Scott Mayers
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Interesting. I recall that. It was the only time I opted to do that anywhere. (not used to the trollers at that time). What I do recall though from both there and here of the post I TITLED, "Einstein was wrong" is that the very first sentence I wrote in it was, "Well, not really,..." and I expanded on my meaning. But some simply didn't like the title and ignored the content. I had copies of that title there and here. One is still extant. I shouldn't have posted it as I wasn't aware at the time that it was frowned upon to double post on distinct sites.
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You seem to have serious reading comprehension problems. I know what the aether is. I was pointing out that your claim that the words "aether" and "other" are related is completely bogus. Therefore, your argument "that which was other than (what) matter(s)" is nonsense. Okay, given you are such an expert on comprehension, what is your point? If I am or am not correct about my etymology, what is the significance of your disagreement? You appear to be nitpicking with suspicious intent to harass and not to contribute to aiding in helping the OP understand his own speculation. If you don't understand me, that's fine. But OWN it as your own opinion, not some presumption of universal agreement. Sorry, I saw this. I don't know you and this appears to suggest you had some power on your suggestions. If you didn't want this impression, why bother stating this at all? ....just do it. viz. I will be submitting this reply by clicking on "submit reply" with great enthusiasm.
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Each colour has a different wavelength, not a different number of wavelengths. You don't know what you are talking about. The energy of each photon relative to its 'color' when created is dependent upon both wavelength and frequency. Given I've responded to the OP to help Jinsuk follow, I'll let him/her respond to whether he follows. I've illustrated why the energy remains given linear propagation as has proven he already accepts. English (American) is my first language.
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I expected as much. The abusive character of your 'authoritative power' against me here in the past (like hiding my credible arguments including deleting them) has proven you are NOT sincerely of a 'scientific' mind. You know.....expecting one to be able to only know 'scientific truth by experiment, rational argument, and independent verification. But then you know that I'm speaking in ways that are sufficiently logical to expose you.....and why you opt to do whatever you can to hide content, use false 'reputation' flags as thought they represent actual 'scientific' credibility, and dictate reality like a church. I'm having the last laugh though! The words 'aether' and 'other' are totally unrelated. The former is from the Greek word 'aithein', to ignite. So your proposed meaning is just something you made up. Aether theories (also known as ether theories) in physics propose the existence of a medium, the aether (also spelled ether, from the Greek word (αἰθήρ), meaning "upper air" or "pure, fresh air"), a space-filling substance or field, thought to be necessary as a transmission medium for the propagation of electromagnetic ... Aether theories - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aether_theories Ridiculous. ...and I'll have no need to reflect further on your own superiority here.
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Scott Mayers started following What is movement? and Alternative for redshifts
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The energy would not be decreased if the propagation is in one direction only. Think of the energy as the quantity of information via some 'length' or number of wavelengths. Normally, if a light wave is created (as a photon), it consists of a unique 'length' or number of wavelengths according to the particular 'color' locally. Each 'color' has different numbers of wavelengths WHEN created and persist as it travels in space. But this means that given a particular 'color' created, differs from the same apparent color of a frequency created of a different original color. For example, let's say that you have a length of a fixed string. When any color (frequency) is initiated, each string has identical length. But since each frequency has different energy, this can be understood as the same length of string being used to create the wave but will alter the linear length presuming no difference in intensity represented by its altitude. Here I've inserted an illustration using Windows "Paint":
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How do you get your presumed interpretation here? I happen to consider myself a 'theoretical physicist'. If you're just trying to malign me personally, you should perhaps ask why you come here with an anonymous label. Are you trying to hide from something? If one has contention with SOME (even if it is potentially some MAJORITY viewpoint) 'theoretical scientists', does that imply one's lack of popularity suffices them to be considered at fault? Please take my arguments at hand, not whatever 'belief' you want to impose others to hold against me. Otherwise you're making it personal, political, and certainly unscientific. velocity = displacement of distance/time. Yet "spacetime" to you is merely time that cancels itself begging the velocity itself is more real? "Spacetime" is just the extended use of time AS A DIMENSION along with the other defaulted 3-dimensions. If you extend this to your response about the dimensions of space to be mere coordinates, is time as the fourth also fictitious to you? Zeno's paradoxes were pure 'geometric' that required real physics: "paradox" is a contradiction that is (or appears to be) real. In one, he argued that movement itself could not exist logically. Because movement requires at least some change in distance in some unit of time, if given any two distances of where something is to where something was, there must be some point between every real distance. If something begins with zero relative change (between any two 'times'), for any positive distance of change when something begins to move requires an infinite acceleration (in reality). Thus, the paradox here is that if movement is true anywhere and at any time, there can be no time nor place where anything is NOT not moving! The 'paradox' is resolved if and only if there is no point in space that is ever actually unchanging. A second paradox with a real resolution was about imagining two scenarios about a dart in some defined space. In one, (an imaginary control condition), an arrow is imagined to be held in that defined specific space. In the secondary condition, a flying arrow is imagined to be passing through that exact specific space but 'frozen' in time only. The question was what difference should each mean when if in the first case, we 'let go' of that arrow held in space versus the one moving horizontally. The arrow we 'let go' would drop down while the moving arrow continues. How could this be possible unless something is transferred TO the arrow? This is resolved by Newton's laws. The first paradox is resolved by Einstein. The actual 'shape' of the arrow's length is less than the one being held in the same place horizontally (and width increased vertically). The energy is transferred and held in the arrow elastically. Both are 'real' examples of change that is required to exist in every part of a very 'real' space.
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Your questions about space are a good start. Many scientists today don't like philosophy but is what is needed more now than ever if it is to progress beyond the limits of institutional authoritarianism. It is also needed if one is to internalize what you learn rather than restricting it to the 'faith' in those claiming authority wherever they exist. Space is hard to define without reference to what 'matters' to us humans. This has lead those supporting the strict 'empirical' approach to refraining from definitions that cannot be shared by the senses. Given we seem to not notice space directly without other matter as a reference, many prefer to ignore speculating upon what the actual nature of space is other than as a referent in mathematical terms where the units of space are describable strictly in terms of some material standard. Originally, the ancients termed this in various ways depending on which preferential philosophy they held over others. For some, the word that has come down to us as "spirit" was one such word. Another was "chaos" (where we get the word, "gas" from). If you look at the religious texts or scriptures, the "holy spirit'", by the Judao-Christian roots was likely intentionally the reference to space and is what permeated everywhere as the 'fluid above' (now written as "the waters above" in Genesis) versus the 'fluid below' (liquids as "the waters below"). The 'spirit' part was a way to describe the apparent power of the air that we can sense but cannot directly observe. Thus even their own kind of thinking was 'empirical' if you don't treat the present religious interpretation passed down to mean that some God literally 'hovered' above the waters below. The mystery was about what wind was. They would have also noticed that you seemed to require inhaling this spirit if only to continue to live. As such, 'spirit', was more of a word to describe a PROPERTY about fluids. They originally divided reality into only fluids or solids. The word for solid, actually originally from the roots of Judaism.....the Egyptians....was "adam" (Atum) and Aten. [Think, "a-thing" in our way of describing a something.] The 'aeather' or 'ether',where we also get the other) was another type of property descriptor that just meant that which was other than (what) matter(s). Einstein's option to approach his theory was in light of the Michelson-Morley experiments and a means to try to avoid even controversially having to deal with whether space was itself a 'matter'. Note though that while in science treat this concept as disproved, this just represents a good example of how we have a problem with modern institutions: Quantum mechanics has now re-introduced this as existing but evades redacting the belief that the luminiferous ether exists. This is proof of how the institutes themselves creatively protect the past heroes of their own history by forcing modern scientists to require preserving old theories by simply creating new words that hide the truth. This is similar to how a culturally accepted word about something evolves such that the old term is abandoned but replaced by a new word that lacks present emotional and derogatory meanings through time. Einstein thus treated space like a kind of mathematical address rather than something directly real. This would be similar to treating the contents of some address in computers as a mere pointer to its content. If the content of data in a memory space is assimilated as 'matter', then the address acts as the pointer to that data without being concerned about what or where that actual address is. Thus, you can use a random array of memory units that can have data located arbitrarily anywhere and treat the 'spacial' connections between data as defined through a specific program. For instance, if we have "Matter A" at some linear distance from "Matter B", instead of treating that distance as 'real' (the space in between the two), we assign a number based on some unit of other material standard as that distance. The actual matter can be treated as having a fixed address arbitrarily assigned to some random accessible array (RAM) and the data itself can be programmed to differ in reality as only a virtual distance. Although this may be useful, I think it inappropriately appeals (oddly) to the lack of some to conceptualize space,...the lowest common denominator of any set of people negotiating what is agreed upon as 'objective'. If one actually thinks space doesn't exist other than this virtual reality, I interpret them as having a religious mindset not dissimilar to how what the ancients may have considered "secular" and "scientific wisdom" of their day that devolves into some interpretation of space as having literal magical 'spirit' (the Holy Spirit, for instance) or that the 'ether' (as 'the other') as that place called "heaven" beyond our capacity to discover until after we die. ["heaven" --> "even" --> "Eve": meant "that which follows"] How would someone literally interpret space as merely a virtual background? You cannot have a 'speed limit' if it has no-thing to limit it!! I'm sure even Einstein realized this. If you beg speed of any-thing to be limited and REAL, you require to find both the inferred distance and time to both be treated as 'real'. Distance is sufficient to treat as based upon a material description objectively: you just point to some standard of matter and use its length as what is 'materially real'; but then if you restrict space to be a 'nothing' without matter, then TIME has to be treated as 'real'. That is, you cannot have any unreal numerator nor denominator because it would make "speed" as defined by these components irrational and likely unreal. Yet later we learn that Einstein did have philosophical reflection about whether time was real or not. I understood he and his co-philosophers eventually argued it cannot be real. Regardless, Einsteins' theory of Special (and partly General) Relativity required treating time as literally what is 'real'. Thus we get the interpretation of time itself as what changes when one approaches the speed of light. This HAS to be a misinterpretation if one is to remain consistent to treating matter as 'real', though. Scientists (theoretical) are often not aware today of their own hypocritical means of jumping between the interpretation of X as being real in one instance while unreal in another. For example, you cannot use the acceleration experiments using clocks in transition through space (anywhere) as proof THAT time is what is itself real and what is being altered. This is because you can rationally argue that the clocks being used are what is doing the changing as it is accelerating through a fixed background (and thus real) space. If time is what is the real factor of change ONLY (exclusive of being matter itself), then it is admitting that that matter is NOT acting 'real' by our local standards of observation of what a unit measure of matter stands for: the distance unit used in the speed ratio. Space 'expands' also cannot mean anything without pretending to ignore other meanings elsewhere. Unlike how we limit extraneous factors when trying to understand some experiment, you cannot remove a fundamental common definition of space, matter, and time without being hypocritically contradictory. So space IS real. Space is what we define matter to be 'occupying'. If space as a fixed reality is presumed false, than the matter that is depending upon that spacial definition is false! Matter cannot exist either without space, contrary to the stupidity of treating a time as existing when matter (and energy) existed without it.
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Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
You guys are severely proving to be extreme elitists here. I am only gaining less confidence, not more, to which you purport to be serving. You guys do not serve justice to persist as you do and am sufficiently qualified in my own right to guess you're going to only meet with your own demise due solely on your lack of appropriate etiquette to respect others. You reduce to another conservative religion. Or...maybe this was your political intent?- 294 replies
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Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
Thanks Colin, The admin closed my thread. He's likely threatened by what I might prove anyways. Note that I did manage to fix the grammar prior to others responding as I reread it and noticed certain clerical errors there. I'm not welcome here by this guy for clearly personal reasons and so will be leaving. I find it interesting that he hides behind anonymity here and so question his own actual credentials. So that's likely a part of it. It was nice to meet you. See you around if you're elsewhere. Scott. -
Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
P.S.S. note: I strongly believe that the next era in education will involve more who learn the way I and others have since the Internet since we no longer require institutional rigidity to have the luxury to learn online. Institutions will still persist as is but they need to embrace the two general approaches by taking advantage of respecting the powers of each way distinctly yet even more powerful when working together. This will eventually be a norm. I even know of a friend who raises his kid solely by means of zero pressure and internet-only learning. His kids are way ahead in their thinking even while losing other advantages of the average person. I'll try to be patient with you. But you need to reassess your own approach. Declaring me 'bogus' is just as absurd without directly responding to the particular content. I'm also respecting the high likelihood that most students of the sciences here are relatively less socially astute and likely one of the reasons for your lack of ability to relate to non-formal-scientists. So I'll wait to see if in that thread you can pinpoint your own dissent against the reasoning there. Why the hell did you close my thread? I had NOT seen or referenced any damn previous discussion elsewhere and would appreciate that you'd have the decency to reopen it rather than be an ass.- 294 replies
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Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
swansont, Please refrain from accusing me of being somehow against science as a whole for my dissension. I am demanding inclusion. Philosophy is the functioning source of even the method itself. You responded prior to reading the whole thing or you would have seen the link to the example I provide in a new thread. But it wasn't even necessary for some of this unless you believe you are defending science as one absolute and perfectly functioning entity. I am not an enemy here. If it helps to clarify, let me explain a little of my background justification for the way I proceed and why. First off, for any science or math classes I've taken, I've been the top of my class. However, contrary to my present writing, in the past from high school on, I had a writers block due to certain personal issues which for whatever reason prevented me from necessary essay writing that is essential to further education. I had proceeded on regardless both on my own and eventually other extra post-secondary classes with good results. But I still struggled until more recent times. However, I had already by then invested in a lot of my own self-driven pursuit in most areas and my best means was to study X until I got to some point of confusion (or boredom) and then try to seek solution to my confusion by digressing into another areas Y until or if I resolved the problem. If I had solved this I'd return to where I left off in X. I did this continuously but it is backwards to the traditional approach through the abstraction processes that those like you may have proceeded from. In avid interest I thus approach this foundationally and though it may lack the same means to attend to it the way you may have, I learned it has a lot of advantages because it enables you to see across different subjects without perfect specialty in any one area (at least yet). I have overcome my writing difficulties and hang with various professionals and students from my own location. As such, while I might appear odd to you, [and I speak for others who come here in the same type of process of learning], I assure you I'm competent enough. My only 'weakness' these days is that as I grow older, I lack being able to always recall all that I learned without hesitation and care. This weakness is common among similar learners because it lacks the means of practice and repetition of the things you would or should learn through a university degree. It's why I stand for those who come here or other forums who often get dismissed offhand for their apparent oddities. And why I tackle approaching this up front by attending to appeal to charity. I too have to apply this to you or others as I don't simply trust one's apparent formal qualifications is assurance that one knows what they've been fortunate enough to achieve through institutions. I hope this helps you be a little more patient, not simply with me, but others. You'd be surprised what can come out of the apparent nut case if you simply give them space and faith as a human being. The only hope to defeating bad religious/pseudoscience thinking is to approach people this way. I at least am trying to appeal through my own example, including my own errors. Thank you. P.S. You did notice that link in the last post I added later? It's a new thread. -
Example Problem of Perception in Science Theory: Case of Ether by Scott Mayers From Wikipedia: To me, the intension of any 'theory' of aether is about questioning whether space itself is what 'matters'. Of course, we predefined what 'matters' originally to the things which occupy such spaces in a way that simply ignores or diminishes any significance to things that we cannot "make sense" of. Often this is more about 'which' senses we are actually referring to only, not all of them. For instance, from our ancient past, the idea of what matters was often only granted to strictly certain solid things. The hints of this can be found in our now-religious scriptures as how we interpret them looking back to the days in which they were written. For the Ancient Egyptians and what evolved into Judaism, the interpretation of water and air were both irresolvable to their understanding and so they presumed that though they had some meaning, they were not actually 'matter'. To them, they thought of water and air as we would now refer to as "fluids". This is why the bible speaks of these things existing as "the waters of below" and the "waters above" when their originator separated the two. The air was granted an even more special status of confusion as they defined this as "spirit". The Greeks called their "fluidity" (= water and air), "chaos" to reference it as being unable to fully grasp in some confused state to becoming what "matters". But just as we got confused at thinking of air as a component of actual "matter", we continued this cycle with regards to discovering the apparent vacuity of space. And just as we learned of our mistake of thinking of the air as some transcendent non-existing concept when we discovered that it really IS composed of substance, the same was inferred rationally to what was initially called, "aether". Another key in considering this discussion is to how in the times of Newton, the idea of a sincere vacuum was understood also to what one might experience when removing all, not simply most, of the substantial air between two cups. If we connect two open cups together with their open side facing one another, when we pump out everything we can, realistically, there still is some substance remaining because the actual pump operates only by relying on the innate movement of particles in the cups to which their internal pressure actually forces out those particles when the space (as a vacuum) is added and provides a place to relieve the energetic particles to go to. Therefore, in reality, the cups being vacuumed are not sincerely absolute vacuums. In essence, a sincere vacuum would not even allow for space itself and would collapse the cups altogether. This arose the question of whether space itself could actually truly be absolutely vacuous outside of Earth (outer space). And it is THIS to which Newton was questioning with regards to how light could go through material like solid glass unless there were a difference in density between kinds of matter that would have to be like space but still substantially meaningful or 'real'. The Michelson-Morley Experiment was intended to try to dismiss that even actual space itself could not be substantial in meaning because we should somehow be able to measure it as Earth itself moved with respect to it. And their absence of finding it was deemed as sufficient qualifying proof that this did not exist. Yet, on a logical grounds, this kind of thinking is similar to the "God-of-the-gaps" or what was known as a fallacy with a different name in philosophy: an "argument from ignorance". Can you see how we tend to cycle between the secular to the religious-type thinking all the time in our approaches to rationalizing reality? This, by most scientists, was labeled as a "confirmatory" form of support and is sufficient unless one could disprove it. But if we are actually unable to remove this as a theory simply for the lack of anything novel to test, it acts as if the authors who suggested it must remain accepted upon their interpretations while ignoring similar interpretations that have equal valence. Often the excuse granted then is about "Occam's Razor". But this too is even a rationale that religions of all times have argued for their simplicity of assuming God without questioning things further. Isn't it a 'simpler' explanation, after all, to assume the whole venture of science itself by default is a result of some "god" to have created what we are without the depths to which science has evolved to with such complexity? So this doesn't fly with me. While we should try to find a sufficiently short path the explains something, we may be blind to resolving other issues if we don't respect expansion in some explanations as a necessary feature to overcome certain problems. For instance, in computer logic, we learn that we need expansion rules so that we can design real material to maintain consistency in sync as a whole. For instance, a simple "buff(er)" gate is technically a gate that does nothing more logically with respect to state. Yet because we have a "not" gate which requires components, we have to use a "buff" gate to make sure that the delay being used for each option remains in sync dynamically. Without this, the computer would get out of sync with respect to different options it takes. This proves how thinking in terms of mere minimizing isn't sufficient. Moving on The next problem with what occurred in science with respect to the Michelson-Morley conclusion is how it made Einstein design his own theory to be independent of this interpretation to lay its hands off of questioning whether the aether existed. But he did this by creating another problem without intending. He assumed that time itself was a 'thing' that altered in different frames rather than the objects themselves. While it works in either interpretation locally with respect to the Relativity as a proof, with respect to a large system of various theories, the acceptance of this forces any following theory to base their own within the confined of the conclusions of Relativity. Valid as it is, it buries the underlying loss of the aether as a precondition AND adds another assumption ('time' as essence) into future evolving theories. I can argue Relativity in the same exact logical form of Einstein's but only reasserting that matter is what alters, not time, as it moves through space and to reinstate ther reality of the aether. Modern science now has revalued space as more than what it was assumed before as being non-existent. But the way that the whole collection of theories based on the institutional processes of evolving, it doesn't like to 'reinvent' the wheel of such early assumptions as it requires a redress to all the multitude of theories based on this and similar other misconceptions of these early assumptions in error. And this is precisely why there is a confused contradiction between quantum mechanics and relativity. This could have been addressed from Einstein then too if they would have only realized that once Einstein's theory was justified, they could have gone back to questioning everything with respect to old theories based on assumptions that depended on a matter preference over space as a factor that changes. Some of this had been done as you could check for yourself on the Wikipedia page or your own potential educational sources elsewhere. [see Ether Dragging Theory for example.] Example in Relativity that fostered further evolution to new errors base on interpretation In this example I will focus on Special Relativity. Although the tests for this often use General Relativity, this is inevitable to change the reference or frame of intertia to a different one with respect to our local Earth experience through time. So I'll use the clock example to which one clock is timed in sync with another and then the other is taken flight in some air or space craft. When the planes land, they check the clocks and notice that the one in transit with respect to the Earth clock has slowed down. Interpretation according to Einstein: that time itself in that frame (inertial & acceleration) made time with respect to the clock in a 'faster' frame slow down. My interpretation: that the very atomic matter of everything within that frame is slowed down with respect to transiting through a real background. This is the supposed argument of the Aether-dragging. But I'm not sufficiently familiar with that historical venture and it appeared to be aroused prior to Einstein's decision to present his theory as it was. On a atomic level, even the electrons that normally travel in their limits of mass due to the speed of light prevents them from cycling around their orbits in the same time as they would in our own frame. As such, the very nature of such atoms is what is slowing down the clock, not some transcendent nature of time that alters it from some magical ability to 'know' that it is a thing and is distinctly traveling in the space of the vehicle transferring the clock. Note that this also respects that if light is 'created' from a light bulb in that moving frame, the very light that gets created from the matter is also 'slowed' in sync with that moving frame and so any measure of it with respect to it within that frame will appear by observers in it that same frame also 'slow' down due to their own atomic matter slowing and makes the measure of light remain constant there. And to add force to this, the actual light being made outside of the moving craft and the 'light' within the moving frame, are actually DIFFERENT phenomena with respect to any one of these frames. This will be represented as a shift in Doppler. Summary/Conclusion I think I've made my point with respect to my point here although I can expand upon this and have on my own elsewhere. For the intent of this site, I wanted to show why we have to take a step back on how we address theories on the extremes by redressing older theories and assumptions even if it may be a great effort to accomplish. If we don't, the bar to how we require becoming scientists becomes ever more so burdening as we may have to go through a more intensive education simply to build upon new theory. In this sense, the institutions maintaining our present paradigm unnecessarily lengthens our means to progress educationally and acts as a serious discouragement in a real way that prevents new students from even desiring to expend such energy in these fields. Also, the complexity has grown so much that it has become necessary to continue to divide what people are even able to learn and so they lose out on the means for each area of study relates to one another as a rational whole. Thank you. Scott Mayers October 10, 2015. © [Need crediting only if you want to speak on this for my own valued input to this topic OR contact me if wanting to publish or quote of this formally elsewhere than this site, especially if being used for some benefit or profit.]
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Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
SillyBilly, I haven't been investing much on the specific background you presented here and though I agree on the question of 'predictability' to some degree, I can't speak to whether we precisely agree on your specific take. It may be what is also preventing others to follow if they haven't had the same background. My approach here only tries to relate generically and to those I can determine where they are coming from specifically through the present dialect. So I won't comment on the detailed descriptions using the terms you are presenting as it would require a different investment for me to learn those terms. Instead, I've focused on strict argument to the case of questioning method on my own terms as well as to try to discover a common means to communicate this from what I can infer is the views of the opposition here. It doesn't mean I'll succeed but am just trying a different way. I'll be opening a different thread to provide an example in history to follow up from my last post above. It should demonstrate how interpretations on theory get locked in place even without intention that makes many scientists diverge including the divergence from philosophy. I believe that 'predictability' is an internal function of the method that is still needed but believe that we need a separate method or more to operate on different areas or kinds of science. My focused interest is on the extremes of Cosmology to Atomic physics. -
Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
I think you are just not following the logic by perspective only. You seem to perceive 'science' as a subject area that must be confined to expediency to practice. Those of us who come from a different perspective see that we must include philosophy to be included within the umbrella of science and philosophy collectively. The method is only relevant for those things that you can both observe upon reality AND to those that have affect upon those objects in real experiments. For instance, you cannot impose any change to a distant star in order to experiment upon it like we do with local experiments where we can have controls and blinds in place to isolate these things in a lab. But for the extreme sciences on the peripherals, much of these are beyond our capacity to use such methods. So it requires a distinctly different approach for those things as a distinctly different method of approach. For these areas, they require philosophy as it analyzes interpretation of observations and logic with a higher priority over strict empiricism. As to your question on radioactivity, you seem to be suggesting that one could actually disprove certain constants discovered. They are discovered, and remain fixed and thus even break the rules of the very method because you cannot present a realistic disproof. Thus it relies on the interpretation of observations and such phenomena with a greater priority and why you cannot use things like 'predictability' as a necessary qualifying need to present a new theory. It is like how a religion uses example PAST prophets who appear to successfully 'predict' some other reality that occurred IN the past to justify their validity and soundness. It is remote from disproof and actually completely irrational to use as a justification for trust in those supposed claims. It reduces us to requiring faith in the authorities promoting these as sufficient 'evidence' to rely on. For instance, will the decay of U-235, ever change? We might find a more accurate means to measure it but these are only about our capacity to fine-tuning them more precisely. However, we might be incorrect as to its actual 'causes'. It is this that is the philosophical part of science external to method alone. I mentioned how I see this as about politics too because I understand that philosophy is the father class over science. And since those like yourself who may practice science, you may inappropriately think that your invested practice is sufficient to be the authority over its subject. The problem is like a company like GM with its management competing with its workers to control its success. The scientists who practice are like the front-end workers who learn specific hands-on techniques through experience. This is advantageous and should NOT be dismissed, but it is the management who acts as the part who defines how and whether the company as a whole exists or persists. There are those in management who would certainly try to command with absolution in the belief that the workers have zero substantial value; but then there are also the workers who also create unions who also try to command and believe they should take absolute precedence as if the company was merely a function to employ them. This conflict is what exists between understanding how we need to reconcile the science with respect to philosophy as management. I think that both play a role in each other under the same banner. The empirical method as a sole approach to discovery, truth, or fact, is short-sighted. It is also NOT true even IN practice for some things as I've pointed out with regards to the peripheral extremes. LINK to digress on this: http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/91533-how-scientific-method-isnt-sufficient-an-example-why/?p=887735 -
Scientific testing (split from goal of science)
Scott Mayers replied to Reg Prescott's topic in General Philosophy
No. But I was asked to provide some example in an implication that nothing was out of the "mainstream" as nothing significantly unusually different lay on the "fringes". And while you are right about relativity 'predicting' worm holes. It is the interpretation upon time and not matter as significant that contributes to this guess. I clearly indicated problems with judging only observations that relate to interpretation and to fixed forms of observations with respect to time (cosmological scale) or the statistical spread in measures that are always the same in atomic physics, like constants to radioactive decay. They cannot be 'experimented' upon to dislodge potential false interpretations for better ones as we are not permitted to present anything new without an equally novel type of observation.