archived as http://www.stealthskater.com/Documents/Mass_01.doc [pdf]

more of this topic at http://www.stealthskater.com/Science.htm

note: because important we-sites are frequently "here today but gone tomorrow", the following was archived on November 10, 2008. This is NOT an attempt to divert readers from the aforementioned website. Indeed, the reader should only read this back-up copy if the updated original cannot be found at the original author's site.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/38788/title/Standard_model_gets_right_answer_for_proton%2C_neutron_masses

Standard Model gets right answer for proton, neutron massescorrect calculation strengthens theory of quark-gluon interactions in nuclear particles

by Ron Cowen / Science NewsNovember 20th, 2008

When it comes to weighty matters, a new study confirms that quarks and gluons rule the Universe.

One of the largest computational efforts to calculate the masses of protons and neutrons shows that the Standard Model of Particle Physics predicts those masses with an uncertainty of less than 4 percent.

Christian Hoelbling (affiliated with the Bergische Universtät Wuppertal in Germany, the Eötvös University in Budapest, and the CNRS in Marseille, France) and his colleagues report their findings in the Nov. 21 Science.

Nearly all the mass of ordinary matter consists of atomic nuclei which are composed of neutrons and protons. These particles are in turn composed of quarks, which are held together by massless particles called gluons.

Gluons are the messenger particles that carry the "strong nuclear force" and are constantly being exchanged by the quarks as described by the theory known as Quantum ChromoDynamics (QCD). These exchanges bind quarks together by changing a quark property known as "color charge". This charge is similar to electric charge but comes in 3 different types whimsically referred to as "red", "green", and "blue". 6 different types of quarks interact with 8 varieties of gluons to create a panoply of elementary particles.

The new computations confirm a prediction of QCD, the authors say. That prediction is that the masses of particles such as the neutron and proton come from the energy associated with the interactions between quarks and gluons.

Calculating exactly how those interactions generate the masses of protons and neutrons requires several types of approximations. That’s in part because QCD has some peculiar properties. Because the gluon-mediated force between quarks grows stronger as they separate, quarks can never be seen as free agents but only in pairs. On the other hand, at extremely short distances (which can be probed at high energies), quarks and gluons interact very weakly.

In their calculations, Hoelbling and collaborators approximated the continuum of space-time with a 4-dimensional crystal lattice composed of discrete points spaced along columns and rows. The researchers solved the equations of QCD on finer and finer lattices and then extrapolated the results to

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the continuum, painstakingly accounting and measuring every approximation and uncertainty along the way.

Although the match between QCD and known particle masses was expected, the finding is still important, the team asserts. “It was stated as a conjecture over 3 decades ago that these fundamental particles (quarks and gluons) would never be observed but rather only bound states of them. Like the proton and the neutron,” Hoelbling and colleagues explained in an e-mail message. Moreover, the team says, physicists can now more confidently apply QCD to other phenomena in particle physics that still require a QCD explanation.

“Because these accurate calculations agree with laboratory measurements, we now know -- rather than just believe -- that the source of mass of everyday matter is QCD,” notes Andreas Kronfeld of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill. in a commentary accompanying the Science article.

In other words, QCD is QED.

Reader CommentsJames Essig, Nov. 20, 2008 at 11:20pm

This reported predictive success of the Standard Model shows what a marvelous achievement the Standard Model is. If the LHC of CERN discovers the Higgs Boson, this would put the Standard Model on all the more stable footing.

Note, however, that even if the Higgs Boson is discovered at the LHC, there still remains the possibility that quarks -- and perhaps even leptons -- have a sub-structure or sub-composition that is not excited at the level of ordinary QCD physics.

For instance, the reduced mass of the nucleons that comprise the Helium nucleus relative to the rest mass of the constituent particles in their unbound states is accurately accounted for by the energy released in the fusion process by which the Helium nucleus forms from nuclear fusion process involving the precursor particles. The quantity of the energy so released was common knowledge to nuclear physicists before the discovery of quarks and the formation of Quantum ChromoDynamics (QCD) theory.

Thus there remains a possibility that the LHC and/or the proposed 1-to-2 TeV Linac will produce strong evidence of a substructure to quarks and/or leptons including perhaps additional nuclear forces by exciting particle decay modes that have not been previously observed.

Regardless, the Standard Model is a beautiful model and may have unforeseen applications such as the production of stable particles called "strangelets" which include strange quarks. The possible development of such particles might even eventually lead to novel materials made of strange matter for which novel applications within the field of nuclear energy may arise.

Some sort of exotic matter that might be based on unforeseen stable or metastable bound states involving top and/or bottom quarks may present itself in the future of QCD applications.

Either way, the Standard Model will remain a valuable tool for decades to come

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http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/80beats/2008/11/21/confirmed-scientists-understand-where-mass-comes-from/

Confirmed: Scientists Understand Where Mass Comes Fromby Eliza Strickland

Discover Magazine / November 21, 2008

The Sandard Model of physics got it right when it predicted where the mass of ordinary matter comes from, according to a massive new computational effort. Particle physics explains that the bulk of atoms is made up of protons and neutrons which are themselves composed of smaller particles known as quarks which in turn are bound by gluons. The odd thing is this: the mass of gluons is zero and the mass of quarks accounts for only 5 percent. Where, therefore, is the missing 95 percent? [App_A]

According to theory, the answer is that the energy from the interactions between quarks and gluons accounts for the excess mass (because as Einstein’s famous E=mc² equation proved, energy and mass are equivalent). Gluons are the carriers of the strong nuclear force that binds 3 quarks together to form one proton or neutron. These gluons are constantly popping into existence and disappearing again. The energy of these vacuum fluctuations has to be included in the total mass of the proton and neutron [App_B]. The new study finally crunched the numbers on how much energy is created in these fluctuations and confirmed the theory. But it took a supercomputer over a year to do so.

The theory that describes the interactions of quarks and gluons is known as Quantum ChromoDynamics (or QCD). These exchanges bind quarks together by changing a quark property known as "color charge". This charge is similar to electric charge but comes in 3 different types whimsically referred to as "red", "green", and "blue". 6 different types of quarks interact with 8 varieties of gluons to create a panoply of elementary particles [Science News]. Calculating these interactions was a massive task as researchers explain in an article in Science [subscription required]. The team used more than a year of time on the parallel computer network at Jülich which can handle 200 teraflops (i.e., 200 trillion arithmetical calculations per second).

But what, you may be saying, of the Higgs boson? It is often mentioned as an elusive particle that endows other particles with mass. The Large Hadron Collider will search for it when it starts up again next year.

But the Higgs is thought to explain only where the mass of the quarks themselves comes from. The new work confirms that the mass of the stuff around us is due only in very small part to the masses of quarks themselves. Most of it comes from the way they interact [Nature News].

Related Content:DISCOVER: The Glue That Holds the World Together tells the strange story of gluonsDISCOVER: Beyond the Higgs: the LHC might see the quark-gluon plasma that existed just after

the Big Bang80beats: All Systems Go for World’s Largest Particle Smasher

Readers Comments

1. Uncle Al / November 21, 2008 at 2:06 pm

The Higgs mechanism is discounted by 95% before the LHC looks! Contemporary physical theory derives from deep mathematical symmetries. Empirical reality is all about symmetry breakings. Yang and Lee demonstrated the hubris of elegance over utility. Approximate physical theory can fail. Gravitation is flummoxed by discrete mass distributions,

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http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/tettet3.png(stereogram) Centers of mass gravitation between the diagonal pair diverges 3.66%

difference/average from 28 handshakes projected upon the center of mass line and summed.

Isotropic vacuum demands angular momentum conservation through Noether’s theorem. Lab and cosmological vacuum EM show perfect isotropy. Equivalence Principle tests validate the massed sector. Do left and right shoes fall identically? If reality is teleparallel gravitation with spacetime torsion, opposed solid single crystals of quartz in space groups P3(1)21 and P3(2)21 will give a net non-zero Eotvos experiment output. Their atomic mass distributions are non-superposable mirror images: 0.113 nm3 shoes gaplessly 3-D tesselated into self-similar 1023-member crystals.

Elegant physical theory is fundamentally wrong for having a falsified founding postulate if the EP has a parity violation. Failure of quantized gravitations is implicit. The nature of mass remains undecided. S omebody should perform the parity Eotvos experiment. Somebody should look.

2. Remigiusz Zarosinski / November 21, 2008 at 5:33 pm

I apologize for my English. But I hope you try to understand what I am writing about.

I have adequate reason that you will be interested to ask for more details of the Universal Theory of the Universe. The theory that describes the interactions of quarks and gluons is wrong because interpretation of results of experiments is wrong.

The Universe started by creating space-time. There are points in space-time and a distance between 2 points is unchangeable. Every point has a force (gravitron) whose value is conditional upon whole energy (also transformed in a matter) near the point. The existence of gravitrons is vital for development and existence of the Universe.

When value of a gravitron overrun max, the force is broken and the point evolves a black hole which open for the Universe a new dimension to conquer Emath (i.e., the Entity in which the Universe was born). During growing of the Universe from the beginning new created elements necessary to build the space-time where created with surplus which was transformed in static energy (heat, pressure, …). Value of static energy was increasing and also value of gravitrons.

When value of gravitron extended max, it created the first black hole. It was beginning of transformation from static to kinetic energy. Reducing of the intensity of heat was beginning of transformation of energy into a matter. When gravity in a center of the Universe dropped to zero, the waves of energy moved first to the Center and next de-contracted to meet incoming. It created new black holes, lowered heat, and was beginning of galaxies.

The quarks are seeds of space-time. When one reached Emeth not conquered by space-time, it created one point of space-time. It is very important that gravitrons push away quarks from points of time-space and control movement of a mater in space-time.

Gravitron has also another very important assignment. One is to continue to register an energy level of the point of space-time. Yes!! It is also the way the Universe registers what you say what you think and what you dream. We are elements of next transformation from energy of Iife to energy of Intelligence. We not only register information (senses) but also process them.

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We use a brain but also a computers. Do we help the Universe how to process all information registered from every point of the space-time? Possible. Think about the consequences. I believe that in the near future, we can download some stored information to create 3-dimensional movies from any time and any place from the Past to verify not what the people were talking about but at the same time we will know what they were thinking. Politics beware.

As you probably see, the electromagnetic field and gravity field are united.

As you know, our galaxy and we are moving through the time-space with very high velocity. Gravitrons control movement of a nuclei. But think about an electron. Is it a part of an atom? And what about its dualism?

No! The electron is no part of the atom. The nuclei moving near a point of space-time (its mass) raises gravity and exposes electrons released by gravitrons. The gravitron leashed an electron till it accumulate quantum of energy it needs to conquer the Emeth. It is why a gravitron rises when level of any energy near the point rises.

I am writing science papers to prove my theory. I need time. I know it will revolutionize our knowledge about the Universe and not only in physics. Please do not hesitate to contact me with questions.

3. peet / November 21, 2008 at 5:57 pm

What is it with all these rambling psuedo-physics kooks?

4. Remigiusz Zarosinski / November 21, 2008 at 9:27 pm Dear Peet:

Do you still believe that the Earth is flat or that the Earth is the center of Universe?Do you know that your body is 95% “empty space”?Do you know velocity of your body in your movement through space-time?Do you know what did happen during an experiment in Hadron Collider?I had emailed them before to forewarn very high probability (and way) that it could happen. I

did not cook it!

If you think that my theory is wrong, say it. It is possible that I see what I want to see not what is to see. Or what is so apparent for me is too difficult to see for you because you believe what you were taught.

5. pete / November 22, 2008 at 12:32 am So if someone can reduce energy, the mass will be reduced. Therefore, it becomes weightless?

6. george / November 22, 2008 at 6:49 amIf mass is energy, then that energy from one end of a mass must be transmitted through the

whole mass to the area of the mass that is being say pushed. (For example, the side of a heavy pendulum that is being pushed by a hand touching it only in one spot.)

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Therefore if there was a way to interrupt the flow of that energy through the mass, then you would decrease the object’s resistance to being pushed (its inertia).

Very interesting implications. It means that inertia can be controlled by putting an energy insulator in the middle of an object.

7. Ragarnok / November 22, 2008 at 11:59 amSo there is no Higgs particle? The guys at the LHC are not going to like this!

8. Anon / November 22, 2008 at 5:36 pm Pete --

Matter and energy are the same thing (there’s a famous formula equating the two: E = mc²). So by definition, space with nothing in it is massless.

9. A Farking Physicist / November 22, 2008 at 8:28 pm As a quantum physicist, I’m really getting a kick out of these comments.

10. kevinc / November 23, 2008 at 9:00 amI take interest in this stuff when I read it. But I’m no student of it. So let me see if I understand.

When you measure the mass of a proton or neutron from a distance, you get some amount. But when you look closely at the quarks that comprise the particle, you only find 5% of that amount? And this is because 95% of the mass is not sitting in the quarks but moving between them as energy. Right?

Assuming that was right, does this mean that a particle with mass is the same as a bundle of energy that stays clumped together? A proton is a clump of energy made of 3 clumps that are quarks and lots of filler called gluons. Just like an atom has clumps called protons, neutrons, etc. If so, then I think I understand the single mass-energy concept much better.

So does this mean that if energy moves around from your perspective, it doesn’t pull you with gravity. But if you step back far enough away that it appears to hold still (i.e., it comprises a particle), it does pull you? Could the mass of an object depend on how much energy it has and how tightly that energy is kept together? Does the swirling energy that comprises a particle produce an interference pattern over time as the particle moves? And is that responsible for particles having properties of waves?

Well, I guess I will be thinking about Quantum Physics all day now. Will someone with more education please clarify this stuff for me?

11. pat / November 24, 2008 at 10:34 amComments on science-news sites are laugh-out-loud delicious.

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12. Conrad J. Countess / November 24, 2008 at 10:59 am

The origin of mass has to be space itself or the vacuum as it is not totally empty and has a ground state energy from and within which the Universe expands. And since energy and mass are equivalent, the most basic mass of the Universe has to be the ground state energy (i.e., mass of the vacuum).

Matter gets its mass from space which it is a condensation of; and its motion in space since mass also comes from motion. Einstein was right when he said that "matter is a manifestation of the curvature of space-time" because it is space-time condensed from particles of space energy in circular and/or spherical rotation.

E=mc(squared) = E=mc(circled). In other words, the rest mass of a particle comes from the circular and/ or spherical motion that it acquires when the angular momentum and speed of the wave when frequency momentum is high enough and equals and balances the speed and momentum of the wave along the linear path for a balance of centripetal and centrifugal forces resulting in circular and or spherical motion.

This is why energy equals matter at the conversion factor of c2. Because c2 is not just a mathematical conversion facto. It is an actual conversion frequency where energy turns to matter because it takes on a circular and or spherical form at this frequency/wavelength of c2.

This is what c2 means geometrically. Analogous to a line of 1-inch in the horizontal direction times a line of 1-inch in the vertical or 90-degree angular direction to create a square inch, the speed-of-light in the linear direction times the speed-of-light in the 90 degree angular direction gives rise to a 90 degree arc which if constant creates circular motion and a balance of centripetal and centrifugal forces. This is how a wave turns to a particle and energy acquires rest mass.

Long version: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dsn5q6f_102hm2wwrhf&hl=enShort version: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dsn5q6f_101hgtjv9fb&hl=en

13. Amos Kenigsberg (Discover Web Editor) / November 24, 2008 at 2:41 pm Howdy. I appreciate that some folks may have a different perspective on some of the big

questions about how the Universe works. But we’re really focused on the generally accepted major theories of Science. I’d like to try to keep the discussion focused around that.

to kevinc:Lots of questions here, but just a quick reply. Mass is equivalent to energy in some senses. But

it’s not entirely the same. Protons and quarks are particles -- not clumps of energy. The energy of the quark interactions does have a certain mass, though. And in fact, that’s most of the mass of the proton.

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http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iYftcP0kR2mf032kK3WFVR9k_O2A

E=mc2: 103 years later, Einstein's proven rightGoogle / November 21, 2008

PARIS (AFP) — It's taken more than a century. But Einstein's celebrated formula E=mc2 has finally been corroborated, thanks to a heroic computational effort by French, German, and Hungarian physicists.

A brainpower consortium led by Laurent Lellouch of France's Centre for Theoretical Physics using some of the World's mightiest supercomputers have set down the calculations for estimating the mass of protons and neutrons (he particles at the nucleus of atoms).

According to the conventional model of particle physics, protons and neutrons comprise smaller particles known as quarks which in turn are bound by gluons.

The odd thing is the mass of gluons is zero and the mass of quarks is only 5 percent. Where, therefore, is the missing 95 percent?

According to the study published in the U.S. journal Science on Thursday, the answer comes from the energy from the movements and interactions of quarks and gluons.

In other words, energy and mass are equivalent as Einstein proposed in his Special Theory of Relativity in 1905.

The E=mc2 formula shows that mass can be converted into energy and energy can be converted into mass.

By showing how much energy would be released if a certain amount of mass were to be converted into energy, the equation has been used many times (most famously as the inspirational basis for building atomic weapons).

But resolving E=mc2 at the scale of subatomic particles -- in equations called Quantum ChromoDynamics -- has been fiendishly difficult.

"Until now, this has been a hypothesis," France's National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) said proudly in a press release. "It has now been corroborated for the first time."

For those keen to know more, the computations involve "envisioning space and time as part of a 4-dimensional crystal lattice with discrete points spaced along columns and rows."

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http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16095-its-confirmed-matter-is-merely-vacuum-fluctuations.html

It's confirmed: Matter is merely vacuum fluctuationsby Stephen Battersby

New Scientist / November 220, 008

Matter is built on flaky foundations. Physicists have now confirmed that the apparently substantial stuff is actually no more than fluctuations in the quantum vacuum.

The researchers simulated the frantic activity that goes on inside protons and neutrons. These particles provide almost all the mass of ordinary matter.

Each proton (or neutron) is made of 3 quarks. But the individual masses of these quarks only add up to about 1% of the proton's mass. So what accounts for the rest of it?

Theory says it is created by the force that binds quarks together (called the "strong nuclear force"). In quantum terms, the strong force is carried by a field of virtual particles called gluons, randomly popping into existence and disappearing again. The energy of these vacuum fluctuations has to be included in the total mass of the proton and neutron.

But it has taken decades to work out the actual numbers. The strong force is described by the equations of Quantum ChromoDynamics (or QCD) which are too difficult to solve in most cases.

So physicists have developed a method called lattice QCD which models smooth space and time as a grid of separate points. This pixel-lated approach allows the complexities of the strong force to be simulated approximately by computer.

Gnarly calculation

Until recently, lattice QCD calculations concentrated on the virtual gluons and ignored another important component of the vacuum -- namely pairs of virtual quarks and antiquarks.

Quark-antiquark pairs can pop up and momentarily transform a proton into a different, more exotic particle. In fact, the true proton is the sum of all these possibilities going on at once.

Virtual quarks make the calculations much more complicated involving a matrix of more than 10,000 trillion numbers, says team member Stephan Dürr of the John von Neumann Institute for Computing in Jülich, Germany.

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"There is no computer on Earth that could possibly store such a big matrix in its memory," Dürr told New Scientist. "So some trickery goes into evaluating it."

Crunch time

Several groups have been working out ways to handle these technical problems. 5ive years ago, a team led by Christine Davies of the University of Glasgow, UK managed to calculate the mass of an exotic particle called the B_c meson.

That particle contains only 2 quarks, making it simpler to simulate than the 3-quark proton. To tackle protons and neutrons, Dürr's team used months of time on the parallel computer network at Jülich which can handle 200 teraflops (or 200 trillion arithmetical calculations per second).

Even so, they had to tailor their code to use the network efficiently. "We spent an enormous effort to make sure our code would make optimum use of the machine," says Dürr.

Without the quarks, earlier simulations got the proton mass wrong by about 10%. With them, Dürr gets a figure within 2% of the value measured by experiments.

Higgs field

Although physicists expected theory to match experiment eventually, it is an important landmark. "The great thing is it shows that you can get close to experiments," says Davies. "Now that we know that lattice QCD works, we want to make accurate calculations of particle properties -- not just mass."

That will allow physicists to test QCD and look for effects beyond known physics. For now, Dürr's calculation shows that QCD describes quark-based particles accurately and tells us that most of our mass comes from virtual quarks and gluons fizzing away in the quantum vacuum.

The Higgs field is also thought to make a small contribution, giving mass to individual quarks as well as to electrons and some other particles. The Higgs field creates mass out of the quantum vacuum too, in the form of virtual Higgs bosons. So if the LHC confirms that the Higgs exists, it will mean that all reality is virtual.

Reader Comments

1. Seth / Nov 24, 2008 17:58:39 GMT

According to the article as I understand it, the quantum vacuum fluctuations account for 90% of the mass. So 10% is still "real" and not virtual. Is this right?

2. Wax / Nov 25, 2008 03:46:48 GMT

That's the same proportion of dark and light matter in the Universe (astronomically speaking). The Marcocosm reflects the microcosm. Spooky.....

3. Skivehard / Nov 21, 2008 10:25:59

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What really gets confirmed here is the effectiveness of lattice QCD (i.e., a way of doing ridiculously hard QCD calculations). The stuff about most (but not all) of the mass of a proton coming not from the valence quarks but from the virtual cloud that surrounds them is kind of old news. Still awesome, but it's not really the story here.

4. Jeremy / Nov 20, 2008 20:08:12 GMT

How can energy be mass? I thought mass was "frozen energy". If it's in one form, then it can't be the other. Is it in an in-between state in the nucleus?

5. Anonymous / Nov 20, 2008 20:14:58 GMT

Energy is a component of mass. The quarks give it its intrinsic rest mass. Their motion and the gluons effect gives it the rest (if I'm not horribly mistaken).

6. Ben / Nov 20, 2008 20:58:11 GMT

It's easier to think of it as both (i.e., mass-energy). Particles (mass) can display wave-like (i.e., energy) properties as in electron interference patterns and vice versa. I t all depends what scale and energy levels that one works with.

Look it up on Wikipedia (for a general guide) or find some articles/journals on Google if you want a more in-depth idea. Mine was the barest tip of the iceberg

7. Neglewis / Nov 21, 2008 09:53:01 GMT

Since I was in school, my understanding of energy-mass was related with waves. Sound waves, light waves, energy waves...

But if elementary particles are just "spinning disks" of energy, this means that the gravity is just a "representation" or effect of those particles, no?

If a spinning disk has no fluctuation if is not shaken, and if it is shaken then you can "feel it" that is hard to move... Then at "quantum level", the "g" force gravity is just a disturbance of the forces.

If the "spin" of all particle are aligned, synchronized, or "stabilized" on a certain direction (in more than 3 dimensions 4D, 5D...), then we have a "direction" that all spinning particle will follow (to the center of the Earth?)

My question is what forces (waves) must exist in order to change the spinning of a particle? If a particle can influence the spinning of another particle (some sorts of wave) ,then it can be blocked too, no?

8. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 12:39:48 GMT

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Neglewis: "But if elementary particles are just "spinning disks" of energy, this means that the gravity is just a "representation" or effect of those particles, no?"

An elementary particle like an electron, for example, is thought to be a point without structure. So the concept of rotation is meaningless. Furthermore this spin is quantized along the axis of measurement when the measurement is performed.

In reality, there is no disk, there is no point, there is no spin, and there is no electron. These are all just real world terms that we pin on various aspects of the system to help visualize what is going on.

There is the void. It is full of a frothing, seething sea of high-frequency fluctuations in the various fields that permeate it. These fluctuations are apparently quantized and can be interpreted as "particles" (if you like).

In reality, what we have are quasi-stable or stable associations of various properties. We call these things "particles". Other combinations of properties are unstable, so we ignore them. When these associations change, they change to other stable forms.

The unusual thing is that these stable associations are not well localized. At least not until they interact with a reasonably large collection of associations that reduce its inherent randomness and places constraints on its location and other properties.

9. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 20, 2008 22:00:35 GMT

Jeremy: "How can energy be mass? I thought mass was 'frozen energy'. If it's in one form' then it can't be the other."

It's not so much "frozen" as it is simply "localized". If you have a box containing a rotating disk, then the mass of the box and its contents are at least in part due to the kinetic energy of the particles composing the spinning disk.

Now in what way is the energy of this spinning disk "frozen"? It may not be visible to you that the energy is kinetic since it resides in a box. But it is still there. And it isn't "frozen".

Now the energy of a non-composite particle like an electron is strictly its self energy which is created through a polarization of the vacuum.

In the case of an electron, this is pictured as a point of infinite charge causing the virtual particle pairs that are said to spontaneously appear in the vacuum, to spread apart, farther than they normally would. The positive charges being dragged a little farther toward the infinitely-charged negative electron core and the negative charges being pushed away.

This charge imbalance in the vacuum in addition to the larger volume of space available as greater radii are considered screens the infinite electron charge and produces the observed electric field. This polarization takes energy and it takes the form of the electron's self energy.

The same principles are at work with every particle although with composite particles like protons, the field strengths are constant rather than 1/r2.

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In any case, all of reality is thought to be composed in this manner. Nothing but vacuum fluctuations in which the truly fundamental particles are stable or quasi-stable configurations in the underlying vacuum fields.

Stability is always the issue in Quantum Mechanics although it's generally not explicitly stated. This is why the field equations are always solved for their eigenvalues as these values are stable under the transformation matrices that are used to describe the wave function.

10. Slobodan / Nov 25, 2008 07:48:21 GMT

Well done, Decarian. Thanks for this nice post. One of the most accurate and yet simple and understandable explanation of vacuum quantum fluctuations for most of the readers.

This accurately describes what I wrote in brief in my "Virtual World" post. Having in mind what we consider as "virtual", we could say that this is a virtual world since the reality that we can observe depends explicitly by our standpoint as the observer.

We are those who named and declared something to be mass (particle) or energy depending what we can see in our observation. What's more, we give names for all occurrences and configurations of energies of vacuum which quantum fluctuations and configurations appear to us as different fundamental particles!

11. 2smrt47 / Nov 21, 2008 18:30:32 GMT

Energy=mass and mass=energy (E=mc2 and all). Simple, really; nothing new. The difficulty lies in the second-order and higher -effects because of the interactions between the virtual particles and 'real' particles is also energy. Which has mass.

12. Preposterous / Nov 22, 2008 13:33:53 GMT 2008

An easy way to think of matter is that it is energy trapped in patterns

13. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 22, 2008 01:52:48 GMT 2008

The modern view of Quantum Mechanics holds that if a particle has a potential of being in several places, it exists in those several places at the same time. This is a requirement to make the principle of "supposition" workable.

For example, if a photon has a choice of moving thorough slit 'A' and slit 'B', it will choose to be in both and interfere with itself on the outgoing side. The idea of how to determine the probability of a particle being here or there is to sum (as a vector) the probability of it reaching that point through all possible trajectories and all possible histories.

The odd thing is that the photon might also be in Alpha Centauri or across the Universe. You see, there is no speed limit in Quantum Mechanics. It's possible (although highly unlikely) that a photon emitted on Earth now may be detected now anywhere in the Universe. In fact, the photon is thought can even arrive before it is emitted.

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It all seems very odd. But in reality, it comes down to this. When a particle falls into the void, it becomes part of the vacuum fluctuations that fill the void. Some of those fluctuations have come from the locality around the experimental apparatus and some have come from any other place in the Universe.

All of this stuff interacts and gets churned up. Tthe final result when the particle is extracted from the void is a particle with properties that have been influenced by forces from all over the Universe as if it had gone there itself at infinite speed and had a party and then came back to be detected.

How does a particle go back in time? Well, it doesn't of course. But it will exchange properties with vacuum fluctuations that are from the Past and -- in doing so -- be colored as if it had traveled back in time.

15. Polemos / Nov 20, 2008 22:04:28 GMT

Superfluid vacuum is elastic. Just compress it and the imparted energy will be stored in the form of persistent vortices (i.e., elementary particles). Compress the superfluid vacuum still more,and the elementary particles will solidify into quantum crystals capable of teleportation (cf. Crystals of solid helium freely teleport within a volume of superfluid helium).

We live inside a black hole which keeps accreting mass. The pressure of the superfluid vacuum in the black hole is increasing. By December 31, 2014, the elementary particles we are composed of will turn into quantum crystals. The Jumpers are coming!

16. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 20, 2008 22:25:03 GMT

Polemos: "We live inside a black hole which keeps accreting mass"

There is a valid argument that your claim (above) is correct.

Polemos: "Superfluid vacuum is elastic. Just compress it and the imparted energy will be stored in the form of persistent vortices (i.e., elementary particles)."

No doubt reality is similar. Not all particles have spin.

What is and isn't "matter "is all relative to the observer. What is a "real" particle and what is a "virtual" particle is also relative to the observer.

Theoretically (and indicated but not positively proven through experiment) acceleration causes some portion of the vacuum energy to be observed as real thermal radiation. This radiation was first postulated by a physicist named Uhnru I believe and became the basis for the theorized Hawking radiation that is emitted by the vacuum around black holes.

The thinking goes that if acceleration produces a realization of thermal radiation, then the acceleration experienced by the vacuum near a black hole should do the same thing under the principle of Equivalence.

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It's not really productive to worry too much about what is "real" and what is "virtual" since there is no firm basis for the categorization. Particles are a quantized bias in the field fluctuations that compose reality. And as such, they are transient in their position but well-defined in terms of their detection.

When an atom emits an electron, for example, it loses a quantized amount of energy, spin, momentum, charge, etc. But that "stuff" just falls into the vacuum. Eventually some of these lost properties will pop up somewhere else (perhaps with some additional properties). They will interact with a "real" particle that we will observe and think because of the observation that we have observed the movement of this electron to another place when in fact the electron never existed in the first place.

It was a name given to the quantized bundle of properties that were combined with the field fluctuations that make up the churning properties of the vacuum.

17. Polemos / Nov 20, 2008 21:16:42 GMT

The mass of a particle is not engendered by the particle's interaction with the ambient vacuum or with distant stars. Mass is gravity itself. Vacuum is composed of virtual gravity fluxes. Elementary particles are persistent patterns of these virtual gravity fluxes.

This persistence is known as "inertia" and "rest mass". The virtual gravity fluxes of ambient vacuum are massive, too. But this mass is not localized and is not directly detectable. Clueless physicists call it "dark matter."

18. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 20, 2008 22:40:18 GMT

Polemos: "Mass is gravity itself."

Incorrect. Photons have no mass but do gravitate. Energy gravitates as well as matter.

19. The Stranger / Nov 21, 2008 01:58:26 GMT

Decarian: "Photons have no mass but do gravitate"

No, they don't. They just follow the curvature of space.

20. Polemos /Nov 21, 2008 07:25:21 GMT

The mass of a proton is localized and is known as "rest mass". The mass of vacuum is delocalized (i.e., you cannot observe its source, but you can observe its action). The mass of a photon is semi-localized.

By the way, slowing photons in a Bose-Einstein condensate makes them stupendously heavy.

21. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 09:06:29 GMT15

Gravitational field strength is determined by the energy, momentum of the body in question. Photons have both energy and momentum.

High-energy photons can spontaneously transform into electron pairs. Electrons have rest mass; photons do not.

If photons do not gravitate, then the transformation from one to the other would require the creation and destruction of a gravitational field. If that were possible, then it would be possible to step away the (photon/electron pair) when it is a massless photon and fall toward it (extracting energy) when it is an electron pair.

Infinite amounts of energy could be produced from nowhere if your claim is correct. So it isn't.

22. Ivor Clark / Nov 20, 2008 22:19:20 GMT

Mind blowing stuff this! So Einstein was right: "Everything is just an illusion".

I am fascinated by the idea of "virtual particles" popping into and out of existence (or into and out of our/another universe?). And that at any given moment, most of my mass is made up of this "virtual" stuff. Are these virtual particles also responsible for the Big Bang in our Universe? Does our Universe have to expand simply because of the continuous additional energy provided by these virtual particles after their annihilation, to maintain a kind of cosmic status quo? Is this why space-time is effectively flat because the energy (mass) added that would otherwise curve it is balanced by its expansion rate?

Hmmm … the whole concept of a "virtual reality" reminds me of a movie aptly named 'The Matrix'. Bit of a coincidence, eh?!

23. Jon Maynard / Nov 21, 2008 04:05:00 GMT

If one has to take into account the mass of virtual particles as part of the mass of real particles, then perhaps one should also consider the effect of these virtual particles on empty space outside of real particles. Perhaps empty space then also has a mass because of these virtuals and could explain also "dark matter" and "dark energy".

24. Jim Ward / Nov 21, 2008 04:25:55 GMT

Could it be that the "red shift" is simply energy absorption by virtual particles?

25. Polemos / Nov 21, 2008 09:08:17 GMT

This is a plausible hypothesis. The absorption was more intensive in the past. As the black hole we call the "Universe" accretes more matter from the bigger-scale black hole in which it is nested, its superfluid vacuum becomes more compressed. The entropy of the compressed vacuum is lower, which makes it less dissipative. Eventually (by December 31, 2014) the absorption vanishes completely. Teleportation, eternal youth.

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26. Vendiar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 09:17:40 GMT

Reasonable efforts to compute the total energy of space (or local energy density of space) have been made.

However, the great mystery is that when all of the energy in the vacuum is added up, it exceeds the amount required by something like 100 orders of magnitude. That's the number 1 followed by 100 zeros!

So the question is: What the????

27. Jon Maynard / Nov 21, 2008 13:46:25 GMT

Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that virtual particles are virtual, they are not there all the time. The situation could be like dealing with alternating electric current. There one has to calculate the root-mean-square and not the peak values of the sine wave involved.

With virtual particles, one would have to calculate the mean density based on how many of them are present in a given volume of space and also perhaps also for how long they persist in existing.

28. Tissa Perera / Nov 23, 2008 14:13:31 GMT

Then all space filled with ZPE must have a massive mass equivalent of energy and therefore must collapse into a negative Big Bang and become a single black hole Universe, right?

29. Bobby / Nov 21, 2008 07:09:48 GMT

"All Reality Is Virtual".

Yes, it does not exist. But that is more complicated than it sounds. Basically imagine a state of nothing actually existing. This is an impossible paradox. Nothing can not "exist".

This paradox manifests the reflection of what "nothing" is not. And that's everything. Our brains take credit for witnessing this fluctuation. But the reality is that our brains are not real but rather an infinite light is what deserves credit for our perceptions of the hologram that is our perceived reality in a paradoxial state of nothingness or vaccum/infinitey.

30. Polemos / Nov 21, 2008 09:16:48 GMT

Real particles move by quantum leaps: station→leap→station.

During a "leap", a real particle is delocalized (i.e., it does not exist). During a "station", the particle exists.

Thus, reality is the synthesis of existence and nonexistence. This synthesis is called "Becoming".

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31. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 09:25:17 GMT

Polemos: "Real particles move by quantum leaps: station→leap→station. During a "leap", a real particle is delocalized (i.e., it does not exist)."

You might as well dispense with the concept of a "particle" then since it does not exist as a localized thing outside of interactions with other things. Hence what is imagined as a "particle" is just a quantized interaction with other objects.

The mystery is how Nature keeps track of the properties and mostly keeps them together.

32. Echo Gnome / Nov 21, 2008 10:21:29 GMT

First, if this reality is nothing but the sum of randomized quantum interactions and doesn't in fact exist (as I have always believed), then I must say that this particular region of the vacuum has some very interesting interactions. Also this would also explain the existence (or just the possibility) of directly manipulating the quantum flux resulting in extraordinary phenomena from mental supernature to distorting of apparently 'solid' objects and reality (I'm thinking of extremely large blocks of granite in particular).

Secondly, Polemos, I have seen your comments popping up on a few related articles here on New Scientist and your ideas intrigue me. I would very much like to know where you are getting or extrapolating your information from. Or if you cannot reveal this, then may be some detailed conversation would be appreciated. I'm at echognome@live.co.uk

33. Polemos / Nov 21, 2008 10:58:21 GMT

Thanks for your interest, Echo Gnome. Many of my ideas are original. If they are based on somebody else's thoughts, I usually provide a reference.

For the time being, let's exchange ideas via this site. You have not yet proved your ability to generate novelty. Read this as a primer:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timewave#Precepts_of_novelty_theory

34. Stephen Battersby / Nov 21, 2008 12:40:02 GMT

"All Reality Is Virtual". It only means that the mass of matter comes from virtual particles (i.e., "virtual" as used in Quantum Mechanics). So it doesn't have any ontological relevance. It certainly doesn't imply that nothing exists.

35. Polemos / Nov 21, 2008 14:46:35 GMT

It does have an ontological relevance, Stephen. If REAL mass comes from VIRTUAL particles, then reality is nothing more than persistent virtuality. Matter is a neurosis of the Universe:

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"As has been mentioned according to the holographic idea, matter is also a kind of habit and is constantly born anew out of the implicate, just as the shape of a fountain is created anew out of the constant flow of water that gives it form. Peat humorously refers to the repetitious nature of this process as one of the Universe's neuroses.

"When you have a neurosis, you tend to repeat the same pattern in your life or do the same action as if there' a memory built up and the thing is stuck with that," he says. "I tend to think things like chairs and tables are like that also. They're a sort of material neurosis, a repetition. But there is something subtler going on -- a constant enfolding and unfolding. In this sense, chairs and tables are just habits in this flux. But the flux is the reality even if we tend only to see the habit."

"Indeed, given that the Universe and the laws of Physics that govern it are also products of this flux, then they too must be viewed as habits. Clearly they are habits that are deeply ingrained in the holomovement. But supernormal talents such as immunity to fire indicate that despite their seeming constancy, at least some of the rules that govern reality can be suspended. This means the laws of Physics are not set in stone,but are more like Shainberg's vortices -- whirlpools of such vast inertial power that they are as fixed in the holomovement as our own habits and deeply held convictions are fixed in our thoughts." -- The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot

36. Mjk / Nov 22, 2008 12:56:33 GMT

Are you a physicist? No? Then leave physics to the Physics community!

37. Polemos / Nov 21, 2008 15:24:10 GMT

Novelty theory proposes that the Universe is an engine designed for the production and conservation of novelty. Novelty in this context can be thought of as newness or "extropy" (a term coined by Max More meaning the opposite of entropy). According to McKenna, when novelty is graphed over time, a fractal waveform known as "timewave zero" or simply the "timewave" results. The graph shows at what time periods -- but never at what locations -- novelty increases or decreases.

Considered by some to represent a model of History's most important events, the universal algorithm has also been extrapolated to be a model for Future events. McKenna admitted to the expectation of a "singularity of novelty" and that he and his colleagues projected many hundreds of years into the Future to find when this singularity (runaway "newness" or extropy) could occur. The graph of extropy had many enormous fluctuations over the last 25,000 years. But amazingly, it hit an asymptote at exactly December 21, 2012. [StealthSkater note: 2012 abounds in conspiracy folklore. The remote-viewers allegedly used in the Montauk Project reported seeing the World up until some 2012 date and some sort of existence a year-or-so afterwards. But they could not "see" the reality in between => doc pdf URL ]

In other words, entropy (or habituation) no longer exists after that date. It is impossible to define that state." (http://www.crystalinks.com/2012.html )

***

The above passage provides a key to understanding one of the key attributes of the evolutionary singularity.

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1) Objective reality is a persistent HABIT of the Universe.2) Entropy (or HABITUATION) no longer exists after the date of singularity (December 21,

2012 in McKenna's theory or December 31, 2014 in my theory).3) The dominance of novelty over habituation is the dominance of spirit over matter --

PSYCHOKINESIS and TELEPORTATION.

38. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 12:55:10 GMT

"What does it mean when you say "all reality is virtual"? Does that mean our reality does not exist? Or does it mean something else.:"

Nothing unreal exists. It means something else.

39. Slobodan / Nov 25, 2008 08:57:09 GMT

I would like to describe what I suppose in this case to call VIRTUAL.

The problem here is in the terminology. When we say "virtual", we normally think about imagined stuff -- something that does not exists in our real world. (Like in Second Life as someone said).

What we call REAL means the stuff that we can see, feel, touch, taste, measure, observe, etc. But all these are only our interpretations of our observations.

The only REAL thing in the Universe is that we can observe side effects of various configurations of energies in the vacuum quantum fluctuations. Sometimes they appear to us as particles (or as we like to say - "matter"). Sometimes they appear to us as "energy".

What observer can see depends on the observer itself. Observer by the act of observing change the reality with the observation itself, depending on the type of the observation and the standpoint, you change the state of the observed phenomena.

How you detect a photon? By means of detectors, you actually change the state of the observed photon. You can observe photon only by interactions that it makes. But during the interaction, the photon is changed so you can never observe the photon since while observing you are changing it. The same is with other "particles".

Being confused about this, we made a hypothesis abut dual nature of the matter.

Matter does not have dual nature. Only we as observers could see dual manifestations of the energy states of the vacuum and interpret them as matter or energy. [StealthSkater note: a recent science article indeed claimed that matter has both particle and wave properties and is therefore independent of the observation experiment.]

That is why I call it Virtual World -- a Universe consisted of a foam of vacuum quantum energy fluctuation bubbles that can manifest to us as matter or energy (or dark matter and dark energy -- (another simplified explanations for observations that we cannot classify or explain) or whatever else.

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Implications of such a model are great. If this model of the Universe is showed to be correct and true, it's implications will completely change future developments in sciences. Not to mention our overviews on the Universe, our existence, philosophy, and all existing religions.

40. Benjamin D / Nov 21, 2008 07:02:06 GMT

It seems that the statement "the reality is virtual" is as much justified as "the virtuality is real". If the term "virtual" means "non-real" and the reality is not real, then the term "virtual" means non-non-real = real. And so the virtuality is the true reality and so on. And thus, this statement leads to endless logical contradictions.

The problem here is that the questions "what is the matter?" and "what is the energy?" do not belong to the field of natural science but rather to philosophical or religious tasteful discussions.

The subject of Physics is interaction between various forms of the reality (not a virtuality, although a virtual representation may be mathematically truly effective as in the case of complex functions in Quantum Mechanics). Everything else is the question of the preferable axioms and the best working mathematics.

One may use the mass stating that the energy is the mass derivative or opposite approach or mass-energy dualism.

I have no intention to diminish the new theory. Rather quite the opposite. But I truly believe that the Reality would be greatly thankful if the theorists grant It with some chance for surviving.

41. No One / Nov 21, 2008 08:54:47 GMT

So okay … obviously there are fluctuations and quarks are not stable and move about between matter because well they can. Seems as this would support M-theory with vibrations and all having connectivity. And even that weird theory about all matter is so interconnected that doing something here is almost instantaneous across the other side of the Universe. It has a name except I'm not a jargon person.

But is this all true? If reality is virtual, then the observer affect makes sense. I must admit I would like to believe that matter was so easily interchangeable and malleable to the point of instant manipulation. Sure makes the idea about a "force field" more real. Or is that too virtual?

Lol! I'll wait until the movie comes out.

42. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 21, 2008 09:31:43 GMT

No one: "So okay … obviously there are fluctuations and quarks are not stable and move about between matter because well they can."

Quarks are stable, although they must come at least in pairs that cannot be separated.

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And Quarks do NOT move about between matter. They are well encapsulated in packets of 2 or 3 or possibly in the core of neutron stars where neutrons are pressed together so tight that a quark plasma forms (which of course may not be possible to exist at all).

43. Slobodan / Nov 21, 2008 1 2:12:34 GMT

"If the LHC confirms that the Higgs exists, it will mean all reality is virtual." !!!

This article -- although I couldn't say that it gives us the PROOF -- has a lot of sense. Actually, I share the same standpoint for a long time. That matter and energy as we know them are only occurrences of quantum fluctuations of the vacuum.

For decades, we are learning about dual nature of matter and energy. But it was only a simplified human explanation, being in the position of an observer. No one really and reasonably explained what does it mean -- i.e., the dual nature of matter>

With more and more knowledge about subatomic particles like quarks, muons, gluons, bosons etc., we are going deeper and deeper in the core of the structure of the Universe. Where is the end of such deeper insights? What is the smallest possible particle? Could humankind ever find out the whole truth about Universe in which we live?

I do not think that the "smallest possible particle" is a particle at all. Mostly, it is a bubble of quantum fluctuations that appear randomly in the form of the matter or energy or both.

On the Macro plan, we could ask ourselves if the movement, energy, matter, antimatter, dark matter, mass, etc. are "real" or "virtual" stuff?

When I say "virtual", I think that only occurrences that we can observe are virtual because they are dependable on our standpoindt as the observer. For example, if I take my pencil and move it from point 'A' to point 'B', did I move the pencil as the piece of matter or it was only the propagation of occurrences (states) of the quantum fluctuations of vacuum in space-time?

If the matter is given and determined by quantum fluctuations (I could swallow this somehow), we could conclude that particles and matter do not travel in time and space at all. The only thing that really travel through space-time is a propagation wave of vacuum quantum fluctuations. This could also explain limits in the maximum speed-of-light and many other things in the field of theoretical Physics.

But if it shows to be a truth, it would imply a huge change in our philosophy, religions, and science.

Post Scriptum:If I am defined to be specific field of quantum fluctuation occurrences in space-time and my

pencil traveling from 'A' to 'B' is also another field of specific propagation of vacuum quantum fluctuations, the question is what caused intentional changes or propagation of quantum fluctuations from point 'A' to point 'B'? Only my will? My consciousness? What is than our consciousness? Just another quantum fluctuation of vacuum? Think about it :-))

44. Dave Schindler / Nov 21, 2008 13:21:07 GMT22

I feel that all particles have a greater mass than their components only because of their relative motion. Like jumping on a scale to increase your weight.

In a similar cosmological vein, I feel that there are no vibrating strings merely zones where the influence of separate forces meet to form a line or plane of greater influence that seems like a string similar to the structure of soap bubbles. Areas where they touch are thicker at first due to the combined influence of water and soap that makes up the bubble until the forces that hold the bubbles' shapes resolve themselves and thin out. This seems to be a model for real space on both immeasurably vast and infinitesimally small spaces.

45. Q-blip / Nov 21, 2008 14:14:14 GMT

98% proton mass accounted for in this model is remarkable. It is mind-blowing that our human drama is built on non/slow decaying objects such as proton which is a lump of short-lived fluctuations.

It is probably more comforting to think that the whole universe/platform is a quantum computer and our human drama is a screen play written in computer code. A bit like 'The Matrix' except we don't know what the reality is if this quantum computer is switched off.

46. Edward / Nov 21, 2008 14:16:23 GMT

"Extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence!"

It is a pity that Physics is evolving into another religion. Some questions worth reconsidering:1) Are physicists interpreting Quantum Mechanics correctly?2) What is the best interpretation of the wave function as to match reality?

47. Q-blip / Nov 22, 2008 05:14:34 GMT

The result of this article was long anticipated when QCD was found to pass all numerical calculation thrown at it. Unfortunately, there is lack of solid experimental anomalies to take unification to the next level, providing room and time for speculations of all sorts.

To answer some of question like the whole universe being in a quantum state, one needs a background-independent quantum mechanical description with a built-in decoherent mechanism -- i.e., a wave function in an unstable phase so that it will make its own background to get stable (collapsed).

In a new quantum formulation such as the topos -- where semi-existent states cooked up where there was too much energy -- could be a driving mechanism for wave function collapse.

Then God discussion can wait.

48. Vendicar Decarian / Nov 23, 2008 01:01:49 GMT

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Edward: "It is a pity that Physics is evolving into another religion!"

You mean a religion verified by experimentation.

"1) Are physicists interpreting Quantum Mechanics correctly?"

An irrelevant question to the physicists who are interested in producing a numerical method of predicting what happens in an experiment. Interpretation is not part of that goal.

"2) What is the best interpretation of the wave function as to match reality?"

That is a matter of personal opinion -- not modern Science.

49. Np / Nov 21, 2008 20:13:55 GMT

It is hard to believe that after such a hard-core Physics article such as this one, people would be engaged in so much mumbo-jumbo conjecture about consciousness, mind, and the incredible lightness of being.

I am so sick of the populist elevation of Quantum Dynamics to some philosophical spiritual enlightenment about the state of the Universe. Quantum Dynamics is a model that tries to explain the behavior of sub-atomic phenomena way outside of Macro human experience.

It makes me cry sometimes to see the stupidity of statements such as "all reality is virtual" etc.

50. Slobodan / Nov 21, 2008 21:15:55 GMT

The difference between a real scientist in the field of Theoretical Physics and a ordinary technician is in that a real genius scientist is 60% philosopher and 40 practical physicist who is trying to explain or to make proofs on his theories. A technician will try to see, touch, measure, calculate, describe etc. if he can. If he can't do that, he will accept any more-or-less reasonable common opinion. And that is all.

The most revolutionary and complex physical principle is explained with one of the simplest mathematical equations E=mc2. Behind this simple formula is one of the greatest philosophical considerations and greatest minds of all of the time.

Is the Einstein's Theory of the Relativity some mumbo-jumbo conjecture? Did you ever ask yourself what this formula means if you write it in a different way? Like m=E/c2? Mass is the energy divided by some constant c2? Does this statement means to you anything?

Yes, philosophical approach is welcomed. But spiritual or religious not welcomed. The last two are only desperate attempts of the humankind to simplify their explanations of UNKNOWN!

You should know that quantity does not necessarily lead to quality. You can spend a lifetime or centuries in unsuccessful experiments pretending to be a scientist. And sometimes, a real advance comes soon after consideration of a quite new approach, new philosophy, newborn ideas.

But I suppose you are the one who will be fully satisfied with descriptions. Illustrated, probably, to understand them easier. Printed in nice colors to remember it easier!

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I would like to know the essence. I do not care about descriptions or interpretations. To try get a essence, you have to open your mind to ALL POSSIBILITIES! If you close the doors of your mind, you will never be able to learn or understand something really new, different, strange! You will remain an ordinary technician.

51. Zephir / Nov 21, 2008 20:49:27 GMT

By AWT vacuum is behaving like foam of tiny density fluctuations of particle environment which gets dense during introducing of energy by the same way like soap foam. The more dense place of vacuum foam manifest itself by curvature of space (i.e., as a material particle).

This mechanism explains both the particle-wave duality and the mass-energy equivalence principle. You can play with this aspect of quantum foam behavior by using of Java applet herein. The foam can be shaken by mouse cursor motion manually: (long URL - click here)

Scientists didn't realize that the whole problem is that the observation of vacuum by light is analogous to observation of water surface by surface waves. From such perspective, the motion/reference frame of environment can be never detected. From this, the negative result of M-M experiment follows.

I suppose a few years later such misunderstanding would be considered as a similar affair like the belief in phlogiston theory or something similar. The medieval era in Physics is finishing right now.

52. Nico / Nov 21, 2008 21:17:03 GMT

If this is all correct, then it shows that mass in general is a side effect of the strong force and quantum fluctuations. So searches for gravity will never find a graviton as it is a resultant of strong force and quantum fluctuation which in turn seem to be able to bend space.

Somehow I always thought that gravitons would not exist. Gravity would be a side-effect of something else. Their test proves that mass is a resultant.

Congrat! That's a great science breakthrough!! [StealthSkater note: there have been rumors to the fact that gravity indeed is the resultant of more fundamental forces => doc pdf URL .]

53. Slobodan / Nov 24, 2008 08:13:20 GMT

Gravitons!!! In my opinion, this is another simple explanation to the side effects that you already mentioned.

I also do not believe that gravitons should be found. Ever. Can you imagine one simple although impossible test? So far, the only confirmed maximum speed in the Universe is the speed-of-the light! To influence a distant body, you need a particular time. At least the time that light have to travel between two cosmic bodies.

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Interactions between 2 celestial bodies could be caused by gravity. But let's imagine something that it is not possible but it is important for consideration. If you instantly remove a companion star in a double star system, what would happen to another companion hundreds of light-years away? Gravity will INSTANTLY stop interacting with remaining companion star!!!!!

What I want to say is that gravity force is the ONLY force in the Universe that is propagating INSTANTLY on all distances without the light-speed limitation. If gravitons exists, they will travel through the Space with the infinite velocity. I cannot agree with this.

Even our explanation of the gravity today is only a simple interpretation of the physical phenomena, it does not give us the deep insight to the essence. It just gives us approximate mathematical model to calculate side effects.

54. Q-blip / Nov 22, 2008 05:49:17 GMT

Can we change these laws of Nature? Unfortunately, these field actions (in any theory) are hard-wired into the vacuum (a bit like DNA and cell). We don't know how to change these field-actions even if we wanted to (for example, to set G to zero or slightly negative to save my energy) because we don't know how these field-actions are wired into the vacuum.

And if the wiring is hard so that the field actions are burnt into any local vacuum as composite, would we have the tool to melt the vacuum and tinker with the fields like playing with DNAs, not creating them?

The "Why" and "Origin" question will take one back into the God arena.

55. Jim Cattlefish / Nov 21, 2008 23:26:31 GMT

I wonder how many universes humans have created in ignorance as a result of our "big bang" atomic and hydrogen bomb test explosions. It looks as though we are living in such a creation now.[StealthSkater note: Look at the sudden massive number of UFO sightings after the first A-bomb tests and the almost-nil number after the later 1980s' worldwide nuke moratorium. Makes one wonder why the knee-jerk reaction and the outcry when nations like India and Pakistan test today.]

56. Lightgrav / Nov 21, 2008 23:41:33 GMT

If QCD is "right", then LatticeQCD will not be able to obtain a "mass-to-mass" attraction (i.e., "gravity"). It's not a good enough approximation. So this has no bearing on gravity.

The perpetual localized concentration of Field derivatives:... are not "mere", is obviously not "random",... are obviously not "vacuum" anymore,... are only called a "virtual" quark and gluon soup

to represent the actual field in terms of what it isn't.

Sporadic temporary fluctuations need not be quantized if they are actually random. Bottom line: the answer is in the back of the book.

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After 50 or 60 attempts to get that answer, one (or another) is likely to be within a few percent even if their method is all wrong.

57. Martin / Nov 22, 2008 22:02:27 GMT

For a brief moment, you really got me to believe you, NewScientist! But then it turned out that this wacky theory is not REALLY CONFIRMED but some equations were simply well done. Too bad they are simply beautiful logic expressed in numbers and variables but have no meaning in the real world where we happen to live.

58. Henry Harris / Nov 22, 2008 23:40:25 GMT

At the risk of sounding like a nut, this reminds me of a book by Robert A. Monroe about his Out-of-Body (OBE) adventures. I read them because I've had a couple of those, although I can't claim or prove they were anything more than just dreams. [SS: doc pdf URL ]

However, at the conclusion of Monroe's trilogy, he travelled as far as he could go and saw a giant projector creating the Universe. Unbelievable? Sure. But if the Universe is really nothing more than fluctuations in the vacuum …

59. Joseph Pritchett / Nov 22, 2008 23:47:35 GMT

I am only a BSc student (but very proud). I am also 35 and maybe this is substantial enough to throw a weighty scientific argument.

The explanation that matter is fluctuation is very appealing. But the article goes on to say that this is within the proton and neatly describes this....theory. I say that matter is completely and utterly fluctuation in energy and is in fact varying conflicting energy forcing the effect, Matter.

Not conventional but totally conceivable and practically applicable (you need a wapping great amount of energy in opposing direction and thus the formation of a "Physical entity"). No?

60. Brian / Nov 23, 2008 03:11:00 GMT

I recalled a conversation I had once with a young physicist who explained that a photon had a "kick" both when it left a light source and when it arrived at its destination.

So I was supposing that if a given mass were to be completely transformed into energy, would the total momentum this energy (assuming it is completely liberated) be stated as equivalent to mass?

61. Douglas George / Nov 23, 2008 15:25:48 GMT

The idea that matter is ultimately just fluctuations in the vacuum fits nicely with the idea that at a subatomic level, matter may simply be holes (or cavities) in the fabric of a space that has intrinsic mass (i.e., a lambda vacuum). This idea is explored in my paper:

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http://www.dcgeorge.com/gpage14.html

62. John Merryman / Nov 23, 2008 17:41:45 GMT

As space is defined by its contents, that it is "fluctuation" might mean that space expands. Since this effect is unstable, it collapses back into gravitational vortices. So the further light travels across space, the more this expansion is compounded until eventually the source appears to recede at the speed -of-light and this creates a horizon line.

That way, the expansion of space is neutralized by the contraction of gravity. We wouldn't need Inflation theory or dark energy since the sources are no more actually receding then gravitational lensing causes stars to move about in space. As a property of energy and space, it is Einstein's Cosmological Constant which he proposed to balance gravity which is an effect of energy/mass and space.

63. George E. Lockett / Nov 24, 2008 10:27:27 GMT

We are a part of all that is our consciousness spring out of the silence which is known as the void or vacuum in Quantum Physics. This first sprouting of consciousness comes out of the silence as waves -- a vibration of light. T he photons of light travel until they hit something then change from a wave to a particle and an anti-particle.

These particles cluster together and start to form the atoms of our body. The positive particles to the centre forming the nucleus and the negative ante particles forming the electrons. These groups of atoms cluster together to form our molecules. The molecules cluster to form the cells and DNA. The cells cluster to form the organs and bones etc. And all the parts together form the whole person.

Our body is an interference pattern of light that has changed from a wave to a solid and grown more-and-more complex. It has built up the layers and slowed down it's vibration from light to solid matter through evolution and self-knowledge.

E=mc2 = Higgs mass Gravity = Space/Time relative to the observer or E=mc2 = Higgs mass Gravity = Space x Time relative to the Strong Force, the observer's body of past points of observation, the size of the Higgs Field at that point in time.

The UFT is a particle clock. The observers body/eyes see time dilated because the Weak Force Higgs mass in oscillation creates a speed-of -ight clock due to the second inertial frame of reference created.

64. Jim / Nov 25, 2008 10:03:00 GMT

As physicists we have already guessed this to be so for a long time. Just as Gravity and Time only exist where matter "exists" and distorts the "fabric" of space (vacuum) or vice versa.

But it begs the bigger question. If matter is simply fluctuations in the vacuum, can we truthfully say we actually exist as at any "point in time" our constituent particles may not? Or does this beg the philosophical questions does time only exist when matter does or does matter only exist when measured at a point in time?

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Perhaps Schrodingers Cat did exist after all.

65.

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