Essay Abstract

Numbers are fundamental to mathematics, sounds are fundamental to language, bits are fundamental to information processing, atoms are fundamental to ordinary mass, and cells are fundamental to living things. In general we know about our world by building with simple "fundamentals" to get our complex reality. Historically we have thought of Space-Time as a void (nothing) within which the stars exist and where we live our lives. This changed about 100 years ago when Einstein argued successfully that Space-Time had the property of being curved. All of a sudden Space-Time became a thing that had properties. This essay will focus on an aspect of light (electromagnetic radiation) and show that it has a fundamental aspect that can be interpreted as a quantum mechanical particle having mass. It will be argued that accumulations of this fundamental precursor of the photon on a large scale creates Space-Time with its curvature (aka gravity). This quantum mechanical particle will be called a graviton.

Author Bio

Don Limuti created this essay at Einstein's Bagels in Missoula, Montana, where he invoked the spirit of Einstein while contemplating the perfect torus. He has a bachelor of Engineering degree from the City College of NY and has garnered multiple patents for multiple companies. He created and maintains the website digitalwavetheory.com This essay was written to honor one of his heroes Sir Roger Penrose.

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Hi Don,

It is a pleasure re-meeting you here in FQXi.

You wrote a very interesting Essay. Einstein vision's of gravity is indeed the first motivation because I became a researcher. Thus, I appreciate your efforts. In particular, I like your statement that

"graviton theory extends general relativity without changing it significantly"

I also have the idea that general relativity must be extended, despite I thing that such an extension must be weak in order to pass the solar system test.

Concerning your statement that

"graviton theory is able to calculate the precession of Mercury about the Sun to the same accuracy as the theory of general relativity"

I suggest you to write a detailed research paper on this fundamental issue and to submit it to some important journal. This will give success and interest to your theory. I have seen you paper published in Prespacetime Journal, but a more detailed derivation in a more prestigious journal will be better.

In any case, your Essay is really entertaining. You deserves the highest score that I am going to give you.

By the way, you will see that you have not been the sole guy, in this Essay competition, who invoked the spirit of Einstein if you will read my Essay. In fact, you will see that I meet Einstein directly!

Good luck in the Contest.

Cheers, Ch.

    Dear Don Limuti,

    FQXi.org is clearly seeking to confirm whether Nature is fundamental.

    Reliable evidence exists that proves that the surface of the earth was formed millions of years before man and his utterly complex finite informational systems ever appeared on that surface. It logically follows that Nature must have permanently devised the only single physical construct of earth allowable.

    All objects, be they solid, liquid, or vaporous have always had a visible surface. This is because the real Universe must consist only of one single unified VISIBLE infinite surface occurring eternally in one single infinite dimension that am always illuminated mostly by finite non-surface light.

    Only the truth can set you free.

    Joe Fisher, Realist

    Hi Christian,

    Thanks for your generous comments, which I appreciate very much. I look forward to reading your current essay because I liked your last one on Einstein very much. Like many I forget that Einstein may have been a genius but he still worked hard and had to overcome many obstacles.

    I say I am trying to extend general relativity, but it is not in a way that changes it. Einstein started with "mass curves space-time". What I am attempting is to explain how does mass accomplish this task.

    I look forward very much to reading your essay and visiting your blog.

    Don Limuti

    Hi Joe Fisher,

    Joe you have me worried. I think I am beginning to understand you ....a little. I look forward to reading your essay.

    In a way all we can see is surfaces. We never see or know "the thing in itself". The ancients knew this and talked about "attributes" and quantum physicists know this and talk about "observables".

    I grew up in Brooklyn NY, and we have a saying there: "The truth may set you free, but what you really want to know is how much it is going to set you back".

    Don Limuti

    Hello Don,

    Well written essay; although I understood your essay partially (because of my qualification as I am a high school student). Your first line is what my essay shows. I liked your last line which is inspiring for a physicist.

    Please discuss and give feedback on my essay

    Kind Regards

    Ajay Pokharel

    4 days later

    Don,

    I like your style, your website (that I've bookmarked) and your out-of-the-box concepts. You have an impressive collection of materials and concepts in your essay. I like your graviton-oriented explanation of dark matter and dark energy. Neither is explained by conventional physics (Standard model) and elementary particles. Our essays share references to current scientific events and phenomena -- LIGO detectors and laser measurements considered.

    Good luck on the contest.

    Jim Hoover

    Dear Don,

    Good to meet again in the newest contest. I really like these FQXi contests because you can receive thoughts from other thinkers on your ideas, like your approach.

    In the first paragraph of your abstract, you gave in my opinion already the indication of causal emergence (each new layer of emergence influences the next one). I don't know if you can underwrite this.

    "We have recently been detecting them en mass on the cosmological scale as dark matter and dark energy.". The only remark I can make here is that both dark matter and dark energy are still "unknown phenomena". Do you catalogue them as that?

    Page 5: First you mention :"Dark Matter as developed here, is a line of mass (a bundle of gravitons)", then you say:"I believe the answer is that this graviton mass is a wave phenomenon and manifests quite differently than observable mass such as a golf ball or planet, and to detect it we need to couple to it.". I can agree with the wave phenomenon, but that the gravitons would be a bundle between as you say 2 planets is hard for me to believe because this implicates that each "particle" in our reality has a specific "bundle". Maybe I am totally wrong because I am not an expert like you.

    Page 6: "This graviton mass is distributed in such a way as to make the universe expand at an accelerated rate." Does this mean that in the last 5 billion years ago the number of gravitons have changed in a way to have accelerated the universe?

    "These galaxy to galaxy gravitons have less mass than inter-galaxy gravitons, but they outnumber the inter-galaxy gravitons and are dominant in the universe".Here you introduce different masses for gravitons for different areas of reality. It is a bit like in the "Standard Model". In the beginning, it was comprehensible but it was growing and growing so...If your model could work with just ONE graviton, it would be more acceptable I think.

    Note 3: the "big end" in my view is just a crossing point in the sinus-wave of what we call the "history" of our emerging reality.

    Page 7:"But the most amazing thing about the graviton prism is that it curves the path of light and also curves the path of ordinary masses (according to general relativity)" I like this part of your model very much, but you still have to convince me about the essential character of the graviton.

    "Physics is amazing, but I believe that completeness is not one of its properties. And it keeps on getting better." I can fully underwrite that. The intelligence of humanity is only existing one second and is its beginning, it is not so long ago that we all thought that the sun was turning around the earth. I just don't think that we (and the next generations) will be able to find the ultimate foundations of our reality. You can also see that in all the essays that we are encountering now in this contest.

    I liked your approach of the problems we are all struggling with, a very thoughtful essay and I brought you UP a little in this "goofy" contest because you are trying to escape from the establishment. I also hope that again you will read, comment and maybe also rate my contribution "Foundational Quantum Reality Loops" where I attack the same problems as you did.

    Best regards and good luck

    Wilhelmus de Wilde

    Hi Wilhelmus,

    Thanks for visiting my blog. I am a little slow in getting started in this essay contest. And I look forward to visiting your essay.

    In answer to your questions:

    1. The question of emergence usually puts me in a spin. Does life emerge from the universe or does the universe emerge from life. I am in the vortex of the snake eating itself (Ouroboros). In this essay am postulating that space time is composed of smaller units called gravitons. And yes, I hijacked the term from the standard model and the only thing they have in common is that they are quantum mechanical in nature. In the sense that I believe that we move from truth to truth I agree with your emergence thesis.

    2. Do I consider dark energy and matter unknown phenomena? I would say no, cosmologists have measured the phenomena of unexpected rotations of galaxies (dark matter) and the unexpected motion of far away galaxies (dark energy). Astronomer Tarun Souradeep makes a good case that both dark matter and dark energy are basically the same phenomena.

    3. I have only one type of graviton. Its mass is inversely related to its wavelength. The wavelength of a graviton is the distance it spans. Thus intergalactic galaxies have more mass than gravitons that span between galaxies.

    4. Newton's law of gravity is mind boggling. Everything connects to everything... What I am proposing here is that this everything to everything has a limit of the Planck mass (this is in agreement with notions of Roger Penrose). So the graviton connections between Mercury and the Sun are Planck mass to Planck mass connections. There are a lot of them and I take the liberty to talk about them as a wire bundle. At the present time we cannot detect this bundle of mass because it has a wavelength of the distance between Mercury and the Sun. Now, many believe the graviton to be a boson that must have mass. This I believe is incorrect the graviton is a precursor to the photon and it has mass. Think of a guitar string that has mass. The guitar string can be made to resonate at sub-harmonics of its length. These harmonics produce sound that has no mass. Photons are are the mass-less sub-harmonics of the guitar string like gravitons.

    You say:

    "I just don't think that we (and the next generations) will be able to find the ultimate foundations of our reality."

    I say: What a great game. The divine goddess has a sense of style.

    I am off to read your essay, and will comment there.

    Don Limuti

      Dear Don,

      1. "Does life emerge from the universe or does the universe emerge from life. I am in the vortex of the snake eating itself (Ouroboros)" If there was no consciousness what would be the "universe"? The origin of the"self-awareness" of reality is consciousness in my perception. This self-awareness is limited by both the time and space dimension that emerge from Total Simultaneity (where there is no time and no space ALL "parts" to form an event are simultaneous. So I put the primal cause in Total Consciousness that is a property of Total Simultaneity. Indeed if you don't do that the Ouroboros is created...

      2. Dark matter and energy may be the result of the same kind of fluctuations at the border of the Before Planck Area (TS), what exactly it is? I don't' know, both you and I are thinking about solutions, but maybe both of us are wrong and maybe one of us is right.

      3.Maybe I am just too stupid to understand you, but in my view when there are different masses involved there are different "particles". I can understand that the wavelength may differ with distance, but how does that influence mass? A wave is a wave (probability). Are you implying "collapse" of the wavefunction?

      4.I do the same with the limits of emerging reality: the Planck length and time. I think that your problem with the "bundle" is the amount of Planck lengths and HOW those are connected to create a "flow". Here the factor TIME is looking around the corner...Furthermore, I think that if gravitons have mass (and maybe they have), then their top-speed is C, which could be the speed of your wave-form. Am I right?

      I fully agree with you that we have a great game in this quest, in my model I even am looking to try to describe this divine goddess in a scientific way....

      best regards

      Wilhelmus

      Hi Wilhelmus,

      Consciousness without a universe ....could be.....can you prove it?

      A universe without consciousness ....could be.....can you prove it?

      You may may be able to experience either condition but it would be a personal experience in the realm of mystical/religious experience (in my opinion). You could form a church to promote either view and then make the other view wrong.....what fun :)

      In your point 3: You are correct different masses imply different objects or particles. These particles do have different wavelengths that depends upon velocity as per deBroglie's equation.

      I am postulating that another type of particle exists, a graviton, that spans a distance between two masses. This distance is the wavelength of the graviton. I believe this as yet undetected particle has a mass as calculated in the essay.

      Can we detect this particle? I believe so because it is very close in nature to light and can be detected with very long antennas.

      My essay could be clearer, its a skeleton outline form and I could use an editor.

      Non of the above impacts your concept of total simultaneity which I find valuable. It also took me a while to appreciate.

      Thanks,

      Don Limuti

      Don,

      While I should read it several times, my experience with harmonics is not deep enough to fully connect with the evidence.

      That said, there is a sense of getting the bigger picture.

      My sense though, is the whole Big Bang/expanding universe is a dead end.

      That what Hubble discovered, with redshift, was evidence of Einstein's original Cosmological Constant. That it is a balance, or opposite side of the cycle, to gravity, that explains why space is "flat" and the universe is neither collapsing or expanding, but is simply infinite space.

      Consider the rubber sheet and ball analogy for gravity and the curvature of spacetime; What is the shape of the sheet, if there is no ball? Presumably it is flat. Yet if you put that ball onto it, what is the logic of it simply creating a dimple? Wouldn't that assume some underlaying force, pulling the ball down?

      Wouldn't a more useful and accurate analogy be that this rubber sheet is over water; Such that while the ball pushes the sheet down, the sheet reacts by being pushed up an equal amount in the areas where there is no ball. Now since we can only detect light from sources very far away, by the necessity of it crossing the most empty and thus upward pushed areas of space, that redshift is evidence of this balance of gravity/CC.

      Thus this "stretching" of space is canceled out and balanced by it being gravitationally contracting into gravity wells, most notably the galaxies.

      This was actually my first insight, from a completely outsiders point of view, that cosmology was overlooking the obvious. It was reading Hawking's A Brief History of Time, when it first came out, in '89, that he made the point that it was theorized the expansion and gravity were balanced. Omega=1, was the term he used. While his assumption was this meant the rate of expansion was neither increasing or slowing and thus flat, from my simple minded view, it seemed to be more of a cosmic convection cycle, where what was pushing out was the opposite side of the cycle from what was pulling in and they were naturally balanced, by being opposite sides of the same cycle.

      In the mid '90's I was discussing this on the old NYTimes Mysteries of the Universe section of their forums and had developed some idea of it being some dynamic of what was falling into black holes was emerging or being matched by a vacuum fluctuation between galaxies and one of the other participants, mention that it could be much more effectively explained by the basic relationship between light and mass and had been doing graduate studies in cosmology when it occurred to him. When he presented it to his adviser, it was suggested he might want to get into some other field, if he wanted any career advancement.

      As I pointed out in my essay, using the premise of spacetime to explain redshift otherwise completely overlooks the idea of time and distance, clocks and rulers, being dilated equally, thus light always being measured at C, because if it is redshifted, then the speed of light is not increasing to match the ruler. This was all proposed as a patch to explain why we appear at the center of this expansion and since we are at the center of our point of view, an optical cause for redshift, rather than actual recession, would be something worth exploring.

      Regards,

      John

        Hi Don,

        When I was preparing my essay for the essay contest, I had to think sometimes at your presentation of the Zeno's paradox. I also went sometimes to your website. The reason is because I wanted to derive the observable properties and their quantification by simple 'physical' symmetry transformation. And certainly there is a relation between measuring a distance as difference of location as a symmetry invariant measure under translation and the measuring of a distance by measuring the time to move from one place the other (as time dependent) symmetry transformation.

        However I did not find a consistent framework. So I limited myself to explore, what can be know under symmetric constrains of the laws. Still I tried to defend a Copenhagen view on quantum mechanics. I wonder, what you think about.

        To discuss your essay. I like the way you combine the Plank-Einstein equation with Newtons law. I remember how my physics professor used a similar reasoning to heuristically derive the electro magnetic interaction strength. I was quite impressed by the simplicity of the argument and wondered, whether a precise derivation of the EM or other forces was possible. The critical part in your essay is in my opinion your section A. In my opinion you make a pretty non standard use of a connection of the eigen modes and the number of photons. That needs a better justification, since it is your starting point of the discussion.

        Hope you find the time to read and comment on my essay, although it won't reflect your opinion on quantum mechanics. I belief I show a pretty new way on how one can see physical concepts.

        Best wishes

        Luca

          Dear Don Limuti, you have a beautiful essay. Numbers are fundamental to mathematics, sounds are fundamental to language, bits are fundamental to information processing, atoms are fundamental to ordinary mass, and cells are fundamental to living things.On the basis of identity of space and matter Descartes Foundation for fundamental theories is the physical space which is matter and which is moving. Look at my essay, FQXi Fundamental in New Cartesian Physics by Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich Where I showed how radically the physics can change if it follows the principle of identity of space and matter of Descartes. I hope you will not leave without attention to this principle and appreciate good New Cartesian Physics for his radicalism

          Sincerely, Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich.

            Hi John,

            Thanks for visiting. Yours was the one of the first essays I visited...of course because it dealt with space. I liked it and think you me and Penrose are suspicious of the big bang.

            Comments:

            1. I tried to make a simple analogy between a guitar string and my postulated graviton. And I could have done a better job of it. I wanted to convey that the graviton like the guitar string has mass. The graviton is postulated to be the fundamental of the photon. Sound vibrations ride on the guitar string and have no mass but can deliver energy. Light vibrations ride on the graviton string and have no mass but can deliver energy. Of course the guitar string is classical and the graviton is quantum mechanical with a vengeance since it can span the universe. There are a lot of gravitons in that every mass consists of a lot of Planck masses and each of these Planck masses connect to every other Planck mass in the universe. I call this network space-time.

            2. This space time is linked to us because we always bring our mass with us into every measurement we make. Michelson-Morley found a constant speed of light because they brought their own space-time (graviton array) to the measurement, and light rides on gravitons at the speed c. It did not make a difference what velocity the experimenters had because all the gravitons that connected to them conveyed light at the speed of light.

            Said another way we are always centered on the ether because light comes to us via gravitons.

            All this is easy to say and good experiments are called for. OK all you gals and guys ...go to it!

            John thanks for making space fundamental,

            Don Limuti

            Hi Lucas,

            Thanks for visiting my essay and my website. Really, that makes you part of a select group :)

            Your question: "Still I tried to defend a Copenhagen view on quantum mechanics. I wonder, what you think about."

            Answer: When you are stuck with the Schrodinger equation and the standard model as your tools, then Bohr's Copenhagen view (particle and wave ...depending) can keep you sane. I personally feel that quantum mechanics is a misread of phenomena that is discontinuous. This is not bad because it is the best we can do until some of the super people (maybe yourself) in this essay can come up with a math? that can handle discontinuous phenomena.

            On my way to your essay,

            Don Limuti

            Hi Dizhechko Boris,

            Good to be with you in another contest. And thanks for your kind words about my entry.

            I hope you noticed that in my essay I have developed a theory that has both matter and space as having mass. Descartes was very insightful! Also you should have also noticed that I have a diagram that shows the vortexes produced by gravity. Descartes on the ball again!

            Be sure to reference my essay in your New Cartesian physics :)

            I'm on my way to your site to comment and vote for a fine essay.

            Don Limuti

            Dear Don Limuti, I sure to reference your essay in New Cartesian physics. To say that space and matter consist of mass is the same thing, that to say the space, which matter, moves, because according to the formula of mass-energy equivalence , mass is the energy of motion. Time is a synonym for the movement. For thinking that we ought to praise each other. Look at my page,

            FQXi Fundamental in New Cartesian Physics by Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich Where is the principle of identity of space and matter of Descartes. I hope you will not disregard this principle.

            I wish you success in the contest.

            Sincerely, Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich.

            Hi Prof Don Limuti

            Very good work ......." All of a sudden Space-Time became a thing that had properties. This essay will focus on an aspect of light (electromagnetic radiation) and show that it has a fundamental aspect that can be interpreted as a quantum mechanical particle having mass. It will be argued that accumulations of this fundamental precursor of the photon on a large scale creates Space-Time with its curvature (aka gravity). This quantum mechanical particle will be called a graviton." Best wishes to your paper...

            Here in my essay energy to mass conversion is proposed................ yours is very nice essay best wishes .... I highly appreciate hope your essay ....You may please spend some of the valuable time on Dynamic Universe Model also and give your some of the valuable & esteemed guidance

            Some of the Main foundational points of Dynamic Universe Model :

            -No Isotropy

            -No Homogeneity

            -No Space-time continuum

            -Non-uniform density of matter, universe is lumpy

            -No singularities

            -No collisions between bodies

            -No blackholes

            -No warm holes

            -No Bigbang

            -No repulsion between distant Galaxies

            -Non-empty Universe

            -No imaginary or negative time axis

            -No imaginary X, Y, Z axes

            -No differential and Integral Equations mathematically

            -No General Relativity and Model does not reduce to GR on any condition

            -No Creation of matter like Bigbang or steady-state models

            -No many mini Bigbangs

            -No Missing Mass / Dark matter

            -No Dark energy

            -No Bigbang generated CMB detected

            -No Multi-verses

            Here:

            -Accelerating Expanding universe with 33% Blue shifted Galaxies

            -Newton's Gravitation law works everywhere in the same way

            -All bodies dynamically moving

            -All bodies move in dynamic Equilibrium

            -Closed universe model no light or bodies will go away from universe

            -Single Universe no baby universes

            -Time is linear as observed on earth, moving forward only

            -Independent x,y,z coordinate axes and Time axis no interdependencies between axes..

            -UGF (Universal Gravitational Force) calculated on every point-mass

            -Tensors (Linear) used for giving UNIQUE solutions for each time step

            -Uses everyday physics as achievable by engineering

            -21000 linear equations are used in an Excel sheet

            -Computerized calculations uses 16 decimal digit accuracy

            -Data mining and data warehousing techniques are used for data extraction from large amounts of data.

            - Many predictions of Dynamic Universe Model came true....Have a look at

            http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.blogspot.in/p/blog-page_15.html

            I request you to please have a look at my essay also, and give some of your esteemed criticism for your information........

            Dynamic Universe Model says that the energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation passing grazingly near any gravitating mass changes its in frequency and finally will convert into neutrinos (mass). We all know that there is no experiment or quest in this direction. Energy conversion happens from mass to energy with the famous E=mC2, the other side of this conversion was not thought off. This is a new fundamental prediction by Dynamic Universe Model, a foundational quest in the area of Astrophysics and Cosmology.

            In accordance with Dynamic Universe Model frequency shift happens on both the sides of spectrum when any electromagnetic radiation passes grazingly near gravitating mass. With this new verification, we will open a new frontier that will unlock a way for formation of the basis for continual Nucleosynthesis (continuous formation of elements) in our Universe. Amount of frequency shift will depend on relative velocity difference. All the papers of author can be downloaded from "http://vaksdynamicuniversemodel.blogspot.in/ "

            I request you to please post your reply in my essay also, so that I can get an intimation that you replied

            Best

            =snp

              Hi Satyavarapu Naga Parameswara Gupta,

              I did visit your blog and responded there. I cannot agree or disagree with much that you have listed, mainly because because I just do not know.

              For example a feature of your dynamic universe theory is: -No differential and Integral Equations mathematically.

              This could be good because, as I believe, calculus has its limits and has been misapplied in quantum mechanics (see my website: www.digitalwavetheory.com). But it could be bad in that calculus, where it is valid, is a very valuable tool.

              So what do I think about your theory having -No differential and Integral Equations- Answer: ????????

              However, I did get an intuitive flavor that you were on to something...

              I also wish that my essay was clearer!

              Wishing you the best.

              Don Limuti