Prev: NYT - 7/13/10 - "Gravity Does Not Exist", but pseudoscience rules
Next: Finding Eulerian angles
From: Sam Wormley on 13 Jul 2010 12:56 On 7/13/10 11:43 AM, Robert L. Oldershaw wrote: > > Sigh, > > If you wanted proof that theoretical physics has left the world of > reason and wandered into the swamp of untestable postmodern > pseudoscience, braying like a crude drunk, just read Dennis Overbye's > piece in the Science Times section of today's NYT [7/13/10]. The jury hasn't even been seated yet! > A Scientist Takes On Gravity > by DENNIS OVERBYE > Published: July 12, 2010 > http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/13/science/13gravity.html > > "It?s hard to imagine a more fundamental and ubiquitous aspect of life > on the Earth than gravity, from the moment you first took a step and > fell on your diapered bottom to the slow terminal sagging of flesh and > dreams". > > "But what if it?s all an illusion, a sort of cosmic frill, or a side > effect of something else going on at deeper levels of reality"? > > "So says Erik Verlinde, 48, a respected string theorist and professor of > physics at the University of Amsterdam, whose contention that gravity is > indeed an illusion has caused a continuing ruckus among physicists, or > at least among those who profess to understand it. Reversing the logic > of 300 years of science, he argued in a recent paper, titled ?On the > Origin of Gravity and the Laws of Newton,? that gravity is a consequence > of the venerable laws of thermodynamics, which describe the behavior of > heat and gases". > > General Relativity has been considered one of mankind's finest > achievements. But our heroic string theorists, unrestrained by the > principles of science, would blithely throw it out the window into the > trashbin. Like Newton's classical mechanics, I doubt that general relativity would ever be relegated to the trash bin. > > In place of GR, the much-deluded Verlinde offers hand-waving about > poorly defined and unmeasurable abstractions: information, entropy and > holographic screens. His speculations cannot make a single definitive > prediction [and the same has been true for string theory in general > over the last 30 years] whereby the speculations could be considered > scientific. Suggest readers read Overbye's article at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/13/science/13gravity.html > > Does the community of theoretical physicists protest? Not much. > Perhaps the majority see a long-term feeding trough in this untestable > pseudoscience stuff? > > What has happened to science? Science still requires empirical testing. If an idea can't be tested, it isn't science, but philosophy.
|
Pages: 1 Prev: NYT - 7/13/10 - "Gravity Does Not Exist", but pseudoscience rules Next: Finding Eulerian angles |