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This article led me to Discover Magazine (Kalmbach Publishing). A Beyond Einstein Section sparked my interest: "Is the Search for Immutable Laws of Nature a Wild-Goose Chase?" Editors of more serious journals including Phys. Rev., nature, Science, and PNAS will perhaps prefer a more factual style. The reason for me to look into "Back from the Future" was to learn more than revealed in the article about the three steps in the mentioned laser experiments. I cannot even confirm an attempt to present possibly convincing data in a style I am used to accept.

Admittedly I am not familiar with Yakir Aharonov and the effect he is renowned for, "in which particles can be affected by electric and magnetic fields, even in regions where those fields should have no reach". Doesn't this assume that particles behave like points rather than spatially extended wave fields? Anyway, I would prefer abstaining from speculations and from questions that lack any basis for a convincing answer.

What about the mentioned three steps, I wonder if they do not overlap. I see the solution to "mysteries" not in boring wild guesses but in hard work that does not shy back from examination of really foundational issues including FOM.

Eckard Blumschein

Incredible interesting subject Julie,

Our perceptions become awareness and then we become conscious of the universe around us and the causality that is fabricating our life-line. This causality seems logic when you look into the past, and the only thing we can do until now is evaluating the past, in doing so we can create expectations about possible futures, probabilities that can become realities. In the double slit experiment there is a final moment to decide to open or close the second slit (maybe a Planck-time duration), this is the very moment that or the particle form (one slit) or the wave form (two slits), if we assume that it takes place at the very last moment (Planck time) at a distance of the Planck length before the screen, then our wave/particle enters for that little moment a non-causal universe, where both the "realities are present, in our life line it does not matter if there is one slit or if there are two, it is the momentum action that is the the decisive following point in our life-line, that is constituted of one of the probabilities of the non causal universe inside the Planck-scale. The same counts in my opinion for the laser experiment, our intention is to amplify the results even if in the "past" (step 1) we WERE not aware of the multiplication, but is this third step is a causal logical step is what I wonder. In theory all the futures are possible and existing, so also the one in which step 3 leads to the amplification is already a reality, thiunk of this a little further and it counts for the whole history of our universe and so accounts for all the constants that we think that are so peculiar (see my essay. Testing Times arrow can only be accomplished in our 4D causal deterministic universe, we can observe only one aspect of the infinite possibilities of time's arrows .

Keep on thinking free

Wilhelmus

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Superimposing absurdities and wasting huge money in the process. Davies & Company should first solve the expanding/static universe dilemma. If they had discussed this dilemma in a biased way, that would still be normal. But if they add backward causation to the already sufficiently absurd accelerating expansion, and if they don't even mention the arguments for a static universe, and if FQXi pays for that - this could only mean that theoretical physics is dead, perhaps irreversibly.

Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

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    Dear Pentcho,

    Yakir Aharonov has been an internationally established Professor and member of FQXi. Even if his strange idea of backward causation did not find general recognition, there might be several FQXi members with similar putatively foundational ideas, and the effort to provide experimental support was published in PRL.

    If you consider dealing with what you called absurdities a wast of money, I would like to remind you of bestselling literature that is appealing to laymen, not just Harry Potter but already science fiction by Jules Verne and to some extent some books by Paul Davies.

    Incidentally, I do not expect much of interest to me from the announced panel discussion with Davies on the topic time. Nonetheless, I see it a challenge to provide alternative arguments. Admittedly, this is often not easy.

    Read my essay 833 as to get aware of my attitude: Time will tell what was really foundational. I do not exclude that there are still fallacies in seemingly proven most basic tenets of mathematics (FOM) and its careless interpretation.

    Regards,

    Eckard

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    Sorry Eckard but I find detrimental any activity within a DEDUCTIVE science if the fundamental axioms remain suspicious:

    http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=5538

    Paul Davies: "Was Einstein wrong? Einstein's famous equation E=mc2 is the only scientific formula known to just about everyone. The "c" here stands for the speed of light. It is one of the most fundamental of the basic constants of physics. Or is it? In recent years a few maverick scientists have claimed that the speed of light might not be constant at all. Shock, horror! Does this mean the next Great Revolution in Science is just around the corner?"

    Is the Great Revolution in Science still around the corner or the money now comes from another corner? That is the fundamental question.

    Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

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    Speaking of the next Great Revolution in science will be understood as attribution of Great Revolutions perhaps to G. Cantor and also to Einstein. Even B. Russell praised Cantor's set theory: "The solution of the difficulties which formerly surrounded the mathematical infinite is presumably the greatest achievement of which our age has to boast!"

    When Wilhelmus wrote "incredible interesting subject" I see him in company with the many who are potential readers of most sensational stories.

    I am not sure whether I understand you Pentcho correctly. Do you support the idea that c is not the maximal speed of light? FQXi and in particular Paul Davies seem to be open for dealing seriously with almost any deviation from mainstream physics on certain conditions. Shouldn't we highly appreciate this attitude?

    The 2nd FQXi contest asked what is ultimately possible in physics. My credo was: There are very few indispensable preconditions for successful science. Perhaps the foremost important one is to assume objective reality and causal relations no matter whether or not we may completely reveal it. In other words, there is no room for mysticism and mere speculations in science.

    Wasn't the Aharonov-effect called the seventh world wonder of quantum physics?

    While I agree on that funding is fundamental to researchers who benefit from it, I do not see physics based on axioms. I am suggesting to look for logical flaws in deductive science. Isn't this a necessary and comparatively cheap activity?

    Eckard

    Hi Eckard,

    The most sensational stories in science (I hope you meant that) are happening every day, see the "possible" and "impossible" results of the LHC (great great funding !!!), it is every day that we are on the treshold of new discoveries that may be able to develop further our consciousness.

    You can always wonder why a project is funded, but perhaps this funding was step 1, andd then...

    keep on thinking free

    Wilhelmus

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    As Eeckard suggests, it need not cost anything more than time to look for logical flaws in deductive science. Likewise I agree that physics should not be based axioms, particularly if derived from mathematics without regard to causes.

    Mathematical constants are ratios between idealised values, most often stated in irrational numbers, whereas physics deals in ratios between quantities with integral values which seldom coincide with idealised constants. The result is a battle between opposing forces creating instability as the standard condition, though fortunately there is a self-regulating tendency among all interacting forces to keep chaos within bounds to allow steady development.

    Because of this equations in physics can have no universal validity in numeric terms. They can only express dimensional equivalence which tells a very different story from standard theory.

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      John Sulman wrote: "As Eeckard suggests, it need not cost anything more than time to look for logical flaws in deductive science."

      We can start right now (the procedure is called REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM).

      Premise: The speed of light is independent of the speed of the light source (Einstein's 1905 light postulate).

      Conclusion 1: Arbitrarily long objects can be trapped inside arbitrarily short containers:

      http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/barn_pole.html

      "These are the props. You own a barn, 40m long, with automatic doors at either end, that can be opened and closed simultaneously by a switch. You also have a pole, 80m long, which of course won't fit in the barn. Now someone takes the pole and tries to run (at nearly the speed of light) through the barn with the pole horizontal. Special Relativity (SR) says that a moving object is contracted in the direction of motion: this is called the Lorentz Contraction. So, if the pole is set in motion lengthwise, then it will contract in the reference frame of a stationary observer.....So, as the pole passes through the barn, there is an instant when it is completely within the barn. At that instant, you close both doors simultaneously, with your switch. Of course, you open them again pretty quickly, but at least momentarily you had the contracted pole shut up in your barn. The runner emerges from the far door unscathed.....If the doors are kept shut the rod will obviously smash into the barn door at one end. If the door withstands this the leading end of the rod will come to rest in the frame of reference of the stationary observer. There can be no such thing as a rigid rod in relativity so the trailing end will not stop immediately and the rod will be compressed beyond the amount it was Lorentz contracted. If it does not explode under the strain and it is sufficiently elastic it will come to rest and start to spring back to its natural shape but since it is too big for the barn the other end is now going to crash into the back door and the rod will be trapped IN A COMPRESSED STATE inside the barn."

      Conclusion 2: A bug can be both dead and alive:

      http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/Hbase/Relativ/bugrivet.html

      "The bug-rivet paradox is a variation on the twin paradox and is similar to the pole-barn paradox.....The end of the rivet hits the bottom of the hole before the head of the rivet hits the wall. So it looks like the bug is squashed.....All this is nonsense from the bug's point of view. The rivet head hits the wall when the rivet end is just 0.35 cm down in the hole! The rivet doesn't get close to the bug....The paradox is not resolved."

      If the conclusions are absurd, then the premise is false.

      Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

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      My apologies to Eckard Blumschein for the excess of 'e's in spelling his name. My fingers go at different speeds when using the shift key!

      In picking up my approval of the economy in seeking logical flaws, Pentcho Valev demonstrates the flaw in using mathematical theory to resolve a physical problem rather than examining physical causes.

      Only waves travel at speeds relative to the background around that of radiation, particles of matter can only vibrate at a comparable speed which is regulated by the ratio of locally available energy to mass at any point constituting a photon. Sufficient energy to accelerate a solid object to such speed could induce a change of phase shrinking it to small fraction of its former size, rather more than the Lorentz Contraction!

      I read an article from Yonatan Sivan and John Pendry " Time Reversal in Dynamically Tuned Zeo-Gap Periodic Systems (Physical Review letters 106, 193902 (2011), it is about to efficiently time-reverse ultrashort electromagnetic pulses, time reversal eliminates any distortions or scattering that occored at earlier times, regardless of the medium the pulse has propagated through. Are we talking about the same object ? is it not quite sensational Eckard?

      keep on thinking free

      Wilhelmus

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        A time-reversed pulse evolves as if time runs backwards: as if! They used a switchable crystal mirror. This is an old hut to those who are familiar with waves.

        Eckard

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        Why did experiments fail to refute Einstein's 1905 false constant-speed-of-light postulate? Imre Lakatos has given the answer:

        http://bertie.ccsu.edu/naturesci/PhilSci/Lakatos.html

        "Lakatos distinguished between two parts of a scientific theory: its "hard core" which contains its basic assumptions (or axioms, when set out formally and explicitly), and its "protective belt", a surrounding defensive set of "ad hoc" (produced for the occasion) hypotheses. (...) In Lakatos' model, we have to explicitly take into account the "ad hoc hypotheses" which serve as the protective belt. The protective belt serves to deflect "refuting" propositions from the core assumptions..."

        In the absence of any protective belt, the null result of the Michelson-Morley experiment UNEQUIVOCALLY refutes the hard core of Einstein's special relativity and confirms the hard core of Newton's emission theory of light. Already the first element of the protective belt - the ad hoc length-contraction hypothesis advanced by Fitzgerald and Lorentz - reversed the situation: the Michelson-Morley experiment started to support the assumption that the speed of light is independent of the speed of the light source.

        Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

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        In the presence of a gravitational field, the protective belt is called "gravitational time dilation". However the VARIABLE speed of light predicted by Newton's emission theory of light cannot be camouflaged so efficiently as in the field-free situation:

        A light source on top of a tower of height h emits light with frequency f and speed c (relative to the source). The light reaches an observer on the ground with frequency f' and speed c' (relative to the observer).

        Equivalently, a light source at the front end of an accelerating rocket of length h and accelaration g emits light with frequency f and speed c (relative to the source). The light reaches an observer at the back end with frequency f' and speed c' (relative to the observer).

        Consider equations (13.2) on p. 3 in David Morin's text:

        http://student.fizika.org/~jsisko/Knjige/Klasicna%20Mehanika/David%20Morin/CH13.PDF

        f' = f(1 plus v/c) = f(1 plus gh/c^2) (13.2)

        where v is the relative speed of the light source (at the moment of emission) and the observer (at the moment of reception) in the rocket scenario. By combining these equations with:

        (frequency) = (speed of light)/(wavelength)

        we obtain THE FUNDAMENTAL EQUATIONS OF NEWTON'S EMISSION THEORY OF LIGHT:

        c' = c plus v = c(1 plus gh/c^2)

        which CONTRADICT EINSTEIN'S 1905 FALSE CONSTANT-SPEED-OF-LIGHT POSTULATE. The fundamental equations of the emission theory can also be obtained from Paul Fendley's text:

        http://rockpile.phys.virginia.edu/mod04/mod34.pdf

        Paul Fendley: "An experiment to test this idea was done in the early '60s by Pound and Rebka in a tower 20 feet from where my office was as a graduate student. First consider light shined downward in a freely falling elevator of height h. Inside the elevator, we're a happy inertial frame. We say it takes time t=h/c to hit the bottom. We also say that there's no Doppler shift of the frequency of the light. But how does this look from the ground? Say the light beam was emitted just as the elevator was released into free fall (i.e. at zero velocity). By the time the light hits the bottom of the elevator, it is accelerated to some velocity v. Since light travels so fast, the elevator isn't traveling very fast when the light hits the bottom, so v is pretty small, and we can use non-relativistic formulas for this (but not the light!). We thus simply have v=gt=gh/c. Now let's see what this does to the frequency of the light. We know that even without special relativity, observers moving at different velocities measure different frequencies. (This is the reason the pitch of an ambulance changes as it passes you it doesn't change if you're on the ambulance). This is called the Doppler shift, and for small relative velocity v it is easy to show that the frequency shifts from f to f(1 plus v/c) (it goes up heading toward you, down away from you). There are relativistic corrections, but these are negligible here. Now back to our experiment. In the freely-falling elevator, we're inertial and measure the same frequency f at top and bottom. Now to the earth frame. When the light beam is emitted, the elevator is at rest, so earth and elevator agree the frequency is f. But when it hits the bottom, the elevator is moving at velocity v=gh/c with respect to the earth, so earth and elevator must measure different frequencies. In the elevator, we know that the frequency is still f, so on the ground the frequency

        f' = f(1 plus v/c) = f(1 plus gh/c^2)

        On the earth, we interpret this as meaning that not only does gravity bend light, but changes its frequency as well."

        By combining the above equations with the formula:

        (frequency) = (speed of light)/(wavelength)

        one obtains THE FUNDAMENTAL EQUATIONS OF NEWTON'S EMISSION THEORY OF LIGHT:

        c' = c plus v = c(1 plus gh/c^2)

        which CONTRADICT EINSTEIN'S 1905 FALSE CONSTANT-SPEED-OF-LIGHT POSTULATE.

        The Pound-Rebka experiment, just like the Michelson-Morley experiment in the absence of a protective belt, UNEQUIVOCALLY confirms THE FUNDAMENTAL EQUATIONS OF NEWTON'S EMISSION THEORY OF LIGHT and refutes EINSTEIN'S 1905 FALSE CONSTANT-SPEED-OF-LIGHT POSTULATE:

        http://student.fizika.org/~jsisko/Knjige/Klasicna%20Mehanika/David%20Morin/CH13.PDF

        David Morin (p. 4): "This GR time-dilation effect was first measured at Harvard by Pound and Rebka in 1960. They sent gamma rays up a 20m tower and measured the redshift (that is, the decrease in frequency) at the top. This was a notable feat indeed, considering that they were able to measure a frequency shift of gh/c^2 (which is only a few parts in 10^15) to within 1% accuracy."

        David Morin's text referred to above reappears as Chapter 14 in:

        http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~djmorin/book.html

        Introduction to Classical Mechanics With Problems and Solutions, David Morin, Cambridge University Press

        Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

        Hi Pentcho, you might be interested in reading the essay of Peter Jackson : "2020 Vision. A model of Discretion in Space", he explains in aclear way the paradoxes of the speed of light.

        keep on thinking free

        Wilhelmus

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        Dear Pentcho,

        I did not find your name among those who signed the petition of NPA at http://twinparadox.net/ while you wrote fqxi-against-einstein.html

        Regards,

        Eckard

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        Eckard Blumschein wrote: "Dear Pentcho, I did not find your name among those who signed the petition of NPA at http://twinparadox.net/ while you wrote fqxi-against-einstein.html"

        They are etherists, most of them. But let me explain. I only disagree with them when they claim, explicitly or implicitly, that the speed of light only varies with the speed of the observer but is independent of the speed of the light source (the original prediction of Maxwell's electromagnetic theory). This is incompatible with the Michelson-Morley experiment or, if one wants it to become compatible, one has to procrusteanize Nature the way FitzGerald and Lorentz did (by making lengths contract along the direction of mouvement).

        Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com

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        Dear Pentcho,

        My dictionaries do not know the word "procrusteanize", just procrastinate in the sense of hesitate.

        While I did not deal with the experiment of concern, my distrust in SR is mainly based on its neglect of the distinction between past and future. Also, I realized that Lorentz contraction, while never experimentally confirmed, is the same for motion towards and away because it depends on v^2.

        Didn't you point me to Gift who commented on measurements which clearly indicate that something like a medium of electromagnetic waves might move with the earth as also does its gravity field?

        Admittedly, I cannot imagine how to define a velocity without prior having defined a distance according to a chosen medium of reference in space.

        As an engineer, I do not doubt that c is the maximal possible front-speed of electromagnetic waves in free space.

        Regards,

        Eckard

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        Eckard Blumschein wrote: "As an engineer, I do not doubt that c is the maximal possible front-speed of electromagnetic waves in free space."

        This is what special relativity says. Both Maxwell's theory and Newton's emission theory of light say that the speed of light varies with the speed of the observer. That is, if the light has been reaching the observer with speed c but now the observer starts moving towards the light source with speed v, from now on the light will reach him with speed c according to special relativity and (c plus v) according to both Maxwell's theory and Newton's emission theory. The emission theory is correct, Maxwell's theory is wrong (it wrongly says that the speed of light is independent of the speed of the light source) but both HAVE PHYSICAL MEANING. Special relativity HAS NO PHYSICAL MEANING.

        Pentcho Valev pvalev@yahoo.com