The current crisis in theoretical physics demands fresh thinking, including a relook at old ideas.  The concept of a background field explaining the origins of mass and inertia is one example, and the concept of a luminiferous aether is another.  The idea that both concepts are one and the same is intriguing.  Q theory is an evidence based approach to investigating this possibility.  Whether it has merit or not is up to its accordance with experimental evidence and its explanatory and predictive usefulness.  This essay summarises the key points and discusses the way forward.  

Keywords:  Universal field theory, origins of inertia, Mach’s Principle, action at a distance, quintessence, Q theory, luminiferous aether, theories of nearly everything.  

Introduction

The existence of Universal fields was expected in physics throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.  The great minds of the day were reluctant to believe in ‘magical’ action-at-a-distance and assumed that light had to travel in ‘something’, and they also believed that long range forces had to act through ‘something’.  

This view received several setbacks around the turn of the 20th century.  Michelson and Morley performed a careful search for effects of aether drift but came up with a null result and Einstein was able to achieve to achieve a revolution simply by postulating that the speed of light was a universal constant and later by postulating that gravity was equivalent to linear accelerations.  This led to an explosion in theories based on mathematical geometries, and as various predictions were confirmed by experiment General Relativity came to be regarded as one of the two pinnacle achievements of physics in the 20th century, the other being Quantum Mechanics.

And yet Nature has a habit of turning up surprises.  In1967 Vera Rubin discovered that stars in spiral galaxies were moving very much faster than physics could explain and since 2022 the James Webb space telescope has been returning data about the early Universe completely at odds with the Standards Model paradigm.  The galactic rotation curve “catastrophe” was countered by assuming the existence of enormous amounts of hitherto unknown cold dark matter, but after fifty years of searching none has been found and the list of plausible candidates is all but exhausted.

[Contrary to popular belief and widespread teaching the existence of a luminiferous aether has not been disproved – it just became redundant and unpopular.  Einstein himself referred to as late as 1920.  Nor did Einstein ever assert that curved spacetime had replaced gravity.  He just said that his generalisation of Special Relativity provided a good description of gravity.  He also said that he felt his theories had not been able to successfully explain the coincidence that Mach had noted between inertial reference frames and the “fixed stars”.]

There are of course many interesting and unresolved questions physics.  Minor ones such as the fly-by anomaly (the planetary fly-by effect works better in the pro-grade direction than in the retro-grade direction) and large ones (the tension in the Hubble parameter, difficulties in explaining galaxy morphologies, the discovery of mature galaxies in very early parts of the Universe etc.)  Plus the continuing difficulty in harmonising Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity.  Not to mention that the need to rely on two conflicting models for light is hardly ideal.  

It has to be admitted that there is something wrong or missing in standard modern physics.  Just as the ultra violet catastrophe led to quantum physics, the current problems should be regarded as a marvelous opportunity to go forward.

Q Theory and the Q Protocol – Introduction

Q theory uses an approach dubbed the Q protocol.  The idea is to gather a critical amount of experimental evidence before leaping to conclusions about what it all means.  To keep an open mind and let Nature do most of the talking.  To rely more heavily on experimental evidence than accepted wisdom and popular assumptions.

The idea started in 2016 in an attempt to develop an explanation for the speed of stars in spiral galaxies other than exotic cold dark matter, or modifying the R² laws of gravity.  (Comment: MOND is an admirable example of pursing original thinking in spite of widespread resistance).  

 The idea was to understand the correlation between inertial reference frames and the “fixed stars” in view of the fact that the Milky Way is just one galaxy amongst countless others.  If the correct reference frame for understanding the rotation of stars in spiral galaxies is the frame of the distant galaxies modified by a stirring effect from the billions of stars in the proximate galaxy, the need for dark matter goes away.

This idea was called the Mixed Rotational Reference Frame effect (MiRRFe).  A list of associated consequences from the idea plus a list of possible experiments to test the idea is given in the early papers of (van de Vusse, 2024).

Note that the idea, if correct, resolves Mach’s Principle.

The idea led on to considerations about the effects on transient starlight, which in turn led to a new look at the old idea of a luminiferous aether.  

A side project arose questioning why modern physics still uses two conflicting models for light itself and what would it take to develop a unitary model capable of explaining literally thousands of different experiments.  An approach was developed (similar to the Q protocol) and an illustrative prototype started to emerge which was codenamed the phot.  Surprisingly the phot model seemed to have the potential to meet all the challenges thrown at it.  It might even have merit.  See essays 3.1 to 3.8 of (van de Vusse, 2024).

Returning to the main agenda, it was conjectured that the inertial reference field responsible for the effects observed in spiral galaxies was also the elusive luminiferous aether.

A good thing about this hypothesis is that is immediately open to experimental testing. It predicts that light travelling through and across the disc of a spiral galaxy will have an otherwise unexplainable difference in travel time of up to several years depending on whether it travels in a pro-grade direction or a retrograde direction.  There are numerous examples of light from distant galaxies being gravitationally lensed by other galaxies.  All we need is some distinct optical signal, such as a supernova, to appear in the pro-grade image and then wait for it to appear in the other side. 

Any good scientific theory needs to satisfy three criteria.  It must be able to explain some problematic experimental evidence in a reasonable way, it must be consistent with the reliable evidence from relevant experiments and, ideally, it should be able to make some predictions that turn out to be true.   

A difficulty faced by novel theories is that they will immediately face quite reasonable objections from proponents of the status quo.  For example, Galileo’s argument that the world rotated on its axis was met with objections that the birds of the sky would not be able to keep up.  In fact objections such as this are to be welcomed.  It indicates that the new idea has been heard.  In the modern age there is such an overload of published material that the most common reaction to a new or strange idea is just to ignore it.  

An Ideal Q

There are various tricks and tools for increasing creativity.  Idealisation is one of them.  Here is what an ideal Q might do:

Give matter mass:  Mass is a property of matter.  It is only revealed through inertial and gravitational effects.  Matter gets inertial and gravitational effect from its interactions with the Q.  If Q did not exist, matter would not have inertial mass or gravitational mass.

Explain Newton’s Laws of Motion:  Matter at rest stays at rest because it is at rest in the Q.  The bigger it is more it wants to stay stuck in the Q.  If a force is applied to matter free to move it moves.  It accelerates in proportion to the applied force.  The constant of proportionality is a measure of its mass.

Q has no resistance to uniform linear motion.

Q resists changes in the speed of matter.  To make the matter go faster a force has to be applied in the direction of motion and extra energy is imparted.  As soon as this is exchange of energy finishes the body returns to uniform linear motion.  Decelerations involve the body giving up part of its kinetic energy to something else.  The momentum changes because the magnitude of the velocity changes. 

Q resists changes in the direction of motion.  If a force is applied at right angles to the direction of motion, it is resisted by the Q.  If the force stops the object returns to uniform linear motion. The momentum changes because the direction of the velocity changes.  This may or may not have involved an exchange of energy.

Explain Mach’s Principle:  Mach’s observation that inertia is correlated to the “fixed stars” occurs when the local experiment and the fixed stars in question are co-located in the same sea of undisturbed Q.  Mach’s observations are significant but the correspondence is not action-at-a-distance.

Explain Lorentz length contraction: If a body’s speed (relative to Q) becomes an appreciable fraction of the speed of light, the body becomes physically compressed (by the Lorentzian gamma factor.)  This requires the input of extra energy.  The extra energy requirement increases exponentially and so matter cannot exceed the speed of light.

Explain Lorentzian time dilation:  Clocks, repetitive processes, vibrations, growth and aging effects all slow down if moving vey rapidly through the Q.  (Note: Our ordinary notion of time is illusory.  The underlying reality is repetitive causality).

Explain why massless photons convey momentum:  Momentum is actually a property of energy moving through the Q.  Same equations, different interpretation.

Explain the orbital speed of stars in spiral galaxies:  Over billions of years the Q in and around spiral galaxies is set in motion.  The stars move closer to the core and are actually orbiting at their correct Keplerian speeds relative to the local Q.

Explain gravity:  Large amounts of matter distort the Q in accord with the inverse square law.  Bodies of matter in this distorted Q are drawn towards the source of the distortion.  There is no action at a distance except through the Q.  More generally, the distortion is cause by concentrations of stress and energy and the local effects are well described by the field equations of General Relativity.

Be the fabric of spacetime:  Spacetime is a system of coordinates invented by man because it is useful.  Curved spacetime is actually describing the Q.  Q can be though of as the fabric of spacetime. 

Be the luminiferous aether:  Electromagnetic radiation is a pulse of pure energy transmitted through the fabric of the Q.  Always at exactly speed c in free space.  Slower if affected by gravity.  Slower still when Q is affected by the binding forces between atoms and molecules. 

Offer no resistance to fast moving particles, charged or not:  This includes neutrinos. 

Support gravitational waves:  Gravity waves can be thought of as ‘acoustic disturbances’ of the Q itself, travelling at the speed of light.  

Support electric fields:  Electric fields would be some sort of rearrangement within the constituents of Q.

Support magnetic fields:  Magnetic fields would be a by-product of movements in electric fields.  The essential orthogonality and right handedness between electric and magnetic fields would have something to do with the nature of Q.

And if this list is not ambitious enough there is more …. 

Be able to convert to matter:  If Q is some sort of energy field then maybe Q can be converted into matter. Possibly inside black holes or the initial singularity (if that actually happened).  If Q can be turned into matter it feeds into a Theory of Nearly Everything (TONE).   Basic particles might be Q ‘tied’ into stable geometrical knots.  The string theorists might be vindicated at last. 

Balance the Universe: If Q is some sort of universal energy field then it would have a role in overall cosmologies.  Maybe it could explain where all the anti-matter went.  

And finally there are ideas that are truly fanciful.  For example … suppose that the Q turns out to be the barrier that stops anything going faster than the speed of light and once this is understood it leads to ideas for signals that can go faster than light.  Or suppose that the curvature of Q can be inverted so that small amounts of matter are repelled rather than attracted to other matter, opening the door to anti-gravity.  We can never be sure that we know everything for sure, so maybe what we think is impossible might actually be possible.  

Speculations on the nature of Q

The Q protocol recommends accumulating a critical mass of experimental evidence in a logical framework before speculating on what it all means.  A bit like clues in a detective mystery.  If the evidence does not start to suggest some possibilities then get more evidence and/or broaden the thinking.  Keep an open mind.  Keep all ideas on the table until they can be conclusively ruled out by hard evidence.  Don’t just leap aboard the first solution that comes to mind.  Hire a devil’s advocate as an antidote to natural biases.  Having said that, favour simple elegant solutions over convoluted obscure solution if possible (Occam’s Razor).

With those caveats in place let the speculations begin…

1. The scale of any structure of Q is probably very small.  Smaller than an electron but bigger than the Planck length.  
2. Q has no mass as such.  It causes matter to have the property called mass, so having mass itself seems circular. In any case, the evidence from planetary motions rules this out.  
3. It is tempting to think of Q as an energy field with just one property that can either be positive or negative.  Maybe it flips between these two states.  Maybe it is some sort of dipole.  Or maybe it is an ‘uncertainty dipole’.
4. If you had to pick an elemental energy field then electricity might be favored.  An electric field would then be a bias in the orientation of the bits of Q.  Magnetic fields would be a byproduct of movements in electric fields.  (Which is why there are no magnetic monopole.) 
5. Q is ‘sub-quantum’ so that rules out any chance of being able to observe it directly.  What could we observe it with?  It has to be defined by its effects.
6. Light is basically fast moving energy in the Q.  A shock wave through the Q.  Q seems to resist any extra energy hanging about. 
7. A radio wave passing between two antennae can suddenly disappear into one or the other.  Or not at all.  It is an all or nothing affair.  That says something about both radio waves and Q.  
8. Space is filled with neutrinos.  If we could see neutrinos then the cosmos would be ablaze with them. What happens to them all?  Can they pass through a star? What if anything might they have to do with the Q? Perhaps Q is a sea of neutrinos.  There is a lot we do not know about neutrinos.
9. If Q is a universal field then each bit of Q should relate to the Q around it.  And so on right throughout the Universe.
10. Major clues to Q come from its relationship to matter and motion.  It has no objection to matter if is at rest.  If matter is given kinetic energy it is obliged to move, but only at a constant speed and in a straight line.  Q has an obsession with straight lines, probably because they offer the fastest passage.  
11. Since matter can move through Q without resistance then it seems that Q can move through atoms without resistance.  But does it flow through or around atomic nuclei? And does a fast moving proton penetrate the Q like a projectile, or does the Q pass through the moving proton like a ghost? 
12. Over billions of years the enormous amounts of matter and dust in swirling galaxies can stir the local Q.   

It is not absolutely essential to understand the Q to make use of it.  We clearly do not understand light as yet but that does not stop us having highly sophisticated optical technologies.  And many people are prepared to believe in dark matter without any proven evidence about what it is.  Whereas there is plenty of evidence for Q.  It is why we get giddy every time we spin around.

Discussion

Progressing the Q hypothesis to a full theory requires progression on two fronts.  The first is unambiguous experimental evidence that it exists.  One can argue that there is plenty of evidence that it must exist e.g. in the shape of the water surface in Newton’s bucket, the precession in Foucault’s pendulum and the journey time differences in Sagnac’s interferometer, but that is old news.  Several new experiments using cosmological evidence have been suggested in these essays and it would be interesting to find out the results.

The other front is to develop some plausible ideas about what the Q field actually is.  The above essay has barely scratched the surface.  There may be answers in the annals of physics or in the five million or so papers in science that are published every year, or even in scientific works that remain unpublished or unread. 

What is clearly apparent is that the task is bigger than one person can handle.  All sorts of talents are required.  Open thinkers, talented experimenters, astronomers, historians of science, mathematicians able to recast the ideas into mathematical models, people to respond to the criticisms that will inevitably be directed at the effort and so on.

The task is huge and the road long and rocky.  But the rewards would be immense. 

Reference

Van de Vusse, Sjoerd B.A., 2024,  Some ideas and experiments for issues affecting modern physics,  https://hereticalphysics.com.au
Author contact:  SBAvan@utas.edu.au
Author’s location:  Hobart, Australia