Also, is there any illumination that qst can cast on young’s double-slit experiment? If you can’t tell already your new theory is making me so curious about so many persisting physics questions and how it might be able to help us understand them.

Thank you for your message.

First off, let me apologize for the late response. I have been at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, exploring a land full of mysteries and beauty. It was an amazing experience.

In response to your questions:

We share your excitement and curiosity about this theory, and look forward to seeing how it with be either supported or refuted by science. We might, however, point out that this is different from being excited about refutation or support from the current scientific community. Because science is made up of a compilation of research programs, it is an active social entity – carrying several social pressures that can lead it astray in any given point in time. Nevertheless, because science is a self-correcting machine, over the long haul it will correct itself toward a more clear and accurate picture. That is to say that if the current climate in the scientific community was such that it immediately accepted qst, this would not in and of itself provide concrete support that qst is an accurate reflection of Nature. Neither would its immediate rejection (there are several historical examples of theories that we now accept that were rejected by the scientific community at large in the time (and social climate) that they were first proposed in). What really matters is – does qst accurately map the true structure of Nature? We are hopeful that we will secure a clear, non-biased answer to that question in time.

You asked how qst plays into the emergence of the forces during the first moments of the Big Bang… The answer is a beautiful example of how qst gives us incredible intuitive access to rather complex ideas. First, let me note that current thought suggests that as we run the clock back toward the Big Bang, there are symmetries that go from broken to unbroken. Translating this into English, this means that as we approach that first moment we go from having distinctly recognizable forces (four of them) to forces that merge in their descriptions. As we approach the first moment (after the Big Bang) all four forces gain complete symmetry with the background metric. They can no longer be teased apart in this state. This special axiomatic state of the Universe is responsible for the fact that the forces are no longer indistinguishable from the metric.

In qst, this situation is made more clear. In this model it is suggested that in that first moment, all the quanta that make up our universe were compressed together (by an external collision by another universe). Because of this there were no uniquely acting quanta (locations) in the universe in this moment. The whole collection acted like a singularity, but instead of reaching this state by losing energy and maximizing entropy, it represented a highly energetic state with minimal entropy (because of its external cause). Because all the quanta acted in unison, there was in effect, only one unique x, y, z location at this point in time. The significant result of this geometric condition (as per our current discussion), is that it was not possible to have spatial density gradients in this moment, nor was it possible to have any waves propagating through the x, y, z medium, or little whirlpools of mixing, etc. The entire axiomatic set of quanta were rigidly locked together. This is why there were no distinguishable forces from the background metric. As the rebound occurred, and the quanta that make up the x, y, z volume of our universe began to separate, the number of independently acting locations in the universe exponentially multiplied, and the geometric distortions that we refer to as forces became geometrically possible.

Please let me know if that helped.

About your question about why qst has not taken hold in the scientific community yet… a little background might help here. Scientific progress is a messy thing. In part, this has to do with the demarcation problem (the task of being able to identify scientific endeavors from pseudoscientific endeavors). Karl Popper famously tried to help speed science along, and overcome this problem, with the suggestion that what makes something science is that it is falsifiable. This has been a popular criterion of science ever since. I am certainly drawn towards the claim that a theoretical construct should make claims that can be falsified before we put our full trust into it. However, as has been pointed out, Popper’s criterion cannot actually distinguish scientific endeavors from pseudoscientific ones. There are fields that we all feel comfortable labeling pseudoscientific that make falsifiable claims. But more importantly, all fields considered scientific rest on axioms, assumptions, and non-falsifiable statements that play a fundamental role in their construction. If we are expected to abandon all theories that contain non-falsifiable statements, then there would be no identifiable sciences at all. In response to this some have grasped for the idea that there is some sort of art to picking the axioms beneath a theory – those that perform that art too loosely fall out of the range of science. This idea lead Thomas Kuhn to conjecture that what it meant to be scientific was to conform to the current scientific paradigm. In this view science becomes merely a social construct that shifts with the tides of time. Paul Feyerabend and Imre Lakatos later wrestled with these issues and came to the conclusion that science is not an autonomous form of reasoning, but is inseparable from the larger body of human thought and inquiry. They determined that because science is a human endeavor questions of truth and falsity are not uniquely empirical.

All of this has led to the general recognition that the demarcation problem is intractable. In response Paul Thagard has suggested that we alter our focus and deem a theory as non-scientific if it satisfies the following two conditions:

1 – It is unpromising: The theory has been less progressive than alternative theories over a long period of time, and faces many unsolved problems: and
2 – It doesn’t adhere to the Scientific Method: The community of practitioners makes little attempt to develop the theory towards solutions of the problems, shows no concern for attempts to evaluate the theory in relation to others, and is selective in considering confirmations and disconfirmations.

Note that the first criteria requires long periods of time.

Certainly, in reference to this evaluation qst is in a scientific vein. However, according to this criteria a “long period of time” must pass before we can expect it to have secured a place for itself in scientific history.

Cutting through all of this philosophy of science, I suspect that the answer to your question has a lot to do with the fact that the majority of practicing scientists are not fully aware of the intricacies of theory construction, or the full history of the demarcation problem. Many scientists have communicated with me about the value they see in this theory. Others have found this theory objectionable based on an emotional fear that it might disagree with currently popular agendas. For some reason these individuals try to undermine the credibility of qst by resting on Popper’s falsifiability requirement, which I find strange since there are many many ways in which qst can be falsified.

All in all, however, I believe that the biggest reason qst has not yet taken off to a mainstream platform is that it is new. We simply need to give it more time and keep spreading the word. It may also have a bit of a harder time taking off than we might expect because it was mostly developed during some intense years of research while I was in prison. Nevertheless, I am confident in the self-correcting method of science, and I believe that it will eventually fully evaluate the richness of this theory.

Just before he passed away, I was in communication with Benoît Mandelbrot, the father of fractals. We discussed the fractal structure of qst and he granted it his blessing to the idea. Mandelbrot was a man that gave the world a new idea, and he gave it to them in a non-traditional way. After professional scientists outright rejected his idea, Mandelbrot continued to develop his insight and share his idea until its practical powers were undenyable. The world at large became familiar with fractals and began to use them in electronic designs, biological calculations, and more. Then and only then, did the research program of formal Mathematics accept the importance of Mandelbrot’s ideas. The lesson I take from this is that, if an idea is useful and brings us closer to the truth, it will eventually be heard.

Thanks for your interest.

Also, if you want to read more, I’d be happy to email you pre-print pdf copy of the entire book.

Sincerely,
Thad

Also, I’ve been searching the web and haven’t really been able to find a lot on QST other than on your website. I’m just wondering why such an interesting idea hasn’t taken hold in the scientific community and why no one has openly talked about this theory of yours. Do you know why this is the case? I’d love to hear more about this. I’ve been gobbling up your website watched both your conversation pieces and the TED talk, which will hopefully make these ideas more public, and I’m really excited by the prospects of QST and what it can mean for the breadth of human knowledge.