Naked Science Forum
Non Life Sciences => Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology => Topic started by: Mr. Scientist on 03/10/2009 17:55:42
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So, i noticed Vern as back, so i wanted to talk about a photon-only universe.
Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?
It seems no accident of nature to not assume that photons are the origin of all matter, with the discovery of the antiparticle. A particle when it comes in contact with its antiparticle it can transform back into massless radiation. In fact, all types of antiparticle-particle collisons ultimately resort their intrinsic proponents back to photon energy.
If all matter where to be forms of photon energy, (or trapped light), then it would mean that in the very beginning, the universe did not begin in a quark-soup of ionized particles, but rather an electromagnetic appearance of the fundamental unit of energy; in fact, a massive cloud of these particles would have been a major gravitational influence very early on in the universe, and it wouldn't be until after the inflationary phase of the universe would their gravitational influence be dilluted within the framework of spacetime.
What are peoples thoughts on a photon-only universe?
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A universe in which the final irreducible constituent of all physical reality is the electromagnetic field rules out many widely held notions. Black holes could not form, for example. There could have been no Big Bang, for another example. It would mean that Einstein's theory of relativity is wrong. In such a construct for the universe, relativity phenomena occurs naturally in flat space-time as H Ziegler said in 1909. (http://photontheory.com/Einstein/Einstein06.html#Ziegler)
I find the idea fascinating. I have traced it back to Maxwell; some say that even Newton held that view. Also, I have never found any experimental evidence that does not support that view of matter.
If anyone cares to explore this notion there are a few posts about it here in the New Theories forum. (http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=19935.50)
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"Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?"
Since matter has mass and photons don't it follows that matter is not composed of photons.
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Well if you place your light bulb beside you I'm sure you will see 'photons'. But what creates them is interactions of matter mediated by 'virtuality' :)
So that 'photonic' universe may exist but I don't think so as all processes creating 'photons' starts as interactions with matter, ah, as far as I know?
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Although 'virtual photons' don't.
But then, on the other tentacle they're outside Plank scale?
So?
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As long as we are discussing from the 'inside' of SpaceTime that is?
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"Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?"
Since matter has mass and photons don't it follows that matter is not composed of photons.
Some kind of decay processes does not seem to care for one having mass and the other not. If it where as easy to say that light has no mass, and so light cannot make up mass, seems circular.
Everyday, particles of mass are fluxing into energy, and energy into mass, caring not of what fundamental difference we may ascribe them.
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Thank you, ttn, for your criticisms of that silly elementary wave theory.
Id like to throw a few things out there regarding quantum physics, though.
First, quantum mechanics isnt incompatible with relativity. No matter or information is transmitted faster than the speed of light when a wave function collapses, even if two entangled particles are measured at events outside each others light cones. No particle is transmitted between the events. The system as a whole happens to be in one state or another, and as a whole is irreducible to the two separate particles. Since the outcome of a measurement is random, theres no way to influence the outcome and use it as a sort of code to send information to the other measurer.
Anyway, to use better jargon, local causation is still possible in theories. Local hidden variable theories arent. Non-local hidden variable theories would violate relativity, and are extremely speculative anyway because they assert the existence of unknown properties of a particle for which we have no way to test. Quantum physics, with its random, non-deterministic results, and its relativistic with local causation version, quantum field theory, work just fine.
Another thing is that classical mechanics, on the observable scale, emerges from quantum mechanics, not the other way around. Its extremely naive to try to interpret physical entities on a very small scale as being entities on the big scale but shrunk. I think this is where people have the most trouble with quantum physics. It doesnt look like what they see, so they reject it. And the difficulty with which one pictures QM probably messes up some concepts in their heads.
A wave is something that propagates as a wave, can be built from sine/cosine functions, and experiences constructive/destructive interference. The fundamental particles satisfy this. They do, in fact, propagate as waves. And they come in discrete packets of energy--that is, if you have a wave of electromagnetic radiation with frequency f, you can only have E, 2E, 3E, etc. as the energy of that wave. Each packet of E in the wave is called a photon. And the packets we observe in real life tend to be localized in space--something localized in space with a set energy. Its convenient to think of it as a particle. Though I should also say that since its localized in space, its really made up of waves of multiple frequencies. But is still only a single packet/particle. So rather than have a set energy, its A a wave with one such energy, B with another energy, etc., and has those probabilities of interacting with a charged particle as though it definitely had that energy. And this is what theyre typically called: "particles".
On the large scale, we observe waves that are due to the dynamics of particles. This is because the conditions needed to result in wave motion are extremely simple and general, and appear in many places throughout nature. That doesnt mean the wave motion in quantum physics is due to smaller component particles, or ropes, or disturbances in an aether, or anything of the like. For others here who are still attracted to fringe theories...
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"Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?"
Since matter has mass and photons don't it follows that matter is not composed of photons.
That argument does not work. There is huge evidence that photons don't have mass because photons are mass. (http://photontheory.com/TheEvidence.html) Within this concept all of the mass of any physical thing is simply the sum of the photons that comprise it.
There is no evidence to the contrary.
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Although 'virtual photons' don't.
But then, on the other tentacle they're outside Plank scale?
So?
The evidence that matter is comprised of photons is far greater than the evidence that virtual anything exists. There is absolutely no evidence that virtual photons exist. They are part of the magic that Quantum Theory needs so that it can avoid reality.
So that 'photonic' universe may exist but I don't think so as all processes creating 'photons' starts as interactions with matter, ah, as far as I know?
We could just as easily say that all processes creating matter start with interactions with photons. [:)]
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First, quantum mechanics isnt incompatible with relativity. No matter or information is transmitted faster than the speed of light when a wave function collapses, even if two entangled particles are measured at events outside each others light cones.
There is no evidence that entangled particles assume their measured state at the time of observation. That they do is only assumed because Quantum Physics predicts it and Quantum Physics is good at predicting other things. In the real world, entangled particles assume their reality state at the time of their creation. When the state is measured (observed) we can know what that state is.
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The inflationary period is a theory. It is an absolute requirement for QM. QM requires the BB to be a soup of quasi-phantom particles because a BB of pure radiation destroys their standard model. The proof that the BB could have been pure radiation occurred at the Standford linear accelerator in 1997. They collided two beams of radiation that turned four photons into an electron and an anti-electron. The assumption that gravity did not exist during the first stage of the BB is based on another assumption that we understand gravity. As far I know, no one knows the mechanics of how gravity works. I have an idea that explains gravity based on changing frames of reference but that would be for another thread.
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The inflationary period is a theory. It is an absolute requirement for QM. QM requires the BB to be a soup of quasi-phantom particles because a BB of pure radiation destroys their standard model.
I don't understand how QM theory even requires that the universe was created out of a Big Bang event. (http://photontheory.com/lamitre.html) As far as I know the theory works just as well for a steady state universe. QM theory does break down in a photon-only universe. Gone are quarks, gluon's, W, Z, and the like. They are not needed. And no, none of them have been observed; just as the Higgs will never be observed. [:)] We have become very proficient in explaining how unobservable particles must have produced a set of observable particles.
We can easily show a mechanism that creates gravitational force in a photon-only universe. (http://photontheory.com/gravity.html)
A photon moving through radiated fields (photon flux) of other photons must then reach its positive and negative amplitude limits taking into account the existing photon flux. Because of this each photon's point of maximum amplitude is offset toward increasing field strength of the photon flux. That is the cause of gravity. It cannot possibly be otherwise.
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"Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?"
Since matter has mass and photons don't it follows that matter is not composed of photons.
It's not so simple, even if the idea that all forms of energy is photons is speculation.
A photon has certainly zero mass; two photons...it depends! If they don't travel exactly in the same direction, the system of the two has mass! See:
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=7762.0
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=19617.0
Furthermore, if you confine photons inside a box, the system of confined photons has mass.
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A photon has certainly zero mass; two photons...it depends! If they don't travel exactly in the same direction,
If two electrons separated by some distance continuously pass a single photon back and forth for some period of time, doesn't that photon contribute to the mass of the system during that time?
Edit: Assuming that the two electrons are considered as a system. This would be the same as a mirrored box IMHO. [:)]
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"Case Seventeen: Electrons show their wave structure. Electrons exhibit a wave structure that is well known. This structure is exactly as it would necessarily be if the electron were composed of one photon trapped in a pattern." excerpt from link by Linda_ol
Just an example but...
the photon is fundamental
the string is fundamental
It kind of seems like we're tripping sideways into an alternate explanation/rendition of string theory here.
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It kind of seems like we're tripping sideways into an alternate explanation/rendition of string theory here.
I don't think so. I see no resemblance between the notion of a universe comprised only of photons and a universe comprised only of fundamental strings. All the string theories I have studied require multiple dimensions. These are completely unnecessary in the various photon-only hypotheses.
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Fair enough. I was looking at it from the view of fundamental composition, so the similarities are superficial. But alas I am unfamiliar with the photon-only proposition, if you have any links with maths, or analysis that's derivative or comparative to the standard model that would be helpful. I'm here to learn after all.
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I would never presume that I might teach anything. [:)] I am also here to learn. When I first started investigating the photon-only universe concept, my greatest surprise was that I could not find any experimental evidence that refuted the concept. The concept is so restrictive that if it is not real there should be easy-to-find evidence to show that it is not real.
Just do a Google search for Photonic Universe, photon theory of everything, and combinations of that phrase and you will be rewarded with many photon-only hypothesises.
As far as I can determine, the photon-only universe concept began with Maxwell. My own small contribution to the notion (http://photontheory.com/MyOwn.html) is the target of the link. The Square-Of-The-Shells rule is the most satisfying for me. It shows how the nuclear interactions are electromagnetic processes.
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A photon has certainly zero mass; two photons...it depends! If they don't travel exactly in the same direction,
If two electrons separated by some distance continuously pass a single photon back and forth for some period of time, doesn't that photon contribute to the mass of the system during that time?
Edit: Assuming that the two electrons are considered as a system. This would be the same as a mirrored box IMHO. [:)]
IMHO too. [:)]
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I would never presume that I might teach anything. [:)] I am also here to learn. When I first started investigating the photon-only universe concept, my greatest surprise was that I could not find any experimental evidence that refuted the concept. The concept is so restrictive that if it is not real there should be easy-to-find evidence to show that it is not real.
Just do a Google search for Photonic Universe, photon theory of everything, and combinations of that phrase and you will be rewarded with many photon-only hypothesises.
As far as I can determine, the photon-only universe concept began with Maxwell. My own small contribution to the notion (http://photontheory.com/MyOwn.html) is the target of the link. The Square-Of-The-Shells rule is the most satisfying for me. It shows how the nuclear interactions are electromagnetic processes.
But the neutrino causes problems no?
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The beam collision I spoke of above is meaningless?
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The beam collision I spoke of above is meaningless?
Ill have a look.
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The inflationary period is a theory. It is an absolute requirement for QM. QM requires the BB to be a soup of quasi-phantom particles because a BB of pure radiation destroys their standard model. The proof that the BB could have been pure radiation occurred at the Standford linear accelerator in 1997. They collided two beams of radiation that turned four photons into an electron and an anti-electron. The assumption that gravity did not exist during the first stage of the BB is based on another assumption that we understand gravity. As far I know, no one knows the mechanics of how gravity works. I have an idea that explains gravity based on changing frames of reference but that would be for another thread.
Seems true enough. I was already aware of the first observation of photons creating matter at the acadamy in 1997. However, gravity would have run the show in the beginning, despite what you say - just not in the conventional form. It's called quantum gravity, and this is in fact a unification of all the four fundemental forces. It seems that the universe arose from a ''gravitational singularity'' - the only solutions that make some kind of sense so far from relativistic mathematics.
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But the neutrino causes problems no?
Yes; a particle made of a photon trapped in a repeating pattern would have an electrical charge. Only by sandwiching the shells can we make a neutral particle.
I speculate that neutrinos might be spin polarized photons if they exist.
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The beam collision I spoke of above is meaningless?
No; not meaningless; it proves your point. If the universe arose out of a Big Bang, the first stuff to exist could have been pure radiation just as you speculated.
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But the neutrino causes problems no?
Yes; a particle made of a photon trapped in a repeating pattern would have an electrical charge. Only by sandwiching the shells can we make a neutral particle.
I speculate that neutrinos might be spin polarized photons if they exist.
Yeh, polarization of photons is a common phenom. That's how your sunglasses work.
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It is also common that the plane of polarization spins perpendicular to the direction of travel. Such a spin in polarization might curtail interaction with other particles.
Just a guess; I really suspect that neutrino's might not exist at all.
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Let's take a forensic look into the decay process of \gamma \gamma \righarrow -e +e, the process of two gamma photons creating an electron-positron pair.
We know two photons are enough for the production of two particles of mass, because according to E=Mc^2 (and also concerning conservation in neutral charges), two particles of mass (the electrons being considered) come together and release two photons with an added composite energy of 1022KeV. This energy scale at this magitude appears to be a cutoff where restless energy becomes heavy. Heavy in the sense of the academic term when considering particles with mass. But what is conserved?
Three main things are preserved:
Conservation of charge. The net charge before and after is zero.
Conservation of linear momentum and total energy. This means that you require the two photons you began with to be released in collision.
Conservation of angular momentum.
These indicate that ''properties'' or ''information'' about the photons are then stored within the intrinsic property of the electron and positron. They must contain the same information to transmutate back into the restless energy they once began. In this instance, there was no other primal particle other than radiation which would seem to give rise to every type of particle with mass other than the photon itself.
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I don't see anything to challenge in your last post. The information remains with each photon in their trapped state. The trapping mechanism is the charge itself plus the power of resonance as the photon completes its entrapment pattern in one wave length.
There are several different ways to view the pattern of entrapment. It seems that everyone except me sees the pattern take the shape of a toroid, twisting as it goes through the pattern. However, I have difficulty modelling the toroid while keeping the maths consistent. Even if we attribute half of the entrapment force to the magnetic plane and half to the electric, the resulting pattern is still a circle with a composite flat wise spin to form a sphere.
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Thank you, ttn, for your criticisms of that silly elementary wave theory.
Id like to throw a few things out there regarding quantum physics, though.
First, quantum mechanics isnt incompatible with relativity. No matter or information is transmitted faster than the speed of light when a wave function collapses, even if two entangled particles are measured at events outside each others light cones. No particle is transmitted between the events. The system as a whole happens to be in one state or another, and as a whole is irreducible to the two separate particles. Since the outcome of a measurement is random, theres no way to influence the outcome and use it as a sort of code to send information to the other measurer.
Anyway, to use better jargon, local causation is still possible in theories. Local hidden variable theories arent. Non-local hidden variable theories would violate relativity, and are extremely speculative anyway because they assert the existence of unknown properties of a particle for which we have no way to test. Quantum physics, with its random, non-deterministic results, and its relativistic with local causation version, quantum field theory, work just fine.
Another thing is that classical mechanics, on the observable scale, emerges from quantum mechanics, not the other way around. Its extremely naive to try to interpret physical entities on a very small scale as being entities on the big scale but shrunk. I think this is where people have the most trouble with quantum physics. It doesnt look like what they see, so they reject it. And the difficulty with which one pictures QM probably messes up some concepts in their heads.
A wave is something that propagates as a wave, can be built from sine/cosine functions, and experiences constructive/destructive interference. The fundamental particles satisfy this. They do, in fact, propagate as waves. And they come in discrete packets of energy--that is, if you have a wave of electromagnetic radiation with frequency f, you can only have E, 2E, 3E, etc. as the energy of that wave. Each packet of E in the wave is called a photon. And the packets we observe in real life tend to be localized in space--something localized in space with a set energy. Its convenient to think of it as a particle. Though I should also say that since its localized in space, its really made up of waves of multiple frequencies. But is still only a single packet/particle. So rather than have a set energy, its A a wave with one such energy, B with another energy, etc., and has those probabilities of interacting with a charged particle as though it definitely had that energy. And this is what theyre typically called: "particles".
On the large scale, we observe waves that are due to the dynamics of particles. This is because the conditions needed to result in wave motion are extremely simple and general, and appear in many places throughout nature. That doesnt mean the wave motion in quantum physics is due to smaller component particles, or ropes, or disturbances in an aether, or anything of the like. For others here who are still attracted to fringe theories...
register registry (http://fix-error.win-help.info/tool/register-registry/)
Linda I followed your eminent link. Although I'm not sure how how 'nipple cream' will affect my theories I'm an avid explorer of the unknown. It definitely sound as a 'hand on' experiment :) one might enjoy?
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First, quantum mechanics isnt incompatible with relativity. No matter or information is transmitted faster than the speed of light when a wave function collapses, even if two entangled particles are measured at events outside each others light cones.
There is no evidence that entangled particles assume their measured state at the time of observation. That they do is only assumed because Quantum Physics predicts it and Quantum Physics is good at predicting other things. In the real world, entangled particles assume their reality state at the time of their creation. When the state is measured (observed) we can know what that state is.
Vern, what are you saying here? That entanglement exist, or not?
Entanglement is defined as a 'instant' connection breaking the law of lights speed in a vacuum. Alike our photons 'instant acceleration'. If it won't do that then it's no entanglement at all, and neither will it be a photon :)
http://calitreview.com/51
And if you found that one amazing try this one for size.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=quantum-entanglement
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Although i don't agree to the conclusions of the IBM experiment Brian Clegg alludes to by writing " By interacting the particle with one half of an entangled pair, and then putting the other half of the pair through a special process, a bit like a logic gate in a computer, it’s possible to make an identical particle at a remote location. We can only do this because the entanglement transfers the quantum information without us ever knowing what it was. In the process, the original particle loses its properties. Teleportation isn’t copying, it effectively destroys the original."
That as they were using/providing information obeying speeds light in a vacuum by their manipulations of it to get their 'result'. And presuming that it is that experiment he refers to?
The other link though is mind boggling, and as I see it possible, quite impressive in fact.
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I don't see anything to challenge in your last post. The information remains with each photon in their trapped state. The trapping mechanism is the charge itself plus the power of resonance as the photon completes its entrapment pattern in one wave length.
There are several different ways to view the pattern of entrapment. It seems that everyone except me sees the pattern take the shape of a toroid, twisting as it goes through the pattern. However, I have difficulty modelling the toroid while keeping the maths consistent. Even if we attribute half of the entrapment force to the magnetic plane and half to the electric, the resulting pattern is still a circle with a composite flat wise spin to form a sphere.
Charge will have something to do with it. Charge is neutral for photon(s) until they come into contact within a reasonable energy-condition within spacetime. If a photon manifests a charge when transmutating into matter, then the mathematcs governing the charge will describe the fundamental change which makes photon changes into matter unique.
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My speculation is that charge is neutral for a photon as long as it moves in a straight line. Charge is neutral because each half cycle of the photon's electric and magnetic change exactly balances because they are exactly equal and opposite. However, when the path of the photon is bent by outside forces, the electric and magnetic fields that comprise the photon can not be symmetrical in the bent path. The area outside the bend is greater than the area inside the bend. The result is a residual electric charge. This residual charge acts upon the trajectory of the photon's path and forces additional bending of the path. The additional bending is just exactly equal to the original bending of the path.
We know this from measurements of starlight that is bent in the gravitational field of the sun. We can see this during a total eclipse. Eddington's measurements of this were controversial at the time that he made them, but they have since been verified many times.
Edit: I know that the Fine Structure Constant is the ratio of the bend radius to the electric charge amplitude resulting from a photon's bent path. But I haven't figured out how to calculate the charge values at the surface of the nuclear shells based upon this. I can only calculate the charge values based upon the fairly gross Square-Of-The-Shells rule.
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Vern, what are you saying here? That entanglement exist, or not?
Entanglement is defined as a 'instant' connection breaking the law of lights speed in a vacuum. Alike our photons 'instant acceleration'. If it won't do that then it's no entanglement at all, and neither will it be a photon :)
Entanglement exists. However, what does not exist is evidence that when we observe the state of entangled entities that the entities assume the observed state at the time of observation. There is no evidence that the entangled entities did not assume their observed state at the time of their creation and not at the time of their observation. [:)]
All of the links assume that the wave function collapses at the time of observation and that the states of the entangled entities happen at the time of observation, somehow caused by the observing process. However, this is all assumption. There is no evidence that this really happens. It is predicted by quantum theory. That is the only claim to reality that it has.
I have seen some experiments where they claim that they can alter the state of one of a pair of observables then instantaneously the other observable changes its state to that of the altered one. But in every event there is no real way to know that the observed state was not assumed at the creation time of the entity and not at the observed time.
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I believe you to be correct in that assumption. There is a clear difficulty in defining 'when' this entanglement defines itself, the only thing we can say experimentally is that they seems to be 'mirrored realities' when getting observed at least spin wise. But the idea behind entanglement is that the spin-states possible exist 'superimposed' on each other. It's also called super position and it goes back to the wave/particle duality. http://www.abc.net.au/science/features/quantum/
That is the background to why mainstream science assumes the wave only collapses into a definable state at the point of 'impact/observation' and it makes sense to me, even if it is indirect evidence. :)
It's about how you define reality. Myself I accept this definition, but that is me :)
And I'm quite weird ::))
( And as I say that no entanglement will be able to violate speeds light in a vacuum it's okay with me any which way:)
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I really suspect that the Quantum theory treatment of wave function collapse is based more on magic than reality. I know that there is some real value in that kind of analysis when dealing with microscopic particles, but it gets really weird when applied to the macroscopic world.
The thing I try to keep straight is that there is no evidence that wave function collapse even happens. The observed states could have been established at the time of the associated particles creation in every case. So I assume that is what happens and so avoid the magic.
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Ah Vern, to me that magic is there every day I wake up :)
The idea of us existing, consciousness and the improbability of it all just boggles my mind.
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Yes; consciousness and self awareness are things that I can't explain. We know that they exist because we experience it. But we don't know how far down the food chain they exist. Do ants experience self awareness for example. It would be difficult to select the amount of gray matter required for an entity to experience self awareness. What about trees? What about microscopic bugs ??
Much we don't know and probably will never know.
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Wasn't there someone on this site that had an example where there they amongst other techniques used mirrors to see if animals were self aware?
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I have seen studies where animals seem to know that they are looking at images of themselves in a mirror. I'm not sure that would be a good indicator for lower animals such as insects etc.
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I have seen studies where animals seem to know that they are looking at images of themselves in a mirror. I'm not sure that would be a good indicator for lower animals such as insects etc.
Yes - Dolphins, Elephants and apes all have the conscious ability to recognize themselves. As far as my studies where concerned, these are the only three animals in the kingdom other than humans with this ability.
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I just did a Google search for mirror test and came up with this Wikki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_test). It seems there may be more animals that pass than once thought.
The mirror test is a measure of self-awareness developed by Gordon Gallup Jr. in 1970,[1][2] that was based in part on observations made by Charles Darwin.[3][4] While visiting a zoo, Darwin held a mirror up to an orangutan and recorded the animal's reaction, which included making a series of facial expressions. Darwin noted that the significance of these expressions was ambiguous, and could either signify that the primate was making expressions at what it perceived to be another animal, or it could be playing a sort of game with a new toy. There are nine species that pass the mirror test, including magpies and elephants but mostly primates. Most human babies do not pass the mirror test until several months of age.[3][4]
But I'm not sure how that relates to concepts that require the entire universe to be comprised only of electric and magnetic change and nothing else. [:)] [:)]
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Although i don't agree to the conclusions of the IBM experiment Brian Clegg alludes to by writing " By interacting the particle with one half of an entangled pair, and then putting the other half of the pair through a special process, a bit like a logic gate in a computer, it’s possible to make an identical particle at a remote location. We can only do this because the entanglement transfers the quantum information without us ever knowing what it was. In the process, the original particle loses its properties. Teleportation isn’t copying, it effectively destroys the original."
That as they were using/providing information obeying speeds light in a vacuum by their manipulations of it to get their 'result'. And presuming that it is that experiment he refers to?
There are a lot of assumptions about entanglement transfers of quantum information without us ever knowing what it was. You could just as easily assume that the observed particles assumed their observed state at the time they were created. The fact that you must lose the original manipulated particles properties means that you can't know what those properties were.
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Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?
It seems no accident of nature to not assume that photons are the origin of all matter, with the discovery of the antiparticle. A particle when it comes in contact with its antiparticle it can transform back into massless radiation. In fact, all types of antiparticle-particle collisons ultimately resort their intrinsic proponents back to photon energy.
If all matter where to be forms of photon energy, (or trapped light), then it would mean that in the very beginning, the universe did not begin in a quark-soup of ionized particles, but rather an electromagnetic appearance of the fundamental unit of energy; in fact, a massive cloud of these particles would have been a major gravitational influence very early on in the universe, and it wouldn't be until after the inflationary phase of the universe would their gravitational influence be dilluted within the framework of spacetime.
What are peoples thoughts on a photon-only universe?
I've enjoyed reading many of the thoughts posted in this thread.
I don't believe in a photonic universe (yet). If the universe once consisted only of photons, matter and anti-matter would have been created in equal quantities. This is not what we observe.
Furthermore, the photonic model will be isomorphic (and the mathematics horrendous) to our existing picture and would make no new predictions without further addendum. The best it could hope for is that the new photon language might provide a different window through which some physics problems might be more easily solvable.
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Your right, matter and anti-matter would have been created equally. So to make the theory work we need to explain why the Universe is made of matter. Since the energy of the proton is much higher than the electron we can assume that the protons and anti-protons would have been created first with the ensuing big annihilation. We would need about one proton out of every one billion annihilations to survive. Suppose that every once in while two anti-protons and one proton collide at exactly the same instant and annihilate leaving one proton still in the Universe. If this process stays slightly tilted in favor of protons then we have a Universe with lots of protons or conversely anti-protons. The big annihilation releases gamma rays that collide and produce electrons and anti-electrons that go through the same process. This would mean there could be four possible Universes. A Universe of protons and anti-electrons that would simply keep expanding and never form the Universe we know or one of anti-protons and electrons with the same result. A Universe of anti-protons and anti-electrons or one of protons and electrons either of which would produce the Universe we see today. Looking at it this way suggests that every Big Bang has a fifty fifty chance of producing life.
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I don't believe in a photonic universe (yet). If the universe once consisted only of photons, matter and anti-matter would have been created in equal quantities. This is not what we observe.
This argument doesn't work. The problem of unequal distribution of matter and anti-matter is the same no matter how you view the make up of matter. We see the process of matter formation from gamma ray photons going on right now. Anti-matter forms and is annihilated.
Protons are made up of three shells. Two curl around to produce a positive charge and one curls around to produce a negative charge. The ratio is two to one. So you do not have an equal chance of matter anti-matter accumulation. Such a proton could take out an anti-matter electron and keep on chugging. I suspect it is just chance that matter dominated. It would be the same if anti-matter dominated IMHO. We could still exist and wonder why matter did not dominate. [:)]
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Since the energy of the proton is much higher than the electron we can assume that the protons and anti-protons would have been created first with the ensuing big annihilation.
You are assuming the Big Bang created the universe. When considering such a fundamental thing as the make up of matter I suspect we should cast out assumptions that rely upon magic and stick with things that do not rely upon magic.
We see the creation of unstable particles down stream of electron-positron collisions. Most are very unstable and re-assume their straight-line photon nature very rapidly. What was their nature when they were observed as a particle. The most obvious property they had was charge. What is charge and where does it come from? In a photon-only universe it comes from the bent path of a photon. A photon is nothing more than a ripple of changing electric and magnetic potential amplitude moving through space. When it moves in a straight line, equal and opposite potential amplitudes cancel to neutral. When the path bends, the electric and magnetic fields cannot be symmetrical and so do not cancel to neutral. There is a residual charge resulting from the bent path.
The charge amplitude is related to the bend radius by the ratio of the Fine Structure Constant.
That is my speculation. It works for me.
As far as predictions that this concept will provide, consider what is impossible with this very restrictive view of the universe. There is a wealth of predictions. Just think !! There could be no gravitational singularities, so no Black Holes. Also there could not have been a Big Bang. Relativity phenomena is a direct result of this make up of matter, so no warped space and time. There are a gozillion others. It is mind boggling. Yet there has never been any experiment or observation that can rule out the photon-only universe concept.
Edit: Think about it. There are at least two dozen fundamental observables in nature that agree with the photon-only concept. (http://photontheory.com/TheEvidence.html) There are absolutely zero observables that do not agree with it. And of course there only needs to be one observable that does not agree with it to trash it. So what are the odds. I make it out to be a few million to one in favour of the hypothesis just by the probability maths.
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I could have sworn that I was agreeing with your idea that the Universe started as photons. You are making the assumption that your design of the proton is correct and it could be but, to knock down the idea of someone else on the basis of your assumption seems a little unfair.
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I could have sworn that I was agreeing with your idea that the Universe started as photons. You are making the assumption that your design of the proton is correct and it could be but, to knock down the idea of someone else on the basis of your assumption seems a little unfair.
I'm sorry; I didn't mean to knock your idea. I guess I didn't realize you were putting forth an idea. As far as I can tell your statement was correct. [:)]
I was trying to guess how the balance of matter and anti-matter creation would not accumulate equal quantities that continuously annihilate each other. If oppositely charged entities are made in pairs but accumulate in matter in three's the matter would contain an unequal amount of the entities that are made in pairs. And so I thought that maybe that could explain why continuous creation-annihilation didn't prevent the formation of the universe.
I was just guessing. The notion came to me while I was writing the post. The excitement of discovery set in I guess. [:)]
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Protons are made up of three shells. Two curl around to produce a positive charge and one curls around to produce a negative charge. The ratio is two to one. So you do not have an equal chance of matter anti-matter accumulation. Such a proton could take out an anti-matter electron and keep on chugging. I suspect it is just chance that matter dominated. It would be the same if anti-matter dominated IMHO. We could still exist and wonder why matter did not dominate. [:)]
I agree with your statement regarding the ineffectiveness of changing our description of matter with respect to the problem of baryogenesis [:D] See my third previous statement.
However, I believe this conjecture here is misplaced, or I'm interpreting your statements erroneously! Protons are made of three quarks: two up, one down. They're all 'matter'-type particles, not antimatter type. Yes, the down quark is negatively charged, but that doesn't matter: electrons are also negatively charged. I don't see how describing the structure of a proton as being made of 3 matter particles leads to the conclusion that one must have an imbalance of matter/antimatter accumulation in the early universe.
Futhermore, a proton cannot annihilate with a positron (an anti-electron) as they're both positively charged. The Coulomb force between them goes as 1/(r^2) and rises to +infinity as they get arbitrarily close.
There seems to be some confusion about the ratio, too. Although the particle ratio up:down is 2:1, the charge ratio is not. Up quarks have +2/3 units of charge; down quarks have -1/3. Positrons have +1. If you managed to pass on an infinite kinetic energy onto the positron and collide it with the proton, you'd get a particle with +2 charge. Again, I don't see why this leads to a necessary imbalance of matter vs. antimatter.
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Sorry to double-post, but I forgot to add my comment on your proposition that the matter/antimatter imbalance was due to 'just chance'. Some mechanism must have favoured the creation of matter over antimatter in the early universe, as pair-production from photons always creates both in equal quantities. Such an imbalance requires a symmetry break in the universe* and this would also mean that a universe consisting of an excess of antimatter would have very different properties to ours (not merely a 'mirror image').
*Please forgive this if it seems like a non-sequiter. It would take me several reams of text and several hours to show you how the standard model requires CP-violation to account for a pro-matter bias. There are several papers on arXiv which could do a better job than I [:I]
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As I said, I was just guessing trying to find some mechanism that would prevent continuous matter-antimatter annihilation. As you point out, the quark model does not seem to provide such a mechanism. Does it bother anybody that no charge value has ever been observed that was not an even multiple of electron charge. And we have figured out a way around not being able to observe quarks.
Murry Gell-Mann (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murray_Gell-Mann) came up with the quark theory. I know it is very useful, however, it does not work with a photon-only universe. It is one of the gozillion [:)] things that are not possible within the very restrictive photon-only concept.
He formulated the quark model of hadronic resonances, and identified the SU(3) flavor symmetry of the light quarks, extending isospin to include strangeness, which he also discovered. He discovered the V-A theory of chiral neutrinos in collaboration with Richard Feynman. He created current algebra in the 1960s as a way of extracting predictions from quark models when the fundamental theory was still murky, which led to model-independent sum rules confirmed by experiment.
Edit: The reason Quark Theory doesn't work is that the charge of an electron must develop from a photon, since in a photon-only universe that is all that there is. So to develop the charge we must show that the bent path of a photon trapped in a pattern exhibits electric charge. But when we do that, there is no way the charge can measure different than the charge of an electron. A tighter bend produces greater charge, hence the nuclear interaction. However, when seen at any distance greater than an electrons radius, it looks exactly like the electron's charge.
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Does it bother anybody that no charge value has ever been observed that was not an even multiple of electron charge. And we have figured out a way around not being able to observe quarks.
Thankyou for clearing that up =)
I believe ions have been measured to have an odd multiple of the electron charge: e.g. sodium in salt has +1; chloride has -1 (I may have got them the wrong way around; please forgive me if I have, I'm more at home with physics!)
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Edit: Yes; I know about CP symmetry. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP_violation) The standard model has some great stuff going for it.
In particle physics, CP violation is a violation of the postulated CP symmetry, the combination of C symmetry and P symmetry. CP symmetry states that the laws of physics should be the same if a particle were interchanged with its antiparticle (C symmetry, or charge conjugation symmetry), and left and right were swapped (P symmetry, or parity symmetry). The discovery of CP violation in 1964 in the decays of neutral kaons resulted in the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1980 for its discoverers James Cronin and Val Fitch.
It plays an important role both in the attempts of cosmology to explain the dominance of matter over antimatter in the present Universe, and in the study of weak interactions in particle physics.
The Standard Model contains only two ways to break CP symmetry. The first of these, discussed above, is in the QCD Lagrangian, and has not been found experimentally; but one would expect this to lead to either no CP violation or a CP violation that is many, many orders of magnitude too large. The second of these, involving the weak force, has been experimentally verified, but can account for only a small portion of CP violation. It is predicted to be sufficient for a net mass of normal matter equivalent to only a single galaxy in the known universe.
Since the Standard Model does not accurately predict this discrepancy, it would seem that the current Standard Model has gaps (other than the obvious one of gravity and related matters) or physics is otherwise in error. Moreover, experiments to probe these CP-related gaps may require the practically impossible-to-obtain energies that may be necessary to probe the gravity-related gaps (see Planck mass).
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I believe ions have been measured to have an odd multiple of the electron charge: e.g. sodium in salt has +1; chloride has -1 (I may have got them the wrong way around; please forgive me if I have, I'm more at home with physics!)
Yes; you're right; I misspoke. I meant to say a multiple of electron charge, not even multiple. I was referring to the charge value of Quarks. You can't make a 1/3 2/3 charge if it must develop from the bent path of a photon.
I'm more at home with physics!)
[;D] [;D]
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Your bent-path idea sounds intriguing. How does a bent photon beam give rise to the charge, mass and spin of the electron? Are you talking about bending the beam using an optical cable; a highly-wound spacetime manifold; or around a higher-dimensional curved space? What experiments have been done/could be done to confirm this hypothesis?
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Your bent-path idea sounds intriguing. How does a bent photon beam give rise to the charge, mass and spin of the electron? Are you talking about bending the beam using an optical cable; a highly-wound spacetime manifold; or around a higher-dimensional curved space? What experiments have been done/could be done to confirm this hypothesis?
The hypothesis has a single photon comprised of two half cycles of electric and magnetic change. Two gamma ray photons can interfere so that the path of each is bent in normal space; nothing extra is needed. No optical cable, no extra dimensions, just empty space. Charge develops from the circumference of the bend. The tighter the bend, the greater the charge.
The only published experiment I know about that confirmed the hypothesis was by Sir Author Eddington, way back in the day.
Physicists at UMBC noticed electric charge developing from photons trapped in high Q cavities; they published in the Annals of NYAS. However, to my great disappointment, the electric charge they noticed was not mentioned in the published document. I only know about it because I was at the conference and discussed it with them. The publication was called "Fundamental Problems in Quantum Theory: A conference held in honor of Professor John A. Wheeler."
Mass develops naturally; as we all know any time a photon is trapped in a local area; example a mirrored box; it contributes to the mass of the local area. Spin is the speed of light pattern of the trapped photon.
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Essentially, are all forms of matter but differential types of trapped energy in the form of photons?
It seems no accident of nature to not assume that photons are the origin of all matter, with the discovery of the antiparticle. A particle when it comes in contact with its antiparticle it can transform back into massless radiation. In fact, all types of antiparticle-particle collisons ultimately resort their intrinsic proponents back to photon energy.
If all matter where to be forms of photon energy, (or trapped light), then it would mean that in the very beginning, the universe did not begin in a quark-soup of ionized particles, but rather an electromagnetic appearance of the fundamental unit of energy; in fact, a massive cloud of these particles would have been a major gravitational influence very early on in the universe, and it wouldn't be until after the inflationary phase of the universe would their gravitational influence be dilluted within the framework of spacetime.
What are peoples thoughts on a photon-only universe?
I've enjoyed reading many of the thoughts posted in this thread.
I don't believe in a photonic universe (yet). If the universe once consisted only of photons, matter and anti-matter would have been created in equal quantities. This is not what we observe.
Furthermore, the photonic model will be isomorphic (and the mathematics horrendous) to our existing picture and would make no new predictions without further addendum. The best it could hope for is that the new photon language might provide a different window through which some physics problems might be more easily solvable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP_violation
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Furthermore, the photonic model will be isomorphic (and the mathematics horrendous) to our existing picture and would make no new predictions without further addendum. The best it could hope for is that the new photon language might provide a different window through which some physics problems might be more easily solvable.
I don't get your reasoning. The photonic model is much more restrictive than any of the accepted models. I don't see why the mathematics would be more difficult, but I'm not an expert in the maths. It is an old idea that has been around for over a hundred years. (http://photontheory.com/Einstein/Einstein06.html#Ziegler) It has been dismissed by every generation of physicists, but the evidence for its reality (http://photontheory.com/TheEvidence.html) is still valid. And there is no evidence that it is not valid.
Are you kidding about predictions??? It predicts that just about every currently accepted theory about physics and the cosmos is invalid. You just can't get to current theories within the photonic concept.
Edit: As far as the difficulty with the mathematics, the Square-Of-The-Shells rule predicts the nuclear forces including the strange dynamics of the strong force (http://photontheory.com/ShellDynamics.html) with nothing more than high-school algebra. [:)]
Here's the source code for the calculator (http://photontheory.com/mevs.c)
(https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fphotontheory.com%2Fmevs.jpg&hash=f8666195b5b4d739f2527429c6cf40a1)
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Apologies for not getting straight back to you, Vern; I'd almost forgotten about this site!
I'm probably misinterpreting your idea, but as far as I can see, it doesn't seem to explain anything better than our current pic-n-mix particle model. I'm not saying it's wrong, just that I feel it is inelegant.
Suppose I used the mathematics of a photonic universe to describe atoms, energy, gravity....etc. Fair enough. But I haven't covered any new ground. I'm not explaining any more phenomena; nor am I making any new predictions. I'm just reinterpreting old statements into new. Perhaps this reinterpretation will make some problems easier; yet, many common phenomena will become hideously complex.
Again, I'm not saying it's wrong: by all means, go ahead and do the mapping. If you shed new light (ha ha...) on physics, then good luck. However, I'll still be sticking to the pic-n-mix model for the time being [:)] When the universe is older and all matter has decayed into photons (assuming, of course, that evidence for the decay of protons is found) then I'll use the photonic universe mathematics.
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ADDENDUM
Your data table is intriguing. However, I'm afraid the numbers you calculate are pretty much meaningless without errors to bound them. For example, if I had
k = 3 (some made up number of mine)
...does this mean
k = 3.0 ± 0.1 [In which case I know the result pretty well], or
k = 3 ± 8 [In which case I don't know the result well at all]?
Without errors, no-one can do a statistical test on the accuracy of your figures. Futhermore, even though your code is short, it can be tricky to follow (despite the well-constructed comments!). Is it possible for you to put up a mathematical paper justifying your reasoning, and including all external references you have consulted? It would be much appreciated!
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There are bounding errors; I post them as binding forces. [:)] The thing I can't understand is how anyone with the capacity to understand the observations can conclude a different scenario than I have concluded. Probability theory alone can see at least 20 coincidences that must match to the exact decimal. If you multiply that out it comes to a staggering number in favour of a photon-only construct for nature.
I suppose I could construct mathematical derivations for the Lorentz Transforms, however that has already been done by mathematicians much more capable than I. I merely acknowledge that the transforms are correct. They do accurately describe the distortions that material objects must experience if they are composed in their entirety, of photons.
Here are some thoughts about the causes and effects in nature as I suspect it exists. (http://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=26456.0)