On Tuesday, August 27, 2019 at 2:47:39 AM UTC-6, Alan Grayson wrote: > > > > On Tuesday, August 27, 2019 at 1:59:40 AM UTC-6, Bruce wrote: >> >> On Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 5:39 PM Alan Grayson <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> On Tuesday, August 27, 2019 at 1:08:33 AM UTC-6, Bruce wrote: >>>> >>>> On Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 4:57 PM Alan Grayson <[email protected]> >>>> wrote: >>>> >>>>> >>>>> But if virtual particles don't exist, if they're based on conceptual >>>>> errors, what's the basis for claiming the vacuum is not a vacuum of >>>>> nothingness? AG >>>>> >>>> >>>> Virtual particles are a useful heuristic for evaluating a perturbation >>>> series. The conceptual error is to reify the terms in this series, >>>> particularly the virtual particles. Quantum foam, or the picture of >>>> virtual >>>> particles fluctuating in and out of existence, everywhere, and all the >>>> time. Is a major conceptual confusion. There are no such things as quantum >>>> fluctuations in the requisite sense. Disconnected Feynman diagrams do not >>>> contribute to physical processes -- this is an elementary text-book result. >>>> >>>> Bruce >>>> >>> >>> How then do you interpret the Casimir Effect? Isn't it used to >>> experimentally establish the existence of virtual particles? AG >>> >> >> The Casimir effect is perfectly well explained in terms of Van der Waals >> type forces. Explanations in terms of virtual particles don't really work >> because virtual particles do not exert any force on anything -- because >> they are not real!!!! >> >> Bruce >> > > I see. What about the vacuum energy? What does it consist of if not > virtual particles? AG >
Part of what I'm getting at is this; if the vacuum energy has anything to do with the quantized EM field, the values 1/2*hbar *omega aren't photons! So what is the form of energy in the vacuum? AG -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/21ac7fa4-c10f-486f-9ce5-2d8dbdd400c7%40googlegroups.com.
