Who is your favorite Physicist?

@fresco,

Dear everyone here, please let us consider as to concur on, namely, that when an issue is obviously clear owing to the common perennial experience of mankind, like for example:

When we are on board a ship sailing on the surface of the sea, the land we see from our location on the deck of the ship, it the land that is, is not moving but the ship is moving i.e. sailing on the surface of the sea.

That is a common perennial experience of mankind.

Wherefore: there is no need to employ so many useless words as to deny the land mass to be at rest, while the ship moves as it sails on the surface of the sea.

If anyone has no experience at all of the land being at rest i.e. not moving, then how will he ever be capable as to steer his ship to return to land, at all?

Please, let us all accept the fact which is obvious from the common and perennial experience of mankind, that when we are on board the deck of a ship, the shore we see of the land to which it is a part, the shore and the land are not moving, but they are at a standstill.

Please, no more useless words in the hope that you anyone not rational at all think if at all he does think, to convince mankind that the land is not at rest on a standstill status.

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@centrox,

Oulah... Indochine... Blast from the past.

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@Olivier5,

Yes, but that would defeat the 'shorthand' attempt. After all, we are writing in a restrictive medium where long posts tend to be ignored. I'm cerinly not going to get involved with Piaget's genetic epistemology here (a good project for you perhaps from the original French?), and I have already given a link to Kuhn which even layman seems to like !

(I have held seminars on many of the topics I respond to here, and topics like for example 'the status of mathematical models in science' took several pages of introduction and references to pave the way to subsequent useful debate. The solution in my case is to publish the notes in advance so that particants can prepare...but this would be impractical on forums).

So one answer for me would obviously be to cease posting here espscially since I think the general quality of debate has declined over the years. But it remains a useful mental workout (at my age), and I believe I have occasionally opened mental doors for others, as indeed some have done for me by forcing me into additional research.

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@layman,

Dear layman, I propose that you just try your best to keep Max and everyone else in this thread at this point in time, to focus on the fact that the land is not moving at all, while as we are on board the deck of a ship which is sailing on the surface of the sea, the ship is moving.

At least everyone with eyes to see and brain to think, we must all concur on that fact.

Then we can move to another issue, like for example, how do the NASA technicians steer their spacecrafts as to reach Mars?

Do or don't they have to factor in the mathematics of general and special relativity, and even say the mathematics of quantum mechanics?

Correct me if I am wrong, I seem to have read in the web something to the effect that for navigating between earth and say the moon or even all the way to Mars, no need to factor in the relativity thinking of Einstein, and much less the thinking of the experts of quantum mechanics.

Hey, what about the simple GPS which we can avail of ourselves with our mobile phone, do the technicians in charge of GPS operations, do they have to factor in relativity math and quantum mechanics math?

And honestly, I am not any expert at all, obviously though, in the math of relativity and not at all in the math of quantum mechanics.

However, modesty I aside, I do think as to be grounded on truths, facts, logic, and the best thoughts of mankind from since the dawn of man's conscious intelligence.

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@Olivier5,

NB Here's a typical example of the deterioration of debate. We have a guy who has just posted a bit of word salad about ' logic' yet completely ignorant of Piaget's concern with the evolution of 'logic' as a limited human 'cognitive device' which is a sub-aspect of semantics. Ten years ago I seem to remember discussing why 'logic' was limited ....happier days !

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@Olivier5,

Olivier5 wrote:

Oulah... Indochine... Blast from the past.

We only got to know them in 2001 with Paradize (2002). We flew to Nice for a concert in 2006. My favorite album is Dancetaria but everyone loves l'Aventurier.

Quote:

Egaré dans la vallée infernale
Le héros s'appelle Bob Morane
A la recherche de l'Ombre Jaune
Le bandit s'appelle Mister Kali Jones
Avec l'ami Bill Ballantine
Sauvé de justesse des crocodiles
Stop au trafic des Caraïbes
Escale dans l'opération Nadawieb

Le coeur tendre dans le lit de Miss Clark
Prisonnière du Sultan de Jarawak
En pleine terreur à Manicouagan
Isolé dans la jungle birmane
Emprisonnant les flibustiers
L'ennemi est démasqué
On a volé le collier de Civa
Le Maradjah en répondra

refrain
Et soudain surgit face au vent
Le vrai héros de tous les temps
Bob Morane contre tout chacal
L'aventurier contre tout guerrier
Bob Morane contre tout chacal
L'aventurier contre tout guerrier

Dérivant à bord du Sampang
L'aventure au parfum d'Ylalang
Son surnom, Samouraï du Soleil
En démantelant le gang de l'Archipel
L'otage des guerriers du Doc Xhatan
Il s'en sortira toujours à temps
Tel l'aventurier solitaire
Bob Morane est le roi de la terre

Ah, le coeur tendre dans le lit de Miss Clark...

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@fresco,

Poincare was way ahead of Einstein, and had basically already worked out (conceptually and mathematically) all the theoretical implication and tenets that Al adopted. He just wouldn't try to put them together the way Einstein did. To his dying day, he never accepted SR as valid. He preceded Minkowski's mathematical treatment of space and time, by years, but again, even though he found the relationship somewhat intriguing, he didn't see any practical value in those "insights."

Einstein ignored Poincare's existence for years, but later acknowledged that Poincare was his superior.

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@Susmariosep,

Every fool and his brother knows that if you pack the boiler of a steam engine with coal, and keep shoveling it in to keep the train going a steady 50 mph, the energy is making the train move. It's not serving to merely hold the train "in place" and motionless because, as soon as the engineer hit the throttle, the whole earth start moving at the rate of 50 mph under it.

Well, except for relativists, I mean.

It's really kinda amazing how much permanent brainwashing can be accomplished on an obsequious and subservient student by teachers. Years after leaving school, they still adamantly insist that you can never know if is the earth or the train moving. They can never really "explain" why, but that doesn't deter or diminish their fervent advocacy of the absurd in the least, eh?

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@layman,

Quote:

Well, except for relativists, I mean.

Or anyone with a high school science education.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Quote:
Well, except for relativists, I mean.

Or anyone with a high school science education.

Thanks for demonstrating my point, Max, to wit:

Quote:

It's really kinda amazing how much permanent brainwashing can be accomplished on an obsequious and subservient student by teachers. Years after leaving school, they still adamantly insist that you can never know if is the earth or the train moving. They can never really "explain" why, but that doesn't deter or diminish their fervent advocacy of the absurd in the least, eh?

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@layman,

Yes, Layman. I am illustrating your point.

You made it clear that you don't value education (that is the type that you get from going to college, listening to professors, studying math, doing experiments and getting feedback on your work). And you have made it clear that you won't change your mind no matter what people who have an education say.

You are bringing up this ridiculous train problem to disprove Einstein, when this train problem has nothing to do with Einstein.

You are misunderstanding how frames of reference work. The ability to solve the train problem from more than one frame of reference is called Galilean relativity... and the math about the energy of a moving object such as a train (which you clearly don't understand) was worked out in more than one frame of reference by Isaac Newton.

The problem is that you are pontificating about General and Special Relativity (very complex topics) with zero education, and zero interest in education. The result is what you would get if you put a science encyclopedia into a blender.

You aren't fooling anyone... anyone who values education that is. Your misunderstanding is of Physics that is commonly mastered by high school students who have to solve problems in more than one reference frame.

This argument really is about the importance of education to understanding Physics.

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@layman,

Relativist to Conductor on moving train: "Does Chicago stop here?"

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@maxdancona,

Would anyone (other than Layman who has no interest in learning anything new) like me to go over the energy of the train in Layman's example.

Seeing how it works in more than one frame of reference is an interesting exercise. Or course, it makes perfect sense once you understand the math. And, it is high school level math.

If anyone requests it, I will walk through the example (which I think is illustrative).

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@layman,

There is no inertial frame of reference where that joke makes any sense (since no one under Galilean relativity would say that Chicago stops). Not to a "relativist". Not even to a high school Physics student.

The problem is that you don't understand the math. There it shouldn't be surprising that something you don't understand doesn't make sense to you.

The rational solution would be for you to learn something new. Instead you are launching your crusade against high school physics (and education in general).

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@maxdancona,

If your "understanding," such as it is, is the product of a formal education, Max, then I would feel quite fortunate to have by-passed it.

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@layman,

I get your point Layman. Everyone should ditch formal education, and just make up what makes sense to them. And they should stick to it no matter what educated people say.

The problem with education (or any kind of learning) is that you need to give up your misconceptions.

I see why you don't want that.

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@maxdancona,

Quote:

Seeing how it works in more than one frame of reference is an interesting exercise. Or course, it makes perfect sense once you understand the math. And, it is high school level math.

If anyone requests it, I will walk through the example (which I think is illustrative).

I'll take ya up on that, Max. Is this guaranteed to explain just how and why you can never tell which one is moving?

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@layman,

The offer was for people who actually are interested in learning something new. You are just interested in fighting. I tried before to teach you something new... you skipped out right when we got to the point that your misconceptions started to be challenged.

You agreed that motion only made sense when there was a fixed point of reference, then I asked you to specify the fixed point of reference on the example you proposed. Then you stated that a moving object "didn't have anything to do with motion" and started talking about bald people. The extent that you are going to avoid having your misconceptions challenged is remarkable.

You can't learn anything new if you are unwilling to give up on things that you have wrong. That is a big part of what education is.

You want to know without first having to learn. That is not how life works.

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@maxdancona,

You never answered my last question, Max, which was basically whether you understood logic.

Because, if ya do, I have a logical problem I need help solving.

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@layman,

You apparently have lots of logical problems you need help solving Wink

. But, my education (that long process where I studied math, and science and took exams and wrote papers to gain an understanding) is in Physics.

You want to know without having to go through the process of learning. Is just knowing stuff you haven't studied because it makes sense to you what you are calling "logic"?

1 Reply

Who is your favorite Physicist?

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