Millka

Communication Section

Latest comment: 18 years ago7 comments5 people in discussion

Welcome!

Hello, Millka, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 08:30, 15 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sehr cooler rant zur Heim theory. ;-) Willkommen! Denial 10:11, 17 March 2006 (UTC)Reply

Response to User:Friendly_Neighbour

Hi, Friendly_Neighbour,

Thx for the explaination. I think there a three levels: a) the truth - whats really going on in reality and why; b) a formula = a more or less useful mathematical description of reality, which allows to calculate everything we've experienced so far; c) our interpretation what that formula means. I agree to Popper, we can only falsify theories by experiment. Every now and then theres a new experiment or phenomenon, which shows the limits in our current theories, so we refine them and get closer and closer to the ultimate truth. However, we will never know if we have reached the ultimate truth (unless some graceful burning bush congratulates us: "youve got it, dude" - but i dont believe in burning plants talking ..). Even when we can calculate and explain everything in the universe weve seen so far, tomorrow or some milleniums later, someone might stumble over some new phenomenon which cant be explained, and we have to refine our theories again. I cant say that this bothers me very much. As a (software) engineer, i'm pragmatic - as long as we can explain and calculate everything known, im OK with it.

Back in ancient Egypt, the priests/scientists thought that the 'moon boat' hunts the 'sun boat' - today we know that this is complete nonsense, but back then they had a formula to calculate the movement of these 'boats', derived a calendar from it, which was slightly wrong (fixed year size of 364 days), but precise enough to avoid getting drowned by the river nile rising in spring. Later came Kopernikus, Kepler and Newton, and about 100 years ago, when most physicists thought they understand everything, Einstein and Planck ripped the whole thing apart. Which brings me back to Heim Theory. Today we have GR and QM, both proved till it hurts, but still contradicting each other in certain important areas. GR and QM cant be wrong (too much tested), but cant be completly right either (because they contradict). As long as that problem isnt solved, every theory/hypothesis/cloudy idea that might help should be investigated to decide whether it contains one or two puzzle pieces of the solution.

Sure, there could be a gazillion mass formulae, but neither the Standard Model, nor Loop Quantum Gravity, nor String/Brane Theory, nor any other theory offers a mass formula. I've studied the various implemenations of HT's mass formula. Cant say i understand every step, but being a programmer im pretty sure its more than just multidimensional curve fitting or a clevely obfuscated table. So until someone smart comes along with a better formula, why not use HT's mass formula ? At least we should understand how it works. Afterwards we can judge whether its crackpot or not. If some physicst claims that he doesnt understand HT's math, and then tells me its crackpot, im not convinced. If it calculates/postdicts all masses with five digits after the decimal point, thats enough for most applications, just like Newtons physics is enough to program an automatic brake system for a car. Only a few applications need GR, e.g. a GPS or planning a Nasa mission and stuff like that. Sure, a theoretical physicists should want more than an engineer. Considering the current vast amount of 1 proposed mass formula available, i would try to understand and fix it. If i get it right to 9 or 12 digits, i might win a trip to Stockholm .. Ignoring HT looks to me a little bit like sticking to Ptolemeus flat earth with the sun circling around, dismissing Kopernikus, Kepler and Newton because they cant explain mercurys perihelion movement.

But back to the topic - pre- vs. postdiction. Lacking predictions makes it harder for us to decide whether HT brings us a few millimeters closer to truth or not, but that doesnt change how correct or wrong HT is. Its a pity if HT doesnt predict anything new, but as long as it the only theory that allows to calculate particle masses, it should be understood, compared to other theories and used as a starting point for further research. And if its crackpot, some physicist should be so nice to write a short or even long paper showing why to the dumb and starving masses like me. After all, if it scrackpot, there should be some contradictions to experiment ? HT is pretty old stuff, 30 years and more. I've googled my b?tt off in the last three months to find some physicist with reputation ripping it apart, but didnt found anything. I hope i made it clear that i dont prefer HT over LQG, ST or BT (i think they are all approaching the same target from different directions), but i dont understand whats so much worse about HT, that it doesnt deserve to be investigated .. Thanks for listening to my blabbering .. ;-P MillKa 00:38, 5 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

It's worse than that. Not only there are no easily confirmed predictions of HT (M-theory has the same problem), the only new predictions of HT seems dubious at best. Gravity speed greater than c? Neutral electrons? C'mon, do you believe any of this is real? (1)

To add to HT problems, there is no Heim Theory. It's rather a family of theories. Walter Dröscher extended the work of Heim creating new variants and myltiplying the dimensions - as far as I understand it - to better fit the already known data. How can you falisify an ever changing theory? Popper deemed such theories non-scientific (his original target was Marxism which - according to him - always modified its predictions to somehow fit reality in response to criticism). (2)

The famous particle mass predictions are - again, as far as I understand - a product of this tweaking, plus manipulating the gravity constant value to make the predictions even better. It's true that the G value we use has a great margin of error. However choosing a value inside the probable range of possible G values to fit a theory does not prove the theory in any way. (3)

I agree that even with the above problems, that results are interesting and show that Heim (or Droesher?) might have hit the right mathematics, even basing on wrong physical model. The problem is that having the right particle masses does not make the theory of everything. I'm not sure what HT added to the theory of fundamental forces, except for the yet unproved two additional ones? When I read claim that Heim explained why quarks cannot be "naked", I know that the authors have not heard about the results of modern field theory. (4)

Which leads me to the most fundamental problem which bothers me a lot. Why are the field theory researchers not interested in HT? Let's not talk conspiracy because it's plainly stupid for anyone who has actually seen how the scioentific community works. The prize for achieving a breakthrough is too big to make a "cartel of old thinking" posible in the long run. And we are talking about several decades of neglect. The thing which bothers me is that there are not even negative remarks by great names in the field. Just silence. Is HT this obviously wrong? Frankly, I don't know. My degree is in physics but I've never worked in particle physics or field theory. (5)

Sorry form the (more or less) randam ramblings about HT. Somehow, unless (until?) some experimental data will confirm its predictions, I will file it between the crackpot theories, but still remember that some of its mathematics may be right even if derived from dubious physical presumptions. (6) Friendly Neighbour 07:38, 5 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

I added numbers to refer to the paragraphs.

(1) Nope. However, ive read the 4/3 c gravity speed issue has been identified as an error and has been corrected without turning over anything in HT. If gravity needs particles (gravitons) its speed is c. If its true that gravity is nothing but warped space(time), its speed is either c again or maybe it doesnt need speed at all. Maybe we should nuke the sun and 8 minutes later we will know - or maybe better not .. ;-P

About the neutral electron, look here: Talk:Heim_theory#Neutral_electron

(2) Yep. What HT needs the most, is a clear separation of HT6 / HT8 / HT12 and the various consequences. What ive read from Heim sounds better than what Dröscher and Hauser have published. On the other hand, history teaches us to be careful and think twice about strange ideas of patent officers from the alps .. ;-P

I wouldnt bet the farm on the hyperdrive stuff. Even if that graviphoton force really exists (ive read rumours about Dröscher and Hauser working on a paper about that recent ESA experiment and its relation to HT), it might still be unusable for propulsion purposes. E.g. maybe the suggested entering of parallel dimensions is as healthy as flying through "wormholes" or into black holes. Maybe whatever you put in here comes out as a bunch of particles on the other side. However i cant exclude, that graviphoton force might become interesting when particle physicits have reached the limits of the LHC (the shiny new large hadron collider in Geneva which will be usable next year). If i were Dröscher or Hauser, i would suggest an experiment to kick a proton into hyperspace - that needs significantly less energy. Rumours are, that the interest of particle physicists is directly proportional to the chance of getting a new collider toy .. ;-P

(3) Yep. But as i suggested on the physorg forum, where several implementations of the mass formula were developed, playing with G might be interesting anyway, e.g. if all calculated particle masses get the smallest error for the same G, that would be interesting. That might not help HT, but it could be an interesting hint even outside of HT. By the way, after identifying several typos between the german and english papers, the mass formula got closer. And then, im sure 32- or 64-bit floats are sufficent to calculate spinning cubes in a screensaver, but when we deal with planck length and the radius of the universe, some more bits wouldnt hurt. My computer arithmetics professor used to joke: "between any two consequtive floating point numbers there are an inifinte number of missing values" .. ;-P

If its true that space and time is quantisized, precise calculation becomes even more important. Quantisized spacetime is another interesting point. Both HT and LQG dont assume but derive it. So if there is some truth in Smolin's LQG (which i strongly believe), basic parts of HT cant be completely wrong. Prof. Loll from Utrecht (NL) works on similar ideas. Quite often when i read papers about LQG, i find stuff that sounds pretty familiar after reading HT stuff.

(4) Well, HT is pretty old. Heims first results are from 1955. He even wrote to Einstein, who unfortunately died before answering (which was not very collaborative ..). As far as i understand HT, the quarks are something like intermediate states and therefore not easy to separate. I dont see HT as a complete theory, but instead as a bunch of some interesting ideas with some mathematical foundation that deserve further investigation, e.g. the mass formula hits too close to be completely bogus.

(5) Conspiracy ? Shhhh, THEY might hear us .. ;-P

Nah, i dont believe in conspiracy. But i think the way ideas/theories are handled these days is not very healthy for science. Just publish one bogus paper, e.g. about cold fusion, and you can hang yourself, cause nobody shakes your hand anymore. The scientific community should be slightly more relaxed. Whats lost (except time) when some wrong answer is published ? My physics teacher used to reponse to wrong answers with "nothing is so bad that i cannot serve as a bad example" and then the thread of thought leading to the wrong answer was analyzed to find out what was right and what was wrong - very enlightning. In fact i learned more about physics, knowledge and life in genral from the wrong answers than from the right ones. I wonder what would happen combining todays attitude about alternative ideas with the state of knowledge of pre-Kopernikus or pre-Einstein. Then suddenly someone formerly unknown publishes an idea that throws over what every expert on the topic knows ... I think previous generations of physicists were more open minded. But back to the silence in mainstream physics about HT - that really disturbs me. If it is so obviously wrong, it shouldnt be that hard to explain that - in several decades ..

(6) I would prefer wrong or incomplete over crackpot. Crackpots usually show that either Einstein or Planck was wrong. The real brave ones attack both. Then they prove that everybody else is an idiot. Next they demand the trip to Stockholm. Heim's history is totally different. He tries to unify QM and GR, basically following the tensor metric path that Einstein 'wasted' his later years on. Then, after a short moment of fame, he doesnt use that fame, but instead dives even deeper into theory and spends the rest of his life to figure out how the world ticks. Obviously understanding was way more important to him than reputation, fame or money. His friends had to talk him into publishing anything at all. I admire Heim's amount of dedication to science, knowledge and search for truth, even if not a single bit of his results turns out as true.

MillKa 11:45, 5 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

I see we agree more often than not. I retract the "crackpot theory". It's really too strong, especially for something which seems to explain at least one thing we still have problems with: the particle masses.

Walking to work today, I wondered about one possible way to prove or disprove HT which actually will be funded. It seems to me from my HT reading that supersymmetry and HT are mutually exclusive. Also there is apparently no place for Higgs particle(s) in HT. If I am right, then finding the lightest supersymmetrical particle and/or the Higgs would falsify Heim theory for good. Unless, of course, Dröscher and Hauser create a new 16-dimensional supersymmetrical HT version ;-)

I have your talk page on Watch, so I'll see when/if you reply me. Cheerio. Friendly Neighbour 12:33, 5 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

Response to Hillman aka CH

Continuing discussion from Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Heim_theory

I cannot respond on the original AfD page, because it has been closed, so here goes:

   Yes, i am aware of the 100 StdDevs error of the HT mass formula. However i cant exclude, that reverse engineering might find
   a biggest blunder ..
   MillKa 16:34, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

   Comment: The StdDev objection is bunk. Standard Deviation is a criterion for random statistical error; the discrepancy in mass 
   formula result is systematic: all the results are off by the same percentage in the same direction. Thus if you were to change 
   the value of, say, the gravitational constant G slightly, you would get “on-the-spot” results. The catch? The value of G is
   only known to about 0.001 accuracy, so its anybody's guess what exactly should be plugged in. Therefore the “100 SD” argument
   against Heim Theory is invalid, unless the discrepancies were different for different masses, which is not the case.
   Freederick 15:22, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

   Reply to Freederick: I fear the StdDev objection is valid. Adjusting G would severly disturb the general Feng Shui of the
   Universe (or even the Multiverse - or is it Multiverses ?) ;-P
   However, as you correctly point out, the errors look quite systematic. The interesting question is whether it is possible to
   apply a corresponding systematic modification to the mass formula so that it delivers better or even exact results. Then the
   even more interesting next question would be: Whats the physical meaning of that nifty math trick ? I have severe problems to
   understand why so many physicists consider that question as completely unworthy to investigate. Since a correct HT-type mass
   formula would drastically lower the number of universal constants, even the most stringent stringists should be interested,
   cause it might help them to fight the recent Not_even_wrong debate by Lee_Smolin and Peter_Woit.
   Which is by the way a major reason why in my humble opinion the HT article should stay: Unsolved problems should be attacked 
   from all sides, instead of just the familiar or promising looking ones.
   MillKa 12:49, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

When talking about “adjusting G” I did not mean that the actual G in the Uni/Multiverse should be tweaked (only the Admin can mess with things on that level) ;-)

Note, however, that the value of G is only known experimentally within an error-bar the size of Manhattan (relative to error bars on known particle masses, anyway); so that any value of G within this error bar can be postulated with equal validity. No modification to the formula would be necessary. That's what I meant by “changing” the value of G. Freederick 21:11, 12 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

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