Biefeld Brown effect in TGD Universe

Biefeld Brown effect is one of the effects studied by "free energy" researchers. What happens is that an asymmetry capacitor for which the electrodes are of different size starts to move in the direction of the smaller electrode.  The so called emdrive could be also based on this effect. Recently I learned of the experiments carried out by Buhler's team. An acceleration of 1 g is achieved for a capacitor-like system in vacuum and the effect increases rapidly with the strength of the electric field between the electrodes. This raises the question whether new physics is involved: either as a failure of the momentum conservation or as a presence of an unidentified system with which a momentum transfer takes place. In this article I consider the TGD basic model in which the third system is identified as the electric field body associated with the system.

In the TGD basic model, the third system is identified as the electric field body (FB) associated with the system. The key idea is that electronic momentum is pumped from the electrodes to their FBs: an electron is transferred to the FB, leaves some of its momentum to FB and drops back and in this way gives rise to a recoil. For the smaller electrode the quantum coherence is higher and the pumping is more effective. This gives rise to the Biefeld Brown effect, perhaps even in the situation when the dielectric is present. There is also a net transfer of electrons momentum to the positive electrode, which reduces the voltage while keeping the system neutral and provides in this way electrostatic energy to the kicked electrons. This explains why the effect is stronger when the smaller electrode is positively charged.

See the article About Biefeld Brown effect or the chapter About long range electromagnetic quantum coherence in TGD Universe.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Could entanglement entropy have a role similar to that of thermodynamical entropy?

Gary Ehlenberg sent a link to a popular article (see this) telling about the work of Bartosz Regula and Ludovico Lami published as an article with title "Reversibility of quantum resources through probabilistic protocols" in Nature (see this).

Quantum entanglement gives rise to a density matrix analogous to that of a thermodynamic system. One can assign to it entropy by a standard formula. In thermodynamics entropy characterizes the system besides other state variables. Could entanglement entropy have a role similar to that of thermodynamic entropy and allow us to classify entangled systems?

1. In thermodynamics there are transformations of thermodynamic state, which in the adiabatic case preserve entropy. There is also a theorem giving an upper bound for the efficiency of a thermal engine transforming heat to work, which is ordered energy. Could one consider a similar theorem? Could thermodynamics generalize to a science of entropy manipulation?
2. Could adiabatic transformations preserving entanglement entropy be possible between two systems with the same entanglement entropy? Could the second law stating the increase of entropy generalize and state that transformations decreasing the entanglement entropy are not possible?

Suppose that a system A defined as an equivalence class of systems with the same density matrix can be transformed B. Can one transform B to A in this kind of situation? This would be a counterpart of thermodynamic irreversibility stating that adiabatic time evolutions are reversible.

1. It has been indeed proposed that it is possible to connect any two entangled systems with the same entanglement entropy by a transformation preserving the trace of the density matrix and keeping the eigenvalues positive. This transformation generalizes unitary transformations, which preserve the eigenvalues of the density matrix having probability interpretation. This kind of transformation would consist of basic physical transformations: I must confess that I do not quite understand what this means. If the conjecture is true one could classify entangled systems in terms of the entanglement entropy.
2. There are however systems for which the conjecture fails. A weaker condition would be that this kind of transformation exists in a probabilistic sense: the analog of adiabatic transformation would fail for some system pairs. One can apply the transformations of a specified set O of transformations to an ensemble formed by copies of A. Intuitively it would seem that the number of transformations in the set of O transforming A to B adiabatically divided by the total number of transformations gives a measure for the success. I am not quite sure whether this definition is used.
3. It is also stated the relative entropy for the probability distributions defined by the density matrices for systems A and B would in turn serve as an entanglement measure. Each fixed system B with fixed density matrix (or A) would define such a measure.

This could have application to TGD inspired theory of consciousness.

1. In TGD inspired theory of consciousness, one can assign to any system a number theoretic negentropy as a sum of p-adic entanglement: here the sum is over the ramified primes of an algebraic extension of rationals considered. The p-adic negentropies obey a formula similar to that for the ordinary entanglement negentropy. p-Adic negentropies can be however positive unlike the ordinary entanglement negentropy as a negative of entanglement entropy. The sum of p-adic negentropies measures the information of entanglement unlike ordinary entropy which measures the loss of information about either entangled state caused by the entanglement.
2. The number theoretic vision of TGD predicts that the entanglement negentropy is bound to increase in statistical sense in the number theoretic evolution and that this increase forces the increase of the ordinary entanglement entropy. Could the basic theorems of thermodynamics generalize also to this case and provide a mathematical way to understand the evolution of intelligent systems?

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Equivalence Principle in TGD

Understanding Equivalence Principle has been one of the basic challenges of TGD.

1. If one accepts Einstein's equations as a realization of Equivalence Principle, Equivalence Principle could be seen as a remnant of Poincare invariance of TGD at the quantum field theory limit of TGD. Einstein's equations at QFT limit would express what is left from exact Poincare invariance at the microscopic level. Recall that the microscopic level space-times are 4-D surfaces in H=M⁴×CP₂ realizing holography in terms of generalized holomorphy (see this) implying minimal surface property failing at singularities, which in turn give rise to particle vertices (see this and this).
2. At the quantum level the situation is not so easy. Here the principle should be global and state the identity of gravitational and inertial masses.
   1. Inertial mass is associated with the conserved four momentum labeling the modes of second quantized free spinor fields of H, whose oscillator operators can be used to build all elementary particles, both photons and fermions.
   2. What about gravitational mass? In zero energy ontology one considers causal diamonds CD=cd×CP₂ subset H, where cd is the causal diamond of M⁴. Now it is natural to perform the quantization of spinors inside a CD. Lorentz group with respect to either tip of CD and instead of unitary representations of Poincare group one has unitary irreps of this Lorentz group. Momentum eigenstates are replaced with unitary irreps of SO(1,3) at the Lorentz invariant hyperbolic 3-space H³ and Minkowski time is replaced with light-cone proper time, cosmic time. Mass spectrum is however the same. Hence Equivalence Principle.

The unitary representations of the Lorentz group are something completely new and have direct physical applications.

1. The unitary irreps of Lorentz group and H³ allow symmetry breaking to subgroups just as the representations of translation groups do in condensed matter physics. One obtains an infinite hierarchy of tessellations of H³ as counterparts of condensed matter lattices. There are however only a finite number of regular tessellations.
2. The recent findings of gravitational hum could be understnd in terms of diffraction in a lattice formed by stars (see this).
3. There is a completely unique tessellation allowing tetrahedrons,octahedrons, and icosahedrons as basic components and one can understand genetic code in terms of this tessellation. This suggests that genetic code is universal and biosystems provide only one particular realization of it (see this) .

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Did Moon turn itself inside out?

The group led by Weigang Liang has presented strong evidence that the Moon has turned inside out (see this). The heavy elements, which should be in the core are at the surface. For a popular summary see this. Can TGD explain this mysterious looking finding?

I have proposed that the Moon was formed in an explosion in which Earth lost a spherical layer, which then condensed to form the Moon. These explosions would have occurred on various scales (see this and this). For instance, in the case of the Sun these kinds of explosions could have formed the spherical layers condensing to planets. During the condensation of the spherical layer to the Moon, the gravitational acceleration experienced by the outer parts of the shell was stronger than that experienced by the inner parts. This implied turning inside out. The outer parts containing originally lighter stuff went to the core and the heavier stuff on the inner boundary of the shell remained on the surface.

A more precise calculation shows that the inversion can occur even with the density gradient.

See the article About the recent TGD based view concerning cosmology and astrophysics or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Why the communication of TGD to theoretical physicists is so incredibly difficult?

During these 42 years after my thesis I have often wondered why the communication of TGD to theoretical physicists is so extremely difficult. Communication with people in other fields of science does not seem to be a problem.

A partial answer to the question was provided by a Finnish colleague who pompously stated that not a single colleague would touch anything that I have written, even with a long pole. This might explain the mystery in the case of the community of Finnish colleagues. I of course sent my thesis to Witten and other big names after its publication around 1982 and received no response. Probably they had more important things to do than read my thesis. But is it possible that in the era of the internet my colleagues have never encountered TGD during these 40 years? Even very many lay people know of TGD.

It is difficult to believe that my colleagues would be so stupid as to miss TGD for so long a time. As if my colleagues were afraid to learn what TGD is. If so it would be about egos and losing face. Could they fear that they could not debunk TGD and even that TGD would demonstrate that they have been wrong all these years. It would not be surprising that superstring theorists whose mission ended with a complete catastrophe could suffer from this kind of fear. As a matter of fact, TGD solves the basic problem of quantum theory identified already a hundred years ago. Could the entire clergy of modern theoretical physics suffer the fear of realizing "I have been wrong all these years!"?

What could be the origin of this fear? The answer is short: "Ontology!".

1. The development of quantum theory forced us to ask how to test the predictions of the theory. It turned out that the outcomes of the quantum measurements were not predictable and only the probabilities for the outcomes in the measurement of the sect of selected observables were possible. This was in sharp conflict with the determinism of Schrödinger equation and also with classical determinism. Einstein who had constructed general relativity could not accept this since it would have made his theory pointless. This led to the Einstein-Bohr debate. The classical predictions of general relativity have been repeatedly verified as also the predictions of quantum theory. Both were winners and losers in the battle.
2. Numerous interpretations trying to circumvent the paradox of quantum measurement emerged and Copenhagen interpretation became the text book interpretation. It gave up the notion of ontology altogether. No reality actually exists and quantum mechanics is only a collection of computational recipes to predict the probabilities for the outcomes of quantum measurements. In particular, the notions of quantum states and wave function must be given up.
3. This led to a kind of postmodernism. Inflation theory and superstring models represent the extreme in this sense. In the basic version of the superstring model, the 4-D space-time is replaced by 2-D string world sheets in 10-D target space and 4-D space-time is believed to emerge in a mysterious process known as spontaneous compactification. Heterotic strings are one variant of the theory and for these left- resp. right moving fermions move in 10-D resp. 24-D target space. This is of course complete nonsense unless one takes theory as a mere computational recipe. Landscape catastrophe emerged as an outcome of spontaneous compactification and meant a complete loss of predictivity but even this is not a problem if one gives up ontology algother. The outcome is postmodernism: there is no grand narrative and science reduces to science fiction literature.

In TGD the situation is different. Ontology has played a key role in the construction of the TGD.

Consider first the classical TGD.

1. TGD emerged as a solution to an ontological problem. The notions of energy, momentum and angular momentum are not well-defined in general relativity. Already Emmy Noether realized this but her discovery was put under the rug. My discovery was that the hybrid of general and special relativities obtained by fusing the postulates of general relativity, namely general coordinate invariance and Equivalence principle with the relativity principle of special relativity, one ends up to a theory in which conservation laws are not lost.

   The prediction is that space-time at the fundamental level is not an abstract 4-geometry but corresponds to a 4-D surface in some space M⁴xS. By choosing S to be S=CP₂ one obtains standard model symmetries so that TGD is unique. Einsteinian space-time emerges at the quantum field theory limit at long length scales. The new ontology, I call it zero energy ontology (ZEO) identifying space-times as 4-surfaces,has dramatic implications in all scales, in particular cosmology and astrophysics.

2. There is also a connection with string models. Space-time surfaces can be seen as orbits of 3-surfaces representing particles as a generalization of point-like particles (and also of string). In fact, the conformal invariance of string models extends to a 4-D symmetry implying that space-time surfaces are minimal surfaces with lower-dimensional singularities giving rise to vertices. TGD strongly suggests also other infinite-D symmetries as isometries of WCW. If 3-surfaces are identified as particles, the minimal surface property generalizes wave particle duality massless particles. Minimal surface generalizes light-like geodesic and minimal surface equations generalize massless field equations.
3. Twistorilization involves one more ontological miracle. Twistorialization has shown its power in the construction of supersymmetric quantum field theories and the natural question is whether the twistor lift of TGD is possible using induction as the basic recipe. One would start from the product T(M⁴)xT(CP₂) of twistor spaces of M⁴ and CP₂.

   A good candidate for the twistor space of the space-time surface is as a 6-surface which has the structure of S^2 bundle, where S^2 is sphere. Could one obtain this 6-surfaces as 6-D analog of Bohr orbit for some action. This turns out to be possible and dimensional reduction leads to a 4-D action, which is Kähler action as an analog of Maxwell action plus volume action having an interpretation in terms of cosmological constant which depends on length scale and approach to zero in long length scales. This is possible if the twistor spaces in question allow Kähler structure. This is the case but only for M⁴ and CP₂ so that TGD and physics are unique.

Let us now consider ontology at the level of quantum TGD.

1. The first guess was that scattering amplitudes are defined in terms of a path integral over all 4-surfaces. However, quantum field theories have an ontological problem. The path integral does not exist in a mathematical sense. In TGD this problem is magnified since any general coordinate invariant action is extremely non-linear and there is no hope of the elimination of divergences by renormalization. Therefore the realization of path integral as integral over all 4-surfaces connecting initial and final 3-surfaces makes no sense mathematically.

   The solution is simple: general coordinate invariance is realized by holography assigning to a 3-surface a unique or almost unique 4-surface analogous to Bohr orbit. Path integral disappears. Instead of 3-surfaces, the 4-D Bohr orbits are the basic dynamical objects and quantum TGD reduces to wave mechanics in the space of these Bohr orbits: world of classical worlds (WCW), as I call it.

   WCW must exist mathematically and allow Kähler geometry, otherwise the geometrization of quantum theory is not possible. Again an ontological problem! Dan Freed studied loops spaces and found that their Kähler geometry exists and is unique. There are excellent reasons to expect that the same is true in TGD.

2. Momentum-position duality plays a key role in wave mechanics. It should generalize to TGD. The natural momentum space-counterpart of H is 8-D Minkowski space M⁸ as its cotangent space. M⁸ and H should provide complementary descriptions of physics. I call this M⁸-H duality.

   Here enters a new ontological element to the picture: number theory, which has not has no fundamental role in standard physics. It took a long time to realize that M⁸ can be interpreted as octonions since the real part of octonions squared gives the Minkowskian norm. Dynamics in M⁸ can be formulated as the condition that the normal space of the 4-surface is quaternionic, that is, associative. M⁸-H duality maps these 4-surfaces to H provided the normal spaces contain an integrable distribution of commutative subspaces. The normal space of 4-surface is parametrized by a point of CP₂, which defines the M⁸-H duality. M⁸-H duality has an interpretation as a physical counterpart of Langlands duality.

   Number theoretic vision predicts that the hierarchy of classical number fields, reals, complex numbers, quaternions, and octonions becomes part of the ontology of TGD.

3. Number theoretic view in turn leads naturally to a hierarchy of p-adic number fields and their algebraic extensions as extension of the ontology of the standard physics. A natural assumption is that the space-time surfaces are characterized as roots of two two polynomials which are functions of the 4 generalized complex coordinates of H. If the coefficients are integers, or even integers smaller than the degree of the polynomials, the space-time surfaces exists also in the p-adic sense: ontology is universal in number theoretical sense.

   One obtains hierarchies of extensions of rationals defined by the roots of the polynomials defining evolutionary hierarchies. The dimension for the extension of rationals defines an effective Planck constant and the larger its value, the longer the scale of quantum coherence. The phases of ordinary matter with non-standard value of effective Planck constant behave like dark matter. It turns out that they do not correspond to the galactic dark matter, which corresponds to dark energy in the TGD framework but to missing baryonic matter whose portion has increased during the cosmological evolution. Galactic dark matter is assignable to cosmic strings and monopole flux tubes so that again new ontology solving physical problems is predicted.

   The ramified primes assignable to the polynomials as divisors of its discriminant have physical interpretation as preferred p-adic primes playing a crucial role in TGD, in particular in p-adic mass calculations.

   Number theoretic physics can be regarded as physics of cognition and the common points of the real and p-adic space-time surfaces consisting of algebraic numbers in the intersection of the extensions of polynomials involved define a universal discretization providing a cognitive representation. Therefore cognitive correlates become part of the ontology.

4. The counterparts of Schrödinger amplitudes are identified superpositions of 4-D orbits, that is WCW spinor fields. This requires spinor structure and gamma matrices identifiable as super counterparts of the infinitesimal generators of the WCW isometries identifiable as Noether charges. The gamma matrices are identifiable in terms of oscillator operators of free second quantize spinor fields of H and this makes it possible to calculate correlation functions. Fermion fields of H define the fundamental fields and bosons can be regarded as bound states of fundamental fermions.

   This however creates an ontological problem. Fermion and antifermion numbers are separately conserved. The idea is that fermion pairs are created from classical induced gauge- and gravitational fields which do exist. It turns out that fermion pair creation is possible but only in dimension D=4. This is due to the fact that in the 4-D case there exists an infinite number of exotic smooth structures, which differ from the standard smooth structures by lower-dimensional defects identifiable as these singularities, that is vertices. In general relativity the existence of the exotic smooth structures is lethal. Ontology shows again its marvellous power (see this): realistic quantum theory allowing pair creation is possible only in dimension 4!

It was quantum measurement theory which led to the Copenhagen interpretation and the recent stagnation of theoretical physics. Can TGD solve the problem?

1. WCW spinor fields in the WCW, the space of 4-D Bohr orbits, define the counterparts of wave functions. Quantum jumps occur between these so that the non-determinism of quantum jump is not in conflict with the classical determinism of the Bohr orbit. Therefore the basic problem of quantum measurement theory disappears.

   The basic implication is that there are two times: the geometric time identified as time coordinate of M⁴ or time coordinate of the space-time surface and subjective time presumably identifiable as the sequence of state function reductions. These times are not identical although they must strongly correlate.

2. To understand this in detail, one must generalize the quantum measurement theory. The outcome is actually a quantum theory of consciousness bringing the observer part of the quantum ontology as a conscious entity, self.

   In standard quantum theory one has two kinds of state function reductions (SFRs): the ordinary state function reduction and the sequences of repeated measurement of the same observables producing the same measurement outcome (Zeno effect). In quantum optics the latter measurements are replaced by weak measurements which affect the system slightly. In TGD one has "big" SFRs as counterparts of ordinary SFRs and "small" SFRs associated with the TGD counterpart of the Zeno effect. The dramatic prediction is that the arrow of geometric time changes in BSFRs.

   In small SFRs the arrow of time is preserved but the state of the system changes. The sequence of small SFRs define a conscious entity, self and BSFR means the death of self.

3. A more precise understanding of the relationship between the geometric time and subjective times requires the introduction of further ontology. Perceptive field characterizes a conscious entity. The perceptive field of the conscious entity is identified as causal diamond CD= cdxCP₂, where cd is the causal diamond of M⁴ identified as the intersection of future and past directed light-cones. Causal diamonds form a scale hierarchy. One can apply Poincare transformations, special conformal transformations of M⁴ and scalings on CDs. The finite-D space of CDs obtained in this way (see this) forms the spine of WCW in the sense that WCW decomposes to sub-WCWs consisting of space-time surfaces inside a given CD.

   In zero energy ontology (ZEO) fermionic parts of states are superpositions of products of fermionic Fock states at the opposite boundaries of CD. The size of CD increases in statistical sense in the sequence of SSFRs, which leave the members of the state pairs at the passive boundary of CD invariant (Zeno effect) but change the state at the CD since each SSFR is preceded by an analog of a unitary time evolution.

   The geometric time can be identified as the distance between the tips of the CD and increases in statistical sense since the unitary time evolution in questions corresponds to dispersion in the space of CDs and SSFR means a localization in this space. There is a natural correlation between the subjective time measured using SSFR as a unit and geometric time identified in this way.

4. Still one key idea about ontology must be mentioned. In standard ontology of classical physics one assumes that there is reality behind its mathematical description. The Quantum Platonia of WCW spinor fields as mathematical objects is the reality: there is no need to postulate anything behind them. The quantum jumps of conscious entities hopping around Quantum Platonia give rise to conscious information about this reality and number theoretical evolution forcing the increase of the algebraic complexity creates increasingly complex memory representations about the Quantum Platonia. The Quantum Platonia of TGD differs from that of Tegmark in that it is not a Zombie but teems with life.

To summarize, the basic difference between the standard view of theoretical physics and TGD is that, since TGD solves the quantum measurement paradox, it can accept ontology. Ontology pops up again and again in the development of TGD and has led to a completely unexpected cascade of new deep ideas with strong predictive power since the mere mathematical existence fixes the physics.

What comes to mind is Copernicus who dared to propose that the Universe is full of solar systems like ours and life is everywhere. It had been realized that Earth is not a center of cosmos but the ideas of Copernicus were simply too much and he was burned on the stake. My crime has been the non-Copenhagenian claim that something exists and even worse: there are two kinds of existences: physical and subjective. I was not burnt on stake but learned what it is to be an academic Zombie.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Correlations between the brains of monotsygotic twins as a direct evidence for large scale quantum coherence

In Qualia Computing Network  there was a very interesting link to  the popular article describing the work of Richard Silberstein and Felicity Bigelow  published in Frontiers with the title "Brain functional connectivity correlates of anomalous interaction between sensorily isolated monozygotic twins"  (https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2024.1388049/full). These statistical correlations are   very significant findings but not the first ones. Already 1965 correlations in EEGs of monozotic twins were discovered.

Telepathy is one explanation but what telepathy  is physically? Standard quantum theory suggests that quantum jumps are somehow involved and might relate to the notion of free will  but  it  cannot provide any satisfactory answer since quantum measurement theory has the well-known fundamental problem.

To proceed, one must start from scratch and try to really understand what happens in quantum measurement and how the standard QM must be modified to explain the findings.

1.  The reported long range correlations suggest that this revised form must allow quantum coherence in macro scales and that brains can entangle. This could occur if their brains can become  controlled by some larger structure  such that its long scale quantum coherence involving both brains induces the correlations.
2. Standard quantum theory does not allow this. In the TGD framework the new view of space-time leads to the notions of field body and magnetic body serving replacing Maxwellian fields in the TGD framework. They are excellent candidates here. Number theoretic vision of TGD predicts a hierarchy of effective Planck constants labelling phases of the ordinary matter and making possible quantum coherence in arbitrarily long scales. These phases would reside at the field/magnetic bodies and behave like dark matter but would not be identifiable as galactic dark matter which in TGD framework would correspond to dark energy located at very long monopole flux tubes and not forming halo. These phases would explain the missing baryons whose portion has increased during the cosmological evolution.

   Field body would serve as a "boss" controlling the ordinary matter at the biological body and the  long length scale of its quantum coherence, which can be of order of Earth size scale or even longer,  could induce ordinary coherence of biomatter.  

3. The  reported correlations could be  produced by the "magnetic body", which by its large scale can control the brains of twins simultaneously.  Ordinary telepathy would rely on the same mechanism. For the notions of magnetic body see for instance, https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/penrose.pdf, https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/magnbubble1.pdf,  and https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/magnbubble2.pdf. For the notion of  electric body see https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/hem.pdf

  As far as the findings are considered, this is enough. But this does not yet allow us to understand consciousness in terms of a generalization of quantum measurement theory.

1. Both subjective and physical existences seem   to be real.  Both  dualistic, materialistic and idealistic views fail.  Dualism leads to grave difficulties with the constraints from deterministic physics as Chalmers demonstrated. Subjective existence must be mathematically something very different from physical existence so that the causalities of classical physics and of free will can be consistent.
2. The answer looks obvious: subjective existence corresponds to a sequence of   quantum jumps,  state function reductions, or more technically,    of state function reductions having interpretation as repeated measurement of the same observables, which in standard QM would not change the state at all (Zeno effect). Self would correspond to the TGD counterpart of Zeno effect.

One must however solve the basic problem of quantum measurement theory.

1. A new ontology is needed to get rid of the conflict between  the deterministic classical causality and non-deterministic quantum causality.  Zero energy ontology (ZEO)     solves  this problem by identifying the  counterpart of a particle's wave function in 3-space with a wave function in the space of its Bohr orbits. Now Bohr orbits are  orbits of 3-surfaces identifiable as particles. This is forced by holography for the space-time surfaces.
2. In the TGD counterpart of ordinary state function reduction (SFR), "big" SFR,  the arrow of time changes. This takes place in all scales.  The TGD counterpart of the sequence of repeated measurement of the same observables (Zeno effect) corresponds to a sequence of "small" SFRs, which affect the system and produce the flow of consciousness, self. Self dies in BSFR and reincarnates with an opposite arrow of time.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Do reincarnations occur?

The idea of reincarnation is gaining a new boost. The Washington post article (see this) describes quite a recent example of a child who remembered experiences of a person who might have been a victim of Holocaust. Since the 1960s, more than 2200 children all round the world have described what looks like memories from a previous life.

What makes this interesting from the point of view of TGD inspired consciousness predicts the possibility of re-incarnation.

1. In TGD, space-time is replaced with a 4-surface in M^4xCP_2. 4-surface can be regarded as an orbit of a 3-surface identifiable as a 4-D generalization of a point-like particle. General Coordinate Invariance for holography. 4-surfaces are analogous Bohr orbits of these 3-surfaces- rather than 3-surfaces, and quantum states are wave-functions in the space of these 4-D Bohr orbits. Quantum TGD is a kind of wave mechanics in the space of Bohr orbits.
2. The revolutionary idea is that basic physical entities are almost deterministic time 4-D time-evolutions of 3-D particles rather than particles. At quantum level wave functions as quantum states are replaced by the superpositions of these 4-D Bohr orbits. This forces us to replace the standard ontology of quantum theory with "Zero energy ontology" (ZEO). The outcome is a solution to the measurement problem of quantum theory and one gets rid of myriads of "interpretations".
3. Number theoretic vision of TGD predicts the possibility of quantum coherence in arbitrarily long scales. This would be due to a hierarchy of phases of ordinary matter with non-standard value of effective Planck constant. These phases would reside at field bodies/magnetic bodies. This matter behaves like dark matter. Field bodies replace the Maxwellian view of electromagnetic fields and the analog of dark matter resides at field bodies assignable to systems consisting of ordinary matter. This dark matter would be the "boss" that would control ordinary biomatter.
4. The new quantum measurement theory predicts that in the TGD counterparts of ordinary state function reductions (SFRs) ("big" SFRs or BSFRs) the arrow of time changes. On the other hand, the sequences of repeated measurements of the same observables, which in ordinary quantum measurement theory do not affect the state at all, do change it, and the sequence of these "small" SFRs (SSFRs) gives rise to a conscious entity, self. Subjective time flow corresponds to the sequences of SSFRs and must be distinguished from the geometric time.

   Self dies/falls asleep in BSFR and reincarnates with an opposite arrow of time and lives in the opposite direction of time. One might speak of time travel to the geometric past. Eventually also this self dies and reincarnates with the original arrow of time: this would be a re-incarnation in the "ordinary" sense. A rough estimate based on a concrete view of what happens in BSFRs and SSFRs suggests that this happens roughly a typical lifetime later than the death of the previous re-incarnate. The claimed reincarnation described in the article is consistent with this.

But is it possible to remember anything about the previous life? One must distinguish between two situations since previous life could correspond to the same or opposite arrow of time as the recent. Since BSFR and SSFR and the notion of self are universal and not restricted to living matter only, it is better to speak of system S although it might sound rather formal and bring in mind the spherical cows of physicists.

1. If the arrow of the geometric time is the same, the signals from the previous life of S in geometric past can reach the later reincarnate of S and the memory recall is possible. This could explain the memories of previous lives. Especially so if they are related to a very intense experience since in these kinds of situations the classical signals are expected to be very intense.
2. What about the situation in which the arrows of geometric time are opposite? Also falling asleep as "death" and waking-up as a "reincarnation" corresponds to a pair of BSFRs. That we remember practically nothing from the period of deep sleep could be understood: the classical signals from the period of sleep travel to our geometric past so that we never receive them.

   One could however consider a loophole to this. The reincarnate RS of the S or its subsystem could live a short period with a reversed arrow of time and send signals received by the S, which wakes up next morning. Dreams could correspond to these kinds of short periods when a part of the brain is awake and gives information of the dream period. If this smaller part of the brain corresponds to a lower level in the self hierarchy and the temporary period with opposite arrow of time is short, one could understand the decomposition of dreams to short logical periods and surreal character. That the memories from the period of sleep are soon forgotten could be due to the fact that the classical signal is a finite pulse and does not spend a long time in the required part of the brain. It could however arrive again it if rotates around a close monopole flux tuber loop as one might expect.

   Temporary short lasting changes of the arrow of time leading from S to RS are indeed predicted to occur routinely. For instance, homeostasis and the biological self-organization in general, would rely in an essential manner on this. Also learning by trial and error mechanism would involve a pair of BSFRs. In fact, our stream of consciousness is not continuous. We continually fall asleep for short periods of time. Living systems would be dying all the subjective time (to be distinguished from the geometric time) and this might make it possible to have memories of previous lifes with an opposite arrow of time!

See the article Does Consciousness Survive Bodily Death? or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Comments inspired by the talk of Anil Seth

The talk of  the neuroscientist and consciousness theoretician  Anil Seth at Friday in Helsinki University was highly interesting. I talked about Anil Seth's  background already in the previous blog posting (see this) and I will not repeat what I said.

Anil Seth is a materialist but admits that living systems are somehow very special. He was also skeptical about conscious AI and stressed that the substrate matters whereas AI people think that eternal life is achieved by  replacing the human brain with a program running in a computer.

The lecture began with an enjoyable discussion of  visual illusions, which support his view that sensory perception  makes  a prediction rather than a representation of the physiological state of  the brain at a particular moment. Prediction  is understood in a very general manner. It can  mean anticipation of the future but also a guess for a sensory percept. In the TGD framework, the meanings of  anticipation and prediction  are more or less the same since sensory perception is essentially 4-dimensional. This leads also to a new view of memory and anticipation.   The reason is that space-time surfaces satisfy almost deterministic holography being analogs to 4-D Bohr orbits.

1. The illusion related to color perception included a cube at a checkerboard, whose presence changed the white color to grey consistent with the symmetric checkerboard coloring. In TGD sensory representation is an artwork built by iteration using virtual sensory input and eventually leading to a standard mental image. This process predicts what is there and   favours symmetries. Checkerboard symmetry won over realism.
2. Second  illusion was related to the shapes.  Human faces are   central for our perception. For instance,  we tend to see faces in the clouds.  The illusion was associated with  a rotating mask representing a human face. Both sides of the faces were perceived in the same way! The image was a mask or its   planar reflection.  The direction of rotation was also changed in the percept.
3. The third example was a video representing a model for how emotional coloring  very strongly affects  what  seems to be  there. The pattern recognition process was weighted so that the features associated with a face of a dog (I experienced it as a wolf) are over emphasized. The psychedelic  video described people moving on the street. By this weighting their faces were very wolf-like.  Everything was very wolfy!

The last example generated some  thoughts. This picture applies also to cognition and language and also to language models.

1. I could imagine that schizophrenic or paranoid could experience  the world in the same psychedelic way as in the video.  What also comes to mind are the  artworks of  Salvador Dali, Hieronymys Bosch, and Vincent van Gogh.
2. I had many discussions with people about the recent world-wide rise of militarism  and also about the extremely cruel policy of the recent  Finnish government in which the cuts to social security strike   the poorest people hardest. Government is also systematically destroying social healthcare and effectively performing a massive  income transfer to the rich people.

   The  discussion  groups  were filled  by fanatic males  defending militarism and the actions of the government. I learned this morning that   about 20 percent of finns belong to this group and males dominate. Basic Finns is the party in which most males see violence as a way to solve problems and agree with the policy of the government. I guess that most of these people in the discussion group belonged to the right wing parties.  

   These participants   did not even try  to represent  comments  based on logical arguments relying on facts and their responses were typically personal insults.    Even small hints that the opponent  is behind the standard human values such as equity, economical safety, justice and  peace made  these people to  identify the opponent as a bloodthirsty bolshevik or  a benchman of Putin receiving orders from Moscow.

   These people  seem to suffer from a paranoia-like state very much like that in the video full of wolfy faces.  One can wonder  whether interaction with more normal people would help them to  widen their perceptive field and end  up in a less  skewed mindframe.   Ordinary people do not however usually want to interact with them and they  are doomed to live in  the small bubbles of similar fanatics.

3. Also a connection with  language models such as GPt is suggestive.  These  models rely on the formation of associations and the response to a question is very much like a perception induced by a sensory input, essentially a prediction.  Here the teaching process defines the perceptive landscape as a region about which the data comes from. There are many white regions in this sensory landscape  of language models  and this is bound to create a very  skewed view of reality.

   For instance, the teaching material included gives an overweight for the mainstream view of science and can totally neglect the non-mainstream, which is  actually the really interesting part of science.  This makes possible a powerful censorship  and I would not be surprised if it were not used.

   For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

   For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Heliosphere has oblique and rippled structures

It has been found that heliosphere contains oblique and rippled structures (see this).

Here is the abstract of the article.

Past analysis has shown that the heliosphere structure can be deduced from correlations between long-scale solar wind pressure evolution and energetic neutral atom emissions. However, this required spatial and temporal averaging that smoothed out small or dynamic features of the heliosphere. In late 2014, the solar wind dynamic pressure increased by roughly 50 % over a period of 6 months, causing a time and directional-dependent rise in around 2-6 keV energetic neutral atom fluxes from the heliosphere observed by the Interstellar Boundary Explorer. Here, we use the 2014 pressure enhancement to provide a simultaneous derivation of the three-dimensional heliospheric termination shock (HTS) and heliopause (HP) distances at high resolution from Interstellar Boundary Explorer measurements.
The analysis reveals rippled HTS and HP surfaces that are oblique with respect to the local interstellar medium upwind direction, with significant asymmetries in the heliosphere structure compared to steady-state heliosphere models. We estimate that the heliosphere boundaries contain roughly 10 astronomical unit-sized spatial variations, with slightly larger variations on the HTS surface than the HP and a large-scale, southwards-directed obliquity of the surfaces in the meridional plane. Comparisons of the derived HTS and HP distances with Voyager observations indicate substantial differences in the heliosphere boundaries in the northern versus southern hemispheres and their motion over time.

What makes the findings so interesting from the TGD point of view, is that heliosphere boundaries contain roughly 10 AU sized spatial variations. These variations are oblique with respect to the direction of the galactic wind. What comes first in mind in the TGD framework is that these could correspond to a icosahedral lattice-like structure with 12 vertices and 20 triangular faces (note that spherical geometry allows only Platonic solids as regular tessellations as analogs of condensed matter lattices). The appearance of AU in this context would be seen as an accident in standard physics but in TGD the situation is different.

If astrophysical quantum coherence and Nottale's model are accepted, planets correspond to Bohr orbits of gravitational atom with gravitational Planck constant ℏ_gr(M,m)= GMm/β₀ assignable to the pair formed by Sun with mass M and particle with mass m. β₀≃ 2^-11/5 holds true for the outer planets in the Nottale's model and Earth corresponds to the principal quantum number n=1. Therefore AU is identifiable as the gravitational Bohr radius a_gr given by a_gr= ℏ_gr/2α_grm, where the gravitational fine structure constant is α_gr= GMm/4πℏ_gr. This gives AU= r_S/2β₀² = 2πGM_S/β₀² =πr_S/2β₀²=2πΛ_gr/β₀². The Bohr radius a_gr=AU and gravitational Compton length Λ_gr define fundamental quantum lengths and might appear also elsewhere in the solar system. Intriguingly, the gravitational Compton radius of the Sun is one half of the Earth's radius and Bohr radius is is the distance of Earth from the Sun.

One can compare the situation with atomic lattices where atomic Bohr radius defines a natural scale. The mutual distances of the ripples at the heliosphere are about 10AU. The value of atomic Bohr radius is about .5 Angstrom in the atomic situation. By scaling by a factor 10, this would predict that the distances of atoms would be about 5 A: for atomic lattices this gives the order of magnitude for the lattice constant (see this).

See the chapter Magnetic Bubbles in TGD Universe: Part I.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Anil Seth and his view of consciousness as controlled hallucinations

The neuroscientist and consciousness theoretician Anil Seth will speak in Helsinki University at Friday. The relevant data are here: 26 April at 16.00–18.00 EEST Place: University of Helsinki, Main building (Fabianinkatu 33, 2nd floor), Auditorium (F2044). Live stream can be found here.

I looked at the summary of AS:s book "Being You: A New Science of Consciousness" (see this).

1. Anil Seth (AS) is a materialist and therefore believes that the neurophysiological state of the brain completely determines the contents of consciousness. AS tries to answer the "real problem" that is why a particular sensory input gives rise to a particular conscious experience. AS admits however that the hard problem, that is why there is any experience associated with the perceptions, is real.
2. The usual view in which sensory input arrives the brain and is processed to produce sensory representations and then follows motor action as a reaction. The view of AS is in some sense opposite. Brain is continually making predictions for the future and they are realized as experiences, which can be sensory experiences and also emotions which relate to the state of the body. Sensory experience is not a summary of what was but a prediction of what it will be! We live in a continual hallucination which does its best to predict the future reliably. When it fails, we speak of hallucination instead of a real sensory experience.

From this brief description motor action is missing. What could it mean in this framework? I do not know what Seth's answer is. How does the view of AS relate to the TGD based view of consciousness? TGD view involves the following new elements.

1. Zero energy ontology (ZEO) replaces the standard ontology of quantum theory and solves the basic paradox of quantum measurement theory. The key point is that quantum state is replaced with a superposition of classical deterministic time evolutions of 3-surface, that is 4-surfaces of H=M⁴×CP₂, obeying holography meaning that 3-D initial data dictate the time evolution almost uniquely. The space-time surface is an analog of Bohr orbit for a particle represented by a 3-surface.

   These Bohr orbits reside inside a causal diamond CD, which has the intersection of future and past directed light-cones as its M⁴ projection. CDs form a scale hierarchy and CD defines the 4-D perceptive field of a conscious entity. The 4-dimensionality of the perceptive field conforms with the idea of AS that conscious experience is a prediction rather than a mere representation of what the world is in 3-D sense.

   The 4-surfaces as analogs of Bohr orbits and as classical time evolution correspond to the predictions of AS. Quantum prediction of the future is quantum state, that is a wave function in the set of Bohr orbits.

2. A new element is the existence of a hierarchy of phases of ordinary matter for which the number theoretically determined effective Planck constant can be arbitrarily large and therefore the scale of quantum coherence. These phases behave like dark matter and control ordinary matter since the h_eff as a measure of algebraic complexity is also a kind of IQ. In this framework, biosystems become quantum coherent systems in scales of the biological body and even in much longer scales corresponding to EEG wavelengths for instance.
3. The new view of space-time as a 4-D surface in M⁴xCP₂ predicts also a new view of Maxwell fields. Field bodies, in particular magnetic bodies consisting of monopole flux tubes as kinds of body parts in an abstract sense, are a basic prediction and central for biology. Field/magnetic bodies w carry dark matter as h_eff>h phases and receive information from biological bodies containing ordinary matter and control it. EEG relates to the communication between the field body and biological body. This view resonates with the view of Fadden.
4. The ZEO based quantum measurement generalizes ordinary measurement theory, which involves ordinary state function reductions (SFRs) and sequences of repeated measurements which do not affect the system at all (Zeno effect) and in a more general view suggested by quantum optics involve a small change.

   Ordinary SFRs become "big" SFRs (BSFRs) in the TGD framework and in these the arrow of geometric time changes. From the point of view of outsider the system loses consciousness/falls asleep/dies but actually in reincarnates and lives with opposite arrow of time so that signals sent by it go to geometric past and are not received by the system as it has reincarnated by making a second BSFR and therefore has the original arrow of time.

   The sequences of repeated measurements of the same observables correspond to sequences of SSFRs and give rise to a continuous flow of consciousness. They would relate to sensory perceptions. BSFR would correspond to motor actions changing the arrow of time and the second BSFR would bring back the original arrow of time and correspond to wake-up and motor action.

   When the sensory input changes the set of commuting observables measured in SSFR, it becomes impossible to continue the peaceful life and BSFR must take place: self loses consciousness temporarily (dies) for a moment. This corresponds to motor action, which is missing from the view of AS as represented above.

   In the TGD framework sensory perception as a sequence of SSFRs yields continually updated quantum predictions and BSFR forced by the change of the measured observables so that it does not anymore commute with the earlier observables, gives rise to motor action as a reaction.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

About the Biefeld Brown effect

Biefeld Brown effect is one of the effects studied by "free energy" researchers. What happens that an asymmetry capacitor for which the electrodes are of different size starts to move in the direction of the smaller electrode. The so called emdrive (see this), which I have commented here and here, could be also based on this effect. The has been a lot of overhyping such as vehicles moving with light-velocity to Mars and the failure of momentum conservation by the Biefeld Brown effect is real.

The recent experiments carried out by Buhler's team using capacitors in vacuum chamber achieve a levitation in gravitational field of Earth (see this). If this is really the case, new physics is involved.

Standard physics based models for the effect are discussed here. The electric fields associated with the capacitors are about 30 kV/dm, which is about 10 per cent of the electric field 30 kV/cm causing dielectric breakdown in air. Note that the electric field of Earth 10-30 V/dm and therefore roughly by a factor 1/1000 weaker.

Brown makes several important statements, including:

1. The greatest force on the capacitor is created when the small electrode is positive.
2. The effect occurs in a dielectric medium (air).
3. The effect can be used for vehicle propulsion or as a pump of dielectric fluid.
4. Brown s suggeset that the effect involves ionic motion.
5. The detailed physics of the effect is not understood.

The models assume that the cm motion is due to the loss of energy and momentum to the environment and fail if the effect is possible in vacuum. The first model assumes ionic wind between the electrodes and predicts effect, which is 3 orders of magnitude too small. The model based on ionic drift is a rough order of magnitude model and predicts that the effect can have an order of magnitude consistent with the findings. The reason why the ionic wind predicts a smaller effect is that the absence of dissipation tends to reduce the effect since the ions arriving to the opposite electrode induce an opposite recoil.

The interview of Charles Buhler by Tim Ventura (see this) gives more details about what has been found in the experiments giving a thrust which is now around one g. Buhler's team has been developing the propellantless propulsion based on asymmetric capacitors understood in a very general sense, i.e. there are just two electrodes which are asymmetric. The work is completely independent of NASA and has been patented. From the interview I learned the following.

1. Electric field is more intense at the smaller electrode and is believed to make the effect larger.
2. The electrodes are cased which means that there is no leakage of charge between them. The claim is that this prevents all kinds of leakage currents between the electrodes. The system is also enclosed in high vacuum and this allows use of lower voltages. There are two types of charges involved. The free charge appearing in conductors and the bound charge appearing in insulators. The interpretation would be in terms of electrons. It is reported that at low voltage free charge dominates the effect and at higher voltages bound charge dominates. The interpretation could be in terms of ionization in high enough voltage in which bound charges go somewhere.
3. Mere charge and electric field are enough and there is no external energy feed. The mere existence of the electric field gives rise to the thrust. In the standard physics framework, this raises problems with the conservation laws of energy and momentum.

I have already earlier commented on the Biefeld Brown effect from the TGD point of view (see this, this and this).

1. In standard physics the center of mass of the system should remain at rest if the system is in vacuum and there is no charge leakage between the electrodes. The findings of Buhler's team demonstrate that there is a center of mass motion in vacuum.
2. Part of the electrostatic energy should go to the cm motion of the system. Where does the momentum and energy leaving the system responsible for thrust as the recoil effect go? In the experiments of Buhler's team it cannot go to the environment as it is understood in the standard physics. Therefore there should exist a momentum and energy exchange with some unidentified system, call it X. Charges and/or radiation should leave the capacitor to produce a recoil.
3. The findings suggest that the charges involved are conduction electrons at low voltages and bound electrons of insulators at high voltages and that the bound electrons increase the thrust dramatically. In the latter case an ionization of atoms is required.
4. If the charges leaving a given electrode return to the system, they can end up at the opposite electrode or return to the original electrode. It seems that the transfer to the opposite electrode cannot take place via standard physics mechanisms in the experiments of Buhler's team since the electrodes are cased. The charges must go to some third system, call it X, and return back to the electrode or opposite electrode.

   If the electrons leave some momentum to X, momentum is pumped to X and a recoil effect results. If the system X is between the electrodes and the pumping is more effective at the smaller electrode, the recoil effect generates an acceleration towards the smaller electrode.

What could TGD say about the situation? TGD predicts that besides classical gravitational fields of the Sun, Earth and other planets are responsible for very large values of effective Planck constant h_eff for ordinary particles located at the gravitational monopole flux tubes. The generalization of this proposal for electric fields is discussed here. Examples are electric fields of DNA, cell, ionospheres of the Earth and Sun, and also of large capacitor-like systems.

1. In the TGD basic model the third system is identified as the electric field body (FB) associated with the system. The key idea is that electronic momentum is pumped from the electrodes to their FBs: an electron is transferred to the FB, leaves some of its momentum to FB and drops back and in this way gives rise to a recoil. If the degree of quantum coherence is higher for the smaller electrode, the pumping at it is more effective. This gives rise to the Biefeld Brown effect, perhaps even in the situation when the dielectric is present. There is also a net transfer of electrons momentum to the positive electrode, which reduces the voltage while keeping the system neutral and provides in this way electrostatic energy to the kicked electrons.
2. The electrons would be transferred to electric monopole flux tubes of the electric field body (FB) of the capacitor-like system as dark electrons, just like protons in the Pollack effect (see this). Also the electric body of the Earth could be involved. The relevant part of the FB would be between the electrodes and the recoil momenta would be directed outwards from the capacitor-like system. The charge transfer via the FB to the opposite electrode would take place by an analog of the Pollack effect and its reversal.
3. If the electrostatic energy is used to generate the analog of the Pollack effect and the system remains neutral, a net negative charge is transferred to the positive electrode and no charge can accumulate to FB. A generalized Pollack effect in which the electrons return back to the electrode that they left makes pumping of momentum and energy to the FB possible and recoil effect results. If the pumping is more effective at the smaller electrode, cm acceleration towards the smaller electrode results.

Could macroscopic quantum coherence predicted by TGD explain why the smaller electrode gets a larger recoil momentum?

1. TGD predicts large scale quantum coherence and this could be highly relevant for the Biefeld Brown effect (see this). The electric Planck constant for a pair of charged particle with charge e and for charged system with charge is h_eff= h_em= Qe/β₀, where β₀= v₀/c≤ 1 is a velocity parameter. For the pair of capacitor plates would be given by h_em= Q²/β₀. h_em would characterize charged particles at the electric body of the system consisting of electric flux tubes, which can be also magnetic since electric flux tubes can obtained as small deformations of the magnetic monopole tubes!

   Note that one cannot exclude the possibility of Maxwellian half-monopole flux tubes having boundary, which I have proposed to be important in the temperature region above the transition temperature in the case of high Tc superconductors (see this).

2. Electric field strength rather than voltage is relevant for the effect. The charge Q of the capacitor as the electric flux Q= ∫ E• dS/ε₀ is indeed proportional to the electric field and this suggests that macroscopic quantum coherence might be important (see this). The effect could become large for strong field strengths suggesting that the transfer of charges to the electric body is a collective quantum effect proportional to the square N² of the number N of charges transferred. If the increase of voltage has been done by keeping the size constant in the experiments of Buhler's team, the dramatic increase of the thrust can be understood in this way.
3. For a particle of mass m, the electric Compton length Λ _em= h_em/m= 2πQe/β₀m serves as a good guess for the lower bound for the quantum coherence length and is for proton by a factor 1/2000 smaller than for electron. The first guess for the thickness d of the electric flux tube is as d=Λ_em= 2π Qe/β₀m. Here m would refer to electron mass. This would explain why the transfer of electrons is what matters in the experiments. Hitherto its assumed that only valence electrons can become dark having h_eff> h. These findings would require that also bound electrons of insulators involved can become dark.
4. Can one assume that the entire electrodes form quantum coherent systems or should one assume that only the flux tubes are such systems? Suppose that the latter option is realized. A natural first guess is that the flux tube radius d is equal to the electric Compton length so that one would have d= 2πQe/β₀m. The entire electrodes need not be quantum coherent systems.

   For instance, if the smaller electrode corresponds to a single flux tube, it decompose to smaller flux tubes near the larger electrode giving rise to smaller quantum coherent units with charge Q_large/Q_small= S_small/S_large and having therefore also a smaller values of electric flux and of Maxwellian electric field. Quite generally, the flux tubes from the smaller electrode would decompose in this way at the larger electrode.

5. The geometric asymmetry of the electrodes, or more precisely the convergence of flux tubes at the smaller electrodes, is believed to somehow explain the thrust towards the smaller electrode.

   Suppose that the flux tubes correspond to bundles of electric field lines as predicted by Maxwell's theory. Suppose that the flux tube acts as a quantum coherent unit. The charges Q(tube) of the flux tubes near the small resp. large electrode are in the ratio S_small/S_large of their areas. By quantum coherence the rate for the momentum transfer is proportional to Q²(tube) and is therefore larger near the smaller electrode. The transfer rates are proportional to the square of the charge per flux tube and in the ratio (S_small/S_large)².

   This predicts that the pumping of momentum and energy to the FB by generalized Pollack effect is more effective at the smaller electrode so that the acceleration is towards the smaller electrode if the monopole flux tubes are in the region between the electrodes.

6. In the experiments of Brown, the thrust is reported to be larger when the smaller electrode has a positive charge: I am not quite sure whether this is the case in the experiments of Buhler's team. The net electron current to the positive electrode is needed to reduce the voltage while keeping the system neutral. Since the electrons travelling to the positive electrode lose part of their momentum to the FB, this increases the effect when the smaller electrode is positively charged.

See the article About the Biefeld Brown effect or the chapter About long range electromagnetic quantum coherence in TGD Universe.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Disappearing stars: one further explanation

One of the numerous anomalies of the recent cosmology are the disappearing stars (see for instance this and this) The latter popular article tells that a group of astronomers has discovered around 100 stars, which have disappeared from view in the last 70 years - and they don't know why. For instance, astronomers remain baffled by what appeared to be a trio of stars disappearing 'within 50 minutes' in 1952. The first article gives a list of explanations. The prosaic explanations are as follows:

1. Instrumentation Errors: Some of the vanishings could be due to errors or malfunctions in the astronomical instruments used to observe these stars.
2. Data Processing Errors: Errors in the processing of astronomical data could mistakenly categorize a visible star as having vanished.

There is a long list of less prosaic explanations.

1. Gravitational Lensing: The gravitational field of a massive object, like a black hole, can bend the light from a star, making it appear to vanish. This phenomenon is known as gravitational lensing. The lense effect caused by an object between the observer and star would create a ring which is too weak to be visible.
2. Transient Light Phenomena: Events like gamma-ray bursts or other short-lived luminous events might cause a star to temporarily flare up before disappearing.
3. Natural Dimming: Stars may naturally dim over time due to changes in their life cycle, although this usually doesn’t result in a complete disappearance.
4. Obstruction by Cosmic Objects: The light from a star could be blocked by interstellar objects like dust clouds or newly formed celestial bodies, causing the star to appear as if it vanished.
5. Supernova Events: One explanation for a star’s disappearance could be a supernova, an event marking the explosive death of a star. However, supernovae leave behind distinct signatures, often observable as a bright burst before the star’s remnants fade away. In cases of disappearing stars, such signatures are notably absent.
6. Black Hole Consumption: Another hypothesis is that these stars could be consumed by black holes. This would theoretically happen without the typical bursts of energy associated with such events, leading to a sudden disappearance.
7. Dyson Spheres: This is a speculative theory suggesting advanced civilizations could build massive structures around stars to harness their energy, potentially causing the stars to disappear from our view.

TGD adds one possible item to this list.

1. TGD predicts a hierarchy of effective Planck constants having arbitrarily large values. This implies quantum coherence in arbitrarily long scales. Ordinary matter, when in phases characterized by h_eff different from h, behaves like dark matter but does not correspond to the galactic dark matter. It however explains the increasing fraction of missing baryons as a transformation of ordinary baryons to their large h_eff counterparts predicted by the TGD view. In biology these dark baryons and also electrons could play a key role. In the TGD Universe galactic dark matter would consist mostly of dark energy assignable to the space-time surfaces that I call cosmic strings. They can thicken to monopole flux tubes. This process, which is analogous to inflation, transforms the dark energy to ordinary matter.
2. Zero energy ontology (ZEO) is the second key element of TGD and solves the basic paradox of the quantum measurement theory and extends it to a theory of consciousness. There are two kinds of state function reductions (SFRs).

   The sequence of "small" SFRs (SSFRs) is the TGD counterpart for the repeated measurements of the same observables and gived rise to the flow of consciousness.

   "Big" SFRs (BSFRs) are the counterpart of ordinary SFRs and involve the change of the arrow of time. In the time reversed state the classical signals sent by the system travel to non-standard direction of time so that this kind of system cannot be detected by classical means. If falling asleep corresponds to BSFR, one can understand why we do not remember anything about the period of deep sleep.

3. TGD predicts an hierarchy of values of h_eff and therefore hierarchy of quantum coherence scales. Magnetic/field bodies of physical systems like stars would carry these phases with a very large value of h_eff. They would also emit radiation which has a large value of h_eff and can be observed only if it transforms to ordinary radiation.

   Could one understand the disappearing stars in terms of BSFRs occurring in astrophysical scales at the level of the magnetic body of an astrophysical system? This would require that most of the observed classical radiation from the star arrives from the magnetic body of the system as a dark radiation. This is because for ordinary matter the period of phases with a reversed arrow of time are very short so that effectively there is no arrow of time.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Leading astronomers meet at London's Royal Society to examine the basic assumptions of the recent cosmology

The leading astronomers will have a conference at London's Royal Society to examine the basic assumptions of the recent cosmology . The conference is organized by Subir Sarkar (see this).

I am happy to hear that also leading cosmologists are aware of what is happening. In contrast to this, in my own country Finland, the local leading cosmologist appearing in the media became completely silent when JWST began to produce its findings.

The TGD view based on the new view of space-time and quantum is consistent with these findings. The following comments include the TGD based reaction on some points represented in the popular article.

The basic new elements brought by TGD to the cosmology are the new view of space-times as 4-surfaces in H=M⁴× CP₂, a generalization of quantum theory based on number theoretical view of physics complementary to the geometric view, and zero energy ontology (ZEO) solving the basic problem of quantum measurement theory and predicting that the arrow of time changes in ordinary state function reductions.

1. A number of researchers have found evidence that the universe may be expanding more quickly in some areas compared to others, raising the tantalizing possibility that megastructures could be influencing the universe's growth in significant ways.

   Comment: The basic prediction of TGD inspired cosmology is the existence of 4-D space-time surfaces that I call cosmic strings. They are unstable against thickening to monopole flux tubes, liberating huge energy transformed to ordinary matter. This would be the TGD counterpart for inflation. These objects can have length scales which are cosmological and can affect the rate of cosmic expansion.

   Number theoretic view of TGD predicts that these cosmic strings are characterized by p-adic length scale characterizing their thickness and length and also by effective Planck constant h_eff which is essentially the dimension of an algebraic extension of rationals assignable to the space-time surface that they correspond. The quantum coherence scale of the cosmic string is proportional to h_eff. The quantum coherent phases characterized by h_eff reside at the monopole flux tubes and behave like dark matter.

   Quantum coherence is possible in arbitrarily long scales and completely changes the views of what quantum gravitation is. For instance, classical gravitational fields of astrophysical objects like the Sun and Earth would play a key role in biology.

   For primordial cosmic strings h_eff is its minimal value smaller than h, but increases during cosmological evolution. The portion of ordinary matter with h_eff=h is reduced during cosmological evolution and this corresponds to the increasing portion of missing baryons. Galactic dark rather would correspond to the energy of cosmic strings consisting of magnetic and volume energy and thus dark energy plus a possible, probably small, contribution of h_eff> h phases. The model explains the flat velocity spectrum of distant stars around galaxies.

2. Sarkar and his colleagues, for instance, are suggesting that the universe is "lopsided" after studying over a million quasars, which are the active nuclei of galaxies where gas and dust are being gobbled up by a supermassive black hole.

   The team found that one hemisphere actually hosted slightly more of these quasars, suggesting one area of the night sky was more massive than the other, undermining our conception of dark energy, a hypothetical form of energy used to explain why the universe is expanding at an accelerated rate.

   Other researchers have suggested that the cosmological constant, which has been used for decades as a way to denote the rate of the universe's expansion, actually varies across space, which would contradict the standard model of physics.

   Comments:

   1. In the TGD framework quasars as active nuclei would be cosmic strings which have just started to decay to ordinary matter and to feed energy and mass to the environment. They are not blackholes, which would "eat" matter from the environment, and are blackhole-like objects in their exterior. They feed energy to their environment and this is the TGD counterpart of inflation. Whitehole might be a better metaphor.
   2. In the TGD framework the fluctuations of the value of h_eff explain density fluctuations inducing CMB temperature fluctuation. The local especially large fluctuation of h_eff could solve the problem of two Hubble constants.
   3. In the fractal cosmology associated with the many-sheeted space-time of the TGD Universe fluctuations of h_eff appear in arbitrary long scales and could also explain the lopsidedness.
   4. Vacuum energy density depends on the value of the Hubble constant, which depends on h_eff and its fluctuations would make average vacuum energy density dependent on position.
3. Stars and galaxies older than the Universe is one paradoxical discovery made already before JWST but not mentioned in the popular article. The zero energy ontology (ZEO) forces by TGD changes profoundly the view about the relationship between experienced time and the geometric time of physics. Ordinary, "big" state function reductions change the arrow of geometric time so that the system can live forth and back in geometric time. This implies that the evolutionary age of a system can be longer than its usual age. One estimate gives an age which is roughly 2 times longer and it has been indeed suggested that the age of the universe explaining the findings could be this.

See for instance https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/3pieces.pdf .

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

What singularities can correspond to vertices for fermion pair creation?

It is far from clear whether all singularities have an interpretation in terms of exotic smooth structures. The physical criterion would be that the creation of a fermion pair takes place at the defect and that the minimal surface property fails. Fermions can correspond to induced spinor fields and fermion pairs could be created at surfaces of dimension d<4.

1. For closed two-sheeted cosmic strings and monopole flux tubes, which split by reconnection, the interpretation makes sense and means a generalization of the basic vertex for closed strings. These objects can be 2-sheeted as elementary particles in which case the reconnection would occur in the direction of CP₂. If they are single sheeted, the reconnection would occur in the direction of M⁴.
2. 3-D light-like light-partonic orbits appearing as interfaces between Euclidean and Minkowskian space-time regions and as boundaries of space-time surfaces are singularities (see this). Boundary conditions state that the possible flows of conserved charges from the interior go to the partonic orbit so that the divergence of the Chern-Simons-Kähler canonical momentum current coming from instanton term equals to the sum of the normal components of the canonical currents associated with Kähler action and volume term.
   1. Chern-Simons action at the light-like partonic orbit coming from the instanton term is well-defined and finite and field equations should not give rise to a singularity except at partonic 2-surfaces, which have been identified as analogs of vertices at which the partonic 2-surface X² splits to two.
   2. At the light-like partonic orbit 4-metric has a vanishing determinant and is therefore effectively 2-D (the light-like components of g_uv=g_vu of the 4-metric vanish). As a consequence, g₄^1/2 vanishes like L² at the partonic orbit unless some coordinate gradients diverge.

      The canonical momentum currents for the volume action are proportional to the contravariant induced metric appearing in the trace of the second fundamental form diverging like 1/L² and to g₄^1/2 so that they remain finite.

   3. Kähler action contains the contravariant metric twice and is proportional to g₄^1/2. This can give rise to a divergence of type 1/L² unless the boundary conditions make it finite. I have proposed long ago that the electric-magnetic self-duality at the partonic orbit can transform the Kähler action to an instanton term giving Chern-Simons Kähler term. In this case, a separate instanton term would not be needed. In this case everything would be finite at the partonic orbit. Minimal surface property fails in a smooth manner.

      The intuitive picture is that the contributions from the normal currents at the partonic orbit and the Chern-Simons term cancel each other and the partonic orbit cannot play a role of a vertex.

   4. The possible presence of 1/L² divergence could however give rise to a 2-D defect and genuine vertex. If it is identified as a creation of a pair of partonic 2-surfaces, the interpretation in terms of a creation of a fermion pair is possible and could be assigned to the splitting of a monopole flux tube.

      In accordance with the QFT picture, I have considered the possibility that the 2-D vertex could correspond to a branching of a partonic orbit. In the recent picture it would be accompanied by a creation of a fermion pair. The stringy view however suggests that pair creation occurs in the creation of partonic orbits in the splitting of monopole flux tubes. The stringy view is more attractive.

3. I have also proposed that 1-D singularities identifiable as boundaries of string world sheets and identifiable as fermion lines at the partonic orbits are important. The creation of a pair of fermion lines would give rise to the analogs of gauge theory vertices as 0-D singularities. It is however far from clear whether the stringy singularities are actually present and whether they could correspond to exotic smooth structures. One can imagine two options.
   1. There are no string world sheets. Monopole flux tubes can be regarded as deformations of cosmic strings. Instead of strings several monopole flux tubes can emerge from a wormhole contact. For the minimal option, monopole flux tubes, CP₂ type extremals, and massless extremals as counterparts of radiation fields are the basic extremals and the splitting of monopole flux tubes gives rise to vertices as defects of the ordinary smooth structure.
   2. String world sheets appear as singularities of the monopole flux tubes or even more general 4-surfaces and are analogous to wormhole contacts as blow-ups in which a point of X⁴ explodes to CP₂ type extremal. I have indeed proposed that a blow-up at which the points of the string world sheet as surface X²⊂ X⁴ are replaced with a homologically non-trivial 2-surface Y²⊂ CP₂ takes place. Y² could connect two parallel space-time sheets. Could these singularities correspond to defects of exotic smooth structures such that the ends of the string carry fermion number? The vertex for the creation of a pair of fermion and antifermion lines would correspond to a diffeo defect. Note that also these defects could reduce to a splitting of a monopole flux tube so that TGD would generalize the stringy picture.

See the article What gravitons are and could one detect them in TGD Universe? or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

Singularities and infinities from the TGD point of view

Gary Ehlenberg sent two links to Quantamagazine articles, which are very relevant (perhaps not by accident!) for what I have been working with recently.

The first link was to a very interesting article about the the role of singularities in physics. Already in twistor Grassmann approach, singularities of the scattering amplitudes turned out to be central as data determining them. Kind of holography was in question.

I have been just working with singularities of space-time surface and have made a breakthrough in the understanding of what graviton is but also in the understanding of what the fundamental vertices (actually vertex!) of the scattering amplitudes are in the TGD framework.

In holography=generalized holomorphy view space-time surfaces are minimal surfaces with generalized holomorphic imbedding to H=M⁴×CP₂ implying the minimal surface property.

1. The minimal surface property fails at lower-dimensional singularities taking the role of holographic data and the trace of the second fundamental form (SFF) analogous to a acceleration associated with the 4-D Bohr orbit of the particle as 3-surface has a delta function like singularity but vanishes elsewhere.
2. The minimal surface property expressess masslessness for both fields and particles as 3-surfaces. At the singularities masslessness property fails and singularities can be said to serve as sources which in QFTs define scattering amplitudes.
3. The singularities are analogs of poles and cuts for the 4-D generalization of the ordinary holomorphic functions. Also for the ordinary holomorphic functions the Laplace equation as analog massless field equation and expressing analyticity fails. Complex analysis generalizes to dimension 4.
4. The conditions at the singularity give a generalization of Newton's F=ma! I ended up where I started more than 50 years ago!
5. In dimension 4, and only there, there is an infinite number of exotics diff structures, which differ from ordinary ones at singularities of measure zero analogous to defects. These defects correspond naturally to the singularities. For the exotic diff structure one can say that there is no singularity. This means that complex analysis generalizes to dimension 4 and only to dimension 4.
6. Group theoretically the trace of the SFF can be regarded as a generalization of the Higgs field, which is non-vanishing only at the vertices and this is enough. Singularities take the role of generalized particle vertices and determine the scattering amplitudes. The second fundamental form contracted with the embedding space gamma matrices and slashed between the second quantized induced spinor field and its conjugate gives the universal vertex involving only fermions (bosons are bound states of fermions in TGD). It contains both gauge and gravitational contributions to the scattering amplitudes and there is a complete symmetry between gravitational and gauge interactions. Gravitational couplings come out correctly as the radius squared of CP₂ as also in the classical picture.

This generalized Higgs field characterizing singularities would dictate all scattering amplitudes! Generalized Higgs would be really the God particle! Its CP₂ part gives standard model interactions and M⁴ part gives gravitation.

Gary Ehlenberg sent another link to a Quantamagazine article (see this), which is very relevant to what I have been working on recently. I am not going to comment on the so called alien calculus discussed in the article as a proposal to get rid of the infinities of quantum field theories. Rather, I will explain how this problem is solved in the TGD framework (see https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/whatgravitons.pdf).

The problem of infinities is due to the assumption that the point-like nature of fundamental objects. In superstring models this problem was at least partially solved but superstrings were not the option chosen by Nature.

1. The basic discovery of TGD is that the generalization of complex structure is possible in dimension 4 of the space-time and corresponds to the existence of exotic diff structures (see https://tgdtheory.fi/public_html/articles/intsectform.pdf). Nature wants all that it can get and has chosen the option with the maximal structural richness.
2. In TGD particles become 3-D surfaces whose 4-D orbits are analogs of Bohr orbits with a finite non-determinism at which the minimal surface property fails. The mathematically ill-defined path integral reduces to a finite sum and only the well-defined functional integral over 3-surfaces remains. Divergences disappear completely.
3. Scattering amplitudes reduce to sums over contributions from the lower-D singularities of the minimal surfaces. Singularities are analogous to the poles of holomorphic functions in holography=holomorphy vision and generalized holomorphic maps define an infinite-D symmetry group analogous to holomorphic maps in string models.
4. The trace of the second fundamental form slashed between the induced free spinor fields of M^{42 gives the universal vertex and contains contributions of all basic interactions including gravitation. Induced spinor fields are second quantized spinor fields of H=M4×CP₂ and correlation functions for these free spinor fields determine the scattering amplitudes.}

See the article What gravitons are and could one detect them in TGD Universe? or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.

The symmetry between gravitational and gauge interactions

The beauty of the proposal is that implies a complete symmetry between gravitational and gauge interactions.

1. Weak interactions and gravitation couple to weak isospin and spin respectively. Color interactions couple to the isometry charges of CP₂ and gravitational interactions coupling to the isometry charges of M⁴. The extreme weakness of the gravitation can be understood as the presence of the CP₂ contribution to the induced metric in the gravitational vertices.

Does color confinement have any counterpart at the level of M⁴? The idea that physical states have vanishing four-momenta does not look attractive.

1. In ZEO, the finite-D space of causal diamonds (CDs) forms (see this) the backbone of WCW and Poincare invariance and Poincare quantum numbers can be assigned with wave functions in this space. For CD, the infinite-D unitary representations of SO(1,3) satisfying appropriate boundary conditions are a highly attractive identification for the counterparts of finite-D unitary representations associated with gauge multiplets. The basic objection against gravitation as SO(1,3) gauge theory would fail.

   One could replace the spinor fields of H with spinor fields restricted to CD with spinor fields for which M⁴ parts sinor nodes as plane waves are replaced with spinor modes in CD labelled by spin and its hyperbolic counterpart assignable to Lorentz boosts with respect to either tip of CD. One could also express these modes as superpositions of the plane wave modes defined in the entire H.

   The analog of color confinement would hold true for particles as unitary representations of SO(1,3) in CD. One could say that SO(1,3) appears as an internal isometry group of an observer's perceptive field represented by CD and Poincare group as an external symmetry group treating the observer as a physical object.

2. By separation of variables the spinor harmonics in CD factorize phases depending on the mass of the particle determined by CP₂ and spinor harmonic of hyperbolic 3-space H³=SO(1,3)/SO(3). SO(1,3) allows an extremely rich set of representations in the hyperbolic space H³ analogous to spherical harmonics. A given infinite discrete subgroup Γ⊂ SO(1,3) defines a fundamental domain of Γ as a double coset space Γ\SO(1,3)/SO(3). This fundamental domain is analogous to a lattice cell of condensed matter lattice defined by periodic boundary conditions. The graphics of Escher give an idea about these structures in the case of H². The products of wave functions defined in Γ⊂ SO(1,3) and of wave functions in Γ define a wave function basis analogous to the space states in condensed matter lattice.
3. TGD allows gravitational quantum coherence in arbitrarily long scales and I have proposed that the tessellations of H³ define the analogs of condensed matter lattices at the level of cosmology and astrophysics (see this). The unitary representations of SO(1,3) would be central for quantum gravitation at the level of gravitationally dark matter. They would closely relate to the unitary representations of the supersymplectic group of δ M⁴₊× CP₂ in M⁴ degrees of freedom and define their continuations to the entire CD.
4. There exists a completely unique tessellation known as icosa tetrahedral tessellation consisting of icosahedrons, tetrahedrons, and octahedrons glued along boundaries together. I have proposed that it gives rise to a universal realization of the genetic code of which biochemical realizations is only a particular example (see this and this). Also this supports a deep connection between biology and quantum gravitation emerging also in classical TGD (see this and this). Also electromagnetic long range classical fields are predicted to be involved with long length scale quantum coherence (see this).

The challenge is to understand the implications of this picture for M⁸-H duality (see this). The discretization of M⁸ identified as octonions O with the Minkowskian norm defined by Re(Im(o²)) is linear M⁸ coordinates natural for octonions. The discretization obtained by the requirement that the coordinates of the points of M⁸ (momenta) are algebraic integers in an algebraic extension of rationals would make sense also in p-adic number fields.

In the Robertson-Walker coordinates for the future light-cone M⁴₊ sliced by H³:s the coordinates define by mass (light-cone proper time in H), hyperbolic angle and spherical angles, the discretizations defined by the spaces Γ\SO(1,3)/SO(3) would define a discretization and one can define an infinite hierarchy of discretizations defined by the discrete subgroups of SO(1,3) with matrix elements belonging to an extension of rationals. This number theoretically universal discretization defines a natural alternative for the linear discretization. Maybe the linear resp. non-linear discretization could be assigned to the moduli space of CDs resp. CD.

See the article What gravitons are and could one detect them in TGD Universe? or the chapter with the same title.

For a summary of earlier postings see Latest progress in TGD.

For the lists of articles (most of them published in journals founded by Huping Hu) and books about TGD see this.