If you had any idea what the NSA is or what they do, you'd realize how fucking stupid you sound. yeah, he didn't even mention wiretapping once in his whole story! Hah, nice one.:)
That point (an unproveable assertion, BTW) is totally irrelevant. The technology doesn't change our rights.
Well, yeah, and think about it. Let's even assume that the founder would be incapable of "conceiving" of such a device. After all, it is pretty freaking amazing compared to 1700s technology. So let's just say you could raise one from the dead and show him an iPhone and show him how it lets you communicate with others, and lets you store personal documents and contact information, and he'd say "Incredible! I never would have conceived of such a wondrous Device!"
And then once he'd gotten over his amazement, you asked him "Okay, so do you think something like this counts as 'papers' or 'effects' with regards to the 4th Amendment? Do you think police should be able to confiscate and search through this device without probable cause or a search warrant? Is that what you intended when you wrote it, that it be limited to literal papers and nothing more advanced?"
What the flying fuck do you think he would say?
This "Oh but times have changed" BS is nothing but a way for them to sweep the principles that our country was founded on under the rug of technicalities.
Well it's my belief that slavery was Unconstitutional from the beginning, without the 13th Amendment being strictly necessary.
It never says slaves aren't people. It actually calls them people, it refers to them as "Persons held to Service or Labour" in contrast with "Free persons".
The 5th Amendment just says "person", and it sure seems like slaves were deprived of their liberty without due process.
Of course it's one thing to say that's what it meant, it's another entirely for that to actually matter.
It says well regulated militia, but it specifically says that the people's right to bear arms shall not be infringed.
Are you going to also argue that the 4th Amendment only grants a "collective" right to be free from searches? In both cases, the right is called "The right of the people "
iPhone: [walking down the street] Doo do doo... nice night for a stroll, listenin' to some tunes... 4th Ammendment: [walking other way] Hello there, citizen! iPhone: Oh hi! Who are you? Haven't seen you around here much. 4th: I'm the 4th Ammendment to the U.S. Constitution! I guarantee your right to be free from searches without a court-issued warrant. iPhone: Ah, that's neat. I don't pay much attention to that politics stuff... 4th: Yeah, I know it's tough, that's why I'm out on the streets, trying to remind people of their civil liber- [Suddenly NSA and DoJ leap out from an alley and attack 4th] NSA: Rar! DoJ: C'mere, bitch! 4th: Aaaaaaah! iPhone: Dude! What the fuck?! 4th: Oh god, oh god! They're raping me! They're raping me right here on the street! iPhone: Oh shit! Dude do you need help? [stepping forward] Cut it out you assholes! NSA: [pulls out a switchblade] DoJ: Back off, fucker, if you don't want to be next! 4th: Please help me! Please- Ah not there! iPhone: Whoa dudes... Chill, seriously... 4th: [incoherent screaming] iPhone: [backing away] Ah, yeah... I gotta go... check out the sale at Whole Foods or something... [starts running] NSA: [shouting at iPhone] You didn't see shit! 4th: [moaning and sobbing]
You do realize that the mars mission is decades away right? More money can be found as more money is needed.
It's only decades away if it begins now, and there isn't enough money to get it started unless NASA scraps a lot of their other, more useful, programs.
If there's not enough money to start it now, meaning it will not make any significant progress, what makes you think there's going to be money in the future? If the one who actually wants to turn this mission into their legacy can't get the money to fund it, how is some future President? How could the President not realize this? I'll answer that one: Of course he realizes it.
Bush and the current administration has been working on peace in the middle east since 2002 that I specifically know of.
You really need to look past the headlines and speeches and whatever news source makes you think that stern talking is at all similar to actual action. It hasn't been part of his policy at all. When you won't even meet with both parties involved then you aren't taking the issue seriously. Only in the last year has any attempts at substantive action been taken. But neither Condi Rice nor Bush have any hope of accomplishing anything -- too-little, too-late.
That rogue should be terminated on the spot, charges should be brought up for misuse of public funds and what ever project was being worked on should be evaluated for whether or not it should be scrapped. But regardless of that, you admit that the problem wasn't bush but a rogue NASA official which is why I am surprised. It seems that you aren't dumb enough to believe the stuff you spout but at the same time still spout it.
No, the problem was an unfunded mandate that would necessitate axing useful programs. And that was Bush's fault.
The solution was to ignore the mandate and continue doing the useful work that NASA was already doing with the blessing of Congress.
You seem to be confused.
You bring up this Mar's bitches thing again as if your obsessed with the mars missions. I will give you a hint, there are more things to science then what you want there to be. I suggest you get over yourself and the Mar's bitched problem will probably disappear. It won't disappear because of anything magical, it will disappear because it is a non-issue that you want to make an issue.
No shit it's going to disappear, because it is and always has been pure vapor, never a serious project. It's only potential was to damage real projects. And you're right, I'm so obsessed with Mars missions, I made it part of my campaign for President. Oh wait. This is an article about the Moon mission that is part of Bush's Mars plan, so what the fuck else do you think I'm going to be talking about, genius?
No wonder you have such odd views, because you always end up thinking the opposite of what was actually stated. Must be why you think Bush is serious about middle east peace. Hint for the clueless: The guy arguing that we should ditch the (unfunded, unrealistic) mars mission is not the one who is obsessed with mars missions. "Mars, Bitches!" is just a way of pointing out that it was nothing more than PR fluff, and was never going to be anything more.
Oh but you know you got me thinking... One rather weird result (well, my interpretation) of these experiments is that it is possible for things to occur instantaneously, but only if they don't convey any information.
If I'm not mistaken, Information Theory arose to a large degree because of QM. It's rather amazing to me that "information" has become a physical entity or property unto itself like atoms and electromagnetic waves, something that shows up in equations, and which can effectively govern how fast things can happen.
First, Bush asked for 1 billion in new funding and diverted some from the then 11 billion budget which was supposed to be skimmed from existing project over the next five to 11 years.
Yes, exactly, he wanted them to skim from existing projects, projects that were themselves hoping for a budget increase, because his budget increase was not close to sufficient to fund the mars project.
Second, your concept of the middle east peace process seems to mimic a headline news blurb. Bush and his administration has been working for middle east peace since the start of his first term. It wasn't until recently that he actually took a trip there outside of US military bases and war zones.
I'm talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and achieving peace there, which most everyone agrees is crucial to achieving peace in the middle east, not The War On Terror which has caused more war and conflict in the region. Bush abandoned the Roadmap and has paid virtually no attention -- in the form of action, not speeches -- to resolving the conflict. But then in his last year in office, he's going to fly out to Israel and broker a peace treaty? When he's already burned all his political capital in the region via Iraq? Yeah right.
I'm actually surprised that your even blaming this on Bush too.
Why are you surprised? He was the one who decided NASA should focus on Mars regardless of whether they had the budget to do so. Thank God that "rogue NASA official" ignored the unfunded mandate and didn't axe useful programs (more than had already been) in order to chase after some politician's attempt at a Kennedy-esque legacy.
Isn't there a repair mission already scheduled for the Hubble? I think it is slated for 2008 and will replace the batteries, gyroscopes, a spectrograph, and the main camera which should put it back in operation until at least 2013.
Yes, thanks to that "rogue official" who decided that spending their money on a practical, useful, and for that matter amazing science tool was more important than "Mars, Bitches!" If Bush had his way -- and he almost did, previous Hubble repair missions were axed due to diverting funds to Mars projects -- Hubble would be set to burn up on reentry.
You would detect the gravity wanes before you see the GRB, but not before it happened, necessarily.
If you detect the gravity waves then you have received information from the source of the GRB. If you can send and receive information faster than light, then you can violate causality. With the help of time dilation and some buddies moving at a fraction of the speed of light relative to you, you could send yourself a message into your past.
Maybe, but I said exactly what I meant, which is that if you're talking about faster-than-light, we have a sound basis for saying that's probably not true.
Also SR can show that for an observer moving at relativistic speed, an event can appear to have not happened yet. But a stationary observer right next to him, this event has already happened.
They may not agree on when events occurred due to time dilation, but they would still agree that a given cause preceded a given effect.
If you are able to cross the frames of reference, then you can easily violate causality, fortunately, there is no practical way to do this, but you could in theory.
If by frame of reference you mean light cone, then yes that allows you to violate causality. But it's not just impractical to leave one's light cone, it's impossible according to SR.
Finally, violation of causality is, as far as I can see, only an issue for us. I'm not convinced that the universe cares, particularly.
The universe is what it is, whether that includes causality or not. But a universe without causality would be extremely hard to make sense of. There's an assumption of self-consistency to the universe that underlies not just causality, but all of our attempts to understand the universe through experiment and all those attempts would be rendered void if we could not continue making this assumption.
So given that, and the fact that so far SR has been an astoundingly accurate and well-verified theory, I'm going to say that until evidence shows us otherwise that causality exists.
There are very few, if any masses, that give rise to appreciable gravity, that are moving anywhere near fast enough to allow relativity to come into play. Yes, theoretically, there is an effect, but it is trivially small. For all practical purposes, the solar system and the galaxy motions are governed by Newton.
It's not trivial to GPS calculations, it makes a significant difference in accuracy. Relativity is always "in play", it's just that for many applications Newton's Laws provide a sufficiently precise approximation. Yet there is in fact a measurable difference due to relativity. Time dilation was experimentally verified decades ago simply by flying an aircraft at high altitudes, proving that you do not need near-c velocities or extremely large masses for relativity to "come into play". Thus it should be no surprise that there are also measurable differences in the more massive and higher velocity earth-sun system.
"Practical purposes" is an engineering definition where using the simplest approximation that gets the job done is alright. For purposes of knowing what is happening to the greatest accuracy, the solar system is governed by Einstein, and this has been empirically verified.
Also, nobody has ever MEASURED a speed factor for gravity.
Not directly, as that requires detecting a gravity wave. However we can measure the motion of the planets and of stellar objects and find that it conforms to the limits of our ability to measure with Relativity and light-speed gravity, and does not conform to Newton and instantaneous gravity.
Until somebody actually DOES measure it, I think it is safe and practical to go with Newton and assume that for present purposes, gravity is not subject to time, at least not in our present frame of reference.
Until somebody actually does measure it, I think it is safe to go with the most advanced theory that makes the most precisely verified predictions of gravity, rather than using the assumptions of a theory which we know for a fact does not match empirical reality.
You're trying to say that because Newton makes "practical" predictions that are close enough a lot of the time, that therefore gravity actually works how Newton said it did. That is simply an unscientific conclusion. The fact that gravity waves have not been verified does not mean that you can arbitrarily assume whatever you want instead -- your hypothesis must match the experimental evidence, and even at low speeds on earth that is simply not the case.
We have to very carefully examine our uniformitarian assumptions, even if they seem very comforting to us.
So, what, are you saying that in the PAST Newton's laws precisely governed the universe more precisely than relativity?
The most egregious assumptions here are being made by you, because you are assuming things that contradict the experimental evidence. Simply by rejecting Newton in favor of Einstein, physics has shown that it has no problem re-visiting long-cherished assumptions when they are shown to be false. You should take a lesson from them.
Coincidentally or not, it seems that in quantum dimensions there is no limitation in speed, information can be transmitted instantly. And, what is more, there are experimental results confirming this.
Despite experiment showing that one can have "spooky action at a distance", it is in fact impossible to transmit information this way. It turns out that any and all information was in fact transfered along with the entangled particles themselves as you separated them at sub-luminal speeds. So you can't use quantum entanglement to send information, but you can use it in a quantum-crypto system to make sure nobody listens in on your communication.
I confess I'm not too confident on those proofs that information cannot be transfered faster than light. Until someone creates a theory that conciliates quantum mechanics with general relativity, I'm willing to believe anything. Maybe irreversible time is just an illusion created by the thermodynamic effects in our macroscopic brains...
The proofs are quite solid in showing that ftl information transfer results in a violation of causality assuming Special Relativity is true. And SR assumes causality, which is why we instead rule out ftl information travel.
So far, while clearly not compatible with SR, QM has made no moves towards trying to disprove it. And that includes the SR assumption that causality holds. While I agree that we should wait for the theory that reconciles QM and SR to arrive (especially given what new and unique views of the universe both those theories gave us), it isn't necessary for such a theory to actually overturn either one.
he equations of gravity are simple and do NOT contain a time element.
Force of Gravity = G*(m1*m2)/r^2
Why hello, Sir Isaac Newton! Great to see you up and about so soon after waking up from cryofreeze. A lot has happened while you were gone. This internet thing, as you may have noticed. Also quite a bit of science. Turns out that, due to the fact that the speed of light is constant for all inertial observers, the assumption you made that time is constant across frames of reference was incorrect! This has lead to a number of remarkable new theories, including an entire new theory of Gravity in which space and time form a single multi-dimensional space that is curved by mass!
But seriously, why don't you quote me the formula for the electric force (which is virtually identical, replace mass with charge and change the constant) and try to tell me how this obviously means that neither time nor the speed of light are relevant. Quoting a Newton's gravitational formula to refute the idea that relativity implies light-speed gravity is pretty hilarious.
Now the ACCELERATION produced by gravity DOES have a time unit, but gravity itself does not.
When there's a mass involved, acceleration and force are the same thing. Even Newton knew that.
Since the orbital speeds are very much less than the speed of light, relativity doesn't enter the picture.
Of course it enters the picture, it's our current model for all gravity, not just gravity at high speeds. It's just a small enough deviation from Newton's theories at small masses/speeds that it can be safely ignored. However it absolutely *does* have an effect. This is why GPS requires compensating for relativistic effects in order to get accurate readings. And why we see alterations of the planetary orbits in excess of what Newton predicted. They're... just... small.
But the funny part about that is the implication that relativity *does* enter the picture when you're closer to the speed of light. So at low speeds, relativity "doesn't enter the picture", and you can just quote Newton's formula and note the lack of a time component... but at high speeds, gravity suddenly becomes subject to relativity and is thus limited to c? That's awesome.
Guess what? Relativity applies everywhere. You can use Newton as a useful approximation, but that's all it is. arguing gravity is instant using Newton is pointlessly wrong.
If the main opposition is truly because "BUSH" wanted it then it speaks volumes for just how juvenile the opponents have become.
The main opposition is because Bush wanted it, and then didn't fund it. He wants a positive legacy (since his *ahem* other legacy isn't looking so hot), but he didn't want to spend any of the political capital necessary to actually do it. It's like his suddenly trying to jump start the Middle East Peace Plan he'd been ignoring for 7 years, only here it's even easier to just "mandate" that it be done without doing anything substantive to accomplish it. He gets to seem like a visionary in the present, and if it somehow ever happens he can claim credit, and if not, nobody will remember that niggling detail of his Presidency anyway.
Bush's "Mars, Bitches!" plan, and resulting budget problems since now NASA had a huge new project to worry about and no additional money to do it with, was one of the factors that directly contributed to the scrapping of any Hubble repair mission.
You want to talk about generating enthusiasm? The continued operation of Hubble would generate ten times more interest than a moon/mars plan that in the most optimistic thinking of a hypothetical plan by a guy who had no intention of being around to see any of it turned into reality isn't going to do anything for a decade.
LIGO is like two cars 4km long that are parked at right angles, and their passenger compartments are a vacuum, with lasers reflecting off the rear-view mirrors...
..... It basically means you're assuming that causality exists......
While in general, yes, I assume causality exists, I was in my post hypothesizing about a universe in which it doesn't exist and the rather inherent problem of ever making sense of it.
It is true that GR assumes causality, and it may in fact be proven false. I couldn't even begin to speculate on what would replace it. Even the models being worked on now to replace GR include causality.
Why do you jump to that conclusion? Gravity has to work either instantaneously or incredibly fast. The sun holds the earth in place where it is NOW, not where it was eight minutes go. Gravity doesn't involve time, only mass and distance.
c is incredibly fast -- as fast as is possible, in fact. And I assume you mean that the sun holds the earth in place where the sun appears to be now, which is true, and is ~8 minutes behind where it actually is, and this effect can and has been measured as a gradual change in orbit. Space (distance) and time are rather intricately linked in Relativy, you know.
As far as we can tell from indirect observation, gravity obeys c. However this implies that if you have an oscillating gravitational system, then it should create waves and they should be directly observable. That's the ultimate proof of this theory.
It is an assumption. But it's an assumption with more experimental evidence and theoretical backing than your assertion that gravity doesn't involve time.
Oooh, yeay. Another joyride that contributes absolutely nothing to space exploration.
By the same logic, commercial aquariums contribute nothing to oceanic exploration. Oh, wait, that's completely wrong. The commercial aspect funds the oceanic research which by itself produce significant returns. Could "joyrides" perhaps provide Scaled Composites with the financial ability to tackle bigger problems? Or would jumping straight to re-usable human-rated orbital vehicles be the wisest financial choice for a startup? Oh, sorry, financial solvency isn't 'advancing the state of the art'. I guess we'll wait for the Boeings of the world to do it then.
It really seems as though you're assuming that the only thing Scaled Composites is capable of is creating up-scaled versions of Spaceship One. I think you're selling Rutan and team incredibly short. Rutan has contributed a large number of advancements to the state of the art in atmospheric craft and now to sub-orbital space craft. This was how Spaceship One came to be in the first place. To assume that nothing further can come from him seems short sighted. Or is it just that he seems to want to get a paycheck for his work in the meantime? Well sorry, but Virgin footed the bill for SH1, and they want their SH2.
In another way, I do think SH1 has contributed something to the state of the art -- a craft that can perform re-entry from literally any orientation. That kind of built-in safety is exactly the kind of thing I like to see. Before you counter with the obvious, of course this won't literally work as-is in scaled-up fashion for a re-entry from LEO. Yet, just like Rutan applied principles he learned from aircraft to apply to sub-orbital spacecraft, if he can carry the principle into orbit and get a craft that has even an additional 5% margin of error on reentry would be a dramatic improvement.
That's a pretty interesting interpretation, actually. No idea how it would fare before an actual physicist, but hey, I'm not one, and I'm impressed.:)
Just one clarification, though... A standing or static electric field does not induce a magnetic field, nor vice versa. Only changing electric fields induce changing magnetic fields and vice versa. So yes there must necessarily be some initial movement (usually oscillation) to get this effect at all.
Slashdot Mirror
That is because a right cannot be granted.
:P
Gee there must be a glitch in the Matrix, because I'm experiencing deja vu.
Sorry for not including the word "unreasonable" in my fucking joke. It surely was meant to be a treatise on Constitutional law.
Also, as the other poster pointed out, the NSA does not in fact sexually assault anthropomorphic documents.
Thank you. My next screenplay will be much better thanks to your criticism.
That point (an unproveable assertion, BTW) is totally irrelevant. The technology doesn't change our rights.
Well, yeah, and think about it. Let's even assume that the founder would be incapable of "conceiving" of such a device. After all, it is pretty freaking amazing compared to 1700s technology. So let's just say you could raise one from the dead and show him an iPhone and show him how it lets you communicate with others, and lets you store personal documents and contact information, and he'd say "Incredible! I never would have conceived of such a wondrous Device!"
And then once he'd gotten over his amazement, you asked him "Okay, so do you think something like this counts as 'papers' or 'effects' with regards to the 4th Amendment? Do you think police should be able to confiscate and search through this device without probable cause or a search warrant? Is that what you intended when you wrote it, that it be limited to literal papers and nothing more advanced?"
What the flying fuck do you think he would say?
This "Oh but times have changed" BS is nothing but a way for them to sweep the principles that our country was founded on under the rug of technicalities.
Well it's my belief that slavery was Unconstitutional from the beginning, without the 13th Amendment being strictly necessary.
It never says slaves aren't people. It actually calls them people, it refers to them as "Persons held to Service or Labour" in contrast with "Free persons".
The 5th Amendment just says "person", and it sure seems like slaves were deprived of their liberty without due process.
Of course it's one thing to say that's what it meant, it's another entirely for that to actually matter.
True, true, and it doesn't say it's granting the right, it says that it shall not be infringed.
It says well regulated militia, but it specifically says that the people's right to bear arms shall not be infringed.
Are you going to also argue that the 4th Amendment only grants a "collective" right to be free from searches? In both cases, the right is called "The right of the people "
The word "militia" must be read in the context of when the document was written. The modern day definition is quite different.
More importantly, the definition of "the People", to whom the right to bear arms is granted, has not changed at all.
iPhone: [walking down the street] Doo do doo... nice night for a stroll, listenin' to some tunes...
4th Ammendment: [walking other way] Hello there, citizen!
iPhone: Oh hi! Who are you? Haven't seen you around here much.
4th: I'm the 4th Ammendment to the U.S. Constitution! I guarantee your right to be free from searches without a court-issued warrant.
iPhone: Ah, that's neat. I don't pay much attention to that politics stuff...
4th: Yeah, I know it's tough, that's why I'm out on the streets, trying to remind people of their civil liber-
[Suddenly NSA and DoJ leap out from an alley and attack 4th]
NSA: Rar!
DoJ: C'mere, bitch!
4th: Aaaaaaah!
iPhone: Dude! What the fuck?!
4th: Oh god, oh god! They're raping me! They're raping me right here on the street!
iPhone: Oh shit! Dude do you need help? [stepping forward] Cut it out you assholes!
NSA: [pulls out a switchblade]
DoJ: Back off, fucker, if you don't want to be next!
4th: Please help me! Please- Ah not there!
iPhone: Whoa dudes... Chill, seriously...
4th: [incoherent screaming]
iPhone: [backing away] Ah, yeah... I gotta go... check out the sale at Whole Foods or something... [starts running]
NSA: [shouting at iPhone] You didn't see shit!
4th: [moaning and sobbing]
[fin]
You do realize that the mars mission is decades away right? More money can be found as more money is needed.
It's only decades away if it begins now, and there isn't enough money to get it started unless NASA scraps a lot of their other, more useful, programs.
If there's not enough money to start it now, meaning it will not make any significant progress, what makes you think there's going to be money in the future? If the one who actually wants to turn this mission into their legacy can't get the money to fund it, how is some future President? How could the President not realize this? I'll answer that one: Of course he realizes it.
Bush and the current administration has been working on peace in the middle east since 2002 that I specifically know of.
You really need to look past the headlines and speeches and whatever news source makes you think that stern talking is at all similar to actual action. It hasn't been part of his policy at all. When you won't even meet with both parties involved then you aren't taking the issue seriously. Only in the last year has any attempts at substantive action been taken. But neither Condi Rice nor Bush have any hope of accomplishing anything -- too-little, too-late.
That rogue should be terminated on the spot, charges should be brought up for misuse of public funds and what ever project was being worked on should be evaluated for whether or not it should be scrapped. But regardless of that, you admit that the problem wasn't bush but a rogue NASA official which is why I am surprised. It seems that you aren't dumb enough to believe the stuff you spout but at the same time still spout it.
No, the problem was an unfunded mandate that would necessitate axing useful programs. And that was Bush's fault.
The solution was to ignore the mandate and continue doing the useful work that NASA was already doing with the blessing of Congress.
You seem to be confused.
You bring up this Mar's bitches thing again as if your obsessed with the mars missions. I will give you a hint, there are more things to science then what you want there to be. I suggest you get over yourself and the Mar's bitched problem will probably disappear. It won't disappear because of anything magical, it will disappear because it is a non-issue that you want to make an issue.
No shit it's going to disappear, because it is and always has been pure vapor, never a serious project. It's only potential was to damage real projects. And you're right, I'm so obsessed with Mars missions, I made it part of my campaign for President. Oh wait. This is an article about the Moon mission that is part of Bush's Mars plan, so what the fuck else do you think I'm going to be talking about, genius?
No wonder you have such odd views, because you always end up thinking the opposite of what was actually stated. Must be why you think Bush is serious about middle east peace. Hint for the clueless: The guy arguing that we should ditch the (unfunded, unrealistic) mars mission is not the one who is obsessed with mars missions. "Mars, Bitches!" is just a way of pointing out that it was nothing more than PR fluff, and was never going to be anything more.
A theorist at Michigan
My, what an awesome discovery! Those chaps at Michigan sure are smart. Someone give them some more funding.
State
I mean, what a bunch of nonsense. It isn't even the *right* Higgs boson!
I kid, I kid...
Oh but you know you got me thinking... One rather weird result (well, my interpretation) of these experiments is that it is possible for things to occur instantaneously, but only if they don't convey any information.
If I'm not mistaken, Information Theory arose to a large degree because of QM. It's rather amazing to me that "information" has become a physical entity or property unto itself like atoms and electromagnetic waves, something that shows up in equations, and which can effectively govern how fast things can happen.
First, Bush asked for 1 billion in new funding and diverted some from the then 11 billion budget which was supposed to be skimmed from existing project over the next five to 11 years.
Yes, exactly, he wanted them to skim from existing projects, projects that were themselves hoping for a budget increase, because his budget increase was not close to sufficient to fund the mars project.
Second, your concept of the middle east peace process seems to mimic a headline news blurb. Bush and his administration has been working for middle east peace since the start of his first term. It wasn't until recently that he actually took a trip there outside of US military bases and war zones.
I'm talking about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and achieving peace there, which most everyone agrees is crucial to achieving peace in the middle east, not The War On Terror which has caused more war and conflict in the region. Bush abandoned the Roadmap and has paid virtually no attention -- in the form of action, not speeches -- to resolving the conflict. But then in his last year in office, he's going to fly out to Israel and broker a peace treaty? When he's already burned all his political capital in the region via Iraq? Yeah right.
I'm actually surprised that your even blaming this on Bush too.
Why are you surprised? He was the one who decided NASA should focus on Mars regardless of whether they had the budget to do so. Thank God that "rogue NASA official" ignored the unfunded mandate and didn't axe useful programs (more than had already been) in order to chase after some politician's attempt at a Kennedy-esque legacy.
Isn't there a repair mission already scheduled for the Hubble? I think it is slated for 2008 and will replace the batteries, gyroscopes, a spectrograph, and the main camera which should put it back in operation until at least 2013.
Yes, thanks to that "rogue official" who decided that spending their money on a practical, useful, and for that matter amazing science tool was more important than "Mars, Bitches!" If Bush had his way -- and he almost did, previous Hubble repair missions were axed due to diverting funds to Mars projects -- Hubble would be set to burn up on reentry.
You would detect the gravity wanes before you see the GRB, but not before it happened, necessarily.
If you detect the gravity waves then you have received information from the source of the GRB. If you can send and receive information faster than light, then you can violate causality. With the help of time dilation and some buddies moving at a fraction of the speed of light relative to you, you could send yourself a message into your past.
You could have phrased that better.
Maybe, but I said exactly what I meant, which is that if you're talking about faster-than-light, we have a sound basis for saying that's probably not true.
Otherwise I have and made no comment.
Also SR can show that for an observer moving at relativistic speed, an event can appear to have not happened yet. But a stationary observer right next to him, this event has already happened.
They may not agree on when events occurred due to time dilation, but they would still agree that a given cause preceded a given effect.
If you are able to cross the frames of reference, then you can easily violate causality, fortunately, there is no practical way to do this, but you could in theory.
If by frame of reference you mean light cone, then yes that allows you to violate causality. But it's not just impractical to leave one's light cone, it's impossible according to SR.
Finally, violation of causality is, as far as I can see, only an issue for us. I'm not convinced that the universe cares, particularly.
The universe is what it is, whether that includes causality or not. But a universe without causality would be extremely hard to make sense of. There's an assumption of self-consistency to the universe that underlies not just causality, but all of our attempts to understand the universe through experiment and all those attempts would be rendered void if we could not continue making this assumption.
So given that, and the fact that so far SR has been an astoundingly accurate and well-verified theory, I'm going to say that until evidence shows us otherwise that causality exists.
There are very few, if any masses, that give rise to appreciable gravity, that are moving anywhere near fast enough to allow relativity to come into play. Yes, theoretically, there is an effect, but it is trivially small. For all practical purposes, the solar system and the galaxy motions are governed by Newton.
It's not trivial to GPS calculations, it makes a significant difference in accuracy. Relativity is always "in play", it's just that for many applications Newton's Laws provide a sufficiently precise approximation. Yet there is in fact a measurable difference due to relativity. Time dilation was experimentally verified decades ago simply by flying an aircraft at high altitudes, proving that you do not need near-c velocities or extremely large masses for relativity to "come into play". Thus it should be no surprise that there are also measurable differences in the more massive and higher velocity earth-sun system.
"Practical purposes" is an engineering definition where using the simplest approximation that gets the job done is alright. For purposes of knowing what is happening to the greatest accuracy, the solar system is governed by Einstein, and this has been empirically verified.
Also, nobody has ever MEASURED a speed factor for gravity.
Not directly, as that requires detecting a gravity wave. However we can measure the motion of the planets and of stellar objects and find that it conforms to the limits of our ability to measure with Relativity and light-speed gravity, and does not conform to Newton and instantaneous gravity.
Until somebody actually DOES measure it, I think it is safe and practical to go with Newton and assume that for present purposes, gravity is not subject to time, at least not in our present frame of reference.
Until somebody actually does measure it, I think it is safe to go with the most advanced theory that makes the most precisely verified predictions of gravity, rather than using the assumptions of a theory which we know for a fact does not match empirical reality.
You're trying to say that because Newton makes "practical" predictions that are close enough a lot of the time, that therefore gravity actually works how Newton said it did. That is simply an unscientific conclusion. The fact that gravity waves have not been verified does not mean that you can arbitrarily assume whatever you want instead -- your hypothesis must match the experimental evidence, and even at low speeds on earth that is simply not the case.
We have to very carefully examine our uniformitarian assumptions, even if they seem very comforting to us.
So, what, are you saying that in the PAST Newton's laws precisely governed the universe more precisely than relativity?
The most egregious assumptions here are being made by you, because you are assuming things that contradict the experimental evidence. Simply by rejecting Newton in favor of Einstein, physics has shown that it has no problem re-visiting long-cherished assumptions when they are shown to be false. You should take a lesson from them.
Coincidentally or not, it seems that in quantum dimensions there is no limitation in speed, information can be transmitted instantly. And, what is more, there are experimental results confirming this.
Despite experiment showing that one can have "spooky action at a distance", it is in fact impossible to transmit information this way. It turns out that any and all information was in fact transfered along with the entangled particles themselves as you separated them at sub-luminal speeds. So you can't use quantum entanglement to send information, but you can use it in a quantum-crypto system to make sure nobody listens in on your communication.
I confess I'm not too confident on those proofs that information cannot be transfered faster than light. Until someone creates a theory that conciliates quantum mechanics with general relativity, I'm willing to believe anything. Maybe irreversible time is just an illusion created by the thermodynamic effects in our macroscopic brains...
The proofs are quite solid in showing that ftl information transfer results in a violation of causality assuming Special Relativity is true. And SR assumes causality, which is why we instead rule out ftl information travel.
So far, while clearly not compatible with SR, QM has made no moves towards trying to disprove it. And that includes the SR assumption that causality holds. While I agree that we should wait for the theory that reconciles QM and SR to arrive (especially given what new and unique views of the universe both those theories gave us), it isn't necessary for such a theory to actually overturn either one.
he equations of gravity are simple and do NOT contain a time element.
Force of Gravity = G*(m1*m2)/r^2
Why hello, Sir Isaac Newton! Great to see you up and about so soon after waking up from cryofreeze. A lot has happened while you were gone. This internet thing, as you may have noticed. Also quite a bit of science. Turns out that, due to the fact that the speed of light is constant for all inertial observers, the assumption you made that time is constant across frames of reference was incorrect! This has lead to a number of remarkable new theories, including an entire new theory of Gravity in which space and time form a single multi-dimensional space that is curved by mass!
But seriously, why don't you quote me the formula for the electric force (which is virtually identical, replace mass with charge and change the constant) and try to tell me how this obviously means that neither time nor the speed of light are relevant. Quoting a Newton's gravitational formula to refute the idea that relativity implies light-speed gravity is pretty hilarious.
Now the ACCELERATION produced by gravity DOES have a time unit, but gravity itself does not.
When there's a mass involved, acceleration and force are the same thing. Even Newton knew that.
Since the orbital speeds are very much less than the speed of light, relativity doesn't enter the picture.
Of course it enters the picture, it's our current model for all gravity, not just gravity at high speeds. It's just a small enough deviation from Newton's theories at small masses/speeds that it can be safely ignored. However it absolutely *does* have an effect. This is why GPS requires compensating for relativistic effects in order to get accurate readings. And why we see alterations of the planetary orbits in excess of what Newton predicted. They're... just... small.
But the funny part about that is the implication that relativity *does* enter the picture when you're closer to the speed of light. So at low speeds, relativity "doesn't enter the picture", and you can just quote Newton's formula and note the lack of a time component... but at high speeds, gravity suddenly becomes subject to relativity and is thus limited to c? That's awesome.
Guess what? Relativity applies everywhere. You can use Newton as a useful approximation, but that's all it is. arguing gravity is instant using Newton is pointlessly wrong.
If the main opposition is truly because "BUSH" wanted it then it speaks volumes for just how juvenile the opponents have become.
The main opposition is because Bush wanted it, and then didn't fund it. He wants a positive legacy (since his *ahem* other legacy isn't looking so hot), but he didn't want to spend any of the political capital necessary to actually do it. It's like his suddenly trying to jump start the Middle East Peace Plan he'd been ignoring for 7 years, only here it's even easier to just "mandate" that it be done without doing anything substantive to accomplish it. He gets to seem like a visionary in the present, and if it somehow ever happens he can claim credit, and if not, nobody will remember that niggling detail of his Presidency anyway.
Bush's "Mars, Bitches!" plan, and resulting budget problems since now NASA had a huge new project to worry about and no additional money to do it with, was one of the factors that directly contributed to the scrapping of any Hubble repair mission.
You want to talk about generating enthusiasm? The continued operation of Hubble would generate ten times more interest than a moon/mars plan that in the most optimistic thinking of a hypothetical plan by a guy who had no intention of being around to see any of it turned into reality isn't going to do anything for a decade.
Here's an analogy:
LIGO is like two cars 4km long that are parked at right angles, and their passenger compartments are a vacuum, with lasers reflecting off the rear-view mirrors...
..... It basically means you're assuming that causality exists ......
While in general, yes, I assume causality exists, I was in my post hypothesizing about a universe in which it doesn't exist and the rather inherent problem of ever making sense of it.
It is true that GR assumes causality, and it may in fact be proven false. I couldn't even begin to speculate on what would replace it. Even the models being worked on now to replace GR include causality.
Why do you jump to that conclusion? Gravity has to work either instantaneously or incredibly fast. The sun holds the earth in place where it is NOW, not where it was eight minutes go. Gravity doesn't involve time, only mass and distance.
c is incredibly fast -- as fast as is possible, in fact. And I assume you mean that the sun holds the earth in place where the sun appears to be now, which is true, and is ~8 minutes behind where it actually is, and this effect can and has been measured as a gradual change in orbit. Space (distance) and time are rather intricately linked in Relativy, you know.
As far as we can tell from indirect observation, gravity obeys c. However this implies that if you have an oscillating gravitational system, then it should create waves and they should be directly observable. That's the ultimate proof of this theory.
It is an assumption. But it's an assumption with more experimental evidence and theoretical backing than your assertion that gravity doesn't involve time.
Oooh, yeay. Another joyride that contributes absolutely nothing to space exploration.
By the same logic, commercial aquariums contribute nothing to oceanic exploration. Oh, wait, that's completely wrong. The commercial aspect funds the oceanic research which by itself produce significant returns. Could "joyrides" perhaps provide Scaled Composites with the financial ability to tackle bigger problems? Or would jumping straight to re-usable human-rated orbital vehicles be the wisest financial choice for a startup? Oh, sorry, financial solvency isn't 'advancing the state of the art'. I guess we'll wait for the Boeings of the world to do it then.
It really seems as though you're assuming that the only thing Scaled Composites is capable of is creating up-scaled versions of Spaceship One. I think you're selling Rutan and team incredibly short. Rutan has contributed a large number of advancements to the state of the art in atmospheric craft and now to sub-orbital space craft. This was how Spaceship One came to be in the first place. To assume that nothing further can come from him seems short sighted. Or is it just that he seems to want to get a paycheck for his work in the meantime? Well sorry, but Virgin footed the bill for SH1, and they want their SH2.
In another way, I do think SH1 has contributed something to the state of the art -- a craft that can perform re-entry from literally any orientation. That kind of built-in safety is exactly the kind of thing I like to see. Before you counter with the obvious, of course this won't literally work as-is in scaled-up fashion for a re-entry from LEO. Yet, just like Rutan applied principles he learned from aircraft to apply to sub-orbital spacecraft, if he can carry the principle into orbit and get a craft that has even an additional 5% margin of error on reentry would be a dramatic improvement.
That's a pretty interesting interpretation, actually. No idea how it would fare before an actual physicist, but hey, I'm not one, and I'm impressed. :)
Just one clarification, though... A standing or static electric field does not induce a magnetic field, nor vice versa. Only changing electric fields induce changing magnetic fields and vice versa. So yes there must necessarily be some initial movement (usually oscillation) to get this effect at all.
It won't let me read the book. :(
But that's quite fascinating.