PSI Blog 20090909 Does Energy Have Mass?
Glad you are enjoying www.scientificphilosophy.com and TTAOS (Borchardt, 2004). I hope you were able to see the media file (Borchardt, 2009a).
Your question was:
Re: E=MC2, if I do the algebra and if c is constant, then c=(sqrt) E/M. Since M can't be 0 (as far as our physical universe is defined), then doesn't E have to have some mass, even if vanishingly small? If the above is true, then could the (even vanishingly small) amount of mass in all the electromagnetic radiation in all of the universe contribute a significant portion of the 'missing mass' problem in cosmology? This question also gets into the current 'solution' to the missing-mass problem that proposes the existence of dark matter. Seems to me that it's fundamentally based on a refusal to question the assumption whether Newton's Law is universal. It seems so much simpler to both me and Occam's razor to admit we may be ignorant about the cosmos and then look at Modified Newtonian Dynamics instead of hypothesizing a theoretical substance that we can't detect but that simply MUST exist so that Newton Law can remain valid. Anyway, just some thoughts for your consideration (or amusement :)
Another interesting question. It’s a logical solution for c that I don’t remember seeing before. You might want to review the chapter in TTAOS on INSEPARABILITY along with my abstract on “The Physical Meaning of E=mc2” (Borchardt, 2009b). I am writing the paper now, so your question is specially apropos. I included that section in the video conference, so maybe that will help. In brief, E has no mass, because it is a matter-motion term for an idea. Likewise, radiation has no mass, if one assumes, as I do, that radiation is the motion of matter. Thus, ether is the medium for the motion called light, just as air is the medium for the motion called sound. Few would think of sound as having mass, but, as you have picked up on, well studied modern physicists would be remiss if they did not consider light to be material (although a contradictory matterless particle, at that). Like most of us, you are playing with the cards that we have been dealt, so it is not surprising that we might think of “dark energy” as a “thing” having mass. The ether, like the air, indeed has mass (Borchardt, 2007, p. 203), and is an absolute necessity for Infinite Universe Theory. The Cosmic Background Radiation is evidence for the presence of the ether, which, like all matter, vibrates to produce temperature.
Remember that many of the paradoxes and many of the questions still being asked by Big Bangers and relativists are based on indeterministic assumptions. Once the correct assumptions are used, those disappear. I haven’t studied the “dark matter” problem well enough to make up my mind whether or not it is an artifact of the BBT. It could be that the mass of the forbidden ether is enough to satisfy some of the math once we assume that the universe is infinite and not expanding.
As Einstein admitted, Newton’s great work will remain so for all time. Newton’s error, similar to Einstein, was to assume finity. Your somewhat prescient call for a Modified Newtonian Dynamics was answered in the “Neomechanics” chapter of TSW (Borchardt, 2007, pp. 127-151). Instead of getting rid of the ether, however, it absolutely required it. So no luck with that for saving the BBT.
References:
Borchardt, Glenn, 2004, The ten assumptions of science: Toward a new scientific worldview: Lincoln, NE, iUniverse, 125 p.
Borchardt, Glenn, 2007, The Scientific Worldview: Beyond Newton and Einstein: Lincoln, NE, iUniverse, 411 p.
Borchardt, Glenn, 2009a, The Ten Assumptions of Science: First Steps in the Overthrow of the Big Bang Theory (Part 1), Natural Philosophy Alliance Video Conference, Natural Philosophy Alliance ( http://www.worldnpa.org/php2/index.php?tab0=Events&tab1=Display&id=243 ).
Borchardt, Glenn, 2009b, The physical meaning of E=mc2 [abs.], in 16th Natural Philosophy Alliance Conference, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, Natural Philosophy Alliance (http://www.worldnpa.org/php2/index.php?tab0=Abstracts&tab1=Display&id=3002&tab=2 ).