• Trick or Truth Essay Contest (2015)

  • When physics is geometry: a new proof for general relativity through geometric interpretation of Mössbauer rotor experiment. Celebration of the 100th anniversary of general relativity by Christian Co

OOPS! drat...

at end of paragraph 4 should read ' 1 sec/sec @ c || 0 sec/sec @ 0 '

jrc

Dear John,

Thanks for your kind words with interesting comments. Actually, today GR is experimentally confirmed almost in the same quantity of SR. Although, on one hand, the time metric remains under constant challenge, on the other hand it has some experimental tests in the so-called gravitational time dilation, i.e. the stronger the gravitational potential (the closer the clock is to the source of gravitation), the slower time passes.

Thanks again, I will be pleasured to read, comment and rate your Essay asap.

I wish you best luck in the Contest.

Cheers, Ch.

Christian,

Great essay. You maintain an exceptional standard. I also agree the wisdom of your approach, which I also use, not attacking Einstein for incompleteness or flaws but helping complete it and improve the understanding. I also found your writing very clear and concise. I think it should be another top essay (in the community scoring at least - certainly for me) but I hope may also now seem more palatable to those more theoretically entrenched.

You should be aware of the other commonalities, but this year I also identify and analyze the consequences of the great mathematical self-deception underlying QM and hampering unification. i.e. I show we CAN trick ourselves by carelessly 'abusing' mathematics in application. I do hope you'll read and comment as I'm sure you'll like and agree it and also maybe find it helpful

Very well done and thank you for a different vista on the reality we agree on.

Best of luck

Peter

    Christian,

    Great opportunity to celebrate GR and Einstein's 100th anniversary. You provide a cogent explanation of a strong and independent proof which reveals the full geometric interpretation of gravity.

    Indeed, Math is truth rather than trick. I have done modelling and simulation and always valued the power of math to lend understanding to operation of weapon systems in aerospace and solve practical problems. I also see its need in bringing us forward in quantum biology, a better understanding of the universe's beginnings (LHC) and the origins of life (DNA). These are sort of my proofs.

    Jim

    Dear Peter,

    It is a pleasure to meet you again here in FQXi. Thanks for the very good judgement on my Essay. I am honoured by this.

    I am going to read, comment and rate your Essay asap.

    Thanks again.

    Cheers,Ch.

    Hi Jim,

    I am happy to meet you again here in FQXi Essay Contest. I am honoured by your good judgement on my Essay, thank you very much.

    I will read, comment and rate your Essay asap.

    Thanks again.

    Cheers, Ch.

    Dear Christian,

    I think Newton was wrong about abstract gravity; Einstein was wrong about abstract space/time, and Hawking was wrong about the explosive capability of NOTHING.

    All I ask is that you give my essay WHY THE REAL UNIVERSE IS NOT MATHEMATICAL a fair reading and that you allow me to answer any objections you may leave in my comment box about it.

    Joe Fisher

      Christian,

      Thanks for taking the time to read my essay. Regarding your comment on Santilli, have you seen this latest report? I don't know all the nuances. What is your reaction?

      http://www.prweb.com/releases/2015/01/prweb12448979.htm

      Jim

        Dear Joe,

        It is very hard for me to think that Einstein, Newton and Hawking were wrong as there are tons of experimental and observing data and tons of computations which show that they were correct instead. In any case, I will read, comment and rate your Essay soon.

        Cheers, Ch.

        Dear Jim,

        Thanks for raised this point. It permits indeed to clarify my position with Santilli also here in FQXi. Santilli is indeed considered a crackpot and a crank by the Scientific Community, see here. Differently from this general judgement, I think that there are parts of Santilli's research which should deserve a better attention, in particular Santilli's research on new clean energies. In fact, my general opinion is that although the 98% of the work of a researcher can be, in principle, wrong, it is a good thing to save the remaining 2%. This is the criteria on which I judge the research work, not only of Santilli, but of every researcher. But there are various other issues of Santilli's research on which I completely disagree. In particular, I completely disagree with Santilli's visions of astrophysics, gravitation and cosmology. I collaborated with Santilli in the recent past, but I ultimately ended my collaboration with Santilli and his running dogs this year. My collaboration with Santilli started to fall into crisis during a Greek Conference in September 2015. In that Conference, I criticized Santilli's stuff on antimatter, gravitation and cosmology. I am indeed very tired, bored and irritated in listening wrong claims as "general relativity is wrong" and/or "Hubble's law establishes that the cosmological redshift is the same for all galaxies having the same distance from Earth in all directions in space. Consequently, the conjectures on the expansion of the universe, the acceleration of the expansion and the big bang necessarily imply a return to the Middle Ages with Earth at the center of the universe". The last statements on the lack of the expansion of the universe can be easily dismissed with the simple example of the similarity between the expanding Universe and the expanding surface of a balloon... I also add that Santilli does not understand he difference between tensors and pseudo-tensor when he claims that general relativity is wrong, see here. I clarified that, although I think that part of Santilli research work should deserve a better attention by the scientific community, particularly what concerns the research of new clean energies, this does not mean that I agree with all Santilli's claims. In particular, I completely disagree with his claims on gravitation astrophysics and cosmology, which are completely wrong. After that issue, the Santilli Foundation started to reduce my salary and I was attacked various times by Santilli's servants (which I suspect to be mere sockpuppets...). It seems that the slaves do not permit their messiah to be criticized... Thus, I ultimately stopped to organize any conference activity for them. They also asked me to write papers criticizing Santilli's stuff on gravitation and cosmology. Thus, I decided to satisfy them by writing a strong rebuttal against those wrong claims. But I will not submit it in the American Journal of Modern Physics Special Issue that they are organizing. I will write a very strong paper in a serious journal which will show that Santilli's stuff on general relativity and cosmology is completely wrong.

        Concerning the report that you cited, its author,i.e. Pamela Fleming is one of Santilli's slaves, a crackpot and ignorant woman who claims that Santilli is the Messiah of science and that people who criticize him are corrupted and/or criminal. On the other hand, S. Beghella-Bartoli from Italy, P. M. Bhujbal from India, and A. Nas from the U.S.A., who should be "the scientists having independently confirmed the first detection in history of antimatter galaxies, antimatter cosmic rays and antimatter asteroids achieved by Santilli" are three collaborators of Santilli. In my personal opinon, Santilli did not detected antimatter galaxies, antimatter cosmic rays and antimatter asteroids while Beghella-Bartoli, Bhujbal and Nas confirmed nothing.

        Cheers, Ch.

        Christian,

        Not being part of the upper echelons of physics, I appreciate being informed on such anti-matter studies and about reputations in scientific studies. The discovery of antigalaxies seemed questionable, even with my limited knowledge. It is sad that such studies can be elevated in importance in the popular media. It speaks to all the deceptions we see in politics and government. Perhaps they can't be separated because the media is no longer a responsible "Fourth Estate."

        Thanks for the scoop.

        Jim

        Dear Jim,

        I think that the Santilli Foundation paid a lot of money to see that stuff on antimatter publicized in the popular media. On the other hand, I also think that Santilli made this in good faith, as he thinks to be correct and it is his proper right to publicize his studies. He is not a bad guy, but the key point is that those studies, as well as other studies by him in gravitation, astrophysics and cosmology, are completely wrong at a basic level. I still think that Santilli's research work should deserve a better attention by the scientific community, particularly what concerns the research of new clean energies, but his knowledge and understanding of general relativity, modern astrophysics and modern cosmology are extremely low, and his wrong claims on these issues have the only result to generate a strong lack of credibility on the rest of his research work. This is his biggest problem, and he is the worst enemy of himself.

        Cheers, Ch.

        "In fact, my general opinion is that although the 98% of the work of a researcher can be, in principle, wrong, it is a good thing to save the remaining 2%."

        I wholeheartedly agree. If Newton had been judged solely by his voluminous output in religion and alchemy, his important and valuable work in science and mathematics would have been lost to us.

        Tom

        Dear Christian,

        Very interesting, important and actual essay in 100 year anniversary of the General Theory of Relativity. I have one question: when the Great Ontologic revolution begun by Planck and Einstein comes to the end?

        Yours faithfully,

        Vladimir

          Dear Vladimir,

          It is fine to meet you again here in FQXi.

          Thanks for finding my Essay very interesting, important and actual. Concerning you question, I think that revolution could never come to the end...

          I will read, comment and rate your Essay soon.

          Thanks again.

          Cheers, Ch.

          Dear Christian,

          I realize this is a funny thing to start with, but I am impressed by your care to add technical endnotes that make your essay accessible to a large public, as required by the contest rules. I didn't read all essays but I feel it's safe to say that you are the only physicist of this caliber to display such care.

          Between all physical theories, relativity is the closest to my heart so I was delighted to read your analysis of the experimental measurement of curvature through means of a rotational system. Your insightful idea to account for clock synchronization does justice to this theory, being a very appropriate way to reclaim and celebrate its meaning. This is very good work and I would like to express my heart-felt congratulations for it. I wish you best of luck in the contest and I am accompanying my regards with a well-deserved rating. Should you have the time to give my essay a read, your comments would be very appreciated.

          Warm regards,

          Alma

            Dear Alma,

            Thanks for your kind words and very nice comments which honour me.

            Relativity is the the theory closest to my heart too. It is pure beauty.

            I will be pleasured to read, comment and rate your Essay asap.

            Thanks again, I wish you best luck in the Contest.

            Cheers, Ch.

            Dear Christian,

            Thank you very much for your words as they bring me joy! I just wanted to let you know I answered you.

            Wish you a lovely start of the week!

            Alma

            Hi Alma,

            It was my pleasure. I am going to read your replies.

            Cheers, Ch.

            Christian,

            Thanks again for your kind comments on my essay. I haven't had time to read yours in detail yet (and I'm neurotic about saying much unless I do), but already appreciate that you address specific experimental results and predictions in light of particular theoretical expectations and critiques. That adds more than generalizations and philosophizing can do on their own. Note this curious irony: you correctly say that GR (now celebrating its 100th anniversary, so an apt time for your essay) is a geometrical theory. That constrains its form and predictions in certain ways. Yet you boldly assert that most physicists have missed an important insight, in their handling of clock synchronization on the rotating disk (all this I am gathering from your abstract alone.) How could this be?

            Well if you are right, it means there are subtle problems of framing issues in this area - like the problems dogging quantum mechanics and relativistic dynamics (such as arguments about the right-angle lever and the "energy current", how is angular momentum conserved in Thomas Precession, etc.)Well if you are right, it means there are subtle problems of framing issues in this area - like the problems dogging quantum mechanics and relativistic dynamics (such as arguments about the right-angle lever and the "energy current", how is angular momentum conserved in Thomas Precession, etc.) I already know, from e.g. reading works like Relativistic Kinematics by Henri Arzeliès, about the problem of synchronizing clocks on a rotating disk (as well as about the problems of stress due to changing length standards, such as Herglotz stresses - how many physicists today heard about that?) One way is to go ahead and pretend one can use ordinary Einstein synchronization for any local section of the disk - but then "cheat" by having a scheme analogous to the International Date Line at some point when the discrepancies must meet somewhere (as noted by Arzeliès) on the disk.

            The other approach is to take simultaneity as being set by a signal from the center portion of the disk, which sets the time standard the same as the lab frame. Physical character of velocity is of course the same either way (such as the kinetic energy of parts of the disk, or the rate of time observed for clocks carried on the rim, per time dilation of the moving points as in the "twin paradox" (BTW I strongly recommend Leslie Marder's Time and the Space Traveler on the TP - out of print but avail. on Amazon. He discusses the controversy of how well one can regard the traveling twin's youth in terms of the relative gravitational fields.) Nevertheless, these two approaches do not use the same standard of simultaneity, so how can we develop consistent physics for the rotating disk? This is surely one of the questions you tackle.

            I'll have more to say later about some details of your argument. Regards.