The Nature of the Wave Function by Edwin Eugene Klingman

Dear Edwin Eugene Klingman and Shan Gao,

Edwin is right. Superposition of wave function associated with different objects leads us to observe them. In PicoPhysics this issue is integrated with action at distance and concept of exchange particle as the mode of interaction between objects. PicoPhysics view on the subject (Though discussed at stage 3 - only stage 1 is available at picophysics.org) is as below:

Superposition:

Space is not conserved but uniform and isotropic at micro level. At macro level, it is defined by space density gradient which can be resolved into three components along the three co-ordinates of reference system attached to observer. Similarly, Object as an observer has a reference system attached. Now the density gradient is with respect to this reference.

The axis of the two reference systems can be assumed aligned and a picture drawn with respect to space density gradient. Knergy content in each object reacts with space as per unary law 'Space contains Knergy'.

Conservation of space makes no room for limitation on space density. The superposition of effect of presence of objects in space is absolute.

Space density

That is how, superposition, effect of presence of different objects in space is computable in complex geometrical distribution.

The density gradient itself is result of consumption of space by Knergy and affinity of space to possess Knergy. This consumption signifies non-conserved character of space.

To address the perturbation introduced by presence of Knergy in space, PicoPhysics introduce g-space as geometrical space, and r-space the real space. The space density is seen as ratio of r-space to g-space.

Space density = r-space/g-space.

Kambhar

The qualification of space as real and geometric is not kind to human perceptions about space. To keep the Space-Knergy dynamic with-in bounds the g-space is identified with space of mainstream physics. Real-space is given an alternative interpretation, 'Kambhar - host reality to anti-Konservation'. The ratio of this reality with respect to 3-D occupied space (G-Space) is now the density that defines Space-Knergy kinematics. Knergy is identified with Kambhar motion in space. The drift speed of Knergy in space is requirement of Unary law, independent of distribution of Knergy in g-space and governed by this density.

Wave-function:

When large amount of Knergy forming a large front confronts another similar front, then the conditions an develop in interference zone where it is not possible to satisfy the unary law - the drift speed, as a function of space density, independent of any particular distribution. So a complimentary process of conversion is hypothesised, which toggles Kambhar under such conditions into the complementary state. The interaction between the two states is only through conversion interaction. Knergy distributed in g-space can be hosted by Kambhar in either state. Kambhar in either state is conserved (Konserved but convertible to the other state).

Kd = K1 + iK2

Wave Function is function that describes the change in magnitude composition of Kambhar with position and time in space. Thus wave-function of quantum mechanics is seen as representing the Knergy density in space. It may be noted that PicoPhysics binds the space occupied by unit Knergy into a single unit to the observer. Schrödinger equation now represents the principle of least action, action being the result of non-Konservation of space. The details will be available at picophysics.org.

Thanks and best regards,

Vijay Gupta

Sorry, the Microsoft equation did not show-up. Below is an attempt to re-introduce the same,

Kd = K1 iK2

wave function = (K12 K22)eia

where

tan (a) = K1 / K2

Positive sign still not coming.

Edwin,

TIME and SPACE-TIME are recurrent elements of this and many of the other essays. It is evident there is not agreement exactly what TIME really means, especially when it is merged with SPACE-TIME. The definition of TIME was simple when it was expressed in mechanistic terms, such as a "unit of time" based upon the 1/86,400th time division of the rotation of a planet; it was given the term "second." There was no problem with the definition of TIME when it was used to express event durations of mechanical events and planetary orbitals, it fit with the established definition. Maxwell did not know he complicated the TIME issue by mathematically formalizing electromagnetics (EM) as a non-mechanistic form of energy.

It has been long recognized that TIME and ENERGY have a close association. Unfortunately, because of the long established use of the mechanistic second, those that established EM definitions, including Maxwell, did not recognize that "TIME is a manifestation of the presence of energy," EM energy. The definition of TIME still remains defined as a "unit entity" separate from EM energy.

It is now possible to define TIME as a function of the two fundamental characteristics of EM energy. Thomas Young identified the two characteristics some 200 years ago, wavelength and frequency. It is a long established assumption that the size of units have to be defined first in order to utilize them in mathematical equations. This changed in 2011 with the IEEE publication of a paper titled, "A methodology to define physical constants using mathematical constants". See topic 1294 or do a search using the title.

It is known that unspecified length sizes can be used to establish the structure of geometric forms. By defining one geometric form in terms that represent wavelength, and another identical form shape in terms that represent frequency, it was possible to identify the size of a unit wavelength and the size of a unit of frequency without needing to know their physical sizes previously. The size of the duration of a "unit of time" was mutually defined by the relationship.

The philosophical issues of TIME were not mentioned in the IEEE paper. TIME is an inseparable characteristic of EM energy.

Hello Edwin,

Thanks for liking my essay. I read the essays you mentioned, and yours. Thought yours was one of the best I've seen so far. In relativity I'm often suspicious of views in which the weirdness in the theory is removed by pointing out errors that everyone else failed to see for a century. Usually when physicists allow a theory to be weird for that long, it's because they couldn't go anywhere else, and not from lack of trying.

But your bringing in the Lundeen experimental evidence is one of several things that make it look different from that, and I felt that unlike many, you were grasping at an underlying reality by looking at the clues. That's what makes a paper of interest to me these days, if it's looking for ways forward for physics - it's not enough for it to be trying to rejig existing theory into something it wasn't before. Like you, in my essay I'm grasping at an underlying reality by looking at the clues, and the real clues are external things like observations, not internal things like elements of existing theory.

To me, for an approach to be relevant in the present situation it also has to be open to there being bits of the jigsaw missing, that we haven't yet found. Many of the essays I've read have implied within them the idea that the pieces we have are enough to finish the puzzle, if we can only organise them in the correct way. And yet a careful look at the clues shows that this idea is unavoidably wrong - new conceptual elements are needed. And the exciting thing is that we can infer a certain amount about the missing pieces - this (for those who can let go of the framework a bit) is a very worthwhile excercise.

So in the Heisenberg quote "the question [is] whether [the wave function] should be seen as a 'spread-out' entity, a 'guiding field', a 'statistical state', or something else" - we should always be open to the 'something else'.

Thanks for your kind comments on my essay - as you suggest at the end, I'll read yours again.

Best wishes, Jonathan

Hello Edwin,

I agree with a lot of what you say. It's hard to know which elements of physics are fundamental, and which are emergent. So the approach I've taken tries to bypass that question, and see what can be deduced anyway. Time is a good place to look, not only because of the present need to solve that puzzle, but also because the deepest cracks in our picture are where the best clues about what the true picture looks like might be found.

To me the two levels of time we seem to find, block time and the apparent motion through time, can't both be real, because of the unpredictability implied in quantum theory, which means they disagree about whether the future is pre-decided. So assuming that only one is real, then you look at both, and try to work out which is real, and which isn't. All of these steps, for those who accept the premisses underneath the reasoning, can be made without knowing what things in physics are basic and what things are emergent. Hope this makes sense... Jonathan

Hi Edwin,

thank you. I don't think we have any reason to do away with causality, as long as we don't assume block time to be right. Block time is what has put this essential principle at risk - and all of science is based on it.

If block time is wrong, you get a dynamic universe. We don't immediataly know how many dimensions it has, but we can explain a lot of what happens in it. We can't yet explain why it has motion through time, but we might, once the shackles and cul-de-sacs of block time have been thrown off.

Logic, to me, is a facet of our minds which allows us to get a handle on things, for instance by ruling things out and limiting the possibilities. I think if you try to see how logic arises in the universe, you're asking some very complicated questions about the mind, which physicists don't need to ask at present. I know you've arrived at these questions via quantum theory, but I think until we have a complete solution to the mystery of how to interpret quantum theory, we won't know if we have to ask those questions, and I suspect we'll find that we don't have to, which would be a relief.

And mathematics works wonderfully well as a way of describing the universe, even if ultimately it's only a set of approximations. Why can't we depend on it? Because a half-solved puzzle suggests we might not be able to? I'd say again, it's too early to assume we have that problem.

Best wishes, Jonathan

I agree with a lot of that. I think people who try to make mathematics fundamental are wrong. It's a description of things, and extremists like Max Tegmark who think it may be the most fundamental thing of all, are in fact reacting to the trouble we've had with the conceptual side of physics in the 20th century - which is nevertheless very important as well.

You may very well be right that mathematics and logic are emergent rather than fundamental, and appreciate that you've studied it in detail. But I don't see the problem with that if it's true. As long as we see them as the tools that they are, which allow deduction, reasoning, theory and calculation, all of which help us to describe and understand things, and find out the underlying rules and patterns, we're ok aren't we? I agree that we mustn't elevate them to anything beyond that.

best wishes, Jonathan

Dear Jonathan,

As I have understood Max Tegmark's mathematical universe idea he means by mathematics the relationships between abstract entities. Also (which I feel less comfortable about he seems, to me, to be saying if a relationship can exist mathematically it can exist as a reality in this universe or another.) I can see that when we try to describe the very foundation of reality, everything comes down to relationships between the properties we have identified and how they change. That doesn't seem particularly extreme to me but it is highlighting what is really important. I think that means not the stuff we imagine to exist, not what we think about it but just how properties interact and how relationships change.

We can express ideas about that verbally or we can express it mathematically. Max Tegmark argues that human verbal language is superfluous baggage and that therefore the relationships should be expressed mathematically. I agree, at least that some kind of uniform, symbolic, unambiguous representation is desirable, if succinctness and precision and uniformity are the aims. I don't see that proposition as extreme either.

Though if the aim is widespread human comprehension then many different verbal descriptions, in many different languages, as well as many different kinds of symbolic representation are desirable, in my opinion. That however is about teaching rather than what is the best or ultimate form of representation, of the universe (or multiverse).

Hello Georgina,

I'm sure Tegmark is an extremist only in some ways, not in every way. But saying that in some cases all sets of possibilities exist is extreme. It's tough for creatives, because whatever you might come up with, there's the worry that he thinks it exists already. But creatives can have fun thinking up absurd things, and then realising that Tegmark believes that exists - I've played this game with friends occasionally, though only in a loose way.

Anyway, I do think that our conceptual picture is simply incomplete, and instead of facing up to that, and trying to make progress within our existing way of doing physics, many are now messing around with the underlying principles, and trying to reset the whole playing field. I see that in quite a few of the essays here, but to me that's a bit desperate and a bit premature - we haven't finished exploring with our present system yet. There's a need to look carefully at the holes in the jigsaw, and see what we can work out about the missing pieces - that's what I've been trying to do anyway.

Best wishes, Jonathan

Jonathan, Edwin,

sometimes ideas that are expressed can be provocation intended to make people stop, take notice and think rather than a statement of conviction that this is how things are-definitely. Whether you or I like what Max Tegmark has said or not he makes people think about it.

My views on what a multiverse is and how they can be a part of reality have changed radically as a result of listening to what Max Tegmark has said in his papers and lectures. I've gone from saying its just mathematical nonsense to thinking it really is a good way of describing what we are dealing with, (if the multiverses are thought of in a particular way).

Now thinking about what an object is I have had to concede that it is all of its possibilities simultaneously and not just what one observer will perceive it to be from his perspective. I doubt I would have got to there without someone demonstrating that there are vastly greater possibilities than I was imagining.

Edwin,

I think he is being serious too and playful. Edward de Bono wrote :"Hypothesis, speculation and provocation allow us to play in our minds. We try out new things. We carry out the thought experiments that Einstein used to develop his powerful ideas." (1992). IMO Whether it is correct or not is not as important as breaking new ground, finding new ways of thinking about the problems.

Edward de Bono also wrote: "The analysis of data is not enough. We also need the creative ability to speculate and use provocative hypotheses. If we can develop these skills in scientists, science will advance more rapidly.The new hypothesis or provocative idea provides a scaffold on which to organise our information and with which to seek new information." (1992)

I'm not disagreeing with your judgement Edwin just expressing what I think. Max Tegmark knows what his intentions were and I'm not a mind reader. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." It would be a dull world if we all liked exactly the same things.