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Dear Constantinos,
I agree with some of your views and the basic approach.I like,in return,you too to read my article and express your views on it.
Good work and best wishes.
Sreenath B N.
A World Without Quanta? by Constantinos Ragazas
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Fascinating essay. Really makes one think about all the conventional thought processes.....
Georgina,
Just one further point to stress in my previous post regarding Planck's Law.
Planck's Law marks the turning point in Physics that brought us to where we are today, and all the 'quantum weirdness' and assault on common sense. It has been thought by physicists that this Law proves we live in a 'quantized Universe'. They came to that conclusion because no one at the time, and for decades latter, was able to derive this Law without using energy quanta. I show in this essay that there is a very simple mathematical derivation of this Law that does not require energy quanta. Had this derivation been known 100 years ago, it would have changed the direction Physics has taken.
Constantinos
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Hi Constantinos thank you.
I am glad that you have reiterated those points and confirmed my understanding of them in your essay. I didn't understand "where you were coming from" when you were posting on FQXi blog forum and assumed that because you were using mathematical arguments you were trying to mathematically describe the function of the universe. Now its very clear and I do not disagree.
Good luck, Georgina.
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Constantinos,
also about duration. I agree with you on this point too. I have said (words to the effect) "Some configurations are replaced by new ones and some configurations persist." Those that persist are the ones we are able to continue to experience (so they have duration).I don't think time has to be brought into it but it does make it clearer and easier to understand when you do.
For the equilibrium idea I can imagine a sand bar. So long as the sand eroded by the wave action is balanced by the sand deposited it will remain in equilibrium and will persist. If the equilibrium becomes unbalanced the sand bar might be completely eroded or might grow into an island. So the recognition of it as an unchanging object or feature depends upon equilibrium over a duration of time , as you say. It is an analogy that applies to all sorts of other ideas. For example water droplet that might evaporate or freeze, or population of animals that retains the same morphology or evolves or dies out.
Best regards, Georgina.
Georgina,
In my thinking, physical time has all to do with 'duration'. And 'duration' has to do with 'equilibrium'. Of course, we have various abstract ideas about time, but physical time as I have come to understand it is what gives 'entities' existence! It's also what The Second Law of Thermodynamics says, as I mathematically demonstrate in my essay.
It all fits well together. We can recognize this sense of time in all experiences we have, not just physics. These are not so much 'analogies' (though they are) but rather 'manifestations' of the same process of Creation!
I believe points (x,y,z,t) in the spacetime continuum identifying 'events' contradict Thermodynamics. Events need 'duration' as well as 'extension' to be physically existing. I truly believe dark matter and dark energy (as well as inflation) required to make Cosmology consistent with Thermodynamics is due to this subtle deficiency in GR.
Constantinos
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Yes and I agree. At that foundational level there is no time dimension and no space-time only space. There is change which generates causality and the passage of time and also as you point out some parts in equilibrium which allows them to endure and so have duration over that passage of time. Causality and thermodynamics are occurring in space, not in space-time, at the foundational level, over time or with a duration. There is no passage of time in space-time alone it is a static block.
Constantinos
A wonderful essay, and with both an important point and fundamental conceptions astonishingly consistent with and part of a falsifiable picture of Local/Reality physics painted by a whole swathe of other essays here, but needing a deeper comprehension and broader viewpoint than in the past to understand. (You'll have seen the threads on Georgina's Edwin's and mine to link to the others). The threads are as interesting as the essays!
I believe this is quite unprecedented, which gives us hope that physics may be about to arise out of it's current deep rut. But then again we may all just be ignored again! Let's not let that stop us this time.
Keep up the good work.
Peter
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Hello Peter,
Thanks for your comment. I do believe that there is a group now coalescing around similar ideas. What's binding us together, however, is our loud call for 'physical realism'. My sense is that call may be getting heard. More from the ranks of physicists are now considering 'a world without quanta'.
We have at least gotten the conversation going. And that's a good think!
Constantinos
5 days later
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Hello Constantinos,
Loved your essay and your characterization of time. I have a similar view.
If you get a chance check out my essay here
I'm sending good thoughts.
Pete
Thank you Peter for your good thoughts. I am especially pleased that you found my characterization of time interesting and useful. Though I have spoken about this very unique and different concept of physical time before, I don't believe anybody truly saw how deeply profound and significant this idea is. I suppose it takes a 'conceptual artist' to appreciate it.
I am very intrigued by your art background. I would love to see what some of your work is. Have you posted any of your work on the web? If so please send me where I can look this up. Are you currently showing anywhere in the East coast, New York / Philadelphia area?
Best wishes,
Constantinos
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Hi Constantinos,
I understand that you are trying to find a common-sense approach to understanding Nature, but I'm not sure that Hamiltonian mechanics had to be rewritten (eta is closely related to H). H is Energy, and is very important in Liouville's Equation. In contrast, eta is energy absorbed within a time interval, and thus may have applications with Measurement Theory.
Your treatment of Planck's Law as a truism is interesting, but ultimately this may be due to the facts that 1) Planck's Law is based on bosonic photons, and the 2) Partition Function for Bosons has the same features as your Planck-like Characterization of Exponential Functions. Check out Equations 1-4 of the free partial preview of my book.
If Planck's Law is a truism, then this would have devastating implications for Maxwell-Botlzmann Statistics, and for Fermi-Dirac Statistics. Remember, Planck had to modify the "standard" Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics to explain Blackbody radiation, but Maxwell-Boltzmann has many other valid uses.
I know that Multiverses are not generally popular - after all, we shouldn't be able to directly observe alternate Universes or Realities. But could other "minimum sips" of eta be possible? Would these imply other scales, and how similar or different would those scales be relative to our reality?
I agree that there may be a scale at which spacetime is comprised of something - whether that "something" is the prime eta that you propose, or the "vacuum" related to the Higgs vev, or Causal Dynamical Triangulation or Spin Foam, or a revised quantum version of the old classical "aether"...
I would appreciate your professional opinion of my essay.
Have Fun!
Dr. Cosmic Ray
Dear Ray,
Wonderful hearing from you again, after how many months of silence? Since the publication of your last paper on scales? I should update you with some interesting developments.
I am coauthoring a chapter in a book on Thermodynamics to be out this July. My coauthor is Hayrani Oz, Prof. Of Aerospace Engineering at Ohio State University. The quantity eta you mention in your post above turns out to be Prof. Oz's 'enerxaction' which he has been using successfully in his work and teaching for many years. Our work will demonstrate, among other things, how this approach combines and supersedes both Hamiltonian as well as Lagrangian mechanics. In my paper on 'prime physis', as well as in my essay, I explain that the quantity eta is both, 'accumulation of energy' (H) as well as 'action' (L).
Ray, have you checked this amazing link showing the indistinguishable match between experimental data and Planck's Law of the blackbody spectrum? Aren't you amazed? And if so, doesn't this beg the question "why so exact?".
My mathematical derivation of Planck's Law, showing that this Law is a mathematical tautology, explains this striking experimental fact. Can you think of any other explanation? There is nothing more accurate than a tautology A = A. I go on to suggest that the amazing accuracy of QED may similarly be due to mathematical tautologies inherent in the theory. A little like mathematical card tricks!
Ray, the reason that Planck's Law is a mathematical truism has NOTHING to do with Physics! This is a mathematical result, pure and simple! It just has a camouflaged appearance in Physics, dressed up as some physical law. As such, this should not contradict anything in Physics that stands in good order and has no self-contradictions!
Ray, I would look at your essay. But if it in written in 'incomprehensible code' (as before) I doubt if I will have much to say about it!
Best wishes,
Constantinos
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Hi Constantinos,
I enjoyed this paper because it included more of your ideas. Most of your prior papers were 2 or 3 page papers that referenced other 2 or 3 page papers.
I am not challenging the accuracy of Planck's Law. I'm asking which is more fundamental - Planck's Law vs. the Partition functions of Quantum Statistical Mechanics? If Planck's Law is a truism (based on your assumptions involving the properties of exponential functions), then it seems to negate the fundamentality of Fermi and Maxwell statistics. If the Partition Functions are truisms, then all three statistics, Bose, Maxwell and Fermi are allowed.
Planck developed his ideas in 1900. Einstein took Planck's ideas to the next level with his explanation of the Photoelectric Effect in 1905. For all of the talk about Relativity, Einstein won his Nobel Prize for his early development of Quantum Statistical Mechanics - ironically Einstein later questioned Quantum Mechanics...
I see how mechanics can be derived from eta, but also see huge similarities between eta, the Hamiltonion, and Action. I don't consider eta so much of a new concept, as just being a different (perhaps more common-sense?) way to formalize these old concepts.
I have been quiet on the blog site lately. Too many of the discussions sound too similar...
I hope my latest essay is not an incomprehensible code. As a mathematician, you might enjoy some of it. I only have a little bit of physics involving scales, intrinsic spin, and supersymmetry.
Have Fun!
Dr. Cosmic Ray
Community Appeal!
The key result (and the Rosetta Stone in this essay) is the mathematical derivation of Planck's Law without using energy quanta. I ask that you check this link showing the experimental blackbody spectrum and the theoretical curve obtained using Planck's Law. "The FIRAS data match the curve so exactly, with error uncertainties less than the width of the blackbody curve, that it is impossible to distinguish the data from the theoretical curve"! I show in my essay that Planck's Law is a mathematical tautology. Such remarkable fit of data I argue can only be explained by this result!
I have tried for several years to have the results in this essay be 'peer reviewed' by professional physics journals. Though all these efforts were rejected, the results were not refuted. My sole purpose for submitting my essay to this contest is to get the 'generals' to consider this 'message'. This is the closest to 'peer review' that I can hope to get. Read the essay. Study the mathematical arguments. Consider 'a world without quanta' sketched by these results. And if you feel, as I do, that these deserve consideration by the 'panel of experts', I ask that you support my efforts to get this 'message' to the 'panel'.
Constantinos
In case the above link does not work, here it is again:
Ray,
You write, "I am not challenging the accuracy of Planck's Law."
That is not the issue! The real question is WHY Planck's Law is indistinguishable from the experimental data! The reason for this remarkable fact is because, as I show in my essay, Planck's Law is actually a mathematical tautology! This does not in any way take away any other 'truisms'. Rather provides more understanding of these. If such a mathematical fact brings to serious question other physical results, than in my humble opinion the physical results have to be more carefully reconsidered. Perhaps here lies more fruitful application of the Rosetta Stone in my essay!
Furthermore, it is a mistake to think that this results (re: Planck's Law) depends on any assumptions regarding the 'energy function', E(t). I show in my essay that Planck's Law taken as EXACT is mathematically equivalent to E(t) being a simple exponential function. However, if we take Planck's Law as a limit approximation (better than any experimental accuracy) then E(t) can be ANY integrable function. Thus, in all circumstances Planck's Law is a mathematical statement describing the interaction of measurement. And that explains why the 'measurements' are indistinguishable from the theory.
Ray, there are so many other results in my essay that neatly tie all together. Let me highlight three:
1)A relationship between entropy and time. This leads to a more intuitive interpretation of The Second Law of Thermodynamics to say that "all physical processes take some positive duration of time to occur".
2)Planck's Law and Boltzmann's entropy equation are mathematically equivalent.
3)The Photoelectric Effect can be explained without using photons. The photoelectric current obtained provides a better experimental fit that includes the 'asymptotic tail' to the data.
(I have not included this result in my essay, but details can be found at "The Photoelectric Effect Without Photons".
Best wishes,
Constantinos
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Hi Constantinos,
There seems to be a disconnect between our conversations.
Planck's derivation of Blackbody Radiation is correct, and therefore, fits the data remarkably well. In the case of the Cosmic Microwave Background, we only observe slight variations in effective Temperature as we scan different angles.
My point is that your "Planck-like Characterization of Exponential Functions" makes assumptions that automatically include the Partition Function for Bose-Einstein Statistics - pretty much the same as Satyendra Nath Bose's original derivation of Bose-Einstein Statistics in the 1920's based on Planck's Blackbody radiation formula.
I honestly think that you have made a circular argument here:
By inadvertantly including the Bose-Einstein Partition Function, you may have inadvertantly excluded the Maxwell-Botlzmann Statistics for identical particles, and the Fermi-Dirac Statistics for particles of odd symmetries (fermions that obey the Pauli Exclusion Principle).
Its just my opinion. You might run the idea by Lawrence Crowell or Philip Gibbs.
Have Fun!
Dr. Cosmic Ray
Dear Ray,
If I were to have been introducing elliptical orbits, you would be asking to see the epicycles behind the ellipses. Your argument then would have been, "since epicycles explain the orbits of the planets, your ellipses inadvertently assume such epicycles and so your argument is (epi) cyclical"!
The way to understand the results in my essay is to understand them for what they show. Don't try to 'see' the epicycles that these replace!
Constantinos
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Hi Constantinos,
I am not a physicist who is happy to sit on a few Centuries worth of understanding Reality and believe that is all there is. I am in favor of replacing all "epicycles" with the appropriate geometries.
Bose developed Bose-Einstein statistics in the 1920's by studying Planck's Blackbody Radiation Law in depth. I think that your analysis is very similar to Bose's. This is fine for describing bosons, photons are bosons, and photons are involved in our experimental observations. My essay addresses these three fundamental spin statistics. I did not derive them from first principles (the Partition Functions of Quantum Statistical Mechanics), but did try to describe them in terms of Lucas Numbers.
Likewise your eta is a hybrid combination of a Hamitonian and Action. Perhaps eta has a good common-sense interpretation, but the Hamiltonian is useful for Liouville's Theorem and the variational principle, and Action is useful for the Principle of Least Action.
I know that you are a competant Mathematician, but you seem to be rederiving Physics that has existed for decades. That's OK with regards to this essay contest, where the purpose is to present a perspective of whether Nature is analog, digital, both, neither or undecided. My problem is that your Prime Physics basically includes Bose's assumptions, and therefore excludes Fermi's treatment of particles, and therefore is a biased perspective of this continuous vs. discrete question.
Have Fun!
Dr. Cosmic Ray