Used Theories Exchange

Ben-CS

Here is a horribly misguided theory from my youth. I polished it up a bit and gave it a name. If anyone wants this theory, they can have it.

MicroElectroMagnetoValence Theory

Tenets:[list=1][*]The fundamental electric and magnetic charges are 1/6 of the elementary electric and magnetic charges.[*]Particles are composed of multiple pairs of fundamental electric and magnetic charges.[*]Fermions consist of an odd number of pairs of fundamental charges.[*]Bosons consist of an even number of pairs of fundamental charges.[*]Leptons are composed of electric fundamental charges only.[*]Quarks are composed of both electric and magnetic fundamental charges.[/list=1] This theory pretty much died when I learned about the Pauli exclusion principle. Would anyone care to revive the old fossil?



Does anybody else have any give-away wacky theories that they came up with but abandoned in light of actual physics?

heumpje

I once tried to write down a theory for gravity based on Maxwell's equations. Simply write down the equations plug in the gravitational field for the electric field and invent a new field to replace the magnetic field.

Anyway, then i learned something about general relativity and found that it was a far better approach.....

arivero

As a first year student of physics, time ago, I had also written in my notebook a kind of technicolor theory, ordering fermions in a plane according charge and generation number. I never got to see how to prevent an infinite number of generations. So I guess I abandoned it soon.

Next year (1987, for the record), some companions and myself discussed about cellular automana, but we were unable to understand how to approach a continuum limit in a sensible way. So it become forgotten too. I remember I told of our ideas to a senior teacher, who suggested me to keep a notebook "because when you are young you have ideas but you havent got the technique, while when you are elder you have the technique but you do not gat any new idea".

I kept the notebook and while all the notes there are unuseful, it brought a second-order benefit: It helps to keep momentum, this is, you keep getting couriosity (and some ideas!) even as you grow older :)

Tom Mattson

What was wrong with "Charge Schematics"? [:D]