ALPHABETICAL INDEX
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EVOLUTION OF THOUGHT ABOUT SPACE

    In 1953, two years before Einstein's death, in the introduction to the Concepts of Space, The History of Theories of Space in Physics, by physics professor Max Jammer of Bar-Ilan University in Israel, Albert Einstein wrote: "These two concepts of space may be contrasted as follows: (a) space as positional quality of the material objects; (b) space as container of all material objects. In case (a), space without material object is inconceivable, in case (b), a material object can only be conceived as existing in space; space then appears as a reality which is in a certain sense superior to the material world. The concept of space was enriched and complicated by Galileo and Newton, in that space must be introduced as the independent cause of the inertial behavior of bodies if one wishes to give the classical principles of inertia (and herewith the classical law of motion) an exact meaning. To have realized this fully and clearly is in my opinion one of Newton's greatest achievements".

A Continuing History of Space

    Atomism was an extension of the corpuscular theory matter, in which substance and light was thought to be small corpuscles which might move about and bounced off one another.  They were substance and in between lay the nothing, which they moved through.
    In terms of the universe above, celestial space, the notion of a vacuum, may or may not have been conceived by them, though Anaximander (611 - 547 B.C.), of Mellitus, in Asia Minor,  addressed the possibility of an infinite, unbounded and invisible entity as the underlying fabric permeating the Cosmos.  These views, all preceded Aristotelian logic, which commenced in the 3rd century B.C. and continued into the Middle Ages.  Before, during and since, the following have influenced Western Civilization's perception of space:

  • Anaximander, 611 - 547 B.C., postulated a spatially unbounded entity.
  • Parmenides' denial of the void, from which the impossibility of multiplicity and motion had been deduced.
  • Leucippus was the first philosopher to affirm, with a full consciousness of what he was doing, the existence of empty space. The Pythagorean void had been more or less identified with 'air', but the void of Leucippus was really a vacuum.
  • Democritus, 460 -370 B.C., studied interstitial space between substance.
  • Plato, 427 - 347 B.C., formulated spiritual divisions, inclusive of the concept of oblivion.
  • Aristotle, aka:  Harry Tottle, 384 -322 B.C., studied under Plato and introduced a religio-scientific system of thought, later adopted and modified by the Scholastics, which has influenced modern scientific thinking regarding space.
  • Euclid, 300 B.C., developed representative space, aka., geometry.
  • Ptolemy, 127-151 A.D., introduced an earth centered celestial space.
  • Copernicus, 1473-1543, introduced a sun centered celestial space.
  • Kepler, 1571-1630, introduced orbital motions in celestial space.
  • Descartes, 1596-1650, introduced three-dimensional fluid celestial space, inner space and spatial position.
  • Newton, 1642 1727, presented an absolute and general inertial space which was empty.
  • Leibniz, 1646-1716, refuted Newton's absolute space on the grounds that it was meaningless because it was empty.
  • Berkeley, 1685-1753 refuted Newton's absolute space on the grounds that it should not supersede God, and therefore, the inertial laws presented by Newton, were not caused by space, but governed by God.
  • Ernst Mach, 1838-1916, thought celestial and local space to be governed by the stars.  This was principally based on the inertial behavior of a swinging pendulum.
  • Albert Einstein, 1879-1955, refuted Newton's absolute space.  He believed that space was a non-material reality, not governed by mass objects, though it might be distorted by them, providing that time was equally embraced, viz., it was directly related and in parity to space as one variable of a four-dimensional space-time reality.  Also, Mach and Einstein remain in conflict over the definition of space.
  • William Unruh and Paul Davies, 1965, observed invisible sea of virtual particle activity in laboratory near zero space.  Their discoveries support Newton's absolute space, as well as Mach's perception of space, rather than Einstein's.
  • Bernhard Haisch, Harold Puthoff and Alfonso Rueda, 2000, theorized quantum space based upon earlier experimental discoveries.  They support Newton's notion of absolute space.
    •     In historical overview, man's notion of space has not so much evolved, but progressed through a series of fits and starts.  Between man's earliest view of space as proposed by Anaximander and the most recent, Haisch, Puthoff and Rueda, there is complete similarity, suggesting over 2,500 years of wasted time.  Both Anaximander and Democritus sought the direct approach to this study, whereas Plato and Aristotle were influenced and sidetracked by religious doctrine.
        The greatest potential advance was initiated by Newton, who historically was restricted by religion, and then eventually refuted by Leibniz and Berkeley, to the extent that absolute space was lain aside.  Then, less than seventy-five years later, it was totally and intellectually dismantled by classical physicists and by the celebrated post classical physicist, Albert Einstein, without recourse.
        This, along with the failure of the Michelson-Morely experiment in 1883, drove the final nail into it's coffin, despite wiffs of either being discovered in the ninteen twenties by researchers in the U.S.
       Just for the record, here are additional items asserted against absolute space:
  • Leibniz, "Empty space is meaningless".  He believed God must be incorporated in the ultimate explanation.  Corporeal phenomenon should be explained from motion;  this being based on Newton's work.  Leibniz proposed the Doctrine of Substance, by introducing theoretical monads, what he believed were "the very atoms of nature - the elements of things"  He believed that substance, the ultimate reality, can only be as devised by God only.
  • Berkeley "No existence is conceivable (and therefore possible) other than conscious spirit or objects of such consciousness.  No object exists apart from mind.  Mind is, therefore, prior both in thought and in existence.
    •     Just as with Galileo at Pizza, certain things not anticipated are not expected.  Newton was measuring and recording results from his studies of mechanics, when inertia popped up.
        It may have seemed odd to him, that masses connected to weights between pulleys seemed to require a greater starting impulse than necessary once in motion.  It had no name, but it was happening, and it always happened the same, no matter where the experiment was being conducted and it was readily observable with sliding blocks which always seemed to stick prior to being set into motion.  It also was more noticeable, if rather than sliding, the blocks could roll on wheels.
        Did the weight used to pull the sliding block gain energy was it started moving, or did the sliding block lose its inherent resistance to motion, once it started moving?  He did not know the answer, and both solutions seemed diametrically opposed.
        Perhaps, he may have thought, there was some sort of weight change related to motion.  At this time, Einstein relativity was centuries away, and beside, it would have produced a different effect, and not at these slow speeds.
        Intriguingly, the process always consistently related to spatial metrics;  implying that space imposed itself in some way, by some principal, yet to be learned.  But the real problem, was how others treated this enigma, which, as you know, undermined any other developments of Newton's efforts.  Ultimately, the problem has remained historically unanswered.
        At this point in time, the scientific method was breached by theological interests and human competitive vanity.
       This of course happened several times, earlier with Ptolemy and in the last century with Hubble law, however, in the case of the Polemic way of thought, alternative viewpoints were academically non-existent.  As far as the red-shift was concerned though, it is now evident that a scientific sound alternative did exist.
        In the case of Newton's absolute space and Hubble law, scientist should have been in more vigorous pursuit of all options, like them or not.  And that was the problem, that in both cases, scientists cherry picked the options, but not without the influence of their respective religions.
        Strictly concerning ourselves with Newton's discovery of inertia, and being wholly aware of proponents of conflicting purpose--namely divine inertia--what should science have done?  For one, science should have began to embarked upon the search for a mechanism sympathetic to the limitations imposed by empty space.  This could have been accomplished, if scientist at the time, seriously approached the problem of "zero space" by hypothetically studying it and giving it definition, and you only need one guess as to why this was not done.
        One thing I can tell you now about zero space is, that it is so simple compared to anything else, it must exist, and that it is, in and by itself, inert, inclusive of any mechanism of inertia.  I can also tell you about surfaces, and how they can generate inertia, not to mention hydrogen nuclei.  This is the field, which Newton knew nothing about, and Einstein was in close pursuit, along with numerous others, such as Maxwell.
        Call space what you want, and if almost everybody who has studied it is right, space is what Einstein may have referred to as option (c):  substance;   the biggest of all real vessels, including jars and Coke bottles, sans outer walls.
        For the absolutely best, modern description of space, go here.
        Having said all this, the consequences of this bad choice have been devastating, really devastating.
        Though many atom smashers may have been essential to the curious researchers of science, CERN is but a bloody waste of time, energy and money.
        Surely, modern theoreticians like Alan Guth, among many, who are at the forefront of the strict principles of logical abstraction, realize this by now, that somehow man's traditional concepts and expectations of space must undergo adjustment, as he has wrongly demonstrated with the Higgs field and hyper expansion, being that, "Their nature cannot be deduced from known physics, and their detailed properties have to be hypothesized."
        This is of course what we now must do with space and matter:  re-hypothesize their detailed properties, something that could and should have been done over twenty four centuries ago. *
        In essence, Democritus, et. al., simply should have stressed in the study of atomism, that all atomoi must be touching, being that the non-existence of space may not, obstensively, lay between them.  Strictly speaking, it is the only logical choice.
        Had Democritus, Leucippus, and all the atomists at the time done this, they would be rationally forced to retreat to the doctrine of Anaximander almost two hundred years earlier (c. 610 - c. 547 B.C.), concerning the hypothesis of apeiron, directly leading to the recognition and belief that fundamental particles cannot exist per se, but are rather the conglomerates of the fine structure of the field. *
     
     

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