CHAPTER 3
Distinctive Properties
It is difficult to reconcile the general acceptance of the current theories discussed in the preceding chapter with the respect that science claims to accord to the observed facts. As expressed by Max Black, “If one trait, more than any other, is characteristic of the scientific attitude, it is reliance on the data of experience.35 But in the formulation of these theories the data of experience are summarily rejected. Apparently the prevailing opinion is that any theory is better than none at all. Of course, there is something to be said for this proposition if the wrong or untestable theories are accepted only on an interim basis, as something to be .used pending the discovery of the correct relations. However, such an interim acceptance is not proof, or even evidence, of the validity of a theory, and it certainly provides no justification for repudiating or disregarding the physical facts.
Elevation of a currently popular theory to a status superior to established facts, as indicated in the quotation from Max von Laue, is a violation of the most basic tenets of science. Whatever the standing of the relativity theory as a whole may be, if and when it conflicts with a physical fact it is, to that extent, wrong. No scientist can deny this if he faces the issue squarely. But to acknowledge such errors would involve conceding that there are serious deficiencies in the conventional structure of theory, and this the scientific community is currently unwilling to do.
At the moment science is riding the crest of a remarkable record of achievement unparalleled elsewhere in human life, and this has fostered an overconfidence in the procedures and capabilities of the scientific profession, specifically the widely held belief that what present-day scientists have not been able to do cannot be done. If long and careful consideration by competent scientists has not succeeded in finding a viable alternative to an accepted theory that is inconsistent with some physical fact or facts, then it is evident, from the present viewpoint of the scientific Establishment, that no such alternative exists. We must accept the defective theory or concept because we have no choice. “There is no other way,”36 says Einstein. “There was and there is now no alternative,”37 asserts Millikan. “There are no physical laws to tell us—and there cannot be,”38 contends Bronowski. Bridgman refers to the “only interpretation”16 of the facts that he cites, and so on. This assumption of omniscience is all the more difficult to understand in view of the clarity with which each generation of scientists recognizes the limitations to which their predecessors were subject. As expressed by Millikan:
We all began to see that the nineteenth century physicists had taken themselves a little too seriously, that we had not come quite as near sounding the depths of the universe, even in the matter of fundamental physical principles, as we thought we had.39
The nature of the fallacy that is inherent in all statements of the “There is no other way” type is well illustrated by the situation to which Einstein applied these words. He was referring to his “rubber yardstick” for space and time. “Moving rods must change their length, moving clocks must change their rhythm,”36 is his conclusion. The positive assertion by R. A. Millikan that “there is no alternative” refers to the same conclusion. But like the former generations of scientists to whom Millikan refers in the longer quotation, he and Einstein are basing their conclusions on the premise that the prevailing view of physical fundamentals is incontestable. As Fred Hoyle pointed out in connection with a similar conclusion in a different field,
The argument amounts to nothing more than the convenient supposition that something which has not been observed does not exist. It predicates that we know everything.40
The truth is that we can never be certain that all alternatives to a set of premises have been identified, or even that we have correctly identified all of the elements that enter into any given situation. The findings with respect to the properties of scalar motion that are reported in this volume now show not only that Einstein was incorrect in his assertion that “there is no other way,” but that the “only way” that he was able to see is the wrong alternative. As noted by one observer, “In his relativity theory, he (Einstein) quite rightly started with the commonplace assumption that time is what you read off a clock.”41 This “assumption” is actually a definition of time for purposes of Einstein’s development of thought, and no exception can be taken to it on that basis. But after thus defining it, he turned around and assumed that “time” , as thus defined, is also the “time” that enters into the equations of motion. There is no physical evidence that this is true, as a general proposition. At low speeds there is agreement, and if this agreement applied throughout all motion, the identity of the two concepts of “time” would be verified by the same principles of identification that were discussed earlier in this work. But there is no such agreement at high speeds.
The conclusion that would normally be reached from such a discrepancy is that “time” as identified by a clock registration cannot be identified with the “time” that enters into the equations of motion. In the analogous case of the identification of the stars and planets, discussed in Chapter 1, if the properties of these objects, under some conditions, were found to be quite different from those of matter, then the identification as aggregates of matter would no longer be tenable. But Einstein did not accept the verdict of the observations, and instead of recognizing that they invalidated the assumption as to the identity of the two concepts of “time,” he assumed a variability in the magnitudes that are involved.
In the subsequent pages of this work the nature of the “time”that enters into the equations of motion will be determined from factual premises, and it will be shown that it is not, except in a special case, equivalent to the “time” registered on a clock—the same conclusion that would normally be drawn from the discrepancy that has been mentioned. The mere appearance of this conclusion, regardless of how it was derived. and independent of its validity, automatically demolishes the contention of Einstein, Millikan, and the scientific community in general, that “there is no other way,” as it clears the way for an explanation based on a different concept of time.
The true place of time in the physical picture will be considered later. The point of the present discussion is that the theories and concepts of present-day physical science are not all firmly established and incontestable, as the textbooks would have us believe. Many of them are, to be sure, but others are nothing more than temporary expedients—steppingstones toward better theories,42 as P. A. M. Dirac called them. Norwood Hanson explains that we are accepting theories that are “conceptually imperfect” and “riddled with inconsistencies” because there is no “intelligible alternative” currently available.43 In those cases, such as the gravitational situation discussed in the preceding chapter where the new findings from the scalar motion investigation take issue with current thought, they are merely producing the “intelligible alternative” or “other way” that is required to put physical understanding on a sound basis. In this present chapter we will continue this operation, exploring the consequences of the distinctive properties of scalar motion.
One of the unique characteristics of this type of motion is that it is indifferent to location in the spatial reference system. From the vectorial standpoint locations are very significant. A vectorial motion originating at location A and proceeding in the direction AB is specifically defined in the reference system, and is sharply distinguished from a similar motion originating at location B and proceeding in the direction BA. But since a scalar motion has magnitude only, a scalar motion of A toward B is simply a decrease in the distance between A and B. As such, it cannot be distinguished from a motion of B toward A. Both of these motions have the same magnitude, and neither has any other property.
Of course, the scalar motion plus the coupling to the reference system does have a specific location in that system: a specific reference point and a specific direction. But the coupling is independent of the motion. The factors that determine its nature are not necessarily constant, and the motion AB does not necessarily continue on the AB basis. A change in the coupling may convert it to BA, or it may alternate between the two.
The observed deflection of photons of radiation toward massive objects is an illustration of the application of this property of scalar motion. The photon has no mass, and therefore no gravitational motion toward a massive aggregate, a star, for instance. But the gravitational motion of the star is a distributed scalar motion, and this scalar motion of the star toward the photon (AB) is inherently nothing more than a decrease in the distance between the objects. It can equally well appear in the reference system as a motion of the photon toward the star (BA). On the basis of probability, the total motion is divided between the two alternatives. The total motion of the star toward the photon is distributed among so many mass units that the motion of each is unobservable, but the photon is a single unit, and it is deflected a small, but measurable, amount toward the star.
Another manifestation of this property of scalar motion is seen in the induction of electric charges. As brought out in Chapter 2, the electric force is a property of a distributed scalar motion. “Charge” is therefore merely a name for this entity that has not heretofore been recognized as a motion. While charges are generally similar to the gravitational motion, aside from the difference in dimensions, it is clear from their effects that their distribution does not have the constant rotational pattern that is characteristic of gravitation. Instead, the rotation of the coupling to the reference system changes constantly and uniformly from clockwise to counterclockwise, and vice versa: that is, it is a simple harmonic motion. The pattern of this distribution is a rotational vibration, similar to the motion of the hairspring of a watch, rather than a simple rotation.
A consideration of the factors involved in the addition of scalar motions shows that this distinctive characteristic of the distribution of the electric motion is a positive requirement. It is necessary for the existence of this type of motion. If the charge had a full rotational distribution, differing from gravitation only by reason of being one-dimensional, it would merely modify the magnitude of the gravitational motion in this one dimension, and would not constitute a distinct physical phenomenon. But the rotational vibration is a different kind of a scalar motion, and it adds to the gravitational motion rather than merging with it.
The vibratory nature of the electric motion (charge) favors a periodic re-determination of the direction of motion (that is, a change in the nature of the coupling of the scalar motion to the reference system). As in the photon situation, the result is a distribution of the motion between the two alternatives. In each case, the motion that originated as AB becomes divided between AB and BA. The result is more striking in the case of the electric charge because of the vibratory nature of the motion, which makes it evident that the motion of object B is induced by the similar motion of the initially charged object A.
Corresponding to the one-dimensional scalar motion distributed in a rotational vibration pattern that we know as the electric charge is a two-dimensional scalar motion similarly distributed. As noted in Chapter 2, this is a magnetic motion. The term “charge” is not generally used in relation to magnetism, because present-day theory regards magnetism as due to motion of electric charges, rather than as a distinct phenomenon. On the basis of our findings with respect to distributed scalar motion, however, it is evident that there is a magnetic scalar motion similar in all (or at least most) respects to the electric charge, except that it is two-dimensional. A detailed development of the magnetic situation will require a theoretical base, which is something that is not provided by the factual treatment of scalar motion in this volume, but it can be deduced from what is known about the analogous electric charge that permanent magnetism and magnetostatic phenomena are two-dimensional distributed scalar motions (and their consequences), whereas electromagnetism is something of a different character.
The foregoing explanation of the fundamental nature of electric and magnetic action has the appearance of action at a distance, a concept that is philosophically objectionable to many scientists. Because of this philosophical bias, the prevailing opinion is that there must be some kind of transmission of an effect between the inducing object and the object in which the effect is induced, notwithstanding the total lack of any physical evidence to support this conclusion. But action at a distance is a concept that does not apply to scalar motion at all. An outward scalar motion of object X simply increases the distance between X and all other objects. So far as the relation between X and some other object Y is concerned, this result is indistinguishable from an outward scalar motion of Y. Because there is no difference between the scalar motion XY and the scalar motion YX, the representation of this motion in the reference system can take either form (or alternate between the two), even though, from the standpoint of the reference system, XY and YX are two distinct motions.
There is nothing strange or irrational about this as long as it is understood that we cannot expect the universe to conform to the particular arbitrary pattern that happens to be convenient for us. The problems arise when we attribute reality to these arbitrary patterns. The fact that will have to be faced is that the three-dimensional fixed spatial framework in which we customarily view the universe is not a container or background for physical activity, as has been assumed. It is merely a reference system. What the scalar motion investigation has disclosed is that it is a very imperfect reference system. As we saw in Chapter 2, it is limited to one of the three dimensions in which scalar motion takes place. Chapter 4 will show that it is further limited to a fraction of the total range of scalar speeds. The point now being emphasized is that even within the limited regions in which it is capable of representing scalar, as well as vectorial, motion, there are some aspects of scalar motion that are incompatible with the inherent nature of a fixed reference system.
To most scientists, this is an unwelcome conclusion. But it is a direct consequence of established physical facts, and it is therefore true regardless of how unpopular it may be. Furthermore, it has long been recognized that there is something wrong with the naive assumption that nature will obligingly accommodate itself to the kind of a reference system that we find most convenient, and it has further been recognized that, as a consequence, we are faced with the necessity of making some changes of a drastic, and probably distasteful, nature in our views as to the relation between physical reality and the representation of that reality in the conventional reference system. For example, F. A. Lindemann made this comment fifty years ago:
It is not easy to make clear the arbitrary nature of the space-time framework which we have chosen in order to describe reality. The coordinates are so convenient in the case of the grosser macroscopic phenomena, immediately perceptible to our senses, and have become so deeply ingrained in our habits of thought and so inextricably embalmed in our language that the suggestion that these indefinables may be meaningless, or, at the best, only statistically valid, is bound to be met with a certain amount of repugnance.44
Enough is now known about this situation to make it clear that the question is not whether there are aspects of reality that are not correctly represented in the conventional spatial reference system, but rather, What is the nature of the deviations? As matters now stand, most of the items of this character with which we will be concerned in the pages that follow are still unexplained by present-day science. Einstein’s relativity theory is currently credited with having provided the explanation of what originally appeared to be a deviation of this kind, an apparently irreconcilable conflict between representation in the reference system and direct speed measurement at very high speeds. In both this and the gravitational situation, Einstein’s answer was to distort the reference system, investing the space and time of that system with enough flexibility to conform with the mathematical expression of the observed behavior. He admitted that “it is not so easy to free oneself from the idea that co-ordinates must have an immediate metrical meaning,”45 but as he saw the problem, and asserted in the statement previously quoted, “there is no other way.”
Recognition of the existence of scalar motion, and the consequences of that existence, has now produced the allegedly nonexistent “other way” in both of these cases, eliminating the need for any distortion of the reference system, and identifying both gravitation and high-speed motion as normal phenomena of the region represented in the reference system. However, there are also many real deviations of the natural order of the universe from the conceptual structure represented by the conventional three-dimensional spatial frame of reference, and these constitute the principal subject matter of this present volume. The apparent action at a distance resulting from the indifference of scalar motion to location in the reference system is merely one of the ways in which the reality of physical existence deviates from the simple and convenient framework in which the human race has attempted to confine it.
In this case, the problem arises because all elements of a scalar motion system are moving. In order to place this system in a fixed frame of reference, one of these elements must be arbitrarily designated as stationary, but there is no requirement that this assignment be permanent. In the scalar interpretation of the three point system YXZ, for instance, all three points are moving away from each other. While point X is moving in the direction XY, it is also moving in the direction XZ. There is no way in which this kind of motion can be represented in a fixed reference system in its true character. When the motion is brought into the reference system it is coupled to that system in such a way that some point that is actually moving becomes stationary relative to the coordinate system. lf this point is X, the motion of Y outward from X becomes an observable motion in the reference system, while the motion of X outward from Y becomes unobservable, because X is motionless in the reference system. The distinction between stationary and moving, which is essential for representation in the reference system, but does not exist in the motion itself, is provided by the physical coupling of the motion to the reference system.
Inasmuch as the coupling is separate and distinct from the motion—the placement of the expanding balloon in the room, for example, is completely independent of the expansion of the balloon—there is no reason why it must necessarily retain its original form permanently. On the contrary, it is to be expected that in the normal course of events, particularly where the nature of the coupling is determined by probability factors, there will be a redetermination from time to time. This is what happens in the induction of charges.
In the induction process, the unusual effect arises because the reference system has a property, location, that the scalar motion does not have. Another unusual effect arises for the inverse reason: the scalar motion has a property that the reference system does not have, the property that we have called scalar direction. The spatial reference system does not distinguish specifically between inward and outward scalar motion. For instance, an object falling toward the earth by reason of gravitation is moving inward. Light photons reflected from this object, which may be moving on exactly the same path, are moving outward. In the context of the spatial reference system, however, both the light beam and the object are moving from the original location of the object toward the earth. In this case an outward (positive) scalar magnitude and an inward (negative) scalar magnitude are represented in the spatial reference system in exactly the same manner.
This is another place where the reference system is not capable of representing scalar motion in its true character. However, we can take care of this situation conceptually by introducing the idea of positive and negative reference points. As we saw earlier, assignment of a reference point is essential for the representation of a scalar motion in the spatial reference system. This reference point then constitutes the zero point for the measurement of the motion. It will be either a positive or a negative reference point, depending on the nature of the motion. The photon originates at a negative reference point and moves outward toward more positive values. The gravitational motion originates at a positive reference point and moves inward toward more negative values. If both motions originate at the same location in the reference system, as in the case of the falling object, the representation of both motions takes the same form in this system.
What we are doing by using positive and negative reference points is compensating for a deficiency in the reference system by the use of an auxiliary device. This is not a novel expedient; it is standard practice. Rotational motion, for instance, is represented in the spatial reference system with the aid of an auxiliary quantity: the number of revolutions. Similarly, a clock is an auxiliary device without which the reference system could portray only spatial quantities, and could not show motion at all. Scalar motion is no different from vectorial motion in its need for such auxiliary quantities, except that it has a broader scope, and as a result transcends the reference system in more ways.
Aside from clarifying the theoretical situation, this recognition of two kinds of reference points has little effect in dealing with gravitation or radiation, as both of these phenomena maintain the same reference point and the same scalar direction within the range capable of representation in the conventional spatial reference system. But there are other phenomena that involve both reference points. For example, the motion that constitutes an electric charge, a distributed scalar motion, is always outward, but that of a positive charge is outward from a positive reference point, while that of a negative charge is outward from a negative reference point. Thus, as indicated in the accompanying diagram, while two positive charges (line a) move outward away from each other, and two negative charges (c) do likewise, a positive charge moving outward from a positive reference point, as in (b), is moving toward a negative charge that is moving outward from a negative reference point. Thus like charges repel each other, while unlike charges attract.
| — | + | — | + | |||||
| (a) | | | <—— | | | ——> | | | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (b) | | | ——> | <—— | | | ||||
| (c) | | | <—— | | | ——> | | |
The special characteristics of the electric and magnetic motions, the vacant dimensions, the inductive effects, and the alternate reference points, account for the screening effects that are prominent features of electricity and magnetism, but are absent in gravitation. As can be seen from the nature of distributed scalar motion, the motion of A toward or away from B, and the corresponding force, cannot be affected by anything in the space between A and B, unless that entity is in contact with either A or B. But if the intervening object C has a distributed scalar motion of the same kind, then the total effect is A + C. In the case of gravitation, C is always positive, as gravitation is always inward, and, in our local environment, always has a positive reference point. In electrical and magnetic phenomena, however, the charge on C, if any, can be either positive or negative. lt is usually an induced charge, and therefore opposes the charge on A. In this case C is a negative quantity, and the net charge A + C is less than A; that is, there is a screening effect.
Any one dimension of a multi-dimensional scalar motion can be represented in the spatial reference system. As indicated earlier, if the scalar motion XA is thus represented, any motion XB that may exist in a second scalar dimension has no observable effect in the reference system. However, under some circumstances, a scalar motion AX, equal in magnitude to the motion XA, and opposite in scalar direction, may be superimposed on XA, reducing the net effective motion in this dimension to zero. In this case there is no obstacle to representation of motion in another dimension, and the motion XB therefore makes its appearance in the reference system. Thus the rather unusual result of applying the negative motion (or force) is to produce a motion perpendicular to the direction of the originating motion.
According to Newton’s Second Law of Motion, the acceleration is in the direction of the applied force. The effect just described appears to violate this law, and in view of the firm position that the second law occupies in physics, a violation is admittedly hard to accept. But, as can be seen by an examination of magnetic phenomena, the kind of an effect that has been described actually does occur. Conventional physics has no explanation for it. The perpendicular direction of the resultant is merely dismissed as a “strange” effect. From the explanation in the preceding paragraph it can be seen that the second law is not actually violated. The applied force does act in accordance with this law, producing an acceleration in the direction of the force, but that acceleration counterbalances an oppositely directed gravitational motion in the dimension of the applied force, reducing the net speed in that dimension to zero. This allows the gravitational motion in a perpendicular dimension, normally unobservable, to manifest itself in the reference system.
Here is one of the places where it is necessary to recognize that scalar motion has special characteristics of its own, and cannot be fully accommodated within the narrower limits of the rules that apply to vectorial motion. This may be a difficult idea for those who have grown up under the shadow of conventional scientific thought, but whatever mental anguish this and the other necessary readjustments of thinking may cause is a small price to pay for all of the clarification of the physical picture that is accomplished by recognition of the existence and properties of scalar motion.
As indicated in the introductory comments in Chapter 1, the presentation in this volume, which deals entirely with established facts and their necessary consequences, is independent of the physical theory in whose context the phenomena involving scalar motion are viewed. This type of motion unquestionably exists, but its role in physical activity has not heretofore been subjected to a critical examination. The objective of this volume is to fill this vacuum; to provide the basic information about scalar motion that is part of the empirical knowledge of the universe around which any theory must be constructed.
What the discussion thus far has done is to explore the consequences of recognizing that the so-called “fundamental forces” of physics are, in fact, distributed scalar motions, and to identify the modifications of current physical thought that are required by reason of this correction of a conceptual mistake. The effect of these modifications is largely explanatory rather than substantive. The treatment of gravitation in practical application, for instance, remains essentially unchanged. But its physical properties are now fully accounted for, and there is no longer any need to call upon ad hoc assumptions, such as the assumption of a finite speed of propagation, that are contrary to observed fact, or, like the assumption that space has the properties of a medium, are conceptually unsupportable. In other cases, the result has simply been to provide an explanation for something that has heretofore been unexplained, or has been regarded as unexplainable. The electric charge, for example, no longer has to be accepted as a given feature of the universe that is incapable of explanation in terms of more fundamental concepts. The perennial question, What is an electric charge?, no longer has to be dismissed as unanswerable. We can now reply that an electric charge is a one-dimensional distributed scalar motion.
Although some of the hitherto unknown physical phenomena discussed in the preceding pages, such as scalar motion in the second and third dimensions, are unobservable, they are, at least in a sense, within the boundaries of the reference system. A further extension of the investigation discloses that scalar motion may also transcend these limits, and take place under circumstances in which it is outside the spatial reference system.
This introduces a question on the borderline between science and philosophy: the issue as to the nature of reality. The orthodox view has been that the “real” world exists in the space defined by the conventional reference system, and in the time defined by a clock. On this basis it would be possible to classify as real the unobservable phenomena that are located within the reference system, but anything outside that system could not be accorded the “real” status. Heisenberg’s atoms, which he located in “abstract multi-dimensional space” therefore had to characterized as phantoms. As he explained,
The idea of an objective real world whose smallest parts exist objectively in the same manner as stones or trees exist, independently of whether or not we observe them… is impossible.46
Just how a “real” world can be fashioned out of components that are no more than phantoms is a difficult question that most theorists have preferred to ignore. Bridgman, one of the few that have addressed the issue, found it impossible to resolve. His conclusion was that,
The world is not intrinsically reasonable or understandable; it acquires these properties in ever-increasing degree as we ascend from the realm of the very little to the realm of everyday things.47
The clarification of the status of scalar motion now throws a new light on this subject. Scalar motion has the same characteristics wherever we observe it. Since it obviously must be classified as real in its manifestations within the spatial reference system, it must also be real outside that system. This eliminates any justification that may previously have existed for the prevailing view that equates the boundaries of reality with the boundaries of the conventional spatiotemporal reference system.
In order to make the foregoing statements intelligible, it is necessary to explain what is meant by “outside the reference system.” There is no space outside the spatial frame of reference, as this is, in principle, unbounded (even if it is finite, as in Einstein’s theory). However, the ability of the spatio-temporal reference system, which combines the spatial coordinate system with a clock, to represent motion (or to represent it correctly) is strictly limited. We have already seen that the representation in the reference system is limited to one of the three dimensions in which scalar motion may take place. In the pages that follow, we will find that there are two additional limitations. First, we will find that there is a minimum distance below which the space-time relations take different forms. This accounts for the difficulties that are being experienced in the realm of the very small, the problems that have led to the belief that the entities of this region do not exist in any real sense. Second, the representation of motion in the conventional spatio-temporal reference system is subject to a speed limit.
Our next objective will be to explore the scalar speed range above this limit, the range in which motion either cannot be represented at all in the conventional reference system, or is not represented in its true character. No phenomena of this nature are recognized by current science. It follows that if they do exist, as the new information now available indicates, there must be some significant error in current physical thought. The existence of multi-dimensional scalar motion supplies the clue that is needed for identifying this error, the nature of which will be discussed in the next chapter.