Correspondence with RMP

 Dear Dr Gouin,

[...] I regret to inform you that I have decided that your article is not suitable for publication in RMP. Your paper gives an extensive discussion of the historical development of some of the ideas in physics, which leads into a discussion of your alternative viewpoint. However, the paper does not provide the means for a quantitative comparison with observation or with existing theory, nor is there any quantitative evidence presented that your theory is in better agreement with observation than existing theory.

 Sincerely,

 Reviews of Modern Physics

 Dear RMP,

 Since your decision was apparently based on my study not *quantitatively* comparing my approach to prevailing theories and not explaining more experimental facts than they do, I wish to put on the record the following facts: 

1. all quantitative formal evaluations were put in appendices and quantitative facts can be found there. The existence or non-existence of a Higgs field is a true-false proposition requiring no further quantitative evaluation and as such was not placed in an appendix, but it does predict an outcome of experiments and compares with existing theories, namely Quantum Field Theory. 

2. Appendix A, Subsection 4 specifically addresses the crucial issue of quantitative comparison with existing theories.

 The supernovae surveys have been plotted on the graph of Fig. 16. I quote my text: "The graph shows that supernovae whose light reaches us from before our sun's existence are not set on a curve (straight line) as the post-sun start supernovae are. These farther ones are instead *spread out* vertically in [brightness] magnitude for a given redshift." Later on I add: "Analyses done within the universal expansion model ... do not account for the spreading of brightness magnitude at equal redshift as observed. If Hubble had observed such spreads he would not have come up with his relation [especially seeing the absence of spread at lower redshift]."

 Knowing now your objections, I would add in the text that 

1. The quantitative part of my approach here is Hubble's relation reinterpreted according to the space generation formulation, together with the known age of the sun. Universe expansion theories would place the start of the sun to the left of the graph at a redshift corresponding to about 3 billion years and thus miss (as they do now) entirely the relationship with the data coming from the surveys.

 2. The observed spreads are *not* due to observational errors as a substantial number of error bars end way off the Hubble straight line, and no single reasonably drawn curve can fit all the experimental points (the referenced articles draw such curves and none of the published curves pass through all the error bars by far). As it has been pointed out in the referenced articles, the intrinsic value of the supernovae surveys came from the accurate readings of magnitude they allow, unlike other astronomical objects. Hubble and most subsequent observers could not make such precise measurements.

 In Subsection A.5 (Conclusion), I add a way to *quantitatively prove* that my approach is the correct one: "..., more supernovae with an even higher redshift and/or smaller brightness, if such can be found, will need to be placed on the Hubble graph (Fig. 16). If the space generation hypothesis is the correct one there will be supernovae piling up vertically (more and more faint) at a given redshift [I would add: ...while *any* expansion model can only draw a curve by assuming redshifts come from an overall spatial expansion. The expansion models cannot explain not only the observed spreads in magnitude but also the fact that these spreads exist only past a certain redshift, namely z =.33.]"

 Besides the question whether my approach is *quantitatively* better than existing theories, many alternate theories have been brought out in the past of Science (the theory of gravitons is one example among many) and certainly were not dismissed on the ground they did not better explain experimental facts, why would not explaining more facts (even if this was true) a case for dismissal here? In fact, as the A.5 conclusion explains, my approach covers at least the same facts without requiring an ad-hoc "dark energy" with no experimental back-up, and thus Occam's Razor applies, eliminating all the universe expansion theories.

 Finally, I did point out in the overall conclusion (Section VIII) that other areas will need to be looked at to ascertain the validity of the presented formulation. This study attempts to bring a number of approaches into one formulation, where particle physics and astrophysics are only parts of the complete evaluation. By dismissing the present study the other (already completed) study where most of the evidence lays has no chance to defend the formulation. I would understand if this formulation was found manifestly incorrect, but this is not the case by your own admission.

 Very Truly Yours,

 Roger Gouin

 [...]the level of quantitative analysis in your paper does not provide an adequate means for comparing your theory with observation, nor does it demonstrate that it is superior to existing theory.[...]

 The "inadequate level of quantitative analysis" is indeed the key to the impossibility to publish in the primary research literature. I went to RMP for that very reason: Today's Science follows the pan-mathematical aspect of logical positivism, and, as the RMP comments above corroborate, Science these days apparently cannot lift itself above formulae and see how inappropriate such can be on a physical, imagination level, to the point that new data are no longer looked at with fresh eyes, witness astronomical data as described in Appendix A, no longer by themselves, and key facts such as the exact match of the age of the sun with redshift start of spread then are missed, or downgraded to "inappropriate," as in the case of the very existence of these redshift spreads. 

 [...] a very basic problem with your paper is that it is only partly a review. It also proposes an alternative approach to the current thinking in the astrophysical community. The rightness or wrongness of this approach remains to be explored, but its originality disqualifies the article from consideration in a review journal. The main task of a review article is to survey and distill the literature, not to formulate new theory. You would be more likely to find a forum for your theory in the primary research literature.

 [...]The manuscript does provide quantitative comparisons with observations and with existing theory, and does present quantitative evidence that my theory is in better agreement with observation than existing theory. I also gave additional quantitative details in my previous reply that would be (and have been) added to the manuscript.

 I would very much appreciate any more specific response that RMP can give. Are there specific reasons RMP can cite for judging that my level of quantitative analysis is not adequate for comparisons with observation and existing theories? Are there specific responses RMP can give to the quantitative evidence cited in my reply, regarding why this quantitative evidence is not adequate?

 If there are more specific reasons RMP can give, then that would be very helpful in guiding me toward possible improvements for my paper. Otherwise, it is not clear to me that the quantitative evidence cited in my reply has really been considered by RMP -- in which case, I would be left wondering whether my paper has really received a complete, unbiased scientific review. 

 My paper reviews the history and present state of scientific theories and evidence of Physics, and demonstrates that there are serious problems which fundamentally bring into question the value of certain existing scientific theories. The paper would be incomplete if it did not propose an alternative approach which could address these problems, better than these existing theories.

 A famous case of this sort was handled by RMP over 40 years ago, through a 1957 paper by Everett which RMP published -- as I have referenced and addressed in my work. It reviewed the problem of the meaning of the Quantum by providing an alternative understanding through a theory attempting to formally *deduce* the main features of the Quantum instead of *postulating* them. By sheer contrast with existing theory it ended up outlining a brand new road for picturing the Quantum that was not thought earlier to exist. The subsequent development of quantum cosmology and quantum Turing machines might have been unthinkable without this attempt at a theory, which was an integral part of Everett's foundational RMP paper.

 Thus, a new approach or theory is a tool that may be used to provide an effective critique of existing theories by sheer contrast with them. It appears that the problems identified by my review do indeed need a contrast to give a proper critique, as present theories may have over the years become taken for granted to the point that new data may no longer be looked at with unbiased eyes, key facts may be either missed or downgraded in importance if they do not fit into the present understanding. (My study suggests this may be happening both in astrophysics and in biophysics.)[...] 

 However, as a description of new theories my study may not be publishable in the primary research literature because it cannot provide a full formalism (as has become "de rigueur" in modern times -- the philosophy behind this matter is discussed in the study), due to the fact that Mathematics itself requires more work in order to be applied -- specifically, a mathematics of the continuum not based on the Axiom of Choice is needed. Yet specific areas of the theory can be, and have been, formalized leading to quantitative predictions, and such predictions are at odds with prevailing theories. So, parts of the theory can be in fact falsified, a feature which has defined any true work of Physics throughout History - while the motivation of new branches of Mathematics has been also a key part of major advances in Physics. In fact three a priori unrelated areas of the Physical Sciences are identified where quantitative evidence can either corroborate or falsify elements of the theory. 

My study might also be rejected by the primary research journals on the grounds that they only want to publish new research, not extensive reviews of the history and present state of scientific theories and evidence of Physics. Yet again, an extensive review is necessary to demonstrate the magnitude of the problems that confront current theories, and the need for a new theory. 

Thus, if the paper cannot be published by RMP, then I am left wondering whether it can be published in any existing scientific journal even though it has scientific value. However, if RMP can recommend an alternative journal which would be suitable for this kind of study, I would very much appreciate it. 

I shall now add the following comments after the above Part 2 of my reply to RMP: 

Even in particle physics, after 40 years of hard and expensive work, we found one fundamental fact of Nature: There are two kinds of matter/radiation, the "confined" and the "free" kinds. We can't evaluate the meaning of this fact because we limit ourselves to "effective field theories," mathematical theories with no physical insight, as a result of following the pan-mathematical aspect of logical positivism, a necessity within an environment where Science became an institution (this matter is discussed in the conclusion of the biophysics phase of the study). 

In quantum physics we have determined the holistic aspect of the electron and other quanta via well-known experiments in the 1980s and 90s. Yet we can't make sense of what that means as to the real nature of the Quantum due to the embargo put on visualizing the Quantum by Niels Bohr. My study discards this embargo and takes each quantum as a space of monads multiply connected to the CSM (our space), inherently and immediately explaining this holistic aspect through multiple reality monadic space manifold connections, a physical picture through which we may be able at last to connect the Quantum with Gravitation. 

Correspondence with Charles Cagle (C.C.) mailto:singtech@telestream.com

 RYG: "Space" appears to be indeed a construct of our perception, being a construct of elemental entities that are an eternal given similar to concepts such as the concept of a circle. Our perception seems to be itself a construct out of these elemental entities, and the second part of the study identifies this matter.

 C.C. : I think keying in to identify the elemental entities is the first step since they represent the fundamental building blocks from which to build a coherent model.

 RYG: I think so too. However, experimental consequences of the model must be identified in order to tell us whether we are on the right road.

 C.C. : Of course, and that is where the requirement for a quality index based upon prediction of previously unknown phenomenon or data comes in.

 RYG: Yes. And I would judge a work as complete only if predictions are included. I do this in three a priori unrelated areas of Physics. How can a work with experimental predictions be called 'overly speculative'? Yet, this is how my work was qualified - see my website for more details.

C.C. : The first step to enlightenment is to confess ignorance. And it takes an unusual person to confess how ignorant stands the 'scientific' community today.

RYG : As I stated in my introductory statements, knowledge is not sufficient for grasping what reality is. Knowledge (information) is a classical concept, thus fundamentally limited.

C.C. : I have some rather hard line positions on 'knowledge'. Knowledge is that which can be generated by people when they are 'doing science' (or conducting any kind of research or investigative efforts which are aimed at providing a comprehension of the universe). I believe that 'knowledge' generated by so-called scientific activities must be made subject to reasonable epistemological examination and given a quality index which is related not to explanatory power but rather to its ability to predict unexpected phenomenon (unexpected from the standard viewpoints).

RYG: Right.

C.C. : Mere post hoc explanations of data are not differentiable from the output of pathological liars and hence is generally pathological science. In other words, knowledge which doesn't have such a quality index may be comforting for it may suffice to satisfy a curiosity or one's desire to have an explanation but it generally cannot predict that which has not been previously observed. It generally also can provide no post hoc explanatory capability that is based upon first principles (where the existence of known data can be extrapolated from first principles).

RYG: I strongly agree. This is the situation I identify for the supernovae survey data explanations found in the literature (the 'accelerating expansion of the universe'). Please read the appendix on the matter found in part 1 of my work. This can only be 'pathological science' as you call it. Another example is the accepted lack of causal explanation for the self-assembly of numerous supramolecular structures found in microbiology (see my part 2). This accepted ignorance and de facto cover-up is part of that pathology. The lack of experimental predictions in the theoretical approach of microbiology is a symptom of the pathology. The experimental predictions I identify are a first (as far as I know) in that field.

"If necessary, Physics may have to operate without the guarantee of mathematics, maybe sometimes using partial formal systems at best, if physical phenomena that cannot be fully formalized need to be covered. In effect it would then rely more on empirical rules and experimental facts than on formal approaches, with the backing of a conceptual understanding to make sense out of them. I shall go that way for the rest of this study, but not before looking at a last formal approach that was attempted by Feynman in the past generation."

 C.C. : Supporting this position are two of my favorite quotes both of which refer to Faraday whom you mention in closing.

 Peter Guthrie Tait (1837-1901) when reviewing Poincare's "Thermodynamique" wrote:

 "Some forty years ago, in a certain mathematical circle at Cambridge, men were wont to deplore the necessity of introducing words at all in a physico-mathematical textbook: the unattainable, though closely approachable Ideal being regarded as a world devoid of aught but formulae! But one learns something in forty years, and accordingly the surviving members of that circle now take very different view of the matter. They have been taught alike by experience and by example to regard mathematics, so far at least as physical enquiries are concerned, as a mere auxiliary to thought...this is one of the great truths which were enforced by Faraday's splendid career."

"The way in which Faraday made use of his ideas of lines of force in co-ordinating the phenomena of magneto-electric induction shew him to have been in reality a mathematician of a very high order --- one from whom the mathematicians of the future may derive valuable and fertile methods.

 For the advance of the exact sciences depends upon the discovery and development of appropriate and exact ideas, by means of which we may form a mental representation of the facts, sufficiently general, on the one hand, to stand for any particular case, and sufficiently exact, on the other, to warrant the deductions we may draw from them by the application of mathematical reasoning.

 From the straight line of Euclid to the lines of force of Faraday this has been the character of the ideas by which science has been advanced, and by the free use of dynamical as well as geometrical ideas we may hope for a further advance. The use of mathematical calculations is to compare the results of the application of these ideas with our measurements of the quantities concerned in our experiments....We are probably ignorant even of the name of the science which will be developed out of the materials we are now collecting...."

Of course, such comments are also comforting to me since I'm not a very good mathematician. :-) 

 RYG: I wish you had time to give me more specifics as to where I missed the possibility of space as being only a dream of some sort, with no *objective* existence. 

C.C. : I never refer to it a 'dream' but rather comprehend it as an artifact of local perception. Bear in mind that I assume that there is nonlocal perception and local perception where the first is only glimpsed as one triumphs over the natural imposition of the second. 

RYG: Ok, I see better now what you meant in your first message. But I still do not understand the meaning of 'artifact' as you use it. Also, you will have to define what you understand by the term 'perception'. 

C.C. : An artifact of perception refers to how we can see things that are not really there. For example, in looking at a high frame rate video or film sequence we obtain the illusion of continuous motion rather than the discrete frozen frames of the film or video itself. We fill in that which isn't actually there. Since the act of perception is hardly able to be divorced from the intellectual realm one might consider that the continuous motion we see is a manufactured 'artifact' of the process of perception. 

RYG: Excellent. Your example shows the construct that is being made by the world we each are. As an add-on I will refer you to the 'puppet master' section in the second part where I use the example of the Bela Julezs images through which we construct 3-D images and thus a space out of its content, as is done in the universe at large. But, contrary to your assertion ('being not really there') in my view these spaces are not artifacts, they do exist, but only in our intellectual world. Their reality comes from the world that creates them. Our creativity (a subject I address) is of that kind, and is the same as reality at large.

C.C. : This is and has always been one of the central messages of the gospel. 

RYG: Whose gospel? 

C.C. : The gospel of life. The good news of the universe. The instruction of God. If religion or the fact that I believe in God is offensive to you then I'm afraid that no matter how much we may like what the other says we would not get on well. I don't attempt to push my religious beliefs down anyone's throat but neither shall I be stymied from making reference to religious concepts merely to satisfy a person's desire to impose an arbitrary separation between science and religion. 

RYG: I have no problem with that as long as I know the background. It does help for understanding each other, very much as you asked for my background earlier. Teillar de Chardin was an excellent scientist, not to speak of Gregory Mendel. 

C.C. : The goal of the true religionist is the same goal that the 'true' scientist seeks. They both want to understand the universe and their motivations are generally not differentiable for residing in the idea of knowledge which is strongly predictive is the inherent idea of survival. The extension of the idea of survival is naturally extrapolated to eternity. None of us knows what it is like to not be so we all equally fear not being - anything that we can do to remove the threat of not being is important and is the primary motivation for gaining true knowledge of the universe. So it matters not if the scientist claims a model came to him out of thin air or if he says that it came to him in a dream or if he says that God revealed it to him. If the model is consistent with known data (not just the prevailing interpretation of the data) and has the added benefit of being powerfully predictive because it reveals or points to phenomena not previously predicted by other models then why should you care what source the scientist identifies as the origin of the model? 

RYG: Absolutely. My approach is different, but I do not claim it is the only way to get to a meaningful model, as long as the model has predictive features.

 C.C. : The submission of the self, the localized, the subjective perception of the universe to obtain the clearer perception afforded one who can however briefly gain a glimpse of the whole from the viewpoint of the whole.

 RYG: I object to the term 'submission'. This is an unwarranted anthropomorphism.

 C.C. : Object all you want but such objection is unwarranted elitism. I am a man. I see through a man's eyes and think with a man's thoughts. To actually intimate that there is an objectivity which is not anthropomorphic or even that there is an objective reality is a wholly unfounded and ultimately illogical concept. People who make such comments are generally hard wired to the idea that a posteriori argument is the royal road to 'knowledge'. It only seems to be especially persuasive because it *seems* to be based on objectivity. Many of the writing of Newton, Darwin, Huxley, and Einstein are built upon a posteriori argument.

 RYG : This is also true of Gauss. His mathematics was presented as 'clean' with all the 'scaffoldings' removed. What you understand as 'revelation' is for me the result of an uncomputable process at the level of the elemental entities I discuss. 'Imagination' is the term I use.

 C.C. : The assumption is that the data suggests the model and hence the process is objective. This is unadulterated nonsense for the act of interpretation of data requires that it be comprehended in a context and the context is always subjective and always precedes the interpretation of the data. To suppose that one can go from the specific to the general is ludicrous for there are infinitely many interpretations of data and to believe that one shall hit upon that which is correct is irrational. A priorism is the only honest intellectual process for it openly acknowledges the existence of the model (general case) which then is logically extrapolated to specific instances.

 RYG: I agree in essence. Our internal world is capable of such creations, which of course are very intimate and non-objective. We will disguise them as logical a posteriori because we are bathed in a classical physics outlook. It is the genius of the men above to have produced a logical output out of such personal happenings. It may no longer be possible if we want to tackle the quantum for what it really is. A friend of mine who is an artificial intelligence specialist cannot take that fact. He still hopes that machines (classical constructs) can be creative... I leave him alone with his beliefs. It is this same fear of unobjectivity which forced the logical positivist trend of 20th century science. We have discovered the quantum in that century, but so far we cannot accept and understand its creative abilities. I venture that it will take us a long time until we do. I address the matter in the 'puppet master' section in the second part.

 When I made the comment above (on 'submission') I did not know from where you were coming. Now I know, so I'll understand not to object there. But for me arguments using that line of thought will be merely unconvincing. Of course, again, if the line has experimentally predictive capabilities, then there will be something for me to consider. Schroedinger had a similar position. He felt that the quantum was basically unknowable by Man, being the product of a deity (Mach had a similar attitude about scientific truths). I address these philosophical approaches in the second part of my work. My words may upset you there. Please take them in stide, keeping in mind that I only want to buttress proposed experiments. 

 [Here C.C. describes his 'revelation' using a certain number of terms from Mathematics and Physics.]

 RYG: The description above is losing me. What are the elements you start from? I am missing the definitions of 'velocity potential', 'charge','topology', 'closure' and 'continuous' or 'continuum'. These belong at first sight to physical and mathematical concepts which may not apply. I go at length on the meaning of continuum and shows that the definitions of topology are tied to classical physics, not quantum physics.

 C.C. : Of course, topology, closure, continuous and continuum may belong to that which does not actually apply to physical reality but we should bear them in mind for the purpose of thesis and antithesis for they are certainly concepts with which we have all dealt. Can one comprehend discrete without juxtaposing it with respect to continuous?

 RYG: This is a very difficult matter and we must be very careful with the words as they hide things. Concepts developed in the past may contain an understanding which is invalid at the level of the elements of reality. I describe in part 1 how the notion of limit found in mathematics (and onto which topology is based) may not apply to the quantum world, and the axiom of choice is a flag to tell us the limitation of the concepts above (Cantor's method is limited). There may be many kinds of continua. So we have to watch these words as to what they contain and where they come from. Please look at section II in the first part of my work on this matter.

 C.C. : The most fundamental element from which I start is the velocity potential. David Mermin in his 'What is Quantum Mechanics Trying to Tell Us?' (available from lanl archives) writes: 

"My complete answer to the late 19th century question 'What is electrodynamics trying to tell us?' would simply be this:

 Fields in empty space have physical reality; the medium that supports them does not.

 Having thus removed the mystery from electrodynamics, let me immediately do the same for quantum mechanics:

 Correlations have physical reality; that which they correlate does not."

 The first proposition probably sounded as bizarre to most late 19th century physicists as the second sounds to us today; I expect that the second will sound as boringly obvious to late 21st century physicists as the rest sounds to us today. And that's all there is to it. The rest is commentary.

RYG: Ok. Here I see where you are coming from. This is a key matter. I have not addressed it in my work directly, and I thank you for bringing it up. This is where you may diverge strongly with my approach. 

Mermin is for me the philosopher of today's Physics. He takes the negation of the aether dating back from the end of the 19th century (the first statement) and wants to apply it to Bohr's quantum physics (the 3rd statement). But Bohr's physics is already devoid of reality, as for him only the classical world exists. So Mermin is talking about the void, nothing. What Mermin had to do was to realize the incompleteness of Bohr's view missing the process of space and time creation by the quantum (or more precisely the monads - see part 1 of my work), a process complementing Everett's multiple reality view, something which has experimental consequences, and quite obvious at that. Notably part 2 of my work describes an alternate structure for space created by the quantum which I identify to permit Life to exist, not a small consequence! I would say (and hope) that late 21st century physicists will find Mermin's views belonging to the end of the 19th.

 [Here C.C. gives more details on his 'revelation'.]

RYG:  I have to confess that my first reaction is to be left in suspense. I do not know what is a 'particle', a 'mass', a 'momentum' and a 'differentiable continuum'. As I said earlier, 'local' and 'non-local' for me are relative notions. Do you see our reality limited to 3-D plus time?

 C.C. : 'Our' reality? Is there another? 

RYG: I meant our common reality. There is no way to know whether there are other common realities. Each of us 'perceives' one. Our reality comprises the common features we agree upon to exist independently of our intellectual worlds. We have internal and personal realities.

 C.C. : I see that 3-D is an illusion we, as local perceivers, are normally caught within.

 RYG: Ok. Before you used the term 'artifact'. Now it is 'illusion'. As I said before I see our common space as a construct by the content of that space, the content being us as well as the other matter and radiation that are common to that space. It has no existence by itself but it is not an illusion, being a constant creation. Experiments are there (or will be) to confirm it is indeed being created constantly. For example I identify in the appendix on supernovae surveys that Hubble's redshift comes from the energy spent by radiation to maintain our space in existence, and such a view has experimental consequences. I am asking for additional surveys to confirm or deny this view. Again, I have been turned down because I have the guts to question the prevailing views of today's astrophysics, a sad commentary on today's science. 

C.C. : As far as the composition of a particle - if you don't know what is a 'particle' you are truly in the same boat as is most of modern science who knows what particles do and how they behave under certain condition but not much of anything concerning of that of which they consist. How can one comprehend the nature of mass without comprehending the nature of particle of which mass is an inherent property? And momentum? Is it not a 'defined' quality which is the product of velocity and mass (which you confess you do not understand)? It stands to reason that you would not understand derivatives if you do not understand those elements from which they are derived.

 RYG: Earlier I listed the mathematical terms we have that in fact hide concepts of classical physics. Here the terms of classical physics are directly questioned by me. My part 1 section on building blocks of space looks at all these terms to see what they hide under the monadic spaces concept. Let's not forget that today's quantum physics has been developed from classical mechanics notions. These terms are from that physics. We must be very careful in their use. Please look again at part 1.

 C.C. : The point of coming into the knowledge of the universe is to gain an understanding or comprehension of what is a particle, a mass, momentum, etc. 

RYG: Of course, and this matter must be addressed and agreed upon. To this day physics claims to know but it does not. Ask Feynman. Ask him where the photons ejected by an atom come from, as his father asked.

 C.C. : As far as a differential continuum - what can it be but an artifact of perception?

 RYG: This is a key subject of my work. Then what is matter and what is radiation? What is time? We need to get to experimental consequences in order to find the worth of the approach, any approach. I have put experiments at the forefront of the work. My problem is that I cannot do the experiments myself as Faraday could.

 C.C. : I feel that I have the answers to such questions: The nature of matter, radiation, and time; but there is an a priori part to the question of time which is experiential like pornography we know it when we see it. :-).

 RYG: Well, this seems to be the case for reality at large... I have the guts to ask in my work. How silly of me. 

Correspondence with Lee Smolin (L. S.) mailto:smolin@phys.psu.edu

 RYG : It has been found that dark matter does not exist in the disk of galaxies (one of Science magazine issues in nov. 1997), strongly implying that it does not exist above and below the disk, certainly not in the amount that would be required to produce the spiral arms constant rotation speeds observed at any distance going away from the center (refer here for example to Science magazine jan 7th, 2000 issue). Alfven did show that a plasma process would allow angular momentum distribution from the sun to the planets during the formation of the solar system, an effect having really no good explanation using only gravity. Is there something against considering Alfven's theory, specially in light of the complexity theme you develop in your "Life of the Cosmos" book?

 L. S. : I am not very familiar with Alfven's theory, but I am convinced by various evidences, from galactic rotation curves to x-ray emissions in galaxy clusters to gravitational lensing of images behind galaxy clusters and microlensing that there is dark matter, enough to bring omega up to .2 - .3, at least. I would be surprised if we could do without it.

 RYG : [My study (phase 1) proposes an alternative to postulating dark matter by rethinking the notion of space.] 

RYG : I cannot resist asking you why you have not considered in your book the electron relativist path integral theory that was thought out initially by Richard Feynman in the 1960s and subsequently developed by Larry Schulman et al. in the 1980s (see phase 1 of my study). As you certainly know, under this theory everything goes at the speed of light, and time appears purely from the relations between "things," a view which is very much in line with Leibniz's relational origin of space and time. 

L. S. : I did work with Feynman's theory a long time ago, motivated by a wonderful idea Ted Jacobson had in 1984 about it. It is interesting but I would be surprised if it can account for all the phenomena accounted for by QED and the Standard Model, to the precision of QED. 

RYG : I am glad to hear this path has not been abandoned. The advantage of Feyman's theory is that time is then not a coordinate at all, but is in effect "constructed" locally, with its delocalization resulting from the transition to the classical level. This would be in line with the views held in your book on how the universe "finds its future," in a sense. Since you are trying to see the universe in a complexity theory aspect, it seems to me that Feynman's as well as Alfven's approaches need to be considered. I have investigated the relativistic path integral (see phase 1 of my study). The random walk generation of time seems very compelling when seen as a Darwinian search algorithm.

L. S. : I am interested in ideas about self-organization on very small scales as an explanation for the [universal] hierarchy problem, and have been working on a paper on and off about this. But it is hard to get it right, so I haven't published it. 

RYG : [Phase 2 of my study zeroes in on the self-assembly of biological supramolecular structures, a process which may be the key to the existence of multicellular Life, and a process that would involve the generation of *unobservable* spatial structures through the quantum, a potential fundamental physical process which has not been thus far considered.]

Correspondence in July 2000 with Valeri V. Dvoeglazov, Editor of the Nova Science series Contemporary Fundamental Physicsmailto:valeri@cantera.reduaz.mx

In the past week I received an announcement about a new volume under the Contemporary Fundamental Physics series you are in charge of editing for Nova Science. That volume, "Instantaneous Action at a distance in Modern Physics: Pro and Contra", struck me as being very much in the line of the work I did in the past several years. So I went to the Nova website and looked at what else was published in your series. One of the two books described there is a monograph by Mark Israelit on "The Weyl-Dirac Theory and Our Universe." This item encouraged me further in thinking that I must have my own monograph published, at last.

I strongly feel that we need to be quite a bit more bold if we want to break the conceptual mold we have put ourselves in the past 50 years in fundamental physics if we want to at last make predictions instead of reacting to specific new experimental findings, as the monograph above continues on doing (in this case trying to explain Dark Matter).

My thesis goes back to the fundamentals behind Classical Mechanics, including the concept of spacetime, using a now centuries-old concept of space being created by its content, a concept which I think is at last possible to use in a fundamental approach encompassing both Relativity and the quantum, with direct experimental consequences in several fields, including Astrophysics and Microbiology.

My thesis is at [...] and has been there now for a while in the hope of getting a meaningful review by Physicists around the world.

The key objection I have received along the months is about the lack of mathematics in the majority of my work, even though I explain within it why this is so. The monograph by Mark Israelit is an example of the fallacy of that argument: When you use mathematics, you immediately set yourself in the Classical Mechanics mold since our mathematics was developed from this mechanics. Mark is thus obliged (as many others before him) to use the mathematics of Relativity as a base, and further assumes the big bang theory as a premise. I reject both. The 20th century has seen an entirely new mechanics with undistinguishable and unseparable elements, something which immediately forces a rejection of the axiom of choice, and thus most of our mathematics, unless you want to use bastard mathematical concepts that really do not belong to the new Physics. We have made do so far through the 19th century mathematics of Classical Mechanics to account for the Quantum, but the wide gap created with Relativity shows that this route is ultimately untenable. We can no longer afford to use non-applicable tools. We must first envision new concepts where the mathematics is not there to guide us. And hopefully we can reach conclusions that can be experimentally verified.

Of course we still will have to connect the new concepts with the old ones, such as the various variational principles we worked out along the centuries. But it will be at least a comfort to have a few experimentally verified hints how to proceed out of the box we are right now. In a sense I am going back all the way to Galileo when he had to face reality with only the rudiments of mathematics. His physics was conceptual. We must go back to that path.

Best Regards,

Roger Gouin

PS: I am of course willing to make all the modifications necessary to permit at last publication outside the Internet.

-----------------------------------------RESPONSE:

Dear Dr. Gouin,

Thank you for your interest in the Nova Science Publishers.

Please sent me 1) the hard copy of the manuscript; 2) brief abstract of the work (1-2 pages); 3) your CV; 4) the list of suggested referees of your book (not less than 6) with postal and electronic addresses; 5) the suggested date of preparation of the final version; 6) your postal address.

I shall inform you within 6 months if the manuscript can be accepted for publication in my series.

Yours Sincerely,

Valeri Dvoeglazov