Later Chapters

Adam: This week we shall look beyond field quanta and wave quanta and examine medium entities that combine both field and wave, both existence and occurrence.

From the ontological point of view, a medium consists of like quanta that are contiguous and either interact with their neighbors or are bound to them. Taking our cue from Einstein, we may attempt a formal comparison of the molecular gas and the photon gas as media. Gas molecules interact via impact, and the whole they create [a gas volume] extends over space and progresses (ages) across the time dimension as a field ["aging" here is simply moving over time and does not imply deterioration/decay]. Photons interact via reinforcement, and the gas they form [a beam of light] extends over time and progresses across the space dimension as a wave.

When regarded formally, quanta are quanta, whether they occur or exist, whether they are matter or radiation, and whether they extend over space or over time. Their ability to aggregate and interact must be formally equivalent; similarly, their byproducts, wave media and field media, must have equal ontological footing.

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Max: I guess I’m getting confused by all the opposing concepts you present. Honestly, Adam, are these ideas anything more than word games?

Adam: I hope so! The concepts I’m presenting are perfectly compatible with the experimental results obtained in both quantum physics and special relativity. The difference in my formulation is that I’m gathering up all the ad hoc assumptions (uncertainty, probability waves, dualism, complementarity, etc.) and deriving them from a consistent set of assumptions about existing and occurring media and the radical equality between mass and energy, between wave and field, and between space and time.

Max: Since you mention probability, perhaps you could clarify that concept for me.

Adam: I’d be happy to do so and suggest we make that our last topic for the day. I’m going to focus on the loaded radiation medium since that’s where probability diverges so drastically from classical physics.

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Adam: I take exception to your characterizing paired photons as having a measurable, increasing space separation. The wave front of a single photon of light will expand over the three dimension of space, and the same will be true of the wave front of paired photons. But photons, paired or not, progress rather than extend in space; and without space extension, you cannot talk about space separation/location. Two photons joined in time (sharing the same originating event) will progress in common over space so there is no "space separation" between them. This is the same as two atoms/particles joined in space at a time point; the conjoined particles as a unit will progress in common over time so there is no "time separation" between them. It is a mistake to assume that paired photons from a calcium atom emission will each be located, particle-like, somewhere on their common wave front such that there is a spatial separation between them.

Max: But the first photon to crossover to a material target will acquire space location.

Adam: And that is because the photon that crosses over ceases to be a photon. It is actually the photon termination-via-crossover that acquires a space and a time location, something characterizing all crossovers. This crossover alters, but does not destroy, the expanding wave front that contains (i.e., constitutes) the unterminated photon [the photon that has lost its pair].

Bound quanta progress/expand from their origin over shared paths as if they were a single entity, which they are. We observe a "separation" of joined quanta only by measuring/intercepting them (via crossover) at different locations in their progression dimension whether that is space or time.

The first quantum to be measured (and identity-changed) becomes fixed/stationary in both space and time as a crossover, while its unmeasured twin keeps advancing in its progression dimension. The resulting separation can be either space or time, depending on the quanta involved. Although spatial separation features three axes of progression and time only one axis, the separation is still formally identical.

Max: This is too abstract for me. I need an example.

Adam: Certainly. Suppose photons A and B are joined together, with their wave front passing through this room. On one side of the room, you measure photon A with a field/material probe, namely a crossover target. The altered photon wave continues to proceed through space, and I am fortunate enough to measure remaining photon B on the opposite side of the room. As human (i.e., material) observers, we conclude that the termination (measurement, identity change) of photons A and B are separated by both time (our progression dimension) and space (our extension dimension). But since photons don't age (don't time progress), and since we are, or should be, reluctant to impose our dimensional perceptions upon bound photons, we agree that from a photon’s perspective the two photon crossovers are separated only by space. Put another way, the measurement (crossover, identity-change) of the first photon halts its progression only in space, leaving its (stationary) position in time unaffected.

Consider now the opposite case. Atoms A and B are joined together within this room during a time interval when you and I are present. You measure atom A with a wave/radiation probe to determine one of its properties. The space-stationary, dual-atom field containing A and B, now altered by this measurement interaction, continues to progress in time until I decide to make a measurement on atom B analogous to yours on atom A. Since in this case, both observers and observed are space-stationary, existing matter, there is no confusion about the progression dimension. Once I make my measurement, we can agree that both atoms’ crossovers (measurements) are separated only by time. In other words, the measurement (crossover, identity-change) of the first atom halts its progression only in time, leaving its (stationary) position in space unaffected.

Obviously, you can arrange the measurements of joined photons to be separated by arbitrarily large space distances, just as you can arrange the measurements of joined rest-mass quanta to be separated by arbitrarily large time intervals.

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Adam: ...Physicists think of mass and energy strictly in quantitative terms, a practice that began with Galileo and Newton, perhaps before.

Max: Whereas you think every entity must have an associated form of wave or field.

Adam: Entities, as I use the term, are composed of mass or energy and, yes, they will always have an associated form. Ontology makes that clear, even if physics does not. I have no doubt that some will find this notion difficult to accept. Frankly, as history has repeatedly demonstrated, most scientists are quite conservative when it comes to new ideas. This is natural, and I accept it. Indeed, certain thinkers positively revel in the perplexities and contradictions of modern physics and have actually grown quite attached to them as, over years of use, one becomes accustomed to an ill-fitting jacket. Such people find wave-particle duality to be a convenience rather than a dilemma.

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Max: You refuse to accept the photon as a particle, but didn't Einstein's paper on the photoelectric effect play a big part in advancing that concept?

Adam: It was Planck who concluded that light was quantized. But you are correct in thinking that Einstein's paper allowed, perhaps encouraged, physicists to think of light quanta as impinging upon a barrier screen in much the same manner that a particle does. Particle impact was the conceptual model everyone had in mind for the absorption of kinetic energy at a point, so it was easy to extend that model to the case of quantized radiation. Equating absorption with impact was misleading enough, but to regard the photon (a wave) as a particle (a field) was completely wrong--and proved disastrous for subsequent thought.

Max: How so?

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Adam: And so the Copenhagen theorists, understandably, missed an opportunity to redefine physics and our conception of physical reality in a more balanced way. Like everyone else at the time, they were mired in the particle-centric, projectile-centric view of reality. Instead of moving to a physics that gave equal place to energy, occurrence, and time extension, they could not look beyond a classical physics that gave primacy to mass, existence, and space extension.

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Max: Meanwhile, with the aid of their computers, a new generation of bright physicists are generating multi-dimensional string theories with the intention of bypassing the traditional problems of quantum theory and making these problems of historical interest only. Are you concerned some will regard your approach as too simple and too traditional?

Adam: Well, I don't mind the charge of being simplistic because I think good science is always simpler than bad or confused science...

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Max: It is exactly 100 years since Einstein's Annus Mirabilis. Do you think he would approve of your approach to his problems?

Adam: That is hard to say. He was very much the nineteenth century realist, and he would probably be disappointed I had no inclination to attack indeterminacy. But he loved new ideas, and I think he...

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