Anger is Freedom…or something…
Every time someone makes a comment, I have to approve it. Coincidentally, a few of you might have your posts marked as “spam” by this automatic bayesian inference spamometer program, and I’m trying to work around it. But if your post hasn’t shown up lately, that’s probably why.
Anyways, I couldn’t help but notice one quote from another site:
I am really impressed by the openness and independence and mental energy of angryphysicist. I wish he/she would continue to write this blog and continue to evaluate physics as a free thinking insider.
How flattering, I couldn’t resist going to this fellow’s website and look at what s/he had to say. It was shocking to say the least.
Are calculations in General Relativity difficult? No. What is complex is the notation. Do you understand this? You need to eliminate the complex and cabalistic notation of General Relativity in order to make simple calculations. Calculations are not complicated, it is the notation which is complicated. And the notation obstructs easy calculations.
No, I don’t understand this. Since the calculations are so easy, perhaps you could enlighten us physicists with a large number of complex solutions to the Einstein field equation? Pretty please? The notation is irrelevant to the actual calculations, you could use various smiley faces if you wish.
Imagine someone who is so obsessed with the authority of IBM that he is still using vintage 1950 punch card driven IBM mainframe! This is your modern physicist. For physicists the authority of NewtonEinstein is sacred.
Hmm…I don’t think this fellow understood my criticism that String theory requires a prior geometry at all because the terrible irony is that I argued “Einstein is sacred, therefore there is no prior geometry by virtue of general covariance.”
My approach to quantum gravity is not by proposing outrageously nonsensical ideas (what do you take me for, a string theorist?). It’s the very opposite of that: be as cautious and conservative as possible! (This was actually impressed upon me back when I was studying with the retired rocket scientist in the CalTech library; he drilled this philosophy into me, and in retrospect that was a good thing.) Heck, I criticized the theory of the graviton as being too radical, and all it boils down to is simply applying the current QFT paradigm to General Relativity!
It’s not justified to criticize scientists who stick to theories that have not been falsified yet because they stick to theories that have not been falsified yet! Obviously Newton and Einstein were right at certain levels of approximation…otherwise we wouldn’t be taught their theories! When one can criticize scientists is when they stick to theories that have been falsified (another valid point of criticism is when a theory contradicts scientific materialism in my book).
<Just a little tangential rant about falsifiability and “faith” in current theories…
Nature works “as if” they were right at certain levels of approximation, so it’s “safe” to assume that they were correct until new unexplainable phenomena arises. Then it’s time for a paradigm shift. That’s what quantum gravity researchers are working on, because Einstein’s general theory breaks down at certain scales…most unsatisfactory!
Where things typically go awry is when there are two theories, A and B. A has more unnecessary premises than B and is reducible to B after certain manipulations…but offers no new predictions. That brings the important crucible question: “So what?” If there is no difference between the two, go with the one with fewer unnecessary assumptions. A contemporary example of a theory with more unnecessary premises that makes no new predictions is String Theory, making it impossible to falsify in a bad way.>
Physicist is stuck in the 18th century because even Einstein is Newtonian physics.
You mean Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler lied to me?! General Relativity is really Newtonian gravity?! Those mean geniuses! They hurt my feelings!
After studying General Relativity and moving indexes up and down according to Einstein convention for two decades poor physicists become science dead. After so much index tai chi no physicist can show any sign of science. I am just sorry for these doctors of physics.
But Kip Thorne has studied General Relativity for ages and he’s done very good work recently. Steve Carlip, too, is doing good work on Black Holes. And what about Wheeler?
There are always exceptions to the rules.
And I don’t really plan to stop doing General Relativity until I’m long gone…whether I do anything new and useful with it is still an open question. I doubt that I’ll make a difference (yeah, I’m cynical even with myself!)…given my rather odd entrance to the physics community online involving criticizing current theories and not offering a suitable alternative (I am, however, working naively on an alternative!) it’ll be hard to “make amends” with my faux pas. Such is life.
17 May 2007 at 3:30 am
But then, just sometimes, some radical thinking in science happens to work.
So you can jump, say, from a Ptolemaic earth centred universe to a Copernican sun centred scheme or from the theory that you can alloy or chemically combine stuff together to make gold to discovering how it can’t be done.
Then seriously suppose (if you dare) the radical thought that quantum gravity theorists are the modern alchemists in search of a combination of two theories that will produce the golden theory of everything but when, as a matter of natural fact, it can’t be done.
And then suppose further that there can be no such theory because, in the sense that Richard Feynman meant it, nobody understands quantum mechanics, and that no theory of quantum gravity could be developed whereby you could come to understand quantum mechanics…
17 May 2007 at 9:49 am
Agreed. Progress in physics requires a healthy mixture of respect for and skepticism of your predecessors.
Respect is important, because the previous work does accurately describe a great variety of natural phenomena. Throw it all out for a “revolutionary” idea, and you’ll find you don’t even get the basics right. There are too many cranks out there whose disrespect for the existing body of knowledge weakens their work considerably.
Skepticism is also necessary, because it drives you to find the implicit assumptions the previous work was based on. Those assumptions are probably correct, but it can’t hurt to flex them a bit and see what happens. From the experimental side (my area of interest), a little skepticism for established theory is good because that way you’ll occassionally look for things that “aren’t supposed to be there.” Again, you usually find nothing, but one unexpected result can be worth slogging through dozens of boring confirmations of existing theory.
17 May 2007 at 11:26 am
But then science must in the end be about reasoning concerning the available empirical findings just as such. And sometines this process can require the rejection of much existing theory because one has found reasons from the findings to consider this theory is based upon fundamentally erroneous assumptions.
17 May 2007 at 12:42 pm
“But then, just sometimes, some radical thinking in science happens to work.”
History tends to disagree with this. The track record for “radical thinking” is notoriously bad…worse than the track record for economists’ empirical predictions being valid! (And *that* is saying something!)
The problem is that no one really remembers the “radical” off-the-wall theories *because they were wrong.* Who remembers Tesla’s dynamical gravity? No one, because General Relativity was: 1) the more cautious solution, 2) actually was a theory that existed (Tesla’s theory, as far as I know, was largely nonexistent).
Everything Einstein did was cautious and conservative; Brownian motion combined the well accepted realms of mechanics and thermodynamics, the Photoelectric effect involved thermodynamics and electrodynamics, and Special Relativity involved mechanics and electrodynamics. All of them were extremely cautious and conservative moves.
Actually, I’m flipping through the appendices in Rovelli’s book “Quantum Gravity”, and in appendix C1 he covers this discussion quite well.
17 May 2007 at 5:27 pm
angryphysicist,
What is your view of Tesla’s work ?
I am a 53 year old layman. I have training and job experience in electronics.
I believe physics is lost.
After all, experimental work awarded the Nobel Prize has been ignored by conventional science.
18 May 2007 at 6:53 pm
>
Okay, I’ve now visited the referenced website. The problem is that it has no numbers. But there is something to be said for the philosophy.
I took GR a very long time ago at U. Cal., Irvine. Ever since then I’ve wanted to write a GR textbook for undergraduates. That is, one that would concentrate on calculations that can be done without tensors, the “complex and cabalistic notation”.
For example, Misner Thorne and Wheeler doesn’t discuss orbits in the Schwarzschild metric until most of a thousand pages in. But the orbits can be found by applying calculus of variations to the integral of the line element ds, as the paths of test particles extremize proper time.
This is all undergraduate mathematics and requires no tensors. It does, however, get kind of messy, and it is possible to get a half decent education in GR without ever seeing the equations of motion written this way. This is the basis for the java applet simulation I wrote here.
The line elements that define a Schwarzschild (or Kerr) black hole can be shown to be solutions to the “no source” GR problem outside of their singularities. Thus these solutions can be found without the complex and cabalisitic notation.
18 May 2007 at 6:55 pm
Ooops. wordpress ate what I was trying to quote. At the beginning of my post a moment ago should be:
“Are calculations in General Relativity difficult? No. What is complex is the notation. Do you understand this? You need to eliminate the complex and cabalistic notation of General Relativity in order to make simple calculations. Calculations are not complicated, it is the notation which is complicated. And the notation obstructs easy calculations.”
18 May 2007 at 10:59 pm
RB: I’m not really well read in Tesla’s work, only loosely familiar with some of it. It seems, to say the very least, impressive! I cannot comment really anymore than that unfortunately.
Carlbrannen: I suppose it’s my inner purist general relativist speaking, but I don’t really have a problem with the tensor notation. Index gymnastics should be approached more as a game than a chore
You are right though about the orbits, it can be done without the tensor notation *sometimes*; there are sometimes when it can’t be done without it but perhaps that’s my inner general relativist speaking again.
19 May 2007 at 12:40 pm
RB–
I believe physics is lost too. Can you please give specific examples about Nobel prizes awarded on experimental physics which are ignored by conventional science?
angryphysicist —
What is the connection between tensor notation and the orbits? I don’t think NASA uses tensors to compute orbits. All you need is period and radius of the orbit.
Thanks.
20 May 2007 at 6:47 am
“But then, just sometimes, some radical thinking in science happens to work.”
‘History tends to disagree with this. The track record for “radical thinking” is notoriously bad…worse than the track record for economists’ empirical predictions being valid! (And *that* is saying something!)’
Surely not, history of physics and science in general tells us that if it wasn’t for ideas that were highly radical in their time (eg those of Copernicus, Gallileo, Newton, Darwin, Lavoisier, Pasteur, Planck, Einstein etc) there would have been no progress at all in understanding how the natural world is the way that it is.
One trouble is that modern scientists can take past discoveries for granted and forget how radical they were, while you can point to instances where conservatism of the major discoverers themselves - let alone of others - probably slowed down progress considerably.
So had not Max Planck been middle aged and so conservatively rooted in 19th century classical physics, instead of spending years trying to refute his own quantum theory, he could have embraced Einstein’s ideas on the photoelectric effect and then, quite possibly, helped to speed up progess towards developing a quantum mechanics.
20 May 2007 at 3:37 pm
Carl,
Thanks for visiting Freedom of Science. I checked your site and I value your work. I put a link in my blog and I hope to continue reading it. Please comment there too. That would help me develop those ideas or debunk them.
Yes, you are right, most of what I write has no numbers in them. But using numbers is not a requirement to make a scientific statement. And using numbers does not guarantee scientific content. Physicists routinely make statements with numbers in them but since they define any number to have any value they want their numbers are corrupted and mean nothing. In physics zero can have any value. Infinity can have any value. G can have any value. Pysicists routinely set G = 1 = 0.0000006. In a field where 1 = 0.0000006 or anything physicists want it to be there can be no science. Numbers in physics are corrupted.
But, more to topic, if we are talking about General Relativity, where are the numbers in Einstein Equations? Einstein equations is a definition. You cannot use “Einstein equations” in any calculations. You need solutions. And there are an infinite number of solutions. A physicist can pick and choose a solution and attach to it a suitable geometry or algebra and define a world scenario.
When there are infinite solutions for the equations those equations cannot give a valid description of the world.
Thanks for your comments. And thanks again to angryphysicist for starting this blog. I think he hit a nerve in the physics community whether he realizes it or not. I hope he would keep posting.
20 May 2007 at 8:29 pm
Andrew Daw Says:
“Surely not, history of physics and science in general tells us that if it wasn’t for ideas that were highly radical in their time (eg those of Copernicus, Gallileo, Newton, Darwin, Lavoisier, Pasteur, Planck, Einstein etc) there would have been no progress at all in understanding how the natural world is the way that it is. ”
But all of these people’s “radical” thoughts were based off of empirical findings, not off of pure speculation like what is happening today.
Copernicus’ big discovery was that the empirical findings of Kepler et al. did not work with the geocentric model of his times; instead it worked with heliocentric model.
Galileo found by rolling balls of different masses down a curved incline that the rate at which the bodies fell was not linked to their masses, contrary to the popular Aristotlean theory. He figured it out empirically not through “pure reason” alone as modern theorists are doing now.
The same goes for Darwin, Planck, Einstein, and others.
Was it challenging for their times? Yeah, of course; but it was, in my humble opinion, a different sort of “radical thinking” than what is being done today by “pure reason” alone. They actually used empiricism whereas an appallingly large number of theoretical physicists do not anymore; which is rather depressing.
Pioneer1 Says:
“Pysicists routinely set G = 1 = 0.0000006. In a field where 1 = 0.0000006 or anything physicists want it to be there can be no science. Numbers in physics are corrupted.”
Um, G isn’t a number, it’s a constant with different values in different scale systems. The MKS system has it at about (2/3)*10^-10 m^3 kg^-1 s^-2, the CGS system has it off by a margin of 10 or so. The Planck scale has it at one planck volume per planck mass times planck time squared (
).
There’s nothing really “corrupt” about it, it’s just a different scale that is computationally simpler to work with.
“Einstein equations is a definition. You cannot use ‘Einstein equations’ in any calculations.”
Why is it a definition and not an equation? What makes it a definition as opposed to an equation?
“When there are infinite solutions for the equations those equations cannot give a valid description of the world.”
What about an eigenvalue problem? There are an infinite solutions to:
d^{2} f(x)/dx^{2} = -f(x).
For example, f(x)=e^{ix}, or a constant nonzero multiple of it (there are thus an infinite number of solutions to the equation).
One could say “Yes, this is all very well and fine, but it is not a physics equation!” It’s the geometrized form of the (time-independent) Schrodinger equation.
20 May 2007 at 9:28 pm
Woops, I missed this one:
“What is the connection between tensor notation and the orbits? I don’t think NASA uses tensors to compute orbits. All you need is period and radius of the orbit.”
By “orbits” I assume you mean Newtonian paths? Because things are little more complicated than “just” the period and radius of the orbits (largely because things like “position” can become a nonlocal entity…worse, one doesn’t really speak about “position” insomuch as one takes about “the time it takes according to a nuclear clock for radiation to reach a location and come back to the observer”).
It doesn’t really matter if you use “tensor notation” or not…it’s merely a notation (actually, I believe the Cartan formalism is used, but I could be mistaken).
Frankly I don’t think it’s really efficient to be attacking the notation, since if you present it without the tensor notation you haven’t really changed anything at all. (Actually, it may be worse be tensors transform in a specific manner with coordinate transformations, which is great with something like General Relativity.) It’s a mere storm in a teacup.
When doing numerical calculations to solve the Einstein field equations with Fortran, e.g., you don’t really have much of a choice in the matter…the calculation “is equivalent” to using tensor notation. It’s just how you present the answer (whether you present them as 10 independent equations or as a matrix)…which is then presentable in tensor notation…
I suppose one could use the weak field approximations for all practical purposes…I would imagine that’s what NASA really does since they are working in the weak field!
21 May 2007 at 7:43 pm
Yes, you are right. G is not a number. Thanks for pointing this out. My apologies also to physicists for bringing up corruption while it was my stupidity not recognizing that different values of G are just unit conversions. So, instead of having different labels for different units, like foot and inches, physicists keep the label G constant and change the number.
But the strange thing is that I knew about this! For instance, I have written
here that G is k in British units.
But more importantly I disagree that G is a constant (of nature). G is a defined unit, just like foot or meter. Would you say that meter is a constant of nature? OK, I agree that there is a lot of evidence that meter looks like a constant of nature as can be shown with this scenario: Consider an alien trying to understand the earth. He would soon notice that in what we call Europe most lengths are multiples of meter. Then he would notice that in North America most lengths are multiples of a different unit. These two units would indeed look like some kind of position dependent constants.
But G is not a constant of nature, it is a defined unit. G is simply the proportionality constant in Kepler’s rule. Newton in his Principia used Earth-Venus distance as this constant. Then it became Kepler’s constant tied to Earth-Sun distance then in the 19th century hard core British Newtonists converted k into British units and called it G in order to make astronomy British. This is the greatest scientific fraud in history of humanity. Since the British and the Europeans lost the control of astronomical constants to the US in the 1960s I expect that in the next stage of G the US Bureau of Standard would set G to unity and call it the universal constant of stars and stripes. I think that sounds really good. And this would be great for physics. Theoretical physicists would no longer worry about setting G to unity. G will be officialy unity.
No reason to worry, the rest of physics will not be effected. G is independent of the rest of physics. Again, proving my point that G is a defined unit.
Thanks again for pointing this out. I am not such a fast thinker as you are so it will take me some time to reply to your other points.
21 May 2007 at 8:27 pm
“G is a defined unit, just like foot or meter. Would you say that meter is a constant of nature?”
Well, the meter is an abstraction created by humans to ease measurements.
The gravitational constant was discovered rather than invented; if I recall correctly Henry Cavendish discovered it and announced it in his work Philosophical Transactions back in 1798.
“But G is not a constant of nature, it is a defined unit. G is simply the proportionality constant in Kepler’s rule.”
Actually, G is a constant of nature. It is equal to
for the Planck length 
, the Planck time 
, and the Planck mass 
.
23 May 2007 at 3:40 am
I see where you are coming from when you say that “G is a constant of nature.” But there is no evidence for this. It is a physics mythology that G is a constant of nature.
And Cavendish could not have discovered G because he was dead when G was defined. It is well documented that G was defined by Sir Vernon Boys in the 19th century about 100 years after Cavendish died. He simply converted Kepler’s constant k then in use in astronomy into British units and called it G, Newton’s universal constant of gravity.
You can check for yourself Cavendish’s paper and see that there is no mention of G in it. G is neither discovered nor invented but it was defined as a unit. You can also take a look at Einstein’s original equations where Einstein is still using k, not G. This also proves that G replaced k by unit conversion.
So it is not true that G is a constant of nature. The fact that physicists are inflicted with institutional amnesia and they have forgotten that they defined G as a unit does not mean that G is a constant of nature.
Physicists must get their act together and start questioning Newton’s ancient authority marketed to them by the 19th century British dogmatic Newtonians as truth. Physicists themselves defined G as a unit for convenience and as “ease of measurement” as you say, (and also for political reasons) and then they forgot that they did. G is no different than the Astronomical Unit. AU is not a constant of nature. Neither is G.
I think it is a big joke to call G a constant of nature. The sooner physicists correct this mistake the better. I first thought that physicists looked like old scholastic doctors when they reified a defined unit into a constant of nature. But now I think that physicists look more like fools who mistook a unit they defined for a constant of nature.
Wikipedia even quotes Nobel Laureate Frank Wilzeck reiterating his belief that G is a constant of nature. So this is not something that you can brush aside as a minor textbook mistake that should not be taken seriously. On the contrary physicists are in deep delusion about Newtonian nature of the world and must take this problem seriously. In physics Newton’s authority is sacred and the reason G exists as a constant of nature with a grandiose Newtonian label is to save Newton’s authority. The sooner Newton and his authority is dumped from physics the better.
I think free physics blogs such as yours is doing a great service to physics by revealing the hermetic nature of physics. Only in a hermetic and cabalistic closed brotherhood such as physics defined units would become absolute constants of nature to save the authority of the founder.
Thanks against for taking the time to reply. I appreciate it.
23 May 2007 at 5:06 am
Concerning the issue of dimensionful and dimensionless “constants of nature” we once had a detailed discussion over at the n-Cafe: Dimensional Analysis andDimensional Analysis and Coordinate Systems.
Maybe you find something of interest there. The discussion does address precisely the issue that you are struggling with here.
23 May 2007 at 8:10 am
Pioneer1, I’ve been over and over your comment and I can’t make heads or tails of it. You keep saying that
and that
but back in your history you assert
so you really do think G is a constant, and your real quibble is in the system of units.
Let me be clear about this for you: no one here is asserting the constancy of the numeric value.
So, either you’re dreadfully misinformed as to the use of the term “constant”, or as to physics in general. If you’re thinking that “constant” means “always has the same numeric value (in all systems of units) then you’re just wrong there.
On the other hand, if you really think that the physical (not numeric) value of G changes even at Newtonian scales then you really have no idea what you’re talking about.
24 May 2007 at 4:33 am
Thanks for your comment. This has been helpful.
You are right I may be confused about the word “constant” as used in physics because it has many different meanings. I started a page in my wiki to disambiguate the word constant and I would appreciate if you care to look at it and help edit the page.
Let me say that I am not talking about the numeric value of G. I agree with angryphysicist’s correction to my original comment. I understand that G as a defined unit may have different values the way different length units may be called meter, inch, foot etc.
But do you agree that there is a difference between a defined unit such as a meter and a constant of nature? Can you please explain the difference?
I am saying that G is a defined unit.
I believe that what is called “Kepler’s constant” is a defined unit even though it is called a constant. Kepler’s constant is just the Astronomical Unit expressed in conventional units. In the nineteenth century British astronomers converted the defined unit k to defined unit G. Does this make sense? There is no “constant of nature” here. (Unless you believe that Astronomical Unit is a constant of nature.)
Kepler’s constant is the conventional proportionality constant for Kepler’s rule. For political reasons, British physicists made a unit conversion on k and gave it a fancy Newtonian name.
They also associated G with Cavendish experiment. Then Cavendish experiment entered physics textbooks as the first measurement of G. Since the nineteenth century physicists have been studying physics textbooks asserting that G is an experimental quantity which was observed by Cavendish. This way textbook propaganda transformed the defined unit G into an experimentally proved constant of nature. This is what physicists believe. There is no historical truth to this. G was defined 200 years after Cavendish’s death.
I would appreciate your comments about where the historical analysis above goes wrong. I haven’t yet checked the references given by Urs Schriber above so there may be relevant information which may be helpful. I’ll post a reply after I read it. Thanks.
24 May 2007 at 8:19 am
Pioneer1: A unit is a convention. It’s a definition that cannot be “measured”, but is used to give numeric values to other physical observations by comparison. The distance from the floor to the top of my head is perfectly well-defined, but to get a handle on it for calculations it’s convenient to pick a rod and lay copies of that rod end-to-end until they equal that distance. Then the number of copies of the rod is my height in “rod-units”. As we change the rod from an inch to a foot to a meter, the numeric value I get changes, but my height doesn’t.
A constant of nature is a little more complicated. Let’s just go back to the definition of G as we use it now. Maybe that will clear things up.
To an excellent degree of accuracy in daily experience, any two bodies experience an attraction to each other that is proportional to each of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them, and depending on no other properties such as their materials. Do you agree or disagree?
Now, this means that when I double the mass of one object (doubling makes sense independently of picking a system of units) or the other I double the force they experience. Similarly, when I double the distance between the objects I quarter the force they experience. All of this holds without ever talking about what system of units I’m using to measure with.
When we pick a system of units we get numbers for all these values. Then we will get a formula: F=Gm_1m_2/r^2. The m_1 and m_2 terms make sure that when we double one mass or the other — doubling its numeric value — we double the numeric value of the force. Similarly, the r^2 in the denoinator ensures the other proportionality relation.
Given the three proportionalities above and given a system of units, the function which takes the numeric values of two masses and a distance and gives back the numeric value of the force experienced is uniquely specified up to a constant multiple. This number (here I’m calling it “G”
doesn’t depend on anything about the system. It can’t depend on the masses or the distance because it would ruin the proportionality. It can’t depend on anything else because then the force would. The only thing it depends on is our choice of units, and it is uniquely specified by that choice.
So, if we decide to use “furlongs” to measure distance, “firkins” to measure mass, and “fortnights” to measure time (and thus “firkin-furlongs per square fortnight” to measure force) we can set up an experiment with two 1-firkin masses placed 1 furlong apart. We then measure a gravitational attraction between the two masses of 0.0005 firkin-furlongs per square fortnight. That is the numerical value of G in the FFF system of units.
Now what you may be confusing is that sometimes we use constant (along with c) to define systems of units. The speed of light shows up as a factor over and over again, so it’s convenient if we choose a system of units in which c has the numerical value 1. So if we start with fortnights as a unit of time and choose the “light-fortnight” ( = 1.8 trillion furlongs) as our unit of distance, c will have the value 1. We can similarly chose a “fortnight-mass” to use as our unit of mass so that G will also have the value 1. We are not changing G here, nor are we using G itself as a unit. We are using the fundamental constant G as a guideline to define a system of units in which G takes the numeric value 1.
Now, you’re also asserting that Kepler’s “k” is just “just the Astronomical Unit”. I take it you’re referring to the length of the semi-major axis of the Earth-Sun system? If so you’re off-base here too. If we use the astronomical unit to measure distances, the solar mass to measure masses, and mean solar days to measure time, then we have a system of units, and thus can get a numerical value for G within this system. Kepler’s constant k is the square root of this numeric value.
Really I don’t see any evidence that you know anything about physics but history. I would fail a high school physics student who couldn’t keep track of units and what they mean. I’m serious: this is extremely basic stuff here, and you’re all over the map on it.
24 May 2007 at 6:44 pm
John says:
John:
Thanks so much for the comment. I have to read it carefully before writing about it. Today I read the references given by Urs so let me comment on that.
Urs:
That’s a great forum and a great discussion and I enjoyed reading it. I learned a lot. But, as quoted above, I believe that “a unit is a convention.”
So, for instance, Astronomical Unit (Earth-Sun distance) is a unit. AU is not a constant of nature. I believe everyone agrees to this. If I use Venus-Sun distance as unit, astronomy will remain the same.
I am saying that G, the *unit* of Newtonian force, is such a conventional unit. It doesn’t matter in what unit system we express G, it is still a conventional unit.
If it is a unit it is conventional. G is a unit therefore it is conventional. If it is conventional, then it is not a constant of nature. What is wrong with this reasoning?
Thanks again for the references.
25 May 2007 at 2:58 am
Exactly. And over there we like to say, equivalently: “A unit is a choice of isomorphism”.
25 May 2007 at 6:20 pm
Pioneer how do you define a constant of nature and a conventional unit?
26 May 2007 at 8:35 pm
Hi Urs,
I don’t understand how a unit is a choice of “a one-to-one correspondence between two mathematical sets” is a better description of “a unit is a convention,” or that they are equivalent.
I searched n-category cafe for related posts but nothing more than the ones you referenced showed up. I would appreciate some pointers to relevant literature. Would your terminology help understand if G is a unit or a constant of nature? Thnx.
27 May 2007 at 5:01 am
Angryphysicist–
I am not sure. I am trying to understand myself the difference between a conventional unit and a constant of nature.
This appears to be more specifically about G. Is G a constant of nature or a defined unit? My personal opinion is that a “constant of nature” is an artifact of the system of units. I labored all day yesterday and created these slides. I would appreciate it if you could look at them and let me know what you think. That’s my present understanding. It may change at any moment! Thanks.
27 May 2007 at 5:05 am
Sorry, link for the slides: http://www.alphysics.com/Slides/UnitStates_files/frame.htm
27 May 2007 at 5:44 am
Slide 2: What you’re calling “rational unit” and “conventional unit” are really the same thing. Everything else in your misunderstanding seems to flow from this wellspring.
Slide 5: You’re picking two different lengths and trying to use them both as units. This isn’t how a system of units works. It seems to you like you’re picking two different things because of the misunderstanding on Slide 2 (supra).
Basically, it looks like your impression of physicists is that they’ve picked meters and kilometers as units and derived “1000″ as a constant. You’re right that that would be simplistic and silly, but that’s very much not how physicists derive G.
I’ll try to rephrase again: G is a very specific property of physical reality, independent of all choices of coordinates. G has no numeric value in and of itself. When we pick a system of units then G has a numeric value within that system and it is very well-understood how that numeric value changes as we change the system of units.
Notice again that I defined G above with no reference whatsoever to units until I needed to derive a numeric value for a particular system of units.
27 May 2007 at 1:09 pm
Can you explain why they are the same? I want to correct the slides.
But, personally, I think there is a difference. In rational units we are using the terms of proportionality as units. R1 and T1, in my example. We keep one of the terms constant and measure others with it.
In conventional units, we add an additional layer of units and measure rational units R1 and T1 with outside unit.
In rational units the terms do not have dimensions. They are the dimensions. When conventional units are introduced the original terms become dimensions under new units.
But going back to your example of measuring your height with a rod. In this case, you created a unit. You are the only one who uses that unit but still that’s a conventional unit.
If you take your own height as unit and measure everybody else as shorter and taller than you, you would be using rational units. The kind of information both units reveal are different.
27 May 2007 at 2:07 pm
Well, you define a rational unit as:
“One of the quantities is kept constant in order to measure other quantities with it.”
Suppose you had a ruler, and it had some length say a meter. Suppose you want to measure your own height with it, then the length of your ruler is kept constant in order to measure other quantities with it; so a meter (the length of the ruler) is a “rational unit”.
But a conventional unit as:
“The rational unit is expressed by scaling it with a conventional unit, such as meter.”
Which is pragmatically what we did with the rational unit. Perhaps here you mean like say a kilometer is a “conventional unit” since it’s 1000 meters long, and a meter is the “rational unit” that’s scaled? (I don’t know, I’m trying to guess an example of a “rational unit” versus a “conventional unit”.)
But then this seems like an arbitrary and pointless definition.
That’s just my take on it from first glance, it seems to be a sort of false dichotomy.
27 May 2007 at 2:13 pm
So your “conventional unit” is exactly what I mean by a unit, but your “rational unit” only gives the answers “less than/equal to/greater than”, right?
But then a conventional unit can serve as a rational unit. Just take the numeric value it returns from a measurement and ask if it’s less than, equal to, or greater than 1. To have both floating around is redundant.
Honestly, the slides are — from top to bottom — too terse and confused to pinpoint exactly what’s wrong. I can, however, say with certainty that your two different units are redundant, and what physicists mean by “unit” subsumes both roles. Your problem then stems from having two different things trying to play one role, and the subsequent dissonance.
28 May 2007 at 9:35 pm
Ok, thanks for reviewing the slides. I think the distinction between rational units and conventional units may be trivial and it does not help understand if G is constant or a defined unit.
But how do physicists derive G? I believe that G is not derived from measurements but it is defined. G was defined in the nineteenth century as a replacement to k which was then used in astronomy. British physicists converted k into British units. The same British physicists defined an experiment conducted a century earlier as the posthumous measurement of G. The experiment referred to never measured G.
Do you agree on these historical facts? If you do then we have to look at k and discuss if k is a constant of nature.
For instance, let me label Archimedes’ constant Newton’s constant. Since Archimedes was an early Newtonian this makes sense. Archimedes’ Constant is now called Newton’s Universal Constant of Geometry G.
Would you agree that it is silly to discuss this G whether it is constant or defined unit? G is a defined unit. I just defined it. If we want to understand what Newton’s constant of Geometry G is we have to eliminate Newton’s authority and we have to look at Archimedes’ constant which came before it.
Similarly, if G is k in British units, G is a defined unit. G is just another name for k. So we need to look at k.
Thanks once again for the comments.
29 May 2007 at 5:28 am
You can believe whatever you want. However, I just told you in a previous comment how G is defined, and even gave an example of how to determine its value in a specific system of units.
If you have a problem with that explanation, say so. If you have a question about that definition, raise it. To just wave your hands past it as if I haven’t said it at all marks you out as being more interested in your own pet theory than the physical truth, and that’s the first sign of a crackpot.
Oh, and by the way: G is k^2, not k. At least get those basic facts straight.
29 May 2007 at 9:24 pm
Yes, actually, I was thinking the same thing. Maybe what I am saying is not correct. I would be the first one to give it up. angryphysicist pointed out that G was not a number and I have no problem with that. You pointed out that my distinction of units was trivial in practice. No problem with that. This is why I appreciate your comments. For me the important thing is to understand if G is a constant or defined unit, not being right or wrong.
I had actually written a reply to your previous comment about the definition of G but I never got around to posting it. I haven’t been ignoring it. There are lots of good comments in this thread.
I definitely disagree. You are describing an occult world with animistic intelligent matter endowed with Newton’s soul you call force. Such an “attraction” between matter has never been observed. And force is not necessary except to save Newton’s authority. The Newtonian force does not exist in nature. As you wrote before, definitions cannot be observed. Force is the fundamental definition of Newtonian physics and it must be taken by faith.
This is not true. Your initial assumption is not correct. F :: 1/RR is not a proportionality. F is a placeholder for R/TT. Placeholders are labels and they don’t vary with other variables.
Please not that F::1/RR is comparing apples and oranges. This is Newton’s gift to modern physics. Newton legalized the absurd by making mixed proportionalities legal in physics. For thousands of years before Newton mathematicians knew that it was absurd to use mixed proportionalities. Newton’s authority notwitstanding it is still true that comparing apples and oranges will lead to absurdities. As is the case here.
1/RR is half of a proportionality. 1/RR is not a valid statement on its own. When you double R, R/TT does not double as you state. In the true proportionality, when you vary the distance the period varies as the power of 1.5.
Note that F cancels. It is a placeholder. So whatever you say about force is irrelevant. And when you cancel F, why do you keep G, the unit of force, in the equations? The force vanishes its unit stays! And what do you mean by multiplying two pieces of matter? m1 times m2 is a meaningless statement. Also please not that G on its own is a purely theoretical and useless concept, in astronomy only GM is used. As its name makes it clear G is a political slogan, not a constant of nature.
Please take a look at this article http://www.densytics.com/wiki/index.php?title=History_of_G . Comments as always appreciated. Thanks.
29 May 2007 at 10:39 pm
And what you’re ignoring is the fact that at everyday scales some attraction is observed. Bodies do accelerate towards each other. Yes, the Newtonian model is now known to be ontologically lacking, but it is a very good predictor within everyday human scales.
And yes, the given proportionalities are observed. Write down Newton’s law and watch Kepler’s equations fall out. What was once merely a curve fitted to a set of observations is now explained. Double the mass of one object and the other accelerates twice as much. Double the separation and the acceleration falls to a quarter. You can argue philosophy all you want, but at the end of the day nature has the last word, and these proportionalities are borne out in experiment after experiment.
It seems here (and in the sequel) that you’re confusing dimensions and quantities like you confused units and numbers before. Do you mean “F has dimensions [distance][time]-2″?
Assuming that’s the case, it’s not only wrong, but it’s immaterial. Again, the simple fact is that doubling the separation of bodies quarters the force each feels. You’re trying to disprove what I’m saying on the basis of dimensionality by glossing over the fact that the constant of proportionality — Newton’s constant G — itself has dimensions. In fact those dimensions are what tells us how to change the numeric value of G when we change sytems of units!
Yes, force has units. Specifically its dimensionality is [mass][distance][time]-2. Each body’s mass has dimensionality [mass], and the separation has dimensionality [distance]. Thus the observed proportionalities — derived from experimental evidence — show that force is proportional to the product of the masses divided by the separation squared; that is, to a quantity of dimensionality [mass]2[distance]-2. The constant of proportionality, thus, has dimensionality [mass]-1[distance]3[time]-2. This compensates for what you see as a mismatch in dimensions.
Please, stop advancing one after another argument that the high school physics books oversimplify the history of the Cavendish experiment and how it was viewed at the time. Honestly, nobody here is arguing that point. We’re trying to bridge the incredible gaps in your grasp of really basic physics. Now, go pick up one of those high school physics textbooks and actually read the physics instead of just ranting about the unfairness of all the historical notes in them.
29 May 2007 at 10:40 pm
Evidently <sup> tags are disallowed. Please read all the numbers in my expressions of dimensionalities as superscripts.
30 May 2007 at 5:50 pm
angryphysicists wrote on May 27:
angryphysicists: No, I meant to keep constant a term in a proportionality. Not to choose a unit which is already constant (like a rod) and keep it constant.
So, let’s say A is a term in a proportionality. A is a variable because each term in a proportionality varies. When we keep A constant it sets the scale. In this case there are no conventional units and there are no dimensions.
Then let’s measure A with a conventional unit, like meter. Then, convert A from meter to inches, to parsecs and so on. A remains invariant under unit transformations. Physicists look at A and say it is a constant of nature because it stays invariant under unit transformations. Does this make sense?
30 May 2007 at 7:10 pm
Most emphatically no. The numerical value of a constant of nature does not stay the same when we change units. I’ve said time and again that G has different numerical values in different systems of units, and the dimensionality of G (which I had to explain in my last comment) is what tells us how that value changes.
31 May 2007 at 12:52 am
Then I fail to see how any arbitrary length is not a constant of nature as when one changes the units one measures with it is the same length.
There is more to a thing being a constant of nature than “invariance under transformations”…that’s what makes a thing a tensor
1 June 2007 at 11:05 am
Pioneer1,
See the Yang, Lee,1957 Nobel Prize and Wu regarding broken symmetry.
2 June 2007 at 7:57 am
angryphysicist said:
Yes! Exactly my point. None of the units are constants of nature. But physicists pick one unit among infinity of possible units and define it as a constant of nature.
Consider the speed of light. SOL is not a constant of nature. SOL is proportional to the medium. But physicists chose SOL in vacuum and defined it by authority to be a constant of nature. Physicists could have chosen the SOL in medium x and defined it as a constant of nature, but they chose the SOL in vacuum and they established it as a constant of na-ture by authority. The SOL in vacuum is no more privileged than the SOL in crystals.
The same is true for G. The constant G points to the constant term in the proportonality not to the proportionality itself.
Whoever defines a constant obtains power. That’s why when Stalin comes to power he changes the name of Tsaritsyn to Stalingrad. That’s why Newtonists define a unit of force Newton which is as superfluous as Aristotle, the unit of impetus.
Here’s a page discussing the problem by exploring your idea about all conventional units not being constants. If we take that as an axiom than we see that constants of nature are standardized units.
http://www.densytics.com/wiki/index.php?title=Unit_or_constant_of_nature_%28mathematical%29
2 June 2007 at 8:19 am
John Armstrong wrote:
It is clear from your usage of the word experiment that we have different understanding of what an experiment is.
An experiment has three parts:
1. experimental equation
2. the set of observations
3. the result.
If the experimental equation contains the terms A and B, the results can only contain the terms A and B. In other words, if
equation(A,B)
and
result(A,B,C)
this is not a scientific experiment.
If a term C which is not in the equation appears magically in the results this is called a polemical physics experiment where a physicist used a gadget as a false witness to save Newton’s authority.
In the case of G, physicists must eliminate F from equations in order to make astronomical computations. F does not enter the equations used in observations or computations. But F magically appears in physicists’ results. Physicists never measure a quantity represented by F but at the end of the day F magically appears in the results. There is a name for this method. It is called scholasticism. And authority symbols appearing in the results of polemical experiments are called dormitive virtues. Physics is full of dormitive virtues the most famous of which is the force appearing and disappearing from equations according to physicists’ wishes.
Re Cavendish experiment:
It is a historical fact that Cavendish was dead when G was defined. You believe that the measurement of G by a dead British landed gentry is an experiment. This is your (and physicists’) understanding of experiment.
I say that Cavendish did not measure G because he was dead. Which one of these statements do you think would be a valid statement if we insist on scientific rationalism as the standard of evidence. The standard of evidence in physics is the absurd. Not coincidentally, it was Newton who established absurd as the standard of evidence in physics.
I am offering to you experimental proof that Cavendish did not measure G. You are asserting by your authority that Cavendish measured G never mind that he was dead.
Your denial of historical facts I think is making impossible to resolve the issue of the nature of G. To me argument by authority is not valid, other than that, I would be the first one to dismiss any statement I make if you have a valid argument against it.
Historical facts come before physics notation because physics and mathematics cannot decide existence. If G does not exist it is irrelevant what dimensions it has.
The following are the historical facts I have been writing about:
1. G was defined after k
2. G is k in British units
3. There is no experimental evidence for G and Cavendish never measured it.
These three historical facts combined with the following proves that G is not an experimental quantity and it is not a constant of nature.
1. G is independent of the rest of physics. Removing G will have no effect on the rest of physics. What kind of fundamental constant is this if it makes no difference if it is there or not?
2. G has dimensions and therefore cannot be a fundamental constant
3. G points to the the constant in the original proportionality and not to the proportionality itself. What remains constant is the proportionality not the constant.
4. Eliminating the unit system eliminates G.
You do not have any arguments against these.
But thanks for agreeing that textbooks misrepresent the Cavendish experiment. To me this is very important.
Physics is teaching young impressionable minds who just started their education that they have measured Newton’s Soul with a toy pendulum factory set to oscillate with the required period so that when the period is applied to standard formulas a conventional value of G is obtained. This is fraud. This fraud should be taken very seriously. You cannot dismiss Cavendish experiment as mere high school physics. The experimental nature of physics has been undermined by this charade of Cavendish lab taught to every physics student as an experimental verification of the Newtonian occult. Cavendish lab is a religious miracle asserted as a scientific experiment. This is a fundamental problem.
Thanks again for helping me understand this issue.
2 June 2007 at 12:22 pm
But Pioneer, there is a fundamental difference between a quantity invariant under coordinate reparametrizations and constants of nature.
It seems by your scrutiny, a “Constant of Nature” is undefinable. Indeed you admitted previously that “My personal opinion is that a ‘constant of nature’ is an artifact of the system of units.”
Well, what do you mean by this?
Suppose a constant of nature X exists. Would that mean that it can only be determined through experiment, or through some a priori mathematical manipulations? If it’s the latter and it’s expressed in one set of units, would that change the fact that we have a “new” constant of nature X’? Why does it suddenly change with a change of units?
“But how do physicists derive G? I believe that G is not derived from measurements but it is defined.”
Could you elaborate? Physicists just randomly pick a value for “G” that works?
I did a simple google search and came up with a number of experiments that can derive the experimental value of G:
http://www.iit.edu/~smile/ph8615.html
http://cip.physik.uni-wuerzburg.de/~rkritzer/grav.pdf
http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~dodds/Files332/cavendish.pdf
http://www.richmond.edu/~ggilfoyl/intermediate/labs/bigG/HeimannWrayCavendish.pdf
Some of these you could probably do at home
2 June 2007 at 1:33 pm
pioneer, your comment on what constitutes an experiment is garbage from beginning to end. I honestly can’t refute it because there’s nothing sensible there to refute. It’s not even wrong.
4 June 2007 at 6:21 pm
angryphysicist said:
I don’t understand what this means. Is this something like parametric equations? The first item on google search was an arxiv paper and they seem to be substituting parameters for coordinates. If so I don’t see why this is relevant to G.
I think I’ll stick to G instead of the more general issue of the existence of “constants of nature.” See below.
For me, it appears that the problem is simpler than whether constants of nature can exist. I am saying that G is not a constant of nature. I think it may be better not to conflate these two questions:
1. Is G a constant of nature?
2. Can a constant of nature exist?
I believe that the question Is G a constant of nature? is independent of the other question. I don’t need to show if constants of nature, whatever they are, exist. All I need to show is that G is a conventional unit, therefore, it is not a constant of nature.
As you mentioned, if I understood it correctly, conventional units are not constants of nature. If they were, every unit would be a constant of nature, which is absurd.
To show that G is not a constant of nature:
1. I reduce G to k which is a conventional unit
2. I show that G was never observed
3. I note that G has dimensions
4. I note that physics does not care if G exists or not.
What is labeled G today is another name for k, the original conventional unit in Kepler’s rule. I don’t know if “constants of nature” exist or can exist. But I know that G is not a constant of nature. Does this make sense?
So, we assume that by pure reasoning you obtained a constant of nature. I am not sure how you can know without testing that your definition is a constant of nature. What you found by a priori reasoning would be something like the cosmological constant. If you take a look at the troubles the cosmological constant has been going through — now here, now gone, back again, and so on — it would be hard to know that what you obtained is a constant of nature without a way to measure it.
In the case of G we have a label, G, and physicists call this label a constant of nature. I don’t know why. I think it is by tradition and because the marketing name of G includes the word “constant.” Physicists, naturally, take labels of physics literally.
I don’t take marketing labels literally. I question them. So your hypo does not apply to G. Because G was not found by a priori reasoning but by unit conversion. And G was not found by experiment.
1. G was not found by a priori reasoning
2. G was not found by experiment
3. G was obtained by unit conversion
These facts prove that G is a cultural artifact and it must be removed from physics.
So here we are assuming that you found a constant of nature X by a priori reasoning and you express it “in one set of units.” And the question is “would that change the fact that we have a “new” constant of nature X?”
The way I understand it “constant” implies an equality of ratios, or as physicists say it, a symmetry. This is what we perceive as a constant. Why? Because the values in the proportionality vary but the proportionality stays constant. If you find a single quantity not associated with a proportionality that would be a defined unit not a constant. So a unit is a kept-constant but a constant, on the other hand, is what stays constant as some other quantities vary. We are unable to define constant without reference to change.
No. Physicists did not pick a random value for G. This is well documented. (For instance, see Nature, 50, 330, 1894.) British physicists took k and converted it to British units and gave it a marketing label and defined it as the true constant of nature. All this shows once again that G is cultural, not physical, and should not be in physics.
4 June 2007 at 6:46 pm
As I’ve already pointed out, G is the same as k^2, not as k. At least get your facts straight.
You rant about the Cavendish experiment. Yes, the standard history there might be somewhat oversimplified. Rest assured, though, that G has been measured plenty of times since then.
Every quantity in physics has dimensions. This is pure nonsense.
I don’t see you as having done anything of the sort. To a very good degree of accuracy on everyday human scales such a constant undoubtedly does exist. Its numerical value can be measured as I’ve already indicated. You still have yet to offer a single coherent rebuttal to my description of G in terms of Newtonian mechanics.
All of your nonsense about labels and conventions is just a smokescreen to hide your dazzling ignorance of basic high-school physics. You are unquestionably a crackpot, desperate to gain credibility from being the “outside man”. You cower under a pseudonym and a broken hyperlink, you claim to know better than everyone else, and you refuse to respond to the actuality of physics. Take your medicine show on the road, pioneer. We aren’t buying anything here.
4 June 2007 at 7:46 pm
John Armstrong wrote:
I am sorry to hear this because your comments have been helpful to me. I was working on a point by point answer on your previous comment, if you care to review it, it is here http://de5ign.wordpress.com/2007/06/02/rationalism-v-newtonian-animism/ .
Also in this case, garbage is better than nothing. In the hard experimental science of physics there is no definition of what an experiment is. Maybe physicists like it that way so that they can define whatever they want as experiment. At least mine is an honest and simple definition of what I thought was experiment. Physicists cannot go wrong by adapting my definition as a starting point toward a rigorous definition of experiment so that physics can move from the state of alphysics that it is in now to a science of physics.
For me the point is not refutation but to learn. Since physics does not have a standard for experiment in physics experiment is anything goes. Can you refute anything goes? But mine is an operational definition of experiment.
Great, now I am in good company
http://globalpioneering.com/wp02/not-even-wrong-bandwagon/
4 June 2007 at 8:25 pm
Pioneer, you never even defined what a constant of nature is…as a matter of fact, if memory serves, you refused to do so.
Your entire argument seems to be sophistry, which is the source of John’s frustration (frankly I’m surprised he stayed with you as long as he did).
Actually, it reminds me quite a bit of Hegelian psychobabble…”the antithesis of an axiom is an anti-axiom which has the resulting synthesis of Truth not to be confused with truth, as Truth is a person but not an individual nor is it alive but it’s not dead…blah blah blah. Ah but we haven’t defined what an axiom is! So I can redefine it thus, tacitly, and still claim the high ground!”
It’s little more than intellectual masturbation. I think it was Karl Marx who once said “The philosophers have only interpreted the world. The point however is to change it.” Your word games, which by the by is pure idealism that Wittgenstein laid to waste long ago, is little more than a mediocre attempt to interpret the world…no offense.
4 June 2007 at 9:32 pm
In the science of zoology there is no absolutely precise definition of what a cow is. However, zoologists can most certainly go wrong by adopting a definition of a cow as spherical as a starting point.
Physics (and the philosophy thereof) does indeed have a notion of what consitutes an experiment. You just don’t like it because it doesn’t support your pet rantings, which (again) all stem out of your cries of “wolf” over some oversimplified history.
Cavendish did not intend to measure G, though since his experiments others have used his data to give a value for G. Similarly, astronomers observing the perihelion of Mercury did not intend to measure frame-dragging, but since then their observations have been used as verification of general relativistic effects. You’re right that the standard story is not quite accurate, but everything else you’ve said after that one jumping-off point is wrong.
Oh, and that link? Serious discussions do not look kindly on sock-puppetry. Again, I call on you to unmask and drop this pseudonym farce. And stop patting yourself on the back for being a voice crying in the wilderness. Instead, go and read some actual physics and do some actual experiments. You’re a petulant child, sulking that we won’t play along with your make-believe and it’s high time you grew up.
angryphysicist: I’m sticking with this because these sloppy thinkers are out there all too often without voices to counter them. It’s easy for someone to find their ramblings and be taken in. If we’re committed to the truth, we are also committed to fighting ignorance.
I’m not going to convince pioneer of a damned thing, and I know it. I might, however, serve to dissuade anyone else reading this thread from following him. I might also give other readers ideas of how to respond to this sort of thing other than throwing their hands up in frustration. If nothing else, it forced me to work up my explanation of where G actually comes from (in the Newtonian framework), thus solidifying my own understanding of the matter.
5 June 2007 at 4:16 am
RB said:
I read so far only the presentation speech by O.B. Klein before the lectures.
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1957/press.html
There he makes a point which I think is relevant to this discussion. He quotes Lao-tse as saying that “the elementary particles, which could be defined are not the eternal elementary particles.” Lao-tse is referring to Tao but the idea fits nicely to units/constants discussion: if it can be defined it is a unit; constants of nature are not defined.
What Klein calls, “the atom of the philosophers” was exactly something like G of today. The philosophers defined a unit of the indivisible and labeled it atom. This unit then was turned into a constant of nature. G too was defined as a unit and then turned into a constant of nature.
Thanks for the link.
5 June 2007 at 6:03 am
And again you outdo yourself. Nobody ever, ever used either the term “unit” or the term “constant of nature” to refer to an atom. Again you prove that your uses of the terms have absolutely nothing to do with their use in physics, that you have no clue how they are used in physics, and that you don’t care. Yet you feel privileged to complain about physics.
Go read Alan Sokal’s Fashionable Nonsense and Intellectual Impostures for a lot more of how a real physicist took down a group of poststructuralist crackpots who similarly mangled the use of mathematics and physics terms.
5 June 2007 at 6:09 pm
John Armstrong wrote:
I know that G is k^2. You can see that here
http://www.densytics.com/wiki/index.php?title=History_of_G
G is defined as
R_0^3/T_0^2 = k^2 = G
This is the origin of G. Do you agree with this? If not why not?
5 June 2007 at 6:40 pm
You say you know that G is k^2. However on this entire page this is the first time you’ve said it. You keep saying over and over that G is k. Of course, part of your condition is a pathological inability to admit that you were wrong.
And no, I do not accept that “definition” of G, since
(a) R_0 and T_0 are completely undefined. Of course, this is then held up as evidence against the physicists, completely ignoring the fact that
(b) No physicist uses that purported definition. It’s a complete straw man. This, of course, is because
(c) That page is, again, pure sock-puppetry. You’re basically saying, “look, I agree with me”. You’re putting words into the mouths of supposed physicists and then pointing to those words as evidence against them, all under the pretense that it’s someone other than yourself talking.
Instead, the definition of G is exactly what I explained above here. It’s there for all to read, and it’s you that refuse to read it, despite me pointing you back to it over, and over, and over, and OVER!
Now stop being such a silly little twit, do the experiments to verify the proportionalities that I assert (yes, I have done them myself. It was part of middle-school physics), and try to understand something without your preconcieved insanities getting in the way for once.
5 June 2007 at 6:55 pm
You say you know that G is k^2, but on this entire page, this is the first time you admit to it. You keep saying again and again that “G is k” and I’ve corrected you a number of times. Of course, even when you admit you were wrong you try to spin it in a way that it looks like you aren’t admitting any such thing. Stop lying and just admit it.
Now, as to that “definition”, I most certainly do not agree with that. This is because
(a) The quantities R_0 and T_0 are completely undefined, either on this page or on that one. Of course, this is then used as evidence against physicists, completely ignoring the fact that
(b) No physicist actually uses this purported definition. It’s a pure straw man, which is extremely convenient because
(c) The page is again pure sock-puppetry. You make up these “outside” sources just to point to them and imagine that they support your point.
Instead, the definition of G is exactly what I stated before. It’s on this very page. I’ve referred you back to it over and over and over, and you claim to have read it but it’s clear you’ve done nothing of the sort. It’s here. Now go read it.
Then perform the experiments to verify the proportionalities I assert. Yes, I’ve already done them. It was back when they were part of middle-school physics.
Then for once, just once in your miserable life, take off your blinders and try to hear something without it being filtered through your petty prejudices and silly superstitions.
5 June 2007 at 7:16 pm
angryphysicist: I think Akismet is acting up and shunting my comments to the spam queue. Could you go into it and fish out at least one of my responses to pioneer’s latest? I have no idea if you’re even seeing these requests, though, since they seem to also be going into the spam queue.
6 June 2007 at 7:24 am
This is really getting me upset if this comment is still getting eaten.
6 June 2007 at 7:48 am
angryphysicist: I think I’ve throttled this spam thing into submission. Can you please go into the Akismet spam queue, fish out one of the two different attempts I made at responding to pioneer’s latest, and delete this comment? I don’t want to have to reconstruct my response again.
6 June 2007 at 10:42 am
I’m trying this now from the department which has a different IP than my home computer. angry: if this gets through can you go into your spam queue, fish out my mismarked comments, and delete all but one of my original responses to pioneer’s latest? Thanks.
6 June 2007 at 1:18 pm
Good news! The spam machine apparatus works by email addresses, I guess…
6 June 2007 at 5:16 pm
angryphysicist wrote:
If I am reading your argument correctly, you said that if it is a definition then it is not a constant of nature. If something is defined it is a definition. A definition is a definition of humans, not of nature. I am showing that G is a defined unit. You said that defined units are not constants of nature. I don’t see a disagreement here.
I am flattered that you compared me to some brand name philosophers but I don’t think I am that intelligent to argue by sophistry. I always try to simplify otherwise I don’t understand.
Maybe you can help me identify sophistry and remove them
Pioneer1 says: Cavendish was dead when G was defined therefore Cavendish did not measure G.
Physics says: Cavendish measured G, never mind that he was dead. It is sophistry to say that dead men cannot measure.
Pioneer1 says: Cavendish was dead when G was defined therefore Cavendish did not measure G.
Physics says: When we say that Cavendish measured G we don’t mean that Cavendish *really* measured G. It is philosophical sophistry to argue against our authority.
So, can you identify which of these is sophistry?
Personally, I think in this case physicists’ version is sophistry. What is incomprehensible is that scientists such as yourself are defending Newtonian occult. Physics is science. Newtonism is an occult religion. Physics and Newtonism are not the same thing. Newtonism has been a parasite feeding on the science of physics. Criticizing Newtonian occult definitions is not harmful to science of physics.
Thanks.
6 June 2007 at 5:41 pm
Pioneer, in my misflagged comment I addressed this. Your paranoia about this single oversimplification in popular and low-level physics books is the root of every other mistake you make.
Physics does not say that Cavendish measured G. Physics says that the data Cavendish’s experiments collected can be used to derive a numerical value for G. Similarly, astronomers observing the perihelion of Mercury were not intending to measure frame-dragging effects, but once Einstein laid out general relativity that experimental data could be used to check against his predictions. Just because the measurement preceded the theory doesn’t mean it can’t be used as a check on the theory.
You’re reifying “physics”, and then putting words in its mouth. This is a straw man, and you’ve even mangled that.
From this point you go on to show your total lack of comprehension of anything physicists actually do have to say. You show prejudicial contempt for the community you claim to try to understand. You ignore all evidence that doesn’t fit into your worldview.
In your previous comment you ask if I agree with your “definition” of G, and if not, why not. I most emphatically reject it because
(a) The quantities R_0 and T_0 are nowhere defined. Not on this page, nor on the page you link to. It’s completely ambiguous. Of course, this doesn’t matter because that purported definition constitutes
(b) a straw-man attack against some imagined “Newtonist” bogey-man. You put words into the mouth of your imagined opponent so you can claim that those who correct you are actually attacking physics itself.
And besides, I already told you how G is defined. I explained it and keep referring you back to it. It’s here in this comment. I don’t care how many times you claim to have read it and then link to something completely unrelated. Actually read it for once.
And then do the experiments to verify the proportionalities I assert. Yes, I’ve already done them back when they were part of a middle-school physics class. Observe the real world around you unfiltered by your blinkered ideologies.
And then read through the logical steps in the derivation. Go ahead and try to find the logical flaw in my argument. The only flaw is the fact that at scales extremely outside those of everyday human experience the proportionalities are ever so slightly off. The derivation I present of G is the one physics actually uses. No actual physicist uses your purported “definition”. If you’re going to attack physics, attack what it actually says and not what you say it says.
Oh, and even if you say you understand that G is k^2 rather than k, this is the first time in this entire thread you’ve said so. I’ve pointed it out before and you’ve only acknowledged your error this once, and only by trying to phrase it so it appears that you’re not admitting any error at all.
6 June 2007 at 5:57 pm
Pioneer
No, what I am saying is that you are using the phrase “constant of nature” and you are refusing to define it.
You wish me to identify your use of sophistry? Well, since you apparently are misusing the term to refer to a historical group of philosophers, which is the incorrect context of its use (I’m using it in the modern sense of the word: sophistry makes heavy use of specious arguments in order to deceive someone).
Where have you used linguistic sleight-of-hand, you might ask; your definition of “conventional units” and so forth is evidence enough of it.
Wittgenstein remarked that if something could be said meaningfully in one language, it could be said in any language. But your argument cannot even be presented in English, much less French or any other language one would like.
It seems to suggest sloppy thinking. Indeed the shroud of mystery that makes “constants of nature” so seemingly “deep” a discussion is because we cannot meaningfully talk to you about it, you haven’t even defined or referred to what you mean by “constant of nature”!
You have not given any criteria for what a constant of nature is. You seem to allege that the constants of nature “don’t exist” because they use units…but since you haven’t even defined what a constant of nature is it doesn’t matter.
You appear to have a vague “inkling” of what a “constant of nature” is, but you don’t really have any well defined criteria for identifying a “constant of nature”. Without this, there’s nothing to attack.
It’s pure linguistic “sleight-of-hand”, and sophistry not even at its best.
Now, perhaps if you could mirror the mathematicians and start with a few definitions (like “constant of nature” which you repeatedly refuse to define), and then present structured logical arguments, maybe just maybe you’ll either convince someone or you’ll realize a mistake in your argument.
But your technique of presenting specious arguments is rather unappealing, and your linguistic sleight-of-hand doubly so.
6 June 2007 at 7:27 pm
I’ve just read this discussion and I am impressed by angryphysicist’s and John’s perseverance with Pioneer.
I was thinking that the troublesome idea of “constant of nature” might be pinned down easier by moving away from G and focusing on something simpler like the density of water.
Pioneer, take some quantity of water. Measure its volume using any units you choose. Measure its mass using any units you choose. Using the same units, repeat this for different quantities of water. You will notice that the mass of the water is always some constant times its volume. That constant is water’s density with respect to the units you have chosen. It is a constant of nature because if you explain how you measure mass and volume another scientist will come up with exactly the same constant.
You will now probably argue that “that value can’t be a constant because its defined in terms of my units. If I change my units the density of water will change!”. There are two responses to this.
Firstly, suppose you initally chose metres cubed for volume and kilograms for mass. The density of water you observe will be in kilograms per metres cubed. If someone else decided to repeat your experiments using inches cubed and pounds they would arrive at a different value for the density of water. However, there is a purely mathematical transformation from kgs/m^3 to lbs/in^3. If you know the relationship between kgs and lbs as well as ms and ins you can compute the density of water in either system without doing any further experiments. Something is invariant here under a change of units. That thing that is invariant is what people call a “constant of nature”, not any particular measurement of that constant.
If that doesn’t convince you, we can extend the experiment slightly. This time, choose your units and experimentally come up with a value for the density of water AND the density of lead. Divide the latter by the former and you will get some number which tells you how much more dense lead is than water. You can repeat this experiment with ANY units you choose and you will arrive at exactly the same number. This number is also a constant of nature. It just so happens that it is dimensionless - i.e., independent of the units you choose to measure it with.
In both these cases there was some fact about the universe that we were measuring. In the first case it was the density of water. In the second it was the relative density of lead to water. In the case of the constant G it is the relationship between the masses of two objects, the distance between them and the force of attraction between them.
For me and other scientists these experimentally observed constants of proportionality are what are known as “constants of nature”. How does your understanding of the term differ from this? If you disagree with this definition could you please try to explain your difficultly with respect to the examples I have just given?
6 June 2007 at 7:40 pm
OK, I just fished through a huge number of spam comments and found a number of John’s posts which I recovered…so if anyone thinks that they are seeing new posts by John, they are.
Sorry for the belated action, I’ve been programming a toy operating system. I’m trying to figure out if one could extend the Unix philosophy of “making everything an object” work for processes and threads too. In addition, I’m using a brand new programming language (the “D” programming language) and have been trying to make efficient code. Sorry once again!
6 June 2007 at 8:19 pm
No problem at all, angry. It sounds like a great idea.
Of course, we really should be trying to make everything a morphism. Then we can categorify
6 June 2007 at 10:35 pm
Maybe this is a complete misunderstanding of morphisms, but why not have each object represent a possible state of the operating system? System calls would then become morphisms!
And then category theorists can work their black magic!
6 June 2007 at 10:37 pm
Scratch that, each object is a state of the physical computer itself.
For a simpler model, it could be the state of a Turing machine. The Turing machine, I think, could easily be categorified.
7 June 2007 at 3:32 am
Well, who knows? Perhaps quantum wave, spin and entanglement hide the real story of how the universe is the way that it is.
7 June 2007 at 6:47 am
angry: I’ll forward you to the excellent lecture notes of John Baez’ seminar on Classical vs. Quantum Computation, from this past year.
7 June 2007 at 5:51 pm
John Armstrong wrote:
Thanks for noting this. I fixed the wiki:
http://www.densytics.com/wiki/index.php?title=History_of_G
R and T refer to “Radius” and “Period” of the orbit and R_0 and T_0 are units of the same quantities.
The link above points to your blog, not to a definition of G. Please let me know the correct link.
7 June 2007 at 11:46 pm
Damn these comments.
The link *should* have been to this comment. If WordPress still screws this one up, just search this very page for “firkin”, “furlong” or “fortnight”. That’s the only comment (before this one) they show up in.
9 June 2007 at 3:08 pm
angryphysicist:
I was reading the comments again. I think there is a lot of good content here. See this page for a breakdown of everyone’s comments.
I also noticed this comment by you:
Just wanted to mention that Kepler was born about 30 years after Copernicus’ death. Copernicus did not know about Kepler’s findings. No big deal, just for the record.
And why Kepler et al? Kepler worked alone as far a