Ладно.

Недавно умер выдающийся и весьма примечательный своим критическим мировоззрением английский физик Джон Полкинхорн (Polkinghorne, 1930-2021).

В 2002 году он опубликовал в Oxford University Press популяризаторскую книжечку "Quantum Theory. A Very Short Introduction", в которой написал:

"The vacuum in quantum field theory has unusual properties that are particularly important. The vacuum is, of course, the lowest energy state, in which there will be no excitations present that correspond to particles. Yet, though in this sense there is nothing there, in quantum field theory it does not mean that there is nothing going on. The reason is as follows: a standard mathematical technique, called Fourier analysis, allows us to regard a field as equivalent to an infinite collection of harmonic oscillators. Each oscillator has a particular frequency associated with it and the oscillator behaves dynamically just as if it were a pendulum of that given frequency. The field vacuum is the state in which all these ‘pendula’ are in their lowest energy states. For a classical pendulum, that is when the bob is at rest and at the bottom. This is truly a situation in which nothing is happening. However, quantum mechanics does not permit so perfect a degree of tranquillity. Heisenberg will not allow the ‘bob’ to have both a definite position (at the bottom) and a definite momentum (at rest). Instead the quantum pendulum must be slightly in motion even in its lowest energy state (near the bottom and nearly at rest, but not quite). The resultant quantum quivering is called zero-point motion. Applying these ideas many times over to the infinite array of oscillators that is a quantum field implies that its vacuum is a humming hive of activity. Fluctuations continually take place, in the course of which transient ‘particles’ appear and disappear. A quantum vacuum is more like a plenum than like empty space.

When the physicists came to apply quantum field theory to situations involving interactions between fields, they ran into difficulties. The infinite number of degrees of freedom tended to produce infinite answers for what should have been finite physical quantities. One important way in which this happened was through interaction with the restlessly fluctuating vacuum. Eventually a way was found for producing sense out of nonsense.

Certain kinds of field theories (called renormalizable theories) produce only limited kinds of infinities, simply associated with the masses of particles and with the strengths of their interactions. Just striking out these infinite terms and replacing them with the finite measured values of the relevant physical quantities is a procedure that defines meaningful results, even if the procedure is not exactly mathematically pure. It also turns out to provide finite expressions that are in stunning agreement with experiment. Most physicists are happy with this pragmatic success. Dirac himself was never so. He strongly disapproved of dubious legerdemain with formally infinite quantities.

Today, all theories of elementary particles (such as the quark theory of matter) are quantum field theories. Particles are thought of as energetic excitations of the underlying field. (An appropriate field theory also turns out to provide the right way to deal with the difficulties of the ‘sea’ of negative-energy electrons.)"

Если кто-то пожелает, могу услужить, переведя ее посредством машинного переводчика -- впрочем, это может сегодня сделать каждый.

Прошу обратить особое внимание на такой момент: "A quantum vacuum is more like a plenum than like empty space." -- Квантовый вакуум больше похож на пространство, заполненное веществом, чем на пустое пространство. И что вывод этот, в сущности, принят как условность, а не как физическая реальность, принят для удобства вычислений. Наверно, чтобы не делить на ноль. ))