Dr. Randall Mills' Grand Unified Theory
Paul A. Scott
I am re-posting this via e-mail (with slight modifications) since I never
did see my original post or any responses to it in the newsgroup over a
period of two weeks. My apologies to those who may have already seen it and
replied.
Has there been any independent confirmation of Dr. Mills' GUT? Reference
http://www.blacklightpower.com or his book. I have read his book, but as a
layman am unable to verify any of his theory. Still, by reading between the
math, at least some, if not most, of his theory seems reasonable. I am
particularly fond of its effect on current quantum mechanical theory. Mills'
GUT has a simplicity that satisfies many doubts I have had about widely held
yet controversial theories ranging from the atomic to the cosmological. I
would appreciate any serious comments by qualified persons. I'm not
interested in any out-of-hand dismissal or agreement (regardless of the
commentator's qualifications), but rather valid assessments of his theory
and experimental data.
I hope for an open discussion in sci.physics.research but welcome direct
e-mail from anyone with valid information.
Paul A. Scott
psc...@netcom.com
Doug Natelson
psc...@netcom.com (Paul Scott) writes:
>> Dr. Mills' ideas have serious flaws, both conceptually and
>> empirically. He repeatedly misapplies the relativistic length
>> contraction to directions perpendicular to the direction of
>> motion. He repeatedly tries to use special rel. in noninertial
>> frames (not in instantaneously comoving inertial frames, but
>> noninertial ones). There were more conceptual problems, but my
>> memory is foggy.
>
>But is either really inappropriate? And if so, why? Could a
>modified approach work?
Yes, both are inappropriate. As for why, I'll refer you to the
physics FAQ (there's a big section on special relativity and
what these various things mean). The key to being a good
physicist (experimental or theoretical) is to know your tools
(Lorentz transforms, various approximation methods, etc.) and
when/how to use them. The relativistic length contraction
*has* to be along the direction of motion in question; it comes
directly from the math. He uses a particular formula in a
situation where that formula is not applicable; this is mathematically
just wrong.
>> Experimentally, there are several flaws with his work.
>> I'll just stick to the biggest one: There
>> is *no* (none, zip, zilch, zero) evidence for the existence
>> of 'hydrinos', a supposed n = 1/2 state of hydrogen w/ an
>> ionization energy of 54 eV.
>
>Yet Mills gives evidence of this and other ionization energies
>predicted by the theory. Much of the evidence is from other
>peoples experiments which (according to Mills, anyway) was
>improperly explained by them. There is no dearth of experimental
>evidence.
Mills (who publishes in a non-peer reviewed cold fusion journal,
IIRC) takes certain xray and uv photoemission spectra from
solid materials and points to broad bumps near energies that he likes.
The line widths are very broad to be atomic sort of resonances.
There is a dearth of what I will call solid evidence. If Mills is
right, I should be able to take a bunch of protons and a bunch of
electrons, allow them to recombine, and some fraction of the time
I should get 'hydrinos'. Many many many plasma physicists have worked
with hydrogen plasma like this for well over 50 years, and there
just is no sign of hydrinos at all.
>Or, you might not
>have the right conditions for hydrino production.
Given that Mills never specifies what those conditions are,
this is an irrefutable argument and thus the stuff of pseudoscience.
I'm in thesis mode right now, so I don't have time to go through
all of the problems with the explanations that Mills has. I would
point out, though, that he pretty much sticks to post-diction rather
than pre-diction. Does he ever say, 'go out and do the following
experiment, and my theory says you should see x, while conventional
theory predicts y.'?
>I am quite skeptical of Mills' work, whether or not I sound that way.
>But I am not willing to dismiss it either, for I think he makes
>some interesting arguments. Then again, I'm a layman without the
>means to work on the problem. That's why I'm asking for input
>from anyone who has worked it through.
Well, as I said before, he may have some wild electrochemistry
happening, but his theoretical work has major problems, IMO.
Best,
Doug N
john baez
"Paul A. Scott" <psc...@netcom.com> wrote:
>Has there been any independent confirmation of Dr. Mills' GUT?
Doug Natelson (nate...@embezzle.stanford.edu) wrote:
>For reasons I won't get into, I was asked to read this book and
>offer my opinion on its merits/problems.
For reasons that I won't get into either, I was also asked to study
Mills' theory. I was given a manuscript written by Randell L.
Mills and John J. Farrell, entitled "A New Atomic Theory". Their
theory seemed nutty, but it had one feature which made me willing
to spend a little time on it: it made a nontrivial testable
prediction.
Namely, it gave a simple formula for the first ionization energy of
an ion with only 2 electrons --- that is, the energy it takes to
ionize the first electron. In ordinary quantum mechanics, computing
this energy requires solving the 3-body problem, which can only be
done numerically: one does not expect a simple closed-form answer.
The formula of Mills and Farrell is as follows. Let Z be the number
of protons. Then they obtain:
Ionization energy = E_{coulombic} + E_{magnetic}
if Z = 2 (helium) and
Ionization energy = E_{coulombic} - E_{magnetic}/Z
if Z > 2. Here
E_{coulombic} = (Z-1) e^2
----------------
8 pi epsilon r
E_{magnetic} = 2 pi mu e^2 hbar^2
----------------------
Z m^2 r^3
where
e = electron charge
m = electron mass
epsilon = permittivity of the vacuum
mu = permeability of the vacuum
r = "atomic radius" = a (1/(Z-1) - sqrt(s(s+1))/Z(Z-1))
and
s = spin of electron = 1/2
a = Bohr radius = 4 pi epsilon hbar^2
-------------------
e^2 m
These predictions match experiment up to 3 significant figures
at least up to Z = 9 (fluorine). This is pretty darn good if Mills
claims to be ignoring relativistic effects, which are of order alpha
= 1/137. I don't know what he thinks about relativity or whether
he proposes a way to correct his theory to give exact results. If
his theory cannot be souped up to give results of arbitrary accuracy,
it is, of course, wrong.
It's interesting to compare his ideas to standard ideas regarding
the first ionization energy of helium. The experimental result
is .90360 Hartrees. (Don't ask me why people use Hartrees when
discussing this question. I'm surprised that I ever mastered the
maze of units involved in this seemingly innocent subject. A
Hartree is 2 Rydbergs, and a Rydberg is about 13.6058 eV - the
ionization energy of hydrogen as computed using Schrodinger's
equation.) The Hartree-Fock approximation gives .861679 Hartrees.
The elaborate calculation of Hylleras using trial wavefunctions
gave .90324 Hartrees, and the still more elaborate calculation of
Kinoshita gave .9037245 Hartrees. The above formula of Mills
gives .90371 Hartrees.
Mills and Farrell give a derivation of their formula starting
from some rather strange physics; I'm curious as to whether some
approximation method starting with Schrodinger's equation also
leads to the same formula.
Ray Tomes
[Moderator's note: Some more critical discussion of Mills would be
welcome, but followups should concentrate on specific aspects and
criticism of Mills's theory, and not become too speculative. -P.H.]
In sci.physics.research, on Fri, 23 Jan 1998,
nate...@embezzle.Stanford.EDU (Doug Natelson) wrote:
...
>There is a dearth of what I will call solid evidence. If Mills is
>right, I should be able to take a bunch of protons and a bunch of
>electrons, allow them to recombine, and some fraction of the time
>I should get 'hydrinos'. Many many many plasma physicists have worked
>with hydrogen plasma like this for well over 50 years, and there
>just is no sign of hydrinos at all. =20
>>Or, you might not have the right conditions for hydrino production.=20
>Given that Mills never specifies what those conditions are,
>this is an irrefutable argument and thus the stuff of pseudoscience.
Not so. If I understand Mills' argument it says that you cannot go
directly from any state of hydrogen (including ionised) to the hydrino
(period). It requires the assistance of a catalyst, I assume because
both energy and momentum must be conserved during a collision. The
catalyst therefore must be a molecule with a very specific mass which
Mills calculated and then experimentally tested.
-- Ray Tomes -- http://www.kcbbs.gen.nz/users/rtomes/rt-home.htm --
Cycles email list -- http://www.kcbbs.gen.nz/users/af/cyc.htm