Consciousness, Physics, and the Holographic Paradigm
Original Essays and Shadowless Poetry by Alan T. Williams
All matter is immersed in it and it penetrates everywhere. No doors are closed to ether.
- Albert Einstein, The Evolution of Physics
Chapter 3
Section 5: Beyond Matter/Mass and Einsteinian Heuristics:
From Old to New Physics, Part 4
Western science traditionally begins in ancient Greece more than 2,500 years ago through the rational Nature philosophy of Thales of Miletus and his slightly younger kinsman, protégé, and successor, Anaximander. The search for the unknown first principle (archē ; Greek: άρχή) of the natural world attracted many pre-Socratic thinkers. Socrates, a philosopher and citizen of Athens, independently turned his attention to the human condition by challenging the thinking of students and citizens through his unique Socratic method. Martyred by the Thirty Tyrants, he left no known writings.
Plato, a student of Socrates and the learned teacher of Aristotle, was born eight decades after Anaximander died. Deeply influenced by Socrates, Plato immersed himself in dialectic, politics, and the writing of philosophical dialogues after the death of his revered martyred mentor. Plato introduced the doctrine of transcendent Forms in his philosophical writings "as an alternative to Ionian natural philosophy", 29 thereby essentially replacing the nature philosophy of the presocratic physicists with the moral philosophy of Socrates.
Going his own way after Plato died at age 80, Aristotle developed a celestial cosmogony based on four pre-existing Greek material elements immersed in aether and set in motion by an unmoved mover as the demonstrable logical conclusion of his novel syllogistic reasoning. Thus, two centuries after Thales and Anaximander demythologized physical theory and practice, Aristotle's metaphysics reinstated an unproved and unprovable form of pre-scientific Greek mythology.
Aristotle's major contribution to physics and philosophy is his novel system of syllogistic logic or reasoning. Based on the carefully chosen premises he deduced from the teachings of Plato and other pertinent predecessors, Aristotle's logic is formidable. Scholar W. K. C. Guthrie writes that on its own merit Aristotle's logic resisted every challenge for more than two millennia:
[Aristotle] worked out a logical system which served the world until the nineteenth century. In the eighteenth Kant could still write: 'It is remarkable that to the present day this logic has not been able to advance a single step, and is thus to all appearance a closed and completed body of doctrine.' So too in more recent times C. Lejewski in the Enclyclopedia of Philosophy IV, 517, in the course of a brief assessment of Aristotle's logical achievement: 'Until the emergence of symbolic logic (that is, for more than two thousand years) Aristotle's authority on matters of Logic remained unchallenged, and his logic was regarded as a comprehensive system which admitted of no extension.' 30
Nonetheless, Aristotle follows Plato by postulating that the fundamental principle (άρχή) of physics can be found in the end results of being and existence in contrast to the antecedent origin or source άρχή posited by the Milesian (Ionian) founders of science. In his treatise, Posterior Analytics, Aristotle acknowledges that basing physical reality on end results may lead to an infinite regress yet offers only equivocation and obscuration rather than directly confronting the problem.
Plato formulated the inverted aspirational end result hypothesis to explain the method and moral philosophy (ethics) taught by Socrates. Plato then extended the end result aspiration hypothesis to the physics described in the corpus of Platonism. Professor F. M. Cornford succinctly captures Aristotle's continued use of the aspiration hypothesis:
[Aristotle's] thought, no less than Plato's, is governed by the idea of aspiration, inherited by his master from Socrates – the idea that the true cause or explanation of things is to be sought, not in the beginning, but in the end. Aristotelian philosophy remains a philosophy of final causes. 31
Seeking aspirational end results in moral philosophy or the human condition as postulated by Socrates, Plato, and their successors, implies the continual application of an appropriate form of reductionism. Seeking the fundamental founding principle (άρχή) of physics, as postulated by the Milesian (Ionian) founders, implies the persistent application of an appropriate form of holism.
The historical consequence of inappropriately applying the aspiration hypothesis to the end results of physics is that it turns physics upside-down. Even so, logic is indispensable in the theory and practice of physics. Moreover, logic and physics are two entirely separate subjects. Happily, logical premises and the hypotheses of physics are open to falsification.
20th versus 21st century physics:
Interpreting the precise meaning of the extant ancient Greek writings and thus unaware of, or innocently overlooking the importance of, Plato's and Aristotle's inversion of their end result physics in contrast to the Milesian fundamental principle (άρχή) of physics, yet fully aware of additional imminent shifts in 20th century physics paradigms, Guthrie wrote in 1962:
The discoveries about the nature of matter (if that term may still be used), the size and character of the Universe, and the human psyche which scientists have been making during the last hundred years are indeed so revolutionary that they may result in a radical reshaping of our fundamental outlook. Apart, however, from the fact that they are still in such a state of rapid transition that it is difficult to see what this new framework of thought will be, the conservatism of ordinary human minds ensures that much in the older outlook will continue to colour our general presuppositions for a long time to come. 32
The first 20th century paradigm shift in fundamental physics, i.e., special and general relativity, represents the culmination of 19th century physics. The second fundamental paradigm shift is the development of quantum mechanics.
The catalyst of Guthrie's anticipated third fundamental 20th century paradigm shift in physics arrived unexpectedly in 1964 with the discovery of the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR). In 1965 the presence of the CMBR was seen as relic energy 33 of the hypothetical Big Bang cosmology. Forty years later, as the one-year data results of the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) were released on 11 February 2003, the breadth and depth of the perplexing new 21st century physics were only just beginning to be understood.
The term "background radiation" may need clarification. Cosmic microwave radiation is an omnipresent, pervasive low-level electromagnetic radiation (EMR). Our complex material universe seems to have more than one natural physical source that continuously produces cosmic microwave radiation (CMR) – not the least of which is the thermal radiation produced by multiple billions of Active Galactic Nuclei (AGN) like M51, for example, multiple trillions of suns, and innumerable enigmatic relativistic jets.
Contemporary astronomy suggests by analogy with the illusional cumulative density of consecutive material object layers as the distance penetrated by deep space observations increases, that the illusional cumulative density of the omnipresent CMBR measured from Earth in any given direction produces the visual impression of viewing a finite background phenomenon rather than an omnipresent, pervasive electromagnetic medium.
The unexpected results of WMAP significantly challenge the traditional classical and quantum physics of matter/mass and bolster the novel physics of the continuum of nonmaterial primordial energy in physical reality just-as-it-is.
Clearly, given the WMAP results, moving beyond traditional classical mechanics, quantum mechanics, and Aristotle's pre-existing primordial matter premise is necessary in order to facilitate embracing the unexpected new discoveries within fundamental physics. Furthermore, the WMAP results demonstrate that neither general relativity nor quantum mechanics, either separately or in combination, adequately describe comprehensive nonmaterial/material physical reality just-as-it-is.
Hence replacing Aristotle's pre-existing matter logical premise with the novel 21st century nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) logical premise implied by the universal principle of energy (TUPE, pronounced "toop") which, in turn, suggests the novel 2-time, 8-dimensional physics of The Energetic Holographic Paradigm (TEHP, pronounced "teep") can be seen as an appropriate logical alternative that leads to new physics.
As noted in the previous essay, the novel combined physics of TUPE and TEHP clearly differentiates between the 4.3% baryonic matter/energy, the 23.3% non-baryonic virtual matter/energy, i.e., dark matter and dark matter halos, and the 72.1% reported in the seven-year WMAP data release labeled as non-particle dark energy matter/energy equivalence. Moreover, the WMAP 72.1% non-particle dark energy matter/energy equivalence can be seen as the physically real fundamental, irreducible, nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED) implied by TUPE.
Unique WMAP results suggest radical changes are necessary in contemporary cosmogony and cosmology models. Changes that go well beyond traditional classical and quantum mechanical limitations. On the other hand, 20th century physics perpetuates Aristotle's pre-existing matter argument by defining the currently presumed universal conservation of energy – which is rooted in mid-19th century thermodynamics – as the conservation of mechanical energy in a discrete, theoretically closed or isolated material system.
Rigorous experimental evidence and testing of alternative logical premises to Aristotle's historical pre-existing fundamental, irreducible material ground of Being seems to be either inadequate, insufficient, or missing. Rigorous experimental evidence and testing for the existence of open mechanical or nonmechanical physical systems as alternatives to de facto closed or isolated (mechanically conservative) material systems also seems to be inadequate, insufficient, or missing.
At the present stage of scientific advancement and investigation in contemporary physics, the de facto Einsteinian absolute reference frame, i.e., the closed or isolated (mechanically conservative) material system itself, can be seen as part of the problem rather than part of the solution. In the absence of definitive experimental testing, habitual unexamined use of the de facto closed or isolated (mechanically conservative) material system demonstrably limits or truncates the prospective scope of novel new physics.
Thus Aristotle's pre-existing fundamental, irreducible matter argument and the presently presumed universality of the conservation of mechanical energy in a de facto absolute closed or isolated material system are crucially vulnerable to critique and falsification in the 21st century.
A material version of the NED which is intentionally deprecated in Aristotle's logical system was conceived in the 6th century BCE as the boundless, limitless material apeiron (Greek: τό άπειρον) by Anaximander, the successor of Thales. 34 Both Anaximander and Aristotle believed in the ancient Greek primacy of material substance. Neither Anaximander nor Aristotle imagined that the fundamental, irreducible substance or essential element each of them sought would be revealed more than two thousand years later as physically real omnipresent, pervasive, nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE).
In the English translation of his prizewinning book, The First Scientist: Anaximander and His Legacy, physicist Carlo Rovelli writes:
[Anaximander] was the first thinker able to conceive and put into practice what is now the fundamental methodological credo of modern scientists: make a thorough study of the masters, come to understand their intellectual achievements, and make these achievements their own. Then, on the basis of the knowledge so acquired, identify the errors in the masters' thinking, correct them, and in so doing improve our understanding of the world. 35
Acknowledging Anaximander's ancient priority for the concept of the boundless, unlimited apeiron despite the vast differences between the physics of the material domain and the yet to be elaborated novel physics of the all-encompassing nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED), the Greek word "apeiron" and the acronym "NED" shall henceforth be treated as synonyms.
Quiet creation and the novel 2-time, 8D holographic paradigm:
Following Aristotle, Newton, Einstein, Bohr and Born, among others, classical physics and quantum mechanics historically postulate that matter/mass is the fundamental omnipresent, irreducible ground of material Being. Under this premise, the conservation of energy or, more precisely, the traditional conservation of mechanical energy in an exclusive, theoretically closed or isolated (mechanically conservative) material system is derived from the motion of conserved matter/mass.
Nonetheless, as we shall see, the advanced space technology of contemporary astronomy commonly observes both the creation and destruction of matter/mass in our compound open, mechanically nonconservative, nonmaterial/material holographic universe.
Interestingly, in contrast to the inherent causality and a posteriori mechanical limitations of the material cosmological argument developed from the time of Aristotle to the present day, the combined novel physics of the universal principle of energy (TUPE) and The Energetic Holographic Paradigm (TEHP), respectively, provide a new logical premise and a novel a priori 2-time, 8-dimensional ( 8D = 6 + 2 ; i.e., 6 + (t1 + t2 ; where t2 = 1 / t1 )) holographic model of cosmogony.
The novel premise of 21st century physics, i.e., the recently discovered universal principle of nonmaterial primordial energy (TUPE), succinctly states:
Fundamental, irreducible primordial energy exists in the absence of matter,
but matter is entirely dependent upon nonmaterial primordial energy
and cannot exist in the absence of primordial energy.
|
|
TUPE clearly implies that nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) precedes the creation of material matter/mass. Thus the new logical premise of the nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED; nonmaterial apeiron) produces a novel 21st century cosmological argument. Moreover, the new a priori nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) physics within the NED (nonmaterial apeiron) reveals a previously undiscovered continuum of omnipresent, pervasive fundamental, irreducible nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE).
The unique all-encompassing, previously undiscovered continuum of conditionally relative nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) that lies beyond and subsumes the familiar electromagnetic spectrum within the nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED; nonmaterial apeiron) can be seen as the First fundamental force (FFF) of nonmaterial/material physical reality just-as-it-is.
A simplified cosmological argument describing the new nonmaterial, First fundamental force (FFF) logic:
- Matter/mass and the material universe exist.
- Matter/mass and the material universe are created by and within something antecedent.
- The antecedent primordial cause and the primordial source of matter/mass and the material universe are nonmaterial.
- The antecedent nonmaterial primordial cause produces an initial extradimensional nonmaterial chain of transcendent creative events within the antecedent nonmaterial primordial source.
- The initial extradimensional nonmaterial chain of transcendent creative events within the antecedent nonmaterial primordial source produces the derivative reciprocally emergent, omnipresent nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED, apeiron) within which the conditionally relative matter/mass of our compound open, mechanically nonconservative nonmaterial/material holonomic universe is created, sustained, and maintained.
- Each all-inclusive, conditionally relative present moment of our derivative, compound open (mechanically nonconservative) nonmaterial/material holonomic system is comprised of at least six extended dimensions and two synchronistic time dimensions ( 6 + 2 ; i.e., 6 + (t1 + t2 ; where t2 = 1 / t1 )).
- According to the combined novel physics of TUPE and TEHP, the entire process can be described by the new 21st century NPE physics.
New directions:
Not surprisingly, the scope of the traditional physics paradigm changed more significantly during the 20th century than it had at any other time since Isaac Newton's 1686 manuscript, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, was published in 1687. Fundamental physics and observational science moved forward at a brisk pace. The last half of the 20th century, documented in Richard Panek's book, The 4 Percent Universe, 36 provided empirical data acquired by contemporary astronomy and astrophysics teams. Special purpose spacecraft like WMAP and space observatories like Planck are indispensable 21st century scientific tools.
The mature 7-year WMAP data results are startling. Less than 5% of the 7-year results fit the Big Bang hypothesis of cosmology based on Einstein's 1917 static material universe extensively modified by Georges Lemaître's gravitational singularity among others. Nonetheless, after more than two thousand years, the physics of the Aristotle-Newton-Einstein matter/mass paradigm describe only the ~4.8% of the Universe humankind sees, hears, touches, tastes and smells. Approximately 22.5% of the WMAP matter/energy equivalence total is unexplained dark matter and ~72.5% is undetected dark energy.
Thus the WMAP data results demonstrate at every turn that the Universe is extremely complex and it implicitly reflects a reality quite different than the assumed material reality suggested by four hundred years of mechanically conservative Newtonian physics augmented by 20th century quantum mechanics and Einstein's geometrical spacetime heuristic. Hence the problem is not "saving appearances", the problem is that after intensive investigation for centuries and millennia the fundamentals of our matter/mass universe are still poorly understood.
Moreover, contemporary physics essentially ignores the larger part of physical reality just-as-it-is, i.e., the physics of mechanical matter/mass presently ignores the transcendent nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) side of the creation equation.
In science it is well known that nothing comes from nothing (Latin: ex nihilo nihil fit). Even so, contemporary physics seems to be historically fixated on mechanical matter/mass while totally ignoring the creative initial conditions and nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) contributions of the omnipresent transcendent nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED, apeiron).
The fundamental information that reveals NPE and the NED has been available – but overlooked – since J. J. Thomson discovered the electron, the carrier of monopolar negative (q-) electric charge in 1897. The positron is the carrier of monopolar positive (q+) electric charge. When an electron and positron meet, they annihilate each other and create a gamma ray photon.
Whether negative or positive, the fundamental electric monopole (quantum) of charge carried by the matter/mass of the electron or positron seems to serve as the sine qua non, the indispensable link between the omnipresent irreducible, nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED, apeiron) and the material domain of matter/mass that humankind sees, feels, touches, tastes, and smells.
With the exception of gravitation which seems to be unrestricted, observational astronomy and astrophysics imply that dark matter is either hidden from the material domain or electrically neutral and essentially undetectable by contemporary methods. Interestingly, the gravity of Newton and the gravitation of Einstein are key to understanding not only dark matter, but also dark energy and the 2-time, 8-D physics of the transcendent nonmaterial primordial energy domain (NED, apeiron).
The novel 21st century physics of TUPE and TEHP postulate that the NED (apeiron) is the all-encompassing transcendent source of dark energy, dark matter, and the nonmaterial initial conditions of ordinary matter/mass in the material domain. The initial conditions on the transcendent nonmaterial level of existence produce the nonmaterial primordial energy (NPE) transition zone (TZ) within the NED (apeiron). Phase changes within the NPE transition zone (TZ) create precursor matter/mass.
Compared to the overt ordinary matter of the material domain, the contents of the transcendent transition zone (TZ) are covert or hidden. Hence as demonstrated by contemporary observational methods, prior to emerging from the TZ and thereby populating the material domain, the precursor matter/mass contents of the TZ are EMR dark or silent and detectable in the material domain only by their gravitational effects.
A previous essay in this series documents a somewhat similar virtual effect in the material domain. The pivotal discovery by the 1996 TOPAZ Collaboration group experimentally determined that the effective increase of the running αQED coupling constant is the result of a decreased electric charge screening phenomenon caused by virtual electron–positron pairs. That screening phenomenon is now known as vacuum polarization.
In the previous iteration of this paper certain questions concerning the speed of muon neutrinos were raised. Two informative Wikipedia papers have been written on the subject by experts involved: Measurements of neutrino speed and Faster-than-light neutrino anomaly (OPERA experiment).
Summary:
This essay asserts that Plato incorrectly applied to the physics of the real world the aspirational end result or final cause hypothesis he developed to explain the method and moral philosophy taught by his mentor, Socrates, in order to explicitly oppose the first principle (archê ; άρχή), origin, or source of physical reality postulated by Milesian (Ionian) nature philosophy or natural science that Socrates eschewed.
The incorrect application of the final cause hypothesis by Plato which was essentially unquestioned by Aristotle required the replacement of Aristotle's fundamental logical premise.
The extent of dark matter(~23.3%) and dark energy (~72.1%) in the early 21st century WMAP data release results were wholly unexpected. Moreover, they are harbingers of the inevitable new physics to come. Indeed, the volume of dark matter implies that significant limitations exist in the 20th century de facto closed or isolated, mechanically conservative material system, and the volume of dark energy implies that significant limitations exist in contemporary physical cosmology.
Reference Notes (Click on the Note number to return to the text) :
29 Kahn, Charles H. Plato and the Socratic Dialogue; Cambridge University Press, 1996, p. 357. ISBN 0-521-64830-0 (paperback)
30 Guthrie, W. K. C. Aristotle: an encounter; Volume 6, A History of Greek Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, 1981, p. 97. ISBN 0 521 38760 4 (paperback)
31 Cornford, Francis MacDonald. Before and After Socrates; Cambridge University Press, 1932, p. 90. ISBN 978-0-521-09113-8 (paperback)
32 Guthrie, W. K. C. The earlier Presocratics and the Pythagoreans; Volume 1, A History of Greek Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, 1962, p. 1. ISBN 0 521 29420 7 (paperback)
33 Panek, Richard. The 4 Percent Universe; Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, New York, New York, 2011, p. 20ff. ISBN 978-0-618-98244-8 (hardcover)
34 Kahn, Charles H. Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology; Columbia University Press, 1960. Corrected printing 1985, reprinted 1994. ISBN 13: 978-0-87220-255-9; ISBN 10: 0-87220-255-0 (paperback)
35 Rovelli, Carlo. The First Scientist: Anaximander and His Legacy; Westholme Publishing, Yardley, PA, 2011, p. 79. ISBN 978-1-59416-131-5 (hardcover)
36 Ref. 33, passim.
Index: Consciousness, Physics, and the Holographic Paradigm
Last Edit: 6 May 2012
Comments and suggestions welcome.
This paper is a work in progress.
Please check for the latest update before quoting in other venues the concepts and hypotheses presented here.
Thank you.
eMail
Copyright © 2009-2012 by Alan T. Williams. All rights reserved.
|
