The Larson Research Center

In an interesting panel discussion called the 2011 Isaac Asimov Memorial Debate: The Theory of Everything, many interesting theoretical and philosophical observations were made by the panelists on theoretical physics, mostly on string theory. 

The thing that struck me the most, however, as the discussion went along, was how the concept of energy was central to all aspects of the discussion. Finally, with about seven minutes to go, a lady in the audience asked the obvious question, which Brian Green answered (see 1:32:0 in the video).

“What causes the vibrations of the strings?” she asked. Brian’s answer was as simple as it gets: “I don’t know,” he confessed. This is a question of where in the universe is the energy to move the strings coming from? The question is profound, not because we need to know, we don’t, but because it reveals the fundamental paradigm of the legacy system of physical theory (LST), which is important to understand, if we want to understand the nature of the trouble with physics: Energy is required to move. 

The motion of massive entities requires energy and the motion of massless entities requires energy, and the ultimate source of that energy must be assumed to exist, in the LST paradigm. In an earlier observation by another panelist, it was noted that the understanding of theoretical physicists working on the unification of the forces of the LST community’s standard model with gravity is that these four forces are really one force at some very high energy.

My reaction to the view points of the panelists, which are really different views on the correct path to seeking the answer to the question, “Why is there something, rather than nothing,” as Brian Green put it, was almost visceral, because I’m convinced that the energy paradigm, as I’ll call it, is so misleading.

If we assume that motion itself is an entity in it’s own right, without regard to changing the locations of massive or massless objects, then we are actually, in a sense, inverting the LST energy paradigm, from energy, which is the inverse of motion, to motion: A new paradigm based on v = Δs/Δt, rather than the old paradigm based on E = Δt/Δs, changes everything profoundly.

The amazing fact that this change immediately places our thoughts in the realm of fundamental magnitudes, dimensions and “directions” of geometry and algebra, as found in the ancient tetraktys, and enables us to convert units of motion (s3/t3) into units of mass (t3/s3) that occupy relative locations in space and time, and units of mass into units of momentum (t2/s2), which is mass changing relative locations of space and time, and units of mass into units of energy (t/s), which converts mass back into motion, presents us with a wonderland of units of motion, combinations of units of motion and relations between units of motion that literally teases us out of thought, with its transcendent beauty and intriguing mysteries.

The fact that all of this comes out of unit motion at high speed, instead of out of unit force at high energy, is very encouraging. 

The trouble with physics is the failure to recognize that the energy of the universe comes from the motion of the universe. It would be a great step forward to remedy this error, even though it won’t answer the real question, “Where does the motion of the universe come from?”

How exciting. Don Lincoln, an author and senior physicist at Femilab, who also does research at CERN, and who makes interesting video tutorials on particle physics for the public, has published an article on preons in the November issue of Scientific American. 

I am happy to be back, after a six-month hiatus, but certainly never expected to be greeted with such good news. For some reason, I didn’t know about Lincoln, or that anyone other than Sundance Bilson-Thompson took preons seriously.

The Scientific American article is entitled “The Inner Life of Quarks,” which is only available online with subscription, but you can read it under another title here.

My first impulse was to contact Mr. Lincoln and see if he could be enticed enough by the success of our own preon model to investigate the Universe of Motion, but alas I’m afraid I’m too late as he is about to achieve escape velocity on his way to star status with his Scientific American article and a possible TED lecture next year (see here.) Now he will undoubtedly be swamped with so much attention and email that he will be virtually unreachable. 

Already, people like Lubos Motl and Peter Woit have weighed in to explain why preons can’t exist, and I doubt that Sean Carroll could be far behind. However, as always we must remember that new wine requires new bottles.

Our new bottle is not going to break under the pressure of arguments such as those pressed by Motl and Woit, because it’s a new system of theory that doesn’t posit that matter exists in space-time, but rather that matter consists of space and time. They argue that quarks and leptons are already “point-like,” whatever that means, thus excluding anything smaller. I wrote previously about some of the difficulties with that line of thinking here.

The trouble with physicists looking for smaller particles to fit inside their “point-like” particles are many, but our preons are not particles and our particles are not “point-like.” Our preons are S|T units, consisting of combinations of SUDRs and TUDRs, which are unit 3D oscillations of space and time respectively.

The LRC’s preons are not massive, but their combinations as quarks and leptons are massive. Yet, this is not a matter of cancellations of mass and energy contributions, in effect masking massive preons, but rather a matter of mass emerging from geometric configuration: The S|T units are massless (i.e. they propagate at c-speed relative to matter,) until they form quarks and leptons, which prevents them from propagating relative to matter. In other words, they become “massive” precisely because they can no longer propagate at c-speed, when they combine, for geometric reasons.

That’s not to say we don’t have major theoretical challenges with our theory. We do, but they are entirely different problems than those presented by the legacy system of theory (LST). And who knows, now that the preon theory is on the table in a more prominent fashion, maybe we will attract more interest in the Reciprocal System of Physical Theory (RST).

That would seemed deserved from the fact alone that our preon sub-structure of quarks and leptons turns out to be so similar to that described in Lincoln’s article. Notice the table of the 1979 preon model of Harari and Shupe that Lincoln illustrates in his article:

Table 1. The Harari and Shupe 1979 Preon Model of Quarks and Leptons

According to Lincoln, Harari and Shupe came up with the same model independently. This is amazing in itself, but then we came up with the same model just from developing the consequences of the RST. To be sure, our clue came from Sundance, and he undoubtedly knew of Harari and Shupe’s work, but we didn’t and the natural fit was readily accepted to advance the development of our RST-based theory, not to discover an underlying order to unify superficially different particles of matter, in an LST-based theory.

We were not positing the existence of +/- 1/3 and +/- 2/3 LST electric charges, with no theoretical definition of them. We were just exploring the combinations of well-defined unit space and unit time speed displacements, two simple building blocks that are logical consequences of the RST, and they ended up forming the same pattern as the successful preon pattern that LST physicists have devised.

The difference between the LRC preon model and the H&S model is, again, the difference between space and time speed displacements and fractional electrical charges. Our preon model defines the negative charge of the electron in terms of more space speed-displacement than time speed-displacement, and the positive charge of the positron in terms of more time speed-displacement than space speed-displacement.

Table 2. The Harari and Shupe 1979 Preon Model of Bosons

We only have one version of the Z boson and the +/- W bosons are different in that they consist of unbalanced S|T units in the parallel configuration. This highlights the difference between the LST entity of 0 charge and (0) anti-charge, and the RST entity of balanced speed-displacement (-)<—->(+) and its inverse (+)<—->(-).

For example, our -W boson is configured as three net negative combinations,

(- -)<—->(+)
(+)<—->(- -)
(- -)<—->(+)

and our +W boson is configured as three net positive combinations,

(-)<—->(++)
(++)<—->(-)
(-)<—->(++)

which makes the Z boson configuration three balanced combinations of three SUDRs and three TUDRs each, or the combination of the -W and +W bosons,

(- - -)<—->(+++) 
(+++)<—->(- - -)
(- - -)<—->(+++) 

That this leads to a correct understanding of beta decay, not to mention things such as quantum spin and quantum gravity, is just one more indication that the RST-based theory, and its preon model is able to seriously play with the big guys.

When do we get an article in Scientific American?

Last night, the second installment of Nova’s program, “The Fabric of the Cosmos” aired. As expected, this episode, “The Illusion of Time,” was just as grating as the last one, “The Fabric of Space.”

The reason is that they treated space and time as “spacetime,” focusing on Einstein’s discovery of how vector motion affects time. It doesn’t occur to any of them, as far as I can tell (and I am familiar with the ideas of most of the physicists on the program), that the reason motion affects time is that time is an aspect of motion. Instead, they view time as something mysteriously apart from motion.

They make a big deal out of the arrow of time, and the fact that the forward direction of time is not incorporated into the laws of physics (i.e. the equations can be reversed as far as time is concerned without changing the result.) However, they don’t seem to notice that, if all motion stops, then so does time, since time can only be measured by motion.

Sitting there, I thought, what if all motion in the universe really did stop, so that it became frozen at absolute zero? Then, what if all the frozen objects were removed from the universe? Would anything be left? According to the big bang theory, the amount of space in the universe, as well as the amount of matter, is finite. Therefore, the amount of space in the emptied universe would be some measurable quantity.

Now, if this quantity of space in the emptied universe were to be subsequently increased somehow, it would have to be increased over time, or if the amount of space were decreased, it would have to be decreased over time. Clearly, there is no other way, and we know that space is indeed increasing in the universe.

Similarly, if time were increased… - but wait a minute - what does it mean to increase the amount of time in the universe? When all objects are removed from a frozen universe, does a finite amount of time exist in it at that point? I guess their answer would be that a certain amount of spacetime exists (imagine a loaf of bread containing slices of time), but what does this mean? Does it mean that for every cubic light-year of space there is a cubic light-year of time?

Certainly not. We can’t say this, because time is zero dimensional; that is, it is a scalar magnitude, with no direction in space. So, then, how much time is in the hypothetically frozen universe? The only way to express it is as a scalar quantity, a number that tells us how many moments passed since the beginning (i.e. since the big bang in their cosmology). But what does the number representing the elapsed time of the universal expansion mean, if not that a certain quantity of motion, or a certain increase of space over time, occurred since the big bang?

The trouble is, of course, this scenario requires a point of view that is outside the universe, since no observer can exist in the frozen universe by definition. However, if we admit this God-view, then it is clear that time would have to continue for the observer, but if we don’t admit it, then the observer’s observation stops at the moment the universe is frozen, and we must conclude that time stops as well.

But what do we mean, then, when we say space and time are frozen? Obviously we mean that the continuous increase of space and time has hypothetically ceased. Now, what should be just as obvious, is that the subsequent increase of either one cannot begin without the increase of the other; that is, an observable change in the magnitude of space requires some change in the magnitude of time, while an observable increase in the magnitude time requires some change in the magnitude of space.

One might argue that, while space can’t increase without a corresponding change in time, time could conceivably increase without a concomitant increase in space. The trouble with that argument however, is that one could never know. Time can only be measured over space, just as space can only be measured over time. Without a change in space, it’s not possible to detect a change in time. The bottom line here is that a change in space requires a change in time as well, and vice versa.

Yet, an LST physicists might want to still argue that motion is defined as a change of position, not a change in size, and in a universe without objects, motion itself is not detectable. How can one determine that the size of an empty universe is changing? There aren’t any grid lines to indicate a change of scale. He would be right, of course, but, by the same token, he would also have to believe that the space of a universe that was expanding with matter, could reasonably be expected not to expand without matter. This is a pretty difficult argument to make.

It’s easy to see that the discussion would quickly lead to consideration of the so-called dark energy and dark matter, but we will have to wait for a future episode of the program to get into that. 

Last night I watched the Nova program “What is Space?”, the first hour of the series by Brian Green, based on his book, The Fabric of of the Cosmos. In the text on the program’s page at the NOVA website they talk about clues which indicate that space is something, not nothing, but in the film the scientists don’t describe these clues as indications of anything. They speak as if the clues were facts of something.

However, these “facts” are unraveling. They are proving to be quite elusive for researchers at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments. So far, they have found no evidence that the strings of finite length, which are supposed to be composed of vibrating nothingness, exist in the extra dimensions that the theorists have imagined to contain them.

Without strings, or more precisely, without the extra dimensions in which to imagine length of strings in various modes of vibration, the concept of the fabric of space that somehow can be twisted and warped enough to move objects, exposes the contradiction between the “facts” of general relativity that lead to small distances in extremely warped space and the “facts” of quantum field theory that posits virtual charges popping in and out of warped space at the same time.

This situation must embarrass LST theorists to no end, but they don’t act or talk like it does. Instead, they make movies for the masses, playing with computer graphics, like children in a high tech science museum, who don’t understand the science, but are fascinated by the displays and models that can be played with anyway.

Here’s the point: There is no point. There is no point that can be consistently defined as having no spatial extent, but yet can carry a charge on its non-existent surface, like an electron or positron. If nothing is perfect, something must be imperfect, by definition, but then how can something come from nothing?

Thus, the very definition of particle, let alone that of space, is jeopardized by their convoluted theories. Regardless, they press on, looking for a Higgs “particle” to get them out of the impasse, by providing a field to generate a force of gravity, which presumably would do away with the concept of warpable space, generating gravity without force.

We have to give them credit, though, because, even though they are looking through a glass darkly, they get many things right. They have the speed of light right and the relations that govern the electromagnetic fields right. These form the corner piece of the puzzle they are seeking to solve, and there’s probably no going back from those first principles, but to replace the dark glass with something more transparent, they are going to have to recognize the fudges that they have accepted in several of their fundamental concepts, most notably in the concepts of motion and force, but also in the concept of points. 

However, to get the concept of point right, they have to get the concept of motion right first. A start would be to consider that the simplification of Dirac’s equation for the electron, through the application of Feynman’s model, invoking quantum field theory, described by Penrose’s “zigs” and “zags,” the “zitterbewegung” of Dirac’s theory and the crux of Hestenes’ work on the electron, could really be a three-dimensional, space/time oscillation.

A three-dimensional space/time oscillation has to be scalar motion, by definition, since it involves a change of size, a simultaneous 1D, 2D and 3D change of size. However, by the failure to recognize such an oscillation as an example of scalar motion, and, therefore, the redefinition of a point that this requires, the mathematicians keep getting all tangled up in their universe of imaginary numbers. Clearly, as John Baez now admits, this experience is like “wading through molasses” (see here.)

Redefining space and time as simply the reciprocal aspects of motion changes the rules of the game entirely, but without throwing out what we already know that is true, just what we know that is not true.

The next episode of Brian’s NOVA program is entitled, “What is time?” A concept even more enigmatic than the concept of space, to be sure.

Several years ago, as President of ISUS, I led the fight to document Larson’s RST in Wikipedia. It was arguably one of the most protracted Wikipedia struggles ever waged at the time (everything has been deleted since then). We eventually lost the battle and everything about Larson was deleted, ostensibly on the grounds that Larson’s work constitutes original research. A while later, another member of ISUS managed to write a short biographical article, which was deleted just last week, after being in existence for several years. This time the reason given for deleting the article was that Larson is too obscure a figure, and he and his work are not “notable.”

Resisting the urge to rant over this, I just want to point out for the record, in this the most obscure of blogs, that Larson’s Reciprocal System of Physical Theory (RST), the universe of motion, is proving to be much more successful than Newton’s system of physical theory, which we refer to as the Legacy System of Physical Theory (LST), in the fundamental assumptions each brings to the table vis-à-vis the observations of experimentalists.

The LST’s fundamental assumption is that nature can be explained in terms of a few fundamental interactions among a few fundamental particles. These particles are assumed to exist within the framework of space and time. True, the framework has been greatly modified over time, as the LST transformed it via the enigmatic and incompatible principles of relativity and quantum mechanics, but Newton’s system of physical theory, his program of research, we might say, has remained unchanged.

In contrast, the program of research that pertains to Larson’s universe of motion is based on the assumption that there are no fundamental particles playing upon the stage of space and time. His new system assumes that space and time do not exist as independent entities, but are merely two, reciprocal aspects of the one component of the universe, motion, which exists in discrete units forming the observed particles of matter and anti-matter and explaining their interactions.

Fortunately, this radical difference, in the fundamental assumptions of the two systems of physical theory, enables investigators to compare how well observations conform to either system. For example, to explain the particle interaction of gravity, the LST postulates that the nature of space must conform to the principles of non-Euclidean geometry, while the RST emphatically insists that the universe conforms to Euclidean geometry: Recent observations confirm that the geometry of the universe is exceedingly flat (Euclidean.) Hence, RST 1, LST 0.

To avoid the difficulty of explaining how a charged point particle (a particle of no spatial extent) can avoid the embarrassment of the infamous singularity that has plagued the LST for many decades, scientists resorted to the concept of strings, but this could only be proffered along with a concomitant introduction of extra physical dimensions, something the RST rules out: Very recent observations coming from the experiments of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have greatly diminished the hopes of ever finding evidence of more than the three observed dimensions of space and the one of time. Hence, RST 2, LST 0.

Finally, in what may be the final iconoclastic blow to the LST, scientists have discovered that non-oscillating neutrinos, traveling from the LHC in CERN to Italy, seem to be arriving some 60 nanoseconds ahead of when they should, if they were traveling at the speed of light. Of course, it wasn’t long ago that neutrinos streaming in from the Sun were found to oscillate between flavors, giving them a slight mass, which slowed them down below the speed of light. Now, if the new results are valid, the faster-than-light neutrinos would have to have what we might call, for lack of a better term, anti-mass, or imaginary valued mass. 

To say the least, there is no room for such superluminal particles, called tachyons, in the LST. In the RST, on the other hand, they are a necessary and integral part of the system, inhabiting the cosmic sector of the universe of motion. Hence, RST 3, LST 0.

Perhaps today, Wikipedia is not the place to announce the score in this tête-à-tête contest of the two systems, but my bet is that, in some future version of this venerable member of the online community, there will be a place of honor for Dewey B. Larson and his new system of physical theory.