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zeromodz
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I have been doing some research and many sources have stated that "zero point energy" exists in all points in space and there is an infinite amount of it. Is this true? please back up what you say. Thanks.
zeromodz said:I have been doing some research and many sources have stated that "zero point energy" exists in all points in space and there is an infinite amount of it. Is this true? please back up what you say. Thanks.
wikipedia said:In quantum field theory, the fabric of space is visualized as consisting of fields, with the field at every point in space and time being a quantized simple harmonic oscillator, with neighboring oscillators interacting. In this case, one has a contribution of E=hw/2 from every point in space, resulting in a calculation of infinite zero-point energy.
Pythagorean said:It's a consequence of Quantum Field Theory:
It hasn't been experimentally verified that I know of, but I think most of you are misinterpreting it. It's not energy that can be used to do work. Remember that only differences in energy are measurable.
Read the two sections of the wiki here for more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy#Gravitation_and_cosmology
"Naively, it is infinite, but only differences in energy are physically measurable. The infinity can be removed by renormalization. In all practical calculations, this is how the infinity is handled. It is also arguable that new physics takes over at the Planck scale, and that the energy growth is cut off at that point."
Free Energy Devices:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-point_energy#Proposed_free_energy_devices
Frame Dragger said:...Unless you consider the possible role in universal expansion. Anyway, there is a vast difference between the scientific QM concept of the Quantum Vacuum and its many properties (expectation value, polarization, etc), but "zero point energy" is really just pseudoscience, which is why it is tied to "free energy devices". Perturbation of the vacuum may drive universal expansion, but as you say, it's not energy that is open to use on a lesser scale.
SpectraCat said:No, zero point energy is a well defined scientific concept. It is the intrinsic energy of a quantum system that is not accessible to do external work. Don't let the kooks take ownership of this concept ... it is the idea of harnessing ZPE to do work, not the concept itself, that is crazy-talking pseudo-science.
1) There is another explanation by Lifgarbagez and Pitaevskii of the Casimir effect in terms of van der Waals force. References are on the wikipage by the way. Please keep in mind that van der Waals forces are well established.ManyNames said:Yes - ZPF is not psuedoscience. It has experimental varification as well, such as the positive and negative attraction of the Casimir Force.
humanino said:1) There is another explanation by Lifgarbagez and Pitaevskii of the Casimir effect in terms of van der Waals force. References are on the wikipage by the way. Please keep in mind that van der Waals forces are well established.
2) Even if there was no other explanation, the tiny effect of Casimir requires for its measurement to spend quite some amount of energy in various cooling of the plates. No experimental device could use the Casimir effect to produce free energy.
Sure, it's up to you. But I'd be interested to know who it is you call "academic community". Is MIT good enough for you ? There are quite a few professional researchers on this very forum who like van der Walls and would call Lifgarbagez "academic".ManyNames said:I'm waiting for it to catch on with the academic comminuty, if you don't mind.
Jaffe said:In discussions of the cosmological constant, the Casimir effect is often invoked as decisive evidence that the zero-point energies of quantum fields are “real.” On the contrary, Casimir effects can be formulated and Casimir forces can be computed without reference to zero-point energies. They are relativistic, quantum forces between charges and currents. The Casimir force (per unit area) between parallel plates vanishes as α, the fine structure constant, goes to zero, and the standard result, which appears to be independent of α, corresponds to the α→∞ limit.
Casimir energy, dispersion, and the Lifgarbagez formulaThe physical origin of the Casimir force is connected with the existence of zero-point and thermal fluctuations. The Casimir effect is very general and finds applications in various fields of physics. This review is limited to the rapid progress at the intersection of experiment and theory that has been achieved in the last few years. It includes a critical assessment of the proposed approaches to the resolution of the puzzles arising in the applications of the Lifgarbagez theory of the van der Waals and Casimir forces to real materials. All the primary experiments on the measurement of the Casimir force between macroscopic bodies and the Casimir-Polder force between an atom and a wall that have been performed in the last decade are reviewed, including the theory needed for their interpretation. The methodology for the comparison between experiment and theory in the force-distance measurements is presented. The experimental and theoretical results described here provide a deeper understanding of the phenomenon of dispersion forces in real materials and offer guidance for the application of Lifgarbagez theory for the interpretation of the measurement results.
Despite suggestions to the contrary, we show in this paper that the usual dispersive form of the electromagnetic energy must be used to derive the Lifgarbagez force between parallel dielectric media. This conclusion follows from the general form of the quantum vacuum energy, which is the basis of the multiple-scattering formalism. As an illustration, we explicitly derive the Lifgarbagez formula for the interaction between parallel dielectric semispaces, including dispersion, starting from the expression for the total energy of the system. The issues of constancy of the energy between parallel plates and of the observability of electrostrictive forces are briefly addressed.
humanino said:I do not think your answer is very interesting, as it does not even address who you call "the scientific community". But I agree that there is an academic debate. I'd just be interested if you could instead share references. For instance
The Casimir force between real materials: experiment and theory
Casimir energy, dispersion, and the Lifgarbagez formula
Well it's better than nothing. The people I quoted where invited speakers in the plenary session at the international conference "60 years of Casimir effect" in 2008. In fact, Milton (second paper) even gave the opening talk. Bob Jaffe was formerly director of the MIT Center for Theoretical Physics.ManyNames said:You want papers? Anyone can surf the net for papers on the ZPF - i am assuring you, the papers you follow are not widely-accepted.
ManyNames said:Right now, the scientific community has a greater stance on it being the ZPF. Until that dissipates, i will not believe it.
humanino said:1) There is another explanation by Lifgarbagez and Pitaevskii of the Casimir effect in terms of van der Waals force. References are on the wikipage by the way. Please keep in mind that van der Waals forces are well established.
2) Even if there was no other explanation, the tiny effect of Casimir requires for its measurement to spend quite some amount of energy in various cooling of the plates. No experimental device could use the Casimir effect to produce free energy.
humanino said:I agree, and Milonni's book on QED and the vacuum is one of my favorite. It contains numerous examples of different calculations with different underlying interpretations leading to the same quantitative predictions, depending on when they were derived. His discussions of Bohr's original calculations for instance are quite revealing. I think such an approach is very interesting.
DarkStar7 said:The zero point energy is fact and is the result or the uncertainty principle.Sir Fred Hoyle would look at these as micro bangs and dark energy is inflation.The energy is obtained from the energy lost from matter and spacetime that is accelerated to the speed of light at our universes event horizon spacetime of the large scale is curved back into the quantum realm.
This assumption is based on the theory of quantum mechanics, which states that even in a vacuum, particles are constantly in motion. This motion, known as zero point energy, is thought to be infinite because it cannot be completely eliminated or reduced to zero.
One piece of evidence is the Casimir effect, which is the attraction between two uncharged plates in a vacuum. This effect is caused by the presence of zero point energy. Additionally, experiments have shown that even at absolute zero temperature, particles still exhibit motion, further supporting the concept of infinite zero point energy.
While zero point energy is thought to be infinite, it is also incredibly small. The energy density of zero point energy is many orders of magnitude lower than other sources of energy, making it impractical to harness as a usable source of energy.
No, zero point energy and dark energy are two different concepts. Zero point energy is the energy that exists in a vacuum, while dark energy is a theoretical form of energy that is thought to be responsible for the accelerating expansion of the universe.
As with any scientific theory, our understanding of zero point energy is subject to change as new evidence and theories emerge. However, the concept of zero point energy has been extensively studied and is widely accepted in the scientific community, so any changes to our understanding are not likely to be drastic.