What is MT?

[michel123456]

That's a great example of circular reasoning. Thank you.

 

Why?

[mooeypoo]

Because you're basically saying that if it's meaningful it has meaning.. that's redundant.

[michel123456]

Hum.

So the question of MT can be resolved by examining the cube.

A.If the cube is meaningful, MT means something.

B.If the cube is meaningless, MT is meaningless (actually i don't know if the reasonning works in this case, but anyway.)

 

I choose A.

[timo]

A.If the cube is meaningful, MT means something.

Since "cube is meaningful" presumably means "all of the sides and edges are meaningful" (what about the points in the corners, btw?) this seems trivially true.

B.If the cube is meaningless, MT is meaningless (actually i don't know if the reasonning works in this case, but anyway.)

No, it's the other way around. If MT is meaningless then the whole cube cannot be meaningful. Of course, part of the cube can still be a meaningful statement despite the cube as a whole not being so.

Example: Assume MT is a meaningless expression in any context imaginable. Then, the cube as a whole does not consist of meaningful expressions only. Still v*t is part of the cube and can be a meaningful expression in some contexts (namely being a distance traveled during a time-span t for an object with constant velocity v).

 

I chose A

I'd always chose "my ideas are great" if I had the choice. Sadly, it's not for you to decide except in your fantasy. While A is a correct statement, it also implies the possibility that the cube as a whole might simply not make sense. I am not sure that you understand/-stood that.

[insane_alien]

its not a choice.

 

its a 'is Mass times time a useful quantity in reality' so far all signs point to no.

[Sisyphus]

I got through college by choosing to be correct.

 

Seriously, though, why are we still talking about this? MT is mass*time. That is its meaning. It's not terribly useful. There is not a special word in the English language for it besides mass*time. What is in dispute?

 

By contrast, MD/T means mass*distance/time. That is it's meaning. It is a useful quantity, and has a special word for it in English (though not every language): "momentum."

Edited December 23, 2009 by Sisyphus

[michel123456]

O.K. I got my answers.

[mooeypoo]

Also, "meaningful" is ambiguous. What do you mean "meaningful"? The cube has meaning as a drawing, but not necessarily as a physics question. It can have meaning as a demonstration of 3D representation on a 2D screen, but have no other meaning.

 

The "Meaning" of the cube is already the solution you are looking for, so by defining it in advance, you're jumping to conclusions and confine the question to a specific desired outcome, that doesn't necessarily follow reality.

 

Meaning is ambiguous and you seem to assume a SPECIFIC meaning (hence, a physics meaning).

Then, you decide that the rest must have meaning, but you again limit the intention.

 

For that matter, if we speak of physics, the cube can have one meaning if it's stationary, another if it's moving and another if it's accelerating. What is the cube made of? is it matter or does it represent something else? Does it have mass or is it a confined space?

Your axes are, too, arbitrary, and imply a predefined meaning. Are you sure that if mass is the y-axis time would be the x-axis? I'm not sure I know why you decided such a thing, and if that's true, I'm not sure why the resulting graph would produce a cube. Under what conditions? Unclear.

 

The cube might have a completely different meaning if we relate to it as Quantum Mechanics demonstration, in which case "MT" might be the door you open to declare Schroedinger's cat dead. Or alive.

 

See my point? This entire exercise is ambiguous, which is why it's really impossible to answer.

[michel123456]

I am not sure of anything.

But now I know that MT is a "supposed unknown something" made of well-known instances.

That is all I wanted to know.

Ah, maybe you should take the time and read my link on previous post ,till the end.

http://www.gyroscopes.org/papers/The%20multiplication%20of%20bananas%20by%20umbrellas.pdf

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The "Meaning" of the cube is already the solution you are looking for, so by defining it in advance, you're jumping to conclusions and confine the question to a specific desired outcome, that doesn't necessarily follow reality.

 

 

Yes, there is a desired outcome. This is not something one can hide.

[mooeypoo]

michel, the problem is that you're STARTING from the conclusion and then try to force the evidence/observation/picture to fit into it. That's not how science is done.

[Sisyphus]

But now I know that MT is a "supposed unknown something" made of well-known instances.

 

What?

[mooeypoo]

"Mass * Time" is an expression that includes well known variables, but alltogether is meaningless.

 

"Building * height" is also made of two well known instances but is an unknown combination. You can't randomly multiply variables and produce something with meaning, you need to check if the product *HAS* meaning, and if your test (for meaning) begins with a conclusion then it is subjective rather than the objectivity that the scientific method requires.

 

In short, if I reaaaaaally really try, I, too, can probably attach some meaning to the term "Building * Height". Does this mean the term actually has a physical meaning? Not really.

[michel123456]

Again.

Does the entire cube have a meaning?

[mooeypoo]

Again.

Does the entire cube have a meaning?

Sure, it's colorful, it has a meaning as a drawing.

 

Does it have a physics meaning? I don't know -- what is it supposed to be representing?

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Michel, does this circle have meaning?

 

The fact that I combined well-known variables like Time, Mass and Energy in a graph and arbitrarily drew a circle with colors doesn't mean that there's physical meaning to it. There might be, but that would require testing -- does "Time per Mass" mean anything? how about "Time per Energy"?

 

Without context, it's meaningless. We can't know what you MEANT in that arbitrary picture. You need to tell us why you think it has meaning and we can help you devise a way to test if this meaning is actually meaningful.

Edited December 24, 2009 by mooeypoo
Consecutive posts merged.

[michel123456]

O.K. I got your point.

 

Let me make the analysis from another point of vue, after taking account of all what has been said above.

 

I have to analyse the kilogram-meter. It is the unit of torque, or thrust.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram-force'>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram-force)

kilogram is unit of mass. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram

meter is unit os space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre

meter can be analyzed in terms of speed & time. "fixing the length of the metre in terms of time and the speed of light:" from wiki

 

So anyone can make a representation of thrust (or torque) by meanings of mass, speed and time.

 

Then anyone makes this representation and gets a cube of sides mass, speed & time.

One of its side has units of meters, it is called distance.(circular reasonning, we all agree, since distance was there at the first beginning)

The second side has units of kg.m/s, it is called "momentum" in the english language, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Momentum) in French for example it has no specific name, being called "Quantity of Movement".

The third side has units of kg.s and has no name in any language, it has absolutely no utility because it comes from circular reasonning (see above)and there is no mystery about it because it is a construction made from well known basic units, the kilogram and the second.

Can we agree on this?

[mooeypoo]

I have to analyse the kilogram-meter. It is the unit of torque, or thrust.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram-force'>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram-force)

kilogram is unit of mass. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilogram

meter is unit os space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre

Okay.. not sure I understand why that specific unit, but alright.

 

meter can be analyzed in terms of speed & time. "fixing the length of the metre in terms of time and the speed of light:" from wiki

No, meter can be *represented* by speed and time, that is it was defined as:

The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1⁄299 792 458 of a second.

[1]

(from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metre)

 

What do you mean by "it can be analyzed" with in terms of speed and time? At best, it can be represented by them. It's a bit of a stretch, though.

 

So anyone can make a representation of thrust (or torque) by meanings of mass, speed and time.

Okay, let's just get a few things clearer on the start so we know what we are talking about, consistently.

 

The units of FORCE is a Newton:

[math]N=\frac{kg*m}{s^2}[/math]

 

• The units of torque are N*m (Newton*meter).
  [math]T=\frac{kg*m^2}{s^2}[/math]
  (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torque#Units)
  
• The units of thrust is N (Newton). Thrust is a force.
  [math]N=\frac{kg*m}{s^2}[/math]
  (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thrust)
  

You need to be careful mixing the two up. One is force-times-distance, and the other is force. They're different. For that matter, you need to pick one.

 

Then anyone makes this representation and gets a cube of sides mass, speed & time.

One of its side has units of meters, it is called distance.(circular reasonning, we all agree, since distance was there at the first beginning)

What do you mean distance was there at the first beginning? Why was distance and not time or speed?

 

Not sure I understand you.

 

The second side has units of kg.m/s, it is called "momentum" in the english language, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Momentum) in French for example it has no specific name, being called "Quantity of Movement".

Momentum is a definition in physics, not in a particular language. I checked this out, and it seems the French word for it is (quite appropriately) "Moment".

 

It should exist in any language, seeing as it's a physical definition with quite clear units and meaning.

 

The third side has units of kg.s and has no name in any language, it has absolutely no utility because it comes from circular reasonning (see above)and there is no mystery about it because it is a construction made from well known basic units, the kilogram and the second.

Can we agree on this?

Kg/s (KG per Second) has a meaning as mass flow rate, like in rocket fuel.

Kg*s has no meaning as far as I can tell.

 

I'm not sure what you mean about 'there's no mystery about it'.. it's just undefined. There's no mystery about any of them - they are all defined by you, seemingly arbitrarily (I still don't quite understand where that cube came from) and some incidentally have physical meaning, others don't.

 

They're not really mysterious.

 

BTW, can you please use * for multiplication and / for division? I'm not sure what you mean with the 'dot' (That is, Kg/s and Kg*s are clear, and kg.s is unclear). I am assuming you mean multiplication, but try to be clearer please.

[michel123456]

_Translation is tricky in physics. I am a victim most of the time."Moment" in French has another meaning from that of Momentum, mainly it is used for "moment of inertia". Momentum must be translated perigraphically as "quantity of movement" or "quantity of motion". Here the link in French Wiki (sorry, but you will recognize the equations, maths are an international language http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantit%C3%A9_de_mouvement). Out of physics, "moment" in french means ...moment. (just a moment, please)

_thank you for your comments, and your patience.

_I will use * from now on. For the story, some 42 LY away, a teacher told the young boy of the picture that multiplication was written like this :2x3=6

After a while, another professor told him multiplication had to be written like this: 2.3=6 The years passed and the young adult was told that the right way to write multiplication was like this: 2 3=6

Then came the electronics, and the old boy has to write multiplication like this: 2*3=6

O.K. change of the times.....I feel like a stupid dinosaur.