Split (B) from SPACES: the reality of science

[swansont]

(B)

I am asking , is it possible that there are NO actual particles of substance , there are only effects produced in the Fields , and in whatever else is there? ( as spoken of a post or two ago , and illustrated (B) except no green particle at the centre ?

 

!

Moderator Note

 

Split from http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/94012-spaces-the-final-frontier/

Feel free to refer to that thread for possible further illumination

 

 

————

 

It's pretty clear in physics that science does not make any claim about reality. Only that nature behaves as the models predict. The models are our way of thinking and making sense of what we observe. The reality may be different. How would we know?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

!

Moderator Note

 

Split from http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/94012-spaces-the-final-frontier/

Feel free to refer to that thread for possible further illumination

 

 

 

 

It's pretty clear in physics that science does not make any claim about reality. Only that nature behaves as the models predict. The models are our way of thinking and making sense of what we observe. The reality may be different. How would we know?

To put the illustrations here to simplify understanding of the point .

 

Not like this particle central of some substance .

 

But like this no particle central , effect caused by field disturbance etc .

 

 

Mike

[swansont]

You've avoided the issue: How can you tell the difference?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

You've avoided the issue: How can you tell the difference?

.

Well even if this went no further , it would make a huge difference .

 

Even if the responses were the same . The absence of any particles at the centre , and it was the environment was responsible for providing a phenomenon with the same responses . The particle standard model would be in trouble , and we would need to look much further out, to the environment for answers . And a new model .

 

Mike

[swansont]

.

Well even if this went no further , it would make a huge difference .

Even if the responses were the same . The absence of any particles at the centre , and it was the environment was responsible for providing a phenomenon with the same responses . The particle standard model would be in trouble , and we would need to look much further out, to the environment for answers . And a new model .

Mike

How would we know if there's no particle at the center? If you can detect it, then there's no point to this, is there?

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

!

Moderator Note

 

Split from http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/94012-spaces-the-final-frontier/

Feel free to refer to that thread for possible further illumination

 

 

 

 

It's pretty clear in physics that science does not make any claim about reality. Only that nature behaves as the models predict. The models are our way of thinking and making sense of what we observe. The reality may be different. How would we know?

.

 

How would we know?

 

I am sure I have heard it said , even in 'civi street ' . Just need to make a ' reality check ' .

 

Reality is good , keeps your feet on the ground . Keeps you grounded. Self esteem .

I appreciate what you are saying about ( all you kneed to know is how it works ) . But the rest of life needs to know ' why ' certain things work the way they do .

 

I do think that if we knew ' there were NO particles , it's all effects of various sorts, coming from within space time , I think it would lead us on to other things , even if it did not help us one bit as regards performance . I think we would look more OUTWARD for other answers , to other questions . Like if there is a swirl or a spin what causes it ? How far out did it cause it.? What caused it ?

 

Mike

Edited March 20, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[ajb]

I am sure I have heard it said , even in 'civi street ' . Just need to make a ' reality check ' .

What does 'reality check' mean in the context of a physics experiment?

[Strange]

.

 

How would we know?

 

I am sure I have heard it said , even in 'civi street ' . Just need to make a ' reality check ' .

 

But the only way we have of "checking reality" is to make some measurements, do some experiments, etc.

 

So far, the results of all these are consistent with there being things we can model as fields and particles. Whether they really exist or not is probably unknowable. Until we have some experiment that says so.

[ajb]

Whether they really exist or not is probably unknowable. Until we have some experiment that says so.

This opens up the question of what it means to 'exist'... we are going to get lost in philosophy if we continue down this road.

[geordief]

I have had the same (I think it may be the same) idea as MSC previously. I felt it would be a big deal if feasible but I also have no idea how it could be shown.

 

The way I pictured it as that what we call "particles" might be areas where the field became concentrated as a result of two separate wave fronts meeting(in the way waves meet each other at an angle) on the shoreline . The intersection of the wave front would be the location of the "particle".

 

I wonder how fast these intersection points could move. If it was FTL then that alone would disprove my "idea".

Edited March 20, 2016 by geordief

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

This opens up the question of what it means to 'exist'... we are going to get lost in philosophy if we continue down this road.

In the example I mentioned earlier from electronics .

Electron movement one way through a semi conductor , is only really possible, if a hole appears in a very tightly fitting crystal lattice . So an electron leaps into that hole , in so doing leaving a hole where it has leapt from . So you ' see' an electron moving left say , and a hole right . Both are real . Reality . ( as of coarse, I am arguing in one of these threads that these items of the standard model could themselves be disturbances in space with no actual centre. )

 

Mike

Edited March 20, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[ajb]

Holes are quasi-particles in the sense that they are collective phenomena of lots if interacting electrons. You cannot think of a hole as being some 'entity' that you can 'extract' from the system. Electrons you can and we have a reasonable notion of an isolated electron. For example, you cannot build an accelerator that collides holes with particles from the standard model.

 

So, holes are not fundamental particles, yet they are a useful in describing some aspects of nature. Are holes 'real'? I am not sure how to answer that totally satisfactorily. We have models for which these holes are a feature and these models match what we can observe well. Maybe we cannot really say much more than that.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

I think it was a sad day when some bright spark decided they would banish anything whatsoever existing in space .

 

All my pictorial examples are existing in something , either the air with the bubble , the pool with the whirling vortex , the sea with the Very Large wave being surfed. All three exist in the medium, but that there is nothing much inside, nothing at all?

 

So , I ask ? is it not possible for all the standard model particles , to be similar entities , where the Big Bang , and the large hadron collider actually create these particles in the medium . Pretty much unbreakable , unless colossal monumental energy is re applied.

 

But inside the vortex , bubble , or wave , that , there is NOTHING ? The 'entity' , the 'reality', is what got created in the medium . There is no illusive piece of mini- micro string or piece of grit , inside harbouring the key ingredients of matter? Is this not possible ?

 

If that were the case , then what I am asking is. Could it not be out there ? Not inside the particle, but in the surrounding space itself, and beyond. With all its exposure to tremendous energy ?

 

. vortex.

 

Bubble

 

. Wave

 

Notice There is nothing in the Vortex, nothing in the bubble , nothing in the wave . Maybe that is an exception with the surfer . He was there , because he put himself there.

 

Mike

Edited March 20, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

I have had the same (I think it may be the same) idea as MSC previously. I felt it would be a big deal if feasible but I also have no idea how it could be shown.

 

The way I pictured it as that what we call "particles" might be areas where the field became concentrated as a result of two separate wave fronts meeting(in the way waves meet each other at an angle) on the shoreline . The intersection of the wave front would be the location of the "particle".

 

I wonder how fast these intersection points could move. If it was FTL then that alone would disprove my "idea".

.

Well, it's nice when somebody else , thought roughly the same thing.

 

Sorry , a bit late replying . I have got a bit confused with so many ' splits' of the initial thread. I have been dodging about a bit , saying some things in the wrong places . And some wrong things in the right places .

 

I have only thought , when I have been swimming over the last few years. At beaches like ' Slapton sands ' where the breakers are near to shore . They give you a fair thump when they hit you in the back. I have often thought ' that was energy , almost like a mass ( like a sack of potatoes , being thrown at your back ) , a packet of energy .

 

I think that is a good demonstration of ' Reality ' you know when those 'hit you ' , all right . Like your two waves hitting one another head on .

 

Keep commenting , as I will probably need your support .

 

But the only way we have of "checking reality" is to make some measurements, do some experiments, etc.

 

So far, the results of all these are consistent with there being things we can model as fields and particles. Whether they really exist or not is probably unknowable. Until we have some experiment that says so.

.

I appreciate your comment about reality .when I took a photo of the three examples , I did think about it quite hard at the time . What quite am I seeing ? The thing , or the hole ? Which is the real bit. ?

 

Maybe it's the bit that ' really matters' !

 

In case anyone wants a little light reading , before they go to sleep, on the side about ' REALITY '

 

Here is a Wikipedia link :- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reality

 

And / Or

 

Some interesting reading :-

" Trespassing on Einstein's Lawn " by Amander Gefter's is a good read in understanding Reality.

Where she discusses this with Famous Scientists around the world .

 

Leading to ' Reality being an external super symmetric view of the World. Seeing all Gauge Forces simultaneously from the perspective of Super Symmetry . ' Was the conclusion proposal !

 

(if you like that sort of thing )

 

If this were to be the case about " Reality " , then Reality is more about what we do not see , rather than what we do see!

 

Mike

Edited March 21, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[ajb]

All my pictorial examples are existing in something ...

All your examples given are mechanical in nature.

 

So , I ask ? is it not possible for all the standard model particles , to be similar entities , where the Big Bang , and the large hadron collider actually create these particles in the medium .

In a loose sense, fundamental particles are excitations of their fields. In a way, the medium could be seen as these fields, as a mechanical analogy. The mathematics can be similar, for example the wave equation appears. But then we usually apply quantisation to these models and so the analogy maybe not be so useful.

[swansont]

.

I have only thought , when I have been swimming over the last few years. At beaches like ' Slapton sands ' where the breakers are near to shore . They give you a fair thump when they hit you in the back. I have often thought ' that was energy , almost like a mass ( like a sack of potatoes , being thrown at your back ) , a packet of energy .

 

I think that is a good demonstration of ' Reality ' you know when those 'hit you ' , all right . Like your two waves hitting one another head on .

 

 

 

Water has mass, so there's no "almost" about it.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

Yes it has mass, but this mass was here by the sea shore , all the time . It has not arrived from out to sea , neither Has it set off from any distant place , and just arrived. The most it has done is gone up and down a bit , and backwards and forward a meter of two . Surely ? As far as I know , I saw the whole thing start off by a persistent breeze , blowing down the inside estuary at Totnes. It was barely rucking up the river water, but the waves generally looked like they were going downstream . Had they been caused by a stone dropping into the water the energy intensity would have died off by

1/Distanced squared. Now with the continuous wind ., the waves slowly increased in height as they went downstream , parallel with each other but at right angles to the wind direction . At sea the same gaining of energy until the waves hit the shore with the Energy to knock me back. This is surely a demonstration of distortion inflicted on the medium ( water ) , energy moves across the water and arrives to 'appear' as the arrival of a bundle of mass from out to sea , but really only an oscillation carrying energy . ( feeling like a 'shed load ' of Mass arriving ) . Is that not so ?

 

In this example which is more real ( namely reality) The phenomenon of being thrust by energy

. Or the the water as mass ? ( which is all over the sea ) .

 

I would have thought it was the wave Energy . That is the Real thing of the moment,

 

 

Link to wave :- https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaking_wave

 

Mike

Edited March 21, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Strange]

None of this appears to have anything to do with the question of whether we can tell if particles are real or just a useful model. Or even if there is any difference between those two concepts.

 

But it sounds a bit like you are talking about "emergent phenomena"; behaviours which are not obviously predictable from the system (e.g. the complex pattern of waves which emerge from the interaction of wind, water and gravity).

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

None of this appears to have anything to do with the question of whether we can tell if particles are real or just a useful model. Or even if there is any difference between those two concepts.

 

But it sounds a bit like you are talking about "emergent phenomena"; behaviours which are not obviously predictable from the system (e.g. the complex pattern of waves which emerge from the interaction of wind, water and gravity).

Strictly my original proposition was .

 

Quote original post "

Mike Smith Cosmos, on 19 Mar 2016 - 7:46 PM, said:

(B)

I am asking , is it possible that there are NO actual particles of substance , there are only effects produced in the Fields , and in whatever else is there? ( as spoken of a post or two ago , and illustrated (B) except no green particle at the centre ?

" Unquote

 

Namely , the disturbance in the medium ,

 

 

Not the particle in the middle

 

 

Mike

Edited March 21, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos

[Strange]

I am asking , is it possible that there are NO actual particles of substance , there are only effects produced in the Fields , and in whatever else is there? ( as spoken of a post or two ago , and illustrated (B) except no green particle at the centre ?

 

And we are asking: how would you tell the difference?

[swansont]

Strictly my original proposition was .

 

Quote original post "

Mike Smith Cosmos, on 19 Mar 2016 - 7:46 PM, said:

(B)

I am asking , is it possible that there are NO actual particles of substance , there are only effects produced in the Fields , and in whatever else is there? ( as spoken of a post or two ago , and illustrated (B) except no green particle at the centre ?

" Unquote

 

 

 

So how is a water wave an example of this? Any question about whether there are "particles of substance" happens at a much, much smaller scale.

[geordief]

Strange,are the waves that are associated with particles in quantum theory moving waves or is this a "static field"?

If we are talking of moving (dynamic?) fields are there wavefronts associated with the fields?

If so,can these wavefronts intersect with one another?

Edited March 21, 2016 by geordief

[Strange]

You might want to work through the pages here: http://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and-posts/particle-physics-basics/fields-and-their-particles-with-math/ball-on-a-spring-classical/

 

They are a bit mathematical (and he skips some steps, which can make it hard to follow) but you might find it useful.

[geordief]

You might want to work through the pages here: http://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and-posts/particle-physics-basics/fields-and-their-particles-with-math/ball-on-a-spring-classical/

 

They are a bit mathematical (and he skips some steps, which can make it hard to follow) but you might find it useful.

thanks, I will.

[Mike Smith Cosmos]

So how is a water wave an example of this? Any question about whether there are "particles of substance" happens at a much, much smaller scale.

.

I am not certain that it is ? However it does appear to fit in this category of things that " wiggle and bounce" , that according to Stranges ref. prof mattstras. Undertake Classical oscillatory motion. The drops of water you see astronauts playing with in the space station seem to " wiggle " in front of them . I am not saying specifically , that that is THE correct model . But medium , does interplay with , mass, in a wiggles , bounces, mode . Often !

 

Perhaps a ' non broken' wave is more apt . Where the wave travels without the ' breaking wave ' collapse .

But as discussed with Analogies , ( the analogies , though useful can only go so far) , enough to set one going in a direction or course of research .

 

I am not sure on the matter of ' scale ' ? Perhaps wavelength of oscillation and distances involved with particles converge when dealing with quantum size particles ( scale )

 

Mike

 

Ps . the collapse is more analogous to the point of ' wave giving up ' its energy ?

Edited March 22, 2016 by Mike Smith Cosmos