No, phlogiston was never detected a single time in any any experiment ever.
If you believe this is not the case, find a single test that determines the physical construct and properties of it. ( hint: there isn't one ) in addition "air" is the perfect analogy because it was part of phlogistic theory! To be very clear, phlogiston was only ever a postulate. Period. A postulate is NOT a theory nor a fact. I'm sure the wiki, if it exists, makes this all clear. If not google it and you will find further definitions and types of theories and how they differ from postulates. You are confusing the definition of theory and complicating that confusion with comparing systems to elements, and testing for behavior vs physical structure. You have good questions, and this is a technical topic. On Sep 22, 2011, at 10:38 AM, Sam <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 11:19 AM, Gruss Gott <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> No, actually, it wasn't. It was an unknown, again, just like "dark matter". >> Read Robert's response, his is the credited answer. >> > > It was for one hundred years. > > >> But how about this analogy: air. >> >> We can see the effects air has, we can calculate air's effect on things, we >> can "test" for it, we can try to theorize about air. So is air a theory? A >> fact? No. Because there is no such substance as "air". It's simply a >> placeholder for other substances. > > Nobody claimed air was an element on it's own but a combination of > gasses. Nothing in common, very bad analogy again. > >> Now if we had a theory about HOW this substance acts given certain >> conditions (let's say a fan at constant speed) in general, at a certain >> level of granularity, that theory will always be fact. > > If someone had a theory about air and tested it, proved it existed and > later discovered it was a combination of gasses than we could say the > theory was not a fact but they were on to something. In other words > you could prove way back that air existed, fact. Now we know that air > is a combination of things. The fact that air exists still holds true. > The theory of what comprises air has changed. Thus a good theory > proven wrong that leads to the understanding of other things. Success. > >> Note the key difference! The second theory is about the motion OF air, not >> "air". If, for example, you assume that "air" is everywhere and you can >> always survive breathing "it" ... Well that experiment would fail. Thus air >> is not a fact, just like phlogiston isn't. >> >> Phlogiston theory was about effects, not the substance itself. Just like >> air is a place holder. >> > No, it was classified as an element and was tested and proven, after > one hundred years of testing by the top scientists of the day it was > proven not to exist and the actions were caused by something > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:342929 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
