String theory is what?

[lpetrich]

Okay... where does electron rest mass and Coulomb electric charge emerge as testable predictions from this 'theory of many symbols'?

This is where it gets interesting. They don't, they come out as variable, along with all the constants. The fine structure constant is a good example of this. See http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Constants/alpha.html:

"Thus α depends upon the energy at which it is measured, increasing with increasing energy, and is considered an effective or running coupling constant. Indeed, due to e+e- and other vacuum polarization processes, at an energy corresponding to the mass of the W boson (approximately 81 GeV, equivalent to a distance of approximately 2 x 10^-18 m), (mW) is approximately 1/128 compared with its zero-energy value of approximately 1/137. Thus the famous number 1/137 is not unique or especially fundamental."

That happens as a result of a very well-understood quantum-field-theory effect: vacuum polarization.

Furthermore, it does not effect newolder's request -- it does not make the value of this parameter less well-defined. All one has to do is calculate the appropriate vacuum-polarization effects to get from one energy scale to another.

[Farsight]

I don't understand how this shows that electrons aren't well understood. All you've shown is that electrons aren't well understood classically. This is the entire point of quantum mechanics. You're attempting to show that because you cannot describe electron spin in terms of classical angular momentu, spin isn't well understood. Wrong. The problem with your argument is that electrons aren't spinning spheres; they are points. The precession of the electron can't be described by a spinning globe; a spinning globe is a classical object. In QED, the electron spin, or the quantum mechanical EQUIVALENT of classical angular momentum, is describe by virtual photons affecting the motion of the electron. This is why spin is intrinsic; it's the result of the electron's own electromagnetic field. As for the direction of the spin: of course there aren't a range of spin directions like in the situation of a spinning globe; globes are not quantum objects. The reason that spin can only be up or down is due to quantum mechanical probabilities. This isn't experienced by the spinning globe.

You've not shown that electrons aren't well understood. You've shown that you don't approve of our current explanations. This isn't to say that your opinion is invalid, but you certainly haven't shown that the electron isn't well understood.

We'll have to agree to differ on this.

[Farsight]

What exactly can topological field theory accomplish that string theory cannot accomplish? What can topological quantum field theory accomplish that normal quantum field theory cannot in terms of completing the standard model?

IMHO it can deliver the completion of the standard model incorporating gravity and neutrino oscialltion, and moreover also provide a simple intuitive understanding of how the universe works.

EDIT: I should probably thank you. It is quite pleasant to have some present reasonable arguments rather than ignoring the arguments that I make. It was much needed.

Thanks Naut. Re my previous post, I don't mean to ignore your argument, but I really meant what I said a few days back about the electron not being well understood in contempory physics. However it's very difficult to persuade people to question things like intrinsic spin or accept that virtual particles are indeed virtual. One has to examine the things that are taken as read and scrutinse the evidence to get past the barriers to scientific progress. This can be difficult, and all to often one finds that the discussion turns into an argument.

[Farsight]

The constants of nature measured since Galileo are an interesting read. But you may have misunderstood. I asked for the mass and charge of an electron. What does your wibble predict in kilogrammes and Coulombs for these things?

LOL, forget it newolder.

[Farsight]

We don't see free quarks because the QCD force becomes very strong at distances above 10-15 m, around the sizes of the light hadrons. When one tries to separate quarks by that distance, it becomes energetically favorable to pull ordinary-quark-antiquark pairs out of the vacuum. That's been demonstrated numerous times in collisions with energies much greater than 1 GeV. Quarks and gluons make jets of hadrons behind them. Free quarks and gluons have never been observed, and this strong-force-becoming-superstrong effect is likely responsible for producing this "quark confinement".

That's the textbook version, it's lame, and it simply doesn't address the issue of where the "fundamental" quarks go in low-energy proton-antiproton annihilation.

Furthermore, the QCD interaction's "charge" declines enough at distances much less than 10-15 m to allow quarks to travel nearly freely -- asymptotic freedom. At energies of about 100 GeV, the QCD equivalent of the electromagnetic fine-structure constant is about 1/9. Not quite 1/137, but still much less than 1. That's been abundantly observed in the more energetic particle accelerators.

But still you've never seen a free quark, and it's supposed to be fundamental. You should be questioning this instead of defending it with rather irrelevant points.

(the Higgs sector...) I will concede that that's still unconfirmed, but that does not affect the success of the rest of the Standard Model.

I agree, but I fear people won't see it that way, and will throw the baby out with the bathwater.

The Standard Model has 19 free parameters:
The Higgs mass and self-interaction parameters: 2
The Higgs couplings with the elementary fermions (eigenvalues and mixing angles): 13
The gauge couplings: 3
The QCD CP-violation phase: 1
Total: 19

Noted. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_M ... Lagrangian

QCD is mostly perturbative at small-enough distances, but its nonperturbative effects become significant at 10-15 m. Furthermore, nonperturbative QCD can be handled with Lattice Gauge Theory, which requires an enormous amount of number crunching to get results.

OK.

From the Standard Model:

• Lattice QCD successes
• Quark confinement
  [*}Quark asymptotic freedom
• Hadron jets
• Deep-inelastic-scattering results
• Electromagnetic and weak properties of hadrons

By contrast, the trefoil model of the proton is a dismal failure.

It doesn't fail, it fits.

[Farsight]

Farsight, electrons are MUCH better understood than what you seem to think.

No Ipetrich, they're not. If you think they are, show me a picture of an electron.

In particular, electrons are very well described by the Dirac equation, the electrons' counterpart of Maxwell's equations.

So explain it, and describe the reality that underlies it.

So how does one get the Dirac equation and Maxwell's equations out of topological field theory. Don't do a lot of hand-waving; give us the derivation.

Sorry, I don't know how to derive the Dirac equation. And I don't have a derivation of Maxwell's equations that I can give you offhand. When I've done similar in the past it's cost me a great deal of time to no avail, and I've realised it's a deliberate red herring to avoid discussion of the subject in hand. So I'll politely decline.

[lpetrich]

Farsight, you really have to realize that new theories must explain what old theories had successfully explained. Albert Einstein and his quantum-mechanic friends had realized that, but many crackpots have not.

Re my previous post, I don't mean to ignore your argument, but I really meant what I said a few days back about the electron not being well understood in contempory physics.

What would you consider not very well-understood about the electron? The Dirac-equation description of it has been VERY successful. One can calculate and test:

• Relativistic effects in atomic spectra
• Multiloop effects like the Lamb Shift and the electron's anomalous magnetic moment
• Relativistic-collision and annihilation cross sections.

Despite their lasting on average only one microsecond, one can calculate and test properties of muons like their anomalous magnetic moment. Quarks also follow the Dirac equation, as can be determined from the success of lattice-gauge calculations.

One can do additional tests by doing pair-production experiments, like with the former occupant of the LHC's tunnels: the Large Electron–Positron Collider (Wikipedia) It went up to 104.5 GeV electron and positron energies, and it performed this reaction:

e + e* -> (virtual photon, Z) -> (particle) + (its antiparticle)

The pair-production cross sections and the angular distribution of the outgoing particles both fit the Standard Model very well, including the Dirac-ness of the charged leptons (electron, muon, tau) and the quarks.

One can sort-of derive the Dirac equation from first principles by using suitable representations of the "Lorentz group" of space-time rotations and boosts (Representation theory of the Lorentz group), and supposing the kinetic and mass terms to have certain forms.

We don't see free quarks because the QCD force becomes very strong at distances above 10-15 m, around the sizes of the light hadrons. ...

That's the textbook version, it's lame, and it simply doesn't address the issue of where the "fundamental" quarks go in low-energy proton-antiproton annihilation.

They either annihilate with each other or form some of the light mesons that that annihilation produces. Farsight, you really need to take Particle Physics 101. You've been stumbling over elementary things in it.

But still you've never seen a free quark, and it's supposed to be fundamental. You should be questioning this instead of defending it with rather irrelevant points.

However, quarks act more-or-less-free at high-enough interaction energies, and though this more-or-less-freedom is very evanescent, it's not fundamentally different from any other evanescent particle-physics effect.

(the Higgs sector...) I will concede that that's still unconfirmed, but that does not affect the success of the rest of the Standard Model.

I agree, but I fear people won't see it that way, and will throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Which people? Given how the history of science goes, most physicists would consider all of the Standard Model well-established except for the details of the electroweak symmetry breaker. Why don't you review experimental tests of the Standard Model some time? Seriously.

From the Standard Model: (success...)
By contrast, the trefoil model of the proton is a dismal failure.

It doesn't fail, it fits.

You have not done anything to show how it gets the numbers that the Standard Model does.

Farsight, electrons are MUCH better understood than what you seem to think.

No Ipetrich, they're not. If you think they are, show me a picture of an electron.

What would you consider acceptable? Why is the Dirac equation unsatisfactory?

In particular, electrons are very well described by the Dirac equation, the electrons' counterpart of Maxwell's equations.

So explain it, and describe the reality that underlies it.

I can't do much better than Dirac equation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So how does one get the Dirac equation and Maxwell's equations out of topological field theory. Don't do a lot of hand-waving; give us the derivation.

Sorry, I don't know how to derive the Dirac equation. And I don't have a derivation of Maxwell's equations that I can give you offhand. When I've done similar in the past it's cost me a great deal of time to no avail, and I've realised it's a deliberate red herring to avoid discussion of the subject in hand. So I'll politely decline.

So you don't have any way of getting the Standard Model (mathematical formulation) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia out of your trefoils and Moebius strips?

[Farsight]

Farsight, you really have to realize that new theories must explain what old theories had successfully explained. Albert Einstein and his quantum-mechanic friends had realized that, but many crackpots have not.

I'm no crackpot, and this is no new theory, and besides, it isn't mine. All I've done is a synthesis that gives an intuitive outline picture that I hope will prove useful in the completion of the Standard Model.

What would you consider not very well-understood about the electron? The Dirac-equation description of it has been VERY successful. One can calculate and test:

• Relativistic effects in atomic spectra
• Multiloop effects like the Lamb Shift and the electron's anomalous magnetic moment
• Relativistic-collision and annihilation cross sections.

What's not very well understand is that the electron is a self-trapped photon, and the electromagnetic field is a geometrical spatial curvature.

Despite their lasting on average only one microsecond, one can calculate and test properties of muons like their anomalous magnetic moment. Quarks also follow the Dirac equation, as can be determined from the success of lattice-gauge calculations. One can do additional tests by doing pair-production experiments, like with the former occupant of the LHC's tunnels: the Large Electron–Positron Collider (Wikipedia) It went up to 104.5 GeV electron and positron energies, and it performed this reaction:

e + e* -> (virtual photon, Z) -> (particle) + (its antiparticle)

The pair-production cross sections and the angular distribution of the outgoing particles both fit the Standard Model very well, including the Dirac-ness of the charged leptons (electron, muon, tau) and the quarks.

I'm not opposed to the Standard Model, merely the lack of understanding of the underlying physical reality that acts as a barrier to its completion.

One can sort-of derive the Dirac equation from first principles by using suitable representations of the "Lorentz group" of space-time rotations and boosts (Representation theory of the Lorentz group), and supposing the kinetic and mass terms to have certain forms.

They're real rotations.

They either annihilate with each other or form some of the light mesons that that annihilation produces. Farsight, you really need to take Particle Physics 101. You've been stumbling over elementary things in it.

I'm not stumbling, I'm off and running. You're wading through a morass, and can't see the wood for the trees. Here's a leading question: how many stable static massive particles are there?

However, quarks act more-or-less-free at high-enough interaction energies, and though this more-or-less-freedom is very evanescent, it's not fundamentally different from any other evanescent particle-physics effect.

Are you aware that the reality underlying virtual photons is the evanescent wave?

Which people? Given how the history of science goes, most physicists would consider all of the Standard Model well-established except for the details of the electroweak symmetry breaker. Why don't you review experimental tests of the Standard Model some time? Seriously.

The people who control the purse strings. Physics funding here in the UK is being squeezed. There were £40m of nuclear physics cuts in December and it didn't even make the news. CERN are nowadays appearing anxious to state their case for continuing funding. If we don't see some significant scientific progress soon I fear patience will run out. Hence I offer what I can. I started all this back in 2006 when my teenage children dropped all their science subjects and I learned of physics A-levels down 56% in 25 years. There are other things too that gave me cause for concern for the well-being of physics.

You have not done anything to show how it gets the numbers that the Standard Model does.

No I haven't. But you don't seem to understand something - in the fullness of time, you'll appreciate that the Standard Model is describing that trefoil proton. Those loops are the quarks.

What would you consider acceptable? Why is the Dirac equation unsatisfactory?

Something that explains it to your grandmother. The Dirac equation doesn't.

I can't do much better than Dirac equation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Try.

So you don't have any way of getting the [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_M ... rmulation)[/url] out of your trefoils and Moebius strips?

I haven't tried. But I'm confident it'll come. Play around with moebius strips of opposite chirality, note what you have to do to transform one into the other, then look at beta decay.

[Nautilidae]

I'm no crackpot, and this is no new theory, and besides, it isn't mine. All I've done is a synthesis that gives an intuitive outline picture that I hope will prove useful in the completion of the Standard Model.

Don't personalize comments. He did not refer to you as a crackpot.

I'm not opposed to the Standard Model, merely the lack of understanding of the underlying physical reality that acts as a barrier to its completion.

Much of the physical reality of the standard model is understood. To what are you referring?

I'm not stumbling, I'm off and running. You're wading through a morass, and can't see the wood for the trees. Here's a leading question: how many stable static massive particles are there?

The electron, positron, up quark, up antiquark, down quark, and the down antiquark come to mind. What on Earth do you mean by "static particles"?

Are you aware that the reality underlying virtual photons is the evanescent wave?

Are you aware that QCD is formulated using many tools from QED? I don't understand what you're trying to show us.

No I haven't. But you don't seem to understand something - in the fullness of time, you'll appreciate that the Standard Model is describing that trefoil proton. Those loops are the quarks.

Are you sure? Why can't they be end points of strings? You seem to be using a tool similar to that of the Christian; we may not realize God now, but we will realize him when the time comes. Furthermore, I find your assertive attitude towards your trefoil proton disturbing; you assert that the loops ARE quarks, yet there is no physical evidence for this. Even a confident string theorist wouldn't assert that particles ARE strings; only that particles MAY be strings.

[lpetrich]

Farsight, you really have to realize that new theories must explain what old theories had successfully explained. Albert Einstein and his quantum-mechanic friends had realized that, but many crackpots have not.

I'm no crackpot,

I was pointing out that you seem like you are making a mistake that many crackpots make.

and this is no new theory,

It's new compared to quantum field theory, I'm sure.

and besides, it isn't mine.

You are advocating it, so I suggest that you take responsibility for doing so.

All I've done is a synthesis that gives an intuitive outline picture that I hope will prove useful in the completion of the Standard Model.

You've got to understand at least some of the mathematics behind the Standard Model to have any hope of succeeding there. Einstein understood both Newtonian mechanics and Maxwellian electrodynamics very well -- that helped contribute to his success.

What's not very well understand is that the electron is a self-trapped photon, and the electromagnetic field is a geometrical spatial curvature.

Farsight, I challenge you to get (1) Maxwell's equations, (2) the Dirac equation, and (3) the appropriate interactions out of that. You need not present the entire equations of motion, just the Lagrangian.

'm not opposed to the Standard Model, merely the lack of understanding of the underlying physical reality that acts as a barrier to its completion.

You have to demonstrate that your theories are correct, not take the claimed correctness of your theories for granted.

I'm not stumbling, I'm off and running. You're wading through a morass, and can't see the wood for the trees. Here's a leading question: how many stable static massive particles are there?

Stability is a side effect of having nothing to decay into, so it's not a primary quality.

Are you aware that the reality underlying virtual photons is the evanescent wave?

Farsight, why do you insist on treating your theories as successfully demonstrated?

Which people? Given how the history of science goes, most physicists would consider all of the Standard Model well-established except for the details of the electroweak symmetry breaker. Why don't you review experimental tests of the Standard Model some time? Seriously.

The people who control the purse strings. ...

An irrelevant issue.

You have not done anything to show how it gets the numbers that the Standard Model does.

No I haven't. But you don't seem to understand something - in the fullness of time, you'll appreciate that the Standard Model is describing that trefoil proton. Those loops are the quarks.

You have an unjustified confidence in the correctness of your theories. Up and down quarks can exist outside of protons -- they do so in pions and neutrons and numerous other hadrons.

What would you consider acceptable? Why is the Dirac equation unsatisfactory?

Something that explains it to your grandmother. The Dirac equation doesn't.

That's an irrelevant criterion.

I can't do much better than Dirac equation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Try.

I don't want to have to post Quantum Field Theory 101, especially given the lack of interest that you have shown in what I'd linked to.

So you don't have any way of getting the Standard Model (mathematical formulation) out of your trefoils and Moebius strips?

I haven't tried. But I'm confident it'll come. Play around with moebius strips of opposite chirality, note what you have to do to transform one into the other, then look at beta decay.

That's your job, not mine. Let's see you get the Dirac equation out of your Moebius strips.

[Farsight]

Don't personalize comments. He did not refer to you as a crackpot.

I didn't like what I saw as an insinuation. But OK.

Much of the physical reality of the standard model is understood. To what are you referring?

I really don't think it is. I'd say intrinsic spin is a good example, along with the scattering inference that electrons and quarks are pointlike.

The electron, positron, up quark, up antiquark, down quark, and the down antiquark come to mind. What on Earth do you mean by "static particles"?

I said static stable particles with mass, and I meant those that we can actually observe. Yes, we can include the electron and the positron. But the photon isn't static, it moves at c, and it's massless, so it's excluded. The neutrino is thought to have a little mass, but you can't trap one like an electron, so that's excluded too. The neutron is excluded because it isn't stable, ditto for mesons. We can't include the quarks because we've never seen a free quark. The proton is included, and so is the antiproton. But look at a table of baryons. They have a short lifetime. We can't include them. We're left with four particles only: the electron, the proton, and their antiparticles.

Are you aware that QCD is formulated using many tools from QED? I don't understand what you're trying to show us.

Yes. What I'm trying to show you is that the virtual photons of QED are virtual. They aren't actually photons. But there is an underlying reality. See Evanescent modes are virtual photons by Stahlhofen and Nimtz along with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evanescent_wave and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near_and_far_field. Pay attention to the Quantum field theory view which says far field effects are manifestations of real photons, while near field effects are due to a mixture of real and virtual photons.

Are you sure?

Yes. See http://www.physorg.com/news182957628.html and note this bit: The study of knotted vortices was initiated by Lord Kelvin back in 1867 in his quest for an explanation of atoms", adds Dennis, who began to study knotted optical vortices with Professor Sir Michael Berry at Bristol University in 2000. "This work opens a new chapter in that history.". He sent the paper to a guy who was at ABB50/25 in Bristol talking about this to people like Michael Atiyah. And remember what I said about Witten. It's just that it hasn't hit the streets yet.

Why can't they be end points of strings? You seem to be using a tool similar to that of the Christian; we may not realize God now, but we will realize him when the time comes.

Ouch. I'm no Christian. IMHO the people I talk to about things like string theory behave like Christians. They will not admit scientific evidence when it doesn't fit with what they think they know.

Furthermore, I find your assertive attitude towards your trefoil proton disturbing; you assert that the loops ARE quarks, yet there is no physical evidence for this. Even a confident string theorist wouldn't assert that particles ARE strings; only that particles MAY be strings.

There is physical evidence. Look at that little example I gave with the crossing points and the bag model and that v the suggests a point particle. Think about spin, magnetic moment, topological charge, etc. There's something "going round and round". In a loop. It really does fit extremely well.

[Farsight]

I was pointing out that you seem like you are making a mistake that many crackpots make.

I rather think you're doing that.

It's new compared to quantum field theory, I'm sure.

Think again. Have a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vortex_dynamics re Kelvin and look at Maxwell's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:On_Ph ... _Force.pdf. Look at the heading: The theory of molecular vortices. OK, the trefoil proton is relatively recent, but the electron as a vorton isn't. Maxwell just got things back to front. He thought the vortex was in the intervening space rather than the particle. All this has somehow been lost from "Maxwell's equations" which Heavside recast in vector form.

You are advocating it, so I suggest that you take responsibility for doing so.

Noted.

You've got to understand at least some of the mathematics behind the Standard Model to have any hope of succeeding there. Einstein understood both Newtonian mechanics and Maxwellian electrodynamics very well -- that helped contribute to his success.

I hope to help other people to succeed.

Farsight, I challenge you to get (1) Maxwell's equations, (2) the Dirac equation, and (3) the appropriate interactions out of that. You need not present the entire equations of motion, just the Lagrangian.

No. It'll take me forever. Look at http://www.quant-ph.cst.nihon-u.ac.jp/~ ... ova065.pdf or http://www.fuw.edu.pl/~dobaczew/maub-42w/node8.html. Or say page 86 of Quantum electrodynamics By Toichiro Kinoshita. I've got to change everything and start from scratch. If and when I've done it, it proves nothing. It's just a mathematical description of a spacewarp stuck in a twisting turning loop of its own making. I can't predict a mass, all I'd be doing is inventing terms then shuffling them around. There's ample scope for rejection from people who will use anything to keep scientific evidence at arms length. And there's better people than me who can't get papers into journals.

You have to demonstrate that your theories are correct, not take the claimed correctness of your theories for granted.

I don't take anything for granted. All this started when I examined what it was that I took for granted. Then I found a mismatch between what I knew and experimental evidence.

Stability is a side effect of having nothing to decay into, so it's not a primary quality.

That's something you're taking for granted. You're missing the configuration aspect. Replace the word particle with configuration, and think "neutron". A configuration might not be be stable, and might decay into other configurations, which are stable. Why?

Farsight, why do you insist on treating your theories as successfully demonstrated?

I don't, I'm just pointing out supporting scientific and giving references to show that these aren't my theories. Pair production splits a +1022keV photon over a nucleus to create an electron and a positron. The electron has angular momentum, mass, charge, magnetic dipole moment, anomalous magnetic dipole moment, and when you annihilate it with the positron the result is two 511keV photons. The dual slit experiement says it isn't a point, the g=2 says the spin isn't like a planet but it doesn't say it's intrinsic. It's all obvious stuff, but many people dismiss it in favour of what I can only describe as quantum mysticism and prioritising mathematics higher than scientific evidence.

An irrelevant issue.

It's not irrelevant. Physics is struggling here in the UK.

You have an unjustified confidence in the correctness of your theories. Up and down quarks can exist outside of protons -- they do so in pions and neutrons and numerous other hadrons.

Because it's so very coherent. Remember what I said about Beta decay and paper strips. I can tell you how to emulate a B-sub meson with a paper loop. It's a plain loop, not a moebius, there's no need to twist the ends before you stick them together. You make a loop, and then you add the twist by turning one side over by 180°, and giving it a pull. Set it down on the table top and it looks like a figure of 8 with two loops. You can transform one loop into the other by undoing the 180° turn and re-applying it to the other side. After a little practice you can do it rapidly. You can set it down in one configuration, then twist and pull again and set it down in the other configuration. Matter/antimatter/matter/antimatter. Try it. There's is no substitute for hands-on experience with all this.

That's an irrelevant criterion.

No it isn't. Einstein said You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.. Feynman, "the great explainer" said The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool.

I don't want to have to post Quantum Field Theory 101, especially given the lack of interest that you have shown in what I'd linked to.

You can't explain it.

That's your job, not mine. Let's see you get the Dirac equation out of your Moebius strips.

I see it as my job to explain fundamental concepts and provide insight. I presume your job is to to the maths. Do it. Make me do it all, and what's the point in you?

[lpetrich]

Much of the physical reality of the standard model is understood. To what are you referring?

I really don't think it is. I'd say intrinsic spin is a good example, along with the scattering inference that electrons and quarks are pointlike.

"Pointlike" in the sense of having "no internal structure except for their spins and quantum numbers".

I said static stable particles with mass, and I meant those that we can actually observe. Yes, we can include the electron and the positron. But the photon isn't static, it moves at c, and it's massless, so it's excluded. The neutrino is thought to have a little mass, but you can't trap one like an electron, so that's excluded too. The neutron is excluded because it isn't stable, ditto for mesons. We can't include the quarks because we've never seen a free quark. The proton is included, and so is the antiproton. But look at a table of baryons. They have a short lifetime. We can't include them. We're left with four particles only: the electron, the proton, and their antiparticles.

This is lame. Why are stability and trappability supposed to be fundamental properties?

OK, the trefoil proton is relatively recent, but the electron as a vorton isn't. Maxwell just got things back to front. He thought the vortex was in the intervening space rather than the particle. All this has somehow been lost from "Maxwell's equations" which Heavside recast in vector form.

Because there's no independent evidence of vortons. That's why they have been dismissed as unnecessary hypotheses

Farsight, I challenge you to get (1) Maxwell's equations, (2) the Dirac equation, and (3) the appropriate interactions out of that. You need not present the entire equations of motion, just the Lagrangian.

No. It'll take me forever.

(some stuff related to mainstream quantum field theory...)

Try [hep-th/9505152]Introduction to Quantum Field Theory or some QFT textbook.

I've got to change everything and start from scratch. If and when I've done it, it proves nothing. It's just a mathematical description of a spacewarp stuck in a twisting turning loop of its own making. I can't predict a mass, all I'd be doing is inventing terms then shuffling them around. There's ample scope for rejection from people who will use anything to keep scientific evidence at arms length. And there's better people than me who can't get papers into journals.

Farsight, why don't you try writing a paper and submitting it to some particle-physics journal? Like Physical Review D or Physical Review Letters.

However, I seriously suspect that the journal editors will be so overcome with laughter that they won't get much business done that day.

You have to demonstrate that your theories are correct, not take the claimed correctness of your theories for granted.

I don't take anything for granted. All this started when I examined what it was that I took for granted. Then I found a mismatch between what I knew and experimental evidence.

What mismatches between the Standard Model and experimental evidence?

Stability is a side effect of having nothing to decay into, so it's not a primary quality.

That's something you're taking for granted. You're missing the configuration aspect. Replace the word particle with configuration, and think "neutron". A configuration might not be be stable, and might decay into other configurations, which are stable. Why?

Free neutrons decay into protons because it is energetically favorable for them to do so. But bound nuclei are a different story. What makes stable nuclei stable is that it's energetically unfavorable for a neutron to decay into a proton. But when it is energetically favorable, a neutron can decay into a proton -- and a proton into a neutron.

Farsight, why do you insist on treating your theories as successfully demonstrated?

I don't, I'm just pointing out supporting scientific and giving references to show that these aren't my theories.

But you are advocating them.

Pair production splits a +1022keV photon over a nucleus to create an electron and a positron. The electron has angular momentum, mass, charge, magnetic dipole moment, anomalous magnetic dipole moment, and when you annihilate it with the positron the result is two 511keV photons. The dual slit experiement says it isn't a point, the g=2 says the spin isn't like a planet but it doesn't say it's intrinsic. It's all obvious stuff, but many people dismiss it in favour of what I can only describe as quantum mysticism and prioritising mathematics higher than scientific evidence.

The electron's observed anomalous magnetic moment agrees VERY well with calculations - it's a triumph for Quantum Electrodynamics, a part of the Standard Model.

You have an unjustified confidence in the correctness of your theories. Up and down quarks can exist outside of protons -- they do so in pions and neutrons and numerous other hadrons.

Because it's so very coherent.

If one calls word-drool coherent.

Remember what I said about Beta decay and paper strips. I can tell you how to emulate a B-sub meson with a paper loop. It's a plain loop, not a moebius, there's no need to twist the ends before you stick them together. You make a loop, and then you add the twist by turning one side over by 180°, and giving it a pull. Set it down on the table top and it looks like a figure of 8 with two loops. You can transform one loop into the other by undoing the 180° turn and re-applying it to the other side. After a little practice you can do it rapidly. You can set it down in one configuration, then twist and pull again and set it down in the other configuration. Matter/antimatter/matter/antimatter. Try it. There's is no substitute for hands-on experience with all this.

Elementary particles do NOT work like macroscopic objects.

That's an irrelevant criterion.

No it isn't. Einstein said You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.. Feynman, "the great explainer" said The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool.

Given what Einstein had worked on, it must be a VERY simplified level of understanding.

I don't want to have to post Quantum Field Theory 101, especially given the lack of interest that you have shown in what I'd linked to.

You can't explain it.

Is that all you can say? With that sort of dismissiveness, you aren't going to get a QFT 101 course.

That's your job, not mine. Let's see you get the Dirac equation out of your Moebius strips.

I see it as my job to explain fundamental concepts and provide insight. I presume your job is to to the maths. Do it. Make me do it all, and what's the point in you?

Yes, you must do it all, and do it without whining "Why should I have to show that my pet theories agree with the Standard Model to within experimental limits?"

[The Dagda]

Much of the physical reality of the standard model is understood. To what are you referring?

I really don't think it is. I'd say intrinsic spin is a good example, along with the scattering inference that electrons and quarks are pointlike.

"Pointlike" in the sense of having "no internal structure except for their spins and quantum numbers".

I said static stable particles with mass, and I meant those that we can actually observe. Yes, we can include the electron and the positron. But the photon isn't static, it moves at c, and it's massless, so it's excluded. The neutrino is thought to have a little mass, but you can't trap one like an electron, so that's excluded too. The neutron is excluded because it isn't stable, ditto for mesons. We can't include the quarks because we've never seen a free quark. The proton is included, and so is the antiproton. But look at a table of baryons. They have a short lifetime. We can't include them. We're left with four particles only: the electron, the proton, and their antiparticles.

This is lame. Why are stability and trappability supposed to be fundamental properties?

OK, the trefoil proton is relatively recent, but the electron as a vorton isn't. Maxwell just got things back to front. He thought the vortex was in the intervening space rather than the particle. All this has somehow been lost from "Maxwell's equations" which Heavside recast in vector form.

Because there's no independent evidence of vortons. That's why they have been dismissed as unnecessary hypotheses

Farsight, I challenge you to get (1) Maxwell's equations, (2) the Dirac equation, and (3) the appropriate interactions out of that. You need not present the entire equations of motion, just the Lagrangian.

No. It'll take me forever.

(some stuff related to mainstream quantum field theory...)

Try [hep-th/9505152]Introduction to Quantum Field Theory or some QFT textbook.

I've got to change everything and start from scratch. If and when I've done it, it proves nothing. It's just a mathematical description of a spacewarp stuck in a twisting turning loop of its own making. I can't predict a mass, all I'd be doing is inventing terms then shuffling them around. There's ample scope for rejection from people who will use anything to keep scientific evidence at arms length. And there's better people than me who can't get papers into journals.

Farsight, why don't you try writing a paper and submitting it to some particle-physics journal? Like Physical Review D or Physical Review Letters.

However, I seriously suspect that the journal editors will be so overcome with laughter that they won't get much business done that day.

You have to demonstrate that your theories are correct, not take the claimed correctness of your theories for granted.

I don't take anything for granted. All this started when I examined what it was that I took for granted. Then I found a mismatch between what I knew and experimental evidence.

What mismatches between the Standard Model and experimental evidence?

Stability is a side effect of having nothing to decay into, so it's not a primary quality.

That's something you're taking for granted. You're missing the configuration aspect. Replace the word particle with configuration, and think "neutron". A configuration might not be be stable, and might decay into other configurations, which are stable. Why?

Free neutrons decay into protons because it is energetically favorable for them to do so. But bound nuclei are a different story. What makes stable nuclei stable is that it's energetically unfavorable for a neutron to decay into a proton. But when it is energetically favorable, a neutron can decay into a proton -- and a proton into a neutron.

Farsight, why do you insist on treating your theories as successfully demonstrated?

I don't, I'm just pointing out supporting scientific and giving references to show that these aren't my theories.

But you are advocating them.

Pair production splits a +1022keV photon over a nucleus to create an electron and a positron. The electron has angular momentum, mass, charge, magnetic dipole moment, anomalous magnetic dipole moment, and when you annihilate it with the positron the result is two 511keV photons. The dual slit experiement says it isn't a point, the g=2 says the spin isn't like a planet but it doesn't say it's intrinsic. It's all obvious stuff, but many people dismiss it in favour of what I can only describe as quantum mysticism and prioritising mathematics higher than scientific evidence.

The electron's observed anomalous magnetic moment agrees VERY well with calculations - it's a triumph for Quantum Electrodynamics, a part of the Standard Model.

You have an unjustified confidence in the correctness of your theories. Up and down quarks can exist outside of protons -- they do so in pions and neutrons and numerous other hadrons.

Because it's so very coherent.

If one calls word-drool coherent.

Remember what I said about Beta decay and paper strips. I can tell you how to emulate a B-sub meson with a paper loop. It's a plain loop, not a moebius, there's no need to twist the ends before you stick them together. You make a loop, and then you add the twist by turning one side over by 180°, and giving it a pull. Set it down on the table top and it looks like a figure of 8 with two loops. You can transform one loop into the other by undoing the 180° turn and re-applying it to the other side. After a little practice you can do it rapidly. You can set it down in one configuration, then twist and pull again and set it down in the other configuration. Matter/antimatter/matter/antimatter. Try it. There's is no substitute for hands-on experience with all this.

Elementary particles do NOT work like macroscopic objects.

That's an irrelevant criterion.

No it isn't. Einstein said You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother.. Feynman, "the great explainer" said The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool.

Given what Einstein had worked on, it must be a VERY simplified level of understanding.

I don't want to have to post Quantum Field Theory 101, especially given the lack of interest that you have shown in what I'd linked to.

You can't explain it.

Is that all you can say? With that sort of dismissiveness, you aren't going to get a QFT 101 course.

That's your job, not mine. Let's see you get the Dirac equation out of your Moebius strips.

I see it as my job to explain fundamental concepts and provide insight. I presume your job is to to the maths. Do it. Make me do it all, and what's the point in you?

Yes, you must do it all, and do it without whining "Why should I have to show that my pet theories agree with the Standard Model to within experimental limits?"

I agree Ipetrich Farsight hasn't got a theory yet, so I would say it's up to him to put up an experimental set up or a mathematical model or shut up. And I wouldn't take anyone seriously who couldn't. The onus is on him, too right.

Mind you the irony of this thread, and pardon me if I'm wrong but neither has string theory done any thing much yet except make bold claims and fail to make a mark in science circles. There is a double standard here, science isn't about popularity it is about the brute facts, the empirical, those who provide none of that are redundant until they do. I'm a great believer in String theory don't get me wrong. It might just do it but until it stops talking the talk and starts walking the walk it is merely a curiosity. A hypothesis is science but let me remark on a wise man:

"Wake up with a hypothesis, destroy it over breakfast, then you are ready to work."

Anon Scientist.

It is very easy to destroy a hypothesis and that is all string theory is. And it has been destroyed so many times. And so it will be until the empirical makes a mark on it's existence.

[hackenslash]

I'm a great believer in String theory

it has been destroyed so many times.

Cognitive dissonance?