Merged Relativity+ / Farsight

[Farsight]

This is just plainly wrong. Anyone can look at Maxwell's equations and see that there is a clear place for electric charge density, and a clear 0 where magnetic charge density would be (and that 0 is only there because of the observation that there are no magnetic charges.

It isn't plainly wrong. There are no particles that have only an electric field. A particle has an electromagnetic field. When you're motionless you might deem it to be an electric field, but when you move relative to it, you start to deem it to be a magnetic field too.

It is certainly not a theoretical requirement - arguably the reverse is true and we would theoretically expect magnetic monopoles to exist)

Come on edd, think it through for yourself. There are no magnetic charges because an electromagnetic field is a "twist/turn" field. Remember the frame-dragging article and the reference to twisted space? If you're moving through this twisted space but didn't know you were moving, you might think you were in a "turn field". A magnetic field. But there are no regions of space that are freewheeling within space like some roller bearing. You could legitimately talk about the universe or a galaxy rotating* but not about space disconnected from the surrounding space spinning like some ball in a cup.

* See http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2011/jul/25/was-the-universe-born-spinning and http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/newsandevents/pressreleases/galaxy_sized_twist/

 

[steenkh]

Observations back up electron models proposed by the likes of Williamson and van der Mark. You can make electrons and positrons out of light waves in pair production. You can diffract an electron. It's got a magnetic moment. In atomic orbitals electrons "exist as standing waves". The Einstein-de Haas effect "demonstrates that spin angular momentum is indeed of the same nature as the angular momentum of rotating bodies as conceived in classical mechanics". And electron-positron annihilation results in light waves again. The wave nature of matter is beyond doubt.

As far as I know, conventional physics can explain each of these phenomena. These are not predictions that distinguish Williamson and van der Mark's theory from conventional physics. You (or Williamson and van der Marks) need to find predictions that are unique to the new theory.

And yet "several people" insist that the electron is a point-particle, and then claim that what I say is contradicted by observations, when it isn't. It's like talking to creationists who dismiss patent evidence.

I have not seen anybody claim that electrons are only point-particles. If you think that conventional physics cannot handle diffractions, I think you should point out the errors in the equations that handle diffractions.

 

[Senex]

So, straight question, Mr Marketing: how can you tell what value Farsight's writing has, in terms of the physics?

Just so that I'm clear on this, Senex; from your perspective, all that's required - for you to accept that an idea has merit (in terms of physics) - is that it claims to see "the beauty of another's work"?

Not just that, but I see dozens of pages over years of Farsight's capturing the imagination of you guys with this theory.

So let's divide up the tasks.

• Farsight will post pictures of spirals and say they're beautiful.
• People who know math and can make predictions will work out the details and see what the consequences are.

OK, we're done. Farsight's predictions have been made by the predictions people. Farsight's math has been done by the math people. His theory is false, it's failed every experimental test we can think of. What's next?

• Farsight will post pictures of spirals and say they're beautiful.
• People who know math and can make predictions will work out the details and see what the consequences are.
• Farsight will post the same pictures again, but while complaining about how nobody understands them the way he does.

Lather, rinse, repeat. How long are we supposed to keep this up, Senex? Centuries?

It's not like you would be the first person experiencing this cycle (think of the money that's gone into Reagan's Star Wars.) If we can get the Chinese to believe in it maybe we can cripple their economy like we did the Russians. But that's not your area. Leave the Machiavellian stuff to the marketing department . Just do your part.

Senex, in order to see the beauty of another's scientific work you have to know about the scientific work!
That is not Farsight who has not yet got past the third equation in one of Einstein's papers. W.D.Clinger summarized this almost 2 years ago (28th April 2012):

Your job is to teach Farsight the hieroglyphics they teach in those fancy physics schools. Geez, a variable is just a variable, how hard can it be?

Nobody is asking Farsight to predict future applications. He is asked to produce predictions about physical consequences of his theory (that he claims is not his theory) that will show that it is a more accurate model of the world than conventional physics. If he cannot do this, his theory (that is not his theory) is worthless.

Several people have pointed out that his theory (that is not his theory) is contradicted by observations, so it seems it is not just worthless, but wrong.

You just lost your job as the motivation guy.

 

[Farsight]

You originally said "The electromagnetic field around the electron is frame-dragged space. Imagine space is a lattice. Reach in with your right hand and twist. Now reach round the side with your left hand and twist. The strong curvature regime is electromagnetism." Frame dragging and strong curvature are something quite different from simply moving charges.

I'm not with you edd. Frame dragging is an aspect of gravitomagnetism which is an analogue of electromagnetism for good reason. Strong curvature is said to be associated with black holes, see this, but actually it's associated with electromagnetism.

You're missing my point. I'm trying to get across that the idea of a 'point particle' is not mutually exclusive with a particle that can be diffracted.

Well it is. Get used to is. You can't diffract a point particle.

My EM doesn't get the workout ben's does these days, but I can assure you I have a reasonable grasp.

The problem is that your reasonable grasp omits the basics, like the screw nature of electromagnetism. It isn't your fault that electromagnetism isn't well taught.

E and B are not forces, they are fields.

Look at the Minkowski quote.

And just upthread you were saying that your spiral diagram wasn't a scalar, and referred to vector fields, so the natural assumption is that your spiral diagram is trying to represent a vector field. I was asking what vector. Now you're saying it isn't a vector. So what is it?

The electromagnetic field. A field is a state of space. It's twisted. To say how twisted you need to give the degree of twist and the direction. In this sense it's a vector field, but it's not the vector field you're used to that gives the strength and direction of some force. If you have two identical electromagnetic fields around two dynamical spinors with no initial relative motion, the force between them is linear and it pushes them apart.

 

[Farsight]

...Even better, there very intuitive geometric pictures for bivectors and 2-forms, for B, or F, and for its Hodge dual ⋆F.

Yes I know:

 

[edd]

I'm not with you edd. Frame dragging is an aspect of gravitomagnetism which is an analogue of electromagnetism for good reason.

Analogue. Which means it isn't actually electromagnetism.

Strong curvature is said to be associated with black holes, see this, but actually it's associated with electromagnetism.

Then you'd be able to geometrically measure that curvature wouldn't you? But you can't.

Well it is. Get used to is. You can't diffract a point particle.

If your definition of 'point particle' includes 'can't be diffracted' then that's tautological, and not the definition of point particle that physicists are using.

The problem is that your reasonable grasp omits the basics, like the screw nature of electromagnetism. It isn't your fault that electromagnetism isn't well taught.

You're saying my university couldn't teach basic electromagnetism?

Look at the Minkowski quote.

Look at the units.

When Minkowski spoke of the electric and magnetic forces, he meant that in the sense that someone might say 'there are four fundamental forces'. When you refer to E and B you are referring to specific more precisely defined quantities that allow you to calculate the force (as in mass times acceleration) on a charged particle.

When you said

It isn't a vector, it's the electromagnetic field, it isn't new, E and B are the forces that result from field interactions

that's just flat wrong. By definition E and B are the fields, not 'the forces that result from field interactions'.

All this stuff about twisted space is nonsense.

 

[Farsight]

Unlimited is right, but nothing to do with gravity.

It is. See hyperphysics. You know how the force between two charged particles is titanically powerful? You also know that in the current-in-the-wire the electrons' electromagnetic field is almost cancelled by that of the metal ions. But not quite. The electrons are moving, so we have the concentric "magnetic field lines". The magnetic field around the wire is the trace of two electromagnetic fields that don't quite cancel. Now, what sort of trace field do you think you might see is you stopped the electrons?

Rather, you can construct experiments where the wavefunction is compact or extended, as you please. If I shoot a beam of atoms through a vacuum chamber 6" in diameter, the wavefunction of the beam is confined to a region smaller than 6".

Let's talk about that another time.

Except for your citation of the Van der Mark "electron radius", fine. You identified 5e-11m as a size scale associated with the atom itself, and you did not get confused by other physical quantities, like the fact that the atom wavefunction can be much larger than this.

I know what I'm talking about.

Wrong. Whole atoms are seen to diffract, just like everything else, exhibiting a wave nature exactly like that of the electron. The relevant wavelength is called the de Broglie wavelength. (Compton was my typo/thinko)

I didn't say atoms don't diffract. We've spoken already about buckballs. I know about de Broglie wavelength, you said Compton wavelength. I'm right again.

You're right, you dont. For example:

I'm right again.

Your link goes to a vector plot, but one in which the streamlines are circular, not twisted. (The vaguely-visible "twist" is an artifact of the artistic choice to make longish arrows, not of the vector field. Note that at the *base* of any arrow the arrow is pointing straight circumferentially.)

Whatever. You know what I mean.

Seriously, greyscale is by definition a scalar quantity.

I know. But the picture shows twist, doesn't it? That isn't.

If your graph is not a graphical depiction of an actual scalar quantity, on some actual physical axes, then it's just a scribble that looks like a spiral. Seriously, is there any aspect of that plot which we interpret as actual data from an actual electron model? The number of spiral lines, their angle, the sinusoidal form of the dark/light variation? No? Do the darker bands represent regions of space where something is different than in the light bands? If so what? If not, why are they there?

Oh stop whining, naysayer. It's a depiction.

You have no idea, do you?

I do. See above. I'm getting everything right, remember. The screw nature of electromagnetism is right too.

The only piece of physics we can derive from this plot is "Farsight has a mental picture of something (don't know what) being a spiral somehow (don't know in what sense)". You produced a graphic showing something being a spiral. Done. Congratulations on seven years of hard work.

Whine whine whine. You were peddling your point particles, now you're complaining that I haven't done enough?

... doesn't occur in Van der Mark's crackpot paper...

It isn't a crackpot paper.

Edited by kmortis: 

Removed personal comment

 

[Farsight]

Not quite. One of Farsight's problems (which you didn't correct him on) is that the lines one draws to depict B are not lines of force, they are the field lines. The force that a B field applies to a charge is never along the field direction (and depend upon the velocity of the charge so it's not constant anyways), and the force that a B field applies to a magnetic dipole is only sometimes along the field direction.

We all know that an electron moves around "magnetic field lines". Don't blame me for magnetic lines of force, google the images.

You are correct, though, that you cannot add the B field and E field lines, and that the B field lines of a magnetic dipole are not concentric circles. I suspect he confused himself...

I'm not at all confused about electromagnetism.

 

[edd]

It isn't a crackpot paper.

Edited by kmortis: 

Removed personal comment

Are we talking about http://www.cybsoc.org/electron.pdf ?
I'm still giggling at equation 5 and the remarkable discovery that 16 π³/3 is vaguely in the ballpark of 137.036.

 

[Farsight]

As far as I know, conventional physics can explain each of these phenomena. These are not predictions that distinguish Williamson and van der Mark's theory from conventional physics. You (or Williamson and van der Marks) need to find predictions that are unique to the new theory.

These phenomena demonstrate that electrons are not point-particles, but instead have a wave nature. Ben m will not admit this because he knows what the next question is: what type of wave? Then we're into what's the configuration, the geometry, the topology, and we're into Dirac's belt and TQFT:

http://www.maths.ed.ac.uk/assets/images/research/1_torus2.jpg

Edited by LashL: 

Changed hotlinked image to regular link. Please see Rule 5.

Image credit Edinburgh Geometry and Topology group see http://www.maths.ed.ac.uk/research/geom-top

Then the standard-model popscience assertion that "the electron is a fundamental particle" starts looking really stupid.

I have not seen anybody claim that electrons are only point-particles. If you think that conventional physics cannot handle diffractions, I think you should point out the errors in the equations that handle diffractions.

Geddoutofit, ben m said the electron is a point-particle. You can't diffract a point-particle. Asking for me to point out an error in an equation is specious, and you know it.

 

[Farsight]

Analogue. Which means it [gravitomagnetism] isn't actually electromagnetism....

No, but Heaviside understood electromagnetism, and was able to develop gravitomagnetism as a result.

...All this stuff about twisted space is nonsense.

[SNIP]What a pity NASA don't agree with you:

NASA Announces Results of Epic Space-Time Experiment

There is a space-time vortex around Earth...

If Earth were stationary, that would be the end of the story. But Earth is not stationary. Our planet spins, and the spin should twist the dimple, slightly, pulling it around into a 4-dimensional swirl. This is what GP-B went to space in 2004 to check...

But if space is twisted...

Edited by kmortis: 

Removed personal comments.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

Senex, in order to see the beauty of another's scientific work you have to know about the scientific work!
That is not Farsight who has not yet got past the third equation in one of Einstein's papers. W.D.Clinger summarized this almost 2 years ago (28th April 2012):

Your job is to teach Farsight the hieroglyphics they teach in those fancy physics schools. Geez, a variable is just a variable, how hard can it be?

During the 1980-1981 academic year, it was indeed my job to teach MIT students (not Farsight) the math they needed to understand Maxwell's equations and other freshman-level electromagnetism. I was a graduate student and teaching assistant in the math department. During the fall semester, I graded calculus homework and did some tutoring. During the spring semester, I led recitation sections in which I'd show students how to solve problems in vector calculus and have them practice solving problems themselves.

I never met an MIT student who was as resistant to learning as Farsight (John Duffield of Poole) has been. You might assume the MIT students were smarter or better educated. That might be part of the answer, but I think it's mostly a matter of attitude. The MIT students genuinely wanted to learn the math necessary to understand basic electromagnetism, because the alternative was flunking physics.

Farsight, however, thinks he already knows it all. In each of the following quotations, he is addressing a professional physicist or cosmologist:

I'm not some Anders Lindman. Instead, as you are to him, so am I to you.

The problem is that your reasonable grasp omits the basics, like the screw nature of electromagnetism. It isn't your fault that electromagnetism isn't well taught.

I know what I'm talking about.

I'm right again.

I'm right again.

...snip...

I'm getting everything right, remember.

I'm not at all confused about electromagnetism.

Farsight overestimates his knowledge of electromagnetism. That's easy to do, of course.

It would be far more difficult to underestimate Farsight's knowledge of electromagnetism. So far as I recall, no one has done that.

 

[edd]

[SNIP] What a pity NASA don't agree with you:

I have no problem with the results of Gravity Probe B. You are quoting me out of context. The thing I have a problem with is you saying that electromagnetism is basically the same thing.

I mean KK theories exist, but those aren't what you're a proponent of.

 

[Senex]

During the 1980-1981 academic year, it was indeed my job to teach MIT students (not Farsight) the math they needed to understand Maxwell's equations and other freshman-level electromagnetism. I was a graduate student and teaching assistant in the math department. During the fall semester, I graded calculus homework and did some tutoring. During the spring semester, I led recitation sections in which I'd show students how to solve problems in vector calculus and have them practice solving problems themselves.

I never met an MIT student who was as resistant to learning as Farsight (John Duffield of Poole) has been. You might assume the MIT students were smarter or better educated. That might be part of the answer, but I think it's mostly a matter of attitude. The MIT students genuinely wanted to learn the math necessary to understand basic electromagnetism, because the alternative was flunking physics.

Farsight overestimates his knowledge of electromagnetism. That's easy to do, of course.

It would be far more difficult to underestimate Farsight's knowledge of electromagnetism. So far as I recall, no one has done that.

That's why I gave the tutoring job to Reality Check. As you said yourself, those MIT students are not necessarily the smartest, so you aren't used to someone who seldom makes a mistake. Don't Despair. You can be the math guy.

 

[Farsight]

Edd: I didn't say electromagnetism is exactly the same thing as gravitomagnetism. The force between two charged is very strong compared to the force of gravity, and gravitomagnetism is weaker again. I'm saying they're related, and that Heaviside was able to develop gravitomagnetism because he understood electromagnetism.

I mean KK theories exist, but those aren't what you're a proponent of.

No, but I sympathise. If you think about Flatlanders, you will recall that people talk about bending their flat rubber-sheet world in the third dimension. There is another way to alter Flatland - to stretch it horizontally. There is no extra dimension in the "higher dimensional sense", but there is another dimension of measure.

I never met an MIT student who was as resistant to learning as Farsight (John Duffield of Poole) has been... ...Farsight, however, thinks he already knows it all. In each of the following quotations, he is addressing a professional physicist or cosmologist

Senex: the problem is that professional physicists or cosmologists think they know it all, when they don't. They are so convinced of this that they dismiss Einstein and the evidence, and Maxwell and Minkowski, and anything else that doesn't fit with what they know. And woe betide anybody who attempts to tell them something they don't know. It isn't me who is resistant to learning. It's ben m et al.

 

[Ziggurat]

We all know that an electron moves around "magnetic field lines". Don't blame me for magnetic lines of force, google the images.

Really, Farsight? Argument by google search terms? The kicker is the first two images are labeled "field lines" right on the image, and they show that the magnetic field lines for a dipole do NOT consist of concentric circles.

"Magnetic lines of force" is obsolete terminology from a time when electromagnetism was thought of in terms of movement of an ether. It is bad terminology, because it confuses fields with force. The confusion isn't too bad with electric fields since the force is always parallel to the field, but that's not the case with magnetic fields. Nobody uses that term anymore, and with good reason.

I'm not at all confused about electromagnetism.

Then why do you keep getting so much wrong?

 

[W.D.Clinger]

That's why I gave the tutoring job to Reality Check. As you said yourself, those MIT students are not necessarily the smartest, so you aren't used to someone who seldom makes a mistake.

 

[ctamblyn]

...
and then claim that what I say is contradicted by observations, when it isn't.
...

You've yet to answer the key question of how we connect your ideas to observations.

Since you have now taken to simply ignoring my many requests for predictions, I guess I'll just have to consider that as an implicit admission that you have conceded my point.

 

[Farsight]

Really, Farsight? Argument by google search terms?

Yes. You google on magnetic lines of force, and up come images of magnetic field lines. Don't blame me for the confusion between force and field.

The kicker is the first two images are labeled "field lines" right on the image, and they show that the magnetic field lines for a dipole do NOT consist of concentric circles.

No, the kicker is that the electron's magnetic dipole means it can't be a point-particle.

Then why do you keep getting so much wrong?

See my response to ben m's questions. I don't.

"Magnetic lines of force" is obsolete terminology from a time when electromagnetism was thought of in terms of movement of an ether. It is bad terminology, because it confuses fields with force. The confusion isn't too bad with electric fields since the force is always parallel to the field, but that's not the case with magnetic fields. Nobody uses that term anymore, and with good reason.

Aaargh! The confusion is too bad with electric field because the field is the electromagnetic field. Two particles, each with an electromagnetic field, if they have no initial relative motion, move towards one another linearly, or away from one another linearly. Two electrons behave exactly like two positrons, which is why I omitted the arrowheads on my depiction, unlike this typical depiction:


http://buphy.bu.edu/~duffy/PY106/2e.GIF

Edited by LashL: 

Changed hotlinked image to regular link. Please see Rule 5.

Image credit Andrew Duffy PY106, see http://physics.bu.edu/~duffy/py106/Electricfield.html

Those two particles experience a linear force. If you throw one past the other, the resultant force is not just linear.

Sigh. I suppose somebody will now tell us that when a charged particle moves through an electric field, it creates a magnetic field.

 

[ctamblyn]

...

These are not predictions that distinguish Williamson and van der Mark's theory from conventional physics. You (or Williamson and van der Marks) need to find predictions that are unique to the new theory.

...

Technically, these are not predictions that any of the loopy photon models make, as the system they describe (a "self-trapped" photon) cannot exist. However, it is true that the phenomena Farsight keeps describing are predicted by mainstream physics for any charged particle, regardless of composition (i.e. whether fundamental point particle, or composite system, or string, or whatever).