Maxwell’s equations describe light as a wave so in the nineteenth century a superfine ether was assumed to propagate it in space. If the earth orbits the sun to give the seasons and spins to give night and day, the ether wind can’t always be stationary (Figure 5.1), so the speed of light should vary: light going against the wind should go slower and light going with the wind should go faster. Then in 1887, Michelson and Morley found to everyone’s surprise that the speed of light was the same in every direction. There was no ether wind! This was deeply counter intuitive – why didn’t the earth’s movement affect the movement of light?

Later, in 1904, Lorentz showed that the equations of light stayed the same if space and time changed as objects moved and in 1905 Poincare deduced the relativity principle, that the laws of physics were the same in every reference frame, so a ball thrown up in a moving car behaves the same as in a stationary car. In our world, constant speed observers see the same laws of physics, so throwing a ball, swinging a pendulum or shining a flashlight is the same on a satellite orbiting the earth at thousands of miles per hour as it is on earth.

This is fortunate because the earth is a planetary platform carrying us through the cosmos. Its spin whirls us around at about 1000mph, it goes around the sun at about 66,000mph and around the galaxy at an amazing 483,000mph. Some estimate our speed relative to the cosmic background radiation at about 1,300,000mph yet science still works on earth as it does in the rest of the universe. How is our reality bubble maintained despite the fact that we live on a moving planet?

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Quantum theory is certainly strange but to my mind relativity is stranger because how time and space change is harder for us to understand than quantum waves. Special relativity suggests there is a mystery behind the movement of ordinary matter.

QR5.2.1. Our Reality Bubble

QR5.2.2. Maintaining Normality

QR5.2.3. Maintaining Causality

QR5.2.4. Matter Has Its Own Time

QR5.2.5. The Universal Speed Limit

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Space and time are defined in physics by standard rulers and atomic clocks. If objects try to occupy the same space at the same time they collide and the standard model claims that matter only moves when other matter hits it. But gravity ignores this rule because it lets the sun hold the earth in orbit even though they are millions of miles apart with nothing between them but space.

Einstein’s answer was that matter can change space and time. Special relativity lets moving matter alter its own time and space and general relativity lets large objects change time and space for objects around them. The equations work but they don’t say how matter changes time and space and Einstein made no suggestions as to how matter changes space and time.

The standard model doesn’t help because space and time aren’t particles and it has no particle that can alter space or time. Can a painting make the frame it presents within larger or smaller? Can a movie make the projector running it go faster? Current physics has no answer to the question how does mere matter change the time and space it exists within?

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About a hundred years ago, relativity and quantum theory replaced Newton’s 200-year-old paradigm with a world of malleable time, curved space and quantum waves. A century of research has confirmed both theories in their respective cosmic and sub-atomic domains yet they contradict, as relativity gives point infinities and quantum field tricks fail for gravity. As one physicist says:

“Mankind has uncovered two extremely efficient theories: one that describes our universe’s structure (Einstein’s gravity: the theory of general relativity), and one that describes everything our universe contains (quantum field theory), and these two theories won’t talk to each other.” (Galfard, 2016)

This schism lay at the heart of physics last century and nothing has changed since. It is as if the universe has two different rule books, one for the very small and another for the very large, with nothing in common. In a nutshell, the rules for the very large don’t work for the very small and the rules for the very small don’t work for the very large.

Two theories that contradict each other can’t both be right but quantum theory and relativity have been proved right innumerable times so rather than being wrong, both seem to be incomplete. If both are right, then each is only half the picture and something more fundamental is at play. Quantum realism suggests that these two theories contradict each other because each exposes the theoretical assumptions of the other but ignores its own:

1. Quantum theory: Assumes that quantum states evolve on a space and time background that is fixed (Smolin, 2006), but relativity assures us that it isn’t so.

2. Relativity theory: Assumes that foreground objects follow fixed trajectories, but quantum theory assures us that it isn’t so.

This leaves physics with two grand theories, one about how foreground entities act on a fixed space and time background and the other about how space and time changes affect fixed foreground entities, with no commonality at all.

Quantum theory can’t replace relativity because it assumes a background of fixed space and time and relativity can’t replace quantum theory because it assumes that particles follow a fixed path. The reconciliation now explored is that the quantum field changes both foreground objects and their space and time background, where the quantum field is defined as quantum processing on a quantum network. If the quantum field causes matter, space and time, it can explain relativity as well as quantum theory.

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Everyone knows that gravity attracts but how does a lump of matter like the moon cause tides on the earth from hundreds of thousands of miles away? Gravity rules the universe at large, but exactly how simple matter changes space and time to cause gravity remains a mystery.

QR5.1.1. The Great Divide

QR5.1.2. Matter Changes Space and Time

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Quantum Realism Part I. The Observed Reality

……Chapter 5. The Quantum Field

   Brian Whitworth, New Zealand

“In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.”  (Galileo Galilei)…

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    The standard model specifies a particle cause for every physical effect, so the action of gravity at a distance is attributed to gravitons, the strong force to gluons and the weak force to W bosons. The result was many fields as each new particle needed a new field to produce it but another long-term goal of physics is field unification, to reduce all the fields of physics to one field that split into many as the universe cooled. Clearly, inventing many fields contradicts the goal of field unification, as one can’t reduce the fields of physics to one by constantly inventing new fields for every effect.

In contrast, quantum realism proposes that only one field, the general quantum field, causes all effects, so it supports physics but not the standard model. This chapter explains how the quantum field that explains the electromagnetic, strong and weak fields also explains gravity, electricity and magnetism.

QR5.1.  Gravity Rules

QR5.2.  Special Relativity

QR5.3.  Matter Trembles

QR5.4.  General Relativity

QR5.5.  Electricity and Magnetism

QR5.6.  Creating Order

QR5.7.  Why Does The Universe Exist?

Discussion Questions

References

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Figure 2.15 summarizes the basic quantum model that the following chapters explain in more detail:

1. Quantum servers allocate processing

2. That spreads on the quantum network as waves

3. Until they interact to overload a node

4. That reboots in a physical event.

A photon is then a processing wave that spreads in all directions by node-to-node transfer until it overloads a node point in a physical event that causes it to restart again. Quantum waves as processing waves can evolve on a network, superpose when they overlap, collide when they overload a node, collapse when a node reboots and entangle if the restart merges the processing, as discussed later. Quantum waves as processing waves even explain relativity in Chapter 5. To reverse engineer the equations of physics only requires us to accept that a quantum processing engine could create the physical world as a virtual reality.

Last century, physics invented a tale of quantum waves spreading at light speed that collapsed instantly to a physical event when observed. It made no sense because no physical wave could do that but it worked brilliantly! No-one noticed at the time that quantum theory could be describing processing waves on a network.

In quantum theory, we must interact with reality to observe it, as Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle implies that to observe a photon, we must change it and the symmetry of interactions implies that both parties observe. It follows that physical reality is like a painting that we can’t see until we paint it, on a vast landscape where many others are doing the same. We only see our local here and now and from this deduce the universe, but it is hubris to assume that we are the only “painters”. If our time and space are defined by the directions and speed that we paint, without that “painting”, time and space as we know it would no longer exist.

Table 2.1 given next compares quantum and physical realism for space and time, so readers can decide for themselves which offers a better explanation of the facts.

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Quantum realism involves looking at reality in a new way, not as what we see but as what we can’t see. Quantum waves literally can’t be seen by our measuring devices but we can still reverse engineer them, as that is how quantum theory was invented in the first place. Many still don’t believe in what they can’t see but that is changing. If waves we can’t see fill our phones with data we can, why can’t a quantum world we can’t see create the physical one we can?

One concern is that accepting quantum reality will lead to a God-theory that explains everything and predicts nothing, but reverse engineering doesn’t work that way as it assumes a finite processing source following the rules of computer science. Reverse engineering is an iterative scientific method based on testing and Chapter 4 gives a testable prediction that current physics denies – that pure light can collide.

Reverse engineering physical reality assumes quantum theory is a reality description and follows the facts. Doing this immediately explains some well-known physics facts:

1. Quantum randomness occurs. If the quantum collapse is a choice that occurs outside physical reality, this is no longer surprising.

2. Complex numbers work. If electromagnetism does rotate into another dimension, this is no longer surprising.

3. Planck limits exist. If our space and time are digital, this is no longer surprising.

4. Feynman’s sum over histories works. If quantum entities do take every path, this is no longer surprising.

5. Space curves in general relativity. If our space is a 3D surface, this is no longer surprising.

6. Time dilates in general relativity. If our time is created by processing, this is no longer surprising.

Quantum realism implies that the equations of physics aren’t fictional but literally true. If the equations of physics are good enough to use, why aren’t they good enough to believe?

The calculus used throughout physics illustrates the case. It began as a thought experiment, like quantum theory, that infinitesimals “in the limit” predict physical reality and like quantum theory, it worked brilliantly. Physical realism decreed that it had to be just a theory but why not see it as a reality description? If space actually does change in infinitesimal pixel steps and time changes in indivisible cycles, Zeno’s paradoxes are resolved. Calculus was only rejected as a reality description because physical continuity is a canon of orthodox physics.

Quantum realism is a new perspective on reality based on applying a known method of science to the facts of physics.

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When Europeans first visited China, they saw a society that made no sense to the bible, king and country culture they came from. Anthropologists eventually realized that concepts like “keeping face” only made sense in the context of that new culture. They had to understand Chinese society on its own terms not theirs. The scientific method used to learn new a cultural context is called grounded theory, which as the name implies, is to first gather ground-level data then theorize. Following this method, anthropologists visiting a new tribe first watch, listen and record, then form a theory to test next day and repeat until they understand the culture on its own terms. The skill of letting the data speak avoided colonial bias but seemed to reverse the usual method of science, until Kuhn noted that science has two phases (Kuhn, 1970):

1. Paradigm growth: Theory predicts new data.

2. Paradigm shift: Data implies a new theory.

In paradigm growth, theory predicts data and in paradigm shift, the data grows a new theory. The first is slow and steady, as water wears away rock, but the latter is often sudden, as an earthquake alters the land in a short time. The history of science is then that established theories rule until an intellectual earthquake raises a new theoretical landscape from the data ground.

Figure 2.14 shows that science, as a way of connecting data to theory, can work from theory to data by a predict-test method or from data to theory by an observe-deduce method. If current physics no longer predicts anything new, it is time to grow a new theory from the ground up.

The computer science version of grounded theory is reverse engineering. It is essentially to understand a new digital system by observing its outputs, form a model of the processing that could produce those outputs, then test the model by further interactions, and repeat until consistency is achieved. The aim of quantum realism to reverse engineer physical reality is thus essentially grounded physics.

The premise is that traditional physics approached quantum reality as colonials approached China, calling what didn’t conform to its traditional culture imaginary. The culture of physical realism handed down from Aristotle is as embedded in physics as King and Country was in colonial societies. The arrogance in both cases is palpable, as physics dismisses what it doesn’t understand just as colonials did. The quantum realism alternative is to understand quantum reality on its own terms, not dismiss it based on our physical tradition. To take this step is not to abandon science but to embrace it.

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Over a century ago, physics left the safe haven of classical mechanics seeking a promised land that explained how light moved and gravity acted at a distance. Digging deep, physicists discovered relativity and quantum theory by imagining causes they couldn’t see, like quantum waves, quantum collapse, time dilation and curved space. Equations that worked in non-physical ways led to the modern world of transistors and satellites but rather than exploring the non-physical further, physics settled down in the semantic desert of physical realism, a place where no new theories grow. Nothing grows in this place so what puzzled Einstein and Feynman over fifty years ago still puzzles us today.

Modern physics has now been stagnating for over fifty years. As the physicist Smolin explains, The Trouble with Physics (Smolin, 2006) is that it has given itself over to ungrounded theories that can never be tested. Trying to understand quantum reality has been abandoned so some busy themselves with books and TV shows to explain what they don’t understand themselves while others rally the troops with papers on strings, multiverses and supersymmetry that are Not Even Wrong (Woit, 2007). Even the weeds of error don’t grow in this desert!

Physicists, like a baker with no bread, now occupy themselves by selling novelties, writing scientific papers on white holes, eleven dimensions, time travel, closed time loops, WIMPs, wormholes, heavy sterile neutrinos, super-particles that hint at the next revolution in physics, but it never comes. In a recent New Scientist cover story, the authors speculate that axiflavons from a hypothetical flavon field will solve physics problems and conclude:

“Its thrilling stuff, if for the moment it is only conjecture” New Scientist, August, 2018, p31

But conjecture without evidence isn’t science, as Hossenfelder explains:

“Instead of examining the way that they propose hypotheses and revising their methods, theoretical physicists have developed a habit of putting forward entirely baseless speculations. Over and over again I have heard them justifying their mindless production of mathematical fiction as “healthy speculation” – entirely ignoring that this type of speculation has demonstrably not worked for decades and continues to not work. There is nothing healthy about this. It’s sick science. And, embarrassingly enough, that’s plain to see for everyone who does not work in the field.”

For decades now, physics “breakthroughs” have turned out to be mirages, with papers titles like:

We may have spotted a parallel universe going backwards in time

Neutrinos may explain why we don’t live in an antimatter universe:

In such writings, “may” is the operative word. The last fifty years of physics can be described as maybe WIMPS, maybe strings, maybe supersymmetry, maybe a multiverse, maybe time travel and so on. The fizz has gone out of physics so much that some despairingly suggest The End of Physics because:

“… for the first time in the history of science, we could be facing questions that we cannot answer, not because we don’t have the brains or technology, but because the laws of physics themselves forbid it.”

But how can the laws we invent prevent us from understanding reality? What held back physics in the nineteenth century was its claim to already know all the answers so is that we already know all the answers really a valid argument for the end of physics? What is stopping knowledge isn’t nature but the dogma of physical realism.

Physics is wandering in the desert of physical realism, the naïve belief that we see all there is, and if it stays there, the next fifty years will be as barren as the last. It is looking for answers in the wrong place, like the man who looked for the keys he lost in the forest under a lamp post because “The light is better here.” By denying quantum waves, physics abandoned humanity’s greatest discovery, that a non-physical quantum reality generates the physical world.

Theories without evidence have no reality roots. No data supports string theory’s 10500 variants but thousands of papers have been written on it. Instead of building castles in the air, why not start anew from the data ground? Quantum realism proposes reinventing physics from the data ground-up.

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