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I think we need to replace a few other ideas about our universe as well, but Arkani-Hamed is right. Gravitation does not work the way General Relativity seem to imply.
During the later part of the 100 years with General Relativity this has become more and more obvious to physicists and philosophers of science working on the problem, so doing something about space-time is one step in the right direction. You may find suggestions about other steps by using the links on the left side.
Does this mean that General Relativity is wrong? Not quite. Anyone who has studied the matter know that General Relativity in all tests has delivered correct answers to the questions asked. That is.. at least to those we have been able to check, but the prediction about gravity waves still awaits confirmation. So far no waves has been detected in spite of the ever more sensitive detectors that are being constructed. Still, whatever might be wrong does not seem to affect the predictive powers of General Relativity which means that gravity waves ought to be real and just waiting for detection. So why don't we see them?
Understanding time is the key to understand gravity as well as the cause of the quanta, making It possible to understand what is wrong with our picture of gravitation and why no waves have been detected.
The reason is quite simple. A gravity wave is actually a wave in the fabric of space, a fabric that also harbor the measuring tape. Try to imagine the measure band of a tailor sticking to the fabric it measures to get a good picture of this idea. The tape would actually wave with the passing waves making them quite undetectable.
This picture is however not quite compatible with the idea of force carriers as various quanta of particular fields. Instead it rather advocate the stand that all the various force effects originate from the dynamic properties of only one common field, which idea I'm afraid, is a deviation from the standard model and so would be a rather bitter medicine to chew on even for Dr Nima Arkani-Hamed.
Anyway, I have found that the common picture of space-time is misleading because the "time" part of space-time is completely misunderstood. So that is another idea that we need to replace. The current view of time.
If you have read any of the other essays on this site you already know how time works, but I will explain it again from a slightly different angle calling upon the phenomenon of entanglement to stand witness.
Entanglement, or "spooky action at a distance" as Einstein dubbed it, is now an established fact of our universe in spite of relativity. One consequence of this is that contrary to what you may believe, simultaneity is now to be regarded a proven fact of our universe because it is only with the help of simultaneity that entanglement may work.
In other words, there is now experimental proof of the existence of a universal "now".
Now, if that is so, how then, with regard to gravitation, the quanta, acceleration, inertia and time might it all work? Is there a single cause that could explain all?
To be sure, there is! And it is all about a Big Bang and inferred dynamic properties of the fabric of our universe. However, not the Big Bang of the standard model of inflation. In this version inflation and dark energy has quite a different cause along with gravitation, the quanta, acceleration, inertia and time. On top of that this universe also manage to get by without the need of any extra dimensions above the three familiar.
So, what is time? The explanation I have found which gives birth to all the other phenomena as well, is that the fabric of our universe is very elastic with properties rather close to those of an elastic solid. This elasticity causes the fabric to oscillate in various ways as a response to sudden compression or dilution, which may have been a result of the Big Bang incident. One of those ways would be a rapid, radial motion between compression and dilution. This radial motion of the fabric is what we perceive as duration and a complete cycle of such motion is a basic unit of "time"... A "now".
The other ways the fabric may oscillate form the bodies of the inhabitants of this universe. Transverse waves of bosons and longitudinal sound-like waves of fermions. It seems rather self-evident to me that the rapid radial motion of the fabric of space during the course of this brief transition between compression and dilution also would give rise to what we perceive as quantum effects, causing virtual bosons and fermions to pop in and out of existence, as well as adding a certain fuzziness due to the difference in size between the volumes of compression and dilution respectively.
This difference in size permits the measure of distance using the difference as a fundamental unit, moving the point of measure along the full extent of stretch of the fabric during the diluting half of the cycle, but holding its position as the oscillation turn around into compression. Repeating the procedure for the length of the distance being measured.
Imagine now this version of the Big Bang scenario. A sudden violent blow(?) to the initially inert volume of fabric of the universe forces it to enter into rather violent pulsating oscillations, far past the fabrics natural resonant frequency. The bulk oscillations will therefore initially be damped quite fast by the elastic properties of the fabric and brought down to a more sustainable size.
This is the mechanism driving inflation in the dynamic present universe. A large amplitude of oscillation being equal to a large fundamental unit of measure that quickly is downsized to a small amplitude and a small fundamental unit, which then produce a relative effect of "inflation" which is equal to that of the standard model.
The same mechanism would be true for the expansion of the universe as the amplitude then continue to drop but at a much slower rate, and also for dark energy as the elastic properties of the fabric(here mainly stiffness?) accelerate the rate of change of size.
If the above is true, then nobody will miss space-time.... but perhaps General Relativity? No, not even General Relativity! Space-time may have been the picture Einstein had in mind when he invented General Relativity, but the same equations apply to gravitation in this version of the universe because the fabric warps and bend around the fermion oscillations during the course of each cycle of fundamental duration. or "time", presenting precisely the same problem to solve as in the space-time version.
Ok, so what about inertia? Not very difficult to explain. All motion in this universe is a matter of resonance. When we are talking about free fall, or coasting, the fermion traveler is simply oscillating at the same frequency as the fabric. As the fabric dilute, or expand, so does the fermion, and if the fermion is in motion it will slide a little distance along with the expansion in the direction of travel. When the fabric during the other half of the cycle of oscillation compress, or shrink in size, the fermion will be braked to a standstill at the new position by the elastic properties of the fabric. As the oscillation of the fabric bring about expansion again, the same elastic properties will propel the fermion onwards to a new position in the direction of travel, where the procedure is repeated. Inertia is in other words simply the sum of elastic forces present in the surrounding fabric of space and acting on the fermion.
Happy New Year 2016!
Acceleration? The short explanation is any action that brings the fermion out of resonance with the bulk oscillations during the cycle of fundamental duration. The somewhat longer only indicate what actions might do that. Those are mainly pushes or collisions with other fermions. After the action has occurred the elastic properties of the fabric will align the fermion with the bulk oscillations and bring it back into resonance again with somewhat different inertia.
Gravitation is another resonance phenomenon with the fermions resonating with the surrounding fabric, but in this case part of the surrounding fabric's oscillations are brought about by other fermions.
The fermions oscillate longitudinally like a sound-wave. The surrounding fabric then stretch between center and perimeter of the fermion in response to, and resonating with the bulk oscillations which it simultaneously is a part of, just as it was in the case of free fall coasting.
The motion of the bulk fabric as it stretch points from a dense, contracted state, into an expanding state, while the fermion oscillations simultaneously enters into a state of contraction. All fermions embedded tn the fabric in question will as a result glide along with the surrounding, contracting fabric towards each other and form a collective center.
The stretch in the fabric from the periphery towards that center is already a part of the bulk fabric oscillations and resonate with them, as does also the longitudinal fermion oscillations, which is why no acceleration forces are present when the increasing stretch closer to the center continue to accelerate the fermion.
With dark energy being a consequence of the elastic properties of the fabric of space accelerating the rate by which the amplitude of the bulk oscillations of the universe drop, what about dark matter?
In my opinion dark matter would also be rather straight forward to explain with help of the scenario on hand!
I am sure dark matter simply is very large and spread-out fermion-like oscillations in space itself.
All fermions oscillate in unison, resonating with, but 180 degrees behind the bulk-oscillations of our universe. That is, when the universe expand they compress, and when the universe compress, they expand. Now, not being able to actually see dark matter, with a little help from Einstein we have non the less managed to map it out and found that it mainly reside in and around galaxies and nebula.
Since the matter of galaxies and nebula mainly consist of fermions which all oscillate longitudinally, assuming that also the fabric surrounding the galaxies might resonate with these oscillations is rather close at hand. If true it would constitute the origin and site of a quite invisible low strength gravitation field. Exactly what we are looking for.
Endless Vibrations - Good Vibrations
-Vibrations and oscillations seem to be what keeps everything going. Why not listen to Lord Shorty or to the Beach Boys while pondering over some ideas that may finally explain the physics of our universe.
Posted 31st of December 2015. Updated January 3rd 2016.
The biggest challenge for science today is to make sense of gravitation. According to Dr Nima Arkani-Hamed we need to replace space-time, the front-end of Einstein's two theories of relativity. Why? In order to find a quantum theory of gravitation that actually works.I think we need to replace a few other ideas about our universe as well, but Arkani-Hamed is right. Gravitation does not work the way General Relativity seem to imply.
During the later part of the 100 years with General Relativity this has become more and more obvious to physicists and philosophers of science working on the problem, so doing something about space-time is one step in the right direction. You may find suggestions about other steps by using the links on the left side.
Does this mean that General Relativity is wrong? Not quite. Anyone who has studied the matter know that General Relativity in all tests has delivered correct answers to the questions asked. That is.. at least to those we have been able to check, but the prediction about gravity waves still awaits confirmation. So far no waves has been detected in spite of the ever more sensitive detectors that are being constructed. Still, whatever might be wrong does not seem to affect the predictive powers of General Relativity which means that gravity waves ought to be real and just waiting for detection. So why don't we see them?
Understanding time is the key to understand gravity as well as the cause of the quanta, making It possible to understand what is wrong with our picture of gravitation and why no waves have been detected.
The reason is quite simple. A gravity wave is actually a wave in the fabric of space, a fabric that also harbor the measuring tape. Try to imagine the measure band of a tailor sticking to the fabric it measures to get a good picture of this idea. The tape would actually wave with the passing waves making them quite undetectable.
This picture is however not quite compatible with the idea of force carriers as various quanta of particular fields. Instead it rather advocate the stand that all the various force effects originate from the dynamic properties of only one common field, which idea I'm afraid, is a deviation from the standard model and so would be a rather bitter medicine to chew on even for Dr Nima Arkani-Hamed.
Anyway, I have found that the common picture of space-time is misleading because the "time" part of space-time is completely misunderstood. So that is another idea that we need to replace. The current view of time.
If you have read any of the other essays on this site you already know how time works, but I will explain it again from a slightly different angle calling upon the phenomenon of entanglement to stand witness.
Entanglement, or "spooky action at a distance" as Einstein dubbed it, is now an established fact of our universe in spite of relativity. One consequence of this is that contrary to what you may believe, simultaneity is now to be regarded a proven fact of our universe because it is only with the help of simultaneity that entanglement may work.
In other words, there is now experimental proof of the existence of a universal "now".
Now, if that is so, how then, with regard to gravitation, the quanta, acceleration, inertia and time might it all work? Is there a single cause that could explain all?
To be sure, there is! And it is all about a Big Bang and inferred dynamic properties of the fabric of our universe. However, not the Big Bang of the standard model of inflation. In this version inflation and dark energy has quite a different cause along with gravitation, the quanta, acceleration, inertia and time. On top of that this universe also manage to get by without the need of any extra dimensions above the three familiar.
So, what is time? The explanation I have found which gives birth to all the other phenomena as well, is that the fabric of our universe is very elastic with properties rather close to those of an elastic solid. This elasticity causes the fabric to oscillate in various ways as a response to sudden compression or dilution, which may have been a result of the Big Bang incident. One of those ways would be a rapid, radial motion between compression and dilution. This radial motion of the fabric is what we perceive as duration and a complete cycle of such motion is a basic unit of "time"... A "now".
The other ways the fabric may oscillate form the bodies of the inhabitants of this universe. Transverse waves of bosons and longitudinal sound-like waves of fermions. It seems rather self-evident to me that the rapid radial motion of the fabric of space during the course of this brief transition between compression and dilution also would give rise to what we perceive as quantum effects, causing virtual bosons and fermions to pop in and out of existence, as well as adding a certain fuzziness due to the difference in size between the volumes of compression and dilution respectively.
This difference in size permits the measure of distance using the difference as a fundamental unit, moving the point of measure along the full extent of stretch of the fabric during the diluting half of the cycle, but holding its position as the oscillation turn around into compression. Repeating the procedure for the length of the distance being measured.
Imagine now this version of the Big Bang scenario. A sudden violent blow(?) to the initially inert volume of fabric of the universe forces it to enter into rather violent pulsating oscillations, far past the fabrics natural resonant frequency. The bulk oscillations will therefore initially be damped quite fast by the elastic properties of the fabric and brought down to a more sustainable size.
This is the mechanism driving inflation in the dynamic present universe. A large amplitude of oscillation being equal to a large fundamental unit of measure that quickly is downsized to a small amplitude and a small fundamental unit, which then produce a relative effect of "inflation" which is equal to that of the standard model.
The same mechanism would be true for the expansion of the universe as the amplitude then continue to drop but at a much slower rate, and also for dark energy as the elastic properties of the fabric(here mainly stiffness?) accelerate the rate of change of size.
If the above is true, then nobody will miss space-time.... but perhaps General Relativity? No, not even General Relativity! Space-time may have been the picture Einstein had in mind when he invented General Relativity, but the same equations apply to gravitation in this version of the universe because the fabric warps and bend around the fermion oscillations during the course of each cycle of fundamental duration. or "time", presenting precisely the same problem to solve as in the space-time version.
Ok, so what about inertia? Not very difficult to explain. All motion in this universe is a matter of resonance. When we are talking about free fall, or coasting, the fermion traveler is simply oscillating at the same frequency as the fabric. As the fabric dilute, or expand, so does the fermion, and if the fermion is in motion it will slide a little distance along with the expansion in the direction of travel. When the fabric during the other half of the cycle of oscillation compress, or shrink in size, the fermion will be braked to a standstill at the new position by the elastic properties of the fabric. As the oscillation of the fabric bring about expansion again, the same elastic properties will propel the fermion onwards to a new position in the direction of travel, where the procedure is repeated. Inertia is in other words simply the sum of elastic forces present in the surrounding fabric of space and acting on the fermion.
Happy New Year 2016!
Acceleration? The short explanation is any action that brings the fermion out of resonance with the bulk oscillations during the cycle of fundamental duration. The somewhat longer only indicate what actions might do that. Those are mainly pushes or collisions with other fermions. After the action has occurred the elastic properties of the fabric will align the fermion with the bulk oscillations and bring it back into resonance again with somewhat different inertia.
Gravitation is another resonance phenomenon with the fermions resonating with the surrounding fabric, but in this case part of the surrounding fabric's oscillations are brought about by other fermions.
The fermions oscillate longitudinally like a sound-wave. The surrounding fabric then stretch between center and perimeter of the fermion in response to, and resonating with the bulk oscillations which it simultaneously is a part of, just as it was in the case of free fall coasting.
The motion of the bulk fabric as it stretch points from a dense, contracted state, into an expanding state, while the fermion oscillations simultaneously enters into a state of contraction. All fermions embedded tn the fabric in question will as a result glide along with the surrounding, contracting fabric towards each other and form a collective center.
The stretch in the fabric from the periphery towards that center is already a part of the bulk fabric oscillations and resonate with them, as does also the longitudinal fermion oscillations, which is why no acceleration forces are present when the increasing stretch closer to the center continue to accelerate the fermion.
With dark energy being a consequence of the elastic properties of the fabric of space accelerating the rate by which the amplitude of the bulk oscillations of the universe drop, what about dark matter?
In my opinion dark matter would also be rather straight forward to explain with help of the scenario on hand!
I am sure dark matter simply is very large and spread-out fermion-like oscillations in space itself.
All fermions oscillate in unison, resonating with, but 180 degrees behind the bulk-oscillations of our universe. That is, when the universe expand they compress, and when the universe compress, they expand. Now, not being able to actually see dark matter, with a little help from Einstein we have non the less managed to map it out and found that it mainly reside in and around galaxies and nebula.
Since the matter of galaxies and nebula mainly consist of fermions which all oscillate longitudinally, assuming that also the fabric surrounding the galaxies might resonate with these oscillations is rather close at hand. If true it would constitute the origin and site of a quite invisible low strength gravitation field. Exactly what we are looking for.
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