(copied from my essay forum -- THR)

Peter,

Thank you, that's very kind. There's no mystery to why my score languishes below the cut -- never in my memory, from the first time I entered these competitions (which dates from the very beginning), has a fully relativistic viewpoint in foundational physics gotten due respect, while some of the fringiest views in quantum theory have won big prizes. So I have long abandoned any illusions I might have had. It is enough that the FQXi forum gives voice to a minority viewpoint that it de facto opposes, and I am grateful to the Institute for that, even when I think it could do more.

There is an even lower score than mine, given for a far better essay by Vesselin Petkov, and -- I expect -- is low for the same reasons. I am going to do a lazy thing, and quote Vesselin's reply to a recent forum participant, because it matches my opinion: " ... if Minkowski had lived to see the advent of general relativity, he would have realized, as a mathematician, that the mathematical formalism of general relativity implies that gravitational phenomena are merely manifestation of the non-Euclidean geometry of spacetime (not an interaction). Einstein made a gigantic step by linking gravity with spacetime geometry, but even he was unable to overcome the seemingly self-evident 'fact' that gravitational phenomena are caused by gravitational interaction (which, unfortunately, is still the accepted view in physics)."

Things are changing. I got an Email from The Minkowski Institute Press just a few days ago that they are publishing Cristi Stoica's PhD thesis (congratulations, Cristi!) , which is relativity-based, with a perturbative path to quantum gravity (my own solution is non-perturbative, but we are pretty close).

In regard to your own defense of conventional quantum theory in the Bertlmann's Socks analogy, I applaud your expansion of the pedagogy, and give high marks for that. It is deservedly among the best of Bell's output (and your own, for that matter).

If you don't mind, I am going to do another lazy thing, and reproduce this reply in your forum.

All best,

Tom

Dear Peter,

I read your essay and saw your nice video that you suggested to me in my essay blog. I should honestly say that--if I haven't misunderstood your essay and video--we are on the opposite sides of the fence: it seems to me that you want to mechanize the whole physics (including quantum), whereas I want to derive the mechanics itself from something more fundamental: pure information processing, or, to be precise, from very fundamental principles that are mathematically stated but have physical interpretation. Our two positions seem to be irreconcilable.

However, I should say that I enjoyed parts of your movie, and the animations illustrating your "mechanization" point of view.

Congratulations for your high position

Best regards

Mauro

    Dear Peter, thanks for getting in touch via my Essay Forum. In reply:

    The remarkably broad sweep of your latest ideas, coupled with your new ideas re the details (eg, Jackson & Minkowski (2014)),* is mostly moving beyond me! Dare I say, leaving me behind. I might even say that our approaches are diverging to the extent that we are moving to be polar opposites in approach.

    Fortunately, I still understand you to be a local realist to the point (as spelt out in my essay) of being an Einstein-local and a Gisin-realist.

    To be clear re our differing methodologies: For my part, I am investigating a very small part of physical reality: one where, like a stone in my shoe, most interpretations contradict my basic understandings of that reality; at the same time aggravating my fundamental sense of comfort -- as a successful engineer -- with my intuitions re such.

    That small part, as you know, relates to the many and varied interpretations of many and varied Bell-tests: whose results I accept without question, since they are exactly the results that my own views endorse.

    But I reject the common interpretation that local realists like us must give up Einstein-locality (for nonlocality) or Gisin-realism (for un-realism): and, in that regard, I happily note the increasing trend of old foes to be moving to my position (which is, hopefully, still our position).

    In particular, my small corner of the business holds out hope for a new quantum theory: one devoid of Hilbert space (since spacetime appears to be sufficient) and certainly absent nonlocality (since, to be blunt, how on Earth could any such thing be possible). For a very simple critique of the mainstream view, just skim paragraph #6.1 of my essay.

    Nevertheless I see a growing trend to go for the Full Monty here; and though I'm not in favour, it's good to see that trend reflected in the very high standing of your essay.

    However, from my own broad experience (and for those who are aware of it), the Full Monty does not quite measure up against what I have to offer!

    With best regards, and hoping to keep in touch; Gordon Watson: Essay Forum. Essay Only.

    * Jackson, P. A., Minkowski, J.S. Quasi-classical Entanglement, Superposition and Bell Inequalities. Academia.edu 9th Nov 2014.

      Thanks Christian, indeed thank everybody for your support and, most of all, comprehension. I'm astonished that the essay has scored highest, particularly considering the excellent quality of many others. however I think and I hope that may bode well for the eventual evolution of entrenched thinking methods and beliefs required for advancement in understanding of nature.

      In the long run the last bastion of such change is represented not by the essayists but the judges. That's the way it must be. Community 'peer' scoring has meant little in that final analysis and I don't expect that to change. Perhaps the placings also mean little. In a way the judging is more a test of how those in the position of judges handle social pressures than the science and essays themselves.

      We're now half way through the 10 year estimate to a new paradigm given in my first ('2020 Vision') essay. I really have no idea how it's going! - but perhaps the events around us on the planet show that mankind isn't quite yet ready for any great advances.

      I'm now off the a dear friends funeral. A salutary reminder of mortality, but will respond to the above posts and continue some excellent and valuable discussions for which I thank you. I'm still learning a great deal, though as Dyson reminds us (and often needs to!) 'there are no 'facts' in physics.

      Peter

      Steven,

      Thanks for your kind comments. The slightly different interpretation of the equations leading to cosmic strings is implicit in the video model of expanding helical paths at all scales with frequent requantizations, and is free of all the issues with the Susskind etc String Theory route. If you wish to look at the important relativistic foundations of this 'discrete field' model (with a similar slight re-interpretation as Einsteins 1952 paper) you might start at my 2011 essay, a slightly less abridged version here.

      FQXi '2020 Vision. A model of Discretion in Space'.

      I was impressed with and enjoyed your own essay and you'll have seen I commented there. If you feel you can have any input to the thesis I always welcome it.

      Peter

      John,

      Many thanks. Please do stay in touch on your photon diffraction work. I feel quantum and nonlinear optics and photonics are very important areas with many interesting experimental results many theorists seem largely ignorant of, possibly due to the (important!) inconsistencies with embedded doctrine, just one of which my essay addresses.

      Peter

      Sherman,

      Thanks. For me the validity of 'Turtles all the way down' improves each day, but in the 'discrete field' model each turtle is simply an ever 'smaller' state of orbital angular momentum (OAM) like octaves in music and wavebands. Translation than gives helical paths within 'charges' with helical paths. (At just one level planet earth has a helical path through the galaxy). The next below the Planck length exists and does NOT couple with EM, but does form the larger 'spin state' polarisation scale motions which does ('Higgs process') when disturbed, like simple vortices. Then all becomes consistent with photonics etc etc and the puzzle pieces all start to fit.

      'Ant's crawling round wires'? Apart from the one helical path I see no value in that. Where was it from?

      Best wishes

      Peter

      Pankaj

      Many thanks. You've identified most of the key points in the essay. It pleases me greatly they're now being recognised and understood, not true of previous essays. I hope that's partly due to the development of my writing style which I've been working on. It seems communication is as important as content.

      But the next and far more onerous test is of course the judges!

      Keep up your own good work. Best wishes

      Peter

      Alma,

      I'm really pleased your brilliant essay ended in the top group and think perhaps it should have been top. Both your perception and writing style are beautiful and I'm sure it has more chance than mine of a prize. (2yrs ago both Christian Corda's and mine, top and 2nd, were omitted in the judging).

      But what would be far more valuable to me is to have a collaborator with your brilliance to help coherently assemble and describe the more consistent model of nature behind by my essay(s). You may be surprised to find the QM derivation fell straight out of a slight re-interpretation of SR consistent with Einsteins 1952 concepts and descriptions (QG is also lying there awaiting description). Your descriptive skills and other attributes far exceed mine.

      First perhaps some careful readings of the full complex progression here, which seems still slightly beyond most (including 2 editors);

      http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0081v1.pdf ">Quasi-classical Entanglement, Superposition and Bell Inequalities.](https://https://www.academia.edu/9216615/Quasi-classical_Entanglement_Superposition_and_Bell_Inequalities._v2

      http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0081v1.pdf )

      Just let me know any or what questions you have or subjects to test the 'discrete field' model with and I'll answer or post a link to the relevant paper.

      Did you watch the redshift (etc!) video?

      Very best of luck in the judging.

      Peter

      Michel,

      Strangely my comprehensive response appears to have vanished into cyberspace! Was it operator error, system failure, or some aliens overlooking us finding it too close to truth!! If I mislaid it and you find it do respond and advise. If lost, I'll try to sneak the other responses to you.

      Essentially you need to read this, carefully and probably at least three times to remember it as it's a complex progression

      Quasi-classical Entanglement, Superposition and Bell Inequalities.

      I look forward to your thoughts and questions. Best wishes

      Peter

      Jeff,

      Thanks. Shame yours didn't make the cut.

      Yes, some of the 'ideas' (analyses) in my essay were quite new. Those most important ones will likely be the ones most quickly forgotten as they have no matching 'hooks' in neural networks yet. I estimated 10 years 5 years ago so there's no rush (Essay '2020 Vision')

      I hope what you might take away, if you needed to, to teach your students is that the only thing we really know about current theories and models is that they're 'wrong'. We might say 'incomplete', but in a similar way to a paper dart not quite being Concord. As my favourite Dyson quote; There are no 'facts' in physics.

      I suspect that may get MORE interested in physics not less, but we must teach our science students 'how to think' and challenge instead. Too many professors might hate that, and all those who do should be identified and fired. Then we can advance paradigms!

      Very best wishes

      peter

      Lorraine,

      Thanks. The 'domain boundary' problem was recognised long ago and never solved. It's solution via 'discrete fields' is the key, but it's still a brain teaser. Like a bracketed function, a 'spatial domain' may be ANY size, and contain ANY number of smaller domains. In maths etc the brackets themselves represent the boundaries.

      In reality it's the same but trickier to imagine and we need to invoke 'virial systems', which are groups of particles/bodies WITH AN ASSIGNABLE GROUP 'REST FRAME' (state of group motion wrt some other group). A galaxy is one, all orbiting it's centre, as are the solar systems within it, a cloud is one, so are ALL LENSES, and so is each electron if in motion through a group! That's true 'locality' but takes some careful thinking through, for some weeks!

      When you get it into your neural network you can then throw all the anomalies of physics at it and find it's resolving power is astonishing.

      The best intro may be my '2020 Vision' essay (2011) though the model has come a long way since 2010.

      Did you see the (compressed!) video yet? - showing we may not be undergoing accelerated expansion after all. Links are scattered all round.

      Thanks and best wishes

      Peter

      Thanks Dominico,I only managed to read 2/5ths and am sure I missed many fine ones. You're right about the potential for quantum computing, you may recall I discussed and analysed that 2yrs ago with my helical 'IQbit'. Zeilinger has recently transmitted a picture across Vienna using that method to prove it's potential.

      best wishes

      peter

      Jon,

      Ron Garret's analysis was significantly flawed so it's not surprising he could only conclude we're only virtual not 'real' (not too surprising from a software engineer). All the effects he showed are more coherently explained in the quasi classical mechanism, including the quantum eraser. It goes off the rails from the beginning where he fails to define 'measurement' in a way far more consistent with light and photonics.

      Entanglement is properly derived and defined in the full paper (see all the links above etc) and only requires a shared polar axis, which is then changed in the 'filter' (really modulator' interaction). Read it (3 times if you want to remember it!) and identify the flaw. There aint one! (It's also shown to be exactly as Bell predicted).

      The real issue seems not so much to do with the science but n more to do with theoretical entrenchment so deep they don't seem to have long enough ladders to see beyond the walls, escape, or even pick up a signal to watch your movie!

      Best

      Peter

      Giacomo,

      Interesting response. I see that view as rather 'dumbing down' the problem to that of the chicken and egg, suggesting the two views of 'which came first' are irreconcilable. In my first lines I accept your case, then reconcile it coherently with reality.

      I've derived the chicken/egg solution elsewhere nearby; to simplify, It's a chicken, which contains an egg, which contains a chicken embryo, which contains the physical constituents required to form an egg, with a chicken inside, etc etc, chicken soup all the way down!

      So at the bottom, when our microscopes get enough resolution do you think we'll find a mathematical formula written out? Will it be in Arabic numerals, perhaps Roman? Babylonian? or even Mayan? Or do you not agree that it's more likely to be some fundamental relative motion, spin or OAM state of motion DESCRIBABLE or representable by a simple equation (in Arabic or whatever system the observer wishes)?

      In the same way SR and QM are probably only irreconcilable due to inadequate understanding I feel our approaches are Ying and Yang, both essential and more "inseperable" than irreconcilable, except perhaps in blinkered or 'tunnel' vision.

      Do you really not agree? If so what would you expect to 'observe' as 'information' being processed at the smallest (sub-planck?) scale? A micro computer?

      I'm not convinced we generally think things through thoroughly enough before pinning our colours to them them. Can you convince me?

      Best wishes

      Peter

      Gordon,

      I don't see my derivation as 'the full monty', just the minimum required to reproduce the findings termed quantum non-locality (QNL) without abandoning local reality. I don't quite understand what it is you 'have to offer' beyond that simple need to circumvent the Bell constraint. What else is needed? Can you elucidate?

      Once that tough nut was cracked, sure a whole lot of other solutions to anomalies came flooding out. They're mainly just verification, though ok, many are also important in themselves, and yes, far too much flooded out for most human brains to assimilate, but noe of thet detracts from the accomplishment of the simple task rationalising QM and QNL.

      I do agree we've approached from opposite aspects, but I think that'd be useful as the problem can't 'get away' and both together have 3 times the value. I'm used to working with top teams to accomplish complex projects individuals can't, but if you don't think you could collaborate that's fine. I'm sure someone will. but I hope you'll stay in touch.

      Best

      Peter

      Hi Peter,

      Congratulations on a high community score! And as Sherlock Holmes said:

      "There is nothing as deceptive as an obvious fact." (A. Conan Doyle - Author & Ophthalmologist)

      John M

      I had thought (reading your essay) of a optical neuron, where a Faraday rotator in the Zeilinger apparatus can change the polarization of the intermediate three filter case, so that could be an optical memory devices for a laser light: a combination of filters could run storage and calculation logic.

      dear Peter

      congratulations with your socks.

      I did not participate this year because of my lack of math so I could not give a group rating but my public rating comes with this. Hopefully you are getting this year a better rating of the committee.

      best regards and again best of luck

      Wilhelmus