Talk:Heim theory/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Heim theory. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

To Do

Some good external references are absolutely necessary.
Should the relevant parts from Burkhard Heim moved here or would a re-write be better?
12-dimensional? Wasn't it 6?
See the new introductory paragraph, I've explained it here.HappyCamper 16:01, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Folks, if you managed to find your way through the Heim books, it should be a minor effort in comparison, to put some more facts here.

Pjacobi 16:39, 2005 Jan 3 (UTC)

Actually, for me, I'm finding it very difficult to obtain a copy for my own use. Could you recommend where I can find a copy? HappyCamper 16:01, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
Some ISBN are shown in de.wiki, and the books seem to be available in some of german online bookshops (try the first one). --Serenity-Fr 11:12, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
I have access to all 4 of those books now...(but unfortunately I cannot read German!) --HappyCamper 12:28, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
About that Higless Theory link - one could make it a re-direct perhaps, but that would imply it's the only Higgless theory - this is certainly true as regards serious rivals to String Theory.
I have 2 of the books but understanding German is not always very helpful. I just got the transcript of the Heim Tapes from IvL - in German - they are much more readable, as promised. Once I get through that (only on page 2 of 67 now) I may have a clearer picture - may even be able to reccomend an English translation.

--hughey 12:17, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Splitup details

@Hdeasy: The splitup between the two articles Burkhard Heim and Heim-Theory would work best, if this article Heim-Theory would concentrate on the theory content, so to say the hard facts and the biography article Burkhard Heim on the personal side, Heim's handicap, working style, etc.

In this reasoning I'd prefer to remove especially:

Those modern physicists who find fault with such a paucity of publications would do well to recall that the modern pressure in academe to publish several papers per year or lose tenure was not present 50 years ago. Also, Heim could afford to operate outside the university milleau and thus was immune to this pressure which often results in premature publication. Einstein went through a long period of 'incubation' before producing his revolutionary relativity theory. Heim's incubation period was somewhat longer (ten times), but then if his theory was all the more revolutionary perhaps the longer the incubation the better.

I don't do it now, to not disturb your editing and to wait for your opinion.

Pjacobi 22:05, 2005 Jan 5 (UTC) Yes - why not move that section to the main Burkhard Heim page? Could you do that? I just answered you on 'E' at the talk page there, by the way.--hughey 11:41, 13 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Okay - I am working on a major re-write of this theory section - the point about being too complex is taken. The updated version should give a better overview of the theory and have some of the biographical details removed. --hughey 14:37, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The recent updates by HappyCamper et al. have made the article much more readable and removed overly technical phraseology. Certainly if one looks at some maths pages with convoluted formulae and abstrusely abstract ideas, this Heim-Theory page is innocuous in the extreme. Thus I think it's more than enough to have the POV warning.--hughey 09:03, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

POV dispute warning

Since this article continues to be developed as an eventual replacement for the discussion of physics in the Burkhard Heim article, it seems reasonable that the POV dispute label from that article be copied here. (Once the physics material is removed from there, I assume that the label there should be removed as well: I don't think anyone disputes the details of Heim's life story, just the validity of his theories.) For an explanation of the POV dispute in question, I refer readers to the extensive discussion at Talk:Burkhard Heim.--Steuard 21:28, Apr 5, 2005 (UTC)

I don't think the article is that biased at the moment, but it is starting to creep in. However, I think the primary reason why the evolution of the Heim-Theory-like pages has generally been biased is due to the lack of equations and a thorough presentation of the logic underneath the theory. HappyCamper 00:00, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I find it is perhaps time to reconsider this disputed label, especially as the paper by Droescher and Haeuser on aerospace applications of Heim-Theory, published by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics ( AIAA ) in 2005 (see Heim talk page) will be awarded the prize for best paper of the year on July 13th by the Nuclear and Future Flight Propulsion Technical Committee of the AIAA. As this was a refereed paper and the AIAA is a recognised scholarly society, it would seem that the Heim-Theory is gaining more credence. Note that the previous winner of the prize was Dr. Robert Frisbee of JPL - announcement here [1] and paper here [2] to show the standard of this award. --hughey 14:45, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Oh and as for a 'lack of equations and a thorough presentation of the logic underneath the theory', surely this would exacerbate the 'too technical' stamp. Equations are there a-plenty should the need arise, as well as descriptions of the logic, again if the 'too technical' thing is relaxed. --hughey 15:02, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, but the credentials of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics on Quantum Field Theory aren't that stellar. It's a not uncommon move in fringe science, to gather support from outsiders. E.g. Anatoly Timofeevich Fomenko tries to get support from statisticans for his speculations in history, which have zero support from historians. --Pjacobi 19:22, 2005 Apr 6 (UTC)

I don't know this Fomenko, but if he is only trying, then he is not comparable, as Droescher and Haeuser have successfully convinced the referees of the AIAA (from universities and industry), and impressed them so much that they have bestowed a prize on them. One reason for this may be that Droescher could answer any mathematical objections of the referees - in May he will present a rigorous derivation of the Eigen-value equations behind the mass formula, to be made available on the Heim-theory page. Note also that the program for the July conference has these authors down for a talk on "a Pulsed Magnet Experiment to Measure the Space Propulsion Heim- Lorentz Force". Thus a good reason for publishing with an aerospace scholarly society may be that experimental evidence is more easily presented in that context. Certainly it will be interesting to see if they succeed where Heim himself could not go, due to the lack of adnvanced magnetic technology in those pre-cyclotron days. It will be amusing to see such proof - then the discussions here will become moot. --hughey 11:04, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Two quick remarks about publishing off-topic in refereed journals. There are several refereed journals devoted to GPS, the Global Positioning System. The referees are competent engineers; none-the-less, one finds that about 1 in 30 papers or so is some crank physics paper ... one finds all kinds of crank goodies ... papers that disprove special relativity, papers that prove the speed of light is infinite, etc. These are mostly based on falacious reasoning about the global space-time reference frame that GPS provides. They are often dense and impenetrable, filled with arcane math. A bit of mental gymnastics and puzzle-solving is needed to find where the author has gone wrong. So getting published in a refereed journal is not sufficient to prove correctness. linas 03:15, 8 May 2005 (UTC)

As to the mass equation ... any equation that gave particle masses, even if it was pulled out of thin air, would be very valuable. It does not need to be derived from first principles or anything like that. Just simply stating a formula that is accurate to 6-7 decimal places (as claimed) and has no (or few) free parameters would be a fantastic achievement. I'd suggest that the Heim supporters publish this equation first, and then worry about how to derive it later. If its really that accurate, it will win supporters, who will then willingly comb over the rest of the material. linas 03:15, 8 May 2005 (UTC)

A few things here. First, Heim is not in the same league as these 'crank physicists'. He had a long pedigree and was recognised as a genius in the 1950s. I just got a reprint of a Stern article from 1954 and this opinion is plainly stated. Then on the mass formula - of course it is highly significant, and the Heim-theory group has published it - look in their web site: there are two 'instantiations' of it - the 1982 and the 1989 ones. Since it is a nested formula however, it is not so easy to follow - but the HT group made an effort to be as succinct as possible, giving the amazing importance of the formula. Then they also include (in German only at the moment) the mathematical derivation of the mass formula. Finally, Droescher has promised for MAY 2005 (i.e. soon!!!) a rigorous mathemtical derivation of one of the main aspects of the formula derivation - i.e. the Eigen-value equations: the terms in the mass formula depend on the multiple Eigen-values for each particle obtained from these relations. So: stay tuned. Finally, on 'infinite light speed' - the case is not so simple: Von Flandern's arguments are not based on abstruse and dense maths, but on clear physical reasoning: gravitational aberration is a real effect - the gravity effect of an eclipse of the sun by the moon comes some second before optical coincidence of the disks: also, Von Flandern's point that by insisting on angular momentum conservation as a constraint, General relativity essentially forces c to be its normal value - but it needs the 'retarded' potential, which anticipates the body's future position. Anyway, rest assured - Heim finds a speed for gravitational waves of 1.1 C as found by various experiments, and since it is an extension of Einstein's theory it normally agrees on the limiting velocity C: only in the case of a 'warp' drive where a sub-space splits off from normal 4-d spacetime can this subspace bubble go faster than c as it is no nonlger part of the normal spactime continuum. That's all covered in Droescher & Haueser's propulsion papers. --hughey 07:57, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

"Meanings" of extra dimensions

A section has just been added to the article discussing the significance of the extra dimensions necessary in Heim Theory, which is obviously a good thing. However, that section seems focused on downplaying the "meanings" assigned to those extra dimensions, which I believe is a mistake. Note, for instance, the following quote from the "Goals of the Research Group" page [3] at http://www.heim-theory.com/:

"The two additional dimensions are not - like in Kalzua-Klein theories - curled up in small areas, but they are principally verifiable domains of values of the world. But they are not measurable by physical instruments and have an informational character, since they describe qualitative aspects (meanings) of material organisations."

This quote seems to clearly state that the reason that these extra dimensions are not measurable is their "informational character" (they aren't measureable "since they describe... [meanings] of material organizations"). And, as I have pointed out elsewhere, I have seen no other explanation from Heim Theory for why those extra dimensions would not be observable (not that I accept this one, mind you).

Similar statements were made by von Ludwiger in the withdrawn paper, "The Physics of Burkhard Heim and its Applications to Space Propulsion", that was discussed at Talk:Burkhard Heim/Archive1:

"The 5th and 6th dimension, although imaginary like the time-dimension, have to be something different, because more than one single time dimension leads to unphysical results (Cole 1980). According to Heim, the two higher dimensions are associated with organizational properties. They will be called “trans-coordinates“, to distinguish them from the four dimensions with which we are all familiar. They are denoted by x5 and x6. x5 is a coordinate designating the degree of organization of a system..."

Again, the position of Heim Theory seems to be that these extra dimensions are intrinsically related to information or organization somehow, and that this is the reason that they are "something different" from ordinary time dimensions. So I believe that the article should take those claims seriously, even if that leads to some embarrassment in the eyes of mainstream science. (Also, even if the new "misnomers" section is only intended to refer to dimensions above six where the above quotes do not apply, I expect that Heim Theory relies on similar arguments about the "informational" character of those additional dimensions to explain why they too are not observed.)

Finally, I would point out that these "spiritual" ideas seem to be very closely associated with Heim's theories in his successors' minds. That same "Goals of the Research Group" webpage discusses Heim's work with logic, and says that

"Only in this way it was possible to formalise biological and psychological processes (like consciousness) in a 6-dimensional manifold, and therefore also non-physical events".

So it appears that a central goal of Heim Theory is the "formali[zation of] biological and psychological processes (like consciousness) in a 6-dimensional manifold". Again, this seems to be at odds with the insistence of the new "misnomers" section that the "spiritual" labels for the extra dimensions should not be taken seriously. On the contrary, http://www.heim-theory.com/ appears to take them very seriously indeed.--Steuard 19:09, Apr 29, 2005 (UTC)

You're welcome to modify the "misnomer" section so it better addresses the concerns you listed :-) HappyCamper 21:19, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I know, I know. : ) But when it comes to this particular topic, I've thus far maintained an almost unbroken policy of not editing the articles directly, for what may be selfish reasons. In particular, I'm a young scientist, and I'm awfully hesitant to put my name on any version of an article whose "science" I disagree with as strongly as this unless that version of the article contains something awfully close to what I'd consider a fully scientific (or perhaps more politely, "mainstream") point of view. In the case of the article on "Heim Theory" (or Heim himself), I think I'd want to rewrite or at least thoroughly rewrite the whole thing, and I just haven't had the time. I'll keep looking for an opportunity, but my real science work has to take precedence.

There's also an issue of POV: I pride myself on objectivity and an open mind (that's what drove me to try to give Heim's work a "fair hearing" here, rather than dismissing it out of hand as most scientists have), but I don't know if any version of this article that I felt did the subject justice would be considered acceptible by Heim's supporters. (At the very least, it would take a lot of effort to write an article that we'd all consider to be NPOV.) I know that I have not seen any appreciable fraction of what Heim and his followers have produced (in part because it's in German and relies on some homemade notation), but what little I have seen has convinced me that there would be little use in investigating the theory further. It is my firm scientific opinion that "Heim Theory" does not describe the real world, and I rather suspect that if I were to investigate it in full detail, I would find that it was not self-consistent as a theory of physics in any sense. My initial involvement with Heim Theory on Wikipedia was to suggest that it be deleted under the "No original research" policy (as I outlined on Talk:Burkhard Heim/Archive1), and if the choice were mine alone I would still opt for that resolution. But that does make writing an article with no perceived bias somewhat difficult.--Steuard 22:16, Apr 29, 2005 (UTC)

Well, I think it's best to leave it at that. You're always welcome to join in with editing though :-) HappyCamper 03:51, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps the "spiritual" 5th and 6th dimensions in Heim's theory are analagous to the conformal boundary at spacial infinity in the holographic principle, which conjectures that the universe can be represented as a hologram which is isomorphic to the information "inscribed" on its boundaries. The connection between the holographic principle and a conformal boundary being drawn from a rigorous realization of the holographic principle as the AdS/CFT correspondence by Juan Maldacena.

Hello everybody

After a long time reading stuff about Heim, I have decided to contribute to the article. As you can see, I have added a new section called "Matter and forces" (the first name I thought) when I will try to explain how matter and interactions arises in Heim Theory. I think that the Dröscher and Häuser papers are very interesting, and all the information about hermetries and gravito-photons should be added to the article (the http://www.cle.de/hpcc links seem to be broken now).

I have also found an interesting biography of Heim, and a couple of links in German:

http://www.worlditc.org/f_06_protosimplex_heim_a_biography.htm http://info.uibk.ac.at/c/cb/cb26/heim/ http://www.datadiwan.de/netzwerk/index.htm?../heim/he_000d_.htm

(I don't know if those links have been posted in another talk page).

--Pezezin 18:49, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

datadiwan.de is of course a site of disputed reputation, to say the least... --Pjacobi 19:29, 2005 May 3 (UTC)

Check out the Burkhard Heim page for a list of all the links which have already been discussed on its talk page. If you like, you're welcome to sort through those links. Some of them are probably more suitable for the biographical oriented Burkhard Heim, while the others might be more suitable for the theoretical oriented Heim theory. Also, if you decide to search for other articles on Heim, typically the more "academic" ones are much harder to dig up; the "new age" stuff seems to predominate. Nevertheless, they do exist!

If we add details on hermetries, an absolute must is an explanation for how the groupings arise. For example, how did Heim specifically derive the set components of H5? Also, please feel free to add any relevant content. Maybe even add a section on hermetries and gravito-photons too. HappyCamper 20:43, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

An explanation for the tensor elements?

I found an interesting site http://www.rodiehr.de/ --> There is a link to a page which appears to explain what the tensor elements mean. Can someone verify this and determine if it is noteworthy to incorporate some of these ideas into the article? The link is found here [9], just scroll down the page. HappyCamper 03:51, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

A request for translation

(originally posted on Marcika by HappyCamper)

I am a contributor to the page Heim theory, and would like to determine whether the material from this website [10] would be useful for the article. If you scroll down to the middle of the page, there is a 6 by 6 square with lots of colours in it. The few paragraphs after that seem to be describing what the colours are supposed to mean. In your spare time, could you consider translating those passages, and placing your translation on Talk:Heim theory? Your efforts would be greatly appreciated! --HappyCamper 01:44, 5 May 2005 (UTC)

Here it goes:

The tensor matrix of 2nd order T_ik has the following structure:

The components labled with 0 describe virtual energy densities. The nine components T11 to T33 on the upper left describe the three-dimensional R3 space that we know. The 16 components T11 to T44 result in the four-dimensional Einsteinian space-time R4. The components T55 to T66 on the lower right are called "transmatrix" by Heim. They are completely outside the space-time R4. T45, T46, T54 and T64 connect the R4 space to the six-dimensional space R6 T11 to T66.

All six dimensions turned out to be physical ones, and Heim could only calculate the values for all elementary particles to all decimal places in these six dimensions. Dr. H.D. Schulz has entered the Heim formulas into the computer at DESY (German Electron Synchrotron, Hamburg) and has calculated all 300 particles know today. With the large accelerators one can measure the physical data of the particles. All of them agree with the theoretical values to the last decimal. This is a "world sensation of the largest order" (E. Senkowski). [end of quote]

Marcika 01:45, 6 May 2005 (UTC)

Thank you very much - your translation will be quite useful for the article! HappyCamper 02:52, 6 May 2005 (UTC)

This reasoning has one major flaw: Since the often mentioned calculations at DESY, improvements and corrections have been made to the mass measurements of elementary particles. So, the theoretical predictions could not be both correct then and now. --Pjacobi 11:45, 2005 May 8 (UTC)

Exactly. Maybe you could provide a list of the most current, verifyable, authoritative and established list of fundamental particles and their masses? Or perhaps a link? It would be a great addition to the article! --HappyCamper 18:52, 8 May 2005 (UTC)

That's an easy question. The Particle Data Group gives yearly summaries of the currently available measurements, start here and you will be drenched in data ;-) --Pjacobi 21:25, 2005 May 8 (UTC)

Comparisons

Are the "theoretical values" with some error bar for higher order corrections or the like?

Otherwise, taken at face value, they are already clearly falsified, e.g. electron mass 27 standard deviations off.

Pjacobi 11:59, 2005 May 12 (UTC)

It's going to take a few iterations of edits before all that material can be added. Feel free to help :) I just put the table there just as a first attempt. Feel free to modify it! HappyCamper 12:59, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

May I ask how you calculated that the theoretical electron mass is 27 standard deviations off? I'd like to learn so I can do that for the other particles too. HappyCamper 15:30, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Assumming that 0.00000015 is the stddev, it's as easy as (0.51100343 - 0.51099907)/0.00000015, try

http://www.google.de/search?hl=de&q=%280.51100343++-+0.51099907%29%2F0.00000015&btnG=Google-Suche&meta=

Pjacobi 15:42, 2005 May 12 (UTC)

Ah, I see why these values are considered "incorrect" - in order for the comparison to be valid, we need to provide errors on the theoretical values. Currently as the data is written, it is saying that the theoretical value is exact (with zero variance) - as a result, the theoretical and experimental values are hardly coincident. Well, to get the errors, we'll probably need to redo Heim's calculations. That's going to take some time :) HappyCamper 17:07, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Yes, that was my initial remark. We need the error bars for the theoretical values.

Also note that there are already 2004 numbers at PDG. The new stddev for the electron mass is down to 0.00000004.

Pjacobi 17:26, 2005 May 12 (UTC)

Wow, that's amazing! Well, in any case, I'm still motivated to perform the calculations. Even if it were 10000 standard deviations away, I'd still do it - I've learned so many new things just by working on this article, and all of it has been wonderful! Those calculations will simply further that. Do you have a copy of Heim's 4 volumes? HappyCamper 17:39, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

For myself, I've decided to wait and see. I have enough mainstream physics to absorb, filling my gaps. --Pjacobi 17:52, 2005 May 12 (UTC)

I brought up a similar point at Talk:Burkhard Heim some time ago (the discussion is now archived at Talk:Burkhard Heim/Archive1; search for the word "uncertainties"). If we assume that the significant figures on the Heim-predicted particle masses are at all justified, then Heim theory is ruled out by experimental data. But serious scientists don't rely on significant figures: they always report estimated uncertainties for their theoretical predictions. The Heim theory folks apparently do not. That may not mean that the theory itself isn't good science, but it certainly doesn't inspire confidence.--Steuard 20:20, May 12, 2005 (UTC)

It should be noted, that comparison with experimental data for the neutrino masses can actually be done. It is true (as displayed in the article) that we currently know only the upper limits for the individual masses (mainly from astrophysical considerations) but neutrino oscillation experiments give us good estimates on the mass squared differences. For an overview of the topic see the arXive at http://xxx.lanl.gov and look up hep-ph/0504026 by R.N.Mohapatra et al. The short of it is that for three neutrinos you get two independent mass differences, e.g., |m1²-m2²| and |m1²-m3²|. If you compare Heims prediction with the experimental results you'll see that they differ by at least 5 standard deviations. Again here an error on the theory would be very good. 128.214.56.241 09:26, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Heim's theoretical mass calculations use four parameters. The least precise of these is G, which the Heim theory page states is only known to a precision of up to 0.001, i.e., just 3 digits. One can take 0.001 as an estimate for Heim's mass uncertainty, or conversely, just look at the first three digits of his estimate when comparing it to another electron mass estimate. And Heim's value is just an estimate; even though Heim's calculation is theoretical, it uses parameters that have uncertainties.

In terms of the 3 digits of precision, the comparison of Heim's estimate to PDG's estimate of electron mass is exact; one makes the comparison to the precision of the least, not the most, precise quantity.

If the uncertainty approach is taken in comparing Heim's theoretical value to PDG's measured value, it is reasonable to expect that the estimate with the larger uncertainty, Heim's, should contain the PDG's estimate within one or two sigma of Heim's uncertainty. Thus, Heim's estimate of 0.51100343 +/- 0.001 should contain PDG's estimate, which it does. Dividing the difference between the two estimates by Heim's uncertainty, rather than PDG's, show's agreement of his theoretical calculation to PDG's within 0.0044 of his sigma. 128.244.234.238 01:04, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Table

As we can see, a Wikipedian Smoddy has come by and made a nice table. To help resolve the POV dispute on this page, what other columns do we wish to see in the comparison table? I personally would like to put p and t tests on it as well, for starters. HappyCamper 16:29, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Forget columns, how about rows? I'd like to see rows included for Heim theory's predicted neutral electron (presumably compared to the Particle Data Group's lower bound on unknown neutral lepton masses of ~40GeV), and for that matter rows for a sampling of the other particles that Heim theory predicts as well. It would also be interesting to state Heim's predicted value for the fine structure constant from the 1982 Mass Formula page; comparing it to the experimental value gives a 20 standard deviation discrepancy much as for the mass data. (For that matter, it's also interesting to compare the numerical results stated on that page to the numerical result obtained by actually evaluating the stated equation. You'd think they would be the same, but they aren't.)--Steuard 20:20, May 12, 2005 (UTC)

Actually that's a good idea. Maybe you can add those? I'll probably try the lepton calculations. HappyCamper 20:33, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

AFAIK neutralino-like WIMPs could be at rather arbitrary masses? Anyway, it would be indirect influences by creating new channels of reactions, that would most likely exclude the "neutral electron", but Heim-Theory so far doesn't predict any cross sections at all, if I am not mistaken. --Pjacobi 20:48, 2005 May 12 (UTC)

I think Heim wanted to do that but passed away before he could. HappyCamper 21:39, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Yes, we discussed the error bars on the Heim theory estimates some time ago: Ideally they should be given. Again, as previously discussed the different mass values for different input values of G imply a sensitivity to this parameter - though we also agreed that the relation was not likely to be linear and that the values were more sensitive to G than to other input. Unfortunatly the Heim Theory group didn't see the estimation of rigorous error bars as their highest priority - they may have a point and it will be interesting to see the new Eigen-value derivations which Droescher should produce later this month in a mathematically rigorous fashion. In the meantime one can still (I might so this if I have time) just take the ball park estimate of subtracting the mass values for different measurements of G - as the G variation gives an estimate of experimantal uncertainty one may reasonably take the resulting mass difference as a measure of error -though it might still be only one Sigma - thus the full error bars might be 3 times as wide. --hughey 08:35, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

From a quick look at the relevant PDG reviews, the most significant non-detection of the "neutral electron" would be a search done in 2000 at the CERN OPAL detector, see: http://opal.web.cern.ch/Opal/pubs/paper/info/pr306.html

Pjacobi 19:21, 2005 May 13 (UTC)

Actually, the use of error bars on theoretical calculations is a 'recent' development (i.e. since the 1960s or 1970s); at the time, it was apostacy, even. It wouldn't surprise me if the bulk of the Heim theory work were older and didn't have such. --moof 05:51, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

As far as I've gathered, the first statement of the theory's particle mass predictions came in 1977 (see article); they were evaluated on computers in 1982 and updated somehow in 1989. The "Selected Results" source document linked in the article makes reference to several calculations done between 2000 and 2003. All of this occurred well into the era in which presenting theoretical uncertainties for calculations like this was expected.--Steuard 20:04, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Coming back to the neutral lepton or electron, I found at [11] some indicaton that the heavy neutral lepton searches assume just one decay path, and there are others conceivable - after all, we know that 3 light neutral leptons exist:

"The known neutral leptons are the v,, v~, and v, neutrinos associated with the e, /A and r charged leptons respectively. The obvious and important experimental question is; Do other neutral leptons exist? There is no comprehensive answer to this question, the significance of an experimental search depends upon the models used for the production and decay of the neutral lepton as well as on the method and energy."

So the game is still very much open and this remains a prediction of hte theory.--hughey 16:29, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Gravitation

I managed to re-solve Heim's DE in the "gravitation" section. I've figured out everything except for some integration constant in his notes. The solution is difficult to interpret because the function has a bunch of infinities.

It turns out that the result is related to:

\int {\frac {1}{1\pm {\sqrt {1-4x}}}}dx+C=\int {\frac {l+1}{2l(l-1)}}dl.

I haven't figured out how Heim decided to take either the positive or negative root. Furthermore, from his paper, it seems that x can range from 0 to infinity, but the result here is only real if x is from 0 to 0.25. There are all sorts of other things hidden in these equations. Some help would be nice :) HappyCamper 13:20, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

What happened with the papers?

A few months ago, it was stated that the papers by Dröscher and Häuser about field propulsion will be awarded am AIAA prize, and that they will soon publish another paper with the derivation of the eigenvalue equations of the mass formula.

But the months have passed and I haven't seen anything about the prize nor the paper. Does anybody know something?

The prize will be awarded at the 41st AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference & Exhibit on the 13th of July, 2005. See [12] and click on "Theorie und Raumfahrt" for a letter they received. As for those eigenvalue equations, I don't know much about them, but I suspect that their publications will be pushed back. --HappyCamper 5 July 2005 12:11 (UTC)

Capitalisation

Someone needs to work out whether Heim Theory is a proper noun or not. Most other theories are not capitalised. — PhilHibbs | talk 09:53, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Right now, the page is at "Heim theory" and both seem amicable. I am not sure whether there are established conventions for "Heim theory" or "Heim Theory" yet. It is unclear to me whether the German usage of the terminology warrants a capitalization in English. --HappyCamper 12:38, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Explanations of the theory

I don't understand many things in the theory.. about the part "further technical details" :

What is a matrix of a non-linear function ? Is it a derivate ?
What is the link between C and the modeled universe ?
What are the role of the 64 state function ?
There is not 6 extra dimension in the full theory but 8, isn't it ? (8+4=12 dim)

I tried to read papers from heimtheory.com but I didn't understand many things. What is required to read this ? Is it necessary to fully understand General Relativity for that ?--81.57.3.212 11:54, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Let's make it very clear from the onset - I am not an expert on the theory, and nor do I know everything that is going on in the theory. Much of it I don't understand. However, I think to appreciate the theory, I think you would need a very solid background in quantum mechanics and relativity - a lot of Heim's ideas draw heavily from these fields. The best resource available right now are the books that Heim got published - but it is quite a difficult reading, and all of it is in German. I have copies of these, and when I get the chance, I will add references to the article. The theory seems to be controversial, so if you go into these readings, it is extremely important that you read very carefully and filter out what is fact, from what is fiction.

The paragraph about C was an attempt to explain what is going on, but it isn't particularly rigorous at all. I think I might remove it actually. In Heim's books, C does not show up; the emphasis is on T. From what I gather, the idea is that T has a certain structure which gives rise to a set of eigenvectors which represent the coordinate system in the basis x1, x2, x3, ... - In the original theory by Heim, 6 dimensions were used. Subsequent modifications by Droescher increased this to 8, and finally to 12, I believe. These extra dimensions are just mathematical constructs which allow additional theories of physics to fall out - but I am not sure how this actually happens. --HappyCamper 19:31, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Just on the dimensional issue (I'll try to address ?--81.57.3.212's other points later. THe limits on dimensions comes from Heim's Dimension Law. If p is the number of real dimensions, and n is the limit on extra dimensions that may be added in the full theory, the law is: n = 1 + sqrt(1 + p(p - 2)(p - 1)) To get an integer, non-zero number of dimensions, you need p = 4, n = 6, or p = 6, n = 12. I just confirmed there were no solutions for p < 11 (p = 10 corresponds to 27.851443164 dimensions). I wrote a noddy program to show that space dim P = 57 and total dim n = 420 was also a solution. Since then I had 2 other (only) solutions scanning p up to 10,000,000: (p = 999801, n = 999700016) and (p = 3431486, n = 1874180936). But there are other restrictions limiting the number in Heim - apart from the purely practical ease of 12 compared to 420 or millions of dimensions.--hughey 12:25, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Interesting news...

Hey, it looks like the USAF wants to test Heim's theories and build and "hyperdrive". There is also an article in Slashdot. Should we mention it in this article? --Pezezin 23:21, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Sure, add it in if you like :-) --HappyCamper 01:28, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure that a article in "The Scotsman" (slashdot references the same article) about some university professor who says NASA or USAF contacted him is a worthy citation. Might be more credible if the referece was from one of the many house publications of those agencies, or even the Houston Daily Shopper. When I hear about money flowing I'll believe it. That the contributer could only find this as affermation, and offered it, speaks of desperation.

Warp drive from a big magnet? Hummm, get an MRI, visit Vega. At the center of our planet is a nuclear core that generates the magnetic field, surely a super intense process, but I don't recall any observations of chunks of core material being warped out on a regular basis.

Reading through this stuff I see nothing from any actual scientist, at most one in traning, and feel the Wiki editors MUST step in and reduce the whole to a brief description that notes that it is not verifiable, accepted or even, as far as I can read here, being seriously investigated by any qualified physical scientific organization. With a link to a blog site for fans and flamers. At least until there can be found some real organization doing paid for work utilizing the "Theory".

This should be a site for information, not a blog. -- PMN

I ran this by my crank-detection physics professional friends, who said that they believe the theory is most likely wrong, far from demonstrably right, but not crank material. It appears to be done in a manner consistent with known physics observations and be formulated in a manner which encourages further test and analysis, unlike typical crank theory. It is most likely not correct, based on consensus, but it doesn't appear to fall into the category It's not right. It's not even wrong.. Georgewilliamherbert 08:18, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

"At the center of our planet is a nuclear core that generates the magnetic field, surely a super intense process" .. really? How do you figure that? The value is less than 0.00005 Tesla. 128.244.81.147 02:12, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Just to be clear, this particular "scientist in training" (but published scientist nonetheless) is pretty firmly convinced that Heim theory is neither an accurate description of nature nor a well-defined theory of physics. If you'd like to make the changes you just suggested, I won't stop you, but I'm guessing that the Heim supporters here will object. I've been trying to be a bit less actively hostile myself, and with the recent bit of publicity I suspect that a moderately more thorough discussion might be worthwhile (if it made comparisons to mainstream science clear). But a rewrite of at least the introduction along the lines you suggest might be a good thing.--Steuard 20:57, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

So - no real scientists working on it, eh? What an ignorant comment. Droscher is a theoretical physicist in the Austrian Patent office and Prof. Hauser is a very prolific scientist - see that hppc link to his documents and you will see how much he's published on Magnetohydrodynamics, new computing techniques etc. And for years he was head of a department at ESTEC - but then the ignorant comentator who appears not to have read the New Scientist article probably doesn't know what this is. Look down through the history of discussion here before raking over such old hat. The theory has evinced quite a positive reaction amongst many physicists - see e.g. the forum discussion at [13] to see that some have even programmed up the mass formula in JAVA, independently of the Fortran implementation, with almost as much accuracy in particle mass prediction. The head of the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion effort was impressed by the potential of the theory but would like to see more detail on the derivation of the mass formula before pumping moeny into a Z-machine test [14]. Finally look at the open letter from the Heim-theory group [15] . From the latter we see that a " We are willing, however, to give some clarifications. concerning fundamental problems of chapter D such as the conversion of Christoffel symbols to a tensor because of a polymetric statement or the derivation of the eigenvalue problem. That chapter is only presented in German at the moment. An English language version is forthcoming after time for a revision.

A talking book (CD) is in preparation which plays back Heim’s voice during a series of lectures and discussions on his theory. The possibility of an English version is being discussed at present. A sample of his voice will also be presented on our web-site.

Finally, a reviewed paper is now being prepared which gives an introduction to Heim’s Theory and the extension to eight dimensions, necessary for the realization of the new space propulsion method." --hughey 17:23, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

entelechy and aeon

I see no reason why Heim wanted to have so different names for those two dimensions (entelechy and aeon). Perhaps they are like X and Y in the real world, aren't they ? I mean, S² is perhaps totally isotropic. Do you have any opinion about this ? --Serenity-Fr 16:33, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, mathematically speaking, you could call the coordinates anything - I guess Heim just liked those two names in particular. I don't think those coordinates are interpreted as the sort of "spatial" coordinates we are familiar with though. --HappyCamper 16:52, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Is this page too far in favour of Heim?

I think that it's good that wikipedia has a page on Heim Theory, i've learned a lot from reading this page, but in my opinion (as a final year mathematics/theoretical physics student at cambridge) we need to make it quite clear that it isn't an "accepted" theory. For example, i think the top paragraph (entitled "Heim theory") should say that (a) Heim is dead and (b) since he worked alone, nobody who is alive today actually fully understands his theory, and so it isn't really a theory at all. It's bits and pieces of waffle with some numerical agreements. The implication here is that it could be deliberately fraudulant. personally i think that Heim theory will go the same way as cold "fusion" did, but of course i keep an open mind.

The theory just seems too good to be true, and in the present "desperate" environment (physicists have been trying, and failing, to unify the 4 forces for nearly forty years) there's a lot of temptation to believe a theory because it's telling you what you want to hear, rather than because it's likely to be genuine. In fact, if i was going to try to design a "fake" theory of quantum graviy, it would probably be quite a lot like this; make it so complicated and confusing that proper physicists would have to make a very serious investment of time to show that it was wrong, but on the other hand make sure it produces a complex formula to "predict" particle masses. "deriving" a formula particle masses once you know what they are is not difficult; for example the proton mass, which is given to 11 digits contains about 36 bits of information. You could arrange a formula to output this result if that formula involves about 36 binary choices, which you make deliberately to produce the desired outcome, then dress it all up in some spurious resoning (preferably poorly translated from another language!).

for example, consider the following "formula" for the proton mass;

m_{p}=e^{-(12+e)}+\left(10\left(\pi -{\sqrt {2}}/10+\left(1/4\right)^{2}\right)\right)^{2}+\left(3e/100\right)^{\frac {1}{2}}-\left({\frac {4}{9}}\right)^{8}=938.2795924

which agrees with heim's theoretical prediction of 938.2795924 MeV/c^2, to 10 significant figures. if i can get agreement that good in half an hour's worth of messing around with numbers, think how much mischeif heim could have got up to in 30 years? maybe he went mad and thought that if his theory gave the right numbers, then it must be correct, and so tinkered with formulae until it did.

I think that wikipedia could take some flak if heim theory is rejected as fraudulant and our page didn't make clear that this was a possibility. i think we need to cover ourselves a little bit better on this one!

As is probably all too apparent on this talk page and on Talk:Burkhard Heim (especially Talk:Burkhard Heim/Archive1, I've been making that point for rather a long time now. (There used to be a POV-dispute label on the article, but that seems to have been moved to refer only to a couple of sections for some reason.) As it stands, the article gives almost no indication that Heim theory has essentially no acceptance in the physics community; that should be a key point in the introduction.

The article lists only one "inconsistency with current physical theory"; I've mentioned quite a few in these Talk pages over time (such as the multiple timelike dimensions, the claim that we don't see the extra dimensions only because they represent "meanings" rather than for some physical reason--hardly just a "misnomer"!, the use of "1 meter^2" as a fundamental physical constant... the list is pretty long). For that matter, practically all of the Heim theory mass predictions are given to enormous precision and disagree with experiment by many standard deviations: either the Heim theory folks have never heard of "theoretical uncertainties" (or even "significant figures") or the theory has already been disproven by experiment. (The section on "comparisons" here says more about uncertainties than anything on heim-theory.com; it's odd to think that Heim fans on Wikipedia are better physicists than the folks actually working on the theory. But the section also neglects to mention the possibility that the mass predictions have been intentionally or unintentionally hand-tuned to agree with the experimental values.)

I have held off on making these changes myself for three reasons. First, given all that I've seen, I personally believe that Heim theory is entirely wrong with practically no redeeming qualities; that wouldn't bode well for making neutral edits. Second, I really, really don't have time to do the massive editing and rewriting that would be required. And third, silly though it may sound, I would honestly be uncomfortable attaching my name to anything less than a full rewrite of the article, for fear that someone looking in haste might think I was endorsing a section that I simply hadn't managed to fix yet.--Steuard 05:55, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

I disagree with this synopsis. Heim did not work alone. Others worked with him vigorously and he was acknowledged as a brilliant physicist in his own right quite young. I believe translation and examination of his works will show that his basic theory that all properties in the universe are quantitized will be proven correct given time. I don't consider myself a "fan", but this theory is quite important and deserves more study from a partical physics perspective. What does Heim theory say about Higgs for instance?Ggb667 17:42, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Forget the Higgs, what does Heim theory say about the top quark? The answer, as far as I can tell, is nothing: Heim theory hardly recognizes quarks at all. (I've seen some claim that one can recognize some sign of three constituent bits in the baryons, but in general Heim theory doesn't seem to be much like QCD.) In fact, that's another question for the folks out there who have read Heim's work: what does it have to say about the three generations of quarks and leptons? Does it make predictions for the masses of particles composed of, say, charm or bottom quarks? (As for the Higgs, I don't get the impression that it's necessary for the generation of mass in Heim theory, and I don't recall seeing anything that looked like it in the lengthy tables on the official website.)--Steuard 21:18, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

There is some very misleading stuff in this article, for example the probability that he could get the masses right by chance. I'd be impressed if he made the theory without already knowing the information that was to be predicted, but I don't think that's the case. There are reasons this theory isn't taken seriously: it's because the Standard Model of particle physics has much more compelling evidence for it, even though it doesn't predict masses. -- SCZenz 23:56, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

May I make a kind request that someone be WP:BOLD and try to improve the article then? :-) :-) --HappyCamper 03:00, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree. It's nice that Heim theory predicts some things, but what does it not predict (or not clearly predict, now); where is it seen as incomplete. Where is it seen as inconsistent with standard models. What types or specific predictions does it make which are testable. Is there any evidence that it's incompatible with observations in particular areas.

Fundamentally, what I would like to see (and it may be too much to do in Wikipedia, but somewhere) is an article by a reasonable skeptic who can place it into context with other theories and the standard model of physics. Is it simply a weird formulation that happens to agree or largely agree with existing known physics? Is it something very different, whose agreement is uncertain in key important areas? I know enough about standard physics to for example be concerned if Heim theory as currently stated doesn't much address quarks, but is it that they don't account for it at all, or that they're well hidden in a way different than the standard model?

Defining the discrepancies will help the rest of us understand and contextualize it, and also help clarify what sorts of things that Heim supporters should be or are doing to try and test its predictions versus the standard model... Georgewilliamherbert 03:24, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Heim theory does address quarks - it sees them as projections of a 6-dimensional flux system, which is a unified process and therefore may not be separated into individual constituents - explaining the absence of free quarks. The first hermetry, H1, is just R3∪I2 and corresponds to gluons and the strong force. So there is plenty about QCD structures in the theory. And it is one of the triumphs of the theory that the Higgs mechanism is not needed to derive the masses. Mass arises as a result of the 'protosimplex' proceeses, which make up the 6-D flux agregates. Funny, though, how hard it is to accept the absence of Higgs - some of the Physorg debaters want to see it predicted in Heim's mass spectrum, despite it being 'unemployed' in the theory. --hughey 18:08, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Rewriting

After a long time learning about Heim Theory and collecting ideas, I think i'm gonna rewrite the entire article. I want to reorder it, add more information and clarifications, and express all the issues the theory currently has. So if nobody opposes, in the next few days I will do it. --Pezezin 14:07, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Sure, go right ahead. :-) --HappyCamper 01:05, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

New broken link

The last link of Propulsion physics is now broken :

Droscher, W and Hauser, J, "Heim Quantum Theory for Space Propulsion Physics," Log No 021, STAIF, American Institute of Physics, 2005 (pdf)

I wonder why Droscher's laboratory has suppressed (moved?) all pages about Heim's theory. If someone can find the a new link, it would be great.

These pages were removed after the University of Innsbruck had been warned that Droscher, Hauser, and their "laboratory", the IGW (Institut fuer Grenzgebiete der Wissenschaft) were using a University of Innsbruck affiliation without authorization. The IGW is a private institute and not a part of the University of Innsbruck.

Please sign your comments! ---CH 21:03, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Glossary

Many people, even in the scientific community, have expressed confusion over the terminology used in Heim Theory. There's a glossary I just came across that might help: http://www.hpcc-space.com/publications/documents/HeimTheoryGlossary.pdf --User:naasking 13:55, 1 Frebruary 2006 (UTC)

POV flag

User:Hdeasy removed the flag I added, which I just restored. Hdeasy, you wrote in your edit line the soliton use of metron has nothing to do with Heim's much earlier use of this term. Maybe so, but my point was actually this: in absence of evidence to the contrary, I don't believe that "metron" is a soliton as that term is used in the theory of solitons! Admittedly, this is a much abused term and Belinsky and Verdaguer admit that they are using gravitational soliton simply to suggest that these solutions have been obtained using a solution generaing method (Belinksy and Zakharov) which was inspired by the inverse-scattering transform for the KdV equation. OTH, it seems that some gravitational solitons might exhibit features which most physicists would expect, such as collision of "soliton waves" resulting in a nonlinear interaction followed by reconstitution of the original waves, but with a phase shift.

If you haven't studied this book, you should certainly do so before writing more about metrons or gravitational solitons:

Belinsky, V.; and Verdaguer, E. (2001). Gravitational solitons. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-80586-4.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

In addition, my other objections to the article stand. As written, it fails to adequately stress the fact that mainstream physics regards with Heim theory with suspicion, for some good reasons. ---CH 20:59, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

Mainstream science does NOT view Heim Theory with suspicion. That is an inaccurate remark and reminiscent of a recent lecture I attended on consciousness - a theologian kept saying "Neuroscientists believe" - until a neuroscientist in the audience objected that in 30 years in the field he had met all shades of opinion in that regard. The lecturer then admitted he had only read some vocal defenders of one particular theory. This is even truer of Heim, as he was essentially unknown (to a modern audience) prior to the New Scientist article - the resonance in the wake of that has been largely positive and constructive. The image of destructive criticism implied by your 'suspicion'is the false one. Hence your POV flag is an ugly construct that may give the wrong impression to a neutral reader.

On the Metron, Heim's use in the 1950's predated its use by Hasselmann et al. as gravitational soliton or Star Trek's use. The soliton refeernce is just as bogus as the Star Trek one. It seems that Hesselman knew of Heim and tried his own form of TOE, [16] rather inconguously recycling Heim's term, maybe thinking that he had disappeared from the scence for good. Tough - his theory wasn't quite dead yet! Was it concidence that this other metron theory also sought to predict the masses of hte particles, coupling constants etc.? --hughey 14:01, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

The test of any kind of theory is always "has it been published in peer-reviewed journals". If so, they should be referenced in the article. I don't see any such refs (no, conf procs don't count). If indeed the resonance in the wake of that has been largely positive and constructive then there should be no great problems finding refs. If there are no refs, its fringe, and needs to be very clearly labelled as such. I agree with Mainstream science does NOT view Heim Theory with suspicion but only because, as far as can be told, mainstream science ignores it. William M. Connolley 14:28, 7 February 2006 (UTC).

OK, there is *one* paper (Zeitschrift für Naturforschung. Teil A, Band 32A Heft 1-7, 1977 Jan.-Juli, pg. 233-243). Thats nowhere near enough. Any more? William M. Connolley 14:33, 7 February 2006 (UTC).

Thanks for showing me where I might have been mistaken.

If anything on this page violates the NPOV principle, and in a big way, it is the "neutrality flag" itself. To quote: "...in fact seems to be regarded..." Either something is a fact, or "seems". Also: "not even mentioned in the recent book by Belinsky and Verdaguer." Oh, golly, not even there? Also: "It seems to consist largely of a theoretically unmotivated Ansatz for a "mass formula"." This is hardly so; actually the theory is concerned with an extension of GR to interactions other than gravity, and the "mass formula" is a by-product of Heim's approach to quantizing the spacetime. It is quite well "theoretically motivated".

While I agree that there should be a flag to indicate that the theory is novel and controversial, the current wording of the flag is blatantly not NPOV, and totally unacceptable. Heim's theory represents an original approach, but it is a legitimate theory with a rigorous mathematical formulation, made by a legitimate and recognized physicist. It makes experimentally verifiable predictions, meets the scientific criteria of falsifiability, and while future analysis may disprove it, it should not be regarded as a crank theory. It is no less scientific than LQG, and more so than other hypotheses regarded as legitimate, such as the MOND ad-hoc kludge.

Freederick 16:17, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Well said Frederick! In fact I believe it is a scandal for Wikipedia that so many garish and ugly flags spoil the first impression on viewing the article. Thus it is high time to reduce this sad display to one discrete flag. If nothing is done soon I will proceed to rationalise this shoddy display of ignorance.--84.167.24.137 17:53, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I see no NPOV problem either (however I agree with the cleanup problem) --Serenity-Fr 00:49, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Hi all, as various editors make changes, the POV may acquire new justifications, unfortunately, but one justification for it in the current version is that the article describes Heim theory as a TOE. But as I explained very carefully, Heim theory appears to consist of an unmotivated Ansatz for a mass formula, not a fundamental theory of physics built upon fundamental physical principles. Certainly very few physicists would describe it as a TOE. There are other justifications, but this suffices. If Heim theory fans want to replace "TOE" by reformulating what I just said in their own words, I will take a look and consider removing the flag.

Someone claimed that Heim theory is mainstream. This is pretty silly since one need only consult an abstract service to see how few citations there are in "mainstream" journals. This or another poster wanted to concoct a conspiracy theory charging Hesselmann with stealing the word metron. I'll just say this made me laugh :-/

A formatting issue: everyone, please do sign your comments but also please avoid inserting comments 'inside' previous comments. It would be awkward for me to try to figure who said what above because either some comments were not signed, or a later commentator inserted comments in between paragraphs written and signed by someone else! TIA --CH 02:05, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

So, CH, you appear to be a bit forgetful, to put it mildly, as you repeatedly drag up this metron thing. Your former citation of volumes on the soliton connection made ME laugh. My answer thereto showed that you were abysmally ignorant of Heim Theory (no Ansatz – though he has many Ansatzes within the theory). And what is meant by an “unmotivated Ansatz”? He was a recognised physicist who for decades worked hard on his theory, which is an eminently logical extension of General Relativity. Drawing again the analogy with Newton – I think that if he were around today and had published nothing about his year of wonders, you would with equal justification have hounded him. Indeed there were those in Newton’s day who dismissed him as an occult dabbler. It is not the place for Wikipedia to become the bloodhound of forces of conservatism in upholding the current paradigm. If there is sufficient evidence that the theory is recognised as having great potential, then its description as a candidate TOE is justified. The AIAA prize was one such indication. The successful programming of his mass formula in DESY was another. So please go away and do your homework (Heim-werk) about the extenuating circumstances that explain the absence of the usual ‘mainstream’ references – his handicap, eccentric secrecy, difficulty of notation, mistakes made in choice of publishers etc. All of that together implies that this is indeed a supremely interesting candidate for TOE. This year will see some journal articles on the theory – that will bring it a tad closer to the ‘mainstream’. This discussion reminds me of last year before the AIAA prize – consult the archived discussions where your predecessors as devil’s advocate doubted that this august body would award the prize – but they were wrong. It was the first major step on publicising the theory since Heim’s death. So, again, do your homework.--hughey 18:57, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Can everyone please try to indent and sign their comments? I am finding this hard to follow at a glance. In the edit lines, please use */ POV flag */ since this helps me to quickly see in which section a new comment has been added. I tried to add some indents above; if you think I accidently misattributed somethign you wrote, please fix the indentation appropriately or add your signature. Thanks, it will help a lot! And this page is getting rather long--- how about archiving some of the earlier discussion?

OK, there have been many responses since I last dropped by a few days ago. My time is limited but I'll try to make a few brief responses in order.

User:Freederick, there are two issues here: the dubious claim that Heim theory is mainstream and the dubious characterization of Hasselmann's metron solution as a soliton (and possibly even as a "solution"). I advocate an WP:NPOV characterization of all theories, including general relativity and better known attempts at quantizing gravitation. However, even a cursory examination of the literature shows that the mainstream view is that at present there is no successful quantum theory of gravitation. Your phrases legitimate theory, rigorous mathematical formulation, legitimate and recognized physicist are all questionable and I do question them. Instead of yelling at me you should produce citations in journals a skeptic like myself might find respectable. Please note that as WMC said, one paper from decades ago does not make a "theory" in any sense "mainstream".
User:84.167.24.137, I don't understand what you are proposing, but please try to remain calm.
User:hughey, your phrase eminently logical extension of General Relativity is questionable and I do question it. Certainly the existing article does not make this case to someone like myself who is familiar with mainstream gtr! You complain I want to make WP the bloodhound of forces of conservatism. I don't think it is inappropriate to demand that an encyclopedia be extremely cautious in characterizing speculative claims, especially controversial claims such as those made by proponents of Heim theory. I am not objecting to providing external links to pro-Heim websites at the end of the article, where interested readers can read incautious endorsements. As for the AIAA prize, this is indeed a curious incident, but here I'll just point out what should be obvious: the membership of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics may not in fact be qualified to comment on matters concerning theoretical physics. What do the professional physics societies say? I can't find anything from the [www.aps.org American Physical Society] but I did find an from the Bad Astronomy blog where someone makes the same point I just did about AIAA.

OK, let's all stay calm and resolve this on the discussion page. If we can agree to characterize Heim theory as non-mainstream I will accede to letting stand something like some find Heim's ideas intriguing. Would that be acceptable to the Heim theory fans here?---CH 00:14, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Well now, CH, you seem to think that you have a monopoly on the right to question the scheme of things. But what you appear incapable of grasping is that Heim WAS a mainstream physicist in the 1950's. The recognized physicists

Pascual Jordan
Werner Heisenberg
Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker
Hans-Peter Dürr

recognized Heim as a genius and accepted him as a colleague. To describe the theory of somebody with this pedigree as 'speculative' is not an objective assessment. An encyclopedia should indeed be eclectic and include aspects of reality which might be valid although not conforming to some hidebound conception of what constitutes the scheme of things. As I've pointed out time and again, there are very good reasons for thinking that Heim Theory is a major challenge to String Theory. And don't be so quick to dismiss the AIAA. Of course there are competent physicists in their ranks, capable of judging on aspects of theoretical physics. Your pompous tone may change later this year when a few papers get published in 'real' physics journals. However, the indications are that you will never concede an inch, even when Droscher is stepping up to receive his Nobel Prize :-).

Finally, don't refer to ' fans' of Heim Theory, unless you want me to refer to you as a fan or lacky of String theory.--hughey 14:52, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

There are good reasons why mainstream physicists today don't pay any attention to this theory—whether some physicists considered Heim a colleague is irrelevant to whether his theory is still mainstream. -- SCZenz 16:20, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Hughey, my understanding is the Heim published a single paper on "Heim theory" and then more or less went into seclusion. If true, this is hardly a strong record of publication in the mainstream research literature. Do you have a citation to published or otherwise verifiable and dated comments by Jordan, Heisenberg, or von Weizsäcker on the merits of Heim theory? (I happen not to be familiar with Dürr's contributions to physics.) In any case, whatever they may have said (perhaps they were speaking positively about Heim's promise pre-"Heim theory"?), arguing from authority is never very convincing to mainstream scientists, even if you can verify your claims about their alleged good opinion at some point in time of Heim's alleged "genius". For one thing, many contemporary physicists seem to have felt that the persons you mention exhibited questionable judgement late in life. Also, in some cases one can accept someone like Thomas Gold as a colleague (to name an analogy you should find flattering, on behalf of Heim), while strongly disagreeing with some of his more outlandish proposals. Finally, please remember that this article is not just about Heim's own proposals, but about those who have attempted to decipher and/or further develop his ideas. As for string theory, you must be confusing me with someone else, since I have never issued strong public statements in favor of string theory! As for the AIAA, I didn't claim that they have no members who have any competence in physics, I just pointed out (rather reasonably, I should think) that physics is not their organizational thing and that this award may represent an abberration; certainly I think it will prove embarrassing. And do you really expect Drosher to be awarded the Nobel Prize any time soon, or was that just a rhetorical flourish? ---CH 00:01, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

(sigh) Okay, CH, old boy, maybe Heim did only publish that one paper in a mainstream physics journal, but you again miss the point – Newton also went for years without publishing any mainstream science papers so that he was dismissed by shallow (I,e, prematurely jumping to conclusions) commentators like yourself as an occult dabbler. Then came the Principia etc. and it was apparent that he had been working on Mainstream stuff all along. In the same way, the mainstream Heim theory papers are just beginning to appear – already the AIAA ones are mainstream, just not in physics proper – but that too will change later this year, as Droscher & co. are working on a review paper on the pure physics. As for the AIAA being embarrassed by the paper – quite the contrary – this point was expressly mentioned in the New Scientist article – see also the point about peer review: [17] The AIAA is certainly not embarrassed.

What's more, the US military has begun to cast its eyes over the hyperdrive concept, and a space propulsion researcher at the US Department of Energy's Sandia National Laboratories has said he would be interested in putting the idea to the test. And despite the bafflement of most physicists at the theory that supposedly underpins it, Pavlos Mikellides, an aerospace engineer at the Arizona State University in Tempe who reviewed the winning paper, stands by the committee's choice. "Even though such features have been explored before, this particular approach is quite unique," he says. <snip>

And it has not passed any normal form of peer review, a fact that surprised the AIAA prize reviewers when they made their decision. "It seemed to be quite developed and ready for such publication," Mikellides told New Scientist.”

Dürr was Heisenberg’s successor at the Max Planck Institute. Maybe you heard of Planck and Heisenberg? As for references about their estimate of Heim – it --hughey 07:48, 20 February 2006 (UTC)was mentioned e.g. in Stern in 1956 or 57: I have a copy of the article somewhere and will get the exact reference if you are that interested. Figaro also mentioned it in an article in the 1960’s. Those scientists never refuted the magazine reports and there is no reason to doubt Von Ludwiger’s account of these things in his obituary[18] --hughey 16:13, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Hughey, please remain civil in this discussion. Can you cite a verifiable source for your claim that the US military has begun to cast its eyes over the hyperdrive concept? "Hyperdrive" seems to be applied to all kinds of things, including science-fiction, so you should refer to "Häuser-Dröscher hyperdrive proposal. Now, it wouldn't surprise me if someone associated with the U. S. military expressed interest in whatever this "hyperdrive" is, but you should avoid making unverifiable claims, at least without mentioning that you can't verify them. However, a more immediately relevant point is that not every member of the U. S. military is well qualified to evaluate outlandish claims regarding alleged "new physics", and in fact it is well known that some members of this rather large organization have been involved in crackpot "science" in the past. Lastly, I didn't claim the AIAA has expressed embarrassment. I said I think this incident will prove embarrassing.

Hughey, I think this discussion is marching in circles, and I'd like to close it now. OK? ---CH 23:47, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

CH, the source for the US military interest in Heim is the New Scientist article as well as interviews given by e.g. Millis, head of the Breakthrough Propulion group at NASA. Maybe the quote wasn't clear above as inverted commas were missing before it. Corrected now so that it may be made known unto you. Latest - PRAVDA, (truth) had now reported on the propulsion angle as well: [19] . And yes, let's close the issue as I just keep repeating the answers to your points, but it doesn't get through to you. Maybe you should do some memory training before engaging in such discussions. --hughey 07:48, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Heim Theory Actually Postdiction -- Math Issues?

I've just came to this subject from the New Scientist article, and have a few thoughts that may help.

1)There's been two recent scandals related to scientific findings, one in Korea, and one in Europe, so in my humble opinion this Wiki should proceed with caution. Heim makes extraordinary claims, and the proof should correspondingly be extraordinary.

2) Actually the Heim Theory is post-dicting particle properties. Theoretical predictions would entail undiscovered novel particles, or new undiscovered processes. That being said, any theory that can "verifiably" compute the masses of the known particle set from 4 universal constants is worthy of further study.

3) There are some issues with the math here however:

3a) On the math, units analysis is necessary. I.e. HappyCamper 13:20, 12 May 2005 (UTC) on Gravatition does not include units in the explanation. The equal sign is as significant for units as it is for numbers, therefore if the evaluation of the left term results in a distance unit(m), then the right term must also result in a distance unit(m). Lacking units makes it very hard to verify the equations, and that leaves you open to inconsistent results such as $m=m^{2}$ or $m=kg$ .

3b) The full domain of the left part of the integral is $-\infty$ to $+0.25$ , giving a real result. The result is only imaginary in the left term if $x>0.25$ .

3c) Analysis of this side of the equation gives the result: evaluates to $\pm {\frac {2x\cdot {\sqrt {1-4x}}}{4}}$ , whereas the integral on the right side of the equation using the upper limit b and lower limit a evaluates to ${\frac {\ln {(2b-2)}-\ln {(2a-2)}}{2}}+{\frac {1}{2a}}-{\frac {1}{2b}}+{\frac {\ln {b}-\ln {a}}{2}}$

From a cursory glance at the results, the left side will not equal the right side of the integral. Provided that the evaluations are correct, in a dimensional (units) sense, the left term could not equal the right term due to the fact that the natural logarithms on the right will mess up the units, regardless of the unit used. So if the Wiki article is to be technical in nature, these kinds of issues must be resolved. As I haven't read the paper yet other that what is in Wiki and a glance at some of the pages in the Heim Theory site, I can't honestly say if these kind of issues abound.

This reminds me of Dr. Podkletnov who discovered that a spinning superconducting disk reduced the force of gravity above it (curved space less?) I'm at a university library, and have access to the journals in physics. Doing an online search of the IOP doesn't find Podkletnov. I did find the 1991 Physical Review D paper from Dr. Ning Li, though: Effects of a gravitomagnetic field on pure superconductors. It's been highly misrepresented througout the Internet, in my honest opininion.

Some useful sites for math/physics questions are:

Mathworld

World of Physics

NIST Reference on SI Units

Al, Happy Cat Technologies

--129.82.30.155 06:43, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Only have a minute to throw some cold water on that negative spin.

Not only post-diction as also predicts mass of neutrinos - which was done in 1980s,

is still in limits and when better experiments to measure neutrino mass, will be a prediction.

As for Podkletnov - this has also been answered already: he used a relatively weak magnet. To see any effect with the Heim-Lorentz force you need 20 Tesla, which is why the US air force is considering using the Z-machine which can achieve more than this flux. But no other setup on Eath can - even accelerators usually have at most 15 T.

And as for units being inconsistent - this is not normally the case on heim-theory.com - though as they are not budgeted for the work, it is in the spare time of the physicists involved and they acknowledgethat some mistakes may be present - e.g. Dr. Anton Mueller of hte HT group is checking over the 1982 and 1989 mass formulae as the JAVA implememntation http://www.daimi.au.dk/~spony/HeimMassFormula/ was based on these web pages - E Heims mass formula

and F Heims mass formula.

Note that the JAVA effort came out of our discussion on Physorg - see

this to se that not all physicists are sour old women with closed minds. --hughey 12:00, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

I added indents and links for readability. Quick comment to both commentators: you are referring to cranky claims by Eugene Podkletnov and questionable claims that the U. S. government has secretly worked on this stuff as fact. The latter could be true but you should avoid referring to it as fact unless you can cite a U. S. government document or reputable newstory (please recall that even the BBC and various sometimes reputable science newsmagazines have gotten their facts wrong in this area, so even reputatable news outlets should be questioned in case of outlandish claims). ---CH 00:21, 17 February 2006 (UTC)