5th April 2000 : Alan Edmonds
Mathematical Structures and the Nature of Reality by Roger Farnworth
A response by Alan Edmonds
The intention of this grandly titled essay seems to be the demolition of current ideas on the fundamentals of physics. It starts with what may be described as a lengthy paraphrase of Newton's well-known 'Hypotheses non fingo'.
It goes on to the first serious error : "........Edmonds was one of the earliest proponents for regarding quantum theory in the same manner." In fact many physicists were taking sides, some adhering to the line referred to, some not, while I was still in short trousers. I am unable to claim any credit in this matter. (If credit was intended ?)
We have next "The reality of both quanta and gravity consist [sic] of unobservables but the experience of gravity is real in a way that quanta can never become real." How the reality of anything can be unobservable is not explained, and in any case a quantum is usually taken to be not an object but a finite quantity of action, energy, angular momentum etc which is the attribute of some atom, electron, photon etc. Roger seems to think that quantum mechanics is some woolly theory without objective consequences, apart from a few mysterious gadgets like transistors.
We could in fact contemplate a real physical phenomenon, namely the behaviour of liquid Helium 4 near absolute zero. In the laboratory the extraordinary behaviour of liquid He may be observed; it is described in popular books of physics. This behaviour is the consequence of the fact that all the atoms of He are existing together in one single quantum state; it is quantum mechanics made visible.
In fact following the discovery early in the 20C by Rutherford and Bohr of the actual structure of the atom the assumption of 'classical' theories of mechanics and electromagnetism would lead to the self-destruction of all atoms and hence of the universe. Roger's baby and all the rest of us only exist as a consequence of quantum mechanics.
The essay then considers the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen phenomenon. Roger misunderstands it thoroughly and makes the hoary and false assertion that it implies the negation of the rules of special relativity. For some reason Einstein's constant is now brought in. This constant appears in the equations describing the large-scale dynamics of the universe and has nothing whatever to do with events on an atomic scale.
The essay ends with the sort of model currently favoured by some philosophers : "Let us imagine a group of people sitting round a table playing a previously unknown game........" I am unable to understand the function of this model, which seems to relate to some argument about what reality really is. Now Roger lives in Cornwall; may I suggest instead that he gives his thought to the question of the reality or otherwise of the Beast of Bodmin ?
Alan Edmonds