The theory of elemental waves TEW, like quantum mechanics without the weirdness

[Subsidiarity]

After qm came up in the free will thread I wanted the community to be aware of TEW. Here are some links:

Theory of Elementary Waves - Making sense of the double slit experiment.
http://youtu.be/XEkWLQXEozg

Quantum Physics Fairy Tale - 6mins

(1h20-7h33m) The Philosophic Corruption of Physics (Lectures 1-5) by David Harriman
http://peacerevolution.podomatic.com/entry/2012-08-12T08_45_48-07_00

[ribuck]

A proposed alternative theory is not much use if it explains fewer things than the mainstream theory.

The first video starts by re-stating a few uncontroversial things, then after 4 minutes introduces some ideas that immediately raise problems. For example: if waves and particles are simultaneously moving in both directions, then all of our experiments that measure momentum cannot be explained. And if the interference occurs near the electron gun rather than near the slit, and the particle goes from the electron gun to its spot in the interference pattern as a regular particle, then the particle must bend its trajectory as it passes through the slit. That requires a change in momentum, which is not experimentally observed.

The TEW guy handwaves all the problems away after 10 minutes, saying "Needless to say, there must be a more robust elementary wave explanation of the double-slit experiment, and I'm not going to try to state it here". So, I just wasted 10 minutes of my life watching this uninsightful video.

[Pepin]

I don't really know how to respond to these sorts of posts.

[Subsidiarity]

I don't feel a need to defend the video production, but I will mix it up about the content. My understanding is that TEW makes different predictions than QM on a few experiments that have been borne out. That is to say that TEW makes better predictions than QM, but I'm not sure that either are very good with the explanations. 

"then all of our experiments that measure momentum cannot be explained." Can you unpack that one for me? Are you saying there is a contradiction, or that TEW has no explanation. Either way, what is the contradiction or what was the previous explanation and why does it not fit with TEW?

"That requires a change in momentum, which is not experimentally observed.[/font]" Nothing about the trajectory from gun to target has been observed. The trajectory could bend at anytime between the gun and the target, but yes it is a challenge to explain the break. I'm not sure qm had a good explanation for this either.

[ribuck]

"That requires a change in momentum, which is not experimentally observed." Nothing about the trajectory from gun to target has been observed. The trajectory could bend at anytime between the gun and the target, but yes it is a challenge to explain the break. I'm not sure qm had a good explanation for this either.

There's no way you can bend the trajectory of an electron (at the slits or elsewhere) without changing its momentum.

Quantum Mechanics has no difficulty here, because it describes the probability of each location of the electron. Summing over all the probabilities yields a result that equals the average experimentally measured momentum.

My
understanding is that TEW makes different predictions than QM on a few
experiments that have been borne out. That is to say that TEW makes
better predictions than QM

Excellent! That provides a way to have a useful discussion about TEW. Please point me to a specific experiment where TEW and QM make different predictions, and where the experimental results are in accordance with the TEW predictions and not with the QM predictions.

[Subsidiarity]

In video form again. Couldn't find this analysis in text.

about 1:30 to 11:00An experiment contradicts wave-particle dualityhttp://youtu.be/3cBm6xDYbKE 

[ribuck]

In video form again. Couldn't find this analysis in text ...
An experiment contradicts wave-particle duality
http://youtu.be/3cBm6xDYbKE

I was hoping for something rigorous, rather than a lot of contradictory handwaving.

I don't like the way Boyd ridicules the scientists who worked on Quantum Mechanics (Einstein, Bohr, Heisenberg etc). "It never even occured to them", says Boyd, "that waves and particles might travel in opposite directions". Firstly, he just pulled that statement out of his ass: he has no idea what thoughts those scientists had. Secondly, I'm pretty sure the possibility would have occurred to the QM guys. If you read any of their papers, you will see that those QM guys are rigorous and thorough. Thirdly, it would be blatantly obvious in any experiment if the observed velocity of particles was in one direction, and the observed velocity of waves was in the other.

I almost didn't watch the whole video because of Boyd's arrogant introduction. But because you took the time to locate it and post it, I kept watching

As the top-rated comment on YouTube points out, Boyd mis-represents the paper that he is criticising. The experiment does not illustrate a problem with Quantum Mechanics as such. It only illustrates the inadequacy of a naive wave description of light, or a naive particle description of light. As no-one here is proposing a naive wave or particle description of light, we can dismiss Boyd at this point.

Notice that between 10:00 and 10:30, Boyd says there are no wave packets in his theory. In other words, there are waves that go on forever, not "packets" of waves. Yet he still says that if you introduce enough delay in the Bismith the interference pattern will disappear. What nonsense! Infinite waves will always interfere, no matter how great the phase delay is.

Sorry, I can't stomach any more of Boyd.

[Subsidiarity]

I certainly appreaciate you taking the time. 

For my benefit could you expand on this: "Thirdly, it would be blatantly obvious in any experiment if the observed velocity of particles was in one direction, and the observed velocity of waves was in the other." 

 

I'm curious if there is a way to rescue the theory from the infinite wave issue that you raise. Firstly I don't feel bound by the classical idea of a wave.  At the base I think it makes more sense to think of 'something' traveling in the opposite direction than the particle rather than speak of ontological probabilities. For example, perhaps the 'waves' may start at a point off in infinity and travel at the speed of light toward the particle source, and there is a new 'wave' for every Plank moment and they only interfere with waves from the same moment. Perhaps that is the reason there is no interference. I prefer to think of the question in terms of if we assume something is traveling in the opposite direction as the particle what can we infer about its nature? However, if it does lead to a logical contradiction then the theory must be cast aside. And we must apply the same standard to QM. 

[ribuck]

For my benefit could you expand on this: "Thirdly, it would be blatantly obvious in any experiment if the observed velocity of particles was in one direction, and the observed velocity of waves was in the other."

What I had in mind was this:

There are many experiments with more than one detector. Let's consider experiments with two detectors, which I will call A and B.

Some experiments measure a "particle" phenomenon, and some experiments measure a "wave" phenomenon, even when it is the same type of object being measured (e.g. an electron). We usually measure the time at which events occur (because we want to discover something about cause and effect).

Suppose we measure a "particle" phenomenon, and detector A triggers before detector B. Then we measure a "wave" phenomenon, and detector B triggers before detector A. We would then have "blatantly obvious" evidence that particles and waves travel in opposite directions. But it doesn't happen that way.

I'm curious if there is a way to rescue the theory from the infinite
wave issue that you raise. Firstly I don't feel bound by the classical
idea of a wave...

I don't think any good will come from re-defining such fundamental concepts as a "wave". Sure it's good to question things, but you need to have a good reason to redo the fundamentals. If you dispute the fundamentals, the onus falls on you to re-visit all of the science from hundreds of years that has been successfully built on top of those fundamentals. If you don't do that, you can't expect to be taken seriously.

 

[Subsidiarity]

I think we are talking past each other. I will let it go unless somebody else wants to mediate or engage or something. Good day.