I like the work of Ken Wheeler in this regard. The aether is energy/charge at at rest. Fields are aether perturbation modalities. There are only two modalities, the dielectric and the magnetic. Dielectricity = inertia and acceleration Magnetism = force and motion There are only these two components to a field, and they are two parts of a whole. These are inherent to eachother, the dielectric being centripetal charge compression and the magnetic being expansive resulting in the creation of 'space'. Essentially saying the same thing just with more specificity.