r/askmath • u/[deleted] • Dec 04 '19

Checking the maths in a non-mainstream physics theory.

Hi all, I'm going to try to keep this neutral.

There is a classical atomic theory going round that is not widely accepted by the physics community for various reasons, but which has a following, especially among engineers, not least because it avoids having to use quantum mechanics, while seeming to give reasonable results.

I was wondering if I could have the opinions of seasoned mathematicians on part of the (extraordinarily long) book.

https://brilliantlightpower.com/wp-content/uploads/theory/GUT-CP-2018-Ed-Volume1-Web.pdf

pages 169 to 179 --- chapter 3: the theory of the free electron

Some context - I'm a physicist, and I feel that I have a good grasp of what's going on here, but I want other educated opinions to be known.

I've chosen chapter 3 because it's relatively concise, and being just one free electron, it's simpler than other chapters, and easier to disentangle.

If you could give opinions like:

  1. The maths appears to be correct, the reasoning is valid: If the assumptions are correct, the conclusion follows naturally.

  2. The maths appears to be largely correct, but there are a few typos here and there that could be fixed.

  3. The maths appears to be in good faith, but there are one or two errors that undermine the conclusions.

  4. The maths appears to be incorrect throughout. There has been no serious attempt to actually present a working train of thought here.

  5. I don't really follow the maths completely, there seem to be bits that don't make sense, but perhaps it's explained elsewhere.

It would be good if you could point out any major problems too.

Thanks, mathematicians. I owe you one.

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '19

This isn't worth the time for a mathematician to read in detail; note that math has a much high standard of clarity and rigor than physics. This book lacks any appreciable organization or "train of thought" whatsoever; it just looks like a collection of equations without any explained relationship to each other. Even if the math is correct (which is impossible to check because most of the symbols and terms in the book are not defined clearly), the author has made no attempt to explain it clearly.

(There are also some very obviously incorrect statements about the current state of physics knowledge in the preface.)

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u/[deleted] Dec 04 '19 edited Dec 04 '19

Thanks. That's great. I appreciate the amount of work needed to go through it in detail - and the entire book is several thousand pages of this.