Essay Abstract

Theoretical physics has reached a catastrophic impasse. New ideas to get us beyond this gridlock are constantly being proposed by the best minds and institutes in the world; yet all these ideas are falling short. We are no closer to revealing the big picture that would unite general relativity (GR) and quantum mechanics (QM) than we were 40 years ago. Many physicists are throwing up their hands in frustration saying that we are either not sophisticated enough to solve such a daunting problem or that there is no solution possible that would resolve the major schism that exists within our current model of physics brought about by the incompatibility of GR and QM. Some physicists say our experimental approaches (such as colliding particles) will never be helpful. But has anyone considered, what if the answer we seek cannot be reached using decisions, computations and predictions; then the solution we are striving to find cannot be reached using our most reliable, faithful tool... The scientific method! That should give all of us pause to think.

Author Bio

Scott S Gordon BS-Biology, MS-Biomedical Engr, MD, Orthopedic/Hand Surgeon, Humorist, Radio Talk show host, Author, Actor, Keyboard Musician, Music Composer/Arranger/Producer Professional Memberships: APS, AMA, AAOS, ASSH, ASCAP, SAG-AFTRA

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Fqxi once again provides an excellent opportunity for people to present new ideas and this topic "Undecidability, Uncomputability, and Unpredictability" lends itself to the most troublesome aspects of theoretical physics. What if the way to find the solution that everyone is looking for to advance physics beyond its current theoretical impasse, is not accessible through decisions, computations, and predictions? if that is the case, then it is no wonder why physics academia is floundering... because if this is true, it means the Scientific Method is useless to find the solution. That doesn't mean that the scientific method can't be used to subsequently support a theory once it is found, but it does mean that the normal methods of advancing physics will not be fruitful.

This Fqxi essay contest on this topic provides an excellent forum for people in and out of physics academia to present ideas that may seem outlandish because to come up with new ideas does not rely on straight forward decisions, computations, and predictions. There is a reason why theoretical physics has not advanced over the past 40 years and a good reason for that would be that scientific method does not lend itself to tell us where to look for the solution.

Keep an eye out for new models and new ideas that do not use anything we already know but leads to what we already know... This essay is one example of that suggestion as it proposes spacetime as an energy medium where the energy of the medium is the base energy tier in a hierarchy of three independent energy tiers.

I am happy to answer any questions and address any interests my fellow Fqxi-er's wish to post.

5 days later

Scott

I suggest the answer to your first question is your 6). The STOE answers several of your questions.

One of your question says ..." the problem we have no to determine what that medium is,..."

There must be some postulates in a scientific model (did you address this?) and the assumption of a medium is one many have take. This allows the presumption of the necessary properties to explain experiments. So, the key becomes if such a presumption can result in PREDICTIONS and later confirmation of those predictions.

Does prediction play any part in your 6 steps?

We have seen string theory (speculation) which seems to not satisfy uur 2). It has been popular for some time. Comment?

Same for ad hoc additions such as Dark Matter and Dark Energy (which is being questioned). So, it seem the answer to your question of why the scientific method fails is that the scientists fail the scientific method.

    Hi John,

    I liked your essay and yes we questioned the same aspects of the approach and what a theory needs to do. I like your conclusion in your post... "Because scientist fail the scientific method"... But let's face it, the reason why they are failing it is because the method itself does not allow out of the box creativity... All the creativity we have seen are methods that use what we already know and then contort them some way to explain a missing ingredient... The better approach would be come up with the missing ingredient. But how can you come up with the missing ingredient using the scientific method if the missing ingredient cannot be mathematically derived from our current knowledge nor can it be experimentally exposed.

    I wish you luck on promoting you ideas... Keep an eye out for Hierarchy of Energy theory towards the end of the year when I get the book out for free download. All the best...

    Scott

    Scott

    I have read your article about lack of consistency with Scientific method. I think that you explain the situation well, and also think this to be an important issue.

    You regard the speed of light to be the same in all inertial frames. I do not regard this as a fact. The prediction from SRT on GPS is only a few centimeters, and SRT can only apply to preadjustments of clocks. Einstein's postulate is only an unproved axiom.

    You refer to MMX. But MMX can be explained by Galilean transform, if you assume no time dilation and doubled FitzGerald contraction. This predicts no effect in both arms and also in stellar aberration. Both useless.

    GRT is also a problem! How can you bend NOTHING.

    Another problem is that you do not know if light transports energy -- or just draws energy from the ether during absorption.

    An ether represented by a frame cannot cause gravity. A spherically symmetric ether wind can do that.

    In my interpretation there is no effect of ether wind in the transverse arm in MMX. This was MIchelson's inertial prediction and think that this correct idea was spoiled in 1882 by Potier. He introduced a wrong idea that light must take a longer way. This was a wrong application of Pythagoras' theorem, and this caused the illusion of particles in light.

    A regard light as just waves and ether as just particles.

    With best regards from ________________John-Erik

      I agree with almost all the aspects you have pointed out. Anything I write has its basis in Hierarchy of Energy theory, the book I mentioned above. While I said the speed of light is measured the same when we measure it within a reference frame. That doesn't mean I consider the speed of light is the same when comparing it between one reference frame to another. Hierarchy of energy theory coined the phrase "Relative Constant". It refers to light always measured at c from within a reference frame BUT when comparing reference frames, the speed of light is relatively different. I think you support that notion.

      In hierarchy of energy theory, spacetime's composition is proposed as a medium of its building block component and the energy required for their alignment. Spacetime is essentially an energy medium and energy creates distance. The relative Movement of spacetime along a direction means additional energy along that direction and the quantum distance relatively shortens. Since the speed of light in hierarchy of energy theory is always defined as 1 quantum distance / quantum time unit, the speed of light will relatively shorten in spacetime we are moving through relative to when we are not moving through... the problem is we can never measure it. AND that is hierarchy of energy theory's account of the MMX results.

      I do agree that Spacetime is not made of nothing...

      This next statement should raise an eyebrow... Light does carries energy and it does so just the way we say it does... E = hf The energy of light and the energy of spacetime represent the base energy tier and light the next higher energy tier. Once particles of light were made at the big bang (they were made first), they make a wave in spacetime's energy. however the energy of each MUST remain independent (hence hierarchy of energy). if one could still become the energy of the other, the photon would eventually cease to exist. The fact that the transition between these two energy tiers is no longer possible is the basis for the law of conservation of energy.

      I think you would be fascinated by the mechanism behind hierarchy of energy's model. I really can't go into the math detail here but it's in the book and I think you will enjoy the book when it comes out...

      All the best John

      Scott

      I will add that an important part of the problem is that we were locked to the idea that we use use 2-way light, since this was needed for finding a value in c[/c]. I demonstrated this to be impossible. If we assume existence than speed is demonstrated by GPS to have spherical symmetry, and explain gravity.

      With best regards from ____________________ John-Erik

      PS

      The other part was Potire's mistake.

      DS

      a month later

      Dear Dr. Gordon,

      I read your brief essay with great interest. You ask the right questions.

      However, you attribute the difficulties in modern science to shortcomings in the scientific method.

      On the contrary, I attribute these difficulties to the fact that most scientists do NOT follow the scientific method, at least not in its original form.

      For example, it is central to the scientific method to be skeptical of orthodox theories, and to require that they be testable by direct observation. Belief in abstract, untestable entities is not science, it is religion. The presence of complex mathematics does not make them any more scientific.

      For example, you talk about spacetime, but spacetime is not a physical quantity; it is an abstract mathematical entity used to solve equations. In my own essay, I point out that all of relativity (both special and general) can be derived without any reference to spacetime. Time and space are indeed relative, due to the behavior of atomic-level quantum clocks and rulers.

      This also enables unification of GR and QM in a simple neoclassical framework. This provides a reinterpretation of GR and a testable alternative theory of QM without entanglement or abstract Hilbert space.

      The link to my essay, "The Uncertain Future of Physics and Computing", is available here.

      Alan Kadin

        Thanks for you interest Alan... The thing I like about these essay contests is the chatting and sharing of ideas. In your response you state... "but spacetime is not a physical quantity". The perspective you have is reasonable but the reason why it is reasonable is because there is never a net effect that the particles in spacetime can have on spacetime. While we say that mass can bend spacetime, it is not clear on exactly how and what exactly is bending. If there is no net effect on spacetime by the particles that exist in spacetime, then there is no reason to think that spacetime exists as anything other than a mathematical construct. However once we do that, then there is no way to show that while particles have no net effect on spacetime... it doesn't mean that there is no interaction between the energy of particles and the energy of spacetime. If that interaction is taken off the table, then we will never be able to model how a particle creates its specific associated energy fields. (Nor will we be able to come up with the internal energy structure of particles since the energy and structure of spacetime leads to the energy and structure of particles)

        In any case I wish you the best of luck on promoting your ideas... GO get 'em!

        10 days later

        Scott Gordon

        I really like this. You have set the table for 'The Universe is Otherwise', my replacement model for the standard model! You picked the best approach by focusing on the speed of light and pointing how the fixed speed causes a complete break-down of current scientific method approaches to the replacement perspective. Your conversational wording is ideal, softening the confusion of technical and energy treatments.

        Breaking the impasse calls for Otherwise. We aren't just merging GR and QM. The way to the new paradigm arrives if we ignore them. The fixed nature of the scientific method leads us astray.

        While your list of steps is not the way, your focus on particle/wave issues helps introduce the thinking and then the 'medium' issue arises.

        Paul Schroeder

          Thanks Paul, You have great insight as you have picked up exactly what I was trying to achieve. I wrote this essay to ease people into first realizing that spacetime is a medium but not easily derived at or revealed experimentally. The next step is introducing Hierarchy of Energy theory which is the theory that I have been recently been promoting to the world of physics academia. In Hierarchy of Energy theory, spacetime is shown to be a energy medium of energy that represents the base energy tier.

          Thank you for your kind words and please if you get a chance keep abreast with my progress in bring forward Hierarchy of Energy theory in the years to come.

          Scott

          Dear Gordon, I read your informative essay and realized that it is with you that I can fruitfully discuss my essay, which contains my answers to your questions.

          Theoretical physics has reached an impasse ... but why?

          The theories of relativity and the probability of quantum mechanics mesmerized physicists and they became deaf and did not want anything else. They are pleased to be in this state.

          6) Share results. This is also a challenge. In this day of organized academia, it requires connections to the right people who may not accept the premise on which you have built your new and novel idea on. You would also require the correct academic pedigree and background to be taken seriously by those in the field, especially if the solution is truly revolutionary.

          For many years I have been promoting the neocartesian generalization of modern physics and have experienced it myself. Even the authority of Descartes is not enough for anyone to dare to understand me. Only the phrase "space-time" acts on them fascinatingly. And I say soberingly - space is matter, and matter is space that moves, since it is matter. It is necessary to distinguish geometric (mathematical) space from physical space, which is the very environment that you are talking about. In this environment, the law of constancy of the Casimir force flow (the Generalized Gauss law) applies. I invite you to discuss my essay, in which I show the successes of the neocartesian generalization of modern physics, based on the identity of Descartes' space and matter: "The transformation of uncertainty into certainty. The relationship of the Lorentz factor with the probability density of states. And more from a new Cartesian generalization of modern physics. by Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich ". At the very beginning of the essay, I repeat twice the idea that rectilinear motion, in essence, is a motion around a circle of infinitely large radius and, if this radius is reduced, then in infinitesimal laws of motion according to the theory of relativity will go over to the laws of quantum mechanics.

          Next come mathematical formulas that only spoil my essay, but without them in any way. I will be pleased if you catch their main meaning and bless me for the further generalization of modern physics.

          Sincerely, Dizhechko Boris.

            Hi Dizhechko,

            Thanks for your interest... Most of us who have come up with a new theory to explain everything will agree on one thing... Those in physics academia are not ready to hear any ideas not arising from within their own ranks. For the most part they have good reasons,... Many of the outside ideas contradict known experimental results, others do not have the math required to show the ideas as being viable and the physicists have no interest in putting the math to other people's ideas.

            My essay was basically an invitation for all physicists to look at other people's ideas since it looks like finding a more fundamental foundation of physics using the scientific method is not possible.

            I have written and published a theory of everything and will be re-releasing it under the name Hierarchy of Energy theory. There is something in your theory that corresponds to Hierarchy of Energy theory and that is your idea that the property of mass is associated with spinning spacetime. However in Hierarchy of Energy theory it is represented much differently.

            I'll share with you some of Hierarchy of Energy's model which does have the math required to correlate with our current understanding. Hierarchy of Energy theory tells us that spacetime is energy... But it is energy that can never be perceived because we can only realize the energy of the two higher energy tiers in the form of E = mc^2 and E = hf which can also be written as E = (h/wavelength)c^1.

            The base energy tier is the energy of spacetime and is expressed using the term c^0 (which is the identity 1 with NO dimensions). Before the big bang all the energy in the universe was in the form of spacetime energy and only during the conditions of the big bang was it possible for the energy of spacetime to jump up to the higher energy tiers of light and then mass. After the big bang, the energy of particles could no longer become the energy tier of spacetime and the energy of spacetime can no longer become the energy of particles. That is why we have the law of conservation of energy!

            Particles in spacetime never cause a net displacement of spacetime because if they did, part of the energy of particles would be lost into displacing spacetime and eventually the particle will cease to exist.

            So to get back to your idea... Photons are the linear motion of the photon's energy in the energy of spacetime where the photon moves spacetime back and forth (or forth and back) leaving spacetime undisturbed. But for particles containing mass, the only way to replace the displaced spacetime is to move it in a circular pattern so it replaces itself. You stated that the property of mass is associated with spinning spacetime. In hierarchy of Energy theory, the property of mass is created by energy in the highest energy tier. Spacetime is energy and there is the extent of this comparison.

            Hierarchy of Energy theory independently derives E = mc^2...

            Since we have different ideas and approaches, we would be naturally at odds, but we are not here to convince each other that our ideas are valid, we are here to convince other. I wish you all the best in promoting your ideas and wish you great success.

            Scott

            Dear Scott Gordan,

            Thank you for a very interesting essay.

            I was wondering if you have any suggestions of how to change the scientific method so that we get past this impasse?

            All the best,

            Noson Yanofsky

              Hi Noson,

              Appreciate the kind comment... I wrote this essay questioning the using of the scientific method to find new physics. Many people are assuming that if I am saying that the scientific method in not useful in finding a solution that I do not believe in the scientific method and therefore my ideas are not valid science. Ironically that is not accurate. While the scientific method cannot be used to find a new theoretical physics model... once a new theoretical physics model is found, the scientific method can be used to validate it. So we do not need to change the scientific method, what we need is for physicists to really get out of their scientific "box".

              Even more interestingly, physics academia poo-poo physics philosophers... Lawrence Krause had said very disparaging remarks about that field. He does not seem to realize that it will be philosophy that brings us the complete understanding of physics and the theory of everything.

              I have proposed a model in a theory entitled, "Hierarchy of Energy theory" - It is mathematically based. It requires an entire book to learn it and it represents a missing course in undergraduate physics. Like I said, everything can be derived from hierarchy of energy theory but this theory cannot be found using the scientific method. How I came up with this theory would make an interesting story, but in any case, you can read the response I written to Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich above to get an idea of what the theory entails.

              All the best to you Noson and please stay healthy

              Scott

              Dear Scott Gordon, where did you see here others whom you can convince. Here everyone has his own idea, and he unwaveringly defends it, so it is very difficult to get a high rating if there is no agreement on mutual support with anyone. I give high ratings to those who visit my page and leave her comment on it regarding the neo-Cartesian generalization of modern physics, even if we do not agree.

              Regards, Dizhechko Boris Semyonovich

              I am not here to convince others... I didn't even mention my theory in my essay - I only pointed out why I think theoretical physicists are in such a bind. I'll make a more concerted effort after the updated version of my book is freely available (the old version has too many "crackpot" aspects - Not in the theory but in the names I applied to the new ideas like calling the component building block of spacetime a GOD Entity, where GOD stands for Gordon Omnipresent Dot. Apparently, that is like kryptonite to them. LOL! In any case, it did serve a purpose by allowing the theory to be out for 5 years. It would be very difficult for anyone to say they came up with it first. I will also be making teaching videos later to go with the new book... That's when the fun starts! In any case - I like seeing the work of others, compare the approaches, etc... All the best to you Dizheckho.

              13 days later

              Dear Scott S Gordon,

              You ask why is the speed of light the same in all frames? I think probably because Einstein could not relate frames in relative motion without a 'standard' velocity to compare to.

              You then say that all waves require a medium yet MM experiments concluded there was no medium. Actually, they concluded that there was no evidence for a universal medium. That leaves room for a local medium for propagation of light.

              If one proposes that the local gravitational field is exactly that medium, then all MM experiments would effectively find zero 'ether wind', which is exactly what they found. In his 1923 Michelson-Gale experiments, the results are best explained by gravity as ether [see my ref 11].

              If the real universe-filling gravitation field is identified with the [abstract] 'space' then the 'energy of spacetime' is the energy of the field and Einstein said "there is no space absent field."

              It seems that this interpretation is largely compatible with your model, and I agree with you that the best physical model should focus on energy as the prime aspect of reality.

              I hope you will read my essay, Deciding on the nature of time and space, and comment on it.

              Best regards,

              Edwin Eugene Klingman

                Dear Dr Klingman,

                Everything you have said is completely compatible with my essay - I read your essay and I think your ideas and concepts are correct. There is a reason why everyone is stumbling in actually getting to the correct model and the mathematics that expresses it.

                I wrote this essay to give the reason why we cannot figure out the correct model. In actuality, I have an alternative motive. In the future you will hear about Hierarchy of Energy theory. I am introducing this theory to physics academia slowly. It is a revolutionary take on physics rebuilding the entire field on a more fundamental foundation.

                Everything you have said in incorporated into this theory and I think you would be very interested in it. We cannot use our math to derive it and we cannot perform an experiment that will expose it. And yet, the theory derives from the more fundmental foundation every law of physics and every validated theory we have without changing the math.

                I will be giving two presentations at the up coming virtual APS meeting in a few days - I really think you would enjoy the talks... 1) http://meetings.aps.org/Meeting/APR20/Session/Y11.8 and 2) http://meetings.aps.org/Meeting/APR20/Session/S01.31

                I realize you have your own theory and I am not trying to convince you one way or the other - (Our job is convince others of our theories). However I see how you are using the gravitational field as a basis. We tend to use things we know to explain things we don't know. I previously presented a paper entitled, "Dark Energy's Role in General Relativity"

                http://meetings.aps.org/Meeting/APR19/Session/H11.8

                Since you line of thoughts and ideas are very conforming with mine I really think you will enjoy Hierarchy of Energy theory. Unfortunately it requires an entire textbook to learn. I am re-writing the book and releasing it by the end of the year as a free download along with teaching videos. You may want to keep an eye on my progress.

                All the best to you!

                Scott

                13 days later

                all knowledge starts with a question.. nice work well and simply phrased. could realligment of in the philosophy of physics lead us to new physics ?read/rate my take -https://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/3525.All the best.

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