Why is there so much crackpot physics?

[Farsight]

And the electron, muon, and tau masses.

That's what they say. But like I was saying to edd, Einstein referred to the electron when he was talking about a body in his E=mc² paper, and said the mass of a body is a measure of its energy content. Not the measure of its interaction with some field. So if you're rooting for the Higgs mechanism, you'll be wearing this on your T-shirt: E=mc².

And electroweak symmetry breaking, i.e. the masses of the W and Z.

Ah, the particles that are said to be responsible for the weak interaction. The W and Z weigh in at 80GeV and 91GeV. And they're said to mediate beta decay. Like when a 939MeV neutron decays into a proton, electron and antineutrino? Ho Hum. Methinks you need to read The Higgs Fake by Alexander Unzicker. He tells us all about the W boson which dates back to 1983 with its lifetime of 10^-25 seconds, and that what was actually detected was an electron. He says "Rubbia urged his collaborators to work day and night before his visit to various institutions in the USA. He took a picture of a 'W-event' with him. There, Steven Weinberg, Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow all happily agreed that it was the long sought-after W boson (which confirmed their theory, by the way)…". Only Burton Richter was right when he said it wasn't a W, but by then it was way too late.

I see, you're thinking of the up and down quarks. The s quark is, something like 30% of the mass of the kaon. The c quark masses are about 80% of the mass of the J/psi, the b quark mass is nearly 100% of the mass of the b-mesons

Only we've never seen a free quark. Because of "quark confinement". Neat.

the top quark is basically a free quark; it's extremely massive and doesn't bother hadronizing---they're basically free quarks.

Oh yes? Unzicker tells us it has lifetime of 10^-25 seconds. Free as a bird eh!? He goes on to say it had to exist because "the bottom quark needed a partner, as the Ws and Zs had to exist because otherwise the standard model was wrong". We’ve never seen a free quark remember? The top quark was "seen" to decay into a bottom quark and a W boson. But we’ve never actually "seen" a top quark, or a bottom quark, or a W boson. The top quark was inferred... from particles that were inferred.

No we haven't. Proton-antiproton annihilation proceeds to pions and kaons, consistent with the mainstream theory of the strong interaction. Most such pions and kaons decay weakly, i.e. to high-energy muons and neutrinos.

Yes we have, there is a cross section for annihilation direct to gamma photons. See for example this. It's academic anyway, because your muons decay to electrons and neutrinos, then we can annihilate the electrons with positrons, and we're left with photons and neutrinos.

Great argument, Farsight! In a universe with no heavy quarks, no Higgs boson, no electroweak symmetry breaking, and in which proton-proton annihilation had some properties you just made up, the Higgs mechanism would sound pretty silly!

It does, doesn't it? Especially when the fabulous Higgs boson is said to decay into two gamma photons. Like Einstein said in his E=mc² paper: a radiating body loses mass. And like I said: all of it. Because the Higgs boson doesn't get its mass from the Higgs mechanism. Oops!

 

[godless dave]

That's what they say. But like I was saying to edd, Einstein referred to the electron when he was talking about a body in his E=mc² paper, and said the mass of a body is a measure of its energy content. Not the measure of its interaction with some field.

He said the mass of a body is a measure of its energy content, or could be converted to its energy content according to the formula e=mc²?

Is mass-energy equivalency mutually exclusive with Higgs field interaction?

 

[dasmiller]

What's with the snip and the sigh? You asked the question, I answered it. I've seen footballers pass, I've seen buses pass. But you've never seen time pass.

Nor have I seen gravity, neutrinos, viruses, Brazil, or, for that matter, you. That does not make them any less real.

Not everything happens simultaneously; that difference between simultaneity and sequence is "time." It has an extent. Whether or not time really passes is a question of philosphy, not physics. But the passage of time is easily and consistently measured in many ways, so if it's a fiction, it's certainly a useful one.

I'm a pragmatist. I don't think that any description of the universe's underpinnings is necessarily correct. In fact, below a certain level, I'm not sure that the 'truth' is comprehensible, or whether it's even meaningful to speak of truth in that context.

So I'm not too concerned with whether a model is based on a fiction. I *do* care about whether the model accurately predicts the results of experiments. To me, Model A is better than Model B only if
1) Model A makes more accurate predictions,
2) Model A makes equally good predictions over a wider range, or
3) Model A is simpler without sacrificing accuracy.

In that context, what does it mean to say that time doesn't pass? Do you mean that dT_x/dT₀=1 for any reference frames x and 0, and that all distances and speeds vary? If so (and that's what I think you're saying),
1) Does that make my models more accurate?
2) Does it make my models apply over a wider range of problems? Or
3) Does it make the math simpler?

If so, how? What are some actual examples?
If not, then by what standard is it better?

In our universe, all measurements for the local speed of light give the same result. In our universe, if we synchronise two clocks, separate them, and bring them back together, they're likely to show different times, indicating that they've experienced different rates of time passage. How do you take "Measurements show c constant" and "measurements show dT_x/dT₀ varies" and conclude that it's more accuate to say that c varies and dT_x/dT₀=1?

Our universe is like that. Change and motion is occurring at different rates in different places. Time isn't really passing at all. Light moves, things move, **** happens, that's it.

In my postulated universe, time really does pass at different rates in different places.

Use the refresh rate to calibrate your rods and clocks, then use them to measure the refresh rate.

Not sure how to get that to work for reference frames that are not at rest with respect to each other (the ether problem), but as I said, that's a different topic.

 

[Farsight]

He said the mass of a body is a measure of its energy content, or could be converted to its energy content according to the formula e=mc²?

The former. See his E=mc² paper where he actually used an L rather than E:

"The kinetic energy of the body with respect to (ξ ɳ Ϛ) diminishes as a result of the emission of light, and the amount of diminution is independent of the properties of the body. Moreover, the difference K0 − K1, like the kinetic energy of the electron (§ 10), depends on the velocity.

Neglecting magnitudes of fourth and higher orders we may place

From this equation it directly follows that:—

If a body gives off the energy L in the form of radiation, its mass diminishes by L/c². The fact that the energy withdrawn from the body becomes energy of radiation evidently makes no difference, so that we are led to the more general conclusion that

The mass of a body is a measure of its energy-content; if the energy changes by L, the mass changes in the same sense by L/9 × 10²°, the energy being measured in ergs, and the mass in grammes.

It is not impossible that with bodies whose energy-content is variable to a high degree (e.g. with radium salts) the theory may be successfully put to the test.

If the theory corresponds to the facts, radiation conveys inertia between the emitting and absorbing bodies."

Matter is made of kinetic energy. That's what E=mc² is all about. Matter is kinetic energy, all tucked up and hidden, because matter has a wave nature, and electrons have spin.

People tend to struggle with this, but see Compton scattering. That's where a light wave is used to move an electron. The light wave loses kinetic energy as a result. If you did another Compton scatter with that light wave, and another and another and another, then in the limit you have removed all of the kinetic energy from the wave, and you have no wave left. All of the wave energy has been converted into the motion of electrons. Now look at pair production. You can convert a photon into an electron and a positron. So in a way an electron is made out of something that can be converted into the motion of electrons. In a way the electron itself is "made out of motion". Or "made out of kinetic energy". But what we actually say is that matter is made out of energy.

Is mass-energy equivalency mutually exclusive with Higgs field interaction?

Yes. The mass of a body is a measure of its energy-content. Not a measure of something else. The wave nature of light and matter ought to make this clear. Photon momentum is a measure of resistance-to-change in motion for a wave moving linearly at c. Electron mass is a measure of resistance to change-in-motion for a wave going round and round at c. Inertia is just the flip side of momentum. That's why the photon conveys inertia between the emitting and absorbing bodies. Just like Einstein said.

 

[ben m]

That's what they say. But like I was saying to edd, Einstein referred to the electron when he was talking about a body in his E=mc² paper, and said the mass of a body is a measure of its energy content. Not the measure of its interaction with some field. So if you're rooting for the Higgs mechanism, you'll be wearing this on your T-shirt: E=mc².

The interaction with the field determines the value of the mass. The presence of mass has various effects, which Einstein worked out, including effects on kinematics (p = beta gamma m, for example) and on energy content (E^2 =m^2 + p^2 for example).

There is no conflict whatsoever between Einstein's work and the Higgs mechanism. Seriously, were you under the impression somehow that Higgs, Englert, Brout, and every particle physicist from 1950-2014 have been unaware of E=mc^2?

Please note, for example, that the electron and the muon are different particles with different rest masses. All three of them obey E=mc^2 and p = beta gamma m and all the rest of that, but one of them does it with m ~= 0 and one does it with m=0.511 MeV and one does it with m=103 MeV. There's absolutely nothing wrong with the principle "something has to tell all muons to have 103 MeV rest mass". (Notice "energy conservation" or "e=mc^2" doesn't do this. If I collide an electron with a positron, after accelerating them to 1000 MeV each (total energy, m+K), they collide and make muons with m=103 and K=897 each. (Not m=0 K=1000, not m=1000 K=0, etc.) If I collide an electron with a positron after accelerating them to 100,000 MeV each, they collide and make muons with m = 103 and K = 999897 each. Something in nature is determining that special "103" value, and E=mc^2 isn't doing it.)

There's nothing wrong with the Higgs as a hypothesis for what that principle is. Please note that the Higgs mechanism was derived, and has been checked a thousand times, by people fully trained in special relativity.

Ah, the particles that are said to be responsible for the weak interaction. The W and Z weigh in at 80GeV and 91GeV. And they're said to mediate beta decay.

Yep! I gather by your wording, and by the rest of your post, that you're trying to overturn weak-interaction physics too now, via your usual method.

Here's a self-evalution question, Farsight: you and I have interacted on this board for, what, several years now? On a scale of zero to ten, with zero being "no respect" and ten being "hero-worship", how much do I trust your intuition to guess that there are errors in an actual, predictive theory for which I've taken grad-level classes, taught undergrad classes, done hundreds of calculations, and personally spend most of my time experimenting on? Go ahead, pick a number. Go negative if you need to.

 

[Farsight]

...Not everything happens simultaneously; that difference between simultaneity and sequence is "time." It has an extent. Whether or not time really passes is a question of philosphy, not physics.

No, really, it's physics. And it's one of the most important things in physics. Once you understand that clocks don't literally measure "the passage of time", you appreciate that when a clock goes slower it's because the regular cyclical motion inside it is going slower. And that this is true for an optical clock. A light clock. After that you appreciate what Einstein was on about when he said a curvature of rays of light can only occur when the speed of light varies with position. Then you're off and away with gravity and black holes and the early universe, etc. It's like pulling a thread with Einstein's name on it, and out comes a string of pearls.

But the passage of time is easily and consistently measured in many ways, so if it's a fiction, it's certainly a useful one.

Just look hard at what a clock really does. Separate the science from the fiction.

I'm a pragmatist. I don't think that any description of the universe's underpinnings is necessarily correct. In fact, below a certain level, I'm not sure that the 'truth' is comprehensible, or whether it's even meaningful to speak of truth in that context.

I am. We do physics to understand the world. I will not settle for non-comprehensible.

So I'm not too concerned with whether a model is based on a fiction. I *do* care about whether the model accurately predicts the results of experiments. To me, Model A is better than Model B only if
1) Model A makes more accurate predictions,
2) Model A makes equally good predictions over a wider range, or
3) Model A is simpler without sacrificing accuracy.

In that context, what does it mean to say that time doesn't pass?

It means things move and change occurs, and we attach the label time to this, but we remain aware that time is not in itself some thing that flows or through which we can travel. It is a dimension of measure, derived from change or motion, not a dimension that offers freedom of motion like the dimensions of space.

Do you mean that dT_x/dT₀=1 for any reference frames x and 0, and that all distances and speeds vary? If so (and that's what I think you're saying),
1) Does that make my models more accurate?
2) Does it make my models apply over a wider range of problems? Or
3) Does it make the math simpler?

If so, how? What are some actual examples?
If not, then by what standard is it better?

It doesn't mean that. And it doesn't change the math. It changes the meaning. dT_x isn't the passage of time, it's a clock rate. An optical clock rate. So is dT₀. At a different location. And when an optical clock goes slower somewhere, it's because the light goes slower there.

In our universe, all measurements for the local speed of light give the same result. In our universe, if we synchronise two clocks, separate them, and bring them back together, they're likely to show different times, indicating that they've experienced different rates of time passage.

They've just been in locations where optical clock rates are different because the speed of light is different.

How do you take "Measurements show c constant" and "measurements show dT_x/dT₀ varies" and conclude that it's more accuate to say that c varies and dT_x/dT₀=1?

Because clocks "clock up" motion, and light clocks are no exception. They do not literally measure the flow or passage of time.

In my postulated universe, time really does pass at different rates in different places.

Honestly, das, that's just a figure of speech.

Not sure how to get that to work for reference frames that are not at rest with respect to each other (the ether problem), but as I said, that's a different topic.

It's down to the wave nature of matter. Have a read of The Other Meaning of Special Relativity by Robert Close.

Right I have to go. It's good to talk!

 

[godless dave]

How do you have motion without time?

 

[Kwalish Kid]

How do you have motion without time?

That is a question that Farsight has spent a lot of time and effort to not answer.

Farsight says here that he is a physics expert, but you might notice that he has never actually shown how to do a single physics problem or application. So he makes claims about a physics that does not use time as anything but something that arises from motion, but he has never produced anything that someone can use and therefore nothing that anyone can compare to observations and experiments.

 

[edd]

People tend to struggle with this, but see Compton scattering. That's where a light wave is used to move an electron. The light wave loses kinetic energy as a result. If you did another Compton scatter with that light wave, and another and another and another, then in the limit you have removed all of the kinetic energy from the wave, and you have no wave left.

That never happens. I know you call it a limit, but I don't know why you talk about a limit you can't achieve.

I disagree with much of the rest quite independently of that anyway.

 

[Farsight]

I was about to log off, but to show that I'm nothing like KK's ad-hominem aspersion:

How do you have motion without time?

I've answered this question before. You just have motion, it's there, it's empirical, you can see it happening. Clocks clock it up. Cogs move, the big hand moves, the little hand moves. Then you move into the kitchen and move your head and eyes to look up at the clock. Then light moves to your eye, and electrochemical signals move in your brain, and you think "the time is ten o'clock". Ever watched a science fiction movie where some guy has some gizmo that can stop time? It doesn't actually stop time. You can't see time moving or flowing or passing. The gizmo stops motion. And the moral of the tale is this: You don't need time to have motion. You need motion to have time.

Night night.

 

[thedopefishlives]

I was about to log off, but to show that I'm nothing like KK's ad-hominem aspersion:

Exactly what is ad-hominem about KK's statement? He is not basing his evaluation of your claims on whether you are or are not an expert in physics, but on their merits. Ad-hominem would be saying, "You are an idiot, therefore you are wrong." I see nothing like that in his post. Would you like to rephrase your statement now?

 

[dasmiller]

No, really, it's physics. And it's one of the most important things in physics.

Why is it important? If it doesn't affect any experimental outcomes, if you can't suggest any experiments that will demonstrate that it's true or false, why is it important?

Once you understand that clocks don't literally measure "the passage of time", you appreciate that when a clock goes slower it's because the regular cyclical motion inside it is going slower. And that this is true for an optical clock. A light clock.

You're repeating, but not shedding additional light on the subject.

After that you appreciate what Einstein was on about when he said a curvature of rays of light can only occur when the speed of light varies with position. Then you're off and away with gravity and black holes and the early universe, etc. It's like pulling a thread with Einstein's name on it, and out comes a string of pearls.

Argument-from-Einstein is not helpful here.

I am. We do physics to understand the world. I will not settle for non-comprehensible.

Suit yourself. I don't know that we have a choice in the matter.

It means things move and change occurs, and we attach the label time to this, but we remain aware that time is not in itself some thing that flows or through which we can travel. It is a dimension of measure, derived from change or motion, not a dimension that offers freedom of motion like the dimensions of space.

Not seeing the relevance of the freedom of motion thing.

It doesn't mean that. And it doesn't change the math. It changes the meaning.

Seriously, I don't understand how you can decouple the math and the meaning. For me, physics is a family of mathematical models that predict the outcomes of experiments. It has other uses, but at its core, that's what it is. The 'meaning' is the experimental predictions; if the predictions aren't changed, then you haven't changed the meaning.

dT_x isn't the passage of time, it's a clock rate.

It's the change in time. AFAIK, there's no mathematical symbol for "passage." Whether or not time "passes," it has an extent. dT_x/dT₀=1 simply means that disparate regions will experience the same total time extent.

At a different location. And when an optical clock goes slower somewhere, it's because the light goes slower there.

Repetition is not evidence.

My central question from the previous post (and occasional earlier posts) was:

1) Does that make my models more accurate?
2) Does it make my models apply over a wider range of problems? Or
3) Does it make the math simpler?

If so, how? What are some actual examples?
If not, then by what standard is it better?

If you don't like that question in terms of dT_x/dT₀, then phrase it in whatever is different about your view.

But how would it be an improvement?

 

[ben m]

I am. We do physics to understand the world. I will not settle for non-comprehensible.

I will not settle for the non-comprehensible. Not in physics, and not in literature either.

The so-called masterpiece 個人的な体験 is just columns of weird characters, so the so-called "experts" who call it a literary masterpiece are trying to pull the wool over your eyes. They say they understand it because they "speak Japanese" which can be "studied" in some sort of "schools", but that's what they would say. They keep telling me there are millions of people who understand it, but that's what they told Galileo. Bah, don't tell me about translations, I know the original text is gibberish. Listen: "言語: 日本語, フランス語, フランス語", that's a direct quote from the source. You can't translate fundamental gibberish into sense, that's the fundamental law of Shannon theory, look it up.

I will not settle for the non-comprehensible.

 

[Reality Check]

Still ignorant about the Higgs mechanism after over a year, Farsight?
If not maybe you can answer these questions:

Farsight: (1 November 2012) Is the Higgs mechanism a relativistic quantum field theory?
Farsight: (19 November 2012) What does Higgs mean by Lorentz-covariant and relativistic?

Or simply acknowledge that
Farsight: (20 November 2012) It is delusional to think that a relativistic QFT such as the Higgs mechanism violates SR

 

[lpetrich]

Einstein referred to the electron...

Book-thumping.

Ah, the particles that are said to be responsible for the weak interaction. The W and Z weigh in at 80GeV and 91GeV. And they're said to mediate beta decay. Like when a 939MeV neutron decays into a proton, electron and antineutrino? Ho Hum.

Farsight, do you have any better theory than virtual W's?

Only we've never seen a free quark. Because of "quark confinement". Neat.

Except that they are approximately free when they are very close to each other. That is evident from jets of hadrons produced by high-energy collisions.

The top quark was inferred... from particles that were inferred.

So what?

Electron mass is a measure of resistance to change-in-motion for a wave going round and round at c.

Farsight, to use your favorite sort of argument, that theory denies Feynman.

Just look hard at what a clock really does.

Change state as a function of time.

You just have motion, it's there, it's empirical, you can see it happening.

Farsight, you only have an idea that there is anything but yourself in all of reality. Thus, solipsism is right and only your consciousness exists.

 

[Reality Check]

The story goes that the Higgs mechanism is responsible for the quark masses, which is 1% of the mass of the proton, and E=mc² is responsible for the rest. Only we've never seen a free quark. But we have seen low-energy proton-antiproton annihilation to gamma photons. So the proton is just another example of light in a box. Light in a box of own making. Light in a box, minus the box. Hence the wave nature of matter. It ain't rocket science.

The Higgs mechanism is not a "story". The science is that the Higgs mechanism gives mass to elementary fermions (including electrons and quarks) and the massive W and Z gauge bosons. And For example, about 99% of the mass of baryons (composite particles such as the proton and neutron) is due instead to the kinetic energy of quarks and to the energies of (massless) gluons of the strong interaction inside the baryons

Only we do not have to see a free quark to know that they exist .
Followed about crackpot nonsense about "light in a box", Farsight !

 

[Reality Check]

Yes.

No, Farsight, repeating ignorance does not make it correct: Farsight: (20 November 2012) It is delusional to think that a relativistic QFT such as the Higgs mechanism violates SR

 

[Reality Check]

Matter is made of kinetic energy

You need to go back to high school learn what energy is, Farsight !
Kinetic energy is a property of a system. Energy is not a "thing". Matter has kinetic energy. It can never be "made of" kinetic energy.

That is why Einstein stated "The mass of a body is a measure of its energy-content" - he was not ignorant enough to think that a body is made up of energy. Instead a body has "energy-content" which includes all energy - binding, etc. as well as kinetic.

What E=mc² is all about is that energy and matter are equivalent.
A system with energy E can be treated as a system with mass mc².
A system with mass m can be treated as a system with energy E/c².

 

[The Man]

It doesn't mean that. And it doesn't change the math. It changes the meaning. dT_x isn't the passage of time, it's a clock rate. An optical clock rate. So is dT₀. At a different location. And when an optical clock goes slower somewhere, it's because the light goes slower there.

So what doesn't go "slower somewhere"? So far all you have asserted is that time doesn't go slower. Certainly if one is going to assert, as you have, that time is just a label that "means things move and change occurs" while asserting, as you have, that said motions and changes do occur slower in some places. Then time slowing is an appropriate, well, label to describe those circumstances.

One of the aspects of crackpot physics seems to be a particular distain for certain labels. Another seems to be an avoidance of applying ones own ascriptions particularly when it leads to one of those distained labels.

 

[Reality Check]

People tend to struggle with this, but see Compton scattering. ... you have no wave left.

Who Do You Mean We Kemo Sabe ?
Anyone who can read English can see that assuming that Compton scattering can repeat infinitely will reduce the wavelength of light toward zero.

But this does not happen in the real world as anyone who knew about Compton scattering should know, Farsight .
Compton scattering happens when the energy of the photon is larger than that of the electron. As the repeated scattering happens the photon wavelength increases , the photon energy decreases and it starts to inverse Compton scatter from the electron - it gains energy !
Repeated Compton scattering results in photons that are in equilibrium with the electrons. Some will lose energy, others will gain energy.