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10/22/2009 01:14:24 AM · #676 |
Originally posted by scalvert:
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
If people want to show me that String Theory can make testable predictions I will accept a link to any web page which professes such a concept so we can evaluate it in its entirety. |
Done. Go nuts. (This is one of the predictions that the LHC is supposed to test). |
By my reading they are doing it backward. They used string theory to explain an already known phenomenon. They didn't use string theory to predict an unknown phenomenon which they then found. This isn't as impressive. To quote this New Yorker article (which is a good read BTW), "Both agree with Karl Popper's dictum that if a theory is to be scientific it must be open to falsification. But string theory, Woit point out, is like Alice's Restaurant, where, as Arlo Guthrie's song had it, "you can get anything you want." It comes in so many versions that it predicts anything and everything. In that sense, string theory is, in the words of Woit's title, "not even wrong.""
So by my reading, these two guys managed to figure out which of the 1x10^500 (that's the number quoted in the New Yorker) versions of string theory fits with high temperature superconduction. That's actually sorta impressive, but it isn't a prediction.
And I didn't see mention of the LHC anywhere. |
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10/22/2009 01:21:34 AM · #677 |
Originally posted by scalvert:
Originally posted by RulerZigzag:
a good point was made in a noetic science magazine that I once read explaining how prayer only works if done collectively and on a planetary scale. The majority of a civilization has to will the same things and perhaps god only listens then. |
If such a thing were actually possible, it would become obvious, demonstrable, and convincing for that particular religion as the "correct" one. However even among the faithful, it must be height of arrogance to think that God takes requests or would change anything on the basis of petition.
EDIT- Just in case, pray for my current entry. It sucks. |
No very poetic! Perhaps the petitions arise in life every now and then through life's history. |
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10/22/2009 02:33:24 AM · #678 |
Lovely couple of paragraphs from the New Yorker article:
Originally posted by Jim Holt, New Yorker:
The usual excuse offered for sticking with what increasingly looks like a failed program is that no one has come up with any better ideas for unifying physics. But Smolin and Woit have a different explanation, one that can be summed up in the word “sociology.” Both are worried that academic physics has become dangerously like what the social constructivists have long charged it with being: a community that is no more rational or objective than any other group of humans. String theorists dominate the country’s top physics departments. At the Institute for Advanced Study, the director and nearly all of the particle physicists with permanent positions are string theorists. Eight of the nine MacArthur fellowships awarded to particle physicists over the years have gone to string theorists. Since the fall-off in academic hiring in the nineteen-seventies, the average age of tenured physics professors has reached nearly sixty. Every year, around eighty people receive Ph.D.s in particle physics, but only around ten of them can expect to get permanent jobs in the field. In this hypercompetitive environment, the only hope for a young theoretical physicist is to curry favor by solving a set problem in string theory. “Nowadays,” one established figure in the field has said, “if you’re a hot-shot young string theorist you’ve got it made.”
Both authors also detect a cultlike aspect to the string-theory community, with Witten as the guru. Perhaps, it has been joked, physicists might have an easier time getting funding from the Bush Administration if they represented string theory as a “faith-based initiative.” Smolin deplores what he considers to be the shoddy scientific standards that prevail in the string-theory community, where long-standing but unproved conjectures are assumed to be true because “no sensible personӉ€”that is, no member of the tribe—doubts them. The most hilarious recent symptom of string theory’s lack of rigor is the so-called Bogdanov Affair, in which French twin brothers, Igor and Grichka Bogdanov, managed to publish egregiously nonsensical articles on string theory in five peer-reviewed physics journals. Was it a reverse Sokal hoax? (In 1996, the physicist Alan Sokal fooled the editors of the postmodern journal Social Text into publishing an artful bit of drivel on the “hermeneutics of quantum gravity.”) The Bogdanov brothers have indignantly denied it, but even the Harvard string-theory group was said to be unsure, alternating between laughter at the obviousness of the fraud and hesitant concession that the authors might have been sincere. |
Need I point out the parallels to organized religion? Of course, this is just one writer, but nevertheless for some time now there's been a lot of questioning of string theory's relevance to reality, basically on the grounds Jason has just discussed.
R. |
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10/22/2009 09:20:59 AM · #679 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
They used string theory to explain an already known phenomenon. They didn't use string theory to predict an unknown phenomenon which they then found." |
I repeat my dismay that you're so clueless about science. It doesn't matter that the phenomenon is known, only that the model uniquely predicts (as in "explains") the observation. Heliocentric models explained already known orbital problems, germ theory explained already known illnesses, evolution explained already known biodiversity, and Newton explained already known gravity. String theory uniquely explains this quantum critical state of electrons that had otherwise stumped physicists. String harmonics, though difficult to test, is another unique prediction.
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
And I didn't see mention of the LHC anywhere. |
From the Wiki on String Theory- "The LHC will be used both for testing AdS/CFT, and to check if the electroweakstrong unification does happen as predicted."
Message edited by author 2009-10-22 09:22:03. |
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10/22/2009 09:30:08 AM · #680 |
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10/22/2009 09:40:15 AM · #681 |
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10/22/2009 09:42:46 AM · #682 |
Now, why on Earth would they need a private registrar, domains-by-proxy? What are they worried about? Too funny.
edit: Ah, yes...the FAQs make it all clear now.
Message edited by author 2009-10-22 09:44:03.
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10/22/2009 10:45:08 AM · #683 |
Well Shannon seems to think I'm still clueless about Science. Oh well. Unfortunately today I have a technical chapter to write on exhaled nitric oxide so I shouldn't be participating here. Hopefully I'll be able to figure Science out before I get that done or it's gonna be a mess. :P
Glad you liked the New Yorker article Robert! I found it a good return to reality. Frankly, I, too, had the mindset that String Theory was the eventual future, but perhaps we are doing our scientific fourty years in the wildnerness before we find the Promised Land.
Message edited by author 2009-10-22 10:45:49. |
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10/22/2009 10:55:03 AM · #684 |
OK, before I head to work I had to quote an article I happened to run across on Google News about the LHC. It's mainly for Louis and his mathematical physics. ;)
"The LHC, they suggest, may be sabotaging itself from the future — twisting time to generate a series of scientific setbacks that will prevent the machine fulfilling its destiny.
At first sight, this theory fits comfortably into the crackpot tradition linking the start-up of the LHC with terrible disasters. The best known is that the Ă‚ÂŁ3 billion particle accelerator might trigger a black hole capable of swallowing the Earth when it gets going. Scientists enjoy laughing at this one.
This time, however, their ridicule has been rather muted — because the time travel idea has come from two distinguished physicists who have backed it with rigorous mathematics."
Message edited by author 2009-10-22 10:55:16. |
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10/22/2009 11:09:32 AM · #685 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Unfortunately today I have a technical chapter to write on exhaled nitric oxide so I shouldn't be participating here. Hopefully I'll be able to figure Science out before I get that done or it's gonna be a mess. :P |
Do be sure to qualify any findings with the opinion that scientific method is equivalent to faith and your revelation that all scientific theories must predict something previously unknown. The result should be similar to inhaled nitrous oxide. ;-)
(yes, I know nitric oxide is different stuff) |
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10/22/2009 12:47:58 PM · #686 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
OK, before I head to work I had to quote an article I happened to run across on Google News about the LHC. It's mainly for Louis and his mathematical physics. ;) |
That is cool! So Star Treky... temporal distortions and anomalies are the best! *sigh*.... why did they ever have to cancel Voyager...
Originally posted by Article:
What Holger Bech Nielsen, of the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, and Masao Ninomiya of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics in Kyoto, are suggesting is that the Higgs boson, the particle that physicists hope to produce with the collider, might be “abhorrent to nature”.
What does that mean? According to Nielsen, it means that the creation of the boson at some point in the future would then ripple backwards through time to put a stop to whatever it was that had created it in the first place.
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James Gillies, a trained physicist who heads Cern’s communications department, said Nielsen’s idea was an interesting theory “but we know it doesn’t happen in reality”.
He explained that if Nielsen’s predictions were correct then whatever was stopping the LHC would also be stopping high-energy rays hitting the atmosphere. Since scientists can directly detect many such rays, “Nielsen must be wrong”, said Gillies. |
Article. |
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10/22/2009 01:53:33 PM · #687 |
To interject, I've had another unexpected conversation (well, the start of one).
A woman on FB says:
"SusyQ is sad and mad, that some people say they don't believe in Jesus or the Bible. Religion has really done an injustice to Gods word and to His people. I am thankful that I have a spiritual relationship with God and not just a religious experience!!!"
I've asked why she would be 'mad', and can't wait to hear her response. While I'm not interested in debating her, but want to point out that there is no need to be angry OR sad with anyone just because of a differing religious belief. Why not just accept / love people for who they ARE (instead of who they aren't?)
NOTE - not that you need my permission, but I really DON'T mind the threadjack... makes for interesting reading. :) |
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10/22/2009 01:55:40 PM · #688 |
| In a nutshell, science in the 21st century will be about mapping DNA, the creation of artificial black holes and understanding the brain's memory cells. The LHC creates mini- black holes, and they magnetically suspend the anti-matter in a Penn trap to keep it from touching anything. I mean, yea definitely Star Treky, afterall, it was anti-matter that propelled the Enterprise, or at least helped propel it. It won't be long before we head to the moon, civilians that is. |
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10/22/2009 02:09:40 PM · #689 |
Originally posted by scalvert:
Originally posted by RulerZigzag:
a good point was made in a noetic science magazine that I once read explaining how prayer only works if done collectively and on a planetary scale. The majority of a civilization has to will the same things and perhaps god only listens then. |
If such a thing were actually possible, it would become obvious, demonstrable, and convincing for that particular religion as the "correct" one. However even among the faithful, it must be height of arrogance to think that God takes requests or would change anything on the basis of petition.
EDIT- Just in case, pray for my current entry. It sucks. |
Health Study: Prayer didn't help sick
Another article about the same study
Prayer/Meditation and Health Status among African Americans and Whites in Georgia
Exerpt: Our hypothesis that more frequent prayer and meditation would be associated with better health was not supported by the data.
NOTE: You're all also welcome to pray for my entry, which almost certainly sucks worse than Shannon's (even given the risk it might make things worse!). |
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10/22/2009 03:01:28 PM · #690 |
Originally posted by rossbilly:
NOTE - not that you need my permission, but I really DON'T mind the threadjack... makes for interesting reading. :) |
It seems to me that all these conversations eventually end up being about physics and the beginning of the universe. Is it the participants, or the nature of the discussion? |
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10/22/2009 03:13:59 PM · #691 |
Originally posted by rossbilly:
To interject, I've had another unexpected conversation (well, the start of one).
A woman on FB says:
"SusyQ is sad and mad, that some people say they don't believe in Jesus or the Bible. Religion has really done an injustice to Gods word and to His people. I am thankful that I have a spiritual relationship with God and not just a religious experience!!!"
I've asked why she would be 'mad', and can't wait to hear her response. While I'm not interested in debating her, but want to point out that there is no need to be angry OR sad with anyone just because of a differing religious belief. Why not just accept / love people for who they ARE (instead of who they aren't?)
NOTE - not that you need my permission, but I really DON'T mind the threadjack... makes for interesting reading. :) |
That always seems to be a part of what religion is all about. Confront the people who don't see it your way and "get" them to see the light.
It's vitually impossible to find a compassionate, empathetic religion that's just genuinely interested in supporting you on your own spiritual journey, whatever that may be.
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10/22/2009 03:23:43 PM · #692 |
Originally posted by Louis:
Originally posted by rossbilly:
NOTE - not that you need my permission, but I really DON'T mind the threadjack... makes for interesting reading. :) |
It seems to me that all these conversations eventually end up being about physics and the beginning of the universe. Is it the participants, or the nature of the discussion? |
Or is it some bizarre time-travelling causality wave that keeps changing the conversation? DAMN THE FUTURE! I wanna talk about GOD, not physics! ;)
It IS a Brave New World we live in as far as physics. Either the field has completely gone off the deep end or we live in a bizarre world.
It's lunch now and I wanted to return for a note to Louis concerning this mathematical physics theory about the reverse time wave and the LHC. Let jump into the future a year and find that Europe has fallen deeper into the global recession and mothballs the LHC which has continued to be plauged with problems. Good Riddance! they say. No use throwing good money after bad when we have people to feed.
First question. Taking the article at its word that the math behind this possible scenario is both rigorous and correct, would you count the idea as qualifying as a scientific theory in all the same ways as the theory of evolution?
Second question. Does the fact that the LHC was mothballed confirm the theory? It's the only prediction the theory was able to make and it came true. Do we now take as fact that reverse time causality waves (or whatever we want to call them) are a reality?
I can answer the questions for myself, although you probably know how I'll answer them. I do not feel the idea counts as scientific theory, although technically it does seem to be able to make a prediction (the closing of the LHC). The reason lies in my second answer. I would not take these waves as fact as the closing of the LHC could have been for other reasons (ie. it was closed for the very reason we saw, lack of money, and nothing else.) The problem is the theory can make no other predictions (that I'm aware of) and so now becomes untestable. (I'll allow for a lack of complete knowledge here on my part.)
I see String Theory in the same light. It seems to predict Supersymmetry and we may be able to confirm this with the LHC. However, Supersymmetry may be true for many other reasons that have nothing to do with strings. No other predictions have been made.
Anyway, if you didn't check out the New Yorker article, read it. I'm not recommending it to bolster my case, but because it was an enjoyable article and informative. I think you'd like it.
Message edited by author 2009-10-22 15:25:05. |
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10/22/2009 03:42:11 PM · #693 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Taking the article at its word that the math behind this possible scenario is both rigorous and correct, would you count the idea as qualifying as a scientific theory in all the same ways as the theory of evolution? |
A scenario that describes a single event is never considered a theory. Theories are models that describe sets of related processes and events. |
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10/22/2009 03:47:27 PM · #694 |
| Exactly, theories spawn from the absolute. Then once you show and prove the absolute, you can figure out the potential, and then once you theorize potential, you can finally figure out the possibility. And then of course, comes trial and error until a solution arises. |
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10/22/2009 03:53:30 PM · #695 |
Originally posted by RulerZigzag:
Exactly, theories spawn from the absolute. Then once you show and prove the absolute, you can figure out the potential, and then once you theorize potential, you can finally figure out the possibility. And then of course, comes trial and error until a solution arises. |
Say what?
R. |
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10/22/2009 03:56:39 PM · #696 |
Originally posted by scalvert:
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Taking the article at its word that the math behind this possible scenario is both rigorous and correct, would you count the idea as qualifying as a scientific theory in all the same ways as the theory of evolution? |
A scenario that describes a single event is never considered a theory. Theories are models that describe sets of related processes and events. |
Read the article. "Nielsen’s idea has been likened to that of a man travelling back through time and killing his own grandfather. “Our theory suggests that any machine trying to make the Higgs shall have bad luck,” he said."
So the generalizable theory is that we will never produce a Higgs Boson because it will always destroy itself from the future (at least as I understand it). As he later puts it, it is "abhorent to nature". It's also worth noting that Nielsen calls it a "theory" and I recall you felt this was valid affirmation as Hawking used the word for String Theory. |
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10/22/2009 03:58:26 PM · #697 |
| You could only form a theory based on previously proved knowledge only. Theories are possibilities that come from established orders. That is what makes theories worth proving, all good theories should have strong foundations. |
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10/22/2009 04:13:22 PM · #698 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Read the article. |
My theory is that you're still fairly lost on the concept of scientific theories. This can be observed, tested, and [possibly] proven false. However, it does NOT make my supposition a scientific theory. |
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10/22/2009 04:17:28 PM · #699 |
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
First question. Taking the article at its word that the math behind this possible scenario is both rigorous and correct, would you count the idea as qualifying as a scientific theory in all the same ways as the theory of evolution? |
No; but I take it to be a theory nonetheless. I assume that the mathematical models behind this particular theory describe a likely set of outcomes for any given event with the same conditions. I feel obligated to say that in other words, I don't suspect this theory was advanced for the purpose of explaining the potential outcome of this one lone event. I accept that mathematical models, while they are used to formulate physical theories, are not generally testable under all conditions, so it's unlike evolution, which is so well tested and confirmed from many diverse disciplines that it's ridiculous.
Originally posted by DrAchoo:
Second question. Does the fact that the LHC was mothballed confirm the theory? It's the only prediction the theory was able to make and it came true. Do we now take as fact that reverse time causality waves (or whatever we want to call them) are a reality? |
Of course not. There's no way to rigourously test whether or not the outcome was a result of the theory. In other words, the one lone event can't be used in a kind of reverse-engineering of the theory in order to establish its value. I believe we call that "Intelligent Design". :P |
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10/22/2009 05:09:42 PM · #700 |
Originally posted by NikonJeb:
That always seems to be a part of what religion is all about. Confront the people who don't see it your way and "get" them to see the light.
It's vitually impossible to find a compassionate, empathetic religion that's just genuinely interested in supporting you on your own spiritual journey, whatever that may be. |
Unfortunately, that's not the way it should be. As God said when he sent the apostles out to preach the word
Originally posted by Mathew 10:14:
And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town. |
Granted, it's not supporting others in their spiritual journey, but maybe the crossing of paths is part of that journey.
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