WhenScience is popularly displaced by falsity

Discussion in 'Free Thoughts' started by Kaiduorkhon, Apr 6, 2007.

  1. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    The much applauded and controversial 'Big Bang Theory' is not a theory. It is an hypothesis.
    The much applauded and controversial 'Super String Theory' is not a theory. It is an hypothesis.
    (Please refer, Webster's dictionary, or, any dictionary of scientific terms.)

    These importantly expansive misunderstandings negatively influence and handicap the entire world of contemplation at the foundations of objective thinking. These endlessly repeated misnomers sustain themselves. Calling hypotheses 'theories' is unscientific and misleading, digressive and harmful. Would I be banned - or omitted from posting - for tactfully pointing this out? (In some cases I already have been).
    Is there no room for a cordial fireside chat about such - very important, fundamental, symptomatic - 'misunderstandings' (Resting comfortably in the center of 'Standard Theory'; expanding tolerance thresholds on the foundations of academia)? Are they not plaintively germane to the influence of scientists on public acceptance, controversy tolerance, perspective, science, art, fiction and culture?
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Apr 6, 2007
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  3. darksidZz Valued Senior Member

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    How u get word so big

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    This so cool : excites :
     
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  5. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    You're wrong, Kaiduorkhon.

    Please research the scientific meaning of "theory". You may need to look beyond a concise Webster's dictionary.
     
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  7. Dinosaur Rational Skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    The Big Bang provides a very plausible explanation for how the universe started and evolved. It is supported by a observational data and no other theory is as viable. It is on much sounder footing than String Theory, which many knowledgeable physics view as clever self consistent mathematics not providing explanations any better than those provided by competing theories.

    BTW: Hypothesis & theory are terms whose meaning varies with context. It is not clear what you are trying to say, but you are wrong when you put String Theory on the same footing as Big Bang Theory. The future might junk the Big Bang for something better and String Theory might become the darling of mainstream scientists. As of now, such is not the case.
     
  8. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    When Science is Popularly Displaced by Falsity, cont.

    Dear Mr. James R.
    Please make your case, sir.

    Dinosaur, please consider the following:

    The ‘big bang’ took the ‘scientific community’ by surprise in 1927 - 1929.
    . An - ad hoc - explanation was hurriedly put together by Lemaitre, Gamow, and others - if the expansion of space in the universe was back tracked, it was reasoned, it would eventually converge at a point of intersection (since estimated to have been some 13 billion years ago), where all the matter in the universe must have been compacted, causing intense pressures and heat which resulted in and caused the ‘big bang’ explosion, resulting in the spatially expanding universe, as it is spectroscopically (‘red shift’) observed today. There are more recent variations on this theme, but the described dynamics are the origin of the ‘Big Bang’ perspective.

    Problem: There is no common - big bang - center from which the observed expanding universe expands. The expansion is astrophysically established as dynamically expanding in direct line of sight, away from a given observer, from any location. This is not the signature of an explosion from a common center.
    It is the signature of a repelling force acting across space out of all material bodies, paralleling all the characteristics of conventional gravity, while acting in the opposite direction. Namely, what Einstein called ‘the cosmological constant’ - a force unlike any other known, because it increased - instead of decreased - with distance.
    Einstein’s Unified Field theory of 1919 predicted an expanding universe - a prediction that Wilem de Sitter foresaw (in Einstein’s equations) as early as 1917. A decade before the expanding universe was spectroscopically discovered between 1912 and 1922, by, Dr. Vesto M. Silpher, and translated in 1927 by Georges Lemaitre, and 1929, by Edwin Hubble as proof of a spatially expanding universe - observing (by way of spectroscopic ‘red shift’) that the speed of a receding galaxy increases with distance (‘Hubble’s “red shift”).

    Einstein - under much influence by Wilem de Sitter - had predicted an expanding universe, and that it is the result of a repelling force acting out of all material bodies, just like gravity, except, in the opposite direction. This is the force that Einstein proposed prevented the universe (full of mutually impelling bodies) from collapsing on itself - a problem that Newton himself called attention to, for which there was no previous explanation.

    When the spatially expanding universe was discovered, it was resolved that this explained why the universe didn’t collapse on itself, and for this reason, under much ensuing controversy, Einstein was persuaded to abandon his previously submitted Cosmological Constant repelling force....
    Recent data is accumulating, finding that the spatial universe is not only expanding, but that it is also picking up - increasing in - rate of speed of expansion. Again, this is not the signature of a big bang originated universe, whereas, it is the signature of the abandoned Cosmological Constant: a force which increases with distance...
    It is well known that Einstein abandoned his Cosmological Constant repelling force (designated with the Greek sign ‘Lambda’ - an inverted V, like this /\ ; calling it his ‘biggest blunder’ ), due to the discovery of the spatially expanding universe. It is not so well known and no issue of controversy that Einstein went back to working on his formerly abandoned unified field - cosmological constant - theory, at Princeton, before he died in 1955...

    Besides the ‘red shift’ established expanding universe, there is one other evidentiary phenomenon in particular, which is said to support (if not ‘prove’) the big bang ‘theory’, and that is the issue of cosmic microwave background radiation predicted in 1949 by George Gamow and confirmed (via satellite) in 1963, by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson. In the interest of keeping this post from being further extended, the issue of background radiation will be with held in this particular post and resumed in a post soon to follow. (Thank you for reading this missive.)
     
  9. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    No, it's a theory.

    You won't be banned, but you are incorrect.

    That is not a problem, since the Big Bang Theory describes the expansion of both matter and space, not the expansion of matter into pre-existing space.

    http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/astronomy/bigbang.html
     
  10. orcot Valued Senior Member

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    I rather believe it took the universe by surprise a little earlier.
     
  11. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    If indeed you do intend to expand your presentation on the CBR, I strongly suggest you do more serious research and be prepared to correct the factual errors such as you made above.

    Wilson and Penzias were working for Bell Labs on the ground in New Jersey when they discovered the CBR. As a subsidiary of the AT&T company, the labs was working to discover the source of interference in their terrestrial-based point-to-point microwave relay network which carried the bulk of their long-distance communications circuits at the time (practically all the rest was carried by coaxial and wire-based carrier circuits).

    There were absolutely no satellites in space at the time that were capable of taking such measurements. They actually used the same cornucopia-shaped reflector antenna that was current;y then employed at the microwave radio relay stations. The only difference being that it was not fixed in position but was mounted on gimbals that allowed it to be rotated in any direction in order to make measurements.

    If you intend to continue with this, you will certainly need to make a much better effort to get ALL your facts correct!
     
  12. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    24,690
    The definition of "theory" in mathematics is different from its definition in the "hard" sciences. The problem is that the boundary between them has been blurred. Both of the concepts you mention are part math and part physics. String theory in particular: when the GUTE is finally perfected, it will very likely be based upon... um... things that do not exist in the reality we inhabit and/or cannot be directly... um... observed and/or fluctuate between manifesting as matter and energy and perhaps twelve other kinds of... um... stuff that we haven't postulated yet. Maybe the word I'm looking for is "constructs." I mean after all, when you get down to it, from the standpoint of an average human, even an intelligent, educated one, there really is no such thing as "energy." Photons don't "exist" in the conventional meaning of the word--much less fermions.

    Modern physics is approaching the level of pure abstraction. We talk about quarks and leptons the way we talk about the collective unconscious on the Psychology forum, and the way some others talk about gods and demons on the Religion forum: a vocabulary we invented so that we can organize and discuss our observations of the physical universe, but not exactly referential to anything that is "real" in the conventional sense of the word.
    Oh come on dude! How many people actually engage in the discourse to which you refer? How many of them/us lack the educational grounding that helps us avoid the influence and handicaps to which you refer? Forty years ago during the New Enlightenment, many laymen found physics interesting. Today it has become fashionable and politically correct to know no science and to brag about it. Quark is a character on Star Trek.
    Huh? Is this the winner of the "Duh" award or were my parents right and I wasted my years at Caltech? Relativity insists that no matter what point in the universe you stand upon, you will seem to be stationary while everything else recedes from you. Suppose the Big Bang Theory is correct. We use our warp drive, jump gate, wormhole, slipstream or stargate and go looking for the Center Of The Universe. How will we know when we've found it? Do we have to look for the edge instead? Even those sci-fi authors seldom invent a technology that will get us out of our own galaxy, much less several billion light years from it.

    I regard this as a purely linguistic issue and suggest that it be moved to my Forum.

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  13. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    Background radiation alleged to support big bang

    Dear Orcot: I did not say that the expanding universe took the universe by surprise. As you well know, I said it took the (so called) 'scientific community' by surprise.

    Dear 'Read-Only'.

    In bold letters you proclaim that Wilson and Penzias were working on the ground, as though a reminder was in order to emphasise that a satellite is not a space capsule and that they weren't working out of same...

    I am familiar with the Wilson Penzias accidental (antenna received) discovery of background radiation, while preoccupied with other motivations, a detailed description of the motives for their mission, and where they were working from, with what kind of equipment, is superfluous. These baroque details on satellite technology reflect your intensely spurious need to speak (condescendingly) with apparent authority.

    What 'factual errors' are you alluding to?

    If you intend to continue with this, please stay on topic. Never mind the profusely decorated podium of irrelevant (google accessible) 'correct facts'.
     
  14. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    552
    Reality has been popularly dismissed, for lack of evidence?

    Dear FraggleRocker:
    Your post speaks volumes in agreement with the camp I am posting from.
     
  15. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    Dear Whatever,

    Rather than take on all your other errors I decided to simply point out that one factual mistake. Yes, I do speak with a degree of authority - simply because I was employed in another department of the same organization. And I am intimately familiar with their work, in part, because I've used the same equipment for other purposes. If you cannot keep the simplest facts straight, how can you possibly expect anyone to accept ANYTHING you say, eh?
     
  16. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    552
    It appears that reality has been popularly dismissed, for lack of evidence or vocabulary. (Mr. Spock has the deck and the conn in the hologram room?)
     
  17. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    Spidergoat's unexpected solution - the expansion of matter.

    Dear Spidergoat, in proclaiming that the Big Bang Theory describes the expansion of both matter and space, you have complied in agreement with the physical expansion of the material universe, as it is described and accounted for at http://forums.delphiforums.com/EinsteinGroupie .
     
  18. Roman Banned Banned

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    11,560
    I'm fairly certain the big bang is now a theory, but I think you're correct in your assertion that string theory is still a hypothesis.
     
  19. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    I think that's a theory too, it is well established, not just some individual's conjecture.
     
  20. BenTheMan Dr. of Physics, Prof. of Love Valued Senior Member

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    8,967
    Now we're splitting hairs. String theory is very much a theory.
     
  21. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    Big Bang, SuperStrings vs the 'outdated' Cosmological Constant, cont.

    Accidentally double posted the same message twice. Please refer the immediate below message. My apologies.
     
    Last edited: Apr 7, 2007
  22. Kaiduorkhon Registered Senior Member

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    Big Bang, SuperStrings vs the 'outdated' Cosmological Constant, cont.

    'Big Bang', 'SuperStrings' & the 'outdated' Cosmological Constant, cont:

    “It is well known to students of high school algebra that it is permissable to divide both sides of an equation by any quantity, provided that this quantity is not zero. However, in the course of his proof Einstein had divided both sides of one of his intermediate equations by a complicated expression, which in certain circumstances, could become zero (‘at the slightest provocation’)...

    “In the case, however, when this expression becomes equal to zero, Einstein’s proof does not hold, and (mathematician) Friedmann realized that this opened a whole new world of time-dependent universes; expanding, collapsing, and pulsating ones.
    “Thus Einstein’s original gravity equation was correct, and changing it was a mistake. Much later, when I was discussing cosmological problems with Einstein, he remarked that the introduction of the cosmological term was the biggest blunder he ever made in his life. But the ‘blunder’, rejected by Einstein, and the cosmological constant denoted by the Greek letter /\, rears its ugly head again and again and again.” - George Gamow, GRAVITY, p. 270


    The ‘ugly head’ Of The 'outdated' Truth:


    “The cosmological constant has now a secure position... Not only does it unify the gravitational and electromagnetic fields, but it renders the theory of gravitation and its relation to space-time measurement so much more illuminating and indeed self evident, that return to the earlier view is unthinkable. I would as soon think of reverting to Newtonian Theory as of dropping the cosmological constant.”
    - Sir Arthur Eddington, THE EXPANDING UNIVERSE, p. 24

    “I can see no reason to doubt that the observed recession of the spiral nebulae is due to cosmic repulsion, and it is the effect predicted (in 1919) by Relativity Theory which we were hoping to find. Many other explanations have been proposed - some of them rather fantastic (* ‘tired light’, ‘the big bang’,’dark matter’, ‘gravitons’, ‘super strings’ ‘anti-matter’) - and there has been a great deal of discussion which seems to me rather pointless. In this, as in other developments of scientific exploration, we must recognise the limitations of our present knowledge and be prepared to consider revolutionary changes.”
    - Sir Arthur Eddington, pp. 89 - 90, A TREASURY OF SCIENCE (Harlow Shapley publishers)

    There are other scientific disagreements with the so called Big Bang theory:

    "The Mt. Wilson astronomer, Carl Sandage, found that stars in a cluster called NGC 188 appeared to be at least 24 billion years old. 'We are in trouble', said Sandage... for the earth could certainly be younger than the universe, but if the universe has been expanding at the present rate for 24 billion years (instead of 13 billion, as submitted by big bang acolytes), it would seem that it should be more spread out than it is. So the astronomers have a new problem to resolve." - Isaac Asimov, THE INTELLIGENT PERSON'S GUIDE TO SCIENCE, p. 49-50

    Asimov states in the same discussion on the only recently discovered 'expanding universe':

    "Astronomers have now generally accepted the fact of this expansion, and Einstein's 'field equations' of his General Theory of Relativity can be construed to fit an expanding universe." - Isaac Asimov, THE INTELLIGENT PERSON'S GUIDE TO SCIENCE, p. 49


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    Moderator note: Posting things in BIG text doesn't make your argument any stronger. Please do not do it.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Apr 7, 2007
  23. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Ohh, you're the 'starlite' paint' guy.
     

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