Feyman Doubling Down by QED

Feyman diagrams revealing the deepest secrets of Nature.

This is a continuation of the previous post on the evolution of theoretical physics during the 20th century in a sequence of doubling downs to a new more complex theory when facing difficulties with an old theory instead of resolving the difficulties. Let us take a look at the step from the Quantum Mechanics QM of atoms of the 1920s to the Quantum Electro Dynamics QED of the 1950s including light preparing for Quantum Field Theory QFT as the ultimate quantum theory of modern physics underlying the Standard Model of elementary particles.   

QED was presented to a general public by its leading proponent Richard Feynman in 4 lectures later collected into the book QED The Strange Theory of Light and Matter. 

Newton's primitive idea of light as a stream of light particles was in the late 19th century replaced by Maxwell's equations, where in particular light appears as a wave carried by oscillating electromagnetic fields. Maxwell's equations concisely captures all of electromagnetics as the top jewel of classical mathematical physics. 

Einstein refuted Newton in 1916 and Feynman refuted Maxwell in 1948 and so returned to Newton: Light is a stream of particles named photons. In the book Feynman's argues: 

• The theory of QED describes Nature as absurd from the point of view of common sense. 
• We have so far, found nothing wrong with QED. It is therefore the jewel of physics- our proudest possession.
• It is very important to understand that light behaves as particles, especially for those of you who have gone to school, where you were probably told something about light behaving like waves.
• We were talking about light. The first important feature about light is that it appears to be particles: when very weak monochromatic light (light of one color) hits a detector, the detector makes equally loud clicks less and less often as the light gets dimmer
• Newton thought that light was made up of particles- he called them "corpuscles"—and he was right (but the reasoning that he used to come to that decision was erroneous). We know that light is made of particles because we can take a very sensitive instrument that makes clicks when light shines on it, and if the light gets dimmer, the clicks remain just as loud-there are just fewer of them. Thus light is something like raindrops-each little lump of light is called a photon—and if the light is all one color, all the "rain- drops" are the same size.
• So now, I present to you the three basic actions, from which all the phenomena of light and electrons arise. ACTION #1: A photon goes from place to place. ACTION #2: An electron goes from place to place. ACTION #3: An electron emits or absorbs a photon.
• The problem is, when we try to calculate all the way down to zero distance, the equation blows up in our face and gives meaningless answers-things like infinity. This caused a lot of trouble when the theory of quantum electrodynamics first came out. 
• People were getting infinity for every problem they tried to calculate!

We see here typical ingredients of doubling down raising the bid so that it cannot be called as in poker: 

1. The theory is absurd beyond comprehension. 
2. The theory is perfect with perfect agreement with observation. 
3. The theory appears to give meaningless results. 
4. The theory is primitive as being reduced to Action #1-3.   

Since the theory is incomprehensible it cannot be questioned or called. That the theory shows perfect agreement with observation is impossible to check, since direct application of the theory by a non-expert gives meaningless infinities.

The reason QED produces infinities is Action #3 which opens to self-interaction: An electron emits a photon and then absorbs the photon, as discussed in this post showing the danger of self-feed back. 

Feynman like Einstein propelled himself to be the golden boy of modern physics as expressed in the book Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman. In later years his geniality has been questioned by e g Freeman Dyson in particular the mystery of self-interaction.

The argument that light is shown to be a stream of particles because light can give rise to "clicks" of an instrument, is as silly as saying that a good joke is a particle because it can give rise to a laugh.  

PS The Standard Model divides particles into matter (fermions) and force carriers (bosons) with photon the massless carrier of the electromagnetic force. The trouble with this double set of particles with matter particles interacting by forces transmitted by force carrying particles, in the above setting electrons interacting by emitting and absorbing photon particles, is that it opens to self-interaction going wild into infinities. In the setting of gravitation this would require some form of graviton particles, which have not been found. Instead, gravitational force appears to come from a gravitational potential field present everywhere. The trauma of modern physics is that the Standard Model is incompatible with gravitation. The trouble comes from the role of bosons as force carrying particles. If there are no gravitons, maybe there are no bosons either? And then what about QED and QFT?   

On Scientific Stupidity

Peter McCullough recalls that in 1943, the Lutheran pastor and member of the German resistance Dietrich Bonhoeffer was arrested and incarcerated in Tegel Prison: 

• There he meditated on the question of why the German people—in spite of their vast education, culture, and intellectual achievements—had fallen so far from reason and morality. He concluded that they, as a people, had been afflicted with collective Stupidity (German: Dummheit). 
• The events in Germany between 1933 and 1943 had shown him that perfectly intelligent people were, under the pressure of political power and propaganda, rendered stupid—that is, incapable of critical reasoning. 

This is what Dietrich Bonhoeffer concluded from his analysis in his Letters and Papers from Prison: 

• Folly is a more dangerous enemy to the good than evil. One can protest against evil; it can be unmasked and, if need be, prevented by force. Evil always carries the seeds of its own destruction, as it makes people, at the least, uncomfortable. Against folly we have no defence. 
• Neither protests nor force can touch it; reasoning is no use; facts that contradict personal prejudices can simply be disbelieved - indeed, the fool can counter by criticizing them, and if they are undeniable, they can just be pushed aside as trivial exceptions. 
• So the fool, as distinct from the scoundrel, is completely self-satisfied; in fact, he can easily become dangerous, as it does not take much to make him aggressive. 
• A fool must therefore be treated more cautiously than a scoundrel; we shall never again try to convince a fool by reason, for it is both useless and dangerous.
• But there is some consolation in these thoughts on folly: they in no way justify us in thinking that most people are fools in all circumstances. What will really matter is whether those in power expect more from people’s folly than from their wisdom and independence of mind.
• There are people who are mentally agile but: foolish, and people who are mentally slow but very far from foolish - a discovery that we make to our surprise as a result of particular situations. 
• We thus get the impression that folly is likely to be, not a congenital defect, but one that is acquired in certain circumstances where people make fools of themselves or allow others to make fools of them. 
• We notice further that this defect is less common in the unsociable and solitary than in individuals or groups that are inclined or condemned to sociability. It seems, then, that folly is a sociological rather than a psychological problem, and that it is a special form of the operation of historical circumstances: on people, a psychological by-product of definite external factors. 
• If we look more closely, we see that any violent display of power, whether political or religious, produces an outburst of folly in a large part of mankind...

We know very well that there are many expressions of foolishness in the history of both politics and science and it is natural to ask if we are less stupid today than 100 years ago when preparing for WWII. Since we now seem to be actively preparing for WWIII the answer must be no, at least as concerns politics. But what then about science? It seems that science and stupidity do not blend well, but is it really true that the stupidity in science is less today than 100 or 200 years ago? 

With the amazing advances in many areas of technology (and warfare), it would seem that stupidity is no longer a problem in science, only in politics, but is it true? Let us listen to what some famous leading modern physicists say, stupid or not:

• Those who are not shocked when they first come across quantum theory cannot possibly have understood it. (Niels Bohr)
• Niels Bohr brainwashed a whole generation of theorists into thinking that the job (interpreting quantum theory) was done 50 years ago. (Murray GellMann)
• Quantum mechanics makes absolutely no sense. (Roger Penrose)
• If quantum mechanics is correct, it signifies the end of physics as a science. (Alfred Einstein)
• I do not like quantum mechanics, and I am sorry I ever had anything to do with it. (Erwin Schrödinger)
• If you are not completely confused by quantum mechanics, you do not understand it. (John Wheeler)
• There was a time when the newspapers said that only twelve men understood the theory of relativity. I do not believe there ever was such a time. (Richard Feynman)
• I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics. (Richard Feynman)
• Since the mathematicians have invaded the theory of relativity, I do not understand it myself anymore. (Einstein)
• No matter how hard you try to teach your cat general relativity, you're going to fail. (Brian Greene)

So we learn from highest scientific authority that modern physics based on the theories of quantum mechanics and relativity are not understood. Does it mean that physicists are stupid, or only that the theory is stupid?

Why Feynman Said: Nobody Understands Quantum Mechanics

We have always had a great deal of difficulty understanding the world view that quantum mechanics represents. At least I do, because I'm an old enough man that I haven't got to the point that this stuff is obvious to me. Okay, I still get nervous with it.... I cannot define the real problem, therefore I suspect there's no real problem, but I'm not sure there's no real problem.

The (trivial) commutator relation  

• $px - xp = ih$, 

where $x$ is the position (operator) and $p=\frac{h}{i}\frac{\partial}{\partial x}$ is the momentum (operator), is supposed to play a fundamental role in quantum mechanics,  in particular as the origin of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle:

• $\sigma_x\sigma_p\ge \frac{h}{2}$,

where $\sigma_x$ is the standard deviation in measurements of position $x$, and $\sigma_p$ that of momentum. 

We see that both the commutator relation and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle concern the product of position and momentum. But such a product lacks physical meaning. Momentum $p$ has physical meaning and so has position $x$, but their product has no physical meaning.  

Momentum multiplied by velocity has a physical meaning as kinetic energy, but momentum multiplied by position does not. Force multiplied by velocity has a meaning as work.

Quantum mechanics is however obsessed with the product of momentum and position, with the message that because of the commutator relation they cannot both be determined at the same time and spot. The message is that this makes quantum mechanics fundamentally different from classical mechanics where supposedly momentum and position can both be determined.

There are two approaches to physics:

1. Make it as simple and understandable as possible. 
2. Make it as complicated and mysterioud as possible.     

Quantum mechanics has developed according to 2 as evidenced by Richard Feynman:

• I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics.

One reason is that the product of momentum and position is given an fundamental role in contradiction to the fact that it has no physical meaning.