Aether and Gravitation. William George Hooper
entire universe as a frictionless medium. Such a hypothesis is contrary to all laws and rules of Philosophy, and to continue to advocate its claims is to remain where we are in relation to the cause of Gravitation, and in complete ignorance of the beauty and harmony of the wonderful physical mechanism that underlies the whole of the universe. Of course, if experience and observation are no guide to Philosophy, then we will let imagination run riot, and postulate the most extravagant explanations for the varied phenomena of the heavens. With experience of no account, we will affirm that the moon is made of green cheese, that the earth is flat, that the sun revolves round the moon, and a host of other absurd hypotheses that require no correction by experience and observation. But there, a truce to such absurd imaginations. Experience is a guide to Philosophy, its claims are recognized by the greatest Philosopher the world has ever known, and therefore as either experience or a frictionless medium has to go, we will part with the frictionless medium, and endeavour to make a hypothesis of the Aether that is in greater harmony with our Rules of Philosophy.
Art. 15. Second Law of Motion.--The application of Newton's Rules of Philosophy to the Second Law of Motion is attended with greater success than was the case with his First Law. “Change of motion,” he states, “is proportionate to the impressed Force, and takes place in the direction of the straight line in which the Force acts.”
Newton adds this explanation to his Second Law: “If a Force generates any motion, a double Force will generate double motion, and a triple Force triple motion, whether they are applied simultaneously or gradually and successively. And this motion, if the body were already moving, is either added to the previous motion, if it is in the same direction, or subtracted from it if directly opposed to it, or is compounded with the previous motion if the two are inclined at an angle.”
According to that, a force which presses or pushes with a four-pound pressure per square inch, if doubled, would press with a force of eight pounds per square inch, which fact agrees with experience. If the force is applied gradually, then the change of motion would be gradual; if applied suddenly, then the resultant motion would be sudden and violent.
The impressed force, therefore, always produces a definite and corresponding effect on any moving body, however that force may be originated, and however it may be applied. The effect so produced is always a change of motion, or, in present scientific terms, a change of momentum in the moving body. If the impressed force is halved, by an alteration in the mass of the body which exerts the impressed force, then the resultant momentum produced is halved also. If the impressed force is doubled, through any alteration in the velocity of the body which exerts the force, then the momentum produced in the moving body will be doubled also. So that the impressed force is equal to the change of momentum in the moving body upon which it is impressed.
When similar forces are impressed upon exactly similar bodies, the velocities produced are exactly the same; but, if similar forces act on dissimilar bodies, then the velocities produced in the different bodies are not the same; yet the total motion produced on all bodies, according to the Second Law of Motion, must always be proportionate to the impressed force. So that when we compare the effect of similar forces on different bodies, we find that there are two factors involved, viz., the mass and velocity of the moving body. The product of these two quantities is termed the momentum of the body.
When we apply the Second Law of Motion to the theory of aetherial dynamics, as suggested in this work, we shall seek to show that Newton's Second Law of Motion holds good in its application to the new theory. With the present conception of a frictionless Aether, however, it is philosophically impossible for the Aether to exert force on any body that may exist in it. Because, to the extent that it is frictionless, to that extent it ceases to possess mass. If it does possess mass, then it cannot be frictionless. Such an assumption violates all the Rules of Philosophy.
Yet the Aether is supposed, in some unknown manner, to possess inertia, which property is also dependent on mass. If the Aether really possesses inertia, then it must possess mass, and possessing mass it ceases to be a frictionless medium. So that if it possesses mass, then it can exert force the same as any other body, and Newton's Second Law of Motion is applicable to it.
Art. 16. Third Law of Motion.--Newton's Third Law of Motion reads as follows--
“Action and re-action are equal and opposite, or, to every action there is always an equal and contrary re-action.” This law is also conformable to experience; for, by experiment, it has been proved to hold good for electric and magnetic action. As MacLaurin points out, the Third Law of Motion may be extended to all sorts of powers that take place in Nature, and belongs to attraction and repulsion of all kinds, and must not be considered as being arbitrarily introduced by Newton.
The mutual action between any two bodies has, therefore, a double action. Thus a piece of stretched string must be conceived as pulling at both ends; the pull at the one end being exactly equal and opposite to the pull on the other end.
A magnet will attract a piece of iron with a certain force, but it is equally true that the iron attracts the magnet with an exactly equal and opposite force. We might even extend the application of this Third Law to a falling stone in its relation to the earth. Thus, if a stone is dropped from a high altitude to the surface of the earth, although the motion seems to be all in one direction, yet if the Third Law holds good, then the earth is attracted by the stone in exactly an equal, but opposite direction, to that in which the earth attracts the stone.
As, however, the mass of the earth is very great compared with that of the stone, it follows that the velocity of the stone compared with the velocity of the earth, must be very much greater, in order that the forces shall be equal.
The application of this Third Rule of Motion to planetary and celestial phenomena is therefore philosophical, in that its conception agrees with experience and observation.
Thus, while it is true that the sun attracts each of the planets in his system, it is equally true that the planets, in their turn, attract the sun with an exactly equal and opposite force. But the velocity of motion induced by the earth's attractive power upon the sun, would be less than the velocity of motion induced by the sun's attractive power upon the earth, although the two forces would be equal and opposite, simply because force, being a compound quantity, is dependent upon the mass of a body as well as upon its velocity.
Not only, however, is it true that the sun and all the planets jointly attract each other, but it is equally true that the planets attract each other also, with an exactly equal and opposite effect. Indeed, as Gravitation is universal, it has to be conceived that there are no two bodies existing, but what the Third Law of Motion equally applies to those two bodies; so that equality of action and re-action is as universal as the Law of Gravitation itself.
In coming to a conclusion with reference to Philosophy and the Laws of Motion, I wish to say that I am strongly of the opinion that the day has come, or will soon come, when they will pass away and give place to a more direct and simple method of working of the great Law of Gravitation. I look upon the Laws of Motion as part of the scaffolding which has been used to build up the Law of Gravitation. That Law has now been erected, and stands firm and secure in its position in the universe. Whatever changes may take place in its scaffolding, the Law itself will stand out with greater beauty and clearness, if we could but see the perfected structure, apart from the props and helps which have assisted in its successful erection and completion. As Dr. Larmor said, in his address to the British Association, 1900: “There has even appeared a disposition to consider that the Newtonian principles, which have formed the basis of physical phenomena for nearly two centuries, must be replaced in these deeper subjects by a method of more direct description of the cause of the phenomena. The question has arisen, as to how far the new methods of aetherial physics are to be considered as an independent departure; or how far they form the natural development of existing dynamical science.”
I hope, therefore, to be able in this work to do something towards clearing the completed Law from some of the outside props, which have long hidden the simplicity, beauty and harmony of the physical working of Gravitation from the eyes of those who feign would see its wonderful mechanism.
In the elaboration and development,