I would like to suggest perusing the literature of Dr. David Hestenes et al. regarding Geometric Algebra and Geometric Calculus. It soumds like you want to talk about the D' Alembertian and possibly Dirac's derivation of his equations as the inverse of 'squaring'. In what way would you interpret...
Buckminster Fuller questioned the orthogonal assumptions of multidimensional drawing and suggested instead, using 60 degree base vectors for x,y,z on one plane, with the fourth dimension as the altitude of a tetrahedron. He also preferred to refer to the second power of a number as 'triangling'...
The question of whether or not a paper is legitimate science is not something that one should be asking others. Let tbe person who asked this question write down explicitly what they consider to be relevant criteria. Perhaps others could add their own set of criteria.
It is also possible...
Sometimes in order to move forward beyond something like The Standard Model, one has to backtrack and pick up a different idea thread such as Weyl's gravity ideas and gauge theory or the ideas of Kaluza and Klein.
One should remember that the idea of photons being absorbed or emitted by...
The nature of an electron has been a mystery since it's discovery. It is associated with EM radiation in atoms and in the creation of an electron and a positron by a gamma ray as it passes a heavy nucleus. So why not use gestalt type ideas and instead of creating light from electfons, create...
I am familiar with Dr. Sach's papers, publications and books. He has a good website online. He does seem to recycle his papers a bit too much but then people do keep reinventing the wheel. He uses quaternions/spinors as a mathematical formalism that is applicable in both quantum mechanics and...
I know that Dr. Pertti Lounesto (http://users.tkk.fi/~ppuska/mirror/Lounesto/) has expressed some disagreement with Dr. Hestenes regarding Geometric Algebra and Geometric Calculus, but one can't walk three roads at the same time and Dr. Hestenes has done a good job of designing a mathematical...
You are not alone. See THE VECTOR CALCULUS GAP: Mathematics not= Physics
by Tevian Dray and Corinne A. Manogue (24 September 1998)
(http://www.math.oregonstate.edu/bridge/papers/calculus.pdf)
BRIDGING THE VECTOR (CALCULUS) GAP by TEVIAN DRAY and CORINNE A. MANOGUE...
James Clerk Maxwell originally used quaternions in his work on Electromagnetism but there was a dispute/difference of opinion regarding their use that led him to use vectors later on. As Dr. David Hestenes points out in his many writings on Geometric Algebra and Geometric Calculus, quaternions...
Several times I've listened to Brian Greene talk about string theory and say that General Relativity is a macroscopic theory but Quantum Mechanics is a microscopic theory. Do you think it could be otherwise?
I know that this is an accepted "dogma" that is often repeated by others but I...
For a list of the incompatibilities between the General Theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics see Dr. Mendel Sach's website http://www.compukol.com/mendel/ or his book "Einstein vs. Bohr".
List on website:
A) Principle of complementarity, implying 'pluralism', versus principle of...
It would certainly be a good idea to compile a list. I found as a result of visiting other libraries and Universities that there was some very good writing available that I would never have known about if I didn't travel and browse the shelves or ask people in other locations about. Living in...
I'm currently reading M.J. Adler's book "HOW TO READ A BOOK" (1940) and it's very good! It's the kind of thing I need and have been looking for. A lot of what Adler said in 1940 is just as true today. People, including myself don't know how to read a book let alone how to discuss it. This...
I really enjoyed the solution to this problem when I first read about it in Mr. de Bono's writings. I know I would never come up with such a creative solution. How do you suppose the young woman might have arrived at such a brilliant solution? Have you ever seen something similar in real life or...
Albert Einstein, Ann. Phys. (Leipzig) 33, 1275 (1910); english translation: "Theory of Opalescence of Homogeneous Liquids and Mixtures of Liquids in the Vicinity of the Critical State", in Colloid Chemistry, J. Alexander, ed. (Rheinhold, New York, 1913), Vol. I, p. 323.
Re: quantised energy being due to Planck.
I'm not so sure about that. I want to say yes and no. Planck employed quantised energy in his equation but it was Einstein that put forward the radical idea of quantising the elecromagnetic radiation field comparing it to a gas. The notion of a light...
What causes the greatest misunderstanding in physics?
LANGUAGE! Physicists talk about "Solid states" when they know there are no solids and atoms are mostly empty space. Astronomers talk about seeing the sun move across the sky when they know very well that it is not moving across the sky...
I actually saw a paper in a journal along the lines of the original post here but I can't recall what journal it was. I'm thinking it was FOUNDATIONS OF PHYSICS.
Maxwell's original formulation of Electromagnetics was in terms of quaternions but there were several individuals such as Gibbs and Heaviside who questioned the necessity and pragmatics of using quaternions and promoted a version employing only VECTORS. The dispute got quite heated with insults...
I'm currently reading Adler's GREAT IDEAS OF THE WESTERN WORLD (1990's version) and I really like the idea of being able to 'listen in' on the GREAT CONVERSATION as it occurs throughout the great books. Adler's dialectic approach is one thing that would be useful for young people to experience...
Einstein's Clock's Poncare's Maps is good if you want to get a full context big picture of where Einstein's Paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" fits into the world scene of the early 1900's. A.I. Miller did something similar in his writings but not on such a personal level. There are...
I question the overall line of reasoning here. I also question the first sentence. Let me rephrase it using "parallel lines" rather than "math". When we study something, say parallel lines, we learn accepted axiomatic ideas. Aren't those very ideas what define parallel lines? This sounds strange...
From the start there is clearly a confusion based on the use of the word logical for rational. All this about 1 rock + 1 rock = 2 rocks is rock logic. There are very defined boundaries. A sheep is or is not a sheep. It can't be sort of a sheep.
How about lateral thinking and WATER LOGIC...
For anyone interested in Professor Edwin Jayne's writing I'm posting this URL.
http://bayes.wustl.edu/etj/articles/
In the paper STATUS OF NEOCLASSICAL RADIATION THEORY, Professor Jaynes models an atom with a quadratic interaction Hamiltonian and mentions a uniform integral of the...
A NEW KIND OF SCIENCE is written in a SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN style and is actually a very good introduction to the subject. If it weren't for the numerous personal remarks Mr. Wolfram peppers throughout the book, I would recommend it to one and all. However, as it stands, it's a big ad for amateur...
Surfing the net I came across a few reviews. Scott Aaronson's review at http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0503.html? [Broken] echoes some of my own views. When I was reading A NEW KIND OF SCIENCE Wolfram's numerous claims to some kind of intellectual propriety or...
Stephen Wolfram's A NEW KIND OF SCIENCE is the biggest disappointment I have ever experienced in my reading. If his book was a program it would be analogous to making a long journey to the edge of the universe in search of the meaning of life ony to be left in the end asking 'That's it?' Nada...
At the moment, I think SIMILARITIES IN PHYSICS by John N. Shive and Robert L. Weber is the most interesting and informative physics book I've read although I really like Poincare's writing in his THE FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENCE volumes and Mach's THE SCIENCE OF MECHANICS. What I find interesting in...
Doctordick wrote:
"For the most part, theoretical physicists earn their bread by being experts in the current accepted theories. They spend their research time looking for specific issues which will either confirm or deny the validity of a current theory. Very rarely does a theoretical...
http://www.mathpages.com/rr/s3-06/3-06.htm
When asked what he would have done if the eclipse observations had disagreed with the prediction of general relativity for the bending of light, Einstein replied "Then I would have felt sorry for the dear lord, because the theory is correct."...
How far have we really come?
What is the destination? How accurate are our predictions?
The original question regarding the progress of science is interesting but I wonder if that progress can truly be measured. The destination appears to be omniscience but how does one determine...
http://www.mathpages.com/rr/s3-06/3-06.htm
The first published reference to Einstein's special theory of relativity appeared in a short note by Walter Kaufmann reporting on his experimental results involving the deflection of electrons in an electromagnetic field. Kaufmann's work was...
Einstein vs. Bohr by Dr. Mendel Sachs
The Science of Mechanics by Ernst Mach
http://www.padrak.com/ine/INERTIA.html
http://www.compukol.com/mendel/articles/The_Mach_Principle.pdf [Broken]
http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/M/Machspri.asp [Broken]
2.4 "Mach's Principle"
To be sure, for a...
The first hour
I took another look at HOUR 1 to see if perhaps I was being too harsh towards McMaster's script.
What bothers me about the first hour is the melodramatic and confrontational tone of the script.Maybe this is a good thing to get the attention of modern young upstarts but it...
Elegant Universe
Thanks for your reply Lubo and for being civil about it.
I understand the point Greene was trying to make with the dog.
The show was o.k. It was interesting. Thank you Mr. Greene and company!
It's just that I got bad vibes from the first part. Everyone knows...
Great Expectations
I would agree with you that people expect too much of artificial intelligence. No matter how large a step one takes, the final system is criticized for not being a genius.
I would be careful about referring to computer 'thought' too anthropomorphically. There is...
Parallel Thinking in an Elegant Universe
In the mid 1980's I dreamed of watching physics video documentaries on a wireless Z-183 in a park on a sunny day and was reading Buckminster Fuller's 1969 book EDUCATION AUTOMATION in which he talked about video documentaries being available to anyone...
memes
During the last decade, I've encountered more and more a cultural shift to the right where tough negative survivor statements like "that's called kicking your ass!","we will kick your alien ass!", "so and so is a buffoon", "he/she/such and such is gay", "he/she is a loser" are all quite...
Physics of Random Experiments
The following chapter from a text planned by Professor Edwin T. Jaynes entitled "Physics of Random Experiments" seems very similar to the views expressed in the first post by smarterthangod. This is also Ch. 10 in the published volume of PROBABILITY: THE LOGIC OF...
History of relativity
In reading this post I was reminded of the Proper Particle Mechanics of D. Hestenes. However, there are some serious problems with the historical exposition given here regarding the development of STR. STR existed before Minkowski got into the picture. For a while Einstein...
The Physics of coin tossing and dice rolling
The question in the original post is discussed at length in the writings of Edwin T. Jaynes (Papers on Probability, Statistics & Statistical Physics) By E. T. Jaynes, R. D. Rosenkrantz
I don't recall the paper's title in the Rosenkrantz...
what's logic?
The author of a text I used in my first year philosophy class defined logic as 'the science that evaluates arguments'. However, both of the words 'logic' and 'argument' were used with strict technical definitions. Some think the use of the word science is pompous. In common usage...
I've seen large catalog type volumes in employment offices that list professions involving physics.Maybe they are now on CD. Would anyone know what those listings are called?
PO GTR controls QM
Here is a Physicist's website that might interest you Kasbah.
http://www.compukol.com/mendel/
Dr. Mendel Sachs wrote several published papers in the mid to late 1960's and several books published by Dordrecht Reidel and others such as GENERAL RELATIVITY AND MATTER and...
I'm sorry Dave. I can't do that.
This is an interesting thread.
I read an account by a knowledge engineer once regarding an attempt to create an expert system in crystal growing that contained some of the problems cited by Hubert Dreyfuss. I've also encountered the problem in a field of...
Witten: You have to be open-minded because ideas come from different places. You can think about something in one way for a long time and it seems like the only way to think about it, but it really isn't. Somebody could make a suggestion that really sounds naïve. It might even be naïve, but it...