A constant speed of light in all reference frames? Surely you can't be serious.
in [Relativity]
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From: mpalenik on 18 Feb 2010 14:55 On Feb 18, 2:35 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Feb 18, 2:17 pm, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 2:01 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > On Feb 18, 1:55 pm, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > On Feb 18, 1:42 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > On Feb 18, 1:38 pm, PD <thedraperfam...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 12:35 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > > > And how do you determine which answer is more correct, other than just > > > > > > > > blank assertion? > > > > > > > > Because I do not have to invent a new type of object or believe the > > > > > > > future determines the past and I have quotes such as this one from > > > > > > > Albert Einstein, "According to the general theory of relativity space > > > > > > > without ether is unthinkable" > > > > > > > Ah. OK, you've had your attention for today. Back to the straps and > > > > > > electrodes for you. > > > > > > And the other poster still refuses to respond because they know the > > > > > future determining the past is absurd nonsense. > > > > > > A moving C-60 molecule has an associated aether displacement wave.. > > > > > I have told you many many times about the bunnies that pick carrots > > > > from the enchanted forest but you simply refuse to listen. It's > > > > getting ridiculous. > > > > You realize every time you respond and do not answer the question as > > > to your belief in the future determining the past you are undermining > > > the other poster. > > > In the end, when the bunnies rule the earth, none of this will matter, > > anyway. > > Does a C-60 molecule enter one slit or multiple slits depending upon > there being detectors placed at the exits to the slits in the future. > The bunnies chose how many slits it enters at their whim. Why is that so hard to understand?
From: mpalenik on 18 Feb 2010 15:02 On Feb 18, 3:01 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > In article <6a95ed37-df77-47ea-9afc-5c5f0230b071 > @q29g2000yqn.googlegroups.com>, markpale...(a)gmail.com says... > > > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 2:35 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Feb 18, 2:17 pm, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > On Feb 18, 2:01 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > On Feb 18, 1:55 pm, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 1:42 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 1:38 pm, PD <thedraperfam...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > > > On Feb 18, 12:35 pm, mpc755 <mpc...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > And how do you determine which answer is more correct, other than just > > > > > > > > > > blank assertion? > > > > > > > > > > Because I do not have to invent a new type of object or believe the > > > > > > > > > future determines the past and I have quotes such as this one from > > > > > > > > > Albert Einstein, "According to the general theory of relativity space > > > > > > > > > without ether is unthinkable" > > > > > > > > > Ah. OK, you've had your attention for today. Back to the straps and > > > > > > > > electrodes for you. > > > > > > > > And the other poster still refuses to respond because they know the > > > > > > > future determining the past is absurd nonsense. > > > > > > > > A moving C-60 molecule has an associated aether displacement wave. > > > > > > > I have told you many many times about the bunnies that pick carrots > > > > > > from the enchanted forest but you simply refuse to listen. It's > > > > > > getting ridiculous. > > > > > > You realize every time you respond and do not answer the question as > > > > > to your belief in the future determining the past you are undermining > > > > > the other poster. > > > > > In the end, when the bunnies rule the earth, none of this will matter, > > > > anyway. > > > > Does a C-60 molecule enter one slit or multiple slits depending upon > > > there being detectors placed at the exits to the slits in the future. > > > The bunnies chose how many slits it enters at their whim. Why is that > > so hard to understand? > > Ok, for the Copenhageners we have the following 'understandings' of what > is physically occuring in nature in a double slit experiment: > > - The future determines the past. The C-60 molecule will enter one slit > or multiple slits depending upon there being detectors at the exits to > the slits in the future, or not. > > - Bunnies choose how many slits it enters. > > Both answers are equally 'rational'. So, you admit that I'm right about the bunnies, then.
From: clivevrob on 18 Feb 2010 15:24 On Feb 13, 1:29 pm, Ste <ste_ro...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > I've been absolutely racking my brain (to the point of getting a > headache) for the last few days about this issue, and it's clear that > the speed of light (where light is either considered in the form of a > ballistic photon, or a wave-cycle) cannot, physically, be constant in > all relative frames, and at the same time be constant when travelling > between two objects in two different frames. It's a physical and > logical impossibility. > > It's also clear that velocities cannot be additive (in the form of > speed of bullet+speed of gun), and nor can they be subtractive > relative to a background medium (in the form of speed of propagation > in medium-speed of source). > > Take an illustration: > > A C > B > > Where A and B are atoms that pass infinitely close to each other. In > the illustration, A and B are separated from C by a distance L. A and > C are stationary relative to each other. B is moving, and approaching > C at a speed S. A pulse is emitted from both A and B simultaneously > towards C, at the point when A and B are equidistant from C. > > Now, clearly, if velocities were additive, then light from B would > reach C much quicker than light from A. We don't see that, so we can > dismiss that immediately. > > Next, if velocities were subtractive, like sound, well that seems like > a compelling explanation for what we see, which is that light from > both A and B travel towards C at the same speed. But the presence of > an absolute medium seems to fall down when one considers that, to be > consistent with observation, the speed of propagation orthogonal to > the direction of travel must be the same as the speed in the direction > of travel. > > A speed (i.e. a mesure of distance traversed within a period of time) > cannot possibly be measured constant in all directions within a frame, > *and* constant between frames, where the frames themselves are moving > at a speed relative to each other. So how the hell does one reconcile > this physically? One reconciles things using special relativity. The composition law for velocities u and v is given by u + v w = --------- 1 + uv/c2 where c2 is the speed of light squared. For v,u << c, then, almost exactly, w = u + v (Galilean velocity composition) If u = c, then w = c If u and v both equal c, w = c
From: Ste on 18 Feb 2010 16:12 On 18 Feb, 16:35, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Feb 18, 9:43 am, Ste <ste_ro...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > > > I'm confused Mark. > > > My position is that someone must hold a priori that alternate > > dimensions are a real possibility, in order to hold that any theory > > that employs alternate dimensions is credible. Some here do hold that > > alternate dimensions are a real possibility, so of course they hold > > theories that employ them as credible. > > > I don't hold that alternate dimensions are a real possibility, so of > > course I don't accept that theories that employ them are credible. > > The problem is, you act like everybody in this group went into physics > classes knowing and believing everything that was taught in the > physics classes. No, I'm basically saying that the only people who came *out* of those classes, and went into theoretical or experimental physics, are the people who by the end believed any of that nonsense. > The point is, your argument boils down to "the only people I see > convinced of alternate dimensions are the people who believe in > alternate dimensions," but that's a circular argument. It's not circular. It's a simple statement that there is, to a certain degree, a self-selection process, wherein the people who have a susceptibility to these sorts of arguments are precisely the ones who adopt and build on them. > The only way > for that to hold water would be if the people who believe in them had > always believed in them. Nobody is born knowing these things. We all > had to learn and change our opinions at some point. It doesn't require that a person always believed something in particular. It can be as simple as, say, having a preference for mathematics and working with numbers in a very abstract sense. Whereas I have a preference for what might be called "practical mechanics" (and actually I think I'm going to adopt this phrase from now on to describe what I mean by a "physical explanation"), where there are mechanical relationships, moving parts, cause and effect, etc. And that's not to say I don't understand abstract mathematics or can't work with it, but in some sense I don't consider it synonymous with reality, so a mathematical explanation of physical phenomena, however obviously true, still doesn't suffice as a complete picture for me until I've distilled it out into some sort of consistent "practical mechanical" form. And I know Paul will laugh about this being all about "cogs and levers", but really the approach is a lot more flexible than that. > If your argument is that there are some people who will never be > convinced, I completely agree with that. There are also some people > who will never be convinced of evolution. And you could make the same > argument "the only people who believe in evolution are the people who > believe in evolution." It's a circular argument and it means nothing. It does mean something. It's basically another restatement of Einstein's "it's the theory that decides what you observe". The point is that people have axioms quite often because they work in one way or another (i.e. work for that individual), and for as long as they continue to work people generally refuse to give them up.
From: PD on 18 Feb 2010 16:48
On Feb 18, 3:12 pm, Ste <ste_ro...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > On 18 Feb, 16:35, mpalenik <markpale...(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > On Feb 18, 9:43 am, Ste <ste_ro...(a)hotmail.com> wrote: > > > > I'm confused Mark. > > > > My position is that someone must hold a priori that alternate > > > dimensions are a real possibility, in order to hold that any theory > > > that employs alternate dimensions is credible. Some here do hold that > > > alternate dimensions are a real possibility, so of course they hold > > > theories that employ them as credible. > > > > I don't hold that alternate dimensions are a real possibility, so of > > > course I don't accept that theories that employ them are credible. > > > The problem is, you act like everybody in this group went into physics > > classes knowing and believing everything that was taught in the > > physics classes. > > No, I'm basically saying that the only people who came *out* of those > classes, and went into theoretical or experimental physics, are the > people who by the end believed any of that nonsense. Hmmm. So there appears to be two models for what has happened in such cases: 1) the student who went through those classes had reason and good sense *stripped* of them to the point where they would believe nonsense, and this result is inherent to the process undergone. 2) the student who went through those classes learned something new, including how to test unambiguously for extra dimensions (regardless whether it has been yet determined by test) and what the motivations for even considering them might be, so that what seems like nonsense to the novice no longer seems like nonsense. Now, how might one test which of these two claims is what has really happened? Let me suggest one. If (1) were the case, then because of the inherent flaw in the process, then it would have likely been observed up to this point that there is a whole class of former students who have come to believe some principle that is objectively falsifiable. It would be falsifiable perhaps by the construction of a whole class of devices whose design is based on that principle and which (because the principle is false) obviously don't work in practice. Perhaps you can point to some cases like that where devices with designs based on relativity or quantum mechanics simply do not work because the principles are wrong. Or is it your claim that all such devices happen to work by accident, even though the design principles are wrong? > > > The point is, your argument boils down to "the only people I see > > convinced of alternate dimensions are the people who believe in > > alternate dimensions," but that's a circular argument. > > It's not circular. It's a simple statement that there is, to a certain > degree, a self-selection process, wherein the people who have a > susceptibility to these sorts of arguments are precisely the ones who > adopt and build on them. Or, to couch this in terms of the second option listed above, this selection process happens to find those who are susceptible to learning something new and which is in conflict with their incoming presuppositions? > > > The only way > > for that to hold water would be if the people who believe in them had > > always believed in them. Nobody is born knowing these things. We all > > had to learn and change our opinions at some point. > > It doesn't require that a person always believed something in > particular. It can be as simple as, say, having a preference for > mathematics and working with numbers in a very abstract sense. And by this do you mean "detached from reality"? What do you think the role of experimental testing of the quantitative predictions of abstract models plays, then? > > Whereas I have a preference for what might be called "practical > mechanics" (and actually I think I'm going to adopt this phrase from > now on to describe what I mean by a "physical explanation"), where > there are mechanical relationships, moving parts, cause and effect, > etc. And that's not to say I don't understand abstract mathematics or > can't work with it, but in some sense I don't consider it synonymous > with reality, so a mathematical explanation of physical phenomena, > however obviously true, still doesn't suffice as a complete picture > for me until I've distilled it out into some sort of consistent > "practical mechanical" form. And I know Paul will laugh about this > being all about "cogs and levers", but really the approach is a lot > more flexible than that. Herein is the presumption that for every abstract and mathematically- rich model that makes testable predictions that can be checked with experiment, you have faith that there is an equally viable alternative model that is not so abstract and is full of cogs-and-levers concreteness that is just as successful in making the same quantitative testable predictions in the same class of experiments. What's amusing about this claim is that if pressed on demonstrating the same success in making quantitative testable predictions, I've gotten the following responses: * "Oh, the math is fine. It's just the underlying concept that needs to be swapped out." (Never mind that the math is *derived from* the underlying concept.) * "But I don't have the mathematical skill to demonstrate that the cogs-and-lever model does in fact have the same quantitative testable predictions. Some techno-drone should be asked to do that grunt work." (This is the Of-course-it-will-work-just-let-worker-bees-show- it defense.) * "Why do I have to demonstrate that it makes accurate and testable predictions of experimentally measurable phenomena at all? That's a requirement of the self-serving scientific community. For my purposes, it's sufficient to have a qualitative picture, and because that qualitative picture involves cogs-and-levers and not abstract concepts, then it's automatically better, at least in my eyes." (This is the take-your-scientific-method-and-shove-it argument.) > > > If your argument is that there are some people who will never be > > convinced, I completely agree with that. There are also some people > > who will never be convinced of evolution. And you could make the same > > argument "the only people who believe in evolution are the people who > > believe in evolution." It's a circular argument and it means nothing.. > > It does mean something. It's basically another restatement of > Einstein's "it's the theory that decides what you observe". The point > is that people have axioms quite often because they work in one way or > another (i.e. work for that individual), and for as long as they > continue to work people generally refuse to give them up. |