Naked Science Forum
Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: dhjdhj on 04/01/2016 20:36:13
-
Does it also provide sufficient opportunity for amateur study.
Professor Brian Cox in his very successful book 'Why does E=MC²?' writes 'An unfortunate consequence of Einstein's apparent isolation from the mainstream is the modern temptation to look upon him as a maverick who took on the scientific establishment and won; unfortunate because it provides inspiration to any number of crackpots who think they have single-handily discovered a new theory and cannot understand why nobody will listen to them' This quote is from a physicist who has won the award for communication of physics to the public, but this communication is all one way and selective. No one can deny that physics has problems. Gravity is still a mystery. the very small and the very large don't talk and every new discovery throws up more questions than answers.
These forums frequently throw up both interesting questions and hypothesis. Most are answered and explained by you professionals very well and thanks for that, but some are answered by ignoring the theory and repeating the mainstream view. For an amateur it is very difficult to get access directly to any kind of direct tutorage so we have no way of obtaining structured information other than the internet or books and this subject requires personal tuition. If physics engaged more by listening to crackpots and putting them right do you think it possible that the key to the TOE may hiding in plain sight and could emerge simply because some one may not be burdened with too much detailed knowledge.
This is not quite as fanciful as it might appear in 1969 I was a young civil engineer working on the design of the Thames Barrier. The design criteria were horrendous. A mighty river some 800 metres wide has to be stopped in its tracks. The barrier had to be maintained, ships had to pass through, tides and silting were serious issues. The design was thrown open. Hundreds of professional engineers provided 40 separate designs, all of which sort of worked with a fix here and there. The problem was solved by a draughtsman on the consultants team named Charlie Draper who had no qualifications of any kind. His incredibly elegant rising sector gate design ( which won many international design awards) was inspired by the taps on his gas cooker and was first ignored until he built a model proving his concept. It was only accepted when he was able to demonstrate it to the project manager. Charlie's design was of course adopted and has kept London safe for the last 35 years. The important point here is that Charlie like Einstein and Faraday before them was inside the discipline they were influencing, they had access to mentors. Can physics do more to both provide access to mentors to the keen to learn but not in fulltime education, and should they listen more to 'crackpots'?
-
If you want to study then by all means do so. There are some very good Stanford lectures posted to youtube. Leonard Susskind has a very good series on there. It isn't easy. Ask any professional physicist. I am not a professional physicist so it's no use asking me. Some of the concepts and mathematics are very difficult to grasp. Videos do help in some cases. However, to simply post unfounded ideas based on nothing more than intuition is not the way to go. The established theories and laws of physics have taken a lot of effort to establish by very intelligent people working over the last two hundred years and more. They didn't have the text book to fall back on. They were creating the material for the text books. So what makes you think that the 'crackpot' community are going to make any inroads? Even if you are determined to learn you get stopped in your tracks a lot of the time by a lack of understanding. So there aren't any easy ways to come to new understandings.
-
There is nothing that says Physicists do not listen, they just can't have crackpots at Nasa etc.
-
Hi dhjdhj like you I'm from outside scientific academia and think there must be some underlying structure at the subatomic scale however the big problem for the unorthodox theories is that , for example , quantum mechanics has provided a practical method of dealing with the very small . These real world solutions ( no matter how weird they are ) work , which means unless experimental physicists start producing results which contradict the current model our ideas about what might be going on are just , at best , interesting flights of fancy. The main problem is that the more informed amateur and professional scientists who post on this forum have heard variations on the most popular unorthodox ideas many , many , many times so while I'm happy to ignore a hundred years of theoretical , experimental and applied quantum mechanics they can't :) So even though 75 percent of matter in the universe isn't included in the standard model we just have to wait for experimental proof of what it is before we get to say I told you so ( or not ) :)
-
Hi guys thanks for the replies. I am NOT saying that AR, GR or the standard model are wrong. They are mathematically very accurate, but They don't connect and they require counter intuitive thinking. No student of physics is going to get anywhere without buying in to the main stream. They have been around for about 100 years now and no significant advances have been made since the Higgs hypothesis 30 odd years ago. We are bombarded by academic physicist whose theories include time doesn't exist, multiple parallel worlds, sub-atomic systems with millions of curled up dimensions and yet we can't get energy out of an atom safely and simply. Charlie Draper who came up with the Thames Barrier solution could not have designed the gate structure or calculated the hydraulic conditions in the river or any of the other complex design features, but he did come up with a way of thinking about the whole problem that hundreds of academic engineers could not, most probably because of the way we were taught. We all approached the problem bite sized building up a solution, rather than top down as Charlie did. I think it is very possible that a single unorthodox idea could be the key and it is just as likely to come from outside the physics community as within.
-
Totally true, any person is just as likely to have a good idea as a person who is a professional in the field of the idea. Ideas come through observation, whether it be a physical observation or a mental pictured observation, this leads to discovery.
However in saying that, the persons idea must have credibility and be presented in a way that everyone can understand, a one paragraph theory with no attempt of maths or true meaning is not a theory, it is just confusion by the opp's in desperation for that one hit pony.
Myself included, but I have wrote big theories and tried maths, it got me nowhere in science except banned from most forums, which is rather strange when it is open discussion.
Education provides stereotypes, there is more stereotypes than free thinkers, you are not a professional scientist just because you have some paper work in my opinion. I experiment, I wish I had more equipment, I think I could capture a Photon on camera, but it is in vein. 2009 I started science, and people still presume that I do not know the present information in brief and understand it, this is because I am tenacious and question everything even if it is said fact.
No stone unturned, who's the professional at the end of day, someone who questions or somebody who just accepts the ''facts'', acceptance gets you know where.
-
Myself included, but I have wrote big theories and tried maths, it got me nowhere in science except banned from most forums, which is rather strange when it is open discussion.
Perhaps you should give some thought to what "open discussion" means. Those trying to conduce a genuine discussion tend to be wary of unsubstantiated dogmatic pronouncements, like this one of yours from another thread.
There is one reason only , the future does not exist, the past does not exist , only the now exists and the now is always the now and the past is a memory of the now which is now the future.
-
Myself included, but I have wrote big theories and tried maths, it got me nowhere in science except banned from most forums, which is rather strange when it is open discussion.
Perhaps you should give some thought to what "open discussion" means. Those trying to conduce a genuine discussion tend to be wary of unsubstantiated dogmatic pronouncements, like this one of yours from another thread.
There is one reason only , the future does not exist, the past does not exist , only the now exists and the now is always the now and the past is a memory of the now which is now the future.
I deem some things, not worth discussing when there is an obvious answer, the future is not written. there is no more to it.
-
I think the underlying issue is that all three of the great modern physics theories SR, GR, and The standard model contain elements that are weird to normal observation. Throw in the Copenhagen Interpretation, dimensionless, and massless particles all predicted by probability and most technical minded people go tilt. Then we are told that all these predictions have been proved by experiments in LHC and Fermilab. All sorts of particles and forces have been discovered so that's alright. But GR and SM don't fit and proofs and discoveries are based on probabilities and interpretation. If you ask a physicist why is c absolute, he will say because its nature or philosophy. He will answer the same for a whole number of questions. Why are there so many fundamental particles? Why does the atom have four separate forces? where do they come from? Even what is time? This leads to inevitable questioning and speculation. Most of these speculations contain errors of such magnitude that they are easy to dismiss but some ( a very few ) are based on different fundamental assumptions to the standard theories, but may still appear particularly to the author to cover or explain the experimental results obtained by mainstream physics. If these hypothesis were produced within a structured physics learning environment they would be discussed, examined and any errors established. Amateurs don't have this luxury, we have no access other than this type of forum. It may just be, that a different primary assumption might be the key, unlike Paul Dirac I am very suspicious of mathematics relating to physical situations that cannot be represented graphically regardless of their accuracy. I believe it is encumbered of mainstream to not only promote the established theories but consider and review properly presented ideas from outside. The other constraint of peer review also prevents radical ideas from emerging from within mainstream. Most of us speculators have no illusions that we are the new Einsteins. We just want to know what's wrong with our ideas. You never know just maybe the key to the TOE might just pop out
-
I think the underlying issue is that all three of the great modern physics theories SR, GR, and The standard model contain elements that are weird to normal observation. Throw in the Copenhagen Interpretation, dimensionless, and massless particles all predicted by probability and most technical minded people go tilt. Then we are told that all these predictions have been proved by experiments in LHC and Fermilab. All sorts of particles and forces have been discovered so that's alright. But GR and SM don't fit and proofs and discoveries are based on probabilities and interpretation. If you ask a physicist why is c absolute, he will say because its nature or philosophy. He will answer the same for a whole number of questions. Why are there so many fundamental particles? Why does the atom have four separate forces? where do they come from? Even what is time? This leads to inevitable questioning and speculation. Most of these speculations contain errors of such magnitude that they are easy to dismiss but some ( a very few ) are based on different fundamental assumptions to the standard theories, but may still appear particularly to the author to cover or explain the experimental results obtained by mainstream physics. If these hypothesis were produced within a structured physics learning environment they would be discussed, examined and any errors established. Amateurs don't have this luxury, we have no access other than this type of forum. It may just be, that a different primary assumption might be the key, unlike Paul Dirac I am very suspicious of mathematics relating to physical situations that cannot be represented graphically regardless of their accuracy. I believe it is encumbered of mainstream to not only promote the established theories but consider and review properly presented ideas from outside. The other constraint of peer review also prevents radical ideas from emerging from within mainstream. Most of us speculators have no illusions that we are the new Einsteins. We just want to know what's wrong with our ideas. You never know just maybe the key to the TOE might just pop out
If anyone has anything plausible to say, I am sure science would spot this, I am not so sure the person would get any merit for their idea. Amateurs do not need to be in a class room, these forums are the class room and the internet offers most of sciences information they have with probably just the top secret stuff left out.
How would you suggest science separates the trolls from the genuine?
How does science know who is the original author of ideas and not just mimicking trolls?
When I first started science, I suggested that every scientist needs a side kick crackpot, the scientist can put the facts to the crackpots ideas and explain it to the science community in words they understand.
-
We live in a world of specialists. A world of specialists can create problems when it comes to theory. In some cases, the left hand may not know what the right hand is doing. One can lose track of the forest because of so many trees. Often it can be hard to reach the person who is not a specialists.
As an example, aspects of physics deal with the essence of matter; sub-particles. The main form of matter we know is chemical matter; hydrogen. Our bodies are made of chemicals. Do any sub particle theories of matter predict chemical reactions? These have become two specialty areas, that act as though they are not connected. Neither theory needs the other to work.
I believe there should be an educational path, called the generalists, whose education and even PhD thesis, is designed to cross the boundaries between specialists. A generalists is educated to see the bigger picture. They can see the forest, but they may lose track of trees. They may not know all the latest research in all the specialities; trees, but they can maneuver the forest making sure A, B and C are in the same forest.
Let me present a mental exercise to show you a potential pitfall due to too much specialty science; discontinuities. This example will also show the possible impact of the generalist POV.
Picture this. We have a large mural on the wall. The mural is analogous to all of science, which a generalist might see. He is not close enough to see all the details, but he does see the big picture. To simulate a speciality, I will zoom into a random place on the mural and then blank out the rest with a masking tool.
At the point of zoom, all we can see is what appears to be an eye. Based on our speciality knowledge of eyes, one infers this is a female eye. Since eyes are the center of their specialty universe; most weighted knowledge, they will try to formulate the theory for the entire mural based on this center. The mural is about a young women sitting in grassy field. This is reasonable based on the eye and some of the light reflecting.
Next, we zoom out, somewhat. We can still see the eye, but now we also can see the face. It is a women and her face looks strained. From this wider POV, the theory changes. We were right about the girl, but now it appears she is laboring, in the field of grass. Maybe she is mowing.
Next, we zoom out more and now we can see she is wearing athletic sweats, that are sort of beat up with holes. We were right about the female and her laboring, but now it appears she is working out at a gym with some odd grasscloth wallpaper; so much for the grassy field theory.
Next, we zoom out further and we notice what appears to be a stage, with dancers sitting, stretching and practicing. Our female now appears to be doing a dance move. We were sort of right. She is working out, but not in the gym, but on a stage with a dance group. Maybe she is trying out for a part. Her old sweat clothes and the strained look on her face make us think, she may not be doing very well, following her dream.
Next, we zoom out even more and notice this is the stage at Carney Hall. Now she is not just some poor girl with a dream, but she must be a dancer of superior skill, trying out for a tough part.
Next, we zoom out further and notice her coach, sitting a few rows back. He is the dance director of the NY ballet. He is focusing all his attention on her, with a smile on his face. Now, she is the prima ballerina of a major dance group giving it her all.
This exercise shows, when you extrapolate outward from the center of any specialty POV, theory from that center does not always extrapolate to the biggest picture. As we open the field of view, a theory can change.
Now that we know the eye belongs to the prima ballerina of the NC ballet, if we go back to the specialists in eyeballs, he now sees her eye in a different way. Now the eye reflects the soul of a talented artist. He never saw that but see it now.
-
We live in a world of specialists. A world of specialists can create problems when it comes to theory. In some cases, the left hand may not know what the right hand is doing. One can lose track of the forest because of so many trees. Often it can be hard to reach the person who is not a specialists.
As an example, aspects of physics deal with the essence of matter; sub-particles. The main form of matter we know is chemical matter; hydrogen. Our bodies are made of chemicals. Do any sub particle theories of matter predict chemical reactions? These have become two specialty areas, that act as though they are not connected. Neither theory needs the other to work.
I believe there should be an educational path, called the generalists, whose education and even PhD thesis, is designed to cross the boundaries between specialists. A generalists is educated to see the bigger picture. They can see the forest, but they may lose track of trees. They may not know all the latest research in all the specialities; trees, but they can maneuver the forest making sure A, B and C are in the same forest.
Let me present a mental exercise to show you a potential pitfall due to too much specialty science; discontinuities. This example will also show the possible impact of the generalist POV.
Picture this. We have a large mural on the wall. The mural is analogous to all of science, which a generalist might see. He is not close enough to see all the details, but he does see the big picture. To simulate a speciality, I will zoom into a random place on the mural and then blank out the rest with a masking tool.
At the point of zoom, all we can see is what appears to be an eye. Based on our speciality knowledge of eyes, one infers this is a female eye. Since eyes are the center of their specialty universe; most weighted knowledge, they will try to formulate the theory for the entire mural based on this center. The mural is about a young women sitting in grassy field. This is reasonable based on the eye and some of the light reflecting.
Next, we zoom out, somewhat. We can still see the eye, but now we also can see the face. It is a women and her face looks strained. From this wider POV, the theory changes. We were right about the girl, but now it appears she is laboring, in the field of grass. Maybe she is mowing.
Next, we zoom out more and now we can see she is wearing athletic sweats, that are sort of beat up with holes. We were right about the female and her laboring, but now it appears she is working out at a gym with some odd grasscloth wallpaper; so much for the grassy field theory.
Next, we zoom out further and we notice what appears to be a stage, with dancers sitting, stretching and practicing. Our female now appears to be doing a dance move. We were sort of right. She is working out, but not in the gym, but on a stage with a dance group. Maybe she is trying out for a part. Her old sweat clothes and the strained look on her face make us think, she may not be doing very well, following her dream.
Next, we zoom out even more and notice this is the stage at Carney Hall. Now she is not just some poor girl with a dream, but she must be a dancer of superior skill, trying out for a tough part.
Next, we zoom out further and notice her coach, sitting a few rows back. He is the dance director of the NY ballet. He is focusing all his attention on her, with a smile on his face. Now, she is the prima ballerina of a major dance group giving it her all.
This exercise shows, when you extrapolate outward from the center of any specialty POV, theory from that center does not always extrapolate to the biggest picture. As we open the field of view, a theory can change.
Now that we know the eye belongs to the prima ballerina of the NC ballet, if we go back to the specialists in eyeballs, he now sees her eye in a different way. Now the eye reflects the soul of a talented artist. He never saw that but see it now.
A great story there, good reading , thanks for sharing.
-
I deem some things, not worth discussing when there is an obvious answer, the future is not written. there is no more to it.
This seems to leave the questions: Why join a discussion on a subject that is "not worth discussing"? Why join a discussion when you know with certainty "there is no more to it."?
There's nothing for you to learn, and no one is likely to accept your dogma, so aren't you wasting your time?
-
I deem some things, not worth discussing when there is an obvious answer, the future is not written. there is no more to it.
This seems to leave the questions: Why join a discussion on a subject that is "not worth discussing"? Why join a discussion when you know with certainty "there is no more to it."?
There's nothing for you to learn, and no one is likely to accept your dogma, so aren't you wasting your time?
Waste my time to save other peoples time, I am not selfish. The trouble with the truth or Dogma as you like to call it, is that the truth is the truth and unarguable , I present axioms, something's we do not know, some things we think we know, something's are quite irrelevant. The things that we know with a certainty are reality, things like objects fall to the ground, the wind ''blows'' , fire burns. Most theories do not even offer any evidence to support the theory that is conventionally logically inconsistent.
There's always something to learn, even if the things you are learning are not actually fact based truth's. These things you learn, give you ideas to new discoveries and ideas.
I would love a situation where I was in an environment of scientists to ask questions, I would impose some tricky questions.
I have so many questions and so many ideas, I can think on the ''fly'' personally.
Start with this question slash axiom -
Can anyone with 100% honesty say that tomorrow is even there?
-
Like the box I have studied the best I can the status quo and as a retired chartered engineer my basic maths and physics is not bad( I took both at A level and refined them at university) I can sum a series, calculate a probability, and differentiate and integrate ( when I can remember the standard integrals) just fine. Like The box I found a different way to join up the experimental dots, but unlike The box I don't believe my way can be right. My frustration is that I cannot find any way to discover why it is not right. Lectures on the internet don't do it. Careful descriptions of the main accepted theories won't do it. Only a discussion with some one more knowledgeable will help. This proves impossible to arrange even if paying, because the physics community operates a one way valve form of communication. These forums are great and I am becoming addicted, but you still don't get an honest critique of any theory or idea put forward.
Because of this one way conversation it may be possible that an unorthodox idea may be missed which the physics community could take up and develop. The interchange between engineering and medicine is two way and very fruitful why not physics and other disciplines. I also agree that the world is becoming more specialised which in itself can be counter productive. A specialist knows more and more about less and less until eventually he or she knows every thing about nothing. We need someone to stop calculating and THINK and I am not sure physics academia is set up for that.
-
Like the box I have studied the best I can the status quo and as a retired chartered engineer my basic maths and physics is not bad( I took both at A level and refined them at university) I can sum a series, calculate a probability, and differentiate and integrate ( when I can remember the standard integrals) just fine. Like The box I found a different way to join up the experimental dots, but unlike The box I don't believe my way can be right. My frustration is that I cannot find any way to discover why it is not right. Lectures on the internet don't do it. Careful descriptions of the main accepted theories won't do it. Only a discussion with some one more knowledgeable will help. This proves impossible to arrange even if paying, because the physics community operates a one way valve form of communication. These forums are great and I am becoming addicted, but you still don't get an honest critique of any theory or idea put forward.
I may regret this but what is your idea?
-
Well thank you for that. You probably will regret it. I posted the whole meandering idea based on Democritus's minimum piece of matter on the 12th DEC in its correct location of new theories. Just find one mis-step any where will do. ( I am still working on the maths but Einstein took 10 years and he was a hell of a lot brighter than I am).
-
If the field around your bead is all directed inwards then it is like an attractive monopole. If it fits into the Planck scale then it is a bit like string theory. I have really only skimmed through the PDF but I didn't regret it. I will give it some more attention over the weekend and get back to you.
-
Well thank you for that. You probably will regret it. I posted the whole meandering idea based on Democritus's minimum piece of matter on the 12th DEC in its correct location of new theories. Just find one mis-step any where will do. ( I am still working on the maths but Einstein took 10 years and he was a hell of a lot brighter than I am).
I posted elsewhere on the linking of scattering amplitudes to the Euler beta function which led on to the work of Leonard Susskind on string theory. I cannot remember The name of the person at CERN who originally picked up the patterns in the data but I will try to dig the information out. It might benefit you to research this area.
-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_string_theory (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_string_theory)
1968–1974: dual resonance model
The first theory of this sort, the dual resonance model, was constructed by Gabriele Veneziano in 1968, who noted that the Euler Beta function could be used to describe 4-particle scattering amplitude data for particles on Regge trajectories. The Veneziano scattering amplitude was quickly generalized to an N-particle amplitude by Ziro Koba and Holger Bech Nielsen, and to what are now recognized as closed strings by Miguel Virasoro and Joel A. Shapiro. Dual resonance models for strong interactions were a popular subject of study 1968-1974.
-
And this is the point at which I believe it all went wrong.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veneziano_amplitude (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veneziano_amplitude)
-
Thanks Jeffrey H I am much indebted. I hadn't realized (shows my inexperience ) that I had theorized the elusive monopole, but I had noticed how I had arrived at a similar type of structure to string theory but with one crucial difference my string has three dimensions not two, even if the third dimension is the minimum possible. Can you now see why I need access to physics brains. There are several questions in my mind. My treatment and ideas about nuclear charge are a bit of a fudge and I need some help with the nature of it. The Rydberg constant in my model comes from a smoothing adjustment of rotating fields. the beads need to reduce their orbits slightly from the empirical calculated orbits to allow for the null areas between the circular fields. In two dimensions at the centre this gives Rb=1.15, Three dimensions will reduce this to some where close to 1.09 but the maths is horrible. The field is a three dimensional doughnut shaped parabola,over lapping these and balancing moments is a nightmare. The other area is to calculate how many beads there are. We know that Hydrogen has a mass of 1.66kg Χ 10‾24. So it should be possible to calculate the number by comparing Newton's gravitational constant with the binding force. All this is of course conjecture I am expecting you to find an error or at least no way of substantiation, but if it makes just one physicist think that maybe I am worth talking to, I'm happy.
-
I'm afraid I am not a professional physicist and my interest is general relativity anyway. I have only learned a small amount of particle physics. However, you monopole sounds like a gluon field. If you can find a way of modeling asymptotic freedom with your conjecture you may be on to something.
-
You certainly sound knowledgeable and it appears there are aspects of the hypothesis that appeal. So how do I get a professional physicist to review it? It seems the messenger is always more important than the message. I think it is a new way of looking at things, but is it right? If there is a physicist out there who could give the theory a read I would be most grateful.
-
keep reading Jeffrey I get onto GR
-
Thanks Jeffrey H I am much indebted. I hadn't realized (shows my inexperience ) that I had theorized the elusive monopole, but I had noticed how I had arrived at a similar type of structure to string theory but with one crucial difference my string has three dimensions not two, even if the third dimension is the minimum possible. Can you now see why I need access to physics brains. There are several questions in my mind. My treatment and ideas about nuclear charge are a bit of a fudge and I need some help with the nature of it. The Rydberg constant in my model comes from a smoothing adjustment of rotating fields. the beads need to reduce their orbits slightly from the empirical calculated orbits to allow for the null areas between the circular fields. In two dimensions at the centre this gives Rb=1.15, Three dimensions will reduce this to some where close to 1.09 but the maths is horrible. The field is a three dimensional doughnut shaped parabola,over lapping these and balancing moments is a nightmare. The other area is to calculate how many beads there are. We know that Hydrogen has a mass of 1.66kg Χ 10‾24. So it should be possible to calculate the number by comparing Newton's gravitational constant with the binding force. All this is of course conjecture I am expecting you to find an error or at least no way of substantiation, but if it makes just one physicist think that maybe I am worth talking to, I'm happy.
Inverse laws mean the smaller the mote the heavier.
You may want to look at Rydberg atoms, how orbitals behave towards the classic limit when they break sýmmetry. Despite the orbitals' shape I model the s orbital as a 1D harmonic superposed in 3D and the p orbital as three loops superposed in 2D; the other blocks make compound loops. Of course I believe in the standard motes but interpret QM as at least a two-body interaction to emulate the wavefunction. I don't believe in superstrings.
-
Thanks once I worked out what a mote was ( we use particle this side of the pond ) and I have had a quick look at Rydberg atoms, but I need to oil my brain a bit before I can comment. I do however have a built-in unease with string theory without having sufficient knowledge to understand why. My modest hypothesis has string like features in the atom model, but I was at pains to stress that the atom model was a maybe and not essential to the idea as a whole, it did however give a possible alternative structure to Bohr's model for Rydberg's mathematics.