Merged Relativity+ / Farsight

[ben m]

I believe Farsight obtained them by just picturing "E + B", presumably believing that "electromagnetism" unification allows him to do this. He presumably was picturing "length of the little E arrow added to length of the little B arrow", which is how you graphically add vectors when the lengths represent magnitudes in the same units, but in this case is not true---in other words, it's precisely the "Shakespearean" crackpottery that you expected.

A rough equivalent, for those playing at home, would be if someone found a vector map of wind speeds (showing, say, wind circling the North Pole) and a vector map of temperature gradients (since it's cold at the pole, the arrows point outwards), then announcing that "since Bernoulli's Law unifies flow speeds and temperatures in a single hydrodynamic state vector" the true structure of the atmosphere is a spiral, built of the vector field V + grad(T).

 

[ben m]

Question four is unlikely to be true but I didn't want to hurt ben m's feelings.

I've got a dry handkerchief at the ready. Do your worst!

What a bunch of naysayers.

The quoted text was me asking Farsight constructive questions.

 

[Farsight]

...I missed it too, although I read that paragraph carefully. I do see your point that the meaning is that at wavelengths below the Compton limit, there will always be more than one point-like particle if you measure them. Farsight, do you agree that it makes sense in this way?

No. Not at all. The electron Compton wavelength is 2.42 x 10ˉ¹² m. At wavelengths below the Compton limit, you're talking protons, not electrons. And if you throw around very-short wavelength photons, you're going to cause pair production. You won't see pairs that were always there, you're going to create them. TheMan is just trying to bamboozle you and get you to accept bad science. You can diffract electrons. They aren't point particles.

 

[edd]

Farsight - you have too narrow a definition of 'point particle'. You might like your definition, but it's not the one that everyone else is using, so it is advisable to go along with everyone else's terminology rather than reinventing the language everyone else is trying to use to suit yourself.

 

[Farsight]

Go on, tell us what gravitomagnetism has to do with the electromagnetic field around the electron? And I mean directly, not by the analogies for which gravitomagnetism is named. You're just throwing out terms that you superficially think have something to do with what you're talking about.

Look at the NASA page and note where it says There is a space-time vortex around Earth and But if space is twisted. 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.

If you want my opinion - I agree that the electron appears pointlike down to the scale of our experiments. I agree electrons have wavelengths associated with them, and what may be termed a spatial extent in certain respects, but this is not in conflict with the definitions of pointlike and the experimental results pertaining to that definition as spelled out quite clearly by ben m, for example. I further think one must not get too bogged down by wedging physical phenomena into words and then falsely drawing conclusions based on those words.

Phooey. You're ducking the issue. It's crystal clear that the evidence for the wave nature of the electron is overwhelming, whilst the evidence for the pointlike nature of the electron just isn't there. It's merely an inference, one that ignores the very essence of quantum field theory. And what you are shying away from, is what type of wave.

I think that you persistently produce (a word I use to include the production of references to, as well as the origination of) ideas that are crackpot.

I refer to Maxwell and Minkowski and Einstein and the evidence. And your "crackpot" ad-hominem is the last refuge of a naysayer.

Farsight - you have too narrow a definition of 'point particle'. You might like your definition, but it's not the one that everyone else is using, so it is advisable to go along with everyone else's terminology rather than reinventing the language everyone else is trying to use to suit yourself.

It's quantum field theory, you can diffract electrons. Ehrenberg and Siday wrote a paper entitled The Refractive Index in Electron Optics and the Principles of Dynamics in 1949. Electrons are not point particles.

 

[Farsight]

OK, Farsight, let's test your ability to explain these things.

For a hydrogen atom, what is:

a) The spatial extent of the atom wavefunction?

Unlimited, in line with its gravitational field. See above then drop a dimension and imagine the rubber sheet analogy without the bowling ball. Grab the rubber sheet with your left hand and twist clockwise. The distortion represents the electron. Grab the rubber sheet nearby with your right hand and twist anticlockwise. The distortion represents the proton. The opposite twists cancel each other somewhat, but not completely - the rubber sheet suffers tension. (NB: the analogy is backwards. A better analogy would feature pressure in a bulk instead of tension in a sheet).

b) The size scale of the atom's internal structure?

In the above analogy, your left hand is circling your right hand at a distance of 5.29 × 10ˉ¹¹ m, and the circumference of your left hand is 2.42 x 10ˉ¹² m. The circumference of your right hand is 1.32 x 10 ˉ¹⁵. It's wobbling a little.

c) The Compton wavelength of the whole atom?

You can define it as the photon wavelength equivalent to the mass od the hydrogen atom, which is a little less than the proton mass plus electron mass, but the whole atom doesn't really have a wavelength like the electron does.

I want to make my own plot of your greyscale spiral. I have Maxwell's Equations and a differential-equation solver. What boundary conditions should I plug in, to exactly which equations, to obtain this spiral?

Sorry, I don't know.

Your plot seems to show an unidentified scalar quantity (represented by the greyscale). What quantity, precisely, maps to the greyscale?

That's not a scalar quantity. The greyscale is just to show the twist. See vector fields for something you'll be more familiar with.

 

[Farsight]

What a bunch of naysayers.

No we're not!

Oh yes you are. You peddle pseudoscience like the multiverse, and if anybody shows any skepticism backed up with references to Einstein etc and the hard scientific evidence, you try to stifle them.

 

[edd]

Look at the NASA page and note where it says There is a space-time vortex around Earth and But if space is twisted. 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.

This is patent nonsense, not least as such frame dragging and geometrical effects would influence uncharged particles.

It's quantum field theory, you can diffract electrons. Ehrenberg and Siday wrote a paper entitled The Refractive Index in Electron Optics and the Principles of Dynamics in 1949. Electrons are not point particles.

if I went to, say, ben m and said "I've got this new theory. One key prediction of it is a new particle called the 'eddmotron' which has a mass of 6.5 oz, a charge of 3/7 that of the electron and is pointlike" then although he'd, shall we say, question the physical motivation of my theory, he wouldn't immediately assume this predicted particle of mine couldn't be diffracted.

 

[edd]

That's not a scalar quantity. The greyscale is just to show the twist. See vector fields for something you'll be more familiar with.

[qimg]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c2/Vector_field.svg/120px-Vector_field.svg.png[/qimg]

Fine, write this vector in terms of E and B, or F_uv if you so prefer, and explain the physical significance of this new vector quantity.

 

[Farsight]

Actually, not even THAT is true. Farsight's radial plot might indeed be interpreted as electric field lines from a static charge; his bullseye plot might indeed be interpreted as magnetic field lines around a static line of current. (If he'd included an arrow, you would be able to make out the direction of the field which would break the symmetry you point out. But let's be generous and imagine such arrows was intended.)

I left out the arrows because in radial electric depictions they point outward for an electron and inward for a positron. See this website which says "lines of force are also called field lines". But there isn't some outward force for an electron and some inward force for a positron. With no initial relative motion, the linear force depends on whether the particles have the same or opposite charge. And it either pushes them apart or pulls them together. It takes two to tango.

But in this case the spiral lines are NOT trajectories of charged particles...

No, think frame-dragging around a dynamical spinor. Think vorticial attraction and repulsion. Think cyclones. With no initial relative motion, two similar cyclones move apart, two opposite cyclones move together. It takes two to tango.

Magnetic field lines exert forces in the "cross" direction (F = v x B) which, no matter what the velocity is, is always perpendicular to B. Farsight's "spirals" have picked up a component parallel to B, in a direction where *neither* the radial nor the circumferential "lines" can exert a force. So those spirals are not force-directions, nor trajectories, nor anything else.

They depict the frame dragging around a dynamical spinor. If you throw an electron through a solenoid, its path is helical because it's a dynamical spinor moving through non-isotropic space.

I believe Farsight obtained them by just picturing "E + B", presumably believing that "electromagnetism" unification allows him to do this. He presumably was picturing "length of the little E arrow added to length of the little B arrow", which is how you graphically add vectors when the lengths represent magnitudes in the same units, but in this case is not true---in other words, it's precisely the "Shakespearean" crackpottery that you expected.

Clinger is a naysayer pumping out straw-man ad-hominem trash, and lots of it.

Also, as an aside, the "bullseye" pattern does NOT give the magnetic field lines of any actual static particle. That's the magnetic field of a line of current. Particles have magnetic dipoles...

So they aren't point-particles, are they? Hoist by your own petard, ben.

there is no slice of a dipole's field whose field lines look like Farsight's bullseye. Since Farsight comes right out and says this describes an "electron", we don't have to be generous: he's wrong.

The moot point is that the field concerned is the electromagnetic field, and you have to combine depictions of "the electric field" and "the magnetic field" to visualize it, whereafter you can understand it. Once you do understand it, you appreciate what Maxwell and Minkowski were talking about re the screw nature of electromagnetism, whereafter there's no going back.

 

[Farsight]

For a minute there I thought he might be suggesting that, since the electron is a point charge, that it's also a magnetic monopole. Wouldn't surprise me if he did.

No way. The electron has its electromagnetic field. It doesn't have an electric field. It doesn't have a magnetic field. It has an electromagnetic field. So it doesn't have electric charge, it has electromagnetic charge. So there is no such things as magnetic charge. So magnetic monopoles don't exist.

 

[edd]

No way. The electron has its electromagnetic field. It doesn't have an electric field. It doesn't have a magnetic field. It has an electromagnetic field. So it doesn't have electric charge, it has electromagnetic charge. So there is no such things as magnetic charge. So magnetic monopoles don't exist.

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

 

[Farsight]

This is patent nonsense, not least as such frame dragging and geometrical effects would influence uncharged particles.

No it isn't. Go and look up topological charge. Also look at the neutron wherein the magnetic moment "is of particular interest, as magnetic moments are created by the movement of electric charges". And Faraday rotation.

if I went to, say, ben m and said "I've got this new theory. One key prediction of it is a new particle called the 'eddmotron' which has a mass of 6.5 oz, a charge of 3/7 that of the electron and is pointlike" then although he'd, shall we say, question the physical motivation of my theory, he wouldn't immediately assume this predicted particle of mine couldn't be diffracted.

What are you on about? I haven't got some new theory. I was telling you about the wave nature of matter and that the electron is not some point particle, and now I'm telling you about Minkowski and Maxwell and the screw nature of electromagnetism. Why do you think we have the right hand rule?. Go on, read the Wikipedia article. See how it talks about both electromagnetism and screw threads? Push a current up the wire and the motor turns. Turn the dynamo and the current is pushed up the wire. Just because you don't know this stuff, don't think I'm just making it up. I'm not some Anders Lindman. Instead, as you are to him, so am I to you.

Fine, write this vector in terms of E and B, or Fuv if you so prefer, and explain the physical significance of this new vector quantity.

I'm sorry edd, but this doesn't parse. 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, and I've been trying to explain it. And now I have to go.

 

[edd]

No it isn't. Go and look up topological charge. Also look at the neutron wherein the magnetic moment "is of particular interest, as magnetic moments are created by the movement of electric charges". And Faraday rotation.

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.

What are you on about? I haven't got some new theory. I was telling you about the wave nature of matter and that the electron is not some point particle, and now I'm telling you about Minkowski and Maxwell and the screw nature of 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.

Just because you don't know this stuff, don't think I'm just making it up. I'm not some Anders Lindman. Instead, as you are to him, so am I to you.

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

I'm sorry edd, but this doesn't parse. 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, and I've been trying to explain it. And now I have to go.

E and B are not forces, they are fields. 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?

 

[ctamblyn]

Why do you keep dodging the question, John Duffield?

Farsight -

...you cannot show us how any one of the loopy photon models you've been talking about can be used to make experimentally testable assertions.

Any progress on this? You've had 7+ years to refine your model and work out some of its experimentally verifiable consequences. I'm keen to hear your results.

 

[ctamblyn]

Oh yes you are. You peddle pseudoscience like the multiverse, and if anybody shows any skepticism backed up with references to Einstein etc and the hard scientific evidence, you try to stifle them.

Every assertion made in your post here is false. I do not peddle anything (e.g. unlike some here, I have no book on sale), and lack both the will and the power to stifle anyone, skeptical or otherwise. As for the implied claim that your objections to the multiverse how somehow been backed up by anything other than your misreadings of references or your personal aesthetics, I'm afraid that is also false, as anyone reading this thread can see for themselves.

That aside, how about you get around to admitting that your decidedly pseudoscientific electron model is incapable of being tested experimentally?

 

[Vorpal]

... and now I'm telling you about Minkowski and Maxwell and the screw nature of electromagnetism. Why do you think we have the right hand rule?.

The "right-hand rule" is just an artifact of using pseudovectors in place of bivectors. In three dimensions, standard Hodge duality maps bivectors to vectors using a purely conventional orientation, which the right-hand rule provides.

Back-track a bit. In mechanics, Chasles' theorem says that any displacement of a rigid body is equivalent to a screw displacement, a translation along an axis and a rotation around that axis. The rotation part can be described by a bivector, whose Hodge dual is a pseudovector--this is where the "right-hand rule" comes in.

That B is a pseudovector is well-known, and there are many presentations of electromagnetism that treat the magnetic field as the bivector or 2-form that it "should" be. There's no need to resurrect the screw analogy of EM field: it's more than a bit obscure at this point and (as Minkowski himself says) an imperfect analogy anyway. In modern language,

F_μν antisymmetric covariant tensor ⇔ F is a 2-form (over spacetime) ⇔ F decomposable into time/space components (E,B) where E is a 1-form and B is a 2-form (over space) ⇔ E vector, B pseudovector​

There's all completely equivalent. Even better, there very intuitive geometric pictures for bivectors and 2-forms, for B, or F, and for its Hodge dual ⋆F.

 

[phunk]

Not all theories predict stuff in their infancy. Even Einstein didn't know what his theories would end up predicting.

Complete nonsense. The papers that introduced his theories were all about predicting what would be observed if the theories were true. For example, in his paper on special relativity, there were several testable predictions, such as time dilation, length contraction, relativity of simultaneity, etc.

 

[Senex]

Complete nonsense. The papers that introduced his theories were all about predicting what would be observed if the theories were true. For example, in his paper on special relativity, there were several testable predictions, such as time dilation, length contraction, relativity of simultaneity, etc.

Could we have phone service bouncing all over satellites without the special relativity theory you mentioned? Did Einstein think about cell phones at the time? Therefore even Einstein didn't know what his theories would end up predicting (somebody used his theory to predict the behavior) just as I said.

What's with not giving the Einsteins of this world enough credit?

 

[theprestige]

Could we have phone service bouncing all over satellites without the special relativity theory you mentioned? Did Einstein think about cell phones at the time? Therefore even Einstein didn't know what his theories would end up predicting (somebody used his theory to predict the behavior) just as I said.

What's with not giving the Einsteins of this world enough credit?

There's a difference between Einstein not forseeing all the applications his prediction would have, and Einstein not knowing that his prediction would hold true for every application anybody ever proposed.