Dear Jonathan I enjoyed our discussions on this and my page.

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Hello. This is group message to you and the writers of some 80 contest essays that I have already read, rated and probably commented on.

This year I feel proud that the following old and new online friends have accepted my suggestion that they submit their ideas to this contest. Please feel free to read, comment on and rate these essays (including mine) if you have not already done so, thanks:

Why We Still Don't Have Quantum Nucleodynamics by Norman D. Cook a summary of his Springer book on the subject.

A Challenge to Quantized Absorption by Experiment and Theory by Eric Stanley Reiter Very important experiments based on Planck's loading theory, proving that Einstein's idea that the photon is a particle is wrong.

An Artist's Modest Proposal by Kenneth Snelson The world-famous inventor of Tensegrity applies his ideas of structure to de Broglie's atom.

Notes on Relativity by Edward Hoerdt Questioning how the Michelson-Morely experiment is analyzed in the context of Special Relativity

Vladimir Tamari's essay Fix Physics! Is Physics like a badly-designed building? A humorous illustrate take. Plus: Seven foundational questions suggest a new beginning.

Thank you and good luck.

Vladimir

    After studying about 250 essays in this contest, I realize now, how can I assess the level of each submitted work. Accordingly, I rated some essays, including yours.

    Cood luck.

    Sergey Fedosin

      Hi Jonathan,

      I liked the easygoing flow (play) of your essay that gives a 3D view of what is happening in flatland.

      It is also good to be with you in another essay contest.

      Best of Luck,

      Don L.

        Thanks Don,

        It is my pleasure to be in this contest with you, as well. I am glad you enjoyed my essay, and got that I was playing tour guide about our journey through dimensional space. I hope to read your essay soon, and I wish you great luck too.

        All the Best,

        Jonathan

        Thank you Sergey,

        I appreciate the time taken to read and your input, and I hope to give you the same courtesy soon.

        Regards,

        Jonathan

        Thank You Peter,

        I appreciate your kind remarks. I have started reading your essay several times, and gotten distracted. What I have read looks very interesting. I shall make a special attempt to finish up and comment soon, before the cut off, as you were one of the first to visit my essay and forum page.

        All the Best,

        Jonathan

        A tall order Vladimir!

        Thank you for your kind remarks, regardless.

        I will see how many from your list I can get to in time. The ones I did read were quite interesting. But I have quite a few essays already in my queue. We shall see how quick the time goes.

        Regards,

        Jonathan

        Thank you Hoang Cao Hai,

        As your query is a generic message that relates to your essay content (rather than mine), I shall attempt to address your concerns on your essay's forum - instead of here - assuming I can get to reading it in a timely manner.

        all the best,

        Jonathan

        OK Ben,

        On 1.) the lack of knowledge about what constitutes the dark sector is something several speakers touched on at FFP11. We don't know exactly what dark matter or dark energy is, so cosmologists are taking a lot on faith IMO. And as you note; the scale dependence of dimensionality is important to consider, and suggests a fractal character to spacetime.

        On 4.) yes Twistors are very cool. They address some of the issues you mentioned were raised about points by Grothendieck - on Ian's forum page. They replace points with Rays, as the most fundamental level of structure. I imagine that relates to the concept of causal structure quite explicitly.

        On 7.) a holistic approach is essential to complete understanding, and it offers insight that is complementary to those obtained through reductionist means. And as for the sum over histories; you need to learn more about Feynman's forgotten gem - Hamiltonian Phase Space Path Integrals.

        Basically you are then looking at dynamism straight on, as a Hamiltonian in phase space, rather than working in the kinematic space of the conventional Lagrangian formulation. The cool thing is that this incorporates quantum uncertainty at the outset, but often resolves into a simpler functional integral along the way. I'll look up a paper by Steven Kenneth Kauffmann you should have.

        All the Best,

        Jonathan

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        • Post #97

        Thank you for the post in my essay: I am weak in bibliographic search (I apply the Poincaré method)

        I am reading the article that you suggest, that is true for a simple (oscillator) system, but have the property to maintain the Plank constant (the weak point in my demonstration) in the Hamiltonization.

        I understand that this is a starting point of a possible complete theory, but I share all my ideas because I think that the puzzles are solved combining small pieces of the solution: I shall try to develop more carefully my theory, but it is important that others had, and develop, the same ideas.

        Saluti

        Domenico

          Thank you so much Domenico!

          I think you will find Steven Kauffmann's work excellent. He is obviously brilliant, yet I once helped him to get a paper published, breaking a blockade. There is another paper of his, that focuses on the Hamiltonization procedure. I think he cites that work in the paper I forwarded though.

          I am glad I could help you out, and I wish you the best of luck.

          Regards,

          Jonathan

          Hello All,

          My essay 'Cherished Assumptions and the Progress of Physics' shows how a playful approach to making assumptions yields swifter research progress, which is essential in times where the available knowledge is growing very fast - like the present day. The time lag in the general public, for the adoption of new knowledge from Physics, is apparently about a century.

          But for those on the forefront of scientific research; knowledge is doubling every ten years or less. Obviously, scientists must be more agile in their thinking strategies than the average individual. A conceptual approach is what is needed sometimes, but the fact there is more and more information to be learned means that there is a lot of memorization. It's important to also learn how to think and how to learn.

          Scientific progress is about learning how to learn about the universe better. This is different from trying to learn all the details perfectly. It is all about trying out possible answers and getting the universe to tell you its secrets. Physics is really about how we learn about the universe.

          That's all for now,

          Jonathan

            If you do not understand why your rating dropped down. As I found ratings in the contest are calculated in the next way. Suppose your rating is [math]R_1 [/math] and [math]N_1 [/math] was the quantity of people which gave you ratings. Then you have [math]S_1=R_1 N_1 [/math] of points. After it anyone give you [math]dS [/math] of points so you have [math]S_2=S_1+ dS [/math] of points and [math]N_2=N_1+1 [/math] is the common quantity of the people which gave you ratings. At the same time you will have [math]S_2=R_2 N_2 [/math] of points. From here, if you want to be R2 > R1 there must be: [math]S_2/ N_2>S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] (S_1+ dS) / (N_1+1) >S_1/ N_1 [/math] or [math] dS >S_1/ N_1 =R_1[/math] In other words if you want to increase rating of anyone you must give him more points [math]dS [/math] then the participant`s rating [math]R_1 [/math] was at the moment you rated him. From here it is seen that in the contest are special rules for ratings. And from here there are misunderstanding of some participants what is happened with their ratings. Moreover since community ratings are hided some participants do not sure how increase ratings of others and gives them maximum 10 points. But in the case the scale from 1 to 10 of points do not work, and some essays are overestimated and some essays are drop down. In my opinion it is a bad problem with this Contest rating process. I hope the FQXI community will change the rating process.

            Sergey Fedosin

            Dear Jonathan,

            You are right that there is too much to know in science. Yet, your managed to write a well-documented and interesting essay. I appreciate the playful style. I also agree that from time to time at least it is important to try to conceptualize more what we do.

            Good luck,

            Cristi Stoica

            Jonathen

            I hope you may still read, absorb and comment on my essay. I did enjoy yours, and think it deserved a higher place, but this years competition runs deep. None the less a high score from me.

            Best wishes

            Peter

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            • Post #103

            Thank you Peter,

            Your thoughtfulness is appreciated. So that I may finish reading and rating papers all the papers I can, before the cutoff, detailed comments will have to wait. Be assured yours was included in those I read.

            All the Best,

            Jonathan

              Hi Folks,

              My gratitude to FQXi, Scientific American, the Gruber foundation and Submeta. I am glad I could be a participant in this contest. At this point; I would like to congratulate all who made it into the finals. Since displayed rankings changed between midnight and morning, I am not certain whether my essay is among that number, or just below the cutoff, but I realize that it was a close race near the top - so I am privileged to be among the uncertain few.

              I thank everyone who took the time to read my essay, and I am thankful I took the time to read so many of yours.

              All the Best,

              Jonathan

              My Thanks!

              To all who gave me a high rating, you have my appreciation. It is my pleasure to be in this contest with you, and to still be in the game. I will continue to field any questions that come my way, and to actively participate on the pages of many of the other essay writers. So feel free to comment or ask questions here.

              I only got to read about one fifth of the total number, but I made a special effort to read and rate the essay of every visitor to this page. I hope that by giving some of you high ratings, I added to your overall rankings to give you the attention you deserve. I shall continue to read and comment, so long as there is an interest in discussion on these pages.

              All the Best,

              Jonathan