I'm not a physicist. I don't know anything about advanced mathematics, such as long division, or taxes. I'm just a knucklehead who likes to think about a wide range of subjects, including ethics, politics, and toilet humor (the last two are not synonyms for the same topic, although they might seem like it occasionally).

Physics is one topic that crosses my mind from time to time. There are many people with far more knowledge than I have who have considered the subject. However, none of them have yet (as far as I know) been able to unite quantum physics with ice cream, toilet paper or orangutans. What point would there be for me to follow the same course of thought?

So I decided, for my own entertainment, to think outside of the box. Perhaps taking the road less traveled would be instructive, or at the very least, a pleasant diversion.

Some of the ideas here are ones I've been tossing around for the last few years, others are recent modifications. Maybe someone else will find them interesting.

My memory is not accurate enough for me to know whether I've heard any elements of this theory elsewhere, so I am making no claims regarding priority or originality.

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We start with E=mc². If everything in the universe can be expressed in terms of energy, what else is there?

This theory posits that there is a universal membrane, possibly reticulated in some way, but not necessarily so. It is also superconductive. When energy reacts with the universal membrane, that energy is never lost from the system.

Energy is a ripple in this membrane. The speed of light is the speed at which ripples travel through the universal membrane, and is determined by the inherent qualities of that membrane.

If sufficient energy from multiple directions collides in the membrane, it can cause the membrane to crumple, or fold, similar to the way mountain ranges are created when two landmasses collide. These crumpled areas are what we call atoms. An atom is not a separate thing, but is a part of the universal membrane.

Electrons are ripples, or paths of rippling, in an atom (which is to say, rippling in that portion(s) of the universal membrane of which that atom is composed).

If such an area is later "uncrumpled", it will release the amount of energy that went into crumpling it, minus any energy it had transferred out over the course of its existence.

Some topographical configurations are less stable than others, resulting in the gradual release of energy (radiation), as parts of the membrane slowly unfold until the area reaches a more stable topographical configuration.

According to this theory, the weak and strong nuclear forces don't exist as separate forces, but are at best characteristics of the universal membrane regarding the tendency to unfold or to remain folded.

Quantum-Linked Atoms:

Each crumpled area is not just one atom, but what we would consider to be two atoms. The areas crumpling in one direction are what we think of as protons, and the areas crumpling in the opposite direction are what we would call neutrons. Viewed from "the other side" of the membrane, one would see the protons of the first side as neutrons, and the neutrons of the first side as protons.

The "two" atoms would appear as two (or more?) quantum-linked atoms from our point of view, but in reality (or in theoretical reality, or theoreticality), they would be one object. As far as I can imagine, they do not need to be near each other in the three dimensions with which we're familiar. They could be like two adjacent areas on a hard drive whose values affect widely separated locations on a computer's screen.

If this conception of quantum-linked atoms has utility in explaining observed phenomena, it might be possible to map out the universal membrane by mapping quantum-linked atoms.

Time:

According to this alternative theory, time is a series of interactions between energy and the universal membrane. The greater the number of interactions, the more time has passed. No interactions, no time.

In a microwave oven, if an object is exposed to sufficient electromagnetic energy, the temperature of the object will increase. Conversely, if an object is subjected to enough heat, such as a piece of iron in a blacksmith's forge, it will increase the electromagnetic energy that the object emits. If the aforementioned theory of time is correct, time should pass faster in hotter environments than in colder ones.

One interesting experiment that I do not have the resources to conduct, would involve two rooms close enough together that a person from a single vantage point could view one (or more, for redundancy) atomic clocks in each room at nearly the same time. One of the rooms would be cooled (maybe to 100 degrees Kelvin), and the other heated (maybe to 1000 degrees Kelvin). If the clock in the heated room showed the passage of more time than the clock in the cooled room, it would support (but not prove) the theory that time is a series of interactions between energy and the universal membrane.

Since humans in hot environments and humans in cold environments have to keep themselves within a narrow range in order to stay alive, it could be that the difference between -20 degrees Celsius and +40 degrees Celsius is not sufficiently great to notice a difference in time on a conventional timepiece.

If this theory of time is correct, travel in time would require reversing the interactions between energy and the universal membrane, and would not be possible in the sense that science-fiction novels portray.

However, if the universe could somehow be read, like a book is read or a movie is viewed, it could be possible to replay any set of scenes, even though the person wouldn't actually be traveling backward in time, any more than a person travels backward in time when re-watching a movie. If enough dimensions are available, it might even be possible to read to a specific point, change a variable, and create a new timeline that splits off at a tangent, without affecting the paths that have already been traveled.

Chemical bonds:

In the case of noble gases, the topography makes it difficult for ripples outside that formation to interact with the rippling exterior of the atom.

The topography of some atoms permits some of the waves rippling around them to transfer their energy. There is an optimal number of waves for each topography (element).

A pair of atoms can form bonds with each other when a wave in one synchronizes with the wave in another one, or connects with another atom in an unused path where rippling could occur.

If one of the atoms had a suboptimal number of waves for its topography, and it connected with another atom that had an optimal or supra-optimal number, the two atoms would bond at the paths of the energy deficit and credit, respectfully. That would be an ionic bond.

In a covalent bond, there is no deficit of potential energy in one or the other, but a wave in each is able to synchronize with the other, creating a covalent bond.

If friction is one property of the universal membrane, it could be that ionic bonds are stronger than covalent bonds because atoms with an ionic bond share a larger surface area than atoms with covalent bonds, or it could be that when one atom in an ionic bond connects with the other atom, the area of synchronized rippling is interlocked to a larger degree than atoms with a covalent bond.

Hydrogen bonds would be weaker than either of these other bonds because the topography of the hydrogen atom is smaller in surface area than any other atom.

Certain topographies can form metallic bonds, which allow energy to pass freely from one atom to the next.

Magnetism, electricity, and radiation:

A subset of metals have the property of being able to be magnetized. Energy which is trapped continually traversing a loop which includes such atoms, is called magnetic energy.

When that energy travels through the magnet, energy is also passing through the universal membrane around it. That area is called a magnetic field. Due to the fact that the universal membrane is superconductive, this flow will continue until the energy is transferred elsewhere.

The magnetic field affects certain metals because of their topography. This flow of energy can reorient such metals along the direction of the flow, such as iron filings sprinkled around a magnet on a table. This energy also bonds to the magnet most metallic atoms closest to the magnet, but not at the atomic level. The bond is also not inseparable; if it were, you wouldn't be able to remove a magnet from your refrigerator.

Energy can also pass other through other substances, such as other metals, water, trees, unlucky people, etc. This energy that is passed from atom to atom, but which is not part of a magnet, is called electricity.

When we deliberately pass electricity through a loop of metals, that flow of energy also extends into the layers of the universal membrane around it, creating a magnetic field as it moves. The primary difference between an electrical flow and a magnetic one, is that we know how to more easily tap into the energy of an electrical flow, transferring it to do work for us, like powering a light bulb, or a battery-powered nose-hair trimmer.

It may be that when electricity travels through unluckly people, it also creates a field through the universal membrane around that person, but I couldn't get any volunteers for that experiment, not even for a bottle of cheap wine and a package of cigarettes.

When a magnet is motionless, even if it's surrounded by a coil of wire, energy is constantly flowing, but it is not generating electricity in the wire because the magnetic field is stationary. However, if the magnet (or pair of magnets) are spun, that motion causes the magnetic field to spin, resulting in a steady rippling of the universal membrane in the atoms of the coil. That rippling of necessity (according to this theory) generates electricity.

For an analogy, imagine a bed sheet suspended horizontally several feet above the floor, with its corners held in place. If there was a fan below the sheet, and the fan was blowing upward, the sheet would bend upward and hold that position, as long as the airflow was steady and there were no other forces acting upon it. If you were to spin the fan so that it pointed down at the floor then back up to the sheet over and over again, each rotation of the fan would cause the sheet to go up and down, creating a ripple effect. Those ripples, running through the universal membrane in the surface of the coil's atoms, are electricity.

What about the reverse? When electricity is run through a wire coil, we know that it will cause magnets centered in it to spin. This is because the movement of energy through the wire creates a field that extends into the universal membrane around it, and the moving flow of energy passes into the magnet, spinning the magnet in the direction of the flow.

When energy travels through the universal membrane, and is not part of a magnetic or electrical field, it is known as electromagnetic radiation. Examples are the light we get from the sun, and microwave radiation for heating a five-star frozen dinner.

These expressions of energy are all essentially the same thing, which is a wave traveling through the universal membrane, but the context affects the results, so we have different names for them.

Gravity:

One possible cause of gravity is that in the process of the membrane being crumpled into what we call an atom, the universal membrane gets stretched or thinned. An effect of this could be that an atom coming into contact with that area would have a steadily decreasing friction from that layer, making travel toward the other atom the path of least resistance.

If this change in the state of the membrane is more pronounced closer to the crumpling, but less so the farther one gets from it, and extends out a for a long distance, the cumulative effect might explain why gravity is so strong close to a large object (an object much larger than a sofa; bigger even than an aircraft carrier), but progressively weaker the farther that one gets from it.

Mapping the membrane (if it exists) and observing changes would be very helpful for understanding gravity, and other properties of the universal membrane.

Unknowns:

I do not yet have an explanation of how "atoms" move in relation to each other while still being attached to the universal membrane. I don't have any idea how many dimensions are possible, nor how those dimensions would affect the potential explanation.

I also don't have a theory for whether what we see is like what our senses tell us it is, or if it's more like were looking at a 3-D computer monitor, with changes actually occurring in the computer's memory.

And I also don't know where all of my socks keep disappearing to. I may just stop wearing them.

Conclusion:

There are not actually any particles. There is only energy and the universal membrane. That's why I called this Wave Physics. I could also have called it Stretchy Thingy Physics, but I would get tired of typing that. Wave Physics seemed simpler, and I like simple things.

It could be that the crumpling that I attribute to the origin of atoms is actually creating subatomic particles rather than atoms, but to make it simpler for myself (for entertainment purposes), I've left them out of this theory. Maybe they actually exist, and are not an artifact of the devices used to detect them, or a misinterpretation of data. But I'm not afraid to be wrong. Being wrong is more familiar to me than I would like.

No offense is intended to practitioners of particle physics. Please keep in mind that I'm just a knucklehead, and this is just a theory.

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If this theory, or something very like it, reflects the relationship between energy and matter, it means that everyone and everything is connected to every other person and thing; and they are connected by a superhighway of energy transfer.

In the world described by the standard model of particle physics, things like psychic ability and the power of prayer are phenomena that don't fit within that conception of the universe, and would require a supernatural explanation if they existed.

In this model, Wave Physics, since we are all connected by a perfect conductor of energy, both the power of prayer and the psychic ability are possibilities within the realm of nature. Energy can be passed from any one point to any other.

The possibility of life after death also does not require a supernatural explanation, but only a greater understanding of the properties of the universal membrane and the ways in which it can react with energy.