1104 hours. The 'Fifth Element' is
Aether.
** **
Aether (classical element)
From
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
According
to ancient and medieval science, aether (Greek: αἰθήρ aithēr),
also spelled æther or ether, also called quintessence, is
the material that fills the region of the universe above the terrestrial sphere
The concept of aether was used in several theories to explain several natural
phenomena, such as the traveling of light and gravity. In the late 19th
century, physicists postulated that aether permeated all throughout space,
providing a medium through which light could travel in a vacuum, but evidence
for the presence of such a medium was not found in the Michelson-Morley
experiment.
Mythological
origins
The word αἰθήρ (aithēr) in Homeric
Greek means "pure, fresh air" or "clear sky". In Greek
mythology, it was thought to be the pure essence that the gods breathed,
filling the space where they lived, analogous to the air breathed by mortals. It is also personified as a deity, Aether,
the son of Erebus and Nyx in traditional Greek mythology. Aether is related to αἴθω
"to incinerate", and intransitive "to burn, to shine" . .
..
Fifth
element
In Plato's Timaeus
(58d) speaking about air, Plato mentions that "there is the most
translucent kind which is called by the name of aether (αίθηρ)", but
otherwise he adopted the classical system of four elements. Aristotle, who had
been Plato's student at the Akademia, agreed on this point with his former
mentor, emphasizing additionally that fire sometimes has been mistaken for
aether. However, in his Book On the
Heavens he introduced a new "first" element to the system of the
classical elements of Ionian philosophy. He noted that the four terrestrial
classical elements were subject to change and naturally moved linearly. The
first element however, located in the celestial regions and heavenly bodies,
moved circularly and had none of the qualities the terrestrial classical
elements had. It was neither hot nor cold, neither wet nor dry. With this
addition the system of elements was extended to five and later commentators
started referring to the new first one as the fifth and also called it aether,
a word that Aristotle had not used.
Aether did not follow Aristotelian physics
either. Aether was also incapable of motion of quality or motion of quantity.
Aether was only capable of local motion. Aether naturally moved in circles, and
had no contrary, or unnatural, motion. Aristotle also noted that crystalline
spheres made of aether held the celestial bodies. The idea of crystalline
spheres and natural circular motion of aether led to Aristotle's explanation of
the observed orbits of stars and planets in perfectly circular motion in
crystalline aether.
Medieval
scholastic philosophers granted aether changes of density, in which the
bodies of the planets were considered to be more dense than the medium which
filled the rest of the universe. Robert Fludd stated that the aether was of the
character that it was "subtler than light". Fludd cites the
3rd-century view of Plotinus, , concerning the aether as penetrative and
non-material.
Quintessence
Quintessence is the Latinate name of the fifth
element used by medieval alchemists for a medium similar or identical to that
thought to make up the heavenly bodies. It was noted that there was very little
presence of quintessence within the terrestrial sphere. Due to the low presence
of quintessence, earth could be affected by what takes place within the
heavenly bodies. This theory was developed in the 14th century text The
testament of Lullius, attributed to Ramon Llull. The use of quintessence
became popular within medieval alchemy. Quintessence stemmed from the medieval
elemental system, which consisted of the four classical elements, and aether,
or quintessence, in addition to two chemical elements representing metals:
sulphur, "the stone which burns", which characterized the principle
of combustibility, and mercury, which contained the idealized principle of
metallic properties.
This elemental system spread rapidly
throughout all of Europe and became popular with alchemists, especially in
medicinal alchemy. Medicinal alchemy then sought to isolate quintessence and
incorporate it within medicine and elixirs. Due to quintessence's pure and heavenly
quality, it was thought that through consumption one may rid oneself of any
impurities or illnesses. In The book of Quintessence, a 15th-century
English translation of a continental text, quintessence was used as a medicine
for many of man's illnesses. A process given for the creation of quintessence
is distillation of alcohol seven times. Over the years, the term quintessence
has become synonymous with elixirs, medicinal alchemy, and the philosopher's
stone itself.
Legacy
With the 18th century physics developments
physical models known as "aether theories" made use of a similar
concept for the explanation of the propagation of electromagnetic and
gravitational forces. As early as the 1670s, Newton used the idea of aether to
help match observations to strict mechanical rules of his physics. However, the
early modern aether had little in common with the aether of classical elements
from which the name was borrowed. These aether theories are considered to be
scientifically obsolete, as the development of special relativity showed that
Maxwell's equations do not require the aether for the transmission of these
forces. However, Einstein himself noted that his own model which replaced these
theories could itself be thought of as an aether, as it implied that the empty
space between objects had its own physical properties.
Despite the early modern aether models being
superseded by general relativity, occasionally some physicists have attempted
to reintroduce the concept of aether in an attempt to address perceived
deficiencies in current physical models. One proposed model of dark energy has
been named "quintessence" by
its proponents, in honor of the classical element. This idea relates to the hypothetical
form of dark energy postulated as an explanation of observations of an
accelerating universe. It has also been called a fifth fundamental force.
Aether and light[
The motion of light was a long-standing
investigation in physics for hundreds of years before the 20th century. The use
of aether to describe this motion was popular during the 17th and 18th
centuries, including a theory proposed by Johann Bernoulli, who was recognized
in 1736 with the prize of the French Academy. In his theory, all space is
permeated by aether containing "excessively small whirlpools". These
whirlpools allow for aether to have a certain elasticity, transmitting
vibrations from the corpuscular packets of light as they travel through.
This theory of luminiferous aether would
influence the wave theory of light proposed by Christiaan Huygens, in which
light traveled in the form of longitudinal waves via an "omnipresent,
perfectly elastic medium having zero density, called aether". At the time,
it was thought that in order for light to travel through a vacuum, there must
have been a medium filling the void through which it could propagate, as sound
through air or ripples in a pool. Later, when it was proved that the nature of
light wave is transverse instead of longitudinal, Huygens' theory was replaced
by subsequent theories proposed by Maxwell, Einstein and de Broglie, which
rejected the existence and necessity of aether to explain the various optical
phenomena. These theories were supported by the results of the Michelson-Morley
experiment in which evidence for the presence of aether was conclusively
absent. The results of the experiment influenced many physicists of the time
and contributed to the eventual development of Einstein's theory of special
relativity.
Aether and gravitation
Aether
has been used in various gravitational theories as a medium to help explain
gravitation and what causes it. It was used in one of Sir Isaac Newton's first
published theories of gravitation, Philosophiae
Naturalis Principia Mathematica (the Principia). He based the whole
description of planetary motions on a theoretical law of dynamic interactions.
He renounced standing attempts at accounting for this particular form of
interaction between distant bodies by introducing a mechanism of propagation
through an intervening medium. He calls this intervening medium aether. In his
aether model, Newton describes aether as a medium that "flows"
continually downward toward the Earth's surface and is partially absorbed and
partially diffused. This "circulation" of aether is what he
associated the force of gravity with to help explain the action of gravity in a
non-mechanical fashion. This theory described different aether densities,
creating an aether density gradient. His theory also explains that aether was
dense within objects and rare without them. As particles of denser aether
interacted with the rare aether they were attracted back to the dense aether
much like cooling vapors of water are attracted back to each other to form
water. In the Principia he attempts to explain the elasticity and
movement of aether by relating aether to his static model of fluids. This
elastic interaction is what caused the pull of gravity to take place, according
to this early theory, and allowed an explanation for action at a distance
instead of action through direct contact. Newton also explained this changing
rarity and density of aether in his letter to Robert Boyle in 1679. He
illustrated aether and its field around objects in this letter as well and used
this as a way to inform Robert Boyle about his theory. Although Newton
eventually changed his theory of gravitation to one involving force and the
laws of motion, his starting point for the modern understanding and explanation
of gravity came from his original aether model on gravitation.
Selected and edited from Wikipedia
** **
1106 hours. The closest thing to all this
as far as science is concerned is gravity. This helps me to better understand
the gravity of the problem which I am no doubt spending too much time on. It seems
simplest to just ignore this and continue as I have in GMG.1 and 2. The
person's heartanmind in the soul moves about within the soul creating herorhis
own stage set, so to speak, a bit like suggested in Our Town.
Wise
move, orndorff. - Amorella
1112 hours. I am sometimes rather slow
but it was nice to brush up on Aether in any case.
Carol is in the shower, you are ready for bed. Craig and Alta are
sleeping in the small bedroom (the warmest in the house with a queen size bed).
You split turtle sundaes at Graeter's after soup and sandwich lunches at
Panera. Later, supper of veggies, bread, and spaghetti pie and a cookie for
dessert. You watched NBC News and last night's "Madam Secretary";
checked for a movie for tomorrow (Manchester by the Sea) and you are going to
Two Cities Pizza for lunch. - Amorella
2233 hours. We had a really fun
afternoon and evening; a great day. We four always get along well. Are we four
soulmates? Yes, we are.
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