- #1
inflector
- 344
- 2
We know particles have mass. Thusfar we don't know of anything that has mass which is not a particle so we assume the likeliest explanation for apparent missing mass must be missing particles. This makes some good sense. But what if this assumption is wrong?
Has anyone looked into the idea of dark mass instead of dark matter?
Let me illustrate one possible idea that shows the difference:
1) We have some instances where fields themselves can contain energy, like the EM field, if I am not missing something. So a charged particle can transfer its kinetic energy to an EM field thereby slowing down the charged particle and increasing the energy of the field.
2) Could there not be an equivalent ability for a field defining mass (Higgs? or something else) to contain mass itself?
3) We know that as Wheeler said: mass tells spacetime how to curve and spacetime tells mass how to move.
4) What if spacetime was springy and wanted to be straight so that the curvature itself implied some stored energy that shows up in our observations as missing mass at very low accelerations?
That's just one possible idea, but I'm sure there could be many other similar ones I've overlooked. The basic idea is that spacetime itself or a mass field might be able to store/contain mass.
Are there any papers discussing this idea or refuting it? Or are there obvious problems with it that I'm not seeing that make it such a silly idea that no one would have even bothered?
Has anyone looked into the idea of dark mass instead of dark matter?
Let me illustrate one possible idea that shows the difference:
1) We have some instances where fields themselves can contain energy, like the EM field, if I am not missing something. So a charged particle can transfer its kinetic energy to an EM field thereby slowing down the charged particle and increasing the energy of the field.
2) Could there not be an equivalent ability for a field defining mass (Higgs? or something else) to contain mass itself?
3) We know that as Wheeler said: mass tells spacetime how to curve and spacetime tells mass how to move.
4) What if spacetime was springy and wanted to be straight so that the curvature itself implied some stored energy that shows up in our observations as missing mass at very low accelerations?
That's just one possible idea, but I'm sure there could be many other similar ones I've overlooked. The basic idea is that spacetime itself or a mass field might be able to store/contain mass.
Are there any papers discussing this idea or refuting it? Or are there obvious problems with it that I'm not seeing that make it such a silly idea that no one would have even bothered?