Benjamin Prather
Benjamin Prather | |
|---|---|
| Known for | Split-octonion physics and a refractive field theory of gravity |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Mathematics, Theoretical physics |
Benjamin Prather (Ben Prather) is a researcher with a background in mathematics who has developed an alternative approach to gravitation that he calls the "refractive field theory of gravity," together with a program he terms "split-octonion physics." He is listed in The Worldwide List of Dissident Scientists.
Ideas
On his personal site, Prather sets out a refractive field theory of gravity built on the postulates that space-time is Minkowskian (flat) rather than curved, that the energy density of the gravitational field itself contributes to gravitation, and that the gravitational field induces an index of refraction that affects physical processes. In this picture, gravity is modeled as a refractive medium in flat space-time rather than as the curvature of space-time used in general relativity, an approach he argues can reproduce standard results within the parametrized post-Newtonian framework while predicting higher-order deviations.
He connects this work to what he calls split-octonion physics, using the algebra of the split-octonions (and, in one dimension, the split-complex numbers) as a mathematical framework from which he derives the Lorentz transformations and related structure.
These proposals are self-published and lie outside mainstream theoretical physics.