by Yablon » Mon Nov 17, 2014 9:10 am
Dear Friends:
As I mentioned last week, the Editor-in-Chief of Physical review D decided to himself review my 225 page paper which is preprinted at
http://vixra.org/pdf/1403.0272v3.pdf. The review was a rejection, which I felt he was going to send, but at least now I have something to work with. I have had this review for all of 12 hours so will obviously want to take some time before a reply. But while these are things which might require more explanation than I have provided to date, I disagree that any of these are fundamental flaws. I will elaborate my reply more in the coming days. For the moment, however, because I find suppression abhorrent from anybody, I will not suppress but will widely share this negative review of my work, as I have done below. The three substantive remarks I will make right now are these:
1. Point 3 for the classical theory would be the most damaging, if it was correct. In fact, it is partly correct but not entirely, and that difference is very important. The issue raised here, I believe, is resolved by consideration of Dirac monopoles and the Dirac Quantization Condition. A. Zee's discussion of this is a good starting point to understand this, and I have linked that here:
https://jayryablon.files.wordpress.com/ ... opoles.pdf. The reviewer is correct that "By appropriate local gauge transformation any nonzero surface integral of F can be made to vanish." But the monopoles have n=0,1,2,3... quantum states, and the "appropriate local gauge transformation" the reviewer refers to is into the n=0 state. So the gauge transformations themselves must be made in discrete, quantized fashion, which is one way of understanding what Dirac first taught. SO: yes, it is possible to use a gauge transformation to make my monopoles vanish, but also, the set of transformations available permit n=1, n=2... states as well. This is effectively the point made by Zee after (10) when he states "the whole point is that
F is locally but not globally exact; otherwise by (6) the magnetic charge
g=$_S^2 F would be zero." So in this context, what I am studying and developing are the n=1 states. And what I would now assert is that these n=1 states yield all of the nuclear empirical data I have outlined most recently in
http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0023v2.pdf, which is a compelling match to empirical data. The one caveat: the piece from Zee I linked above is for abelian gauge theory. It would be desirable to do the same calculation for Yang-Mills theory. Over the next week or two as time permits, I will look to develop that calculation.
2. The first part of point 2 about source free solutions is a red herring and wrong. As one individual has pointed out to me previously in private correspondence when the same reviewer made the same point about an earlier draft earlier this year, "It is well known that a differential operator is defined together with the boundary conditions. But the latter conditions are in fact determined by the sources. Anyway, do in nature (universe) source free electromagnetic waves indeed exist? There must be some source that produced them. In fact, there exists so called action-at-distance electrodynamics whose Lagrangian contains only sources. Wheeler and Feynman had shown that from such electrodynamics one can derive all the well-known results of conventional Maxwell electrodynamics." As to convergence, I would agree that I have not shown convergence. But a) that is just a statement about something I have not shown, not a fatality of the theory. And, b) if there is some domain of large J for which there is divergence, neither is that fatal. That may simply mean that there is a limited domain of convergence, which in some way in turn limits the physically viable sources, which may be a good thing.
3. I guess now is the time for me to comment as to the "burden of proof" which I carry as an author promoting a new theory, and when the burden or proof shifts from me to others in the community. The law makes these distinctions very clear; I am not sure that scientists have advanced as far as the law, in this case. Specifically, I have used this theory which the reviewer calls "fundamentally flawed" to match up a wide range of nuclear energy data that has never before been explained, as detailed in
http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0023v2.pdf. This not only includes a wide range of nuclear binding and fusion energies, but even the proton and neutron masses themselves within experimental errors. I believe that once an author shows -- as I have -- that his or her theory explains the observed proton and neutron masses
within all experimental errors, the burden is shifted. Now, the community must accept the view that something is "right" about the theory which lead to that result, and that whatever is perceived to perhaps be "wrong with" or "missing from" the theory needs to be understood and filled in, and that some of the burden to do that shifts over to the scientific community as a whole. Otherwise, we start disregarding
nature herself, and the whole point of the scientific method as taught by Galileo which advanced us from millennia during which people were able to espouse theories without ever connecting them to observed data, is that we must reset our thinking to line up with the theories that match nature. Once a theory matches up with nature as mine does, everybody else has to adjust their thinking and ask themselves "where is my own thinking amiss which would make me think that a theory which matches nature in this way is wrong because I think something differently."
Matching nature this tightly is not some triviality that can be ignored because it contradicts the way someone -- even at the top of the physics world -- looks at the pertinent theories. Otherwise, the critic effectively says "perhaps you have explained nature, but I still do not believe you because what you have done does not fit with the way I and the community have organized the science in our own brains." It is
always matches with empirical data which provide the threads that when pulled, can and do unravel the dominant scientific paradigms of the day. I have carried my burden. I am doing something right; and whatever I may have missed or not explained, there is more that is right than there is that is wrong. Nature is backing me up, and that is more important than anything else. Once a theory explains a wide range of empirical data previously unexplained, the burden shifts from the proponent to the wider community. I have met my burden by matching the natural observations, and by any responsible understanding of scientific practice, the burden has shifted to the community to make its understanding fit with what I have shown.
Anyway, enough from me, here is the review. Jay
PRD Editor-in-Chief wrote:I regret to say that, despite your revisions and additions, I still find that your manuscript is fundamentally flawed and not suitable for Physical Review D. I have outlined below some of the major problems that I see. These are nontrivial issues that cannot be remedied by simple revisions or additions. Rather, most of them are intrinsic to your approach and suggest that a complete rethinking is in order.
Classical Theory
1) Because the classical theory is scale-invariant, there is no way to pick out either a distance that specifies a confinement length or a mass scale that defines a mass gap. Hence, there can be no confinement.
2) Even in the Abelian theory the fields are not uniquely determined by the sources, since one can add arbitrary solutions of the (linear) source-free field equations. In the non-Abelian theory, which is already nonlinear before the addition of sources, there are nontrivial (i.e., not simply plane wave) solutions of the source-free field equations, so it should be clear that the sources cannot uniquely determine the fields. Furthermore, while you present a recursive scheme for defining an inverse operator, you fail to demonstrate that this scheme converges for arbitrarily large fields and sources; in fact, it is hard to see how this could fail to diverge when J is sufficiently large.
3) The surface integral of F is not gauge-invariant, and neither are the other surface integrals of quantities that you write down. By appropriate local gauge transformation any nonzero surface integral of F can be made to vanish. This not only invalidates your Eq. (3.3), but shows that physical conclusions cannot be drawn from the value of this quantity.
4) The discussion of topological stability that begins on page 71 appears to be based on serious misunderstanding of the relevant physics. The topology here is derived from the scalar fields that break the initial symmetry G, and topologically stable configurations must involve those scalar field. The truncated theory with the unbroken symmetry H and with those scalar fields omitted does not have topologically stable configurations.
Quantum Theory
1) In the quantum theory the need to introduce a renormalization scale breaks the scale invariance, thus allowing the possibility of a mass gap and of confinement. This leads naturally to the running of the coupling constant. The running coupling constant cannot be simply inserted ad hoc, as you have done.
2) The details of the running of the coupling constant, including whether or not there is asymptotic freedom, depend on the number of fermion and scalar fields entering the theory. Working with a path integral that only integrates over the gauge and ghost fields leads to a running that differs from that in QCD.
3) Without including the quark fields in the path integral, the theory is not QCD, and so there can be no baryons.
4) You try to evaluate the path integral with the aid of the inverse operator that you have defined by recursive methods. This is problematic not only because of the issues with the inverse described above, but also because the path integral is to be taken over all values of the fields, not simply those obeying the classical field equations.
5) Evaluation of the path integral inevitably requires dealing with divergences, because the bare coupling and the physical coupling differ by an infinite renormalization. This does not appear in you treatment.
Dear Friends:
As I mentioned last week, the Editor-in-Chief of Physical review D decided to himself review my 225 page paper which is preprinted at http://vixra.org/pdf/1403.0272v3.pdf. The review was a rejection, which I felt he was going to send, but at least now I have something to work with. I have had this review for all of 12 hours so will obviously want to take some time before a reply. But while these are things which might require more explanation than I have provided to date, I disagree that any of these are fundamental flaws. I will elaborate my reply more in the coming days. For the moment, however, because I find suppression abhorrent from anybody, I will not suppress but will widely share this negative review of my work, as I have done below. The three substantive remarks I will make right now are these:
1. Point 3 for the classical theory would be the most damaging, if it was correct. In fact, it is partly correct but not entirely, and that difference is very important. The issue raised here, I believe, is resolved by consideration of Dirac monopoles and the Dirac Quantization Condition. A. Zee's discussion of this is a good starting point to understand this, and I have linked that here: https://jayryablon.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/zee-dirac-monopoles.pdf. The reviewer is correct that "By appropriate local gauge transformation any nonzero surface integral of F can be made to vanish." But the monopoles have n=0,1,2,3... quantum states, and the "appropriate local gauge transformation" the reviewer refers to is into the n=0 state. So the gauge transformations themselves must be made in discrete, quantized fashion, which is one way of understanding what Dirac first taught. SO: yes, it is possible to use a gauge transformation to make my monopoles vanish, but also, the set of transformations available permit n=1, n=2... states as well. This is effectively the point made by Zee after (10) when he states "the whole point is that [i]F[/i] is locally but not globally exact; otherwise by (6) the magnetic charge [i]g=$_S^2 F[/i] would be zero." So in this context, what I am studying and developing are the n=1 states. And what I would now assert is that these n=1 states yield all of the nuclear empirical data I have outlined most recently in http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0023v2.pdf, which is a compelling match to empirical data. The one caveat: the piece from Zee I linked above is for abelian gauge theory. It would be desirable to do the same calculation for Yang-Mills theory. Over the next week or two as time permits, I will look to develop that calculation.
2. The first part of point 2 about source free solutions is a red herring and wrong. As one individual has pointed out to me previously in private correspondence when the same reviewer made the same point about an earlier draft earlier this year, "It is well known that a differential operator is defined together with the boundary conditions. But the latter conditions are in fact determined by the sources. Anyway, do in nature (universe) source free electromagnetic waves indeed exist? There must be some source that produced them. In fact, there exists so called action-at-distance electrodynamics whose Lagrangian contains only sources. Wheeler and Feynman had shown that from such electrodynamics one can derive all the well-known results of conventional Maxwell electrodynamics." As to convergence, I would agree that I have not shown convergence. But a) that is just a statement about something I have not shown, not a fatality of the theory. And, b) if there is some domain of large J for which there is divergence, neither is that fatal. That may simply mean that there is a limited domain of convergence, which in some way in turn limits the physically viable sources, which may be a good thing.
3. I guess now is the time for me to comment as to the "burden of proof" which I carry as an author promoting a new theory, and when the burden or proof shifts from me to others in the community. The law makes these distinctions very clear; I am not sure that scientists have advanced as far as the law, in this case. Specifically, I have used this theory which the reviewer calls "fundamentally flawed" to match up a wide range of nuclear energy data that has never before been explained, as detailed in http://vixra.org/pdf/1411.0023v2.pdf. This not only includes a wide range of nuclear binding and fusion energies, but even the proton and neutron masses themselves within experimental errors. I believe that once an author shows -- as I have -- that his or her theory explains the observed proton and neutron masses [i]within all experimental errors[/i], the burden is shifted. Now, the community must accept the view that something is "right" about the theory which lead to that result, and that whatever is perceived to perhaps be "wrong with" or "missing from" the theory needs to be understood and filled in, and that some of the burden to do that shifts over to the scientific community as a whole. Otherwise, we start disregarding [i]nature herself[/i], and the whole point of the scientific method as taught by Galileo which advanced us from millennia during which people were able to espouse theories without ever connecting them to observed data, is that we must reset our thinking to line up with the theories that match nature. Once a theory matches up with nature as mine does, everybody else has to adjust their thinking and ask themselves "where is my own thinking amiss which would make me think that a theory which matches nature in this way is wrong because I think something differently." [i]Matching nature this tightly is not some triviality that can be ignored because it contradicts the way someone -- even at the top of the physics world -- looks at the pertinent theories.[/i] Otherwise, the critic effectively says "perhaps you have explained nature, but I still do not believe you because what you have done does not fit with the way I and the community have organized the science in our own brains." It is [i]always[/i] matches with empirical data which provide the threads that when pulled, can and do unravel the dominant scientific paradigms of the day. I have carried my burden. I am doing something right; and whatever I may have missed or not explained, there is more that is right than there is that is wrong. Nature is backing me up, and that is more important than anything else. Once a theory explains a wide range of empirical data previously unexplained, the burden shifts from the proponent to the wider community. I have met my burden by matching the natural observations, and by any responsible understanding of scientific practice, the burden has shifted to the community to make its understanding fit with what I have shown.
Anyway, enough from me, here is the review. Jay
[quote="PRD Editor-in-Chief"]
I regret to say that, despite your revisions and additions, I still find that your manuscript is fundamentally flawed and not suitable for Physical Review D. I have outlined below some of the major problems that I see. These are nontrivial issues that cannot be remedied by simple revisions or additions. Rather, most of them are intrinsic to your approach and suggest that a complete rethinking is in order.
Classical Theory
1) Because the classical theory is scale-invariant, there is no way to pick out either a distance that specifies a confinement length or a mass scale that defines a mass gap. Hence, there can be no confinement.
2) Even in the Abelian theory the fields are not uniquely determined by the sources, since one can add arbitrary solutions of the (linear) source-free field equations. In the non-Abelian theory, which is already nonlinear before the addition of sources, there are nontrivial (i.e., not simply plane wave) solutions of the source-free field equations, so it should be clear that the sources cannot uniquely determine the fields. Furthermore, while you present a recursive scheme for defining an inverse operator, you fail to demonstrate that this scheme converges for arbitrarily large fields and sources; in fact, it is hard to see how this could fail to diverge when J is sufficiently large.
3) The surface integral of F is not gauge-invariant, and neither are the other surface integrals of quantities that you write down. By appropriate local gauge transformation any nonzero surface integral of F can be made to vanish. This not only invalidates your Eq. (3.3), but shows that physical conclusions cannot be drawn from the value of this quantity.
4) The discussion of topological stability that begins on page 71 appears to be based on serious misunderstanding of the relevant physics. The topology here is derived from the scalar fields that break the initial symmetry G, and topologically stable configurations must involve those scalar field. The truncated theory with the unbroken symmetry H and with those scalar fields omitted does not have topologically stable configurations.
Quantum Theory
1) In the quantum theory the need to introduce a renormalization scale breaks the scale invariance, thus allowing the possibility of a mass gap and of confinement. This leads naturally to the running of the coupling constant. The running coupling constant cannot be simply inserted ad hoc, as you have done.
2) The details of the running of the coupling constant, including whether or not there is asymptotic freedom, depend on the number of fermion and scalar fields entering the theory. Working with a path integral that only integrates over the gauge and ghost fields leads to a running that differs from that in QCD.
3) Without including the quark fields in the path integral, the theory is not QCD, and so there can be no baryons.
4) You try to evaluate the path integral with the aid of the inverse operator that you have defined by recursive methods. This is problematic not only because of the issues with the inverse described above, but also because the path integral is to be taken over all values of the fields, not simply those obeying the classical field equations.
5) Evaluation of the path integral inevitably requires dealing with divergences, because the bare coupling and the physical coupling differ by an infinite renormalization. This does not appear in you treatment.
[/quote]
