The Quantum Luminiferous Aether. Videos. Publishing. Philosophy.

I have finished the shorter version of my paper and plan to submit it to the Physical Review. The new version of the paper is now on my website, right at the top of the aether page. Click the link in my signature and it will take you to the correct page. The new version is 57 pages long, double spaced, which is about a fifth of the full length version. The videos present a pretty close representation of what is in the new version.

I don't know how long it will take to submit to the Physical Review. I see I need to get an account, and then there may be some request for reformatting of things before we can even get started. (If they will even consider an aether paper.)

A replacement for relativity should be a rather big deal. I went through all the math of the shorter paper carefully. As with the last full proofread of the full version I can find no error in the numbered equations. Everything makes sense and it provides answers to present problems in physics. I hope publication is possible.

a reply to: delbertlarson

Just on a brief look, I think it will be a very hard sell.

In looking at other papers on Physical Review, I don't see any "forewords" on others, nor do I see deities mentioned in any acknowledgements. Your academic credentials aren't mentioned (I presume that would be taken care of when you create an account???)

As far as I can see, they've published only two articles on aether and these were specific to a certain situation and not an "we're overturning relativity" type situation. Frankly, I think a work like that where you find flaws in certain approaches and show that the aether theory makes a better prediction is more likely to be accepted.


(hubby needs to go to the pharmacy and to dinner. Back later.)


(Disclaimer: I'm an anthropologist, not a physicist. I have only a handful of papers published and the only journal publication I have was in 1983. Take everything with a grain of salt.)

I know that trivialities seem to be nit-picking, but the devilish little details are often what make or break a paper.

The Einstein quote is very popular but not quite in context - and not quite correct, either. (see Encyclopedia Britannica)

That's not going to make them reject the paper, however. Just note that I can be a picky scholar.

I would think that it would be far stronger if you can show how your solution is a more perfect match for this experiment that confirms relativity (I notice there's a tiny discrepancy in the numbers) or this or another of your choice.



Best wishes to you, but I think the tone is not similar enough to what they publish and without demonstrating that it produces better results for some known observational errors.

a reply to: Byrd

First, thanks for continuing to engage. It is helpful to continue to discuss things. I'll respond to your latest posts in order.

Just on a brief look, I think it will be a very hard sell.

In looking at other papers on Physical Review, I don't see any "forewords" on others

I am aware of the difficulties. One issue is "for enormous claims we require enormous evidence". I have provided evidence, but it is 272 pages long. Once shortened to 57 pages, much of the small detail is dropped, and that could lead to a claim that not enough evidence is there. So I tried handling it with the forward, linking the short and long documents via equation numbers. That way, if anyone wishes to find out more about any specific equation, they can just cross-reference to the longer version to find any specific details, without requiring anyone to look through the full paper all at once. This way, readers can get an overview first, and then dig into the details as they see fit.

nor do I see deities mentioned in any acknowledgements.

The absence of religion from scientific works stems from the same philosophy that has led to relativity. Namely, Hume's observational supremacy. Hume's questioning of miracles, and his questioning of the veracity of the origins of religion, has over time led to an abandonment of long-held beliefs. Nietszhe was very anti-Christian. Not mentioned in my timeline of the OP was Spinoza, who essentially equated God and Nature. In addition to being a follower of Hume, Einstein also had an affinity for Spinoza's thinking. Einstein's philosophy was consistent, and it is different from mine. Today, Einstein's philosophy dominates physics.

As far as I can see, they've published only two articles on aether and these were specific to a certain situation and not an "we're overturning relativity" type situation.

Yes, I face hurdles. In looking into publishing with the Physical Review, they refer me to ArXiv, with an expectation that I will post my work there first. When I go to ArXiv I see they would perhaps take my work if I still worked at a major university or national lab, but now that I do not, I will need to be sponsored. Critically, ArXiv also mentions how they are careful not to take certain types of works, and call out works that make claims that are too dramatic. So that all sounds like a non-starter. My work is about as dramatic as it gets.

a reply to: delbertlarson

The Einstein quote is very popular but not quite in context - and not quite correct, either. (see Encyclopedia Britannica)

I read the Encyclopedia Britannica article you mention and it reinforced everything I have been aware of, although it did add information about Talmud and Einstein's childhood that was new to me. Thanks for sharing the link. After reading the article I still believe my quote is in the proper context. While the quote isn't fully correct in that Einstein uses "He" instead of "God", it is quite clear that "He" refers to "the Old One" which in turn refers to "God".

The Encyclopedia Britannica article does a nice job in my opinion of succinctly covering the central philosophical issue concerning the confrontation between relativity and quantum mechanics. My philosophy is that I agree with Einstein in his realism, and I disagree with Bohr and Heisenberg on that issue. I believe the wavefunction represents reality. My philosophy, which I believe is new, is discussed in my section A.2, "A New Starting Philosophy" in the 57 page work. In that section you will find a discussion involving Hume and Mach and their relation to Einstein. Ironically, it is Einstein's relativity that must be set aside in order for us the embrace Einstein's realism.

Note that once we accept that quantum mechanics allows for results that are indeed probabilistic and not deterministic, we achieve the basis for the existence of free will, as well as a physical basis for a living God that is different from Spinoza's God. The essence of free will can be posited as an ability to affect a choice. That choice can be the ability to collapse a wave-function in a way that we decide. I believe it likely that our ability to affect such collapses starts neurologically with perhaps a single neuron firing, and then through our nervous system we can move muscles to achieve changes that we ourselves decide upon.

Since the paper I wrote not only confronts Einstein's relativity, but also confronts the Bohr and Heisenberg quantum mechanical interpretation, and also confronts modern "scientific" atheism, I am coming to the conclusion that trying to publish in ArXiv would be a complete waste of my time.

a reply to: Byrd

I would think that it would be far stronger if you can show how your solution is a more perfect match for this experiment that confirms relativity (I notice there's a tiny discrepancy in the numbers) or this or another of your choice.

Thanks for the links. The first experiment you link to, Gravity Probe B, is certainly relevant, and indeed points to something my theory presently lacks. The missing piece is the flow law for gravitational effects, and it is such a flow law that could lead to equations governing the Gravity Probe B results. So far, I've postulated a flow speculation that accounts for light bending, but I call it a speculation rather than a law because different speculations remain possible. That is still an open area for research. The second experiment you link to involves a quark-gluon plasma and I don't see how that would have any relevance to a gravitational or electrodynamics theory. It is related to my ABC Preon Model, but that is a different matter.

Best wishes to you, but I think the tone is not similar enough to what they publish and without demonstrating that it produces better results for some known observational errors.

My theory gives an equation for gravity that is different from Einstein, and this does produce an improved result for one set of experiments. Specifically, the first-field-mass is identified as dark matter. My equations can be tested against observations. For spiral galaxies, my equations predict that distant stellar orbits will have velocities approximately independent of radius, and this has been observed.

originally posted by: delbertlarson
a reply to: Byrd

The missing piece is the flow law for gravitational effects, and it is such a flow law that could lead to equations governing the Gravity Probe B results. So far, I've postulated a flow speculation that accounts for light bending, but I call it a speculation rather than a law because different speculations remain possible. That is still an open area for research.

This incompleteness (I noticed it) is not in your favor. I really think you would do better to focus on a recent relativity confirming experiment that has some discrepancies and show how an aether could better describe the results.

People have been trying to put forward the aether theory ever since it was overturned. Almost all of them come back with a full description (as you have) and invariably it gets sent off with a "go away, kid. You're bothering me."

The very few I see accepted are where someone has shown that an aether theory better explains a result and gives a more accurate result than the standard models. Not a complete description; just a pecking away at a corner.

If you use those papers as your strong references and attack a single problem, you will be able to build up a large "wrecking ball" to go after standard relativity. As it is, a single long paper that has gaps in its application is not enough of a wrecking machine to cause any foundation to crack.

My theory gives an equation for gravity that is different from Einstein, and this does produce an improved result for one set of experiments. Specifically, the first-field-mass is identified as dark matter. My equations can be tested against observations. For spiral galaxies, my equations predict that distant stellar orbits will have velocities approximately independent of radius, and this has been observed.

Why don't you focus on this particular result, then? Leave off the philosophy, look at how that aether paper presented their case, and use that as a model. No guarantee, but I think it would greatly increase your chance at success.

a reply to: Byrd

The very few I see accepted are where someone has shown that an aether theory better explains a result...

The articles getting published recently predominantly concern Einstein-aether, a concept completely different than an aether that carries mechanical waves. So taking that approach is a nonstarter for my work.

If the argument is that only experimental differences are relevant, we would never have gone beyond Aristotle. Copernicus and Kepler didn't predict anything that the celestial sphere model did not. With enough cleverness I suspect that even the moons of Jupiter could have been wedged into the older theory. Right now the standard model has over 150 terms and something like 90 free parameters. Of course everything can be made to fit! Simplicity and an ability to understand things are also important.

It is claimed that Einstein's theories have a simple underpinning, and in some sense they do. Assuming that light speed is constant in all frames is simple. Assuming that gravity is equivalent to an accelerating frame is simple also. Of course, these simple ideas lead to very weird (and celebrated) departures from previous thinking, most dramatically concerning what we think about space and time. But the larger point is that Einsteinian simplicity is made possible just by declaring all other effects as "natures laws" and not treating them at all in any way. Those laws now include the 150 terms and 90 free parameters mentioned above. Cleaning out this complex mess is important even if it still leads to the same numerical results for experiments.

To drive home the point, if the present theory is allowed to continually add parameters and effects to account for all data, it will indeed account for all data. If a new theory is required to do a better job matching the data, it never will be able to, since the old way can just add more to itself as needed. While dark matter presently isn't well understood within the standard model, rest assured it will be someday (unless the standard model is replaced). Someone will come up with something that fits the dark matter data in a covariant way, with a goal to add as few new parameters as possible, but still the monster will survive and get just a bit bigger. That's how we've got to the present state, slowly growing the standard model over time.

People have been trying to put forward the aether theory ever since it was overturned. Almost all of them come back with a full description...

Yes. Other aether theories I have seen, and occasionally reviewed, were always severely flawed. Sometimes rather hilariously so. It isn't helpful. Individuals get the idea that theirs is the next Einsteinian leap forward, oblivious to their own flaws. Of course, any one person may not see their own flaws. I believe my work is sound, but it would profit greatly by serious study from others. That would either validate it, invalidate it, or point to areas in need of improvement. That is why I seek to publish.

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In other news, the Physical Review asks for a letter of submission to accompany the submission of a paper. Also asked for is a Popular Summary. Also a 100 word justification as to why the work is important enough for PRX. Things have gotten far more involved than when I submitted my PRL's a three decades ago! Acknowledgements are prescribed to be so limited that my whole acknowledgement section (including thanks to God) must be removed. They ask for inclusion of any supportive materials, and in this case that is the 272 page paper. So lots to do.

a reply to: delbertlarson

I wish you luck, then. My own area of understanding is too small to be able to usefully offer any further suggestions.

originally posted by: delbertlarson
If the argument is that only experimental differences are relevant, we would never have gone beyond Aristotle. Copernicus and Kepler didn't predict anything that the celestial sphere model did not.

Look at the example of Copernicus. He proposed an alternate idea, without any evidence to support it. What happened? As far as I can tell, almost nobody believed him during his lifetime, though maybe that doesn't mean much since he knew his idea was controversial so he waited until he was near death to publish it. But for many years after his death, apparently either few people believed or else few people were willing to admit they believed Copernicus' heliocentric idea.

But what finally got more than a handful of believers was observational evidence. When Galileo could show through his telescope the phases of Venus were consistent with a heliocentric model, that was observational evidence which anybody could look through his telescope and see.

Which reminds me of a story I heard about Peter Higgs. Someone said that Higgs first submission to a journal about the Higgs mechanism was rejected, precisely because he not only lacked experimental evidence but lacked any means of obtaining such in the future. After his rejection, he basically added a sentence that if his idea in the paper was correct, then there should be a detectable particle associated with it, which we now know as the Higgs boson, which was eventually detected decades later, but still within Higgs' lifetime. Thank goodness the journal refused to accept Higgs' paper until he linked it to something which might be observable in the real world, otherwise it might have just been another idea lost in relative obscurity because there was no evidence to support it.

The fact you're trying to replace a well-established theory with apparently lots of observational evidence backing it up would seemingly make it even more helpful to have observational tests showing that your proposed alternate theory fits observations better. You seemed to suggest that your theory obviates the need for dark matter to explain stellar orbital velocities in galaxies. Even if that's true, it faces the same problem as MOND (MOdified Newtonian Dynamics) which tries to explain only the orbital speed aspect of dark matter claims, and not the gravitational lensing aspect. So, because of gravitational lensing observations, it's difficult to point to some alternate explanation for stellar orbits and say dark matter is no longer needed, because it's still needed to explain gravitational lensing.

originally posted by: Byrd
a reply to: delbertlarson

I wish you luck, then. My own area of understanding is too small to be able to usefully offer any further suggestions.

I sincerely thank you for your time and comments, as they have led to some improvements. While I was always going to add references, I likely added a few more because of your comments. And I almost certainly would not have included mention of my previous Physical Review Letters nor my Ph.D. research credentials in my cover letter to the Physical Review. I believe works should stand on their own merit, and people should just read and judge based on the substance. I believe we should not judge based on credentials. When I reviewed, I always tried to do so based on the substance alone. But your commentary reinforced the realization (which wasn't new to me, but which I don't pay enough attention to) that appearances can mean more than substance when one is being judged. I have a habit of always reverting back to substance alone. Upon reflection, I agree with you that it is important that the cover letter emphasize the credentials more than what I typically do. So I have done so. Your commentary has been very helpful. Thanks again!

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Hello again Arbitraguer! It's been quite a while since our earlier conversations. I always appreciate your feedback! Thanks for the additional comments concerning the Venusian phases. As for MOND, I am not an expert. What I can do is cover what my theory says about dark matter.

In my aether model, mass displaces the aether leading to energies within the tension, quantum and gamma fields. This leads to Newtonian gravity as the dominant term near the mass. Additionally, the field energies lead to two mass densities. For regions outside of a large central hadronic mass, the integration of the first-field-mass density inside of a radius r is shown to increase linearly with r, leading to a 1/r force term. That force term eventually dominates the Newtonian 1/r^2 term, leading to a flattening of the velocity curve with respect to r. From what I understand of MOND things are somewhat similar so far. However I also have a negative second-field-mass density, which when integrated drops off as 1/r^3, and that second-field-mass is what causes an advance of the perihelia. The second-field-mass also causes a hidden mass within neutron stars, which is another topic.

So the origin of the 1/r force in my theory is different from that of MOND. I am not altering F=ma nor F=GmM/r^2. Rather, there is the presence of additional mass in the way of field-masses. For dark matter to achieve the same effect as my field-masses, the density of the dark matter would need to be the same as the density of my field-masses: both the dark matter theory and my theory are simply adding mass. (My first-field-mass is a dark mass.) I believe this should explain lensing as well, at least lensing from spiral galaxies.

My field masses are derived from the same first principles that lead to my derivation of Maxwell's Equations and the Lorentz force equation. There is an appealing unification of electromagnetism and gravity. There is a very specific derivation for the field masses that can be done from any known distribution of hadronic mass; it is not an ad hoc theory like MOND; nor is it an ad hoc assignment of dark mass in places just to explain results. It simply is an added result that comes about from the initial aetherial postulates provided we make an assignment of the sign of the gravitational masses of the individual fields. The calculations can be compared to observations. The theory can be wrong.

A word of caution though. Dark matter will come from hadronic mass, and such mass can be in neutron stars. In my theory neutron stars do not collapse to a singularity, and they can get quite massive, as massive or more so than Sgr A*. Since neutron stars are black, if there is not enough nearby gas to accrete they will remain black. In such cases there will be a large amount of field mass in the regions surrounding the neutron star. And with everything dark in such a situation, there will appear to be dark matter there yet we will see no hadronic matter. Such situations can form lenses. So I think the theory may be OK with regard to lensing. This latter effect can however be applied ad hoc, but who is to say that such rogue neutron stars do not exist? And note that they could exist in the line of sight to some distant objects (such as in the line of sight to the bullet cluster) and this would mess up with what we think we are seeing. I imagine such rogue neutron stars (or rouge black holes in the contemporary theory) might assist with certain MOND interpretations as well.

Since both light and gravity are operating within the same aether, having the same aetherial mass density and tension, light and gravity waves will both travel at the same speed. I believe this is also different from certain MOND theories.

Also note that if you have two nearly equal mass objects such as two galaxies, then the aetherial displacement in between them will be zero, and there will be zero field masses when there is zero displacement. Hence the first field-mass grows with radius inside of a galaxy with a large central mass, but outside of the galaxy it will die off as other galaxies push back on the aetherial displacement.

I believe the combination of the above effects match observations well, but I am not an expert there. Of course, I'd appreciate your further comments on this point.

I'd also appreciate any other comments you may have. Please consider watching the videos that you can access by clicking on the link in my signature. And please let me know of any problematic issues you may find. The present papers are also up on my site, and you can refer to them for more information. I believe you might have access to a group of experts, and I would appreciate any and all expert feedback. I was planning to submit my paper to Physical Review soon, but if you see any show stoppers I would delay sending it in until I can address the issues.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

In doing a bit of searching online, it appears that both lambda-CDM and MOND are being defended by their promoters. Each of these ideas also appear to have challenges. And from what I read, there are some rather critical assumptions being made in the data interpretation. Correlating galactic mass to luminosity, the constant luminosity of SN1A explosions, and trusting in the cosmic distance ladder are three such assumptions. Then, we must fold in the fact that we presently intepret all of our observations by assuming that general relativity is correct. With all this uncertainty, I believe the best approach for me is to wrap things up and try to publish what I presently have.

My paper is focused on the elemental aetherial quantum cube. With its simple postulates it explains a great deal. On more than one occasion, unexpected explanations came about. One is that the mass density needed for the speed of light relationship turned out to be 1/c^2 of the energy density of the quantum cube. While such things can be coincidences, it is also very encouraging when such discoveries happen without trying to force a solution.

As always, I'd appreciate any further comments. Especially valuable is if an error is found, or, if no error is found. The key is to start getting actual serious peer review.

a reply to: delbertlarson

The paper is now submitted to Physical Review X. I will post here concerning the outcome of the review process after it happens.

Don't know if you saw this announcement, but thought I'd leave a link here just in case: www.msn.com... ntp&cvid=0106d2914bf04b369e265dd7c3f000d1&ei=37

a reply to: Byrd

Thanks for sharing. I read the article.

On another matter, I mentioned I would post here once I heard from PRX. This morning my paper was rejected without review. The email says it does not meet their criterion. However, a reading of their criterion reveals that my paper is entirely consistent with what they ask for. I am writing a response to ask for a bit more information concerning their decision. It is hard to improve things when you get no meaningful reason for rejection. However, I don't know that I'll get anything more out of them.

Of course I think I know the reason. Einstein is widely viewed as the best physicist ever. While many works come out all the time in opposition to relativity, such works are often crackpot efforts. It saves a lot of time to just reject anything that questions relativity.

The only surprising thing was that it took 13 days to get this result.

a reply to: delbertlarson

As you said, the rejection isn't surprising. Hopefully someone will get back to you with comments.

a reply to: Byrd

Publishing attempt update: I sent two emails to Physical Review X asking for more information regarding their rejection of my work, but haven't heard back yet. So I then checked into the Astrophysical Journal. That journal listed an email for questions about submitting, so I sent a copy of my work there and asked if they would consider it. (The specifications for formatting would have cost me days of work and perhaps introduced typos, so I wanted to know if they'd even consider my work.) I haven't heard back from them yet either. It will be two weeks tomorrow with no response from either journal, so I'm guessing their position on this matter is to just ignore me. I am keeping copies of all journal correspondence in a Word document. I plan to post that correspondence to my website once my attempts at publishing are done.

Yesterday I submitted to the Journal on Classical and Quantum Gravity. I'm going off of a list of the top impact physics journals, and this one is fairly far down the list, but it seems to specialize most closely to my subject matter.

I'm now also putting out a daily tweet on X, formerly twitter. Of course, since I have very few followers, I'm not getting much traction there yet either. From the metrics X gives you, I believe I am getting less than five impressions per tweet. I don't know if ATS wants me to post my twitter handle here, so I'll only say you can find me by searching X for Delbert Larson. I plan to start posting my videos on X starting in a couple of weeks after I've laid the foundation with these daily tweets. It would be great to get more relevant followers there.

When I first came to ATS about eight years ago there were vibrant discussions. Traffic here has died off considerably over the years, but I remain grateful to ATS for a place to get at least some feedback. I learned at X that there is a "Physics Forums" online site that might be good to try, but the two linked articles I saw on X were about how Physics Forums would not allow threads on the Lorentz Ether Theory and one about crackpot theories. So thanks again to ATS.

a reply to: delbertlarson

I suspect that you won't get that much more attention on Twitt...er.. X - that doesn't seem the kind of audience for long and scholarly videos.

The outlets you're approaching seem more hardwired for shorter pieces. Most journals really won't take book length subjects; their audience wants shorter articles on issues relevant to their interests. A book or a manuscript of the length that you're offering would require several days of reading (or more, if you're checking the equations), and most readers aren't interested in devoting that much time to it. While there's an audience on YouTube for longer pieces, I don't think that's the same for X and similar markets.

Honestly, I'm not sure where you might find acceptance other than self-publishing.