Yes. They are fundamental — Gnomon

The Quantum Field Theory on Which the Everyday World Supervenes:

Sean Carroll on QFT: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2101.07884.pdf

It is not at all clear what electromagnetic fields are, nor if there are fields of other kinds — Wayfarer

How about a fundamental consciousness field, per David Chalmers?

Particles move in spacetime, don't they? — Dijkgraf

'Particles' are directly field quanta, so they move along the fields like kinks in a rope.

This is because quantum fields are not in spacetime — Gnomon

Because quantum fields are Fundamental.

(Now, what about qualia....?) — Wayfarer

Of course, all the wonders of life and consciousness evolved over a very long time after the cosmic evolution that was also over a very long time, thus both evolutions appearing to be completely natural with no other guidance. So mind-numbingly slow!

Qualia have to be constructed from the neural correlates.

I've never heard of "mind atoms" before. — Gnomon

More accurately, the universe is made of quanta; that definition covers more than atoms. So, anyway, all that forms is of quanta.

Whereas materialists of all stripes believe that the objects of perception have intrinsic reality - the kind of reality that persists independently of any perception, sensation or judgement. The difficulty with that view is that, even though it seems to accord perfectly with common sense, we can obviously never say of the reality of anything that it persists independently of perception, sensation and judgement, because in order to assess its reality, we have to perceive or sense it. We can presume with sound reason that the object persists in the absence of any perception of it, and act as if to all intents and purposes that this is true, but this is still a presumption, not a demonstrated certainty. — Wayfarer

I think it's a stretch to think that all that goes on is a hoax, such that the senses don't take anything in, that it is a story in a 4D movie in which everything matches perfectly with reality as if it were real. This is describing the block universe, and if it is then I think it all still had to have happened at some point—all at once, I suppose, and then it plays out.

The block universe would be merely the implementation—the messenger, but the message is still the same. It would be that a difference in implementation that makes no difference to the message is truly no difference.

Yes. I call it "mind stuff"; — Gnomon

I'll take it as something. The word 'immaterial' doesn't seem to be doing any work. It's like 'unstuff' that is still stuff.

Since the universe has atoms, 'mind' would be of atoms.

Since "immaterial" literally means "not made of matter" — Gnomon

Wouldn't it still be the stuff of something to be able to be?

No. I'm implying that your either "material" or "immaterial" formulation is fallacious because "immaterial" is neither an intelligible nor a corroborable option compared to – negation of – the material. — 180 Proof

Well said!

The transcendental temptation can now be thrown out of the stained-glass window. In short, the elementary ‘particles’ are physical, and because they are directly field quanta the quantum fields that they consist of must also be physical. The quantum vacuum overall field is continuous as the Simplest and thus it is Fundamental, and so its mathematics becomes the Theory of Everything. Quantum Field Theory (QFT) gives us all of physics and all of our devices.

All is Purely Physical

All That Underlies Our Lives is Now Known.
In the stars our atoms are slowly grown
From the quantum field elementaries—
Omar’s knot of how human fate is sewn.

Where’s the esoteric among atoms?
What inside their doings would be else wise?
Do molecules swirl into spooky states?
What their secret patterns hidden away?

The light atomic elements were Banged,
And the stars made more, on up through iron,
And the rest were from collisions/novae;
So, what unknown secrets would they contain?

Sounds as if you talk about God! — Raymond

Hail to 'God' the Simpleton!

We want to see you suffer more for your philosophy. — Bitter Crank

No suffering; only joy. My own slant on QFT that goes all the way:

‘Nothing’ Cannot Obtain;
The Simple Fundamental Something is Ever

Something is and a lack of anything isn’t.

To be Fundamental the Something cannot have parts, else the parts would be more Fundamental, and so there cannot be an infinite regress of lesser and lesser parts. Composites cannot be Fundamental. ‘God’ is out; impossible. Neither can be a lasting template of the lesser ever having to come from the greater, ad infinitum. The logic herein matches the cascade from the least to the greater that’s seen in our universe.

There cannot be a sequence in time from a lack of anything to Something because ‘Nothing’ has no time, nor anything; thus the Something cannot appear spontaneously, as if there was ‘Nothing’ and then there became Something, and besides, ‘Nothing’ cannot have being anyway.

Thus the Fundamental Simplest Partless Something has to be ever, as Eternal; it has no alternative. It is also Continuous because there cannot be any spacers of ‘Nothing’ in it and it is also Eternal because it cannot be made of parts that it can’t have and because it cannot broken into parts because there aren’t any. It is ungenerated and deathless. It was there before the Big Bang and exists ever after. The Bang was from the Something. A ‘Beginning’ and ‘End’ to the Something is impossible. This shows the multiverse.

Why isn’t the Something Still, never doing anything? If the Something has Stillness, then naught would happen. Scientifically, the uncertainty principle indicates that ‘Stillness’ is impossible. The Something is ever in motion; it is energetic. We don’t need all the proof when we have the truth.

From what can it form entities? It can only form entities of itself, as that’s all there is. In short, its motion as fluctuations makes for a wave nature that allows the elementary forms to be quanta of its excitations at stable rungs that grant some persistence. See Quantum Field Theory (QFT). We know that the elementaries of a type are identical and so that also tells us that they are directly quanta forms, plus that they can be annihilated shows us that they are secondary.

Why are the elementaries so minuscule? The Something as the simplest is lightweight and then so must be the elementaries.

Can the metaphysical creep back in as a hyperphysical substance to be the Something? No, the elementaries are physical and they are the quanta of the Something and so the Something is physical. What the elementaries go on to form is also physical. There can’t be anything esoteric about matter and forces.

What of the fluctuations of the Something that don’t reach a quantum energy level? They are the so-called virtual particles that ever come and go.

Can the virtuals ever persist more? If there was inflation, it would drive them apart quicker than they could annihilate.

What is the Something? It has to be the quantum ‘vacuum’ fields, for the proposed absolutes of time, space, and particles making fields have fallen by the wayside.

Are there things? The quantum ‘vacuum’ is the only thing; all else are events. A tree is a long event; the sun is a longer one; a proton’s life is very long; photons don’t decay on their own. Events come and go.

So, we and all the temporaries that the Permanent Something forms are consigned to oblivion? Yes, even the universe, but the Permanent ever remains and all is of its fields.

Well, there’s no ‘Separation’ at heart, but we and all as field forms must fade, the universe unwinding like a spring, no matter our grand complexities that outdo in scale that of the Simplest. We always knew that the Theory of Everything (TOE) would be boring in its simplicity.

What if a universe just doesn’t work? Some will, like ours does, although ours is not near to the best or near to the worst. It’s just OK.

Posting a link to an article about a 'deep' topic and then asking, "what do you think?" is the easy and lazy way of doing things. We want to see you suffer more for your philosophy. — Bitter Crank

It is right on and correct and is in accord with so much that I've posted on the subject of QFT. I only just now discovered his article of a year ago.

So not being able to see them doesn't mean you can't imagine them to fly in space. The photons can't be seen but they still are there. Like a hidden force of nature. — Raymond

Particles are a product of our imagination, although useful at times as a model when there are little perturbations about. The photon shown in a Fenyman diagram between pairs of electrons is virtual, not to be confused with virtual particles in fields. This virtual photon is actually a disturbance in the photon field caused by the electron fields. All interactions involve quantum fields at heart, not particles but as sometimes for short. Photons and electrons go through two slits to form an interference pattern because they are directly field quanta.

What's the difference between these fields and convenient math? — theRiddler

Not too much; the math is not complete.

then forget where you parked your car? — Gnomon

It's that I know where I parked my dream car but it isn't there any more. In last night's dream, I went back to where I parked my motorcycle but there was a giant electric fan in its place. Also, sometimes the neighbor hood streets and houses turn into a place I never been to; such creativity in the subconscious to model all that, making it as I pass through!

Train to be a ninja to gain focus.

Do you see fully fleshed-out Qualia in your dreams? — Gnomon

Yes, full, although now and then there are some slight mistakes, and my car never remains where I parked it.

How can physicists be so blind that they don't see that there is more elemental stuff than quarks and leptons? — Raymond

The great needle plays, stitches, winds, and paves
As the strands of quantum fields’ webs of waves
That weave the warp, weft, and woof, uni-versed,
Into being’s fabric of Earth’s living braids.

those conceptions from perceptions are what we call mental "symbols" representing reality. — Gnomon

Plus, in our imagination we see very dim qualia that have about 90% transparency, and full qualia in our dreams.

quantum bubbles — Raymond

The Literature of the Cosmos

The quantum vacuum field waves are the strokes
That write the elementaries’ letters
As the Cosmic alphabet for wording
Of the elements and the forces that

Phrase the molecules’ interactions
Unto the cells’ sentences that make for
The lives’ paragraphs of the species that
Experience the uni-versed story,

In a book from Babel’s Great Library,
The epic tales of the temporaries,
Their glorious triumphs and sad failures,
Amid complexity’s unwinding spring.

mental image — Gnomon

Of course, the subconscious also determines what gets into consciousness and then structures it from its parts but then it becomes a unified whole and is no longer reducible and it is this whole of qualia that perhaps then more easily becomes a reference focus for the subconscious if qualia are the highest point of the brain's own invented symbolic language.

at least currently seems to be the case, that there is no such solid foundations that matter is built on, — Reformed Nihilist

Well, the foundation has been found; it's the quantum 'vacuum' and its fields that form matter, but that doesn't mean there is some expected deep meaning to it; no meaning is still a find.

To continue, there is the Permanent along with the temporaries that it necessarily forms that are doomed to fade away until more are forthcoming.

So, the conscious Mind has no role in human behavior? — Gnomon

It's probably a focus short cut that other subconscious areas can use for reference to what's going on.

A particle is a funny thing. — Raymond

A neutrino walks through a bar.

He will, without remorse, and firmly, strictly, and justified, bestow humanity with his Ivory Bashing, and catastrophe will descend from His untouchable and unshakeable Sacred Realm, cleansing the Earth from a God-forgotten species, unwillingly to bath in His immaculate light and conform to His unquestionable Will. Brothers and sisters, let's hold hands and prey together. Let's ask the Great Annointed to release us from our pagan ways, and to restore his blissful order before too long. Oh unparalelled Being, our blessed King and Savior! Bless Thou Glorious name, leading us to Ultimate Victory. — Raymond

Good jokes ongoing.

I'm a Mysterian. There are no answers I'm particularly interested in. I just understand that reality is ineffable, to a delineating degree. — theRiddler

Well, now it's effable, but what are you interested in?

That means on one side there is a different force then on the other. What's different in between? — Raymond

Sorry, it pushes the plates together:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casimir_effect

There is no empty space? — Raymond

All is field, plus 'Nothing' cannot be.

What are field points and how can they oscillate? Are it not the excited wavefunctions that show oscillating behavior? — Raymond

Field points are just the moving continuous points of a field that can be assigned a value. The excitations of a field oscillate, too, as the sums of the harmonic field point oscillations and can make for a stable lump of stuff called a particle.

These wave functions go along deterministically until someone wants to measure something or until they interact with something else. Whoever wants to know both the location and the momentum of a particles is out of luck due to these not being arithmetically commutable due to the uncertainty principle. I and adding this stuff in just to show that we know more about what goes on.

So, some measurements often only return a probability about a particle's doings, but they are statistically deterministic in that the probabilities add up to one, which is called unitarity. After all, we don't know all the quantum math, plus we can't even then take the whole universe into account, plus the elementaries aren't point particles but are spread out field waves that have a volume…

Virtual particles are a weird ingredient of empty space. One might even argue that it's the source of dark energy. For sure it has a different effect on empty space as normal, real matter does. The negative energy contributions give negative curvature. It is said that the vacuum fluctuations have a very high energy, while in fact it should be negative. — Raymond

Well, there's no empty space because all is field, and there's no inert space as Newton had it as a background who's only quantity was value. Einstein got rid of Newton's absolute space, achieving background independence, and there is still no space because quantum fields serve as what used to be called 'space' and are everywhere.

Yes, the 'vacuum' energy could be the source of the push of dark energy, the fuel that ever keeps on giving. In the Casimer experiment the 'vacuum' pushes two plates apart.

As I understand it, at every point in spacetime operator valued distributions are assigned and these operators excite states in a Fock space of particle states. All these states have frequencies and wavelengths and can indeed be seen in the light of oscillators, or rotating complex vectors. But are there really operators present that excite a particle state? Is not a particle state, and it's demise, propagation, or creation what comes first? Are it really creation, destruction, or propagating operators, that govern? — Raymond

I think that the approach of having creation and destruction operators is just another way to model the quantum fields. The fields oscillate on their own; it's not like that there are little springy oscillators attached to field points.

the virtual fields could be pulled into real existence. Quantum bubbles pulled into reality. inflation would be solved. — Raymond

Well, we know that the universe grew very large in a hurry, which could already be called an 'inflation' as a normal word and that there is a humongous, even extravagant amount of material, like 2x10**76 or so particles, indicating that material is very easy to come by. The 2x part is to include antimatter, and the 10**76 part began as 10**85 because there are now ten billion photons for every proton and so there were 10**9 or so annihilations of matter and antimatter early on.

The proposed inflation would have driven the virtual particles and their anti-particles faster than they could recombine and annihilate. We still need a lot of positive kinetic energy to have come forth and gravity can supply it because its negative potential energy can grow more negative without bound. This doesn't violate the law of energy conservation because the net energy amount remains constant, as zero or near zero.

The quantum fields are lightweights and and probably don't have enough energy, although they got predicted to have energy that was 121 orders of magnitude too large, which was the most embarrassing notion in science, perhaps because they should have instead looked to gravity for the energy.

If we find a lot of gravity waves way back that have a lot of b-mode polarization then we can better hone in on what kind of inflation there was. Inflation also flattens the universe, which makes it work out better than it having curvature. I don't know if the new telescope does any of that WMAP kind of stuff.

(There's no 'true vacuum' because all is field.)

That's where the "free won't" comes in, giving us an opportunity to veto the action — Gnomon

"us" is still the subconscious brain will analysis going on just like always.

Is there an oscillator attached to all points in space? — Raymond

From Wiki:

Given the equivalence of mass and energy expressed by Albert Einstein's E = mc2, any point in space that contains energy can be thought of as having mass to create particles. Virtual particles spontaneously flash into existence at every point in space due to the energy of quantum fluctuations caused by the uncertainty principle. Modern physics has developed quantum field theory (QFT) to understand the fundamental interactions between matter and forces, it treats every single point of space as a quantum harmonic oscillator. According to QFT the universe is made up of matter fields, whose quanta are fermions (i.e. leptons and quarks), and force fields, whose quanta are bosons (e.g. photons and gluons). All these fields have zero-point energy.[2] Recent experiments advocate the idea that particles themselves can be thought of as excited states of the underlying quantum vacuum, and that all properties of matter are merely vacuum fluctuations arising from interactions of the zero-point field.[10]

Many physical effects attributed to zero-point energy have been experimentally verified, such as spontaneous emission, Casimir force, Lamb shift, magnetic moment of the electron and Delbrück scattering.[12][13] These effects are usually called "radiative corrections".[14] In more complex nonlinear theories (e.g. QCD) zero-point energy can give rise to a variety of complex phenomena such as multiple stable states, symmetry breaking, chaos and emergence. Many physicists believe that "the vacuum holds the key to a full understanding of nature"[8] and that studying it is critical in the search for the theory of everything. Active areas of research include the effects of virtual particles,[15] quantum entanglement,[16] the difference (if any) between inertial and gravitational mass,[17] variation in the speed of light,[18] a reason for the observed value of the cosmological constant[19] and the nature of dark energy.[20][21]

It's more reasonable there 20 massless basic fields — Raymond

The number 25 matches the number of entries now in the Standard Model.

What oscillates if you say that the field is a collection of oscillators? — Raymond

The whole field fluctuates from the continuous field points oscillating; the points are not separate from one another; there can't be any spacers of the impossible 'Nothingness' anywhere.

Now, is there anything non physical or spooky going on in the fields? No, because the elementary particles and forces are physical, and since they are the field quanta outright, the quantum fields are purely physical.

So it follows that the universe is wholly physical!

You can construct all with two, — Raymond

Well, protons and neutrons consist of electrons and up and down quarks that trade off with gluons sort of.

So, then, to continue, it makes logical sense that the elementaries have to be arrangements of their quantum fields as their excitations since that's all the fields have to work with. This theory is tested by modeling the field points as harmonic oscillators that tug at the other points, making for the field waverings as the sum of these oscillations, from which, in short, the quantum aspect comes about from the wave nature. The infinities get renormalized away.

The model works, especially for Quantum Electro Dynamics (QED), which is the jewel of Quantum Field Theory (QFT), for it has accuracy up to 11 decimal points and lets us produces devices that work. When an electron goes down by a quantum the electron field interacts with the photon field to produce a photon, making light. So it is that some of the the quantum fields can interact.

There are 25 quantum field types, all atop one another, making for one overall quantum field. The Higgs field is interesting in that its energy is higher than that of the other fields. The term 'zero point energy' is used for the average of a field's energy but it isn't zero.

So now we have the astounding insight that the quantum fields exhaust reality as being all that there is! Astounding progress!

P.S.

So, the elementaries are constituted of quantum fields, and not of any new and distinct substance, which would be not only be impossible but would make them Fundamental by themselves. One cannot get something (new) from from Something Fundamental and one cannot get Something Fundamental from 'Nothing'. A Fundamental is Necessity. 'God' is not required.

Onward next time.

I think there are two truly elementaries. — Raymond

The up and down quark and the electron seem to be the most useful. There are also forces.

So, in short for now, the elementaries are directly the quantum excitations of their respective quantum fields and they can move along their fields like a kink in a rope can move along a rope. Thus, the elementaries are the fields' quanta.

Why is there no Stillness in the quantum fields? Logically, naught would have happened, and physically the uncertainty principle causes quantum fluctuations. So, 'Stillness' is impossible. Parmenides thought that his One didn't have to do anything but he was wrong in that area.

Why not Nothing, as a lack of anything? Well, Something is and 'Nothing' is not. The Fundamental(s) Existent(s) are mandatory, having no option not to be, having no alternative. A partless continuous Fundamental cannot be be made, for there are no parts to make it of, nor can it go away, for it cannot be broken into parts. Thus, 'Beginning' and 'End' for a Fundamental are impossible. Parmenides got this right, saying that his One is "ungenerated and deathless" and even that 'Nothing' cannot even be meant.