Quantum Matter "Beyond The Point Particle - A Wave Structure For The Electron" Part I

INTRODUCTION

The apparent inconsistencies between the point particle theory and the observed wave behavior of the electron are reconciled by an electron structure, the Space Resonance.  Electrons or positrons can be described as a pair of spherical scalar waves diverging and converging at their center.  This simple structure produces the observed properties of electrons.  This basic charged-particle structure is then found to be the origin of the basic laws of physics, including quantum theory, relativistic mass increase,  inertia, charge  and electromagnetism.

The Space Resonance structure is obtained from three assumptions  or principles :

(1) a wave equation describing spherical scalar waves,

(2) theSpace Density Assumption , which leads to an energy exchange mechanism, and

(3) the Minimum Amplitude Principle, which regulates particle interactions.

Origins Of Natural Laws.

The business of physics is the abstract quantification of facts observed in nature.  The rules we form for reconstruction and expression of the observed facts are thelaws of nature  and Principles of nature .  The distinction between them is  tied to their generality.   Principles are considered to be more general and by implication more basic.  For example, the Principle of Least Action is inferred from several of the force laws and the principle of Conservation of Energy  expresses  all the various heat and energy flow laws.

Since  laws are obtained by measurement of nature rather than derived from other knowledge, they are by definition empirical and  "of unknown origin".  Therefore if we seek to find the origins of laws we cannot use the existing laws themselves but must use other observed facts together with logical deduction and established mathematics.  Rarely a law is found contained within another law. 

For example the gas lawPV=nRT  half a century ago was seen to be a result of Newton's laws and QM applied to molecules in a closed container.  

Such serendipity is the exception; today, the search for origins must probe deeper into nature than heretofore and we must be prepared to find unprecedented perspectives of nature.  

Growing evidence cited by Galeczki [1]  is compelling that the basic laws are intimately involved with cosmology and and are dependent on relationships between individual particles and the remaining matter of the universe. 

Accordingly in the search for the the origins of natural laws, observations of unexplained puzzles of quantum particles and cosmology are attractive sources of input data.

When seeking origins, it is important not to inadvertently  use existing laws to deduce themselves.  Although the quantum laws of quantum particles can be extrapolated to large macro-objects,  the inverse is not possible.  Such circular reasoning can occur if, for example, an e-m field or mechanical model from macro-physics is assumed to be the structure of a quantum particle.  

Logically, finding the origins of existing laws requires forming new concepts that nevertheless satisfy observed data.  It is a major result of this article to further deduce that most of the natural laws originate from the properties of the quantum waves of the charged particles (electron, proton,etc) , and the properties of the space (ether, vacuum,etc.) which is formed from the totality of all those particle quantum waves.  One such effect is already known as Mach's Principle which asserts that inertia is a result of an inertial reference frame established by all matter in the universe.

The discovery of these origins from the work of this article  creates a radical new picture of the physical world:  quantum mechanics and relativity are in a sense united, origins of forces are understood,  puzzles and paradoxes are explained and, most important, relationships between microphysics (electrons and particles) and the universe (cosmology) are seen to be a result of an all-pervading  "space" (the vacuum or ether) filled with oscillating quantum (particle)  waves.

The reader should be aware that he is evaluating a new  basic proposal that  all natural science results  from just three assumptions about the properties of space.

SECTION I  -  HISTORY

The search for the structure of the electron started over a century ago, in H.A. Lorentz's book [2] Theory of the Electron.  No satisfactory structure has been found (until now).  As late as the 1950's, Einstein was asked if he could explain the confusion of hadron particles which were being found in ever increasing numbers.  He replied, "I would be happy  just to know what an electron is!"

Many have suggested that a wave-structured electron plays a fundamental role in nature.  The famous geometer-mathematician Clifford [3] suggested in 1876 that all physical laws were the result of undulations (waves) in the fabric of space.  Nobel laureate Paul Dirac, who developed much of the theory describing the quantum waves of the electron, was never satisfied with its point-particle character because the Coulomb electron required a mathematical correction termed "renormalization". 

In 1937, he wrote,  "This is just not sensible mathematics.  Sensible mathematics involves neglecting a quantity when it turns out to be small — not neglecting it because it is infinitely large and you do not want it! "  Weyl, Clifford, Einstein, and Schroedinger [4] agreed that the puzzle of matter will be found in the structure of space, not in point-like bits of matter.  They speculated that the physical world is based upon a geometry of space.  What we observe as material bodies and forces are nothing but shapes and variations in the structure of space.  The complexity of physics and cosmology is just a special geometry.  This idea had an enduring appeal because of its economy of concepts  and  simplicity  of  design.

In 1945, Wheeler and Feynman [5] represented charge by assuming a pair of spherical inward and outward electromagnetic   waves.  Their use of advanced (inward) waves is an apparent violation of the principle of causality which states, "Events cannot occur before their causes."  Wheeler and Feynman showed that the puzzling inward waves do not violate causality because they are not directly observeable.  Their results hold for scalar waves which are exact solutions of a wave equation in spherical coordinates.

Phipps [6] put forth a beta-structure hypothesis , in which he suggested that the electron-positron is the fundamental particle of the universe.  He reasoned that the infinite extent of charge forces were more fundamental than local effects of baryons.  Wolff [7, 8, 9] formulated the results described here.

This paper shows that these scientists' visions have come true.   Dirac was correct.  The electron is a wave structure without particle substances.   The medium of the waves is space, still unexplored but related to "vacuum" and "ether";  terms increasingly used as the wave nature of matter becomes unmistakable.

SECTION II  -  PUZZLES OF ELECTRON STRUCTURE

A.  Is the Electron a Wave or a Particle?

The electron exhibits properties of both particles and waves.  However, many experiments have been done to search for a core of the electron without results.  What we do observe is that energy exchanges take place at "point-like" locations in the metallic lattice of detectors.  On the other hand, wave properties of an electron are obvious from the success of Quantum Mechanics.  This theory describes a mechanism where waves interact at point locations and thereby produce the results that we observe as particle-like.

B.  What is the Mechanism of Energy Exchange?

Exchanges between charged particles is the dominant way in which energy is transferred in our solar system.  An exchange  is always  required to darken a film, move a needle, record a bit, or fire a neuron.  These exchanges dominate our technology, daily lives, and Nature.  They are the means of our human senses, laboratory experiments, and the production of knowledge, but the mechanism is unknown.

Furthermore, an Energy Exchange Mechanism can be seen to underly the force laws and even special relativity, the DeBroglie wavelength, and Conservation of Energy. 

For example, the force laws describe force as the change in energy over distance, F = dE/dr .

Therefore, whatever motivates the change in energy generates what we observe as force.  The coulomb and gravity force laws do not describe what creates these forces because they are only formulas to calculate force.  That is, they do not imply any particular energy exchange mechanism.  This mechanism for the electron, described below, depends on the existence of other matter in the universe.

C.  How does Matter depend on other Matter in the Universe?

The mere existence of a particle imposes requirements upon its properties.  Without particles to populate a universe, the universe could not exist because our concept of "universe" is simply a collection of particles and their distribution.  Thus our understanding  of our universe depends on our understanding of the particles in it.  Further, the natural laws of the universe could not exist without particles ;  Laws demand the presence of particles, upon which the laws can operate.  Laws without particles are meaningless because particles are the objects  of the laws.   Especially  we need to understand the relationship of the laws to the electron and proton, the two charged particles whose infinite fields dominate the universe 

And the opposite is true.  We cannot identify a particle without the force laws to locate and measure it.  Thus our perception of particles depends on the form of the natural laws.  These three, particles, laws, and the universe  are an interdependent trilogy .  Each requires the existence of the others.  Therefore, we cannot expect to understand cosmology, the structure of the universe, unless we also understand the relationships  within the trilogy.   The nature of the relationships  between separated particles of matter,  more basic than forces between them,  are brought out by the following arguments.

Measurement is a Property of an Ensemble of Matter.  A particle entirely alone in the universe cannot have dimensions of time, length, or mass.  These measures are undefined without the existence of other matter because dimensions can only be defined in comparison with other matter.  For example, at least five separated particles are necessary to crudely define length in a 3D space: four to establish coordinates and one being measured.  Thus the measurement concept requires the existence of an ensemble of particles.  In our universe the required ensemble must include all observeable matter, for there is no way to choose a special ensemble.  The importance of this fact becomes clear when we recall that time, length and mass are the basic unit set used to describe all scientific measurements.

Particle Properties require Perception-communication Between Particles. If there were no means for each particle to sense the presence of other matter in its universe, the required dimensional relationships above could not be established. How can a particle possess  a property which is dependent on other particles, if there is no way for the particles to impart their presence to each other?    Without communication, each particle would be alone in its own separate universe.   Therefore continual two-way   perceptive communication between each particle and other matter in its universe is needed to establish the laws of nature.  The laws are then  established in terms of the dimensions (units) established by  the ensemble of matter.

We deduce that the waves of an electron structure are the means of the communication between particles of matter.  Below  in Section III we shall see that the mathematical solutions of the wave equation indeed allow for two-way continuous communication by means of waves which form the the electron structure.   This reasoning underlying  measurement yields boundary criteria on the structure of the electron  summarized  in the two corollaries below  :

Corollary  I.   There exists a means of continual communication between particles which takes place  in the space (ether, vacuum) of the universe of the particles.
Corollary II.     A "universe"  is defined for each particle as the space and other  particles within the space  which are able to communicate with  the particle. 

The Measurement of Time requires a cosmological clock.  Using reasoning similar to the above but for the dimension of time, we can conclude that time measurement requires the existence of cyclic events among the particles of the universe;  a kind of clock.   Those properties of particles which involve the measurement of time, notably  mass and frequency,  cannot have a meaning if particles have no scale of time.  That is, the particles themselves, must have a way to compare their own cyclic events with other particles.  Therefore, there must exist a standard cosmological clock.  One straight-forward proposal is a cosmic clock contained in every identical particle structure as an oscillator which communicates with other particles.   Because of the uniformity of space (the oscillator medium) the clocks would be alike.

The role of Space.  Since all the laws of nature are written in terms of the dimensions [time, length, mass] defined by ensembles of matter communicating in the space of a universe, we infer that the behavior of matter is at least partly determined by the geometric properties of the space (aether) within the universe.   It may be noted that Einstein's general theory of relativity (GTR) is also derived from properties of space that determine the large scale motion of matter and light beams.  Similarly,  measurements in GTR space depend upon the distribution of matter in the universe.  However, unlike the viewpoint employed here, the GTR theory is descriptive rather than investigative.  And the large-scale GTR does not involve quantum-level properties nor is it concerned with communication between particles.   Nevertheless the properties of space viewed from this quantum perspective, particles dependent upon particles,  should, when expanded to the limit of large scale matter,  be the same  as the GTR.

D. Mach's Principle.

 The unknown origin of Newton's law of inertia,F=dp/dt, has attracted frequent attention.   Ernst Mach [10] in 1883 boldly suggested that inertia depends upon the existence of the distant stars.  His concept arises from two fundamentally different methods of measuring the speed of rotation.  First, without looking at the sky, one can measure the centrifugal force on a mass m and use Newton's Law in the form, F=mv2 /r, to find circumferential  speed v.  The second method compares the object's angular positions with the fixed (distant) stars.  Mysteriously, both methods give exactly the same result.  Mach reasoned that there must be a causal connection between the distant matter in the universe and inertia.  He asserted: Every  local  inertial  frame  is  determined  by  the  composite  matter  of  the  universe.  (This wave structure of  the electron now proves that Mach was right.)

Mach's Principle of Inertia is the clearest evidence that very distant bodies can affect us instantaneously.  Phipps [6] quotes Mach, "When the subway jerks, it is the fixed stars that throw you down."   Mach's Principle is criticized because it appears to violate causality:  "Events  cannot  occur  before  the  causes  which  produce  them."  but this does not actually occur as will be seen below where Mach's Principle is used to find the energy exchange mechanism of the electron.