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I'm a layman without a university background in physics / math. Since I don't have a background, reading a paper is more of an effort. Consequently, when I come across an interesting paper, I can't really just give it a glance, and see if it is science, or psuedoscience.

This question is about this paper:

The Schwarzschild Proton. Nassin Haramein. Originally at The Resonance Project; archived here by the Wayback Machine on 20/02/2012. [Edit by bcrowell, 19/08/2013: this web page provides a very detailed discussion, and offers heavy criticism.]

If the advent of the internet has taught me anything, its that there is an inverse relationship between cost to publish and the need to vet what is published

On the other hand, Lisi's E8 paper has taught me that a paper doesn't necessarily need to be correllated to an establishment like the Perimeter Institute or the Institute for Advanced Study (two examples off the top of my head) to be worth reading.

Is the paper worth reading?

Tommy Hinrichs
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3 Answers3

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I'm going with "Nonsense." on account of

  • Mixing physics 101 mechanics with special relativity with no evident effort made to tell which case is applicable. In particular, modeling the proton as a black hole, and asserting that he can use physics 101 circular motion to describe the acceleration of two such objects whose event horizons are in contact!
  • Claiming that the proton's mass arises from "cohering" some of the vacuum, and making no attempt to explain whence the charge comes and why it is always the same.
  • No effort to explain where the neutron comes from, or why it is chargeless, or why it is unstable.
  • No hint of an explanation of how or why nucleons can bind together, and why some states are stable and some are not.
  • Frankly, I gave up looking at the alleged physics at this point...there is some verbiage that purports to relate the anomalous magnetic moment of the proton, and the author finds it necessary to use scare quotes on anomalous. Not promising.
  • A general sense of "snake oil" in the web site.

A side note that may be of interest. AIP conferences accept a few papers from authors whose theories are...ehm...not well regarded. I don't know why. I do know that people flock to see these talks as comic relief (and they are generally scheduled very late in the day). Personally I find myself intensely embarrassed on the presenters behalf: I figure they must know how the audience feels, and don't know why they do it.

dmckee --- ex-moderator kitten
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  • This answer is wrong on point 4. Haramein write on binding between nucleons just after equation 14: "We then add the Coulomb repulsion of 3.310^6 dynes to the centrifugal component and find a negligible change on a value of ~ 47^10 dynes of centrifugal force. From the Eq. 5, above, the gravitational attraction between two Schwarzschild protons is 7.4910^47 dynes. Therefore, we obtain a stable orbit for two orbiting Schwarzschild protons at a diameter apart. " – David Jonsson Nov 05 '21 at 18:33
  • The answer also omits the contributions of Rauscher, a nuclear and astro physicist capable of such work, and multi-decade employee at NASA for nuclear and astro physics. – New Alexandria Aug 09 '23 at 15:28
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Experimental disproof:

Here's an experimental disproof of such result. Nassim's model predicts that a pair of two protons will form a stable nucleus, orbiting each other at a speed close to that of light in vacuo. However, various experiments shows that a diproton is an extremely unstable isotope of helium, which decays in less than a billionth of a second. You can read: G. Raciti et al., Physical Review Letters 100, 195203–06 (2008) "Experimental Evidence of $^2$He Decay from $^{18}$Ne Excited States" to check the facts.

Hakim
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A good guideline is to ask yourself "is this paper published in a reputable journal, or a crackpot website." If the former, maybe; the latter, no. So that would be a no for this and Lisi's paper.

Mr X
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