The Logical Leap: Induction in Physics


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The most interesting part of this discussion was my friend's observation that the competition for research grants in universities often stifles the development of dissenting theories. I was curious whether anyone on OL has some thoughts on this topic.

It is not because reality is weird that QM and relativity are weird, it is because of political spin. It is true that the related experiments are surprising, but it is normal in science that when you search for truth, you start with surprise and end with understanding. But in physics there is a concerted effort by irrationalist physicists who are in the vast majority to use that surprise for political purposes, such that they start with surprise and end with the bizarre. Just walk into any bookstore and browse how they're cashing in with all their babble about the meaning of QM as it applies to God or the limits of human reason etc.

Why do I know this? Because I've looked at it enough to know that there are leads on some of this alleged "weirdness" that make it perfectly sensible and explainable, even in layman terms. Are those providing actual physical explanations geniuses? No, the reason these explanations are not available widely is that the establishment does not want them available, they prefer the mystical and the bizarre. *And that should surprise no one.* Just look around you. Who is in the vast majority? Statists and religionists. They are only doing what one would expect them to do.

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George, look up Newton's Bucket for an example of something any layman can analyze for himself while comparing to the bizarre theories of physicists. Incidentally Harriman wrote a TIA article on this years ago, where he plagiarizes Mach's absurd notions and then doesn't give him credit.

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What I am trying to get at is that there is never a single cause => single effect relation in reality. There are always other factors involved and we will never be able to account for them all. No theory will ever fully explain everything. Where did you get this idea?

It is not the purpose of theories to "explain everything." Where did *you* get this idea?

Shayne

I got that idea here:

It is when a theory doesn't explain fully that we know another cause is operating and thus go look for it.

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I got that idea here:

Note the scare quotes I put around "explain everything." You are using "explain" in a different sense than the one used here. No theory can explain in your sense of the term "explain". So no, you didn't get that from me or from George, you got it from yourself.

Shayne

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What does politics have to do with QM? I can see some relation to global warming theories, but not QM.

It is fairly obvious. QM is used as propaganda to discredit reason, which discredits its corollary, freedom. If physics were put on a rational foundation, the one that Newton had begun, then that would be a massive force for changing the mind of the common man, to turning his mind to reason and freedom instead of faith and force. Therefore, QM must be used to discredit man's rational faculty as much as possible, and no one with any rational explanation for it can ever be allowed to get a PhD or hold a job.

Shayne

I know a physicist who's a staunch advocate of hard determinism and also a supporter of a Bohm-like (though not identically Bohm's) interpretation of QM who's convinced that the QM-indeterminacy hegemony is motivated by last-ditch hope for free will.

It isn't the case that no one who supports a causal explanation "can ever be allowed to get a PhD or hold a job." Larry's a counterexample, and there are other counterexamples. Possibly if QM had been Larry's area of research, however, he'd have had troubles.

Ellen

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Ellen if you don't have an example of an academic whose main body of work is not based on a causal theory of QM you're affirming the substance of what I said while quibbling with how I said it.

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Ellen if you don't have an example of an academic whose main body of work is not based on a causal theory of QM you're affirming the substance of what I said while quibbling with how I said it.

(I'll assume you meant "is based.")

Shayne, no, I'm not affirming the substance of what you said, which was a wholesale charge against the character of a lot of physicists, including some top-flight ones. I'd be the last to deny that there's plenty wrong with the funding of science, and that there is trouble getting funding for theories which are off the main track. Furthermore, there are strong political factors skewing research in certain areas, most notably climatology. But to charge, as you have, that an attempt to "discredit reason, which discredits its corollary, freedom" is the operative motive for causal theories of QM not being much supported, I think is reckless accusation. Except for the obvious example of Bohm himself, I'm not going to cite, on a Google-able discussion list, names of physicists whose work has been in support of causal interpretations. But, yes, there are such examples currently alive and tenured.

Ellen

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Ellen I like broad brush strokes. You like to quibble over trifling details. We could go at each other forever. Good thing we aren't married.

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I should add that in this context I consider it trifling. If I were writing a book, I think Ellen would make a fine editor, assuming I could pick and choose which of her comments to incorporate.

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Damn it! The whole objective of physics is to make correct predictions. That is what well found science does. It makes (empirically) correct predictions about the world.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I was under the impression that the objective of science is to give us knowledge of reality, and that predictions, which are used to test theories, are a means to that end. During my college days I had a number of friends who went on to become scientists. Not one ever told me that he wanted to become a scientist because he wanted to be able to predict the future. What they had in common was a passion to understand the world.

Ghs

The way we demonstrate that we know what we think we know is to make accurate predictions of the outcomes of processes and interactions. Knowing and making accurate predictions are coeval and coequal.

How did Newton know he had the effects of gravitation pegged? By prediction accurately the motion of the Moon. How did we know Newtonian gravItation is not quite right? By the failure to predict the precession of the perihelion of Mercury.

To know is to predict accurately. To predict accurately is to know.

That is how Einstein became a gravitational super-star. He predicted accurately the bending of light in the gravitational field of the sun very accurately. The Newtonian prediction which assumed that light was a massive particle was off by a factor of two. It turns out the the gravitational field (according to Einstein has a "gravitational charge" so the field itself gravitates and that his how Einstein correctly predicted the bend of light.

Einstein did rehabilitate Newton's particle theory to the extent of showing the energy that light carries is quantized. The particle of light, a particle with rest mass zero was later called the photon.

Ba'al Chatzaf

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You are correct in principle, but it is not true that QM doesn't contain substantial integrations. The problem is that those integrations contradict one another. E.g., the wave/particle duality, or Bell's Inequality vs. relativity.

There are no contradictions. Wave/particle duality is an observed phenomenon. Ever heard of an electron microscope? About Bell's inequality: experiments have definitely shown that these are violated, as predicted by QM, ruling out local realistic theories with hidden variables. However, this is not in contradiction to the special theory of relativity.

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It seems Shayne has a point. Why do you call QM a theory? If a biologist described an elephant, a zebra, a lion and a wild dog--where's the theory? These animals can do various things, predictable things out of the descriptive material, but all without falsifiable biological theories. From such examinations a biologist may come up with theories about life and living and those would naturally address the questions of why? Why indeed? As such then, QM is physics exactly the same relatively easy way as the primitive descriptive biology assuming it's been aptly described here. Data is not the end-all be-all. It's just uneaten food on your plate.

Where did you get that nonsense? Surely from an ignorant Objectivist? QM is the most successful theory ever. It is eminently falsifiable - but it has never been falsified, all the empirical evidence confirms the theory with an unprecedented accuracy. The idea that Newtonian mechanics would "explain" things, but QM not, is complete bullshit. What is Newtons law of gravity else than a formula that describes the regularities found in measuring the attractive force between two massive bodies? And what is the notion of a "force", mysteriously working at a distance, else than a description of regularities found in the changes of movement of such bodies? What is more explanatory in Newton's "force" or in his equations of motion than in the wave function of QM or in the Schrödinger equation? Newton's theory is a mathematical model that makes it possible to make predictions that can be verified. So is QM, only in an age in which more accurate measurements are possible the empirical evidence confirms with extremely high accuracy the predictions by QM and relativity theory and falsifies those by Newton.

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You are correct in principle, but it is not true that QM doesn't contain substantial integrations. The problem is that those integrations contradict one another. E.g., the wave/particle duality, or Bell's Inequality vs. relativity.

There are no contradictions. Wave/particle duality is an observed phenomenon. Ever heard of an electron microscope? About Bell's inequality: experiments have definitely shown that these are violated, as predicted by QM, ruling out local realistic theories with hidden variables. However, this is not in contradiction to the special theory of relativity.

"I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics." -- Richard Feynman

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"I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics." -- Richard Feynman

You have dropped some context. I have attended some lectures given by Feynman. What he was saying is the the quantum effects cannot be understood in terms of common sense notions learned by experience at normal human size scales of time and space. His use of the word "understands" is somewhat at variance with the common usage. Of course, physicists understand quantum mechanics. They simply do not understanding it in terms of notions which exist at man-size scales. To really grasp the nettle requires some fairly high power mathematics. The same could be said of the space-time manifold at the center of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. The notion that gravitation is curvature of a four-manifold is very much at variance with Newton's notion of a force exerted at a distance. But force at a distance? That is rather weird, and Newton thought so. That is why he gave up trying to figure out the causes of gravitation. He wrote in -Principia Mathematica- "hypotheses non fingo". That is Latin for "I feign no hypothesis" which is a fancy way of saying that he (Newton) did not know what causes gravitation. But he did give a physical law, which while not quite correct, describes it rather will under a large range of conditions.

Contrast this with Aristotle's notions of matter of motion. They were completely in line with man-size scales of magnitude in a world in which the naked eye was the primary instrument of observation. Aristotle's physics was common sense and mostly wrong.

So much for common sense. Even in modern times most people, many of them educated, do not grasp what free fall is. And most people believe that the electrons that light your lights are pumped all the way from the power station. Not so. That is common sense at work.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited by BaalChatzaf
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You are correct in principle, but it is not true that QM doesn't contain substantial integrations. The problem is that those integrations contradict one another. E.g., the wave/particle duality, or Bell's Inequality vs. relativity.

There are no contradictions. Wave/particle duality is an observed phenomenon. Ever heard of an electron microscope? About Bell's inequality: experiments have definitely shown that these are violated, as predicted by QM, ruling out local realistic theories with hidden variables. However, this is not in contradiction to the special theory of relativity.

Both the wave and particle aspects of light are observed in single slit diffraction experiments (Frauenhoffer Diffraction). Quantum electrodynamics reconciles the seeming contradictions perfectly. Good to twelve decimal places to the right of the decimal point.

Ba'al Chatzaf

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Damn it! The whole objective of physics is to make correct predictions. That is what well found science does. It makes (empirically) correct predictions about the world.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I was under the impression that the objective of science is to give us knowledge of reality, and that predictions, which are used to test theories, are a means to that end. During my college days I had a number of friends who went on to become scientists. Not one ever told me that he wanted to become a scientist because he wanted to be able to predict the future. What they had in common was a passion to understand the world.

Ghs

The way we demonstrate that we know what we think we know is to make accurate predictions of the outcomes of processes and interactions. Knowing and making accurate predictions are coeval and coequal.

How did Newton know he had the effects of gravitation pegged? By prediction accurately the motion of the Moon. How did we know Newtonian gravItation is not quite right? By the failure to predict the precession of the perihelion of Mercury.

To know is to predict accurately. To predict accurately is to know....

I know that Ayn Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged. What predictions does this entail?

What we know and how we demonstrate (or justify) what we know are not the same thing. This distinction is so elementary that I'm surprised anyone would deny it. You admit as much when you ask, "How did Newton know he had the effects of gravitation pegged?" To accurately predict the motion of the Moon is not the same as knowing the effects of gravitation. If this were true, Newton's knowledge of gravitation would have been restricted solely to the Moon.

Likewise, when we say that Newton was wrong, we don't mean that his theory was unable to "predict the precession of the perihelion of Mercury." I can understand what it means to say that Newton was wrong while knowing nothing about precessions and perihelia..

Ghs

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His use of the word "understands" is somewhat at variance with the common usage. Of course, physicists understand quantum mechanics. They simply do not understanding it in terms of notions which exist at man-size scales. To really grasp the nettle requires some fairly high power mathematics.

It's far better from Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeBkMzSLA8w

What about the entangled photon experiments that indicate far faster than light transmission of information? That's a man-size scale. Actually what seems to be held is that the transmission is instantaneous and without any means. What do you make of that?

Shayne

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I got that idea here:

Note the scare quotes I put around "explain everything." You are using "explain" in a different sense than the one used here. No theory can explain in your sense of the term "explain". So no, you didn't get that from me or from George, you got it from yourself.

Shayne

Now i remember why I haven't posted here for many months. :)

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I got that idea here:

Note the scare quotes I put around "explain everything." You are using "explain" in a different sense than the one used here. No theory can explain in your sense of the term "explain". So no, you didn't get that from me or from George, you got it from yourself.

Shayne

Now i remember why I haven't posted here for many months. :)

GS: Look at the spinning dial. You are getting deeper and deeper relaxed. Deeper and deeper relaxed. GS, you will now forget what you have remembered. You will now forget what you have remembered....

--Brant

I was never here

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I got that idea here:

Note the scare quotes I put around "explain everything." You are using "explain" in a different sense than the one used here. No theory can explain in your sense of the term "explain". So no, you didn't get that from me or from George, you got it from yourself.

Shayne

Now i remember why I haven't posted here for many months. :)

GS: Look at the spinning dial. You are getting deeper and deeper relaxed. Deeper and deeper relaxed. GS, you will now forget what you have remembered. You will now forget what you have remembered....

--Brant

I was never here

LOL, always did like your wit. :)

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His use of the word "understands" is somewhat at variance with the common usage. Of course, physicists understand quantum mechanics. They simply do not understanding it in terms of notions which exist at man-size scales. To really grasp the nettle requires some fairly high power mathematics.

It's far better from Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QeBkMzSLA8w

What about the entangled photon experiments that indicate far faster than light transmission of information? That's a man-size scale. Actually what seems to be held is that the transmission is instantaneous and without any means. What do you make of that?

Shayne

No one can make Feynman's point as well as Feynman. He is what I call a Magical Teacher. When you attend one of his lectures, during the lecture and for a very short time thereafter you understand what he has to say perfectly. A few hours later, ones grasp is not so definite. He can project Insight for a short time. We won't see the likes of Feynman for a very long time to come, if ever.

What I make of it is the Feynman is a brilliant physicist and you are not. The tunneling effect is not understood except by mathematical representation of the quantum field and quantum wave function. We are not equipped to grasp it at the perceptual level because we don't perceive fields. By the way Quantum Electro-dynamics is the all time champion physical theory. It predicts the phenomena it is designed to predict to twelve decimal places and has not yet been falsified empirically. Feynman was one of three men who brought quantum electrodynamic to perfection from its start by Dirac in the 1930s.

See http://en.wikipedia....ster-than-light

and

http://en.wikipedia....electrodynamics

Ba'al Chatzaf

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"An experiment performed in 1997 by Nicolas Gisin at the University of Geneva has demonstrated nonlocal quantum correlations between particles separated by over 10 kilometers.[48] But as noted earlier, the nonlocal correlations seen in entanglement cannot actually be used to transmit classical information faster than light, so that relativistic causality is preserved; see no-communication theorem for further information. A 2008 quantum physics experiment also performed by Nicolas Gisin and his colleagues in Geneva, Switzerland has determined that the "speed" of the quantum non-local connection (what Einstein called spooky action at a distance) is at least 10,000 times the speed of light."

"Non-local connection" is a contradiction in terms. This is what I'm talking about. I don't care about the silly analogies they gave with lasers and shadows moving faster than light in order to let themselves off the hook for the contradictory implications of their theories, that is not what the theory says.

As Einstein said, it is indeed "spooky" action at a distance.

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"An experiment performed in 1997 by Nicolas Gisin at the University of Geneva has demonstrated nonlocal quantum correlations between particles separated by over 10 kilometers.[48] But as noted earlier, the nonlocal correlations seen in entanglement cannot actually be used to transmit classical information faster than light, so that relativistic causality is preserved; see no-communication theorem for further information. A 2008 quantum physics experiment also performed by Nicolas Gisin and his colleagues in Geneva, Switzerland has determined that the "speed" of the quantum non-local connection (what Einstein called spooky action at a distance) is at least 10,000 times the speed of light."

"Non-local connection" is a contradiction in terms. This is what I'm talking about. I don't care about the silly analogies they gave with lasers and shadows moving faster than light in order to let themselves off the hook for the contradictory implications of their theories, that is not what the theory says.

As Einstein said, it is indeed "spooky" action at a distance.

Spooky, but non the less real, as exhibited by the experiments. When your experiment says X and your philosophy says not X (assuming the experiment is valid) then give up what your philosophy says. Experimental fact invariably trumps principled generality. This is simply an expansion of some very elementary logic: If the general proposition for all x A ( x ) is asserted and a specific instance b such that A ( x ), then the general proposition is false. It is as simple as that. Even Aristotle knew and agreed with that argument.

Speaking of spooky, Newton was the first to assert gravitation is spooky, since he saw it as action at a distance. How can one body A exert a force on another body B which is separated in space from A? Newton was uncomfortable with the position, but he assumed it non the less. Gravitation according to Newton is spooky action at a distance. Later on gravitation was modeled as field acting on bodies and bodies creating gravitational fields. A similar step was taken by Faraday who envisioned electric and magnetic fields in space. A charged body A acts on a charged body B by creating a field F\sub A which interacts with body B. Similarly body B creates a field F\sub B which interacts with body A. The field in space is the sum of fields F\subA and F\subB (the principle of superposition). In a way, the field concept was a way of rehabilitating the notion of direct contact rather than spooky action at a distance.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited by BaalChatzaf
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Spooky, but non the less real, as exhibited by the experiments.

No, as interpreted by physicists using corrupt philosophy as their guide. There is no such thing as causeless action, there is no such thing as action without means, thus this "experiment" is merely an illusion of some kind that physicists haven't yet figured out.

Shayne

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