[Kryptid]

It seems to me that, at the point where the virtual particle is present, the law of the conservation of energy has been violated.

Depends on how you look at it. One way that I've seen it described (In Kip Thorne's Black Hole and Time Warps) is that the part of the vacuum that temporarily acquires a positive net energy has taken it from a nearby portion of the vacuum, leaving that portion with negative energy to compensate. Alternatively, you can say that conservation of energy isn't violated because the time period for which the virtual particles were created and then destroyed happens inside of a window of time that is too short to allow the particles to be observed. Thus, any attempt to measure the system will never come up with mass violations.

A star that was once observable but then disappeared would not fall under either of these scenarios, which means a definite violation of conservation of mass must have taken place.

[mxplxxx (OP)]

Here is an interesting article on simulations. https://scienceblog.com/513429/supercomputer-simulations-showcase-novel-planet-formation-models/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+scienceblogrssfeed+%28ScienceBlog.com%29.
The penny seems to have dropped that, to simulate large scale data, you need abstractions, HFSMs (Hierarchical Finite State Machines)  and Systems as described in this post.

[Bored chemist]

The penny seems to have dropped that, to simulate large scale data, you need abstractions, HFSMs (Hierarchical Finite State Machines)  and Systems as described in this post.

That's nice.
Do you have any idea when the penny will drop that this has nothing to do with measuring photon energies?

[mxplxxx (OP)]

This post is better titled "The Theory of Universal Systems". "How to measure the energy of a photon" was how it started out in the Physics forum before it was moderated to be a new theory. I have no control over the title.

Tinkle, tinkle (the sound of a penny dropping).

[Bored chemist]

"The Theory of Universal Systems"

No
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_theory

[mxplxxx (OP)]

The Universal System described in this post has outer and inner components. For a solar System, these are the Solar System itself and the Sun System respectively. The Inner component contains the time-independent state of the  system and the Outer component contains the time-dependent state of the System.

The state variables in the Outer component of a System are:

Direction

    the direction the System is travelling relative to its parent System (which will be a galaxy System in the case of a Solar System)

Velocity

    the speed which the System is travelling at relative to its parent System. This is zero for the Inner (i.e. Central) System.

Location

    the current location of a System relative to it's parent System.

There are shades of Einstein's relativity here, but only two objects (the System and its parent) are involved and no need for an absolute speed of light.

Amongst the state variables in the Inner component of a System are:

Energy

    the energy of the  System

Charge

    positive, negative or neutral

Spin

    as per physics
 
The energy of a system is contained as a variable in in the Inner component of a System. Energy and time are not things. They are states of a System, i.e. just concepts. Thus, we need inner and outer components (energy and velocity) interacting to obtain the momentum of a System (which will include the momenta of all its subsystems).

The Inner component is a System in its own right (it inherits a Central System object) but has limited ability to be able to interact with other systems.

So, here is the Visual Basic code for calculating the momentum of a System.

public readonly Property Momentum as double

    Get
        dim momentum as double = (me.Star.Energy / (c * c)) * me.velocity

        for each subsystem as System in me.subsystems
            momentum += subsystem.momentum
       next

    return momentum

    end Get

end Property

where me is the current System, c is SOL and Star is the central object of my central system. Thus, the momentum of the universe is given by universe.Momentum where universe is defined as:

 dim universe = New Universe.System(Star:=new Universe.Star())
 

[mxplxxx (OP)]

https://scienceblog.com/513858/how-supercomputers-are-helping-us-link-quantum-entanglement-to-cold-coffee/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+scienceblogrssfeed+%28ScienceBlog.com%29

Quantum entanglement has been at work since the early days of computing. In fact, it is integral to the way modern computers work. A language like Microsoft's Visual Basic.NET implements an object by creating a "behind the scene" object and making it available to Apps via reference objects. The App cannot access the original object directly. All change in state in the original object (it can change its own state or be changed via reference objects) are immediately available to the reference objects. This is the essence of quantum entanglement.

Quantum Entanglement implies instantaneous access. This is not available to the "simulated" part of the Universe, but would be available to the Universe's run-time system.

[mxplxxx (OP)]

IMHO I think the current Physics theory regarding the nature of a photon leaves a lot to be desired.

I would like to, very tentatively, propose that a photon is a type of gyroscope, the purpose of which is to maintain the angular momentum of the photon as it travels through the hell and high water of Reality.

The E and M waves of standard photon theory become the E and M Gimbals of a gyroscope.

So, according to my theory of Universal Systems proposed in this post, a photon would be the central object in a Photon System with the following structure.

Photon System
    Inherits Gyroscope.System

    Photon (central object/system of photon system) with Property Frequency (of Spin)
    Subsystems
        E Gimbal
        M Gimbal

There is no energy here, which means the photon system is both stable (via its Gyroscopic nature) and nonreactive as it travels.

THe photon will interact with and be destroyed by a system that accepts its Frequency. The accepting system will increase in energy by an amount equal to E=hf where h is Planck's constant and f is the frequency of the photon.

[Bored chemist]

IMHO I think ...

What does the H stand for?

[mxplxxx (OP)]

THe photon will interact with and be destroyed by a system that accepts its Frequency. The accepting system will increase in energy by an amount equal to E=hf where h is Planck's constant and f is the frequency of the photon.

Probably "forgotten" rather than "destroyed" and collected by the Universal garbage collection function (whatever that is).

Note that time and energy in this proposal are just different forms of each other. The fundamental quantum equation of quantum physics, E=hf (or E=h/t), screams out this relationship. So we will have conservation of time and we each likely have a fixed amount of time to play with in the game of life/Reality. As this time runs down, so does our energy.

It is highly likely that Reality is a school of the future and time/energy are the basic teaching tools of this school. Why have a school of the future? Possibly because the universe/us are evolving entities that need to get better and better organised over lifetimes. Why? Heavens knows! Or maybe Reality is  just a game for us to have fun in:)   

[mxplxxx (OP)]

https://scienceblog.com/513921/sand-dunes-can-communicate-with-each-other/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+scienceblogrssfeed+%28ScienceBlog.com%29

Of course they interact; they will be Universal Systems.

[Bored chemist]

IMHO I think ...

What does the H stand for?

[mxplxxx (OP)]

A photon travels at the speed of light. Absolute (versus perceived) time passes at the speed of light. This means that a photon exists only in the present. The photon is still whilst (likely) the universe evolves around it. Nothing else (apart from other bosons) exists in the present. The photon will pass information to the brain about the nature of past events. So the brain will perceive Reality as being current when, if fact, everything except bosons is a past event. 

[Bored chemist]

IMHO I think ...

What does the H stand for?

[mxplxxx (OP)]

So we will have conservation of time and we each likely have a fixed amount of time to play with in the game of life/Reality. As this time runs down, so does our energy.

Please ignore this. Nothing to do with E=hf.

[Bored chemist]

IMHO I think ...

What does the H stand for?

[mxplxxx (OP)]

Nothing else (apart from other bosons) exists in the present.

Everything else is memories. The big question is "what does the remembering". DNA-based organisms would appear to be one answer. But these are just systems. The universe itself is just the top-level system of a HFSM tree of systems. Maybe the universal run-time system can "remember" systems, so we should look behind Reality to find answers as to what makes the universe tick and why.

Actually, the is no reason why a HFSM cannot be infinite in nature. A Universal HFSM (Hierarchical Finite State Machine) is a tree of systems. Going up the tree, Systems become more and more abstract Going down the tree, systems become more and concrete. At infinity at the top of the tree everything becomes an abstraction. This System may be what we think of as God. There is no reality at this point. At infinity at the bottom of the tree, there is nothing but a continuous Reality. There is no abstraction at this point. We are somewhere in between and may be capable of accessing the top and bottom of the HFSM that we exist in.

[mxplxxx (OP)]

I have mentioned that Universal Systems have an infinite aspect about them. This comes about from the fact that they contain a Parent reference and Subsystem references. A System can reference its Parent which can reference its own Parent and so on ad infinitum. A Subsystem can reference its child (Subsystems) which can then reference its own child and so on ad infinitum.

Subsystems can exist by value as well as by reference. If this is the case, a System "contains" all its Subsystems. At first glance, this seem to be so, mostly, for Reality. Systems that have been created via Quantum Entanglement are an exception. An entangled System may have two or more parents. This is called "multiple inheritance" in computer science. This makes the Universe a type of neural net, with the obvious possibility that the Universe, and everything in it, is intelligent.

In a "by value" System, a parent system will be larger than its children (probably quantized larger). So the top of the parent/child tree will be infinitely large (everything) and the bottom of the parent/child tree will be infinitely small (nothing). But, thanks to the scale up/down feature of Universal Systems (described elsewhere), The top system and the bottom systems will experience themselves as being the same size. 

A simulation is an abstraction of something "real". The more abstract something is the more it is a simulation. The less abstract something is, the closer it is to Reality. We exist as a System that is at a certain level of abstraction. Hence we are a simulation, possibly very close to Reality. But abstractions appear to be relative and our system is a scaled up version of another system. We consider ourselves to be "Real" and, in a sense we are but with limitations because of our place in a Universe of abstractions. This is how we learn.     

A sufficiently detailed simulation is indistinguishable from Reality. An infinitely detailed simulation may be GOD.

[mxplxxx (OP)]

Subsystems can exist by value as well as by reference. If this is the case, a System "contains" all its Subsystems. At first glance, this seem to be so, mostly, for Reality. Systems that have been created via Quantum Entanglement are an exception. An entangled System may have two or more parents. This is called "multiple inheritance" in computer science. This makes the Universe a type of neural net, with the obvious possibility that the Universe, and everything in it, is intelligent.

Actually, on closer analysis, it would seem that subSystems in an Outer System are accessed "by value" and subSystems in an Inner System are accessed "by reference". The "by reference" access makes for very flexible access and, as a result, Inner systems are very easy to change.

Thus, the subSystems of a (outer) Solar System (such as the Earth System) are physically part of the system but those of the (Inner or Central) Sun System are references to the physical Systems that are part of the Sun.

As mentioned previously, combined with parent/co-parent access "by reference" and the Quantum nature of Reality, much of the Universe will exist as neural networks. The universe will have an extraordinarily level of intelligence. The quantum nature of Reality ensures that energy adds up to a specific value before an event "fires/activates", thus paralleling (but much, much superior to) an artificial neural network. 

[Bored chemist]

IMHO I think ...

What does the H stand for?