Book

Researches undertaken during the last 20 years have confirmed that space possesses physical properties even where it is devoid of ordinary matter. In addition to the well known properties of permittivity, permeability and the ability to transmit electromagnetic waves, other features have been more recently associated with the nature of space. These include the Casimir Effect and a significant amount of energy. This medium, devoid of any trace of ordinary matter, is usually referred to as \"Physical Vacuum\", \"Plenum\" or \"Cosmic Substratum\" along with other appellations. Despite the veil of equivalent terms, these names obviously refer to the Ether, a medium conceived in antiquity, which received much attention from Science between the 17th and early 20th centuries. Today it is commonly understood throughout the academic community that Einstein excluded once and for all the ether from modern physics with his Special Theory of 1905. There is a widespread, unjustified assumption that ether is conceptually incompatible with Relativity, though Einstein developed an equivalent concept in the context of the General Theory and his later work. We may add that Einstein?s ether concept has inspired many modern physicists though others follow another direction of thought. The aim of this first volume of papers is to examine the different paths by which the modern ether concept has been developed and to highlight the part it plays in major departments of 21st C physics. The evidence for its existence is reviewed, and it is hoped, widespread misconceptions concerning ether are corrected. It is anticipated that the emerging modern concept of ether will play a fundamental part in the development of 21st C physical science.