[Draft 7-24-2024, 8-14-2024]
Here’s a possible story which helps demystify quantum field theory. A personal visualization, which stays within the bounds of spacetime and avoids needless paradoxes [1].
There are two key concepts to my sketch:
- The first is the Grid, as characterized by Frank Wilczek.
- The second is a quantum’s tail.
The Grid defines a cosmic superconducting landscape in which quanta can extend in spacetime essentially without limit, without loss of energy or waveform integrity, unless they interact with or are confined by other quanta within fields.
A quantum’s indefinite tail provides a context for superposition and entanglement. So-called waveform collapse and distant correlation of quantum state.
Yes, there are issues as to the viability of these two concepts. Later I’ll try to summarize any commentary that I’ve found so far.
This post lays out the first idea, namely, the Grid.
The Grid
The Grid [that ur-stuff that underlies physical reality] fills space and time. Every fragment of Grid – each space-time element – has the same basic properties as every other fragment. The Grid is alive with quantum activity. Quantum activity has special characteristics. It is spontaneous and unpredictable. And to observe quantum activity, you must disturb it. The Grid also contains enduring, material components. The cosmos is a multilayered, multicolored superconductor. The Grid contains a metric field that gives space-time rigidity and causes gravity. The Grid weighs, with a universal density. – Wilczek, Frank. The Lightness of Being: Mass, Ether, and the Unification of Forces (p. 111). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
Grid analogy
Figure 8.1 Grid, old and new. a. A grid is often used to describe how various things are distributed in space. b. The Grid, which underlies our most successful world-model, … – Wilczek, Frank. The Lightness of Being: Mass, Ether, and the Unification of Forces (p. 74). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
One of the best analogies for Wilczek’s Grid (which he uses himself, as noted above) is a Geographic Information System’s multilayered data model, as discussed in this article:
• TechnoFAQ.org > “Thoughts on the Future of GIS. What Will Change in 50 years?” by Lucy Benton (July 5, 2017)
The Grid as superconductor
Thus we come to suspect that the entity we call empty space is an exotic kind of superconductor. – Ibid. p. 96.
Even though the conceptual and mathematical parallels run very deep, Grid superconductivity differs from conventional superconductivity in four main ways: … – Ibid. p. 213.
The Grid as multilayered
The primary ingredient of reality is alive with quantum activity. … The primary ingredient of reality also contains enduring material components. These make the cosmos a multilayered, multicolored superconductor.
I will use the word Grid for the primary world-stuff. That word has several advantages [vs. ether, space-time, quantum field]: We’re accustomed to using mathematical grids to position layers of structure, … – Ibid. p. 74.
Ordinary matter = Grid excitation
Ordinary matter is a secondary manifestation of the Grid, tracing its level of excitation. – Ibid. p. 75. [2]
So the recent astronomical discovery that Grid weighs – that the entity we perceive as empty space has a universal, nonzero density – crowns the case for its physical reality. – Ibid. pp. 104-105.
Visualizing the Grid
We’ve seen that not only can two quanta be entangled with each other, but a single quantum can be entangled with the quantum vacuum. – Hobson, Art. Tales of the Quantum: Understanding Physics’ Most Fundamental Theory (p. 181). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.
Grid dynamics analogy (shear)
Objective: Visualize layered Grid interplay with spacetime geometry, within context of stress–energy–momentum tensor in relativity theory.
Layered (stratified) systems are common in fluid dynamics, e.g., for plasma, gas, water. Macroscopic stellar and planetary atmospheres, oceans. Where there are gradients, due to density, temperature, …
As a physical model, stratification introduces the notion of shear (stress) between layers. And perhaps conceptually as quantum curvature and inertia. [3]
As to the dynamics of interactions across Grid layers (quantum dimensions), here’re some quotes:
You can visualize the quantum dimensions as new layers of the Grid. When a particle hops into these layers its spin changes, and so does its mass. Its charges—electric, color, and weak—stay the same. – Wilczek, Frank. The Lightness of Being (p. 188). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
• Phys.org > “How to think about a four-dimensional universe” by Paul M. Sutter, Universe Today (November 13, 2023)
Spacetime is not a fixed stage, but a flexible membrane that suffuses the entirety of existence. It is a thing, an object and entity in its own right, a dynamical actor in the cast of characters in the universe. The universe consists of the usual assortment of particles and radiation and all their wonderful interactions, and those interactions don’t happen on top of spacetime but along with spacetime, which has now joined their ranks.
• Forbes > “Ask Ethan: Do Virtual Particles Really Exist?” by Ethan Siegel, Senior Contributor (May 7, 2021) – The effects of virtual particles are real, but the particles themselves are not!
… the quantum vacuum itself will exhibit real, physical effects on matter and radiation that passes through them. The vacuum gets polarized, meaning it generates its own internal fields, and those internal fields — not just the external ones — affect the matter and radiation that passes through. However, there are no particles themselves in there to smash into, collide with, or scatter off of.
Notes
[1] As a counterpoint to statements like this:
• New Scientist > “How quantum entanglement really works and why we accept its weirdness” by Michael Brooks (22 May 2024) – Subatomic particles can appear to instantly influence one another, no matter how far apart they are. These days, that isn’t a source of mystery – it’s a fact of the universe and a resource for new technologies
“These quantum correlations seem to appear somehow from outside space-time, in the sense that there is no story in space and time that explains them,” says Nicolas Gisin at the University of Geneva, Switzerland.
[2] Here’s a quote from one of Wilczek anecdotes about Feynman.
Feynman told me that when he realized that his theory of photons and electrons is mathematically equivalent to the usual theory, it crushed his deepest hopes. He had hoped that by formulating his theory directly in terms of paths of particles in space-time – Feynman graphs – he would avoid the field concept and construct something essentially new. For a while, he thought he had. – Wilczek, Frank. The Lightness of Being: Mass, Ether, and the Unification of Forces (p. 84). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.
[3] Here’s an article about research on “the shape of space-time surrounding a proton” – twisting shear forces and pressure changes. Which someday might explain “why quarks bind themselves into protons at all.”
• Quanta Magazine > “Swirling Forces, Crushing Pressures Measured in the Proton” by Charlie Wood (March 14, 2024) – New experiments – exploring the distribution of subatomic energies, forces and pressures – show [shear] forces push one way near the proton’s center and the opposite way near its surface.
Over decades, researchers have meticulously mapped out the electromagnetic influence of the positively charged particle. But in the new research, the Jefferson Lab physicists are instead mapping the proton’s gravitational influence — namely, the distribution of energies, pressures and shear stresses throughout, which bend the space-time fabric in and around the particle.
Schweitzer [Peter Schweitzer, a theoretical physicist at the University of Connecticut] has spent most of his career thinking about the gravitational side of the proton. Specifically, he’s interested in a matrix of properties of the proton called the energy-momentum tensor. “The energy-momentum tensor knows everything there is to be known about the particle,” he said.
The new approach measures the region of space-time that’s significantly curved by the proton.
But protons are made from the lightest members of the quark family. And lightweight quarks can also be thought of as lengthy waves extending beyond the proton’s surface. This picture suggests that the binding of the proton may come about not through the internal pulling of elastic bands but through some external interaction between these wavy, drawn-out quarks.