That link is rather old Adrain - and contains a lot of the stuff I teach to students who show some desire to move beyond learning some flip rhetorics or regurgitation. Zero sums in physics are based on assumptions, much as one can construct business spreadsheets around them - sometimes they are only helpful in letting you know something about the assumptions is wrong. This doesn't absolve us from recognising some of this kind of work has practical uses and works better than Sooty's magic wand. Anything goes rapidly descends into any crap will do, which it won't. If there is one key lesson in systems theories it is that complex systems are difficult to predict, along with the social fact that we keep needing to re-learn this lesson. Most people will need a discovery that bacteria are festering away somewhere on Europa to realise life didn't start on Earth. One of my questions on systems ask students to work out what impact a gadget that would make water into an oxidising agent would have - some can't even foresee detergent factories closing, others can throw out very inventive scenarios. Try getting people to consider whether incest is wrong when there is no need for any progeny from sex. There are still some good reasons, but most won't get to them in the emotional spill. We have already created an educated cadre with no integrity beyond its own interests. This may well be because ordinary life is something to be avoided if you can - a sump one is motivated to leave behind or stay out of.
On 5 Sep, 12:03, adrf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Try this for size. > From http://www.newciv.org/ISSS_Primer/seminark.html > HINTZ PAGELS "We live in the wake of a physics revolution comparable to the > Copernican > demolition of the anthropocentric world > -- a revolution which began with the invention of the theory of relativity > and quantum > mechanics in the first decades of this century and which has left most > educated people behind" > AND: ""If you take a highly intelligent person and give them the best > possible, elite > education, then you will most likely wind up with an academic who is > completely impervious to > reality." Halton Arp > > I've got several more with similar sentiments. So it may be an advantage to > know no physics, > less clutter to put in the waste basket. I'm beginning to entertain the > notion that the > educated are our biggest contribution to social disaster. > > Nature abhors a vacuum, is Newton's worst contribution. There are no vacuums > at all. In an > infinite universe things can get quite tenously close to zero, but never > attain it. So Physics > habit of making their sums out as zero, is false to fact. It's probably a > generalisation based > on the Magdeburg experiment of vaccuuming two half globes and pulling them > apart with horses > which they could not. > > adrian > > > > archytas wrote: > > Nature abhors a vacuum; physicists are none too keen on it either. > > However, conceptual attempts to fill it up, most famously with ether > > as a hypothetical medium, have regularly created more problems than > > they solved. This is because whatever occupies empty space would have > > to be somehow different from the tangible stuff the world is made of. > > Modern physics challenges the ancient dichotomy between substance and > > void. What is perceived as empty space turns out to be a new kind of > > ether, a patchwork of quantum fields teeming with spontaneous > > activity, and the fundamental building block of nature. Subject to > > random disturbances, this “grid” creates stable packets of energy > > which, by dint of Einstein’s most famous discovery, expressed in the > > equation E=mc2, account for the mass of ordinary matter. > > Wilczek draws on recent developments in the special theory of > > relativity, quantum field theory and quantum chromodynamics to probe > > the origin of mass and the prospects for a unified theory that would > > account for all its seemingly disparate aspects. “The Lightness of > > Being” began as a series of public lectures given by the author at > > different institutions. Not the easiest read, this book does cover > > the ground about to be tested at CERN. I’ll see if I can find a > > sensible review I can codge into the basic claims about more recent > > work. I am not and never have been a physicist. This collection of > > papers did help me understand more than I have in the past. > > > On 5 Sep, 09:35, archytas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > >> I do, in some senses, believe we are waiting for 'things to pop up'. > >> Travel in the solar system may be fantastic in engineering terms, yet > >> also reveals how limted we still are against concepton of vastness. > >> Metaphors are subject to manifold interpretation as Carlos points to. > >> Even the most studied research leaves us with approximation in our > >> theories (Ludwig - horrible to read). CERN cranks over in the next > >> few days and will no doubt conclusively prove we need a bigger home > >> for the bouys and girls playing in it. > > >> On 4 Sep, 19:34, Georges Metanomski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:- Hide > >> quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Epistemology" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/epistemology?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
