind - but why? in my limited knowledge, so far as we have discovered everything has that has mass has positive mass (energy - positive energy) - we have no basis to think about repulsive gravity or spacetime distortion in the opposite direction (if that can even happen).

 

For there to be a repulsive gravitational force then we must first acknowledge the possibility of negative mass/energy. Rather than jumping straight out to the long scale interaction of gravity we should first try to understand how we could accommodate negative mass into our small scale world.

[Widdekind]

Widdekind - but why? in my limited knowledge, so far as we have discovered everything has that has mass has positive mass (energy - positive energy) - we have no basis to think about repulsive gravity or spacetime distortion in the opposite direction (if that can even happen).

 

For there to be a repulsive gravitational force then we must first acknowledge the possibility of negative mass/energy. Rather than jumping straight out to the long scale interaction of gravity we should first try to understand how we could accommodate negative mass into our small scale world.

 

I meant this merely as a mathematical exercise, not as any sort of speculation. Could you describe EM, with a GR-like mathematical theory, by 'tweaking some signs here and there', to (1) reverse the amplifying 'hyper-force', which 'pulls down' on the 'rubber sheet' (GR), to a restoring hyper-force, which would 'push up' (EM?); (2) allow for 'bulges in both directions' -- each experiencing restoring, center-seeking hyper-forces -- to account for opposite charges. Again, I was not speculating, about what is, merely asking a mathematical question (albeit completely qualitatively), as a 'fun homework assignment'.

 

As for your question, and setting aside all this 'EM stuff', negative mass, could be incorporated, into regular GR, by supposing that anti-mass, caused curvatures in the fabric of spacetime, in the 'opposite (hyper)direction'. To wit, in the standard rubber sheet analogy, massive bowling balls would sink down deep, but anti-massive anti-balls would 'want to float upwards towards the ceiling'. Thus, mass & anti-mass would want to fly apart, so that, each far away from the other, they could both bulge away from the mid-plane, the one sinking & the other rising, as much as possible, producing an 'opposites-repel' effect. Yet, with all matter, or all anti-matter, everything would happen, as per the standard rubber sheet analogy, producing a 'like-attracts-like-effect'.

 

Please ponder, too, the presumable 'self-straightening' tendency of matter embedded in spacetime.

[imatfaal]

Widdekind - it gets beyond me, but I think that the only reason that we talk about and can easily visualize the rubber-sheet analogy working in two opposite ways is that it is a two dimension system embedded within a three dimensional space. Space time distortion is not embedded within a higher dimensional space (or if it is we are struggling to show it). To have a direction of distortion of the whole of space time - you need an extra dimension, and if one extra dimension why not two or three? And with three extra dimensions and (I guess) 8 further new directions of distortion how do you account for the additional 6 forms of distortion.