INERTIA OR REACTION?

Copyright © Harold Aspden, 1998

Research Note: 9/98: October 16, 1998


I am writing this Research Note after reading the September 1998 issue of New Energy News, the monthly newsletter edited by Dr. Hal Fox on behalf of the Institute for New Energy of P.O. Box 58639, Salt Lake City, UT 84158-8639, USA.

In choosing the above title I was tempted to head this Research Note: 'Reinventing the Wheel', but prudence and the serious nature of the issues involved overcame that temptation.

There is something odd about the world of theoretical physics, in that those who seek to advance in that field of knowledge tend to get in a groove and stumble along, ignoring cracks and crevices, but always looking downwards in search of new foundations and seldom looking back at the distant hills to check their bearings.

In this context I will refer to two items from pp. 7 and 9 in that September issue of New Energy News.

Firstly, there is the notification that a paper has issued in Physics Letters A, vol. 240 (1998) pp. 115-126, to which Hal Fox has assigned the heading 'INERTIA AS A REACTION'. The paper itself is entitled: 'Inertia as Reaction of the Vacuum to Accelerated motion'.

It seems that the inspection of that furrow in the onward path of 'zero-point' field theory is telling us something about the equivalence of 'Sakharov's conjecture of a connection between Einstein action and the vacuum' and this concept, according to the reported conclusion would: 'if correct, substitute for Mach's principle and imply that no further mass-giving Higgs-type fields may be required to explain the inertia of material objects, although extensions to include the zero-point fields of the other fundamental interactions may be necessary for a complete theory of inertia.'

In plain English the property of inertia assigned to any body of matter stems from the individual electrically charged particles that collectively consitute that body. There is supposed to be electromagnetic radiation from those particles when the body is accelerated and, 'Lo and Behold' - 'wonder of wonders', the vacuum by its zero-point activity reacts to feed enough of that energy back to that body, to thereby account for its inertia. Putting this latter statement in even plainer English, the inertia of an electric particle arises because it says to itself "I believe in the Principle of Conservation of Energy and if any external electric influence tries to accelerate me then I shall react to prevent any loss of my intrinsic electrical energy!"

I wonder why, in 1998, the authors of that paper, Rueda and Haisch, need to get into issues such as the so-called Higgs-type fields, when that common sense assertion concerning energy conservation suffices. An electric action affecting the aether will have its reaction, but if the two are found to balance out then who can say there is any action in the first place? It is different for the steady-state electromagnetic action, where there is non-accelerated motion of charge and where the aether must get into the act with its reaction 'field', because there is then no such nullification effect. Energy is transferred to the 'field', the aether, because that is where magnetic energy is stored.

So what about that glimpse backwards to see the hills on the horizon? Looking back one can see, if one really looks with properly focused vision, a short scientific paper published in 1976 in the International Journal of Theoretical Physics at pp. 631-633 of v. 15, having the title: 'Inertia of a Nonradiating Particle'. It abstract includes the sentence:
"by supposing that the energy radiated is absorbed by the particle's own field, inertia is found as a resulting property and the relation E=Mc2 follows as a consequence."

There is nothing involving such ideas as Higgs-type fields, zero-point energy, or Einstein philosophy in that paper. The analysis merely corrects an omission or rather an error in the classical theory of electromagnetism by which Larmor first suggested than accelerated charge could radiate energy. Note that the point of concern is radiation by a discrete charge as opposed to the collective activity of interacting electromagnetic fields set up by numerous charges all accelerating together but generating action from their individual source positions.

Inevitably, from such a track record, perhaps in another 25 or 50 years a future physicist will rediscover this secret of the inertial property and tell us about it once again, but by reference to some future new notions of physics as yet to be invented.

Hence I say to would-be students of physics: "Raise your heads high, stop scanning deep into those grooves and furrows that your forebears have been digging and just look back once in a while to take stock of that real world on the horizon. There may be 'gold in those hills and even greater gems if you can focus on the odd mountain! If there is mist obstructing your view then that is the aether, but that then is your primary research challenge, namely to use the right optical means to aid your sight so that you can see through that aether mist."


By way of a footnote at this point I add the comment that very often, to get refereed papers accepted by science journals, one cannot write in plain English. It is necessary to disguise what is sometimes very simple and make it look complicated to as to appear to keep faith with the current state of peer-review opinion. Ideally, one's starting point is to build on the proposals of a recent author published by the same periodical and develop a constructive or critical argument from there. Editors will otherwise not publish what is a quite revolutionary but yet simple contribution to our understanding of physics, simply because its spirit runs contrary to what is deemed to have become the orthodox belief. As author of that 1976 paper in the International Journal of Physics, I can say this from experience. Indeed, my interpretation of inertia in its full and simple form was privately published earlier, in 1966, in my book 'The Theory of Gravitation' (2nd. Edition) at pp. 10-15 and a little later in 1969 in my book 'Physics without Einstein' at pp. 8-14, and again thereafter in 1980 in my book 'Physics Unified' at pp. 80-84.


Now we come to that second point I take from the September 1998 issue of New Energy News, the subject heading being 'TELEPORTATION OF PHOTONS'. This was a reference by Editor Dr. Hal Fox to an article on 'Experimental Quantum Teleportation' which appeared in Nature, v. 390 at pp. 575-597 in December 1997.

Photons, it seems, can be split and they can also be entangled! Scientists do not really know what photons actually are, but they can split them and get them entangled, if I understand this item correctly.

It is Dr. Hal Fox's remarks that attract my special interest, because he declared:
"An author said that those who claim to understand quantum mechanics are not honest. As an honest editor, it is proposed that an explanation for this unusual quantum event could be derived from the existence of an aether, the speed of transmission of information in the aether as being many times the speed of light, and a new concept of conservation."

Dr. Fox then suggested that 'entangled particles' should be regarded as dynamic constructs of the aether such that the creation of one such particle implies a second particle where such particles are in communication at superluminal velocities and such particles have their quantum nature conserved. In short he affirmed that:
"This editor can understand superluminal communication better than quantum physics."

Now one sometimes hears theoretical physicists talk about a 'theory of everything'. What they mean is a theory that they are looking for and which has yet to be discovered. They would laugh if one said to them: "Stop looking down as you probe the depths of the mathematical jungle where you have lost your way and come out into the open to look back at those hills on the distant horizon. You will then see that the aether which you pretend does not exist is, in fact, your 'theory of everything'"

So, you see, I tend to agree with Dr. Hal Fox and take this opportunity to draw attention to an 'entangled photon' theory that is aether-based. I refer to a paper published in Physics Letters A, v. 119 at pp. 105-108 in 1986. Whether one discusses entangled photons and split photons or entangled particles and split particles it is all embraced by that 'theory of everything', the aether.

The paper just quoted sets out to explain why the neutron, a single particle form, can suffer diffraction as if it were a wave or a particle with a split personality. The secret lies in its encounter with the photon world of the aether and its interplay with an 'entangled' photon system, meaning a team of four photons that come into existence as the apparent wave that accompanies the neutron in its passage through space. The quantum properties are preserved and even the de Broglie wavelength formula for the neutron is derived, all by an aether theory of some 50 years standing.

So perhaps one day, whether reacting to these comments by Hal Fox or digging deep into future grooves and furrows, theoretical physicists may 'reinvent the wheel' or rather reinvent the aether. I just wonder how closely the new aether might resemble that aether of mine that lies out of view in those hills of the past!


As an added footnote, and bearing in mind that my main theme in these web pages concerns 'energy science', it is of possible interest to mention that, whilst the mysteries of quantum theory are rooted in the aether, the dominant factor controlling the behaviour of photons, electrons or even neutrons is not quantum theory or its embodiment in the structural fabric of the aether, but rather the energy considerations. I have, for example, declared that the accelerated electron does not radiate its energy because it is governed by its efforts to conserve its energy. Equally, concerning the wave properties of the electron (and much the same applies to the neutron), the electron "develops a photon spin system of its own when in motion and balances its angular momentum by compensating the effect of a primary spin unit by three complimentary spin units orthogonally positioned in the adjacent lattice metric of the vacuum medium (aether). The electron does not radiate electromagnetic waves, but its photon system contains a standing wave system having the de Broglie wavelength. The spin energy of the four photon units is identified as the kinetic energy of the electron. When the electron is diffracted some of this energy spills out, as the waves are no longer contained by the perfect interference of the pulsations set up by the units." [This quotation is from the text of the Physics Letters paper just mentioned.]


Harold Aspden
October 16, 1998