In: Physics
I'm a layman without a university background in physics / math. Since I don't have a background, reading a paper is more of an effort. Consequently, when I come across an interesting paper, I can't really just give it a glance, and see if it is science, or psuedoscience.
This question is about this paper:
The Schwarzschild Proton. Nassin Haramein. Originally at The Resonance Project; archived here by the Wayback Machine on 20/02/2012. [Edit by bcrowell, 19/08/2013: this web page provides a very detailed discussion, and offers heavy criticism.]
If the advent of the internet has taught me anything, its that there is an inverse relationship between cost to publish and the need to vet what is published
On the other hand, Lisi's E8 paper has taught me that a paper doesn't necessarily need to be correllated to an establishment like the Perimeter Institute or the Institute for Advanced Study (two examples off the top of my head) to be worth reading.
Is the paper worth reading?
I'm going with "Nonsense." on account of
Mixing physics 101 mechanics with special relativity with no
evident effort made to tell which case is applicable. In
particular, modeling the proton as a black hole, and asserting that
he can use physics 101 circular motion to describe the acceleration
of two such objects whose event horizons are in contact!
Claiming that the proton's mass arises from "cohering" some of the
vacuum, and making no attempt to explain whence the charge comes
and why it is always the same.
No effort to explain where the neutron comes from, or why it is
chargeless, or why it is unstable.
No hint of an explanation of how or why nucleons can bind together,
and why some states are stable and some are not.
Frankly, I gave up looking at the alleged physics at this
point...there is some verbiage that purports to relate the
anomalous magnetic moment of the proton, and the author finds it
necessary to use scare quotes on anomalous. Not promising.
A general sense of "snake oil" in the web site.