Objects vs. Concepts

There is a fundamental irrationality found in Modern Physics which is a massive misunderstanding of the difference between concepts and objects.  Missing this leads one down the road of an absurd Platonic Realism where conceptual ideas exist in reality and have effects on real physical objects.



 I don't doubt that Relativity's equations are practical and applicable in reality. What I doubt is the ultimate understanding of what it is that the equations describe.  I would liken it to chemical knowledge before the atomic explanation of chemistry.  We may have known that certain objects changed at certain temperatures and we knew that mixing one thing with another would produce whatever desired result, ect.- but we had no idea what physical mechanisms actually determined the process.

The basic difference between objects and concepts is something that confuses people of all fields of study, so I thought it would be helpful to take the time to explicate this distinction fully before picking apart specific physical theories.

The difference is very simple: objects are individual things with a shape of it's own.  Concepts are relationships between two or more objects.  If something is an object then we would be able to identify it by pointing to it and uttering it's name. If something is an object we can draw it.  If an object exists then in addition to shape it has location.
Concepts have no shape of their own since they merely describe the way two or more objects relate to one another. They cannot exist.

Here's a basic example. Objectively, air exists. Something exists if it has a physical presence. Shape and  location.  Air is an object with a shape and a location.  Conceptually, the wind is a motion of air  This concept of wind is solely the result of the motion of air particles.  With this the difference becomes clear.  "Air" refers to the physical structure of the object, "wind" is a concept which distinguishes a particular motion of air (EDIT: I changed the previous example because it was confusing more than anything).

To clear up some confusion about whether or not concepts are "real" or not.  It depends on how you define real! Here's a distinction I'd like to make:

Concepts can either be rational or irrational, objects can either exist or not. 

Concepts as objects, the fundamental flaw of Modern Physics

TO clarify! These concepts may be true for all I know! I just wanted to point out that the concepts are NOT the objects.  The MAP is not the TERRITORY.  Yet physics are treating fields, points, waves, ect (the map) as real objects (the territory.)

Here are some of the most common mathematical concepts that are treated as physical objects in modern physics.


-Space: Quite simply, the distance between two or more objects.  The only rational way to define space is conceptually, space has NO shape.  It is not a physical object itself any more than justice or love.
Correct Example: "The space between my chair and the table is about 12 inches."
Incorrect Example: "The space around the Earth is bent or warped."

-Time: I have already defined this (and dimensions) in another article.
Correct Example: "What time would you like to meet for lunch tomorrow?"
Incorrect Example: "If you take the right path around an object you can travel backwards through time!" -Neil DeGrasse Tyson

-Waves:  A "disturbance or oscillation". Oscillating is to

"move or swing back and forth at a regular speed: "a pendulum oscillates about its lowest point".

Clearly, a wave or oscillation is a concept based in motion.  It is not an object with a shape of it's own, but just a description of how particular physical objects move. This ties in with the next big confusion called energy.
Correct Example: The boat was smashed with wave after wave of water.
Incorrect Example: A wave of nothing travels from the sun, through no medium at all, and reaches the Earth to heat and light it.

-Energy:

the capacity for vigorous activity.

Capacity is yet another concept which will always and forever be a relationship.  In this case, the relationship describes the activity, or motion of an object.  So energy is merely describing how the object is moving.  Motion or activity is a behavior of objects and energy is our description of that behavior.

Correct Example: Heat energy is measured as how fast a given object's atoms are vibrating.

Incorrect Example: "Pure energy" exists without a physical structure.

-Field:  In mathematics, the word field describes an area of an object that is being measured by some standard.  The "field of view" one has on the ground is much less than the "field of view" one can see from the top of a tall tower.  A "magnetic field" is the area in which you'll feel a push or pull from toward or away from the magnet.  Field is another conceptual term referring not to objects but how those objects are related.
Correct Example: "The field of spread of a shotgun is bigger than a watermelon from 10ft away."
Incorrect Example: "The magnetic field around a powerful magnet can attract from a few feet away."

By stating that any of the above concepts of fields, waves, energy, ect. "exists" alone and aren't just descriptions of physical objects is like saying a family exists without individual people or that a forest exists with no trees.

Is light an object or a concept?

All five of the example concepts I gave you above refer to actions, yet physicists are convinced they are objects!  According to wikipedia,

"Electromagnetic radiation (EM radiation or EMR) is a form of energy emitted and absorbed by charged particles, which exhibits wave-like behavior as it travels through space."  

Oh so, EMR is the form of an activity?  Activity of what?  The behavior is wave-like, but what is behaving?  Physical actions are always caused by physical objects.  This is called the Law of Causality, which stands as a self-evident axiom.  If a concept is valid, then the question is indubitably begged: "What physical object does the concept relate to?"  If the answer is "nothing" then the concept is false.


When the sun's rays hit the Earth, one vibrating object is warming and lighting a object at a distance.  Since logic demands that physical actions must be caused by physical processes, this description must be seen as incomplete.  It is irrational to say that "waves moving through space" since "wave" is a logical subset of motion (motion is moving?) and "space" is a concept through which objects may not move.  Objects can only move toward, away from, through, around other objects.  Not concepts.  Clearly, a fully explanatory notion of light is currently being denied.

Is space synonymous with 'bendy stuff?'

Space also cannot "bend" if we are using the word consistently (i.e. scientifically).  Only objects can be bent- like the bands the artist drew in these pictures.  If something in the area around earth is being bent, which must be the case according to these measurements, then what is it? What is it's physical structure?  Scientists currently don't have an answer but they assert that it is indeed "space itself" or "the fabric of time". However, time cannot be bent or "moved through" because time is already a concept of motion.  It is not fabric, an object.  This proves the concept of "time travel" to be irrational.  It also shows that General Relativity and Special Relativity are incomplete explanations, and not physical theories even in the slightest.  They merely deal with how the object appears when we measure it at particular times and is not a consistent and scientific inquiry into the nature of things.  Treating concepts or your measurements as things will lead you down a road to absurdity.  It is commonplace now for scientists to speak of time travel.  Everything from gravity to backwards time travel is attributed to "spacetime bending".

It is also true that only objects can pull. I can pull on you from a distance but only with a physical medium like a rope or a hook.  However, gravity is not even considered in such terms.  Basically, physicists throw up their arms and proclaim, "They just attract, damnit!" and thus abandon scientific inquiry.

What is the physical medium connecting the earth and I which causes the pull between us?

What is the physical mechanism underlying this structure?

The fact is that the physical structure described by the concepts above still have not been made intelligible.  The knowledge is out there but current scientists have been stunted by irrational non-answers and I hope one day the errors can be widely understood so that real answers are sought out.

In fact, they have been explored a bit by Bill Gaede at youstupidrelativist.com and a physicist by the name of Lewis Little who also asserts the irrationality of "nonlocal causes" as he puts it. Each of these scientists are great to check out and they deserve more attention. It seems rationality still has a pulse in science.




This article is part of a Series questioning modern physics:
1. Has Physics Become Irrational?
2. Objects vs Concepts
3. Time
4. Specific Quantum Strangeness (Soon to come)