I promised this essay, this attempt at offering an explanation of some aspects of Physics, several years ago. Some of the time that has since passed was needed to really explore the current state of understanding … the background against which the serious ones in physics and related tech see things. As those serious ones could have told me (and some did), things are far messier, disconnected and infected by uncorrected notions than I had suspected.
I was also hoping to find some overlooked (by physics and physics commentators) insight to which I could just point to, like this (about population growth) and this (about climate and desertification).
I found some tantalizingly close discoveries and insights which provide good hints … but nothing to date in which the penny, so to speak, actually drops.
That accounts for some of the years since you last heard from me on this topic.
The remaining couple of years’ delay was due to my perverse aesthetic and my right-brain’s (not Dakini-Grade, but serviceable) overview.
Many understandings of physics result (along with their benefits) in very nasty applications in technology. I wanted to give some time for someone else to say these things, or for some indication that sharing this might be a really bad idea.
So, enough of the why not’s and delays … but, why should I get into this messy stuff in the first place?
The main reason is the time I have spent helping many students to see beyond some seriously erroneous symbols of reality which they have been taught, often by well meaning teachers and commentators.
A common example: Thinking based on popular misunderstandings of the old double-slit wave/particle puzzle abound, particularly the nonsense about the observer determining the reality. This wrong idea caught on among physicists, leading to Einstein saying “I prefer to think that the moon is there, whether I am looking at it or not.” It also led to macabre thought experiments involving cats.
Reading just a little deeper into the exposition of the Uncertainty Principle by their Nobel Laureate (Saint) Heisenberg: “If it could, in principle, be observed”. If anything (e.g. turning up the lights or magnetic field enough to see which slit an electron went through - whether you look or not) interacts with a thing, it alters/disturbs/perturbs that thing - and that disturbance (pretty damn obviously) changes the outcome of the experiment (messes up the delicate pattern and makes things go fuzzy).
The only sense in which "the observer determines the outcome of the experiment" is by messing with it, semi-messing, or not messing with it. Not very mysterious. Not exactly the scientific support for magical thinking which so many new age teachers think it is.
So .. error-correction. Similar errors, many caused by dogmas of science, pervade our culture and affect the minds I work with. That’s one reason.
The other is to do my bit to demonstrate that there is at least one description of the quantum and relativistic zones that can be consistent with the mathematics and does not require acceptance of things which would be way too fanciful for a children’ story.
My motivation is to dispel, if I can, the fake/surface mysteries of current physics and reveal where the real, deep mysteries lie.
The troubles/gaps/mysteries within physics which I intend to address are:
- Why gravity is so very much weaker than the other known forces, and why it is proportionate to mass.
- Why mathematics describing particles and waves describe reality well - i.e. why things at small scales seem to have both a wave and a particle nature.
I am not laying out sixish years of my research, and I am not going to cite my sources.
In general, my study ranged from current academic papers to translations of the vedas, included actually reading Heisenberg, discovering Noether (mentor of Einstein), watching videos of underwater gunshots, extreme vaping, computer simulations of vortices in superfluids, dolphin play with vortex rings, my own experiences in meditation and some rough attempts at checking if my description conflicts with the mathematics.
In general, my study ranged from current academic papers to translations of the vedas, included actually reading Heisenberg, discovering Noether (mentor of Einstein), watching videos of underwater gunshots, extreme vaping, computer simulations of vortices in superfluids, dolphin play with vortex rings, my own experiences in meditation and some rough attempts at checking if my description conflicts with the mathematics.
All I have in the ‘willing to share’ category is a simple, rather basic idea which has only been missed on account of a few things about which I will now permit myself the indulgence of a little rant. A rantlet, not meant with any mocking or derogatory intent, just 6 paragraphs of toughish love.
Science separated from philosophy a while back. The study of Natural Philosophy ended. Philosophical basics like: “Existence is self-similar at many scales, “There is no such thing as “time”. “There is no past, no future. All that exists exists only in the eternal arising moment”, “What is, is and what isn’t, isn’t.” have been long ignored.
According to one of my favorite physicists, Richard Feynman, the state of physics in his time, in its quest to explain the fundamental nature of stuff, was similar to that of the Mayan mathematician-priests in their quest to accurately predict lunar eclipses.
The Mayans had no knowledge or ideas about the actual motions of celestial objects, but they had calculations. Stories were formed to support the memory by providing ‘explanation’, such as “in 54 seasons, the influence of the sun weakens because of changes in friendliness between sun and moon in their God/Goddess roles. Add x to the last tables we had, and the discrepancy with the last eclipse goes away, and we can be more confident in our next prediction.”
He made the point that, when a focus on calculation is yielding results, do not bother about looking for underlying explanations. Rather “shut up and calculate”.
I like to give current science more credit than that. Just as before good theories of orbits and gravity emerged, it was known that planets moved in a timing which could be modeled as circular motion, the current notions of strings, particles, waves and forces are not just mathematical abstractions which happen to work. They hint strongly at a reality which has an actual nature which features existence as a wave, existence as particles and forces, and that ‘empty space’ is, in fact, far from empty.
I have had years of finding it exceedingly strange that physicists have not caught on to the reality their calculations imply. I blame dogma: “There is no Luminiferous Ether - no medium through which light propagates as a wave/particle.” and I blame compartmentalisations sans overview. Male minds, each running on a one-pointed focus with no cognizance of their part in a bigger picture and no Feminine Overview available to guide them or unify their understandings.
So, with all the simplicity I can muster …
The truth of (the) Matter
Physics currently regards existence as composed of a large nothingness in which particle/wave-like things pop in and out of existence and interact with each other. Basically, lots of empty space in which real stuff bounces around.
Invert that.
What is, is: One fluid arising. All that appears in it appears on account of resonance/vibration/pulsation/motion/energy.
It arises, if we must tickle the edge of the mathematics, between 0 and 1, and not from 0 being split into (+1)+(-1).
In other words it is a oneness which is arising, not a nothingness being divided.
Philosophically, it is the assertion that something exists, not nothing.
The mathematics of 0=(+1)+(-1) though, does apply, not to the arising itself, but … later.
It arises, if we must tickle the edge of the mathematics, between 0 and 1, and not from 0 being split into (+1)+(-1).
In other words it is a oneness which is arising, not a nothingness being divided.
Philosophically, it is the assertion that something exists, not nothing.
The mathematics of 0=(+1)+(-1) though, does apply, not to the arising itself, but … later.
The fluid in question is a superfluid. It has no friction with itself, also it has nothing that we could call mass, and yet it is awesomely stiff/solid … dare I say “Real”?
When physicists calculate its stiffness - its Young’s Modulus – and check it against their gravitational wave detections, they find it to be huge. Around 100 000 000 000 000 000 000 times more solid/stiff than steel.
Here is a link exploring the mathematics of the stiffness of “empty space”, and another, relating string theory to fluid dynamics.
The fluid arises in the moment, a little more in every step of the moment. More of the fluid arising in the moment creates a motion/pulse in the fluid as well as increasing its volume.
Taking the mathematics of the arising to a respectable level would probably yield formulas that looks more like fractals than anything else, because it is, to all intents and purposes, eternally arising, incrementally.
Toroidal vortices in in the fluid are strongly hinted at in stringy maths if you substitute “mechanisms” for “dimensions”. They also arise in simulations of superfluid behavior.
Toroidal vortices (think smoke rings that don’t dissipate) are the particles. If this sounds unlikely, take a little time to enjoy this fellow showing off vortex rings and some of their astounding interactions.
Experiments with superfluids show that they readily produce quantised vortices. From wikipedia:
Experiments with superfluids show that they readily produce quantised vortices. From wikipedia:
Some toroidal vortices spin with a lot of energy. Lots. Enough to rip open a thread/loop of true vacuum at their core. These are the neutrinos, electrons, quarks, and the high energy toroidal-threads of true vacuum are the strings of string theory.
Matter is energy expressed as bubbles/threads/loops of true nothingness appearing in the primal fluid.
Matter is energy expressed as bubbles/threads/loops of true nothingness appearing in the primal fluid.
Think (and maybe google) dolphin bubble rings.
In high energy experiments they are produced as matter-antimatter pairs – opposite-turning vortices like the whirlpools each side of an evenly stroked oar. This is where the mathematics of 0=(+1)+(-1) does apply, and another unnecessary/misleading mystery "Why is there more matter than antimatter". That (local at least) fact indicates that the arising of the primal all-pervasive fluid came with a twist or a stir – and the cause/source of that is a deeper mystery.
In high energy experiments they are produced as matter-antimatter pairs – opposite-turning vortices like the whirlpools each side of an evenly stroked oar. This is where the mathematics of 0=(+1)+(-1) does apply, and another unnecessary/misleading mystery "Why is there more matter than antimatter". That (local at least) fact indicates that the arising of the primal all-pervasive fluid came with a twist or a stir – and the cause/source of that is a deeper mystery.
The interlinking of three quark-vortices, two up and one down, gives us a proton. Stir the vortex/spinon of an electron into that and you get a neutron.
Vortices have gyroscopic forces. In nucleons, three gyros (quarks) linked/knotted, resist changes in motion in all directions, giving them momentum, a core property of what we call Matter.
Ancient diagrams of trefoil knots and interlinked triple-circles abound.
The property of matter which is called Mass is proportionate to the number and volumes of the true vaccum contained in its skinny thread/strings. The insane speed the vortices of emptiness spin at is hinted at in many equations of physics using "c" and "c squared". The energy which creates (and is preserved in the momentums of) the thread of emptiness is huge – according to Einstein, as huge as the mass times the square of the speed of light.
The weak and strong forces arise from the speeds at which these vortices and their composites (protons, neutrons) rotate. Surfaces speeding past each other in a fluid generate a low pressure between them, sticking them together firmly. The various ways a vortex can rotate and spin give us the "flavours" of the quarks. Nearby surfaces, if counter-rotating, can cause vortex-tubes of tension (gluons) to arise between them.
Electromagnetism emerges from gyroscopic imbalances resulting in twisty energies propagating through the fluid as (non vaccum-threaded, hence massless) open vortex tubes which push on same-direction-ended tubes, and pull at opposite-direction ones, giving us "static" electric charge. When the spinning forms close into vortex loops, we have magnetic field lines.
That touches on Matter, energy, forces, mass, momentum and electrics. Now for Gravity and the wave-particle duality.
They both arise from the same thing: The pressure wave of the continual arising of the primal fluid. A continual all-pervasive vibration/pulsation which the high-tech civilization before ours, which last rediscovered these things, called “OM”.
That which I have described thus far is what is happening in the off-beat (the low pressure moment) of the Om pulsation. Call it the Planck Time …
In the high pressure moment of Om, all (most likely, depending local conditions) vortex-loop-threads collapse. Their energies are preserved in the dynamics of the superfluid. They are describable by, and evolve according to Schroedinger’s wave equations. There are no massy particles, though the photons (real and virtual), which do not open thread/bubbles of vacuum (and therefore have momentum, but not mass) continue more or less unaffected - hence their mandatory speed.
Our world of massy particles vanishes entirely. Energies are preserved as motion in the stiff but slippery, frictionless fluid.
At the next off-beat of Om (low pressure moment), all the matter pops back into existence just where it was before, like bubbles fizzing into existence when a carbonated beverage is depressurised.
Not exactly where it was before, but probabilistically speaking, usually pretty much where it was – but, in the extremes of possibility, it could effervesce back into existence pretty much anywhere … or could split into a few (non vacuum-threaded) photons and later recombine, or perhaps never re-manifest as a particle ever again.
This indeterminacy as to a thing’s continuing re-manifestation makes it quite reasonable to speak, as some physicists now do, of the seething probabilistic “quark sea” that comprises a nucleon.
Conservation of energy turns out to be a more fundamental proposition than conservation of matter.
Matter particles or even fairly large chunks of matter behave in wavy ways when thrown at great speed because they are waves (fluid-in-motion) for much of the journey.
When thrown through double slits, their interference-pattern is delicate. It disappears if one disturbs them in their particle (off-beat of Om) moment, say by whacking them with enough photons to detect which slit they pass through.
All matter is, by turns, describable as the fluid probabilities of its wave-function in the high pressure on-beat, and as vaccum-threaded vortices in the lower pressure off-beat.
… which brings us to the easy bit: Gravity.
Every on-beat-compression of Om collapses the ever-so-tiny vortex bubble-threads.
When this happens, the collapse of the combined true-vacuum vortex threads of very massy objects - asteroids, stars etc moves the stiff but slippery primal fluid (along with the motions of the energies it contains) towards where such objects were.
In the next off-beat/decompression of Om, everything reappears (mostly) accelerated towards the centre of that nearby big mass.
The volume of the vortex ring-threads of which matter is composed is very, very tiny.
Only a really, really large number of them packed close together can be expected to have any effect on things in the surrounding fluid. It takes many to give a volume of the superfluid a tiny bit of sponginess to squeeze flat during the on-beat.
Gravity is proportionate to Mass because both Mass and gravity are proportionate to the tiny volume of true-vacuum which is alternately collapsed and reinflated in the on and off-beats of Om.
Gravity is proportionate to Mass because both Mass and gravity are proportionate to the tiny volume of true-vacuum which is alternately collapsed and reinflated in the on and off-beats of Om.
It seems that gravity has the effect of 'warping' space without requiring extra dimensions into which the warping could happen. It is perhaps reasonable to suggest that the quantum of gravity is the size of the collapse of the volume of a string forming, say, an electron. Even when large numbers of strings / particles / gravity quanta are present, their tininess and very slight effect on fluid motion when they collapse ensure that gravity is extremely weak when compared to the other forces.
I have enjoyed musing over the implications of this inversion of view for electromagnetism, the speed of light, the differences between fermions and bosuns, anomalous (but self-similar to bubbles in a fluid) galaxy structures, the phenomenon of entanglement and more … and so far, I have failed to rule my inverted idea out.
If my view is more or less correctish, there is much magic happening in the on-beat moment in which the particle-based world of phenomena disappears and everything becomes one fluid arising. Those motions of energy determine what is and what is not going to reappear in the off-beat. They are the mechanism by which best-path options are discoverable via quantum computing. The motions of the fluid are far more detailed, rich and complex than the little bits of really-nothing which we have been studying. Discerning what's going on in that fluid – especially in its on-beat matter-less moments – looks to be far, far more tricky.
Questions raised that I have enjoyed exploring: What electrons doing cooper pairing look like in a superconductor? Does a minuscule energy drop as photon-vortices travel through the fluid explains some of red-shift? Is the superfluid the same – same state, same phase – everywhere? Would distant differences be hidden because everything that reaches us has to manifest here, where we can detect it within the local conditions and can therefore only look like the things that can be manifested in local conditions?
There are obvious, and I hope helpful, implications for dark matter, not so obvious ones for time dilation, quantum entanglement and macro scale entanglement through which far apart galaxies seem mysteriously connected …
This notion describes the evolution of the moment – and it has implications for time. Although I suggest that there is no actual past or future, just the current arising … the current arising expresses its whole history in the current moment and that which is happening now will continue eternally as motion in the primal superfluid.
"The moving finger writes and, having writ, moves on …"
Gnostics and others have long insisted that the divided world of many parts which we observe and take to be real is just a fleeting shadow/reflection/image/expression of a deeper, more fundamental and undivided reality.
I suggest that this is true. The world of matter seems emergent, secondary, dependent on the state of the primal superfluid in which it arises. The very substantial and stiff yet super-slippery all-pervading fluid in which matter appears seems to have more realishness and more causality.
For the more spiritually/mystically inclined, this idea can provide hints of the unity of consciousness. It explains some of the mechanisms by which an indivisible oneness appears as two, then as more, then as all the “ten thousand” things. It clarifies the idea that we can never step in the same river twice, and that there isn’t even a truly contiguous ‘us’ to do the stepping, and there is no “twice” either. We (in the physical, matter-based sense) truly are always freshly created, formed from the formless in this arising moment.
As always, when I recommend unusual ideas, it it not because they may be "true", but because they can stretch your perceptions, test your assumptions and inspire your own exploration, if that's your thing.
I hope I have at least managed to demonstrate that:
Gravity is a myth. The truth is: matter sucks.
As always, with love, however it looks.
Rahasya
