Abstract
Thanks (again) to astronomers, we now can only account for 4% of the mass and energy density that appears to be governing the motions in our Universe. Ernst Mach once wrote "The general experience cannot be constructed from the particular case given to us. We must, on the contrary, wait until such an experience presents itself. Perhaps when our physico-astronomical knowledge has been extended, it will be offered somewhere in the celestial space, where more violent and complicated motions take place than in our environment.", "If, however, we so interpret it that we come into conflict with our experience, our interpretation is simply wrong." and "Also when we speak of the attractions or repulsions of bodies, it is not necessary to think of any hidden causes of the motions produced. We signalize by the term attraction merely an actually existing resemblance between events determined by conditions of motions and the results of our volitional impulses." In this essay, we take Mach's wisdom to heart and re-examine whether one of our foundational assumptions, the modeling of forces as vectors, is mathematically complete and whether we have simply misinterpreted what we choose to see.
J P Baugher