E ~ mc^2

Oh no.... by t3kad0n · 2002-12-31 18:00 · Score: 3, Funny

My world is falling apart.

Light Speed limits... by Red+Warrior · 2002-12-31 18:01 · Score: 2, Funny

Just A good idea. Not the law. ?

--
"If, therefore, any be unhappy, let him remember that he is unhappy by reason of himself alone."
~Epictetus

Re:Light Speed limits... by packeteer · 2003-01-01 23:04 · Score: 2

The "c" in e=mc^2 is not the speed of light. It is the maximum speed of anything. Light will theoretically travel that fast in a vaccum but that doesn't exist. Time travels that fast when there is no other movement but thats also assuming you can find something not moving at all. But then again movement is all realative. So is the speed of anything, ouch my head. Anyway light goes about 3/4 of "c" in water so calling it the speed of light isn't correct. Also this is all theoretical and never actually was a "law". I should also point out that any theory to prove e-mc^2 wrong is ALSO just a theory.

--
unzip; strip; touch; finger; mount; fsck; more; yes; unmount; sleep

The more we learn by cbensinger · 2002-12-31 18:02 · Score: 2, Insightful

the less it seems that we know. I'm not a scientist by any stretch of the imagination; but considering how much of our science is based on this kind of thing I do find it amazing that that at this point in time we're now questioning the e=mc^2....

Re:The more we learn by AyeRoxor! · 2002-12-31 20:41 · Score: 2

"Einstein was quite the odd-ball, having hardly (if ever) experimented any of these theories. So, of course they are flawed."

I checked your post history. You don't seem to be a troll, so assuming you just need some reproof, I can't let this one fly. Einstein wrote thousands of pages in his books and lectures, explaining every minute detail of his theories and their foundations. He coined the idea that the framework of basic particle physics is so simple that it is inexcusable not to be able to explain it to anybody.

And your logic statement? Roughly "Because he never explained them, they are flawed." This is a heinous logic fallacy right off the bat, even "pretending" that he never wrote a single book to explain his theories. It just makes no sense.
Re:The more we learn by arkanes · 2003-01-01 02:54 · Score: 2

The parent said "experimented", not "explained", and actually is correct - Einstein didn't empirically test most of his theories. Of course, that's not really his fault, since he lacked the tools to do so, so you could look at it another way and be astonished at how correct his theories are, despite the fact that he was unable to test them to exhaustion.

Even if he was off.. by OmniVector · 2002-12-31 18:03 · Score: 4, Insightful

It still answered some questions and anomolies about the universe and changed the way we think about the world.

--
- tristan

Re:Even if he was off.. by iamdrscience · 2002-12-31 18:07 · Score: 3, Interesting

Exactly, gravity in the way Newton theorized has also proven to have many shortcomings and to not be adequate for everything, but it works on a small scale, so it IS useful.
Re:Even if he was off.. by iamdrscience · 2003-01-01 07:14 · Score: 2

alright then, I guess I meant works on an immediate scale, where as quantum mechanics would be a more distant abstract scale.
Re:Even if he was off.. by Jace+of+Fuse! · 2003-01-01 18:43 · Score: 2

Right... it's like the old saying goes...

No model is perfectly accurate, but some are useful.

--

"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"

Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Re:Even if he was off.. by Zog+The+Undeniable · 2003-01-01 22:38 · Score: 2, Insightful

Rather more disturbingly, it showed that nuclear weapons were possible, i.e. you only need to lose a little bit of m to make an awful lot of E.

--
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.

Light Speed Relative? by cranos · 2002-12-31 18:03 · Score: 2, Insightful

I thought this was obviouse. If a blackhole can suck light into it then it will be affecting the speed at which it travels, all celestial bodies will, its just the magnitude that differs.

Re:Light Speed Relative? by Jordy · 2002-12-31 18:43 · Score: 4, Informative

A blackhole warps space and time around it. Light travels in a straight line, but since the space it is traveling over is warped, it enters the black hole.

The light itself does not speed up or slow down. From outside the blackhole, light is moving away from an observer at the speed of light. From inside the blackhole, light is moving towards you at the speed of light.

You have to remember that "speed" is a function of distance and time. Time is not constant, but from any frame of reference (you for instance) however, the "speed" of light is.

--
The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.
Re:Light Speed Relative? by jtdubs · 2002-12-31 18:45 · Score: 2

wtf?

blackhole's don't "suck" anything in. anything with a gravitational field "bends" light, or acts like as a lens because light has mass.

light traveling at c across the void of space and light orbiting a super-dense mass at c are still both moving at c. it's just that the latter will never leave the "event horizon" of the black hole. still the same speed.

justin dubs

Umm... by iamdrscience · 2002-12-31 18:03 · Score: 2

Granted I am not a physics expert, but isn't this pretty old news? There have been good theories around for a long while that require either ammendments or nullification of Einstein's E=MC^2 to exist.

E=M*c^2 story. by Anonymous Coward · 2002-12-31 18:06 · Score: 4, Informative

The New York Times Sponsored by Starbucks
December 31, 2002
E and mc2: Equality, It Seems, Is Relative
By DENNIS OVERBYE

Roll over, Einstein.

In science, no truth is forever, not even perhaps Einstein's theory of relativity, the pillar of modernity that gave us E=mc2.

As propounded by Einstein as an audaciously confident young patent clerk in 1905, relativity declares that the laws of physics, and in particular the speed of light -- 186,000 miles per second -- are the same no matter where you are or how fast you are moving.

Generations of students and philosophers have struggled with the paradoxical consequences of Einstein's deceptively simple notion, which underlies all of modern physics and technology, wrestling with clocks that speed up and slow down, yardsticks that contract and expand and bad jokes using the word "relative."

Guided by ambiguous signals from the heavens, and by the beauty of their equations, a few brave -- or perhaps foolhardy -- physicists now say that relativity may have limits and will someday have to be revised.

Some suggest, for example, the rate of the passage of time could depend on a clock's orientation in space, an effect that physicists hope to test on the space station. Or the speed of a light wave could depend slightly on its color, an effect, astronomers say, that could be detected by future observations of gamma ray bursters, enormous explosions on the far side of the universe.

"What makes this worth talking about is the possibility of near-term experimental implications," said Dr. Lee Smolin, a gravitational theorist at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Ontario.

Any hint of breakage of relativity, scientists say, could yield a clue to finding the holy grail of contemporary physics -- a "theory of everything" that would marry Einstein's general theory of relativity, which describes how gravity shapes the universe, to quantum mechanics, the strange rules that govern energy and matter on subatomic scales.

Even Einstein was stumped by this so-called quantum gravity.

For now, any clue would be welcome. There is very little agreement and much confusion about the possible end of relativity. "These are times when theorists are being very adventurous," said Dr. Andreas Albrecht, a physicist at the University of California at Davis. "It's hard to tell where things will go."

The avatars of new relativity have been encouraged by hints that some cosmic rays hitting Earth from outer space have more energy than normal physics can explain. But some scientists doubt that these rays exist or, if they do, that a violation of relativity is the only way to explain them.

The cosmic ray hints are not the only signs making physicists wonder about relativity. They have also been tantalized by evidence, as yet unconfirmed, from distant quasars that a fundamental constant of nature, a measure of the strength of electromagnetism known as the fine-structure constant, might have changed ever so slightly over billions of years, shifting the wavelengths of light emitted by the quasars.

The result has been a minor explosion of interest in strange relativity, with some 70 papers being published this year, said Dr. Giovanni Amelino-Camelia, a theorist at the University of Rome.

The field, while still small, is destined for at least 15 minutes of fame next year with the publication in February of "Faster Than the Speed of Light," by Dr. João Magueijo, a cosmologist at Imperial College London. The book is a racy account of Dr. Magueijo's seemingly heretical effort to modify relativity so that the speed of light is not constant, and he will promote it on a long lecture tour.

"Ruling out special relativity by 2005 is a bit extreme," Dr. Magueijo said in a recent e-mail message, referring to the coming centennial of Einstein's famous paper, "although I would be very surprised if by 2050 nothing beyond relativity has been found."

Most physicists have yet to buy into this presumed revolution. Dr. Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, called recent arguments that some versions of quantum gravity would violate relativity "unimpressive."

Dr. Juan Maldacena of Harvard said he doubted relativity was violated in string theory -- the leading candidate for a theory of everything. "But of course," he noted, "we should always test our theories."

Dr. Carlo Rovelli, a gravitational theorist at the University of the Mediterranean in Marseille, said it was a "risky" hypothesis, "but the prize if it happened to be true is so great that it is worthwhile taking the risk of exploring it in detail."

Dr. Andrew Strominger of Harvard pointed out that Einstein himself modified relativity in 1915, when he brought gravity into the picture with his general theory of relativity. Special relativity, as the 1905 theory became known, is only strictly valid in flat space without gravity, Dr. Strominger said.

He added, "It is natural to think that Einstein's relativity will in some sense be violated by small corrections, just as Newton's theory of gravity has small corrections." These corrections did not make Newton wrong, he said, they just meant his theory was not always perfectly applicable. Likewise, relativity may give way to a more complete and accurate theory.

How relativity could break down, if it does, depends on how physics might accomplish its grand dream of quantum gravity.

Many physicists are placing their bets on string theory's mathematically imposing edifice in which nature comprises tiny strings vibrating in 10 dimensions of space-time. But this theory may play out in billions of ways, and some physicists complain that it can be made to predict almost anything.

In the late 1980's, Dr. V. Alan Kostelecky, a particle physicist at Indiana University, and his colleagues pointed out that in some of these solutions, the spins of the strings could impart an orientation to empty space, like the lines left by the weave in a fine cloth. In that case, they say, a clock oriented in one direction could tick slightly faster or slower than one oriented differently, in violation of the rules of relativity. That is something Dr. Kostelecky and his colleagues have proposed to test using ultraprecise clocks on the space station.

Dr. Kostelecky and his colleagues have constructed an extension to the standard model of particle physics that catalogs all the possible ways that relativity can be violated. Others, including Dr. Amelino-Camelia, Dr. John Ellis of CERN, Dr. Tsvi Piran of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and the Harvard theorists Dr. Sheldon Glashow and Dr. Sidney Coleman, have attempted to study the ways that relativity can be violated by quantum gravity or in the high-energy cosmic rays.

Violation is not inevitable, Dr. Kostelecky said. "Is it plausible? Yes. Is it likely? Enough so that I've invested years of my life."

Few physicists would seem to have as much invested in revising relativity as Dr. Magueijo. In his book he describes how beginning in 1996 he cajoled Dr. Albrecht, then at Imperial, into pursuing with him the heretical notion that the speed of light had been much higher in the dim cosmic past as a solution to various cosmological puzzles. Cosmologists did not rally to the idea, which even Dr. Magueijo admitted violated relativity. His co-author, Dr. Albrecht, himself called it an idea that is "not even properly born yet," and said it needed to find roots "in some convincing physics."

In the intervening years, as a sideline to his day job as a conventional cosmologist, he and a growing number of comrades have continued to tinker with modifying relativity in a variety of ways that go under the umbrella name of V.S.L., for variable speed of light theories.

In the science world, the book might attract attention for its jaunty and irreverent style as well as for its content. "What the hell, it's only Einstein going out of the window . . .," he writes in one passage. In others he describes the editor at a prominent journal as a moron, his bosses at Imperial as pimps and the rival quantum gravity camps as cults.

Asked how he expected his colleagues to react to the book, he answered, "It wasn't written for them; it was written for the public." He called it "a very honest view of how scientists feel," adding, "It's the language I use normally."

The main motivation for considering V.S.L. theories, Dr. Magueijo explained, comes from the as-yet undiscovered quantum gravity. In relativity there is only one special number, the speed of light, but in quantum gravity, he explained, there is another special number, known as the Planck energy, equivalent to 1019 billion electron volts. According to quantum gravity thinking, an elementary particle accelerated to that energy will behave as if space and time themselves are lumpy and discontinuous and all the forces of nature are unified.

According to relativity, however, Dr. Magueijo explained, differently moving observers could disagree on how much energy the particle had and thus whether it was displaying quantum gravity effects or not. In short, they would disagree on what the laws of physics were.

"Perhaps relativity is too restrictive for what we need in quantum gravity," Dr. Magueijo said. "We need to drop a postulate, perhaps the constancy of the speed of light."

The most recent buzz in V.S.L. circles is about something called "doubly special relativity." In 2000, hoping to fix the cosmic ray problem, Dr. Amelino-Camelia proposed modifying the rules of relativity so that there would be a limit to the momentum that any particle could have, just as now there is a limit to the velocity.

Subsequently Dr. Magueijo and Dr. Smolin of the Perimeter Institute proposed their own doubly special version in which there is a limit to the amount of energy that an elementary particle can attain, namely the so-called Planck energy, at which the forces are unified and quantum gravity effects dominate.

One casualty of this tinkering, the V.S.L. scientists agree, will be everyone's favorite formula, E=mc2, to be replaced by a more complicated, cumbersome equation that Dr. Magueijo reproduces in his book.

A mark of all the doubly special theories, Dr. Magueijo said, is that the speed of light will vary with its color, with higher frequencies and energies going slightly faster than lower ones. That might manifest itself in observations of gamma ray bursters, distant gargantuan outbursts by an upcoming NASA satellite called Glast (gamma ray large area space telescope), scheduled for launching in 2006.

The theory also predicts that light should slow down near massive objects and actually come to a stop at the end of a black hole, preventing anything from entering that dark gate, Dr. Magueijo said in his book. In principle the effect, he said, could be tested by spectroscopic measurements of the light emitted from dense objects like neutron stars.

To some physicists, however, the very idea of variations in the speed of light in a vacuum -- the c in E=mc2 -- is meaningless. The miles and seconds by which speed is measured are human inventions, they point out, defined in fact in terms of lightwaves, so the whole notion of the speed of light varying is circular. In the last analysis, they point out, all physical measurements boil down to a few dimensionless constants like the fine structure constant, alpha. "What we measure objectively is whether alpha varies," said Dr. Michael Duff of the University of Michigan in an e-mail message.

Dr. Magueijo said those criticisms were technically correct but said the speed of light was one factor of several in the formula for alpha. So if alpha varied, as some astronomical measurements have suggested, one could choose to think of it as a variation in the speed of light, of electric charge, or even a variation in another number known as Planck's constant -- or all three -- if that made the math simpler. "It's a matter of convention," he said, adding, "you make the simplest choice."

Despite all the activity, scientists agree that they are mostly in the dark about the deeper consequences of these conjectures. "Some may eventually be developed to the point of being a credible alternative to relativity," conceded Dr. Kostelecky, saying that he suspected that others might not really change relativity or might have already been excluded by existing experiments. Without a systematic analysis it was impossible to know.

Dr. Amelino-Camelia said that the doubly special theories preserve Einstein's principle that all motion is relative, but at an unknown cost to the rest of physics."We paid a dramatic price for relativity: the notion of absolute time," he said. "This time it is not completely sure what is the axiomatic principle we have to give up."

Dr. Albrecht urged caution and said physicists needed guidance from experiments before tossing out beloved principles like relativity. "The most dignified way forward," he said, "is to be forced kicking and screaming to toss them out."

Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company | Permissions | Privacy Policy

Of course not.... by starsong · 2002-12-31 18:06 · Score: 2, Informative

It's (E^2) = (m^2)(c^4) + (p^2)(c^2).

Unless everything in the universe has zero momentum, that is. :)

Re: Re:Of course not.... by starsong · 2002-12-31 18:32 · Score: 3, Funny

... If you do i will have to shoot some sense into you all.

Will your bullets have momentum or should I quiver in fear at their rest energy? :)

No = Registration*link^2 by Anonymous Coward · 2002-12-31 18:06 · Score: 5, Informative

NYT article

can someone explain to me by SHEENmaster · 2002-12-31 18:11 · Score: 3, Interesting

What c is relative to? When we say that a car is moving at 60mph we meann relative to the ground, but what is c relative to?

If it's relative to a "given thing" then doesn't that hint toward Ether theory? The further we go in AP Physics the more I realise that my school is imprepared to answer anything that comes up and that modern theories (String theory and the like) seem reminescant of the old ones like Ether theory.

--
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.

Re:can someone explain to me by Leers · 2002-12-31 18:25 · Score: 2, Insightful

No, no, c is relitive to anything. That is the magic of the math of special relitivity. No matter what refrence frame you look at something moving at the speed of light, it is still moving at the speed of light. Distance and time are physicly warped to inforce this speed limit. It sounds crazy but its true. There is no ether.
Re:can someone explain to me by rossifer · 2002-12-31 18:37 · Score: 5, Interesting

c is relative to the observer, no matter which observer we're talking about. Anything that can measure the speed of a photon will always measure it going at the speed of light through that substance. Through a perfect vacuum, it's c. Through space it's c - epsilon (epsilon is an infintesimally small number). Through water it's about c/1.335.

If you are zooming past me at half the speed of light and both of us measure the speed of a particular photon at the same time, we'll both measure it's speed as c. What will be different about our two measurements is that you'll see a higher energy photon (bluer) than me if the photon is moving opposite to your motion relative to me and a lower energy photon (redder) if the photon is moving in the same direction as your motion relative to me.

No particular point in space is special. Once you identify where the observer is located, you can call that point in space an "origin" or "zero" and make all of your measurements from that point in space. The rest of the universe relative to that origin is called an "inertial reference frame", but it's just the same as any other reference frame. There's another trick. Behavior of things in inertial reference frames is time dependent because gravity pulls your frame around and changes everything around it slightly every moment. Besides that, two inertial reference frames may have a relative velocity but for a moment share the same point in space (the example above).

That's when tensor math starts to come in handy. Don't worry, I won't torture you with that.

Relativity, once you grok it, will bend your mind. From a metaphysical perspective, it emphasizes the reality that most of what we call facts are actually just high probability observations.

Remember, there is no spoon.

Regards,
Ross
Re:can someone explain to me by GMFTatsujin · 2002-12-31 19:00 · Score: 5, Insightful

Lordy... You don't ask much, do you?

The speed of light is constant in all possible frames of reference, according to Einstein. Basically what he's saying is that for any two objects at rest relative to each other (regardless of their motion to the rest of the universe, they appear not to be moving to *each other*), time and space behave in the same way. The beauty of his theory is that no one object can be said to be at universal rest to everything else -- there is no universal frame to measure against. Therefore, every frame of reference is valid and will behave the same way. This kills Ether theory dead, since Ether theory depends on a universal frame of reference. If it didn't have a universal frame of reference, then space and time would start behaving oddly within your *own* frame of reference depending on your motion. This is not the case - the light on Pluto behaves the same way as the light on Earth, even though the two are moving in different frames.

It's only when you introduce out-of-frame references (I'm standing still, the train is moving at 60mph away from me) that relativity kicks in and the laws start to behave weirdly.

Not inconsistantly, just weirdly. It's all in shifting your viewpoint.

The trick with light is to realize that although it travels at the same speed in every frame of reference, the *wavelength* is what changes between frame. This is what that whole red-shifting/Doppler effect is about. The speed of light is constant; the color, however, changes depnding on your frame of reference. If you shoot a blue light at me while we're both standing still relative to each other, it looks blue to me. If I run away *really fast*, it will still be blue to you, but it will appear red to me because the wavelength alters even though it still travels toward me at a constant rate. Ditto if *you* run away from me - the light is blue to you, but again, it appears red to me, even though it travels at the same speed.

Light does not behave in the Newtonian way - acceleration does not effect its speed, only its wavelength. That's where the question of why light is constant to everything, even moving objects, is answered.

Weird, huh?

For a far, far, better explanation (and a fantastic grounding on String Theory in terms for non-physicists) check out The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene. If I could, I'd give this book a Pulitzer every year until the day I died.
Re:can someone explain to me by nathanh · 2002-12-31 21:25 · Score: 2

What c is relative to? When we say that a car is moving at 60mph we meann relative to the ground, but what is c relative to?

Relative to the observer.
If there are two observers then both of them see light travelling at c, even if the two observers are moving relative to one another.
The further we go in AP Physics the more I realise that my school is imprepared...

The word is "unprepared". Don't neglect your English studies.
Re:can someone explain to me by pod · 2002-12-31 21:55 · Score: 2

Small correction. The wavelength 'changes' because your frame of referance forces a change in space/time to allow light to travel at the same speed relative to you.

--
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
Re:can someone explain to me by ColaMan · 2002-12-31 21:58 · Score: 2

Since when is (c - an infinitesimally small number) smaller than c?

Perhaps your infinitesimally small number is negative.

(ducks and runs for cover)

--

You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
Re:can someone explain to me by Soft · 2003-01-01 01:38 · Score: 2

Well, I ask the basic question: Why cant matter go faster than light?
People answer that the mass => Infinity as Speed => C
Why? There must be something holding it back from reaching C .

Not necessarily. First, I don't like that view of mass varying with speed, because then mass is no longer what one is used to. I prefer to reason in terms of momentum and kinetic energy: "p=(gamma)mv" and "Ec=(gamma-1)mc^2", with "gamma=1/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2)".
Then, as you can see, your momentum p climbs to infinity as you approach the speed of light. So, if you are to accelerate, a (finite) force F has to push you, and "dp/dt=F". But however strong F is, p cannot reach infinity in a finite time. Therefore you cannot reach lightspeed that way.
Re:can someone explain to me by rossifer · 2003-01-01 07:16 · Score: 2

That's true, and not what I was talking about. When you understand GR or SR from a theoretical level up through the practical applications, the tendency to make forceful assertions goes way down.

You will have been dragged over the coals of conditional thinking and understanding to learn this stuff. At that point, unless you think like a scientist about what you know, you're going to come to a lot of overeager conclusions.

Regards,
Ross
Re:can someone explain to me by anthony_dipierro · 2003-01-01 08:46 · Score: 2

The fact that "c" = "c" only in a perfect vacuum tends to escape most people.

Show them this. It makes more sense.

That's the paradox... by starsong · 2002-12-31 18:17 · Score: 5, Informative

...and the beauty of special relativity.

They key thing is that the speed of light is fixed relative to *everything*. This means that if I'm standing by the highway and measure it, I get the same speed as a person in a car going 60 mph away from me. And since the speed of light is fixed, everything ELSE distorts to make up for it. That includes time (time dilation) and space (Lorentz contraction). It leads to some pretty freaky and amazing consequences.

Re:That's the paradox... by Trogre · 2002-12-31 23:05 · Score: 5, Informative

A good way to observe (well, simulate) some of these effects is to download lightspeed and have a play. Effects such as Lorentz contraction, doppler shift, headlight effects and optical aberrations can be observed. Very cool with the add-on Starship Voyager model.

There's also some very nice mpegs floating around the net of tram cars and flashing lamp posts in a world where the speed of light is slowed to a couple of meters per second. Now if only I could dig up the URL...

--
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Re:That's the paradox... by Canar · 2003-01-01 17:19 · Score: 2, Informative

Not the site exactly you're looking for (I've seen that one too), but another site with relativity ray tracings: [LINK]

well, of course... by QID · 2002-12-31 18:24 · Score: 5, Informative

E=mc^2 is actually a simplified form of the real equation, E=mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2). A convenient graphical depiction can be found in a few seconds with google, or here: http://www.btinternet.com/~j.doyle/SR/Emc2/Derive. htm.

Re:well, of course... by PurpleBob · 2002-12-31 21:04 · Score: 2

If v=c, you've got a chunk of matter moving at the speed of light, and energy has every right to be undefined when impossible things like that start happening.

--
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
Re:well, of course... by Galahad2 · 2002-12-31 21:07 · Score: 2

I guess that's where the Calculus comes in. Stupid Newton.
Re:well, of course... by HiThere · 2003-01-01 07:54 · Score: 2

I believe that E=mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2) is a simplified form too. I seem to remember an infinite regress of derivitives in the derivation. There's a pretty good argument that the contribution from all of the higher derivitives is negligible, but it is truncated. I believe that they stopped with acceleration, and didn't include the higher derivitives (surge, jerk, etc.). This creates the logical possibility that someone with one of those rotating weight gizmos actually has something real. But, of course, there's a bit of a difference between a logical possiblity and an actuality. Still...

OTOH, I seem to recall that it was solved exactly for circular motion (closed paths? It's been so long I wouldn't even know where to look this up.), and proved equivalent to the simplified form. So perhaps the more general case could be handled if anyone saw any reason to.

--

I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Re:well, of course... by DudeG · 2003-01-01 08:17 · Score: 3, Informative

I think you're thinking of the expansion of E=mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2), which produces
E=m c^2 + 0.5 m v^2 + ...
where m is the rest mass. This is a beautiful piece of math. It shows that the kinetic energy that we already knew about (0.5 m v^2) is actually an artefact of the relativistic change in mass.
The rest of the terms are negligible for low v, which is why we never noticed it in the lab before Einstein.
Re:well, of course... by HiThere · 2003-01-02 03:01 · Score: 2

I think you're probably correct. That does look like the expansion I was remembering. Sorry for the confusion.

--

I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.

Bad Memories by UniverseIsADoughnut · 2002-12-31 18:25 · Score: 2

Anyone else read this and get a flashback to an exam, say in college were you got the answer right but the prof. took off points because there was some slight flaws in your work or thinking. You were not wrong you just had a few things sketchy or didn't explain it well enough. One of those deals you just want to go insane on the prof on. Your right enough and nothing bad will happen with your result. Can just see a prof. pulling one of those on Albert.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by Feanor1 · 2002-12-31 18:25 · Score: 2, Interesting

Well this is still in debate.
Since it is impossible to "transport" an object in that sence, no one has yet to be able to say that it is instantanius.. and Magnatism is definitely not the same way.. I believe its logical to assume that Gravity is Not Instantanious.. Example.. The stars as we see them in the universe are not actually where we see them.. we see them as they were several to hundreds to Thousands of years ago.. Yet if we calculate where gravity is interacting, its where we see it..

There is a study being done now I believe that is designed to find out if gravity travels instantaniously or if its trackable.. but as a logical person, I find it much more likely that at best it travels faster than we can track, not instantaniously. Much the way Light was thought to travel instantaniously before it was clocked at really really fast.

-Slashdot, Add spell check!:)

Coincidence...? by CyberDong · 2002-12-31 18:27 · Score: 5, Funny

This story's at the top of the page, and look what's at the bottom:

186,000 Miles per Second. It's not just a good idea. IT'S THE LAW.

Re:Coincidence...? by Our+Man+In+Redmond · 2002-12-31 20:28 · Score: 2

You think that's weird. Here's what I found in my Christmas cracker:

If you're in a car that's going at the speed of light, what happens when you turn on the headlights?

--
Someone you trust is one of us.
Re:Coincidence...? by Dirtside · 2003-01-01 05:44 · Score: 4, Funny

186,000 Miles per Second. It's not just a good idea. IT'S THE LAW.
Actual mileage may vary.

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"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
Re:Coincidence...? by scrytch · 2003-01-01 09:18 · Score: 2

If you're in a car that's going at the speed of light, what happens when you turn on the headlights?

Duuuude, you like are the headlights!

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I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.

I just thought of the funniest joke by Anonymous Coward · 2002-12-31 18:28 · Score: 2, Funny

Hope you like it:

IN SOVIET RUSSIA,

mc**2 = e

Heheee. +5 FUnny,.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by rsidd · 2002-12-31 18:28 · Score: 5, Informative

Wrong. Newtonian gravity suggests effects should be instantaneous, that's why Einstein knew it was wrong and came up with the general theory of relativity, which is the best theory of gravity we have today (and unlike special relativity which was built on the work of others, GR was Einstein's own, nobody else was even thinking along those lines.)

As for magnetism, that travels at the speed of light -- that has been known since Maxwell's time. Basically, that's what electromagnetic radiation is: a changing magnetic field causes a changing electric field, which causes a changing magnetic field, .... The paradox was that Maxwell's equations give you a constant for the speed of light, without reference to the velocity of the observer, so people assumed that they are valid only in the rest frame of a mythical "ether". Einstein showed that Maxwell's equations are correct for all observers, and it is Newton's/Galileo's ideas which are wrong.

Incidentally, just like electromagnetic radiation, GR implies that gravity waves should exist too.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by Fastolfe · 2002-12-31 18:29 · Score: 2

This is incorrect. Gravitational and magnetic fields are most certainly limited by the speed of light.

This is how we have things like electro-magnetic waves and gravitational waves. If time (speed) did not factor in to magnetism or gravity, there would be no such thing as a wave based on either of these things.

so if two objects are traveling toward the same by SHEENmaster · 2002-12-31 18:29 · Score: 2

point at c/2 from opposite directions they both gain infinite mass!?

By that same argument if I am traveling at c toward Earth, Earth gains infinite mass and the gravitational pull drags me toward it even faster!

No offense, but this makes no sense. Either none of us understand it, or the emporor has no theory.

--
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.

Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by lirkbald · 2002-12-31 19:08 · Score: 4, Informative

point at c/2 from opposite directions they both gain infinite mass!?
Nope. Drop all your newtonian physics assumptions out the window. Speed is relative as well, and doesn't add in such a straightforward fashion. An observer on one object will actually measure the velocity of the other as something less than c. (pardon me if I don't go look up the exact equations right now). That's where relativistic time dialation comes from- time has to slow down to make up for the non-additive properties of velocity.

By that same argument if I am traveling at c toward Earth, Earth gains infinite mass and the gravitational pull drags me toward it even faster!
Wrong again. You can't travel at c toward earth, so the question is meaningless. It takes infinite energy for a massive to reach that velocity, so it's impossible.

No offense, but this makes no sense. Either none of us understand it, or the emporor has no theory.
Quite a bit of offense taken, actually. You missed the third possibility, that *you personally* don't understand it, and that physicists do. Do you really think that points as obvious as yours would have been missed in all the years that Relativity has been under close scrutiny?

Oh, well. People who argue "I don't get it, therefore it's wrong" annoy me.
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by Alsee · 2002-12-31 20:35 · Score: 2

so if two objects are traveling toward the same point at c/2 from opposite directions they both gain infinite mass!?

The problem is that you think 30mph + 30mph is 60mph, but it isn't.
30mph + 30mph is really 59.99999999999999999mph

Is is so close to 60mph that you can't measure the difference. 30mph is extremely close to zero c so the "missing speed" is close to zero. As you get closer to the speed of light the "missing speed" gets closer to one.

0.99c + 0.99c = 0.99995c
1c + 1c = 1c

Speeds never add up to a value above c.

Either none of us understand it, or the emporor has no theory.

No, things just get really wierd at high speeds and you don't understand it.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by wass · 2002-12-31 21:04 · Score: 3, Informative

point at c/2 from opposite directions they both gain infinite mass!?
NO, you cannot look at a relative velocity in a simple Newtonian method, as others have described above.
You can realize this easily by looking at the Lorentz transform of an object in a moving frame as observed from the rest frame, to determine the relative velocity. Or from the moving frame.
Just to get you started, because it looks like you're rather confused, here are the Lorentz transforms. I hope you understand what the Lorentz transforms are. Basically, they let you convert an event occuring at a specific time/place in one frame to the time/place in another frame. We'll assume 1-D systems here, which is essentially true because only the direction of motion is Lorentz-contracted. Note, these formulae convert a moving frame to the rest frame (where the moving frame is moving at velocity v in positive coordinate number relative to the rest frame).
x'=gamma(x+v*t)
t'=gamma(t+v*x/c^2)
Okay, now the fun part. Assume an object moves distance dx in time dt in the moving frame. how far does it move in the rest frame? Plug in, and then divide and we get our relativistic velocity.
dx'/dt'=(dx+v*dt)/(dt+v*dx/c^2)= (dx/dt+v)/(1+v*dx/dt/c^2)
The object in the moving frame moves at velocity dx/dt, so we'll call that velocity u. Thus, we want the speed u as measured in the rest frame.
u'=(u+v)/(1+uv/c^2)
That is the formula you should be using. Note that at very small relative velocity between frames, uv/c^2 is practically zero, and hence you can use the Newtonian relative velocity formula u'=u+v. But at appreciable speeds, it's not valid. And plugging in numbers for your v=c/2 example, from one of the incoming reference frames you would see the other frame moving at v=(4/5)c, which is CLOSE to c but definitely LESS THAN c.
Happy New Year to all you other folks on slashdot, It's 4am here, and i'm not sober yet, but my girlfriend is still talking to her family in El Salvador so I'm still browsing /. yay...

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make world, not war
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by Old+Wolf · 2002-12-31 21:06 · Score: 2

Funny that you open your post with "30 + 30 isn't 60" and your tagline is making fun of "50 + 1 - 1 isn't 50" :)
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by mgv · 2002-12-31 22:52 · Score: 2

Funny that you open your post with "30 + 30 isn't 60" and your tagline is making fun of "50 + 1 - 1 isn't 50" :)

You see, the karma you have - k - can never exceed 50. Its pretty much the same with light. Because ordinary human brains have alot of trouble understanding karma, Cmdr Taco has hidden the underlying relavistic changes in our k by simply describing it. The maths of karma are simply too complex for most geeks to understand, and they just end getting confused.

On a side note, the underlying theme of this thread is that one should never try and explain qantum mechanics when drunk after new year. It just doesn't work.

Michael

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There is no cryptographic solution to the problem where the intended receiver and the attacker are the same entity.
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by shogun · 2003-01-01 00:25 · Score: 2

You see, the karma you have - k - can never exceed 50.

Don't forget the cases where people who gained a lot of karma before the universal karma cap was imposed could still have a karma well in excess of 50.
Of course back on topic maybe theres some objects out there in the universe floating around at speed like 30c as they gained that velocity before the speed limit was put in.</handwaving>
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by Alsee · 2003-01-01 08:42 · Score: 2

your tagline is making fun of "50 + 1 - 1 isn't 50" :)

Hmm, maybe I need to change my sig because you aren't the first person to missunderstand it. I have absolutly no problem with 50+1-1=49. It makes perfect sense to me. What I was making fun of was the fact that Cmdr Taco actually went through the work of HIDING the fact that 50+1-1=49 just because of people who don't understand it.

It works correctly, he just hid how it works so the non-geeks wouldn't hurt their brains on it. "Solving" a problem by giving people LESS information is a very non-geek solution.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by Alsee · 2003-01-01 08:53 · Score: 3, Funny

The maths of karma are simply too complex for most geeks to understand

No, I doubt the geeks had any trouble with it. It was a perfectly logical system. It was the non-geeks who didn't get it.

2+2=0 (mod 4 arithmetic)
2+2=1 (mod 3 arithmetic)
2+2=1.9999999 (relativity)
2+2=2 (bitwise OR)
2+2=3 (karma cap at 3).
2+2=5 (2 is really 2.4 rounded down and 5 is really 4.8 rounded up)
2+2=10 (base 3 arithmetic)
2+2=22 (string concatenation)
2+2=44 (sum of ascii characters, hexidecimal)
2+2=100 (sum of ascii characters, decimal)

Geeks "get it". Non-geeks don't understand anything other than 2+2=4.

Cross refference this post.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Re:so if two objects are traveling toward the same by Alsee · 2003-01-01 18:56 · Score: 2

In base 3 arithmetic, 2+2=11

Oops, yep.
I meant to say 2+2=10 in base 4.
The 11 makes a good addition to the list.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.

Even if his theories are improved by backslashdot · 2002-12-31 18:35 · Score: 4, Insightful

He will still be a great physicist that helped bring us to where we're at in science today.

I dont see the big deal in "disproving" him. It's sad that people will take some sort of glee in thinking "Ha! Einstein was wrong!" Einstein himself would be glad to see people come closer in figuring out the natuer of the universe.

Given the knowledge and tools available to him at the time, its amazing he came up with something in 1904 that people nearly 100 years later are still trying to figure out how to improve or disprove. Today we have the advantage of knowing how to look at things the way he did.

Einstein's abilities, creativity, and ideas will have a permanent influence on humanity's acheivements.

You misunderstand completely by kfg · 2002-12-31 18:39 · Score: 4, Insightful

The more we learn where our knowledge is incorrect the more *correct* it becomes. The job of the scientist is thus to question *everything.*

The very thing that shakes your faith in our knowledge is the very thing that *strengthens* our knowledge.

Think about it.

KFG

Re:You misunderstand completely by Hektor_Troy · 2002-12-31 23:58 · Score: 5, Funny

The job of the scientist is thus to question *everything.*
Why?

--
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.
Re:You misunderstand completely by lars_stefan_axelsson · 2003-01-01 00:21 · Score: 5, Informative

I don't mean to be a troll, but I really want to ask this. Why is it so frowned upon to question evolution? By the nature of science, it is granted that theories and current "knowledge" may be overturned in light of future counter-evidence. However, evolutionists give the impression that they consider their views to be rock-solid, indisputable Truth that is impossible to disprove now and forevermore. Anyone who dares to disagree is dismissed out of hand as a kook. (See, I had to post as AC to even ask.)

Well, I don't know if it's really the case that evolutionists consider their views to be a "truth that is impossible to disprove" etc. (at least not the scientfically minded ones, for any theory there are supporters that one could do without).

Now let me start by saying that I'm not really an expert on evolution, since I'm european I've never had to be. There are no creationists here to speak of, and hence I'm not well versed in their way of thinking. I am a "scientist" however, so I'm somewhat qualified to speak about that.

Now, not to write an essay answering your question, but much of it boils down to what we mean by "wrong." First some preliminaries though. The strength of any scientific theory rests on its predictive powers, how well does it foresay and explain the outcome of experiments or observations (past of future). Any good scientific theory then is very specific (or strong), what we like to call "easily falsifiable", i.e. it is simple to detect when its predictive powers are failing. (Hence many of them in the natural sciences are formulated in some form of logic; "mathematics" since that provides for a stronger statement to be made). So, strong theory equals "easy to prove wrong" given contradictory evidence.

Now, then what does it mean to be "wrong" in the scientific sense? In short it's when there are observations made that cannot fit into the current theory. A prime example would be Newton's law of kinetic energy E=1/2mv^2. For a long time that was thought to be all there is to it, and all the experiments and observations that could be made corroborated that. Today we know that it's not "true". It's OK for lower speeds, but it completely fails to take relativistic effects into account (see previous posts in this thread), and hence has been relegated to the scrap heap of scientific theories, right?

Well, not quite. It's still a very good approximation for most macroscopic real world phenomena. It still explains them very well, and even post Einstein, it hasn't really lost any of it's predictive powers in the domain in which it was thought up. So even though it may now be thought "wrong" in the strictest sense of the word; it may not tell all of the truth to all people, it's still a pretty darn good theory if you're a bit more careful with it's application.

This is also true of Darwinian evolution. It's a very well tested theory (or "fact" if you will) by now, with wast predictive and explanatory powers. Any later theory that superseeds it must still explain all the observations with the same (or better) accuracy as Darwinistic evolution has to date. So even though evolution as a theory may be proven "wrong" at a later date, it'll still be mostly "right." As Newtons' laws still are.

Now, in order to completely close the sack, we also need Occam's razor. I.e. given two equally predictive theories, we prefer the simpler one. It's really a common sense argument. Why make things harder than they have to be. It's also the only scientific loophole that creationists can exploit. By invoking a "deus ex machina" in the form of an omnipotent God, that stacks the deck so that scientists cannot make correct observations (or make them correctly), you can of course invalidate any and every theory. And that's why science doesn't deal with that. If someone stacks the deck, we won't play! (Then we can continue various philosophical arguments, and in doing so rapidly leaving the natural sciences.)

And that's incidentally why science isn't "just another religion", science specifically is about absolutely minimising the things that have to be taken on faith (such as the existence of the rest of the world etc), while religion(s) are about systematising the things you take on faith. Often that means that science cannot say very much on a subject, and people having a natural tendency towards taking things on faith, often over interprets scientific statements (it takes practice to so thoroughly disiplining your subjectiveness as the scientist must do). This leads to "scientific" statements or belif in the general public, that really aren't. But that's not the fault of science, more a fault of the schooling system.

If you're specifically interested in evolution, I have it on good authority that you could do worse than studying talk origins. I haven't got any good references on the philosophy of science in english for you, but I'm sure that a few minutes of googling will turn up a multitude.

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Stefan Axelsson
Re:You misunderstand completely by jonadab · 2003-01-01 01:16 · Score: 2

> Why is it so frowned upon to question evolution?

Because, evolution has to do with origins and therefore fundamentally
is not science. It falls into the same category as archeology, human
psychology, and history -- there is no way to conduct experiments to
test hyphotheses and theories in these areas. Put another way, there
is no way to conduct science in these subject areas. So instead the
people who study them do it by examining whatever existing evidence
they can find and then sitting around thinking about what it probably
might mean, and making up theories they will never be able to test or
verify. No one will ever prove or disprove any of it.

Physics is somewhat different. In physics, as in math, if your
theory isn't quite right, sooner or later somebody will *prove*
that it's not right.

--
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:You misunderstand completely by JCMay · 2003-01-01 03:20 · Score: 2, Interesting

Lars wrote:

This is also true of Darwinian evolution. It's a very well tested theory (or "fact" if you will) by now, with wast predictive and explanatory powers.

Actually, nobody has ever seen "evolution" happen in a way congruent with the theories proposed by Darwinian evolutionists. Their theories include rates of change that are so slow as to be unobservable.

Furthermore, no evolutionist has ever explained creatures like the Bombardier Beetle and its built-in flame thrower. This strange little insect has a defense mechanism based on the hypergolic reaction of two chemicals that it (obviously) stores in seperate sacks, mixing the two only in its rear-mounted "combustion chamber." The chemistry and mechanical complexity of the system is high enough I don't think simple evolutionary changes can account for it-- it must have been put in the beetle completely operational: how did it get two chemicals that are hypergolic into its body and learn to control them without blowing itself up?

Later you rightfully mention Occam's Razor. I think that upon honest reflection, you will find that holding dogmaticly to Darwinian evoltion isn't nearly as satisfying and compelling as you previously thought compared to other, ultimately simpler, ideas.

Happy new yera!
Re:You misunderstand completely by jaoswald · 2003-01-01 04:28 · Score: 5, Insightful

Did you actually read the link you included from talkorigins.org? It contains a plausible sequence of evolutionary changes that would lead to the bombardier beetle; exactly what you claim is impossible.

In any case, argument from design doesn't provide any "explanation," much less a better one. How did the designer make the beetle, and all its close genetic relatives, where none had existed before? Why the variety of mechanisms in the close relatives, instead of a single design?
Re:You misunderstand completely by jaoswald · 2003-01-01 04:40 · Score: 2

Evolutionary biology, as with archaeology, is an historical science. It makes claims as to what happened in the past (continuing in the present). The way to test theories in evolutionary biology is to continue studying existing organisms and fossil specemins in ways that determine their historical development.

With the tools of modern biochemistry, for instance, we can use DNA sequencing to test whether organisms that we believe to be related from previous studies actually share common DNA patterns that are consistent with common descent.

To find that the DNA sequences are incompatible or unrelated would create a difficulty that must be resolved. If it can't be resolved in the frame work of evolutionary theory, then that is disproof!

As an extreme example, if the fossil record started showing (what are currently belived to be) relatively recent forms (e.g. modern humans) in much older sediments, then that would cast serious doubt on the current picture of human descent. Given that DNA sequencing pretty convincingly links humans to other primates, and to other mammals, and the current fossil record sets pretty firm limits on the time when these various groups came into being, the possible ages of human fossils are actually pretty well constrained by current theory. That is, it isn't hard at all for a fossil discovery to disprove evolution in the case of humans. That no such fossil has yet been found is evidence, in the provisional sense of all scientific evidence.
Re:You misunderstand completely by NoMoreNicksLeft · 2003-01-01 05:07 · Score: 5, Insightful

Actually, nobody has ever seen "evolution" happen in a way congruent with the theories proposed by Darwinian evolutionists. Their theories include rates of change that are so slow as to be unobservable.

Wrong. We also can't see electrons, or stars/galaxies at the edge of the universe. We don't need to see them to observe them though. Evolution has been observed in the fossil record, and even to some extent in the laboratory. Still, the lab observations are fairly new (the last 30-40 years) and science is busy debating whether or not it is indeed evolution... after all, as you pointed out, it is a slow effect.

Furthermore, no evolutionist has ever explained creatures like the Bombardier Beetle and its built-in flame thrower.

Huh? Of course evolutionists don't know everything at once... they don't claim to be omniscient. However, that doesn't mean they are doofuses without a clue. There have already been several possible explanations suggested in the scientific community, and no one disputes that something unknown is going on. You must not be researching this issue very thoroughly, if you believe there are no explanations at all, and that biologists are all sitting around dumbfounded.

Some of the more radical ideas center around the possibility that DNA acts more like a computer than a raw blueprint. That it might "store" a bunch of "mutations", saving them for a rainy day when some threshhold is reached. This "computer" might even span many individuals in the population. So instead of a gradual change into a "bombadier beetle" where there are many transitionary variants doomed to blowing themselves up, evolution simply "skipped over" those and went straight to the version capable of blowing up its enemies, and not itself.

Was it Greg Bear that said "Even evolution is evolving, becoming better at what it does." ?

Besides, lay off Darwinian evolution. Most people today see it as only the crudest approximation of the reality of evolution. Would figure that a bible thumper would be reacting to the scientific community of 100 years ago... you guys are always more than a few steps behind.
Re:You misunderstand completely by PsionicMan · 2003-01-01 05:47 · Score: 2, Insightful

One big and well-known website in the brotherhood dedicated to presenting these facts is apologeticspress.org. For instance, one thing I recall reading on there is that the earth moves about 18 miles/sec in its orbit and for every 19 miles I believe it was (I might have those 2 numbers switched) the earth departs from a straight line by about 0.9 inches. Now if the earth moved 0.8 inches or 1.0 inches instead, all life on earth would either freeze or incinerate. The probability of this happening by chance, as I'm sure you can imagine, or not too good. And there's 1000's, if not millions, more facts like that out there

You are absolutely right in asserting that the probability isn't so great--and not only for that; there are many, many other factors that might come into play when discussing a planet and whether or not it is fit for life, most of which are also with a low probability. But guess what? There's universe is so friggin' huge that even with those small odds it's not so surprising that it has happened, and it's also not completely out of line to think that it has happened more than once (i.e. life on other planets).

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Re:You misunderstand completely by j3110 · 2003-01-01 05:52 · Score: 2, Interesting

Surely there would be a simpler way of explaining how the speed of light could be constant. Even if there wasn't, I think it's nearly impossible to falsify. No matter what sane experiment people come up with that bends it, someone always claims it doesn't break it. If I said we all live in the Matrix, you may be able to bend my theory, but not break it. This is basically what the theory of relativity is. The theory of relativety says we live inside a warped universe. Our mass and our dimension changes depending on our speed. Which boarders contradiction of conservation of matter.

Then you have to consider that photons created by different orbitals are different wavelength. Where does that fit in to the theory? It's called different "energy" photons. This energy can't make the photon go faster, so it bounces more? Doesn't that make it go faster along the wave? If so, then does the theory mean you can't travel in a straight line faster than c? Then the theory falls apart for any peice of the wave.

The cesium chamber experiment alone proves that either the cesium chamber was moving at phenominal speeds without us seeing it, c ~ infinity, or the chamber is shorter than was measured. Some experiments actually get photons out before they go in. According to everything I've read about the theory, "all calculations of the speed of light will be the same to any observer." This clearly isn't true in the cesium condensate experiment.

Really now... Occam's Razor tells me that it would be much easier to believe that we can't measure the speed of light properly with our equipment, and it could be possible to travel faster than light. This is especially true considering that c is the speed of light in a ray at an ungiven wavelength instead of the speed of a photon along a wave.

There are more complications caused by the theory of relativity than those it sought to fix. I would rather go back to the original failures of the "classic" equations and fix whats wrong than fix a theory that seems to generate loop holes every month. It would be easier to scrap it and solve the original problems than make a patchwork theory.

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Karma Clown
Re:You misunderstand completely by lars_stefan_axelsson · 2003-01-01 06:34 · Score: 2

However, those of us who are truly dedicated to Christianity don't take God entirely on faith. Rather we look at the design in the universe, and I believe rightly conclude, that this order could not have happened by mistake, nor that the universe is eternal. We look at what we call "Christian Evidences" to help solidify our faith. And Christian Evidences are another word for scientific facts we use from both creationists *AND* non-creationists scientists alike, to show that no other theories of the existence and organization of the universe can be valid or than the God of the Bible.

Well, this is the sort of argument that has a tendency to degenerate rather quickly, but I'll give it a shot. Not that I'm an expert on religion. I'm a bit intrigued by the beliefs held by you (and people like you) since as I said, they are not very common on this side of the pond. (I can think of a historic reason or two why this is so, but I digress).

What I cannot really understand is why faith isn't enough? Upon reading your post I get the feeling that you're reading moral statements where a scientific statement was intended. None of the astronomers I know (mostly radio astronomers but there you go) believe that the universe came to be by "mistake." Ranodom events play a large part in their models, that's for certain, but no moral judgement as to whether that was/is any worse or better than anything else.

Now, there isn't really any conflict between the natural sciences an religion as I see it. They deal with disjunct sets of questions. Since there is no way of proving scientifically whether there is a god or not, we're not even trying. We deal only with what can be observed and verified.

And even though I don't believe myself, I cannot see the point of a religion that leaves no place for doubt.) If indeed it is as you claim, that the earth's orbit couldn't have happened by chance, then all rational people must conclude that there is a (christian) god, right? What then of free will? That's severely restricted now that you only have the options of irrational, or believer? I'm sorry but I was under the impression that the very idea was to take god on faith? We as scientist doesn't deal with that. At all. So it's not a question of protestantism, versus catholicism versus science. The latter doesn't try to answer the questions that the former two try to. Science tries very hard to answer the question how we came to be, but not why. If you want to call that boring or limited, sure, I can agree up to a point.

Now, and here's the inflamatory part: When it comes to the hard observable facts, is where your argument disintegrates. Now, the statements as such aren't understandable, the earth doesn't move in a "straight line" around the sun, and hence cannot deviate a certain amount from it (other than the trivial, if it deviated more or less than what is required for the orbit to meet up, then of course the earth wouldn't stay in orbit). If you're saying that the exentricity of the earths orbit cannot deviate from a true circle more than a tenth of an inch, for all life to cease, that's patently false. The earths orbit is a lot more eccentric than that. As in several orders of magnitude more eccentric. Try the analemma site for a very readable (and nicely illustrated) introduction to the earths orbit around the sun, and how it give rise to the analemma and the equation of time. So, I'm sorry, but arguments such as these will only convince me that you're not doing good religion, but bad science.

As I don't know much religion, nicely done religion (addressing the problems of the field) would probably be interesting to me. As a person the questions that religion addresses interest me. However, bad science (and I do know a thing or two about that) doesn't interest me at all.

If you wish to correct my attemt at religion, as I've corrected your attempt at science, I'd be more than willing to listen. I don't profess to be an expert. ;-)

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Stefan Axelsson
Re:You misunderstand completely by pauljlucas · 2003-01-01 06:36 · Score: 2

Why is it so frowned upon to question evolution?
The thing that so many people confuse is theory vs. fact. Evolution is a proven fact. Darwin's natural selection is one theory to explain evolution. Another is Gould's punctuated equilibrium.
An analogy: gravity is a fact. Newton's laws of classical mechanics are one theory to explain gravity. They were later displaced by Einstein's theory of relativity. But while physicists argue about theories of gravity, that doesn't make gravity any less of a fact.
So too with evolution.

--
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.
Re:You misunderstand completely by Yunzil · 2003-01-01 06:49 · Score: 2

Rather we look at the design in the universe,

How do you tell something that's designed from something that wasn't?

Now if the earth moved 0.8 inches or 1.0 inches instead, all life on earth would either freeze or incinerate.

Do they present any scientific evidence to back this up? Or are they making unsupportable assertions? Considering that the distance to the sun varies by over 3,000,000 miles over the course of the year, I'm rather doubtful of their claims.

And there's 1000's, if not millions, more facts like that out there.

Facts? I don't think so.
Re:You misunderstand completely by scrytch · 2003-01-01 09:36 · Score: 2

The job of the scientist is thus to question *everything.*

Why?

Why do you ask?

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I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Re:You misunderstand completely by NoMoreNicksLeft · 2003-01-01 10:25 · Score: 2

For crying out loud...

He was working with what he had. Budget cuts, deadlines moved forward, half his dept. was layed off, it was a mess. You're actually lucky you don't *shit* out of that same tube, the divine marketdroids were sure that was the only way to come in at budget and still have a viable Human(TM).
Re:You misunderstand completely by JebusIsLord · 2003-01-01 16:24 · Score: 2

Simpler ideas such as...

Please, I am all for simpler working models that explain biological diversity. I think we all are.

Extra terrestrials, divine intervention et al. all require large leaps of complexity wholey unsupported by evidence, so I hope you do not suggest that these are easier to believe.

I expect you have an ulterior motive (usually religious) anyway for saying this however, so I won't waste my breath. Pardon me if I misinterpret , Its just that every single time I have this discussion with someone it is EXCLUSIVELY because they have fundamentalist belief in the bible, and frankly those people are a waste of time to converse with.

--
Jeremy
Re:You misunderstand completely by babbage · 2003-01-01 16:37 · Score: 2

Thank you. That was the clearest & most thorough answer to that question that I have ever encountered, and I've been reading [and using] less well-stated versions of this comment for years now. Every school board in the USA should be forced to read this before trying to impost creationism on their poor students... :)

--
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
Re:You misunderstand completely by Tyreth · 2003-01-01 18:18 · Score: 2

So even though evolution as a theory may be proven "wrong" at a later date, it'll still be mostly "right." As Newtons' laws still are.

You know, you might have actually hit the nail on the head here. Most evolutionsts (or perhaps all) that I have encountered have simply not understood the creationist argument. In fact it surprises them that creationists also believe that natural selection occurs, and is quite natural. They think that we reject natural selection. One even suggested that I believed a different brand (one of many) of creationism to the rest. This is false, since the most recognised creationists all agree that natural selection occurs. It's a process, its maths, it simply happens.
Now when you say evolution, you are most likely talking about natural selection. Natural selection is proven, demonstrated. What has not been demonstrated is that chance mutations can lead to the introduction of benefical genes that will later lead to a new species and a superior lifeform. Natural selection is merely the selection of genes. Where the two sides differ is where the genes originally came from. Creationists say they were present in the beginning from the two parent species, while evolutionists say these genes came from chance mutations.
Now, getting back to what you were saying - if evolution were proven false then it will still leave a remnant that is "mostly right". This remnant would be natural selection. This process appears to support evolution, but in fact it is expected of the creationist model too. And I think this is one of the main reasons why evolutionists are so confused as to how the creationist could reject evolution when there seems to be so much evidence.
Now let me start by saying that I'm not really an expert on evolution, since I'm european I've never had to be. There are no creationists here to speak of, and hence I'm not well versed in their way of thinking. I am a "scientist" however, so I'm somewhat qualified to speak about that.

I'm used to being ridiculed as a believer of fairy tales when the people who say it obviously don't understand what I am saying. I hope that since you have not encountered us much you are willing, and will remain willing, to discuss these opinions with respect towards each other as we all try to understand the truth - because that is ultimately what is important. I don't believe creationism because I need to, but because I genuinely believe it is true and has the weight of evidence. If I was proven wrong then I would believe in evolution. I encourage you to find out more about the creationist argument. If you genuinely learn our model then you will probably be surprised at how coherent it is and how well it fits the observable facts. But please don't become like everyone else I have encountered - who is quick to speak without understanding even the basics of the creationist model. As I mentioned before, like those who think that the creationist model of the universe rejects natural selection.
Re:You misunderstand completely by Tyreth · 2003-01-02 01:24 · Score: 2

You are correct about science not taking into account God in its predictions. However, I would be disturbed if believing in God implied that science, and indeed logic, would have no place. You are implying that when God acts that our predictions will fail. I believe that the world is rational with God and irrational without.
Moving on, I do believe you can prove God. When you say that He cannot be proven to exist, you are working underthe assumption that everything can be explained through science. I put it to you that the earth is only 6000 years old (or close enough), and that evolution over millions of years therefore did not occur. If (lets pretend) that I could demonstrate to you that the earth was indeed only 6000 years old, and that therefore the history that the Bible presents is correct, would you consider this a proof for the existence of God? Or do you have another scientific explanation for how the earth could have been created so recently without God?
Consider also that God's miracles as recorded in the Bible do break the laws of physics, but they do not break all laws. The very fact that we can reason, argue, and understand logic I think is a testimony that there is a logical and rational explanation for everything. So when God performs a miracle, such as parting the red sea, even though it is not physically possible, it is still possible within the laws that God has defined in the universe - including the spiritual realm, to do. An example may be helpful. It is simply not physically possible for man to fly on his own. Yet we can devise wings, aeroplanes, etc, that allow us to apparently "break" this law. Yet we do not break a law, it all makes sense. So too the spiritual realm even though it appears to defy physics, if we could understand more of the laws of the physical and spiritual realms it would make sense, be logical and rational. See where I'm headed?
As for more proof - there is the evidence of the spiritual realm. Largely ignored in the western society, there are definately supernatural occurances. I do acknowledge that many/most supposedly supernatural/miraculous healings and other events today can be explained through the physical realm - hypnotism, suggestion, etc. Yet there are some things that are definately spiritual (supernatural is the common word, but that means above natural, while I think the spiritual is natural, but not physical obviously). For example, people in operating rooms who have been unconscious and floated above their bodies watching doctors operate on them. Then, when they return to their body and wake up they are able to describe to the doctor what was going on, things they couldn't have known through any physical means.
I am happy for you to be sceptical about these stories, it is worthwhile to be. But you may just find some spiritual events that are not explainable through the physical. Believing in the spiritual realm I think provides a very good evidence for God. So would it if I could demonstrate that the earth were only 6000 years old. Another excellent evidence is our sense of morals. Our sense of morality is simply not in line with what evolution would have required for the last 4.5 billion years.
Well, I spent an hour surfing the link that someone provided, and there seems to be other "creationists" around, that doesn't subscribe to your version of the theory...

There are, no doubt. Just like there are evolutionists that claim humans were created and formed by aliens...like that Canadian cult at the moment claiming to have the first human clone. The most widely acknowledged, recognised, and researched creationists ascribe to the same views I present - including an acceptance of natural selection. This includes icr.org answersingenesis.com and creationscience.com. If my views or opinions at any time differ with theirs then I submit myself to their superior understanding, since I am only laiety while they have dedicated their work to this topic.
So i'm curious to know if you would consider any of the above things proofs, or at least excellent evidence, of God's existence or not? I certainly think He can be proven to exist, or at least shown to fit the available evidence much better. Actually, perhaps one of the greatest proofs is when He came to earth as the man Jesus the Christ - and the resurrection. Another topic worth pursuing if you want evidence for God's existence. What better evidence than from when he walked among us, died and then rose from the dead? A good starting point that I would recommend to give you an idea of where to look if you are genuinely looking for evidence and the answers would be this book. It gives you an overview of the issues involved, and the answers given. Excellent resource, but also a great starting point if you want to look more in depth. It is the journey of one journalist who was an atheist as he goes to find out whether the things he believes about christianity are true or not - inspired to do so when his wife becomes a christian.
Re:You misunderstand completely by swv3752 · 2003-01-02 01:47 · Score: 2

Well, random mutations do occur. Some random mutations can lead to specific survival traits. This was a large portion of what we studied in microbiology. We took strains of bacteria that were susceptible to a specific antibiotics. We cultured the bacteria in the prescence of chemical mutagens. (Easy to think of the stuff as carcinogenic.) We then tried to culture the bacteria in petri dishes with the antibiotic. Anything that grew was a mutant strain. Your whole basis of belief has been disproved by me personally a decade ago. And the original studies happened much earlier.

Evolutionary theory has been refined from Charles Darwin's model, but it has not been debunked. For anyone that is interested in this further, research "Punctuated Equilibrium" and "Cambrian Explosion".

--
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Re:You misunderstand completely by Alphtoo · 2003-01-02 04:17 · Score: 3, Insightful

Evolution does not, in any way, invalidate the existance of God, or of His creation of life; it just attempts to explain how He did it. (I heard this from a Baptist Pastor some 35 years ago, and it made perfect sense so I wanted to pass it along. And no, I'm not a Baptist). It is perfectly rational to believe in evolution and in a Creator at the same time. May our Creator bless you all for the new year, and may we all continue to evolve!
Re:You misunderstand completely by gpinzone · 2003-01-02 12:56 · Score: 2

"Now let me start by saying that I'm not really an expert on evolution, since I'm european I've never had to be. There are no creationists here to speak of, and hence I'm not well versed in their way of thinking. I am a "scientist" however, so I'm somewhat qualified to speak about that."

You might want to look around Italy in a place called "the Vatican." I hear there's a bunch of creationists living there and are...*gasp*...European!
Re:You misunderstand completely by lars_stefan_axelsson · 2003-01-02 23:47 · Score: 2

You might want to look around Italy in a place called "the Vatican." I hear there's a bunch of creationists living there and are...*gasp*...European!

Well, I'm from northern europe, we threw out the catholics in the 1540:s, so I'm not expert on them (even though we've had religious freedom for quite some time, I think I may know one very secular catholic). But see my previous answer about Stephen Hawking and his consultation with the pope. There is even a quite famous astronomer who is a cardinal, though his name escapes me. There may be more, since the vatican has it's own observatory

Their form of creationism is wholly in line with scientific understanding, if their FAQ and other documents are to be belived. They do belive that there is a god that is everpresent and started it all, they are christians after all.

So, if that's the best you can come up with when it comes to european "creationists", it's still quite reasonable for me to say that there are no creationists here to speak of. Certainly none even beginning to come close to the view that has been presented here, and in the referenced links.

--
Stefan Axelsson
Re:You misunderstand completely by lars_stefan_axelsson · 2003-01-03 00:07 · Score: 2

To be truly scientific, one must separate the two questions: Did evolution occur? And... Can evolution occur? No matter the answer, until someone invents a time machine and goes back in time, the answer to the first question MUST be an "argument from silence", which is a formal logical falacy. Since science must be able to reproduce its results, history will NEVER be scientifically "proven." The second question is an entirely different matter. This is something that can be reproducable in a lab environment. Results can be inferred to account for historical events, but they will never prove anything to the extent that a logical or mathmatical proof proves a theory.

Well, you're not discussing science here (and by that I mean natural science), but the philosophy of science. And that's a related but different animal (or beast perhaps?).

Not that I concur with your deductions. If you say that given a heap of evidence of things past and a theory to explain them, no sound scientific conclusion can be drawn. By your reasoning we could never prove murder either. All we have are a number of clues to what happened after the fact, and we cannot have the same person killed again, to determine how he died the first time, now can we? (Sure, we can kill other people after the fact, but that's not the same thing, and actually closely parallels your argument with regards to evolution then and now).

The natural sciences are based on observation. Sure, if we observe some kind of experiment, that can often (but perhaps paradoxically not always) strengthen our argument, because the experiments can be repeated. But by your reasoning, plate techtonics, most of geology and cosmology would fall also, since they also deal with events that are too slow to observe directly. We don't have to observe the outcome of experiements, it's equally valid to observe the outcome of natural occurrences.

I don't know of any current theory of the philosophy of science that would exclude geology et al, on basis of logic. But again, I'm not a philosopher.

Now, the rub of your argument is the dual use of the word "proof" as it is employed in mathematics/logic (which are formal systems, not based on observation/experiements in the natural world), and the natural science use, where they mean something different. Now, of course, we may not ever be able to "prove" evolution, in the mathematical sense, but we're quite frankly not trying to. Proof means something else in the natural sciences. (And I don't include mathematics, though there are some who do, though there may be language problem here also, english isn't my native tongue).

Now, it's interesting to note, that in practice, in mathematics the meaning of "proof" has come to slide more and more into the natural science one, i.e. how many other reasonable, sceptic experts (scholars) of your peers can you persuade your arguments are sound. There are even a few "back to basics" schools of thought in mathematics these days, to try and counter this trend. But as interesting as that may be, I digress, it's the topic of another discussion.
.

--
Stefan Axelsson
Re:You misunderstand completely by gpinzone · 2003-01-03 17:28 · Score: 2

"But see my previous answer about Stephen Hawking and his consultation with the pope."

Yeah. That was the meeting when the Catholic church said that studying the nature of the universe was okay...as long as it didn't disprove the "unmoved mover." You know...God. Little did they know Mr. Hawking was coming up with a theory that time breaks down at the beginning of the universe and thus doesn't require an unmoved mover...or "God" as some like to refer to him.

You mean those people? Yeah. They're called creationists.
Re:You misunderstand completely by jonadab · 2003-01-04 23:25 · Score: 2

> There are many questions in human psychology that can be answered
> scientifically, you just have to ask them right.

This is true to some extent, but generally accepted ethical standards
prevent you from conducting most of the experiments that would really
be interesting. Nobody complains very much about the unethical
treatment of matter and energy, but you do one unethical thing to a
human, and the rights groups are all over you.

--
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:You misunderstand completely by jonadab · 2003-01-04 23:44 · Score: 2

> Evolutionary biology, as with archaeology, is an historical science.

Sometimes they are also called "soft" sciences. There are a number
of such fields; my point is, none of them use the scientific method;
they are called "sciences" because people don't understand science.

> The way to test theories in evolutionary biology is to continue
> studying existing organisms and fossil specemins in ways that
> determine their historical development.

That's not a valid way to test hypotheses. There are no predicted
outcomes, no control groups, no doubleblindness... in short, there
is no science in this method.

> With the tools of modern biochemistry, for instance, we can use
> DNA sequencing to test whether organisms that we believe to be
> related from previous studies actually share common DNA patterns
> that are consistent with common descent.

Evolutionists _assume_ that common DNA means common descent because
they believe that evolution has occurred, but there are at least
three alternative explanations for common DNA. (In rough order of
popularity, the three I can think of are common design, complete
chance, or similar circumstances leading to similar development.)
Meanwhile, the very basic idea of evolution (that one organism can
evolve into another) has never been tested and cannot ever be
tested in a scientific fashion.

> To find that the DNA sequences are incompatible or unrelated would
> create a difficulty that must be resolved. If it can't be resolved
> in the frame work of evolutionary theory, then that is disproof!

That's naive. Any number of unexpected things have been found over
the years that have had to be resolved or explained, but regardless
of how many such difficulties arrive, none of them ever disprove
anything, because none of it has ever been tested in even a single
experiment.

> As an extreme example, if the fossil record started showing (what
> are currently belived to be) relatively recent forms (e.g. modern
> humans) in much older sediments

That has happened repeatedly. It disproves nothing; the timetables
are just adjusted, or the order in which various organisms evolved,
or the age of the layer is changed, or gradualism passes out of
vogue and is replaced by catastrophism. A few years later as the
difficulties are forgotten and the difficulties with catastrophic
evolution prove hard to explain, gradualism passes back into vogue,
and a fresh crack is taken at explaining away its problems.

Evolutionism has much more in common with history than with physics.

--
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:You misunderstand completely by jonadab · 2003-01-04 23:47 · Score: 2

> there are at least three alternative explanations for common DNA.

I thought of another. If you subscribe to Hume's epistemics, you
can say you imagined the common DNA sequences. This is of course
complete nonsense, but nobody can _prove_ that it's nonsense.

--
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
Re:You misunderstand completely by lars_stefan_axelsson · 2003-01-05 03:25 · Score: 2

Yeah. That was the meeting when the Catholic church said that studying the nature of the universe was okay...as long as it didn't disprove the "unmoved mover." You know...God. Little did they know Mr. Hawking was coming up with a theory that time breaks down at the beginning of the universe and thus doesn't require an unmoved mover...or "God" as some like to refer to him. You mean those people? Yeah. They're called creationists.

And yet, there's a world of difference, between a pope that says "Then that instance 'before' the big bang when the laws of physics as we know them is when God did his work", and the people here that says that "the earth is only six thousand years old (give or take) and evolution as we know it has not taken place."

Look, I realise that we're engaged in a semantic quible, and of course strictly speaking it's not illogical to define "creationist" as someone who belive god created the universe.

However, by grouping together two such extremes of view as those of the two groups of "creationists" as you do, something is irretrievably lost in the translation.

And to maintain that just because we Europeans have those "creationists" of the view of the pope (which has been considerably refined since Hawking's consultation, and Galileo's I might add) that it would be resonable to assume that we also were familiar with the arguments of "creationists" of the other kind is absurd.

And though I doubt that anyone really mistook my using "creationist" as a label solely refering to the latter version, let me state clearly that I did.

To reiterate, while there is no conflict between science and those that hold the (updated) view of the pope. I would say that there is an irreconcilable difference between the latter type "creationist" and the views of the natural sciences.

There, I've gone and defended the pope, it's wasnt 400 years ago that we started a 30 year war to try and kill him. That's progress ;-)

--
Stefan Axelsson
Re:You misunderstand completely by jaoswald · 2003-01-05 04:22 · Score: 2

I'm trained as a physicist, so I can sympathize with your feeling that evolutionary biology is a "soft" science, but claiming it isn't a science is just unfair. Softness is a continuum: psychology is softer than biology because psychological experiments are just so difficult to control. Who knows what slight effect might get picked up by the brain and change its response.

Experiments *can* be reproduced because nature is so abundant in species that similar situations arise in totally different, presumably independent groups. One person can research marine invertebrates where a population became separated by some natural event, and another can research mammals, yet another can research ants.

Your conception of the "scientific method" is so narrow that I suspect even hard scientists can't follow it. Experiments that unambiguously test a rigorously posed hypothesis is an ideal that really can't be achieved in practice, even in physics. Independent measurements of fundamental constants, for example, don't always overlap, and physicists assume that there was some systematic effect that threw the odd experiment off, we just don't know what it could be, despite a *great* amount of care that was taken to avoid just this situation. Yet, we continue to believe that the fine structure constant really is a constant.

As for DNA, we know (as much as anything can be known) that DNA gets passed and modified by descent. I can take a DNA test that proves that my mother is my mother, and that her mother is her mother (and, hence, my grandmother). Thats a real experiment, don't you think? Sure, my DNA could have been "designed" that way, without having actually been transmitted from my mother, and maybe my great-great-grandmother never existed. But is it really useful to claim that science has to be able to prove my great-great-grandmother existed through a controlled laboratory experiment (presumably, causing her to be reproducibly born in the multiple labs under controlled conditions...) in order to be scientific? I can always come up with a possible objection, but at some point it becomes a conspiracy theory, not a scientific objection.

Do you believe cosmology is not a science because we can't recreate the big bang?
Re:You misunderstand completely by Tyreth · 2003-01-06 14:45 · Score: 2

I'm sorry, I don't see any contradiction in what I said. Some "beneficial" mutations have occurred. Example: Beetles losing wings on a windy island
That is the result of a loss of genes, but a genetic mutation nonetheless. In this case, this normal disadvantage becomes an advantage. The weakness is a strength. But its hardly evolutionary. I said that chance mutations can lead to the introduction of beneficial genes that will later lead to a new species and a superior lifeform . These kinds of mutations involve the changing of existing genes, or the loss of information. Never is new information added.
Basically, the example given was about bacteria that become immune to certain anti-biotics. This has been discussed by creationists - when some of these bacteria gain a specific immunity, they become weak somewhere else. Hardly evolutionary. Mutations occur, but they involve the loss or change of information - never the introduction of information required to reach a new species, for example from homo-erectus to homo-sapien, or from a single celled lifeform to humans, or from reptiles to birds. See where I'm heading? You have a string of genes, some of those values change. Almost always the change is harmful - but sometimes this turns out to be advantegous, such as the loss of wings. Not evolutionary, more like entropy.
Here is an article for your reference and further understanding: Superbugs
I'm quite sure that you have quite a lot to learn about the creationist position, and frankly its not worth my time explaining again because it is always misunderstood. Unless you are the exception amongst the rule (which would be refreshing).
Re:You misunderstand completely by jonadab · 2003-01-09 19:17 · Score: 2

> Do you believe cosmology is not a science because we can't
> recreate the big bang?

In a word, yes.

--
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2002-12-31 18:40 · Score: 4, Informative

Comment removed based on user account deletion

What I want to know is... by HotNeedleOfInquiry · 2002-12-31 18:49 · Score: 2

Why can Google News post a link to The New York Times without pulling up the subscriber page and Slashdot can't?

--
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...

I'm sorry, but this is entirely incorrect. by kfg · 2002-12-31 18:50 · Score: 4, Informative

The fact that light is in orbit has *no* effect on its speed. You're thinking of light as a Newtonian object getting "sucked into" the black hole. Light isn't "sucked in." The escape velocity of the black hole is simply higher than the speed of light and the light follows a ballistic trajectory. . . at * the speed of light.*

Light is not Newtonian. It dosn't "speed up" as it falls, or "slow down" as it rises. That's kind of the point. Try working some simple Lorentz Transformations to begin to get a feel for this.

KFG

Re:I'm sorry, but this is entirely incorrect. by jayed_99 · 2003-01-01 16:37 · Score: 3, Informative

Dude. I have to say it. I *have* to say it.

Lorentz transformations might be "normal math" to you, but to a lot of people (even the average slashdotter) they probably aren't. Think about it. If the poster that you're replying to could *do* Lorentz transformations then he wouldn't be having this mental roadblock...because by learning how to do them, he would have figured out the concepts involved.

It might be more helpful in the future to say something like "here is a cool little Java applet that visually (and interactively) explains a Lorentz transformation. It's not a thorough mathematical explanation, but it should give you some clues to what I'm talking about. Simple Lorentz transformations can be done easily with the skills that you (hopefully) learned in high school algebra. I know that most papers explaining Lorentz transformation are written in mathematicese, but, hey, it's just like learning Perl. Take it slowly, one step at a time, and work all of the examples out yourself. Good luck."

LOL by Jucius+Maximus · 2002-12-31 18:51 · Score: 2

I see this story and then look down at the bottom of the page. Lo and behold, the QOTD has special meaning in this context:

186,000 Miles per Second. It's not just a good idea. IT'S THE LAW.

PLEASE torture me with that! by SHEENmaster · 2002-12-31 18:52 · Score: 2

That's when tensor math starts to come in handy. Don't worry, I won't torture you with that.

I've heard the same damn "Just Because" explanations forever! I downloaded a quite lengthy explanation of Tensor Calculus to my Zaurus.

What I was really asking is if anyone knew the basis for these theories.

--
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.

Re:PLEASE torture me with that! by Aleatoric · 2002-12-31 18:58 · Score: 4, Informative

I'll let someone else torture you with tensors :o)

Here are three (of many) links that I've found in the past that deal with relativity and provide varying degrees of rigor and completeness in the explanations.

How stuff works! Talking about special relativity:
http://www.howstuffworks.com/relativi ty.htm

A pretty interesting and more rigorous explanation:
http://physics.syr.edu/courses/modul es/LIGHTCONE/

And finally, a question and answer format explanation :o)
http://www.sciencenet.org.uk/database/Physics /List s/relativity.html

This should get you a good set of basic coverage about relativity.

--
Nunc Tutus Exitus Computarus.
Re:PLEASE torture me with that! by guybarr · 2003-01-01 02:31 · Score: 2

I'll assume you're serious, and give a serious (though a bit caustic) reply:

I've heard the same damn "Just Because" explanations forever! I downloaded a quite lengthy explanation of Tensor Calculus to my Zaurus

What I was really asking is if anyone knew the basis for these theories.

There are many people who learned the theoretical, and some of the
experimental basis of SR. They are commonly known as:
"second year or above physics undergraduate students"

If you seriously want a layman's introduction to SR, don't study
Tensors just yet, (do it sometime, though, its good for the soul),
instead, go to the nearest library or book-store, open a copy of
"Berkely's Physics Course" (Vol I, IIRC) and read relevant sections.

No pain, no gain.

--
Working for necessity's mother.
Re:PLEASE torture me with that! by rossifer · 2003-01-01 07:12 · Score: 3, Insightful

What I was really asking is if anyone knew the basis for these theories.

Ah. I'm not going to be able to do more than point you in the right direction in one /. posting. For that direction: don't worry about tensor math yet, you won't need it until Special Relativity. In the short term, you should study a good "Modern Physics" text. Specifically, Maxwell's equations, the theoretical underpinnings of each equation and finally, their application to EM fields.

At that point, there's enough information to head over to the General Relativity chapter and take a gander. That ought to be enough to blow your mind for a little while as what you thought you knew about the universe resorts itself (don't worry, it happens to almost everyone).

After that, you can finish the book, develop some basic tensor math skills, then come back and explain Special Relativity to all of us! Actually, I do get Special Relativity, but it is mind bending. You really start thinking about the universe on a completely different scale.

I found it incredibly interesting stuff to learn, but because I went to a non-top-twenty school, there were only a few other people in my class with any interest. The hostility from the other undergrad students who hated learning (and especially hated having to rethink the universe) was a bit of a downer for the in-class exchange that the prof was so hoping for.

The graduate level classes were much more fun. :)

Regards,
Ross

So the new equation is... by Znonymous+Coward · 2002-12-31 18:55 · Score: 2

E != mc^2

--

Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.

No, what this is saying is that. . . by kfg · 2002-12-31 19:03 · Score: 3, Informative

some physicists believe they may be seeing things at the macro level that are unexplainable by Relativitly theory, and then extrapolating that, without any apparent justification, that if such is the case *maybe* explaining this differece can open the bridge to the Theory of Everything.

Please note that most physicists are of a mind that the physicist who are seeing these things are, ummmmm, seeing things.

So far it's all still a lot of waving of hands in the air and ignoring the part where "a miracle happens."

Not to say that it might not all work out in the end, but to imply that Relativity has been disproven, or even that certain limits have been found, is, ummmmm, premature.

KFG

Re:No, what this is saying is that. . . by Aerog · 2002-12-31 20:37 · Score: 3, Insightful

So far it's all still a lot of waving of hands in the air and ignoring the part where "a miracle happens."

Wow. You really have taken an advanced physics class! (not being sarcastic at all) In my brief experience with quantum mechanics, that's pretty much all it is. Sure, there's math to back up most of it, but a lot is just "classical parallels".

some physicists believe they may be seeing things at the macro level that are unexplainable by Relativitly theory

Something like when you examine a classical system of a partical moving in a one-dimensional region of definite length (the 1D infinite square well), you can see that it is equally probable to find the particle at any distance from the sides. However, quantum mechanically, the particle has a definite probability of being in the centre and said probability decreases like a gaussian distribution as it approaches either boundary. However, this is only for the ground state. As you get to higher and higher energy levels, you start to notice that the QM probability begins to resemble the classical one. But I'll leave with the best quote ever, which means my sig is finally applicable:

--

- Relativistic? That's barely Newtonian!

Einstein knew he was wrong by automatic_jack · 2002-12-31 19:12 · Score: 5, Informative

Not more than a few year's after developing his theories of general and special relativity, Einstein realized that they weren't perfect. The simple reason behind his realization was that the theories of relativity didn't make sense when applied on a quantum scale, and the theories of quantum physics didn't make sense when applies of a relative scale. Einstein refused to believe that the universe worked in such a way that there had to be two mutually exclusive theories to explain physics on the very small and the very large scale.

Of course, the rest of the world was busy experimenting with his theories of relativity, but after he published them he quickly lost interest in their progress. He spent the rest of his life searching for what he referred to as the "unified field theory," a single theory that could properly explain quantum physics and relativity at the same time.

I'm not a physicist by any stretch of the imagination, but theoretical science does interest me. Brian Greene's book, The Elegant Universe does a great job of explaining the background on this. It's worth a look.

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-- Have you ever noticed that at trade shows, Microsoft is always the company that is handing out stress balls?

Re:Einstein knew he was wrong by HiThere · 2003-01-01 07:59 · Score: 3

Certainly he considered his work on the Unified Field Theory the most important thing he was doing. But he was up to lots of other stuff. Fequently he would mount challenges against some irrationality or other of quantum physics. (Usually the irrationality won, but not always.)

In fact, Einstein was one of the unwilling architects of modern quantum theory. Because his challenges to it shaped the developing theory. And THIS was probably the actually most important thing he was doing.

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I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Re:Einstein knew he was wrong by caller_number_six · 2003-01-01 08:38 · Score: 2, Insightful

I know it's nitpicking, but isn't "wrong" kind of a misleading term here? I thought the whole idea of modern science rested on the notion that at best science asymptotically approaches "truth" as all the data comes in. "Wrong" to me implies that reaching "truth" is an option.

only its wavelength? by SHEENmaster · 2002-12-31 19:14 · Score: 2

So its wavelength is not an indication of speed as it is with every other type of wave?

So with light, velocity!=wavelength*frequency?

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You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.

Re:only its wavelength? by Alsee · 2002-12-31 19:52 · Score: 3, Informative

So with light, velocity!=wavelength*frequency?

For light velocity DOES wavelength*frequency.

But different people will see the same photon as having different wavelenths and different frequencies. When you travel very fast you get time dilation and time slows down for you. When your clock runs slow more "waves" will occure in one second. The frequency appears to increase. High speed also cause distortions in apparent distances.

EVERYONE will see the volocity as C. It doesn't matter if you are standing still or moving towards the light at 500 million miles per hour or moving away from the light at 500 million miles per hour. The light always looks to you like it is moving at speed C.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.

And just a stupid quibbling footnote by GMFTatsujin · 2002-12-31 19:17 · Score: 3, Interesting

String Theory doesn't touch Ether with a ten-foot pole.

String Theory, in part, seeks to explain the structure of the universe in such a way as to accomodate both gravitation and quantum effects. It does this by shifting the understanding of particles from a family of points that all have different properties (protons, electrons, quarks, what have you) toward a *truly* fundamental form of matter - a string - that displays different properties depending on its orientation and motion in space. One (and ONLY one) type of string, many configurations, all leading up to families of particles.

It's elegant, unproven, pretty damn keen, and possibly wrong, but worth a look. The math involved makes *predictions* about the fundamental properties of matter, rather than being built off of measurements of those properties (as quantum theory and relativity are). That's an important step that cannot be underscored enough.

String Theory doesn't posit that there's a universal medium that everything travels through, as Ether theory does. Instead, it describes a configuration of space that strings wiggle around in to produce the world that we're used to looking at.

String Theory rocks. I hope it's right.
GMFTatsujin

Re:And just a stupid quibbling footnote by Alsee · 2002-12-31 19:58 · Score: 2

The math involved makes *predictions* about the fundamental properties of matter

Yeah, except we have basicly zero clue what the predictions are. Pretty interesting definition of "prediction" :D

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2002-12-31 19:17 · Score: 2

Comment removed based on user account deletion

thx for the links. Here's one for you. by SHEENmaster · 2002-12-31 19:18 · Score: 2

Google has several good html tutorials. The tag should be enough.

Seriously though, thanks for them.

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You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2002-12-31 19:25 · Score: 2

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Comment removed by account_deleted · 2002-12-31 19:27 · Score: 3, Informative

Comment removed based on user account deletion

The QOTD I had by Ibag · 2002-12-31 19:30 · Score: 2

186,000 Miles per Second. It's not just a good idea. IT'S THE LAW

Well, I thought it was a funy coincidence.

Wait a sec: Kinetic energy is relative too! by Theovon · 2002-12-31 19:34 · Score: 2, Informative

>> It's (E^2) = (m^2)(c^4) + (p^2)(c^2).

Actually, it's E = m * c^2, where m is the rest mass times the Lorenz transform.

If you then subtract the rest energy from the energy when in motion (m*c^2 - m0*c^2), you get the kinetic energy, which at low speeds is approximately equal to 1/2*m*v^2, which we all recognize as the formula for kinetic energy in Newtonian physics.

That is to say, relativistic kinetic energy is not exactly equal to newtonian kinetic energy.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by JayateMo · 2002-12-31 19:47 · Score: 2, Informative

As someone pointed out, its work in progress(everything is). Kopeikin will try to settle this once and for all but One should know that there is people who disagree with Kopeikin's experiment model(pdf), e.g. H.Asada. He's view is that it will measure the EM speed, which everybody(well almost..) agrees on.In this(pdf) paper he points to the Light-cone effect on the Shapiro time delay (and here is Kopeikin's answer to that). There are a people out there, mostly physics and astronomers who questions the Gravity propagation speed(yeah..what speed are we talking about?), many of them called crackpots. Among famous astronomers you'll find Tom Van Flandern and friends here. You'll find he's wrap-up on the matter here. And if you want more, follow this thread.

Please try to use EM instead of just light, some people get confused :)

Physics is nothing by a model by dracken · 2002-12-31 19:54 · Score: 2

At this point, I would like to point out that physics is nothing by a model. Its a bunch of equations trying to create a model for what we observe so we can make predictions on the model. Now to explain an observation that is inconsistent with the model, we need to change the model. As it were - there are no "absolute thruths". Einstein's model and the theory based on it was astonishingly accurate and made amazing predictions. If our current observations are incosistent with the model - we need to revise it.

By the way are all the comment posters the one who answered "I would be reading slashdot" for what would be doing during the new year ;)

I hate to say this... by dasunt · 2002-12-31 20:15 · Score: 4, Funny

But why do you think that your brain is capable of understanding the basic forces of the universe?

Your brain evolved to keep you away from things that want to eat you, find things you want to eat, and basically preserve you until you could insure that you have spread your genes. Last time I checked, understanding the basic rules of reality wasn't needed to ensure that you live long enough to breed.

Hell, we'er just lucky that the same math that works on our scale also seems to work when we look at how the universe works.

Even now, logic has begun to fail us when we ask the deep questions. Consider this: What made this reality? Oh sure, I know the theories that suggest that this universe might have been created by another universe, and at this level, cause and effect goes out the window, leading to the possibility that this universe can create the ancestor of the universe that created it, but what allowed this gestalt to exist?

There's an Heinleinian phrase that occasionally gets said on slashdot: There ain't no such thing as a free lunch (TANSTAAFL). Too bad that its wrong, since the universe is the biggest example of a free lunch in action.

[ Don't feel so bad - my brain also seems hellbent to make me survive long enough to ensure my genes are passed on. Damn thing is that my body agrees with it and is planning to expire in half a century in order to free up resources for my future offspring. Its a comspiracy, I tell you... ]

Just my $.02

Re:I hate to say this... by pyrrho · 2002-12-31 22:28 · Score: 2

holy hell, I never thought of that! Heinlein would have known that implication. I'm not kidding. Did Heinlein intend this double meaning?

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-pyrrho
Re:I hate to say this... by Rik+van+Riel · 2003-01-01 01:38 · Score: 2

Last time I checked, understanding the basic rules of reality wasn't needed to ensure that you live long enough to breed.
It is needed for long term survival, though. One day this planet will be hit by a huge asteroid again, some day way into the future the sun will stop burning. If we want to survive beyond those hurdles we'll need to understand a lot about the universe; this means that physics is important to our survival.
OTOH, if all that mattered to us was getting away from the things that want to eat us and finding the next thing to eat, then I guess we don't really deserve long-time survival. Or do we ?
Re:I hate to say this... by canadian_right · 2003-01-01 08:10 · Score: 3, Insightful

The universe is not ruled by math. Math is an excellent TOOL used to describe the universe.
You can write down music, but the written music is just a description, not the actual music. In the same way, math is a handy, concise, notation used to write down descriptions of the universe.

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Anarchists never rule
Re:I hate to say this... by SEE · 2003-01-01 09:23 · Score: 2

What made this reality?

What makes you think reality had to be made in the first place? Why did the gestalt need to be "allowed" to exist? Even if you "answered" your question, you'd simply regress to "Okay, what made that?" There is no valid Origin of Existence Question, because, whatever the origin is (an ultimate cause, an infinite regression of causes with no begining, a closed causality loop where everything exists because everything else exists) it had to have existence without making.

Whether there's a truly infinite regress of causes, or there is an ultimate cause, or existience is a closed causality loop, at some point the answer is "It just is. It needed no creation. The whole gestalt exists because it exists." The only question is "what exists?"

"Why" can only have proximate answers, not ultimate ones -- and the reason you ask why is because you're misapplying a evolved instinct to seek proximate causes to the existence of the universe. The only thing you need to understand on the origin question is, ultimately, there's no "why" to understand.
Re:I hate to say this... by sckeener · 2003-01-02 07:14 · Score: 2

Gosh that reminds me of a theology discussion that I over heard between a mother and her son:

Son: What's created the universe?
Mom: God created the universe.
Son: Who created God?
Mom: God has always existed.
Son: Why can't the universe have always existed?

Mom: Shhhh...

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"Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain

That's not exactly true... by jpmorgan · 2002-12-31 20:22 · Score: 4, Informative

It's not exactly true that we have no clue what string theory's predictions are.

On one hand, the formulations of string theory are Very Hard (TM). I'm sure you think youv'e seen hard math, but there's hard math and there's string theory math. Classic standard model quantum mechanics and general relativity is hard math, nice hard partial differential equations to solve. String theory math makes this look easy though. It's so hard that nobody has yet even formulated the exact equations - everybody's working with approximations. So the predictions that people are making with string theory may not be completely accurate, as they aren't working from the real threory, just an approximation of it. Nice, eh?

On the other hand, most of the quantitative predictions that string theory does generate are mindboggling hard to test anyway, since in almost all respects string theory agrees with classic quantum mechanics (there's an oxymoron...) until you get to some pretty insane energies (think plank energy).

Fortunately, recently a few physicists have come up with some more subtle qualitative predictions that should prove feasible to test (for example, string theory predicts that cosmic microwave background radiation should be pixelated - the big bang didn't do antialiasing:).

Re:That's not exactly true... by Alsee · 2002-12-31 21:39 · Score: 2

I was just noting with amusment that while the theory makes absolute and inflexible predictions, almost without exception we can't tell what they are.

About the pixelation - I'm about to get in over my head, but what the hell. It seems like scientists are pretty sceptical about being about to detect the effect, and it doesn't seem to be particular to string theory. If I understand it right, the effect would be common to a variety of unified quantum theories.

It will be interesting to see what happens when someone figures out what the testable predictions actually are.

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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Re:That's not exactly true... by Brand+X · 2003-01-01 08:30 · Score: 2

I spent about 18 months trying to wrap my brain around the string theory math. At that point, I'd already gotten to the point that I could do QM and GR with very little difficulty (even occasionally coming up with tricks to shave pages off of the solutions my fellow physics grads came up with, thanks in large part to an extensive background in transform methods), and was writing very good multipass prediction software for cluster-scale orbitals (essentially, how likely is it that there will be an electron interaction at point x if the energy level of the cluster is in range y, with permutations i and j from outside electromagnetic fields; and what does the field look like; and how does it permute the said outside fields? - The whole point of this was computational analysis of nerve signal induction solutions...) and string theory was creating tangles in my gray matter comporable to what happens to those strings of colored lights people store in their attics. And this, even though my transform background made the multidimensional tensor analysis part of it trivial...

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-- Still waiting for the Nike endorsement

What is C relative to? by DesScorp · 2002-12-31 20:24 · Score: 4, Funny

Dude......C is relative to B. It's C++ and Java that's relative to C. Cobol is a different species altogether.....

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Life is hard, and the world is cruel

-1, Disbeliever by murky.waters · 2002-12-31 20:28 · Score: 3, Informative

Actually not quite, I do find this issue extremely fascinating and I had thought of submitting this story earlier today, but I felt that there wasn't any actual news here. The thing is, currently, there is no evidence whatsoever that supports VSL (Varying Speed of Light) theories in any appreciable way, as the NYT writes, Superstring theorist super-star (as far as physics goes :) Edward Witten calls the whole thing "unimpressive". VSL is basically a product of physicists brainstorming to somehow come up with an answer to that most pressing question: just how to consolidate quantum mechanics (Bohr, Heisenberg, et al., about the really really small stuff) with Einstein's general relativity (mainly about gravity, big'n'fast stuff).

It is actually not that much of a stretch. After all, when Einstein published his findings about ninety-eight years ago (I think), physicists abandoned the notion of absolute time (you have to spend a moment sometime to really appreciate what that means, most of the time, we really are Newtonians through and through). Today, some theoreticians and experimenters are considering to do the same with c, the speed of light.

The idea that c varies, however, is not all that new, it has already been conjectured to be a function of time, c -> c(t), to make sense of some odd stuff in cosmology. What's new in Dr. Magueijo and other's work is that they play with the idea of c varying in much more complex scenarios, having to do with with position, wavelength, momentum, etc.

It's worth mentioning that the latest shift in the literature tends to go to a varying alpha, the fine structure "constant", from which c can be seen to be derived from. For more info, check out this article, co-authored by Magueijo (full text in pdf, on windows you have to add ".pdf" to the filename).

Needlessly to say, there's dozens of scientific articles about this issue, some quite readable (I have a couple of links at home, writing this from a party I'm supposed to enjoy).

The real news in all of this, it seems to me, is how almost esoteric science (in a good sense) has made its way into mainstream journalism. And with the publishing of Magueijo's book, which will be among the more readable ones of its kind, being scheduled for 2003, there's certainly a hot issue to watch as it unfolds. Last, unlike with superstring theory (you know, the little elastics swinging in 10 or so dimensions, and whose detection is so many orders of magnitude away from current technology, it ain't funny anymore), VSL is going to get some experimental underpinnings in 2006 from NASA's GLAST (Gamma Ray Large Area Space Telescope) satellite.

Hey, with a little luck, who knows what the limit is going to be. It would be fucking amazing if we arrived at a correct Theory Of Everything within our lifetimes. Boy, what better issue for today.

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Imagine the Creator as a stand up commedian - and at once the world becomes explicable. -Mencken

Doubly Special Relativity by serutan · 2002-12-31 21:03 · Score: 2

Top 5 Rejected names for the new formula:
(read the article before modding)

Extra Special Relativity
Relatively Special Relativity
Double Secret Relativity
Not Ready for Prime Time Relativity
Britney Spears Nude !!!

Bummer by Tablizer · 2002-12-31 21:23 · Score: 3, Funny

But

E=mc^1.99999923850927642081748272

is just not quite as catchy. Harder to fit on T-shirts also.

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Table-ized A.I.

Oldie but goodie revised! by imag0 · 2002-12-31 21:23 · Score: 2

E=mc2 but only for large values of E

FTL == Time Travel ? by steveha · 2002-12-31 22:59 · Score: 3, Interesting

I'd like to understand why theory says faster-than-light travel is impossible.

I do understand why you cannot ever reach or exceed the speed of light through normal acceleration. The closer you get to the speed of light, the more aparrent mass you get, and thus the more energy it takes to accelerate you. To hit the speed of light would take infinite energy (and you would have infinite mass when you hit it). Infinite energy and mass aren't really available, so you can't have a speeed >= C by accelerating, no matter how hard you try.

The part I don't understand:

I have been told that theory forbids any travel faster than light, no matter what the means ("warp drive", "hyperspace", "teleporter", whatever). My understanding is that if you could, some observers would see you traveling back in time, and this is forbidden.

I would appreciate any explanation of this, or even just a pointer to a reference I can understand. Thanks.

steveha

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lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely

Re:FTL == Time Travel ? by Soft · 2003-01-01 01:14 · Score: 5, Interesting

I have been told that theory forbids any travel faster than light, no matter what the means ("warp drive", "hyperspace", "teleporter", whatever). My understanding is that if you could, some observers would see you traveling back in time, and this is forbidden.

Yes. One of the hypotheses of relativity is causality, that is, one event can possibly cause another only if the latter occurs at a later time than the former, and this must hold true for all possible observers whatever their frame of reference.
Now, as you know, the passing of time for an observer varies with his frame of reference (his speed, to put it simply). Hence, given two events, the interval of time from one to the other will not be the same for all observers. But if one is to cause another, it must always remain in its past; the sign of the time difference "t2-t1" must not change whatever the observer.
Unfortunately, my memories of relativity are too scarce to put this into equations, but if you could travel faster than light, you could, say, watch an asteroid smash into the Earth and warn your friend on the Centauri stock market to sell shares of all Terran businesses before anyone could "see" the flash of the impact.
And in a given frame of reference (maybe that of a traveler aboard a STL ship in-between), it would look as if you knew about it before it happened; stretching it further, it would be possible for the traveler (maybe through another FTL "jump") to warn Earth before the impact. Bye-bye causality.
If these situations are not to happen, information must not travel FTL.
Re:FTL == Time Travel ? by Soft · 2003-01-01 02:53 · Score: 2

I have been told that theory forbids any travel faster than light, no matter what the means ("warp drive", "hyperspace", "teleporter", whatever). My understanding is that if you could, some observers would see you traveling back in time, and this is forbidden.

Much better than my previous comment, see this relativity and FTL travel FAQ, which has a chapter about just that question.
Re:FTL == Time Travel ? by Soft · 2003-01-01 06:11 · Score: 2

Hm. That's assuming that what the law of causality describes as an 'observer' always uses his/her/its physical vision, which uses a speed-limited medium (light), and thus Causality's chain of events is defined by vision...

No. See my other reply, which is the one that should have been moderated up, not the one you are replying to.
I don't think that Causality cares much about who's there watching, when things happens. I always figured an 'observer' as something close enough, or able, to be in the same space _and_ time referential as the event, and above all _remain in the same referential_.

But you can't make that assumption; if a ship coming from Earth at high (but still sublight) speed crosses the Centauri system as you break the news, they will get the message although in their frame of reference the event really has not occurred yet. And if they also have FTL capability, they can send a message to Earth in time, effectively preventing an impact from happening thanks to the impact actually happening. Thus creating a time-travel-like paradox, which must be prevented, possibly by such means as you suggested.
About FTL itself, the whole point is making the travel's duration approach zero. An ideal FTL travel would make us go from one side of the universe to the other in no time flat, whatever size the universe is. No time travel involved. You wouldn't be 15+ billions years in the past, or future, or whatever, but exactly at the same time than anyone who didn't travel.

Anyone where? At what speed? In which gravity field?
Since, ideally, the events "departure" and "arrival" are in different places, they cannot be simultaneous in all frames of references; otherwise, you are implicitly supposing the existence of an "absolute" time, shared by everyone at every place in the Universe; this is exactly the hypothesis Relativity drops in favor of lightspeed being constant.
'Stretching it further' wouldn't change anything: the 'observer' (the FTL traveller) still doesn't stay in the same referential as the event during the whole incident (his time is 'compressed', while the event's is not).

Without knowing what kind of mechanism would produce FTL travel, one can't really argue about this, but the end result is the same. I really suggest looking at the FTL causality problem FAQ I pointed to in my other post.
If he actually managed to find an intact Earth _after_ it blew up, then A) it's the same Earth, when warning authorities hadn't worked, or B) it's a parallel earth, so the original event wouldn't have any impact (so to speak) to that universe's Causality.

Now that's another matter, and one which is, rightfully, just like time travel. And with such special provisions, then you can have FTL travel or communication, albeit restricted insofar as either some journeys or messages can be prevented in some circumstances (possibly including events which have not happened yet in your timeframe), or you may drop out into another Universe altogether. And then FTL travel isn't really fun, any more than time-travel in which you can't return to your particular time after killing your own grandfather...
Re:FTL == Time Travel ? by Soft · 2003-01-01 15:55 · Score: 3, Informative
Interesting material; I'm going to have to read it entirely (and find a way to keep the diagrams from displaying over the text... damn.)

The PostScript version might be more comfortable.
In your example, if X and Y share the same frame of reference, G and L may not be aware of anything, but the problem is that you don't take into account the point of view of someone traveling between X and Y, who will effectively see G going back in time, even if he takes the information travel time into account. (I shouldn't have mentioned seeing a "flash" in my previous message, it sent you off the wrong path...)
Did I miss something in your exemple? Could you describe the chain of events in more details?

The document will have told you all about it, but let's try. X is Earth, Y is Alpha Centauri, four light-years away and at rest relative to X. S is a ship traveling along the (XY) line at 0.866c, which yields a gamma-factor of 2. Times are measured in years, distances in light-years. t, t', t" are the times for X, Y and S.
Here are the events of interest in Earth's and Centauri's timeframe:
- S passes X: t=t'=0, t"=0.
- X sends a distress call to Y thanks to a "10c" device (so that it is not instantaneous): t=t'=4 (t"=2).
- Y receives call: t=t'=4.4 (t"=2.2).
- S passes Y: t=t'=4.6, t"=2.3; it is after Y got the message, so Y breaks the news.
Now, in the timeframe of S, things are slightly different; X and Y are seen as moving at 0.866c, and the distance between the two is only two light-years due to length contraction. Two events are easy:
- S passes X: t"=0, t=0 (t'=4.45).
- S passes Y: t"=2.3, t=1.15 (t'=4.6 because they say so).
See? From the point of view of S, not only you cannot consider that the time is the same at X and Y, but if a message from X bears the date t=4 but has already arrived at Y at t=1.15, it looks like it has come from the future.
Now, to understand that it does not merely look like time-travel, suppose Y tells S that X sent a distress call; S has the same kind of FTL device, which can reach X in about 0.22 years (it is two light-years away in the timeframe of S, and receding at 0.866c). In the timeframe of S:
- S sends inquiry to X: t"=2.3, t=1.15.
- X receives inquiry: t"=2.52, t=1.26.
so X receives a message at t=1.26 which contains information about something about to happen at t=4, time enough to send Bruce Willis. As you can see, there really is a paradox, which never appears without FTL devices.
Now, if you are not convinced, then I think you're thinking either:
1. S is moving but not X or Y, so the FTL device won't work the same, or:
2. when S passes Y and learns about X, it merely thinks that t=1.15, whereas it really is 4.6, or:
3. X does not move with respect to Y, whereas S is moving with respect to X, so the FTL communications won't work the same.
Item 3 could be valid, but you can always suppose that another ship S2 follows S and passes Earth at the right time; it won't be moving with respect to S, so FTL communications must work. For the other cases, you have to violate relativity in some way.
To settle it down, try to reverse the situation: A is Earth (time t), and two spaceships B and C (time t',t") are coming up on it at 0.866c, two light-years apart. In Earth's timeframe:
- B passes A: t=t'=0.
- C passes A: t=2.3, t'=1.15.
and in B's timeframe:
- B passes A: t'=t"=t=0.
- B sends out a distress call to C: t'=t"=4 (t=2).
- C is four light-years away in this timeframe, the message will reach it at t'=t"=4.4 if it travels at 10c.
- At t'=t"=4.6, C passes A (four light-years distance, still 0.866c) and tells them about B's problem.
When C passes A, in A's timeframe, t=2.3, t'=1.15; A sends a message to B at 10c, which arrives at t=2.52, t'=1.26...
If you object, remember, the situation has to be the same when you exchange A, B, C for S, X, Y, if no single frame of reference is to be privileged, so the objection has to work both ways.
If you single out a given frame of reference, however, and state that you believe that causality must only hold there, then you can build a consistent theory of FTL travel - the FAQ I pointed to does just that, by the way, when trying to reconcile Star Trek with relativity in part four. But I'm not too convinced by the postulated physics of subspace, and not sure that time-travel-like paradoxes are eliminated altogether.
Re:FTL == Time Travel ? by steveha · 2003-01-03 07:28 · Score: 2

The speed of light IS achievable with the use of a propulsion system that is acceleration based *AND* not matter based.

I look forward to seeing you test your working prototype. Every physics textbook I have ever seen says you are wrong, so it will be a triumph when you prove you are right.

You will need a catchy name for your amazing new space drive. I suggest you call it "impulse drive".

steveha

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lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely

Real scientists will not frown at good questions by Morgaine · 2003-01-01 00:55 · Score: 2

It isn't frowned upon by scientists to question evolution. Only non-scientists think that science seeks out the truth about reality, and most of them are quite unaware that science only creates models and correlates them with the observed behaviour of reality, and thus has no means to determine the actual structure of reality at all.

Admittedly, scientists occasionally get a mental lapse, forget their own principles, and start pontificating as if they knew The Truth, but it's not all that common except when they're acting defensively for some reason. Of course, they lose their science hat when they do that, despite protesting that it's still firmly on their heads.

It should be said though that the questioning has to be based on sound prior research and must use the language and logical tools and methods of science, because otherwise it merely wastes the scientist's time to have to provide the questioner with remedial education --- a very good reason for "frowning". That's the main reason why non-scientists sometimes get what they consider to be an unsatisfactory response to their questions: their points are usually just empty handwaving to a scientist, simply because they lack the scientific training to do better.

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"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra

Only two things are infinite by mraymer · 2003-01-01 02:02 · Score: 2

The universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the first one. - Einstein :)

Anyone else know that, for all his genius, Einstein was kind of loosely wrapped? He couldn't tie his shoes, and would often forget where he lived. His college professors didn't think he'd amount to very much, and he often copied the work of his classmates. It just goes to show you that anyone can have something important to contribute to the world...

--

"To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit." -Stephen Hawking

There *is* a spoon... by Rui+del-Negro · 2003-01-01 02:30 · Score: 2

...but Uri Geller bent it.

RMN
~~~

Link to open-minded scientific position by Morgaine · 2003-01-01 03:22 · Score: 2

If you've been trying to obtain more than a "frown" from scientists on questioning evolution then you'll know about some of the slightly better than normal critiques, like that made by creationist Timothy Wallace countering a representative article written by evolutionist Mark Isaak on the talk.origins website.

Those criticisms were then countered in turn by (open-minded evolutionist) Wayne Duck, and throughout his response you can see his open-minded scientific position quite clearly. Where Wallace makes a point using clear logic, he accepts it, rather than simply rubbishing the criticisms with more rhetoric. Note in particular the final page, in which Duck could not be more clear as to the status of evolution as a scientific theory: ultimately, while the huge weight of supporting evidence for evolution is still entire universes away from being a complete picture, it is believed by scientists to be reliable only because there is currently no other theory that comes anywhere even remotely near to providing as scientifically complete a model with substantiating evidence as does evolution. But, as he says, that could change tomorrow. It's unlikely.

--
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra

Occam's Razor. . . by Fantastic+Lad · 2003-01-01 04:12 · Score: 5, Insightful

Thanks for a good post. --I offer the following not as a criticism in any way, but just as a thought which has been bouncing around in my mind looking for an excuse to be expressed.

First off, I'm not a creationist. Indeed, I find that whole debate to be entirely infernal, as both sides seem to me quite flawed in their own ways. That being said. . .

Occam's Razor bugs me. As a deductive tool, it is a pretty good one; it works for the most part. What I find unsettling, however, is that it seems to have become, thanks to its presentation and treatment in popular media, understood and accepted by many as a de facto scientific law when it is not.

It is a rule of thumb, and only a rule of thumb. --It is only a rule of thumb, because it is not always right. Every time something unexpectedly complex turns out to be the reality behind a phenomenon which might otherwise have been explained through simple means, Occam's Razor is blunted.

Example:

When Alexandre Graham Bell first announced to the world that he had discovered a way to send a voice signal over a wire, the world erupted with both excitement and disbelief. One major newspaper even ran a story written by experts which attempted to debunk Bell's claim. They used diagrams demonstrating that sound waves sent down thin metal tubes of the diameter Bell was using for wires, could not possibly travel the kinds of distances he claimed. The experts were engineers well versed in the science and dynamics of sound as employed in the kinds of voice communication pipe systems once used large ocean going vessels. To the writers of the article, they were being entirely reasonable.

"Which is more likely?" they must have asked themselves, "That Bell has created some magical new invention to send sound along miles of very thin tubes? Or that he is lying?"

Occam's Razor is deeply rooted in how one perceives, how much information there is available to work with, and what has been previously accepted by culture as normal and/or outlandish.

-Now Bell was, of course, proven to be right. When words crackled out from crude speakers for all to hear, the enthusiastic debunkers, (and there is never any shortage of enthusiastic debunkers or respected, conservative media outlets to give them a voice and print their diagrams), had to quietly go mum and withdraw their objections. But that was in part due to large forces which wanted and allowed Bell to be proven right. If you don't advertise a fact or discovery, facts and discoveries can easily vanish. People have short memories. People have short lives. Without active perseverance, knowledge is a self-burying commodity until it becomes large enough to self-sustain, and even then, it is not so very difficult to forget important turns of history after only a few fickle generations have passed.

Science as a concept, is a pure, wonderful thing, but it does not know everything. Indeed, many institutions are not so pure as the science which they employ; it is well known that individuals with weak morals, and corrupt institution will suppress data, twist data and even make up data on a basis regular enough that the public pool of knowledge has been polluted to the point that the employment of Occam's Razor is by no means reliable in today's arena of public thought.

Just something to consider next time you feel the need to slam a new idea. Remember that Occam gave us a deductive tool, not an irrefutable law.

-Fantastic Lad

Re:Occam's Razor. . . by Fulcrum+of+Evil · 2003-01-01 05:38 · Score: 2

"Which is more likely?" they must have asked themselves, "That Bell has created some magical new invention to send sound along miles of very thin tubes? Or that he is lying?"
So, basically, these scientists set up a strawman (thin tubes) and knocked it over. I don't see how this affects Occam's razor, as it is primarily applicable to natural phenomena, whereas Bell's invention is an act of engineering.

--
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Re:Occam's Razor. . . by JebusIsLord · 2003-01-01 16:30 · Score: 2

Right, so making a leap in assumption that the "dense ball of matter" was put there somehow by a humaniform deity of unknown origin using unknown techniques is a simple explaination. Wow, sorry we clearly have differing views of what constitutes "simple". At least the big bang theory is internally consistent, actually it explains itself quite nicely using simple physical laws originating from within itself.

--
Jeremy
Re:Occam's Razor. . . by Fantastic+Lad · 2003-01-01 18:15 · Score: 2

In my view it's not an application of Occam's razor until you've at least agreed on the observations. "There is obviously sound coming out of the other end of the telephone". Then you can start and build theories as to why that is happening. And given competing theories Occam can help you chose.

Precisely my point. The problem is that Occam's Razor is not always used correctly, or with the level of responsibility you describe.

The problem with people standing on the shoulders of giants is that eroneous nonsense can find endorsement in at best, foolish ways, and at worst, dangerous ways. --Though twisted, (like the Bell example), such paths of logic might sound reasonable enough to the lay person.

It bothers me to see Occam quoted so frequently, largely, I think, thanks to the film, 'Contact'. --Which, incidentally, even touched on this very issue. Jodi Foster's character used it to help deal with the question of whether or not it was reasonable to expect the existence of alien life in the cosmos. But, as demonstrated, that very thinking was easily and convincingly used in the other direction. "Is it more likely that a fantastic thing has happened, or that somebody perpetrated a hoax?" Occam's Razor, because it is so interpretive, opens itself up to annoying circles of semantic debate. This is why I remain wary of the lay person who uses it as their primary line of argument. When used properly, it is a powerful tool. But so is a chainsaw. Powerful tools should be treated with care.

-Fantastic Lad
Re:Occam's Razor. . . by toriver · 2003-01-02 02:55 · Score: 2

God set the rules that the Universe plays by and the Universe went and played by those rules ...
Ah, the Intelligent Design hypothesis. Wonderful. And if God was so powerful he could lay down those rules, then whatever created God must have been even mightier...
if God did not set the rules, who/what did?
Does someone/something need to have set them? And which of the many gods people have believed in did? The Christian God is a late-comer to the "party", and seems to be a derivate of older faiths anyway. In fact, shouldn't you be a Hindu instead? They had a creation myth for centuries before you guys.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by rsidd · 2003-01-01 04:15 · Score: 2

There are a couple of other good answers to your question already. About photons, it's best to keep that out in this discussion: basically, there are two different, separate corrections to classical Newtonian mechanics: relativity, and quantum mechanics. It turns out that classical electromagnetic theory is already correct with respect to relativity. quantum electrodynamics is the quantum version of it, but it is needed only in the limit of small photon numbers: that is, when the intensity of light is very low, or when interactions with single electrons (or other subatomic charged particles) are important. If we're thinking about radio waves, optical telescopes, etc, we don't need to worry about single photons at all. But to understand how atoms emit light, or the photoelectric effect, or how CCDs work, we do need to use quantum mechanics.

Even in quantum mechanics, photons aren't the same "sort" of particles as electrons. You can put any number of photons in the same "state", thereby approximating a classical wave. You can put no more than one electron in the same state (two if you ignore spin), so you can never have anything like a classical wave of electrons.

About your other questions: yes, the field does lose its strength as it moves out (except for special cases like a laser). Light is a rapidly oscillating electromagnetic field. We call it transverse because the electric and magnetic fields point perpendicular to the direction of motion (and also perpendicular to each other). All this comes out of Maxwell's equations, and is discussed in elementary texts like Resnick and Halliday. Not possible to give a detailed answer on slashdot, I'm afraid.

Complex numbers by theolein · 2003-01-01 04:50 · Score: 2

In my first year at uni back in the early 80's, we were learning the basics of relativity and we got around to the equation E=mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2). As I was just learning about complex numbers in the Maths and Electric Power courses at the same time I recognised that while the mass and energy tend exponentially towards infinity as v aproaches c, it becomes a complex number when v is geater than c. Being a total science fiction nut I asked my prof what this meant. He was just irritated and basically told me to bugger off. I was dissapointed, being convinced that I had discovered the key to FTL travel and read up as much as I could about Tachyons (theoreticals particles that always move FTL) because as I saw it, complex or irrational numbers do not mean that time goes backward.

At the time I thought that this in some way correlated with some sort of "hyperspace", "subspace", "foldspace" or any of those science fiction terms used to make it quicker to get to B from A by transitioning to some special state of space.

With time I forgot about it (discovered girls and booze) but I have never found anything anywhere that goes into the mathematical problems created by v>c in that equation.

Why is it that it is always just dissed off as childs play, while physicists grapple with complex notions of 10-dimensional strings etc?

Re: Much ado about nothing by bcrowell · 2003-01-01 05:35 · Score: 2

They have neither convincing experimental backing, nor strong theoretical reasons why they should be true.
Well, actually I think there are some pretty good theoretical motivations for what they're doing. The basic idea is that there's a certain distance scale, called the Planck scale, at which we need a theory of quantum gravity, which we don't have. At the Planck scale, space and time are probably granular, or foamlike, rather than smooth.

So what happens when a particle's wavelength gets so short that it's comparable to the Planck scale? One reasonable conjecture is that the wavelength can't get any shorter than that, because spacetime itself has a granularity at that scale. It would be like trying to move a rook on the chessboard by half a square.

The shorter a particle's wavelength is, the more momentum and energy it has. Therefore there might be an upper limit on the energy a particle can have. That's the physical content of the modified form of the equation.

Also, re

They have neither convincing experimental backing...

you might want to take another look at the article. It discusses some empirical observations of cosmic rays that helped to motivate this stuff.

--
Find free books.

Examine your assumptions by naasking · 2003-01-01 05:49 · Score: 4, Interesting

What makes you think there even was a beginning? Keep in mind that we have never actually seen the beginning of an event and the end; those boundaries are imposed by us. Reality is really a continuous cascade of effects which themselves become causes. How do we know there even is a beginning to the universe?

--
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.

Re:Examine your assumptions by Dannon · 2003-01-02 07:23 · Score: 2

As you say, everything can be broken down into causes and effects, and effects themselves become causes. This does lead us into a sort of chicken-and-egg question with the universe: Was there ever a first cause which was not itself the effect of something else?

I would say, yes. How do we know? Because we are here. We exist. And for things to exist, they had to begin existing at some point.

Beginnings and endings are not all imposed by our minds. That I first breathed air at a certain point in time measurable as the equivalent of just over twenty-five orbits of the Earth about the sun is fact, not opinion. The end of the Roman Empire centuries ago was a fact, not a point of view. We can't point at the exact time and place, but we do know that there was a first culture ever to use writing, or currency, or the wheel, or even fire.

I can only rationalize one temporal view of the universe in which there is no such thing as an independent cause, and that would be an infinite loop of the universe going through the same motions of creation and destruction... which still begs the eternal question, how did that loop get there?

Your assertion is that the universe is causes 'all the way back' to infinity. I can't help but think of the old woman in the science lecture who believed that the world was flat, on the back of a tortoise. When asked what the tortoise stood on, her reply was, "You can't fool me, it's tortoises all the way down."

Down to what?

--
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
Re:Examine your assumptions by naasking · 2003-01-02 16:24 · Score: 2

And for things to exist, they had to begin existing at some point.

This is exactly the assumption I would have you question. Do not take human perceptions for granted, for they can easily decieve you.

Beginnings and endings are not all imposed by our minds.

There exist one possible source of beginnings: true random events. Since we have not conclusively determined that true randomness exists or is even possible, I stand by my statement that no human has ever witnessed a true beginning. So how can we know they exist?

That I first breathed air at a certain point in time measurable as the equivalent of just over twenty-five orbits of the Earth about the sun is fact, not opinion.

The fact that you percieve this as a beginning of something new is just that: your perception. It is nothing new but the result of your development and birth. Your atoms know little difference between the time they were ejected from a star to the time they formed part of your lungs. It was merely a continuous ride from creation (if it happened) to now. The fact that there is something meaningful to "breathing" are values we impose. A "breath" is not inherently significant, it is not an event in spacetime except that you label it so.

Down to what?

An amusing anecdote, but it merely emphasises my point about the underlying assumptions inherent in human perceptions. Humans think in limited terms because we are limited creatures; volumes, spaces, here to there, all concepts expressed in terms of limitations and the thought of infinity thus seems nonsensical. But simply because we cannot conceive of it, does not mean it does not exist.

In fact, there are physicists working with theories of "infinite time"/no creation. They do not see time as existing as such; existence is merely a relative spatial configuration that sort of morphs into the next moment. There is no past to speak of, no future, only the evolving present, the eternal NOW. Pretty Neat (TM).

--
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.

Re:I think you're right by Hektor_Troy · 2003-01-01 05:55 · Score: 2

In a word:

0wn3d :-D

But - don't worry about that. You're not the only one who's fallen for it - both my physics and chemistry theachers fell for it. Unfortunately I can't claim originality points for it - I stole it off the web somewhere.

As far as I remember, a bronze plaque next to the main door to a University or some such place (The Niels Bohr Institute) said:

Question everything!

Underneath it was a graphiti:
why?

--
We do not live in the 21st century. We live in the 20 second century.

Re:gravity effects are instantaneous by Fulcrum+of+Evil · 2003-01-01 06:01 · Score: 2

As I recall, if you model the solar system with gravity propagating at C, everything crashes into the sun in fairly short order.

--
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"

Putting the Bombardier Beetle argument to rest by bonch · 2003-01-01 06:06 · Score: 2

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/bombardier.html

Of course this should be followed by. . . by kfg · 2003-01-01 06:41 · Score: 2

the answer to Santayana's infamous final exam which posed that very question.

Because. :)

As for your sig, why do you think that guns are long, skinny, and have holes down the middle of their barrels?

KFG

Quick review by deblau · 2003-01-01 14:30 · Score: 4, Interesting

E=mc^2 is actually a simplified form of the real equation, E=mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2).

Please don't forget your subscripts! As everyone learns in basic special relativity, total energy, which is kinetic + potential, is

E = m0 * c^2 * gamma,

where gamma = 1 / sqrt( 1-v^2/c^2 ) and m0 is the rest mass.

At v = 0, gamma = 1 and E = m0 c^2, Einstein's famous formula for rest energy. Kinetic energy is given by KE = E - m0 c^2, or

KE = m0 c^2 ( gamma - 1 ).

To see any appreciable effect of velocity, consider the situation where you are going fast enough to double your effective mass (gamma = 2). Solving for velocity gives v = c sqrt(3/4) = 86.6% of the speed of light. Not gonna happen with current technology (outside of atom smashers).

As v -> c, gamma -> infinity and this is Einstein's rationale for saying it's impossible to accelerate any matter up to the speed of light, since doing so would require an infinite amount of kinetic energy. On the other hand, the formula for photons is

E = p c = h c / lambda = h nu,

where p is momentum, h is Planck's constant, lambda is wavelength, and c / lambda = nu is the frequency. Since photons are never at rest (remember the constant speed of light?), you won't see any m's make an appearance here. And just for the record, this last formula explains the photoelectric effect, which is what won Einstein his Nobel, not E = m c^2.

--
This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.

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