FQXi Community

If you are aware of an interesting new academic paper (that has been published in a peer-reviewed journal or has appeared on the arXiv), a conference talk (at an official professional scientific meeting), an external blog post (by a professional scientist) or a news item (in the mainstream news media), which you think might make an interesting topic for an FQXi blog post, then please contact us at forums@fqxi.org with a link to the original source and a sentence about why you think that the work is worthy of discussion. Please note that we receive many such suggestions and while we endeavour to respond to them, we may not be able to reply to all suggestions.

Please also note that we do not accept unsolicited posts and we cannot review, or open new threads for, unsolicited articles or papers. Requests to review or post such materials will not be answered. If you have your own novel physics theory or model, which you would like to post for further discussion among then FQXi community, then please add them directly to the "Alternative Models of Reality" thread, or to the "Alternative Models of Cosmology" thread. Thank you.

Forum Home
Introduction
Terms of Use

Posts by the author are highlighted in orange; posts by FQXi Members are highlighted in blue.

By using the FQXi Forum, you acknowledge reading and agree to abide by the Terms of Use

RSS feed | RSS help

RECENT POSTS IN THIS TOPIC

paul valletta: on 4/21/09 at 15:02pm UTC, wrote Think of a system containing just a single particle/photon?..this particle...

Georgina Parry: on 4/2/09 at 10:51am UTC, wrote In the article the question was asked.. "Both gravity and light can be...

paul valletta: on 9/6/07 at 22:21pm UTC, wrote The linked article I tried to cite is, hopefully here new idea of...

paul valletta: on 9/6/07 at 22:09pm UTC, wrote If this recent paper is anything near correct (which I think it is)..then...

paul valletta: on 8/31/07 at 4:03am UTC, wrote Why is it that there is a North pole and a South pole on the Earth? We...

Reason McLucus: on 8/15/07 at 19:21pm UTC, wrote Understanding gravity may require temporarily forgetting what physicists...

FQXi FORUM

January 27, 2020

ARTICLE: Making Waves with Gravity [back to article]

Reason McLucus wrote on Aug. 15, 2007 @ 19:21 GMT

Understanding gravity may require temporarily forgetting what physicists think they know about gravity.

I've mentioned in other threads the potential problem the human brain can cause in understanding physical reality, but I'll repeat it here. As we learn we store information in brain cells and "program" them to process future information in certain ways. This process can predispose us to continue thinking about physical reality in the same way even though what we have been told are facts are not actually true.

When confronted with something new, the tendency is to explain it in terms we are familiar with. For example, before the term "automobile" became common people referred to such vehicles as "horseless carriages" because that is what the vehicles most resembled.

For example, early science classes teach us that gravity is a force with this concept being reinforced through graduate school. Perhaps gravity is something unique rather than fitting in the category of forces. It might have similarities with forces or light, but be something entirely different.

I am not advocating any of the following concepts, but mention them as concepts that could be considered. The concepts are provided to encourage looking at gravity in a different perspective from the way we have traditionally viewed it. Even if these concepts don't explain gravity they may lead to an explanation in the same way that guessing at the answer of a very complex equation may lead to solving the equation.

Gravity may be a dimension of reality, in particular it might be a property of matter. Matter would occupy a certain area and possess a gravity. Large bodies like stars would not emit gravity, but carry it with them with its effect extending out as if it were "strings".

Einstein suggested that gravity warped space. Perhaps it is matter that warps space, the greater the amount of matter the greater the warping. The sun and planets appear to attract each other because this warping of space has the effect of moving them closer to each other.

As far as we can determine nothing is motionless in space. Earth is moving around the sun, the solar system is moving around the galaxy and the galaxy is moving through space. All objects on earth are moving at essentially the same velocity as earth. In order to move away from earth, even if there were no such thing as gravity, an object would have to expend sufficient energy to significantly change its velocity. Auto racing fans know about what is called "drafting". One vehicle follows closely behind another and is "pulled along" by the leading vehicle.

Gravity may involve two separate processes. One process for a large body in space would be external affecting other matter in space. The other process would be internal. One of the pecular aspects of gravity is that matter is distributed by density with the less dense matter being toward the outside. A basket attached to a balloon sitting on the ground with person inside is too "heavy" to rise, but if the person has a container with helium that can released into the balloon the whole contraption can rise into the air without any change in the total mass of basket, balloon and cargo merely because the mass is spread out over a much large area with the helium in the balloon rather than a smaller container.

view post as summary

report post as inappropriate

paul valletta wrote on Aug. 31, 2007 @ 04:03 GMT

Why is it that there is a North pole and a South pole on the Earth? We detect the North magnetic pole using a compass detector, there are four co-ordinate directions on a compass, North,South, East and West, but the detector only detects North. One can know where the North Pole is situated by the signal of the compass needle, at the equator, one cannot locate East or West, they are both just global convience directions, and can be ignored, WRT Earth's magnetic Field.

Now for the Graviton, one has surely to have a detector that can ignore the irrelevent "forces", all except Gravity, one really does need a force filter Graviton Detector?

Now I am certain that Graviton is a spin 2 particle, it's identiy is dual (helicity)?..this attribute I believe is functional to the properties of Gravity, it can be both positive (attraction) and sometimes negative (repulsion).

Spin of 360% equals one rotation in one 2-D direction, (left or right), whereas a 720% rotation can be seen as a "double" spin, or for 2-D field propergations, a full 360% rotation to the left, and a full 360% rotation to the right.

In 2-Dimensions the rotation can be oscillating say from left to right, and continues right to left. In a 3-Dimensional realm, this action results in a Vector rotation . Like the fact one can travel from North to South and continue to North (full rotation on the globe), one can also travel North-South-North, using the "-" that are equvilent to East and West?

A full Gravity detector would be like a compass that detects all directions, not just the North Pole?

A 2-Dimensional wave can have two vector rotations, expanding or contracting, an expansion vector would entail a spin left, and a contracting vector a spin right ( think of a fractal image, or a spinning "vertigo" label), wheras in 3-Dimensions, the Graviton would be an encompassing vector field, which produces no detectable particles or waves?.. One could label it as a perfect Fundemental Vacuum.

Iam certain you cannot detect the perfect fundemental Vacuum, so the Graviton must be undetectable, by its very nature, it a "particle" label, but it has been a "one-off" process in the early instants of the pre-universe bang?..a inflation wave/particle?

Graviton is a single particle that gave rise to inflation, which fluctuated out of the perfect fundemental Vacuum, it may be in the future there will one Anti-Graviton vector field?

report post as inappropriate

paul valletta wrote on Sep. 6, 2007 @ 22:09 GMT

If this recent paper is anything near correct (which I think it is)..then there are some really interesting issues that are quite open to discussions?

paper cited here

report post as inappropriate

paul valletta wrote on Sep. 6, 2007 @ 22:21 GMT

The linked article I tried to cite is, hopefully here

new idea of Penrose[link]

report post as inappropriate

Georgina Parry wrote on Apr. 2, 2009 @ 10:51 GMT

In the article the question was asked.. "Both gravity and light can be described as waves but what is waving?" The answer to this must be the substance that fills the Void in objective reality. The void has been called a vacuum because there has been no conclusive evidence that the void has material substance of any kind.

This is because we receive no information detectable by our senses or sensors.I.e.No data crosses the Prime Reality Interface. It may not have a discreet atomic structure but perhaps is a continuous frictionless "dark matter"(in that we see no reflected or emitted electromagnetic radiation from it). It may be like a Bose Einstein condensate or some other kind of completely un encountered substance for which we have no concept for comparison. However numerous problems of physics can be explained if the assumption is made that there must be something there. It allows all of the forces to be united as disturbance of that substance. Each force arising because of the particular dynamics within that substance.

A photon is the smallest detectable disturbance as it is the amount of disturbance needed to move an electron to a higher orbital i.e. to gain Universal potential energy. This does not preclude smaller disturbances but just means that we are unable to detect them, as there is no effect observable from such small disturbances.The disturbance caused by a photon travels afore along the 4th dimension and simultaneously out across 3D space. It is spreading out in 3D space like a ripple but falling along the 4th dimension of space. Why would it fall? Perhaps the "ripple" is an area of higher density of the substance which sinks unhindered by friction through the less dense undisturbed substance.

Gravity is in my opinion not due to graviton particles . These particles are imaginary. A body of matter will itself be a gravity well. The exterior of the body being further aft along the 4th dimension than the interior. The heavier a mass the further afore it will be along the 4th dimension. Therefore more dense materials will tend to sink to the interior of a body.The centre then leads the progression along the 4th dimension followed by the rest of the body with the exterior last. This flow through space along the 4th dimension will cause a disturbance in the unknowable substance of the void which will impart the force of gravity to a neighbouring body. In the wake of the attracting body moving along the 4th dimension will be an area of lower density of void substance.

Due to the particular way a body moves along the 4th dimension this wake will extend as a gravitational field all around the body. The neighbouring body will move from the area of higher density to lower density towards the attracting body along the 4th dimension, which will be observed as attraction in 3D space. All matter will take up the most afore-ward 4th dimensional position that it can as this is the lowest potential energy level.

So gravity arises from the movement of all matter along the 4th spatio-energetic dimension, that is from higher to lower universal potential energy.This force results from the flow of the mass itself from its exterior to its interior, which causes disturbance of the substance in the objective reality of the void.

The exterior takes up the 4th dimensional position that was occupied by the interior when the interior has moved afore.It is falling along the 4th dimension but not contracting in space.It can be visualised as a gravity well progressing along the 4th dimension rather than being stationary. This takes a little getting used to as we do not usually think of objects moving in 4 dimensional space.

view post as summary

report post as inappropriate

paul valletta wrote on Apr. 21, 2009 @ 15:02 GMT

Think of a system containing just a single particle/photon?..this particle can not be affected by the process we call gravity, it is singular and has nothing to "gravitate" with. Now increase the system to two particles, will these two particles gravitate?..if so explain the process of gravitation between these two particles?

P.S you may NOT use another particle to relay the information about gravity, for this will increase the system by at least another particle!

report post as inappropriate