KEEPING IN TOUCH: A rationale for Mach's Principle

v. 2 n. 37

When speaking of mass and space, a common assumption is that they are separate entities. Familiar visible matter is only a few percent of the mass of the Universe, hardly worth entering the discussion. Aside from visible matter, space and mass (mass/energy) are coincident according to general relativity; not separate entities. Most mass/energy is tied up in space -- space has mass, some 95% of the Universe. The accelerated expansion of space attests to this. The term "dark mass/energy" is superfluous and a possible distraction.

Mach's Principle suggests that the entire Universe communicates in some way with each common visible particle, particle assembly, person -- not just the small fraction of visible matter. It is not Mach's Law because the physical mechanism of the communication is not clearly expressed in a falsifiable way.

Elementary particles have no internal structure according to experiment so far and can be considered to have zero extent, mathematical points in space. But each one has a gravitational field associated with it. In which direction is this field pointing? Away from or toward the particle:

If the field is pointing away from the particle as in the drawing on the left, the implication is that the field originates at the particle, that the particle is a source; then where does the energy come from to sustain a gravitational field that extends to infinity in all directions since the time of the creation of the particle?

On the other hand if the field is pointing toward the particle as in the drawing on the right, the field originates in all of space, meets at a point, then cancels at the point; if it did not cancel the particle, or aggregate, would move without apparent force applied. Even though no external forces are applied the particle of zero extent has inertia by virtue of having position. This particle is imbedded in this space, and is apparent because of a point lack of field in an ambient gravitational field. This particle does not move relative to space. Moving this particle requires work because the field is altered with an imbedded particle if position is changed. This could be an origin of inertia if particles are imbedded in the ambient gravitational field, if they are infinitesimal absences of space.

This particle is apparent to measurement because it is different from the space beside it; the instrument is measuring a difference from ambience, and the operator interprets this difference as a spike in voltage. This particle is a gravitational sink, and does not require renormalization, nor does it add excessive mass to the quantum vacuum, as particles treated as theoretical sources add. The mass of a sink is in its field extending to infinity. This particle is in contact with all of space, and always was from the moment of its creation, whether near the beginning of the Universe, or recently.

The the small fraction of visible matter in the Universe is inconsequential to Mach's Principle rather than the conventional focus. The 95% space mass should be the focus if particles are mathematical points supported by the ambient gravitational field; actually, if particles are sinks 100% of the mass of the Universe is fundamentally the ambient gravitational field. Electromagnetism and the nuclear forces were shown to be derivative of gravitation, and dark matter and dark energy were shown to be gravitational as well.

Mach's Principle in falsifiable terms: Create a sufficiency of particles in a device, and measure the associated gravitational field of the new particles. If the particles are sources, the field will move outward at finite speed. If the particles are sinks, the field will immediately point to the particles.