Thomas Hawkins’ Post

“The fascination of the electro-magnetic theory of light, advanced by Maxwell and subsequently experimentally investigated by Hertz, was so great that even now, although controverted, the scientific minds are under its sway. This theory supposed the existence of a medium which was solid, yet permitted bodies to pass through it without resistance; tenuous beyond conception, and yet, according to some, one thousand times denser than platinum. According to our conceptions of mechanical principles and ages of experience, such a medium was absolutely impossible. Nevertheless, light was considered essentially a phenomenon bound up in that kind of a medium; namely, one capable of transmitting transverse vibrations like a solid. “It is true that many scientific minds envisaged the theory of a gaseous ether, but it was rejected again and again because in such a medium longitudinal waves would be propagated with infinite velocity. Lord Kelvin conceived the so-called contractile ether, possessing properties which would result in a finite velocity of longitudinal waves. In 1885, however, an academic dissertation was published by Prof. De Volson Wood, an American, at a Hoboken institution, which dealt with a gaseous ether in which the elasticity, density and specific heat were determined with rare academic elegance. But, so far, everything pertaining to the subject was purely theoretical.” “What, then, can light be if it is not a transverse vibration? “I consider this extremely important. Light cannot be anything else but a longitudinal disturbance in the ether, involving alternate compressions and rarefactions. In other words, light can be nothing else than a sound wave in the ether.” “This appears clearly if it is first realized that, there being no Maxwellian ether, there can be no transverse oscillation in the medium.” The Newtonian theory is in error, because it fails entirely in not being able to explain how a small candle can project particles with the same speed as the blazing sun, which has an immensely higher temperature. We have made sure by experiment that light propagates with the same velocity irrespective of the character of the source. Such constancy of velocity can only be explained by assuming that it is dependent solely on the physical properties of the medium, especially density and elastic force.” –Nikola Tesla “Tesla Sees Evidence Radio and Light Are Sound.” New York Times, April 8, 1934.

Where do photons come from? This 200+ year old picture below (again directly from Newton's Principia) is applicable to any medium involving particles and waves. We all admit some form of wave/particle duality for light, so this ancient reasoning is important to consider today. If we think that photons are travelling from Point A to Point B in a straight line from the source (I do not necessarily fully subscribe to this and have some in-progress experimental rationale)....and we therefore reject the idea of the aether, because we reject the notion of more or less "fixed" particles in empty space. However, there are secrets hidden in the permeabilities and permittivities that show there is some sort of underlying photonic structure in a vacuum. Fine, this is ok when you are creating photons from moving electic fields (electron orbitals or free electrons), but what about compliance with Faraday's Law where a magnetic field that changes in time creates an electric field change, then Ampere's Law creates a travelling wave? How are photons "created" to carry the electromagnetic wave when a magnet moves without a conductor nearby? The laws don't change just because there isn't a conducting wire, although this is the primary picture shown in science and engineering courses for Faraday's Law. Are the photons carrying the wave spontaneously created by a magnetic field moving through an empty region? How do they become polarized to create an elecric field? We are told that photons are neutral particles, but somehow they carry oscillating polarity EM waves. 🤔 More to come on how answers to these questions allow us to have propulsion in a vacuum. I want to close today's post with a 524-year old quote (by a man who intuitively connected light and magnetic fields 355 years before Maxwell proved it): "Men of acute intelligence, without actual knowledge of facts, and in the absence of experiment, easily slip and err." -William Gilbert, On the Loadstone

The uncertainty principle is NOT exclusive to quantum mechanics. Researcher Gabrielle Carcassi showed me why. Classical mechanics has its own form of uncertainty, rooted in the Third Law of Thermodynamics. Here are some details. In quantum mechanics, the uncertainty principle states that reducing uncertainty in position increases uncertainty in momentum, and vice versa: sigma_x * sigma_p >= h-bar / 2. But what about classical mechanics? Consider that entropy (S) measures uncertainty. For a classical system, the third law dictates that S >= 0. But when entropy reaches zero, what happens to our uncertainties in position and momentum? Even in classical mechanics, perfect precision in position and momentum (i.e., zero uncertainty) leads to an entropy of negative infinity, violating the third law. This is the key insight and it's difficult to understate its importance. This comes from calculating the entropy of a Dirac delta. Thus, there's a natural bound on how small uncertainties can get. Formally, this means that for any classical distribution, the product of uncertainties in position and momentum cannot be arbitrarily small. This mirrors the quantum mechanical uncertainty principle, albeit derived differently. Let's look at the derivation. Using Boltzmann's formula S = k_B * log(W), where W is the number of accessible microstates, and considering continuous variables in phase space, W becomes phase-space volume. For a single microstate, phase-space volume is zero, leading to S = k_B * log(0) = -∞, which is nonsensical. Introducing a constant W_0 (a minimum phase-space volume) corrects this, ensuring S >= 0. Thus, S = k_B * log(W / W_0) ensures S is non-negative. Minimizing entropy yields a Gaussian distribution, similar to quantum mechanics, but with the uncertainty bound sigma_q * sigma_p >= W_0 / 2pi. QED

Superconductivity always reminds me of liquid nitrogen. if this is true and we are going to have a room-temperature superconductor, then it is going to be bigger than ChatGPT

Physics of the Sun by Dermott J. Mollan is a great book on solar physics, providing comprehensive overview of solar phenomena! I enjoyed reviewing this book. Thank you, Taylor & Francis Group, for publishing my book review. #SolarPhysics #Spaceweather #TheSun

I'm very excited to share that my first first-author research paper is online on the ArXiv! 😁 A fascinating truth about the universe is that even at the absolute zero of temperature, there are still random fluctuations of the vacuum field due to the Uncertainty Principle of quantum mechanics. This poses a serious challenge for measurements in quantum computing. Here we show that we can reach a record level of squeezing (noise reduction) of a microwave vacuum state! Moreover this squeezing stays stable with increasing a magnetic field above 1 Tesla and raising the temperature beyond 1 Kelvin. This offers exciting opportunities to use this technique for quantum information readout, continuous variable Quantum Computing and can even speed up the search for dark matter! 🚀 This work was made possible by a great team of collaborators at UNSW: Anders Kringhøj Wyatt Vine Tom Day Andrea Morello Jarryd Pla Read more here:

The February 2024 issue of ASME Journal of Computational and Nonlinear Dynamics includes research papers on #neuralnetworks, #industrialrobots, and more: 🔹 Dynamic Modeling of the Ball-on-Flexible Beam Using Euler–Lagrangian Formulation    🔹 Data Driven Approach to Determine Linear Stability of Delay Differential Equations Using Orthonormal History Functions    🔹 Neural Network-Based Region Tracking Control for a Flexible-Joint Robot Manipulator    🔹 P-Bifurcation Analysis of a Quarter-Car Model With Inerter-Based Pendulum Vibration Absorber: A Wiener Path Integration Approach    🔹 Synchronization of a Class of Nonlinear Systems With and Without Uncertainty Using State Feedback and Extended Kalman Filter Based Control Scheme    🔹 A Computational Conformal Geometry Approach to Calculate the Large Deformation of Plates/Shells With Arbitrary Shapes    🔹 Motor Bearing Fault Diagnosis in an Industrial Robot Under Complex Variable Speed Conditions ASME Journal Program #ASMEJCND #computationaldesign #dynamics

Happy to share our new paper published in "Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering" with the title: A computational approach to identify the material parameters of the relaxed micromorphic model https://lnkd.in/eyy-efri

Can there be a net force in a system without external forces? https://lnkd.in/enpBHzr8 #classical #Newtonian mechanics suggests no. We don't normally observe objects accelerating without an obvious external force. However, could a nonzero #net force exist yet be too small to notice in everyday situations? This paper(preprint) explores that possibility using the concept of #retardation and demonstrates that nonzero net forces can indeed occur within a system and can reach significant magnitudes under specific conditions. While the paper focuses on electromagnetism, the conclusions may have implications for other areas of physics. Concepts in this paper require some understanding of vector calculus but are not limited to those with backgrounds specifically in electrical engineering or physics. Furthermore, the paper suggests the possibility of detecting #anisotropy of the speed of #light. This detection relies on the effect of retardation on forces and how differences in the speed of light could influence measurements. The use of high frequencies could amplify these potential differences. (Note: the constancy of the speed of light 'c' refers to the two-way speed of light, essentially the average speed, and does not necessarily mean that the back-and-forth speed of light is the same for all frames) The conclusions in this paper are made based on these assumptions: ·      Fields and momentum propagate at the finite speed of light (c). ·      #Maxwell's equations govern electromagnetic fields. ·      #Lorentz force is used to describe the forces.

A new way to represent Pi. Link to the article here. The paper itself referenced here does not directly talk about this and is more about quantum mechanics. https://lnkd.in/g478KpFP Happy reading!