(David Evens) wrote in message ...
On Sun, 28 Sep 2003 09:41:22 +0800, "Tom Potter"
wrote:
"Bill Hobba" wrote in message
...
Randy Poe wrote;
You write an incomprehensible anti-relativity article. The
reviewers can't make head or tail of it. Which rule
applies?

You see the problem don't you? He does not believe that so it must be a
conspiracy or the establishment are stupid or some such rubbish. The
problem is you will never convince someone like that otherwise. Sad
really.

Thanks
Bill

I suggest that the folks who object to General Relativity do so,
not because they believe
"that it must be a conspiracy of the establishment"
but because it is not a viable theory.

As can be seen by the debates on and about General Relativity,
and the amount of the taxpayers money that is spent on
education, seminars, publications, supporting G.R. experts, etc.
and the lack of useful applications for it,
General Relativity consumes more time and resources
to support, than it returns in terms of productivity.

For example, I challenge Bill
to post how G.R. would model a mass spring system,
model a simple series-parallel resistance circuit,
or compute the ionization potentials of a few simple atoms.

The few applications that General Relativity models better than
more viable theories, do not require G.R. as the practical limits
of all but extremely tightly controlled experiments can be
modeled by more viable theories, and even the few cases where
G.R. makes for an elegant curve fit, the more viable theories
can be adapted to account for variations from the simpler
expressions of the theory.

No doubt, elegant theories should be pursued,
in the search for subtle effects that can be
profitable applied for the advancement of mankind,
but as it is, G.R. is a waste of time and resources,
and is essentially, a means by which
modern day priests extract money from the general public,
and charlatans hide behind to pretend to be
privy to useful, esoteric knowledge
(As a means of stroking their egos, or impressing people.).

To sum up,
rather than read the ego tripping, and insults
and the rationalizations of the people who defend G.R.
I'd like to see objections to my position
be expressed in viable, real world calculations such as
a spring mass system, a series-parallel circuit,
ionization potentials, etc.

Any of your terrorist friends manage to come up with an objection to
GR that is: a) Not based on delusion alone, b) not completely wrong,
and c) not completely unable to be an objection to GR?

I repeat:
"To sum up,
rather than read the ego tripping, and insults
and the rationalizations of the people who defend G.R.
I'd like to see objections to my position
be expressed in viable, real world calculations such as
a spring mass system, a series-parallel circuit,
ionization potentials, etc."

It is clear that Davy Evens is incapable of defending G.R.
and like most people has been brainwashed to
think that it is a viable physics theory.

Hopefully, some intelligent poster will attempt to rationalize
the viability of G.R. and show that it
is a viable physics theory,
and has the benefit/cost ratio greater than unity.

In other words, does G.R. benefit society, or cost society?

--
Tom Potter

"George Wilkie" wrote in message
om...
Tom Potter wrote:

As can be seen by the debates on and about General Relativity,
and the amount of the taxpayers money that is spent on
education, seminars, publications, supporting G.R. experts, etc.
and the lack of useful applications for it,
General Relativity consumes more time and resources
to support, than it returns in terms of productivity.

So if it can't be applied, the theory shouldn't be studied?

And tell me, how does one spend money to "support" a theory. Most work
being done on GR is trying to find a situation in which it does not
apply, ie. trying to _disprove_ or improve it. Until that is done
sucessfully, scientists will continue to apply it to make sense of our
universe and it will continue to be taught.

For example, I challenge Bill
to post how G.R. would model a mass spring system,
model a simple series-parallel resistance circuit,
or compute the ionization potentials of a few simple atoms.

How's this: general relativity is used in GPS systems to compensate
for the small delay in time due to the change of the earth's
gravitational field between the ground and the satellite. GPS
measurements are so fine that this correction becomes significant.

Several posters have claimed that
"general relativity is used in GPS systems to compensate
for the small delay in time due to the change of the earth's
gravitational field between the ground and the satellite. GPS
measurements are so fine that this correction becomes significant."
but I have challenged all of these posters to provide
the data that proves their assertion, and so far no one
has provided the data. All they have provided are
specifications and solutions to equations,
which prove nothing.

And even if the GPS clocks are offset by some
calculated amount to compensate for effects that other
models do not provide, this does not mean that
G.R. is a cost effective, viable physics theory.

In other words, daily adjustments are made to the
GPS clocks, and even if the clocks had large drifts,
this are compensated for by the daily adjustments.

The bottom line is,
if a theory is not cost effective,
and a simpler theory can do everything the costly theory
can do, why waste time, money and resources on the less viable theory?

For example, using a theory that gives results to ten decimal places
is of no values, if the system artifacts are in the one percent range.
This is like calculating a length to ten places,
and using an ax to make the cut.

As I indicated, I'd like to see a few real world calculations
that prove the viability of G.R. in computing
spring-mass systems,
simple series-parallel resistance circuits,
ionization potentials of a few simple atoms, etc.

No doubt there are problems such
as stresses in critical system components with complex shapes,
where it is desirable and perhaps essential to use tensors
to generate useable numbers, but this is not G.R.

The question is:
Is G.R. a viable, cost-effect tool that benefits society,
or an over hyped,. limited application, model?

--
Tom Potter http://tompotter.us

"Tom Potter" wrote in message ...
"Bill Hobba" wrote in message
...
Randy Poe wrote;
You write an incomprehensible anti-relativity article. The
reviewers can't make head or tail of it. Which rule
applies?

You see the problem don't you? He does not believe that so it must be a
conspiracy or the establishment are stupid or some such rubbish. The
problem is you will never convince someone like that otherwise. Sad
really.

Thanks
Bill

I suggest that the folks who object to General Relativity do so,
not because they believe
"that it must be a conspiracy of the establishment"
but because it is not a viable theory.

Those who object to GR should do so for the simple reason
that establishment ****heads have never had a viable theory of gravity.


As can be seen by the debates on and about General Relativity,
and the amount of the taxpayers money that is spent on
education, seminars, publications, supporting G.R. experts, etc.
and the lack of useful applications for it,
General Relativity consumes more time and resources
to support, than it returns in terms of productivity.

The amount of taxpayer money that spent on GR
is close to zero compared to the amount of taxpayer money
spent on Calculus and Newton moron gravity.
So your comments have been stricten from the cosmic record.
Since for one reason the only people who spend taxpayer
money on GR are Astronomers, not Mathematician and Chemist ****heads.
Who only spend money on particle-nothing.


For example, I challenge Bill
to post how G.R. would model a mass spring system,
model a simple series-parallel resistance circuit,
or compute the ionization potentials of a few simple atoms.

The few applications that General Relativity models better than
more viable theories, do not require G.R. as the practical limits
of all but extremely tightly controlled experiments can be
modeled by more viable theories, and even the few cases where
G.R. makes for an elegant curve fit, the more viable theories
can be adapted to account for variations from the simpler
expressions of the theory.

String Theory has already been trough out. Due to the initial
condition that scientients are more clueless about
dimensions than they are about taxes.


No doubt, elegant theories should be pursued,
in the search for subtle effects that can be
profitable applied for the advancement of mankind,
but as it is, G.R. is a waste of time and resources,
and is essentially, a means by which
modern day priests extract money from the general public,
and charlatans hide behind to pretend to be
privy to useful, esoteric knowledge
(As a means of stroking their egos, or impressing people.).

But, since the Choice in Gravity is limited to
Einstein and Feynmann, we've stuck with Einstein
by default, since Feynmann was a MORON.


To sum up,
rather than read the ego tripping, and insults
and the rationalizations of the people who defend G.R.
I'd like to see objections to my position
be expressed in viable, real world calculations such as
a spring mass system, a series-parallel circuit,
ionization potentials, etc.

That's quite trivial. Since the only people who
have ever defended GR are mathematicians.
Of which Einstone was one. And he would have even
had troubles locating a Circuit Court Judge, nevermind a Judge
who's opinion really mattered.

Tom,

The question is:
Is G.R. a viable, cost-effect tool that benefits society,
or an over hyped,. limited application, model?

Probably not.

Would you only learn something new if you could apply it to your job
so that you can get a raise? If not, why waste money on a book?

Just because the knowledge does not directly benefit society
monetarily does not mean it is not worth persuing. Man is a curious
animal. In my view, far better is it to satiate this curiosity than to
save a few extra bucks that you would spend on things that don't
really benefit society anyway.

Bill Hobba wrote:
You see the problem don't you? He does not believe that so it must be a
conspiracy or the establishment are stupid or some such rubbish. The
problem is you will never convince someone like that otherwise. Sad
really.


Gregory L. Hansen replied:
Every once in a while I think about keeping a list of articles published
in the major journals that are at odds with "establishment" science.
They're certainly there, I come across them now and then, even published
in the last few years, but I've never tried to make any kind of
comprehensive search.


It isn't going against the establishment the gives me problems it is the
refusal to:

1. Not acknowledging the establishment is usually fully in accord with
experiment and so is a perfectly valid theory
2. The belief that you are somehow brighter and better than all the smart
people that created the establishment
3. The discovery of some point that has escaped the attention of
generations of students and physicists since Einstein or whoever published
their works and when you point out this is highly unlikely - nonsense such
as your not independently thinking or whatever is all they can say.
4. Delusions of grandeur where that believe they have found something that
puts them in the same class as people like Landau of Feynman when their idea
is obviously wrong or similar things have been known for some time
5. Failure to elucidate the physical basis for their beliefs when simple
considerations indicate that what their proposing is more complicated than
generally accepted theories. It is even worse when you point this out and
the response indicates they do not even understand the fundamental point
your making.
6. The attacking of the person that originated the theory as if this somehow
undermines the countless other people who have written on it as well.

I could go no but I am sure you get the idea. These probably would not
apply to articles published is respectable journals. I suspect the tone of
the paper would give them away but not reading a lot of journal articles I
would not really know.

Thanks
Bill


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Tom Potter wrote:
I suggest that the folks who object to General Relativity do so,
not because they believe
"that it must be a conspiracy of the establishment"
but because it is not a viable theory.

Please point me to a peer reviewed paper that refutes GR? Such refutation
agreed by acknowledged experts such a Steve Carlip and John Baez.

Tom Potter wrote:
As can be seen by the debates on and about General Relativity,
and the amount of the taxpayers money that is spent on
education, seminars, publications, supporting G.R. experts, etc.
and the lack of useful applications for it,
General Relativity consumes more time and resources
to support, than it returns in terms of productivity.

And when is trying to understand the world a waste of time and money? Now
the real world applications of GR may be limited AS YET but for SR it is the
plaything of the work a day engineer - I have been assured by one that
without SR the cathode ray tube your probably writing this on would not be
able to be designed.

Tom Potter wrote:
For example, I challenge Bill
to post how G.R. would model a mass spring system,
model a simple series-parallel resistance circuit,
or compute the ionization potentials of a few simple atoms.

There are realms that GR applies to and realms it does not. I challenge you
to model the universe at large on a Newtonian system that is fully in accord
with experiment - in particular I challenge you to explain the background
radiation by such a model.

Tom Potter wrote:
The few applications that General Relativity models better than
more viable theories, do not require G.R. as the practical limits
of all but extremely tightly controlled experiments can be
modeled by more viable theories, and even the few cases where
G.R. makes for an elegant curve fit, the more viable theories
can be adapted to account for variations from the simpler
expressions of the theory.

Can light ray bending by the sum be explained by an alternative peer
reviewed theory that is not just as weird as GR?

Tom Potter wrote:
To sum up,
rather than read the ego tripping, and insults
and the rationalizations of the people who defend G.R.
I'd like to see objections to my position
be expressed in viable, real world calculations such as
a spring mass system, a series-parallel circuit,
ionization potentials, etc.

Please explain the calculations on page 188-196 of Gravitation and
Space-time by Ohanianon and Ruffini on the bending of light by some other
means.

Thanks
Bill


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On Mon, 29 Sep 2003 09:43:48 +1000, "Bill Hobba"
wrote:

Bill Hobba wrote:
You see the problem don't you? He does not believe that so it must be a
conspiracy or the establishment are stupid or some such rubbish. The
problem is you will never convince someone like that otherwise. Sad
really.


Gregory L. Hansen replied:
Every once in a while I think about keeping a list of articles published
in the major journals that are at odds with "establishment" science.
They're certainly there, I come across them now and then, even published
in the last few years, but I've never tried to make any kind of
comprehensive search.


First, you're painting with way too broad a brush...

It isn't going against the establishment the gives me problems it is the
refusal to:

1. Not acknowledging the establishment is usually fully in accord with
experiment and so is a perfectly valid theory

I can think of several such as Petr Beckmann, Burniston Brown,
Herbert Dingle, Thomas G. Barns, Tom Van Flandern, Harold
Puthoff, Halton Arp... etc. that challenge conventional perspective.
I don't think that ANY would meet this criteria...

2. The belief that you are somehow brighter and better than all the smart
people that created the establishment

This is simply a red-herring. At the time of many (such as Galileo,
Newton, ...etc.) they WERE! This has been the case throughout
history, and only history (after the fact sorts it out). Usually
those are due to intuitive insights that all others simply do NOT
think about! Many aren't of course, but the argument is simply false
in the face of history...

3. The discovery of some point that has escaped the attention of
generations of students and physicists since Einstein or whoever
published their works and when you point out this is highly
unlikely - nonsense such as your not independently thinking or
whatever is all they can say.

That also happens (or are you claiming it does not?). However,
science is never injured by ideas. It is severely injured by
closed minded bigotry... Since the scientific method sorts it out
ideas and philosophical perspectives are beneficial NOT harmful.

4. Delusions of grandeur where that believe they have found something
that puts them in the same class as people like Landau of Feynman
when their idea is obviously wrong or similar things have been known
for some time

This is a complaint of personal ego, like Feynman loved to say, "what
do you care what other people think". Again, the bottom line is
explanatory power.

5. Failure to elucidate the physical basis for their beliefs when simple
considerations indicate that what their proposing is more complicated
than generally accepted theories. It is even worse when you point this
out and the response indicates they do not even understand the
fundamental point your making.

I suggest you remember what Einstein said about simplicity. Somtimes
simplicity leads to extreme complexity.

6. The attacking of the person that originated the theory as if this
somehow undermines the countless other people who have written on
it as well.

And, for the most part (and certainly not always) the perceived
attack is transfered in the mind of the reader. The old addage you
don't want to be the bearer of bad news to people with extreme egos
(like Saddam)...

I could go no but I am sure you get the idea. These probably would not
apply to articles published is respectable journals. I suspect the tone
of the paper would give them away but not reading a lot of journal
articles I would not really know.

Paul Stowe

In article ,
Bill Hobba wrote:
Bill Hobba wrote:
You see the problem don't you? He does not believe that so it must be a
conspiracy or the establishment are stupid or some such rubbish. The
problem is you will never convince someone like that otherwise. Sad
really.


Gregory L. Hansen replied:
Every once in a while I think about keeping a list of articles published
in the major journals that are at odds with "establishment" science.
They're certainly there, I come across them now and then, even published
in the last few years, but I've never tried to make any kind of
comprehensive search.


It isn't going against the establishment the gives me problems it is the
refusal to:

1. Not acknowledging the establishment is usually fully in accord with
experiment and so is a perfectly valid theory

Maybe scientists around the world think they successfully work with a
theory that's obviously and fatally flawed, or they know something that
the crank doesn't.

If experiment shows fast pions to live longer than slow pions, no amount
of pontificating to the contrary will change that.

But if you've watched some of these discussions closely, it's completely
irrelevant to them whether it's fully in accord with experiment. In fact,
some of them have mocked the very idea that accord with experiment even
matters! They think they know something about how the universe REALLY
works, not just appears to but REALLY does, knowledge revealed to the
prophet, as it were, and the prevailing theory ain't it. "Einstein's math
makes all the right predictions, but the theory is wrong because that's
not how nature really works." The quote is a paraphrase because I don't
remember exactly how it went, but I'm not otherwise making it up.

2. The belief that you are somehow brighter and better than all the smart
people that created the establishment

Relativity disproven with nothing more complicated than high school
algebra. Gosh, why didn't anyone see that before? See comment on point
one.


I could go no but I am sure you get the idea. These probably would not
apply to articles published is respectable journals. I suspect the tone of
the paper would give them away but not reading a lot of journal articles I
would not really know.

Every once in a while I see the accusation that mainstream journals
wouldn't dare publish anything that doesn't agree with "the party line".
I don't think the people making those accusations read a lot of journal
articles, either. But moreover, they're just plain wrong. E.g. Van
Flandern in Phys Lett A (1998) examines some measurements and concludes
that the speed of gravity must be greater than 2e10 c. And something
related in 1999 that I haven't looked up yet but was referenced in
Carlip's reply. And somewhere I have an otherwise mainstream article
about acceleration in special relativity that managed to get in some
words about local aether theories. You can't just do a keyword search for
something like "aether" and get a comprehensive listing of those sorts of
articles (but try it and you'll find some).

Or the accusation that nobody in "the establishment" cares about the
anomalous Pioneer 10 acceleration. Make even the smallest effort to
search the literature or arXives and you'll see it discussed. Or other
statements about how physicists and the industry of physics works when
it's clear they're making **** up. That's something that bugs me. As
near as I can figure they assume Usenet is a representative cross-section
of the professional work of physics.

--
"When the fool walks through the street, in his lack of understanding he
calls everything foolish." -- Ecclesiastes 10:3, New American Bible

Gregory L. Hansen wrote:
Every once in a while I think about keeping a list of articles published
in the major journals that are at odds with "establishment" science.
They're certainly there, I come across them now and then, even published
in the last few years, but I've never tried to make any kind of
comprehensive search.

Hi Gregory

A great idea, but someone is a way ahead of you in doing this. If you
are trying to invent new theories in any area of science then I highly
recommend the series of books on scientific anomalies by William R
Corliss. He has a general anomalies volume and then a further dozen or
more, one on each branch of science. His articles are almost all drawn
from peer-reviewed journals and are arranged for easy reference. He does
have a web site - http://www.science-frontiers.com/

Ray Tomes

Bill Hobba wrote:
It isn't going against the establishment the gives me problems it is the
refusal to:

Bill you have had a lot of replies to this, but why not one more
perspective. In general a lot of your comments have validity as it
applies to many people who post new theories. However there are subtle
little errors of generality and exceptions in almost every case.

1. Not acknowledging the establishment is usually fully in accord with
experiment and so is a perfectly valid theory

This may be largely true (although I would add "observation" as well as
"experiment" to cover astronomy). However there are notable exceptions
and some of these are in the areas where people make new suggestions.
For example, in astronomy the existence of periodicities in redshifts is
pretended to not exist as are physical connections between objects at
very different redshifts.

2. The belief that you are somehow brighter and better than all the smart
people that created the establishment

Not brighter than all the ones that created it, just brighter the
reactionaries that try to stop any further progress. :-)

3. The discovery of some point that has escaped the attention of
generations of students and physicists since Einstein or whoever published
their works and when you point out this is highly unlikely - nonsense such
as your not independently thinking or whatever is all they can say.

The mistakes in papers concerned with EPR / Bell's inequality / Aspect
experiment do actually qualify as generations of mistakes, surprising as
it may seem. These mistakes relate to the fact that the vast majority of
people (scientists included) cannot do statistics, particularly when it
relates to conditional probability and subsamples. This has been proven
by several people and published in peer-review jouirnals, but the
mistakes continue.

4. Delusions of grandeur where that believe they have found something that
puts them in the same class as people like Landau of Feynman when their idea
is obviously wrong or similar things have been known for some time

Definitely not in the same class as Feynmann. I would never for example
make the mistake of saying that light is a particle. ;-)

5. Failure to elucidate the physical basis for their beliefs when simple
considerations indicate that what their proposing is more complicated than
generally accepted theories. It is even worse when you point this out and
the response indicates they do not even understand the fundamental point
your making.

Good comments.

6. The attacking of the person that originated the theory as if this somehow
undermines the countless other people who have written on it as well.

Yes, this is a serious problem. One reactionary wrote a thing that he
called "The crackpot index" for awarding points to crackpots, so I did
an alternative one called "The reactionary index" for the other side of
the problem. All in jest, but many a true word ...

I could go no but I am sure you get the idea. These probably would not
apply to articles published is respectable journals. I suspect the tone of
the paper would give them away but not reading a lot of journal articles I
would not really know.

There are many incomprehensible articles in journals, and many mistakes
of all kinds in others. Most are never picked up because most journal
articles are never critically studied by anyone. A much smaller number
of mistakes are perpetrated for decades by "the establishment". I will
list a few of these in my opinion:

A. The fundamental calculation error in EPR / Bell's inequality which
does not understand the difference between a sample and a sub-sample.
There is nothing mysterious happening.

B. The resulting FTL communication of quantum events that is rubbish.
The intelligent physicists know that FTL information transfer is not
achieved by EPR experiments and therefore popularised articles are nonsense.

C. The belief that M-M experiment disproved an aether. It really proved
that matter is made of the same stuff as light, and a further generation
had to pass before DeBroglie said a similar thing. However the garbage
M-M explanation had by then stuck.

D. The big bang theory has been proven to be quite false. Keeping it as
a serious theory is an act of religious faith (they want a creation).

E. The "Collapse of the Wave-function" is a nonsense. There is no such
thing as a "photon in flight". Quantisation exists only at emmission and
absorption events and the E/M field is continuous exactly as Maxwell
stated. An absorbed photon may be related causually to an emitted photon
but it is not "the same photon" as a single emmission may result in more
than one absorption events.

That is enough to show that stupid ideas can persist in physics for
generations. Also, in the group sci.physics.research you cannot even
post some experimental results that have been published in peer-review
journals because it contradicts the beliefs of the moderators. That is
not science, it is religion.

Ray Tomes