I suppose it’s because they just love contemplating the nature of God in the absolute silence of a prison cell. 🤣
What kind of question is that, and isn't the answer blindingly obvious? It’s all part of God's will, plain and simple. And let’s face it, God certainly knows His own flock best, and He tends to be particularly hard on those who go out of their way to claim they belong to Him. You have believers who worry that God is too strict, fearing His divine judgment will catch up to them in heaven if they live in sin, but it seems their deserved punishment arrived a little early, right here on Earth. Everyone gets exactly what they deserve, doesn't anyone else agree?
As for the non-believers, well, maybe God turns a blind eye to them, since they never actually made any formal promises to follow His laws to the letter.😬
What really seems to irritate Him, though, are those who swear blind loyalty while breaking His commandments the moment they step out the door. Take our friend Second's, for example:
Second's says: It's because there are almost no non-believers left in the USA, you fraud! b> In one single, incredibly brief sentence, he managed to commit three of the seven deadly sins— pride, wrath, and sloth. If he hadn't been so lazy and arrogant, he might have bothered to look up some actual statistics to realize that non-believers in America make up about 14 percent of the population (atheists, agnostics, and the religiously unaffiliated). So, if he weren't so slothful, he wouldn't be lying so shamelessly and violating the eighth commandment:
8. Thou shalt not bear false witness! b>
After being caught red-handed in a lie by Super-skeptic, he immediately tries to swap one falsehood for another, even more egregious one, claiming:
Second's: Of these 8% (atheists and agnostics) 99.9% are of criminal character. b> Once again, with just one solitary sentence, he has thoroughly violated the eighth commandment, and to top it off, he’s tacked on several other sins—gossip, hatred, slander, intolerance, and passing unfair judgment on his neighbors.🙂 There’s no need to even mention his wrath; it's a constant companion for Second's. Don't blame him, though—whenever someone attacks an opposing view with that much passion and fury, it’s usually just a subconscious sign that they know they lack any solid foundation for their beliefs. Deep down, he knows his only real argument for his faith is the one famously uttered by the church father Tertullian:
. . I believe because it is unbelievable. b>
Second's anger is the clearest indicator that his views are upside down. The only real problem with fools and fanatics 🙂 like him is that they are always so certain of themselves, which often leads people much wiser than Second's to simply walk away from the argument just to avoid being spat upon. But, we don't want the loonies taking over b> as Slartibartfast would say.
After dissecting Second's—a textbook example of a fanatical Catholic and a blinded believer par excellence—it becomes perfectly clear why Catholics often lead the pack in the criminal population of America. So many of these people operate under two different sets of morals: one set they preach and advocate for but never actually practice, and another set they live by, but rarely ever speak of or dare to preach.
Yet, far worse than crimes committed due to a failure to follow one's religious convictions are the crimes committed specifically *in the name* of those very convictions. Or, as Blaise Pascal, a deeply devoted believer, once put it:
Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction. b> 👎
bozanstvena333 said:😁 I honestly hold a bit of a grudge against Plato for not being more specific about where Atlantis actually is located. Plus, I’ve always had a thing for those fireballs, you know, because of the way they just slice right through matter.
Maybe he just got too caught up playing games with the little kids and simply ran out of time to mention it?🤣
nobody and nothing said:Feynman loved to joke. Take his book, for instance, where he lays out wave optics and explains how light functions as a wave. Of course he knows that light follows both the traditional wave model and the particle model. His whole goal is to unify those two frameworks under a single new concept of a 'particle' that encompasses both behaviors.
What an absolute idiot you are. "Feynman loved to joke"? Sure, that’s true, but he was being deadly serious here. Quantum electrodynamics—have you even read anything by Feynman besides this one little booklet?—actually starts by explaining the very experiments that prove light doesn't just act like a wave, but like a particle. Then, he spends the rest of the entire book showing how to calculate that particle's movement using a wave equation. That’s how you account for all those experiments where light looks like a wave in traditional physics and the ones where it acts like a particle. Mysteriously, nobody actually knows why light behaves this way, but that's the reality.
But hey, Feynman loved to joke. Honestly, it isn't even worth my time to argue with you. Goodbye.
nobody and nothing said:So, here is my question for you: how on earth is probability linked to a WAVE function? Why does that function have to be a wave function specifically? Is there actually anything within probability theory itself that suggests probability should be described by a wave function? And is there anything in classical mechanics regarding collisions between spheres that implies this probability ought to be modeled by a WAVE function?
.
I honestly can't give you an answer to that. I have no clue. Look, I’m smart, but I’m not exactly a genius. You seem to think you’ve cracked the code just because you’ve read some Plato, right? Wolfgang Pauli thought he had it too. Heisenberg felt the same way. And look, your lawyer, Nobel laureate Feynman (yet another heavy hitter in science—it seems you have a thing for destructive types😲, only drawn to scientists who helped build atomic bombs) claims even he doesn't grasp it. Or anyone else for that matter!
The man simply admits he hasn't a clue.. I’m sure that quote rings a bell for you, so I won't bother searching for it. It's a mystery to him and everyone else. And once the mystery begins, that’s where God steps in. Or Plato’s forms from some incomprehensible realm. To quote your lawyer again.
Richard Feynman's Views on the Irrational Origin of Religion
"God was invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand.
Now, when you finally discover how something works, you get some laws which you're taking away from God; you don't need him anymore. But you need him for the other mysteries.
So therefore you leave him to create the universe because we haven't figured that out yet; you need him for understanding those things which you don't believe the laws will explain, such as consciousness, or why you only live to a certain length of time -- life and death -- stuff like that.
God is always associated with those things that you do not understand. Therefore I don't think that the laws can be considered to be like God because they have been figured out. "
When it comes to this whole mess, Feynman strikes me as being far more honest and sincere. The ultimate form of integrity is simply saying, when you don't know something, that you don't know.
nobody and nothing said:And if you actually wanted to call me a liar, you’d have to back it up by twisting my words into something I never actually said. But you didn't do that. Then again, fanatics don't need logic; they just prefer the whole "spit on it and claim it stuck" approach. So now I'm suddenly a liar? Here is the exact quote of what you wrote. How else am I supposed to interpret this, given how it's phrased: So, you claimed Christian doctrine is just Platonic teaching. That isn't true, and I refuted it. But then you shifted the goalposts and wrote that Christians eventually took Platonic teachings and reshaped them—which is the exact opposite of your initial claim.
You didn't refute anything.
If someone writes "fuck you" on a wall, does that mean Joe broke his dick?
Stop taking everything so incredibly literal.
Did you honestly think I was suggesting that Plato was out there preaching about a coming savior, the resurrection, or the Three Wise Men?
Those kinds of myths have always existed, before or after. What made Christianity the most dominant religion on the planet was precisely its use of the sophisticated Platonic philosophical system, which Christian theologians—think Jesse, Origen, St. Augustine, and others—leveraged to build their foundation.
And let's be real: if that Platonic framework hadn't served their purposes, those theologians wouldn't have touched it in the first place!
nobody and nothing said:Actually, Heisenberg wrote this himself (Physics and Metaphysics, published in the States, p. 356) '' 'In the beginning there was symmetry,' which is certainly a more accurate way of putting it than Democritus's thesis that 'In the beginning there was the particle.' Elementary particles embody symmetries; they are merely their simplest representations, acting as consequences of those symmetries.'' And also (from the same book, p. 364.): ''...the representatives of one or more properties are mathematical forms that outline elementary particles; they are, so to speak, the ideas of elementary particles, which ultimately correspond to the actual object of an elementary particle.'' But of course, what did he know about physics—that fascist, that metaphysician, that homosexual Platonic thinker? You can laugh at his words too, since physics isn't exactly your specialty. You've never even heard of quantum physics—it's a damn shame you died before you could update him on a few things.
That all sounds lovely and wonderful, and sure, Heisenberg was a top-tier scientist, but does that somehow change the fact that Heisenberg was leading the project to build the atomic bomb for Hitler?
nobody and nothing Galileo didn't just stumble onto the idea that there's no difference in a vacuum simply by sitting around thinking about it. His own experiments couldn't have proven that through pure thought alone. John Walker74 Why are you so stuck on the notion that Galileo arrived at the assumption that objects fall at the same rate in a vacuum just by using his imagination? What else was he supposed to use? But with the specific experiment we keep going back to, Galileo first used it to open his own eyes to the fact that he shouldn't blindly trust Aristotle.
Through countless trials using inclined planes, he realized that friction was what actually hindered an object's movement. So, he spent his time smoothing out those surfaces, lubricating them—doing everything possible to minimize friction—while measuring falling speeds at various angles and so on...
Naturally, he eventually concluded that if you could reduce that friction to zero, or essentially remove the air, all objects would fall equally. But he didn't reach that conclusion through mere speculation; he got there only after a rigorous series of experiments.
People had been pondering this exact problem for thousands of years before Galileo ever showed up, but clearly, nobody bothered to master it until Galileo came along and bridged the gap between mathematics, logic, and experimentation. Once experimentation was finally integrated into the scientific method, science actually started to move forward. It stopped being nothing more than empty philosophizing. This is where you and I differ significantly.
You seem to believe that Plato made a massive contribution to science, whereas I believe he actually set science back by completely ignoring empirical evidence. Even if we ignore the fact that he left behind a whole trail of misconceptions and failed to contribute anything truly vital to science, that's the least of the problems.
nobody and nothing In the future, if there's something I've written that you don't understand, just ask. John Walker74 To be honest, I didn't understand, because you won't find that kind of phrasing in the works of either Newton or Galileo.
nobody and nothing It seems to you like there's a massive distinction between moving at a constant velocity and being at rest. Honestly, it’s no wonder; that is the most common mistake made by people without any actual physics training. And since you're so insistent on precise terminology, Newton's first law doesn't even mention a vector sum; it says: "...unless some external force changes that state." John Walker74 It is perfectly clear to me that all physical laws regarding rest and uniform motion remain identical, but who exactly said otherwise? And it isn't my fault that Newton specifically distinguishes between rest and motion in his first law; don't blame me for his wording.
And since we're talking about strict citations, Newton doesn't say an external force but rather external forces. Here, look at the Latin and English so you can actually learn something. For those external forces to be able to change a state of rest or uniform motion, their vector sum cannot equal zero. LEX I: Corpus omne perservare in statu suo, quiescendi vel movendi uniformiter in directum, nisi quatenus illud a viribus impressis cogitur statum suum mutare.
LAW I: Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a right line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.
So don't act surprised when you run into definitions like these in textbooks:
Newton’s first law of motion states: If the vector sum of the forces acting on an object is zero, then the object will remain at rest or remain moving at constant velocity. OR: An object at rest remains at rest and an object in motion will continue in motion with a constant velocity, (i.e., a straight line with constant speed), unless it experiences a net external force - this means the vector sum of all the external forces acting on the object. OR: A body at rest will remain at rest and a body in motion will remain in motion with a constant velocity unless acted upon by an unbalanced and outside force.
There might be some arrogance involved here, but at the end of the day, we are talking about actual knowledge.
nobody and nothing So, you're claiming the "difference will be too small," implying they won't fall at the exact same time? There *is* a difference. And even if that gap is tiny, you can actually see it with your own eyes—you can clearly observe that one specific object always hits the ground just a fraction sooner. Galileo arrived at the conclusion that there would be no difference in a vacuum purely through logical deduction, because he couldn't actually perform that specific experiment himself back then.«
John Walker74 I didn't bring up this experiment because I wanted to get into a pedantic debate with you about some microscopic discrepancy in how fast a stone falls; I used it as an example to prove how utterly useless philosophy and mathematics become when they aren't backed up by experimental verification.
The reason Galileo is such a titan is that he integrated experimentation into the scientific method, which is easily his most significant contribution to physics. That’s precisely why he’s hailed as the father of modern physics.
This particular experiment matters because it provided a simple, elegant way to demonstrate that the old way of looking at things was fundamentally broken compared to the Platonic or Aristotelian worldview.
The point wasn't to explain away some negligible difference in falling speeds, which is exactly the kind of vague, circular reasoning you try to hide behind with your Platonic obsession; the issue was a massive, cardinal error that persisted for two thousand years and served as the foundation for a completely delusional model of the universe.
Based on the flawed premise that heavier objects fall faster, Aristotle concluded that Earth is the heaviest thing in existence and sits right at the center of everything. Then you have air, which is lighter, and finally the celestial bodies, made of ether, which are considered the lightest of all. Throw in fire, water, air, and earth as the four elements—each supposedly possessing qualities of being cold, hot, wet, or dry—and you end up with a vision of the cosmos that is spectacularly backwards.
It wasn't just that this model was wrong or that you couldn't calculate a single thing using Aristotelian physics; it was that anyone brave enough to question this geocentric and ego-centric universe saw their books burned, and the author would be lucky to escape the stake along with their writings.
I'll say it again: I don't give a damn about that tiny margin of error. The goal was to show people that Aristotle's claim regarding the proportional speed of heavy objects falling was a MASSIVE mistake. We aren't talking about fractions of a second here.
nobody and nothing But you can see that difference with the naked eye—it's incredibly slight, but you can tell that one object consistently lands just a hair before the other. John Walker74 Regarding this "naked eye" observation you're so sure of, it’s blindingly obvious that you haven't actually tried the experiment, despite my suggestions. You've let Plato cloud your judgment far too much. Just try it once; it won't kill you. I am telling you right now, if I stand on the roof of my house and drop objects of varying weights—where one is many times heavier than the other—there is absolutely no way you could judge which hit first without precision instruments. If you think I'm wrong, let's make a bet.
ironbadger31 said:Oh, please... Jesse, I have to say, I was actually a bit blindsided by the sheer amount of pointless insults you’ve been throwing around in here... 😢 It’s just not what I expected from someone like you...
Look, whatever the case may be, I’m asking you nicely to drop the attitude and tone down the rhetoric, because honestly, none of this makes any sense. And without even getting myself dragged into this debate as a third party, I’ll just point out that your explanations are riddled with holes (I read the whole thing 😉), which really doesn't justify acting out like this.
So, I’m signing off. 😁
Hey ironbadger31,
it’s been a while since we last spoke..
I take all that criticism with a grain of salt, truly. 🙂
Down here, a heavy wind is blowing through the city, rain clouds have taken over the skyline, the cat is meowing, and on the corner of my street, they're selling roasted chestnuts—they're steaming and sizzling, wawecli hot and delicious..
But how on earth does any of that have anything to do with Plato? 😕
mistyfox812 It's common practice to assume that anything "real" has to have mass. But photons aren't little marbles (and if they were marbles, why wouldn't they be pyramids or cubes?). Marbles can't undergo interference. John Walker74 A pyramid won't work, you mean a cube instead, because a pyramid isn't a polyhedron—Plato will come after you if you mention that again....😁
Will you please just stop thrashing around? The more you struggle, the deeper you sink into the swamp of your own ignorance. The water is already up to your neck, and the only thing keeping your head above the surface is your hollow skull🙂filled with helium. The sheer desperation of your position is proven by the fact that you’re calling upon Feynman to defend Plato. That would be like a lamb hiring a wolf to be its lawyer. After all, Feynman had no patience for philosophers who tried to theorize about the material world, let alone those trying to lecture him on the immaterial.
I can, I absolutely can; marbles, electrons, protons, cubes, pyramids, apples, pears, planets—everything that exists can interfere. It's just that with macro-sized objects, the effects are so infinitesimally small that nobody notices them. Go find Feynman's explanation of the double-slit experiment; it's an absolute classic, and nobody explained that experiment better than he did. Maybe then you'll finally grasp that marbles actually can interfere.
But let's look at whatFeynman says about light. Since you brought him up first, I assume you hold his opinion in high regard. As it happens, I have about a dozen of his books sitting on my shelf at home, including the famousLectures on Physics.
I want to emphasize that light comes in this form – particles. It is very important to know that light behaves like particles, especially for those of you who have gone to school, where you were probably told something about light behaving like waves. I’m telling you the way it does behave – like particles. R. Feynman / QED
If you don't trust the lawyer you called yourself, who else are you going to turn to? Let's see what else your legal counsel has to say about photons, which you seem to think are nothing more than figments of the imagination.
…… Thus we see immediately that the energy of a photon must be momentum times c, or if c = 1, the energy and momentum are equal. That is to say, the rest mass is zero…. If it is a particle of zero rest mass, what happens when it stops? It never stops! It always goes at the speed c. ………the photon really can (and does) have energy even though it has no rest mass, but this it possesses by perpetual going at the speed of light. Six Easy Pieces – Richard P. Feynman
So, from the evidence, you can see that even your own lawyer is against you, and that everything I stated in my last post was spot on. Much to your disappointment, light isn't some kind of world spirit; it consists of particles—photons—that possess their own energy and momentum, just like any other physical particle. The material world is comprised of everything we can measure with our physical instruments, and light is no exception.
My dear mistyfox812, this is pointless now. I would love to keep giving you private tutoring sessions in physics, math, philosophy, and history over the internet, but quite frankly, I don't have the time anymore. We've debunked plenty of myths regarding Plato, and almost everything regarding you.
I hope that after this lesson, you won't be so blindly idealizing Plato. Be open to all ideas, but never so open that you lose your common sense. Otherwise, you'll spend your whole life blindly following things you can't understand and can't even wrap your head around.
I realize it’s absolutely mind-blowing to someone as clueless as you that these kinds of ideas were actually floating around 2,500 years ago. And don't worry, you aren't the only one struggling to wrap your head around this; most people fall into the same trap. You're just another sheep following the herd instead of using your own brain. 🙂
So, here we are: you're totally enamored with Plato, yet you have the nerve to nitpick Democritus because his concept of particles doesn't perfectly align with how we understand quantum physics today. Let's be clear, Democritus's physics was inherently deterministic, much like Newton's classical physics (and keep in mind that Newton was well aware of Democritus's atomism, just as Galileo was, both of whom were undoubtedly influenced by him).
However, it wasn't long before Epicurus, a follower of Democritus, introduced one crucial modification. He suggested that an atom could suddenly and spontaneously swerve from its straight path—its behavior becomes unpredictable, which is strikingly similar to the modern uncertainty principle we deal with now.
When you take these stances from Democritus and Epicurus and add Aristarchus's heliocentric model into the mix, you start to see that 300 years before Christ, the very foundations of modern science—modern chemistry, astronomy, and physics—were already being laid down. Sure, if you tried to build an atomic bomb using nothing but these atomistic theories, someone like Saddam Hussein wouldn't have stood a chance, but we have to remember these were philosophical theories rather than hard sciences. They were full of errors and flaws—it's obvious Epicurus had his fair share of brilliant moments and total blunders—but the facts I've listed above served as the fundamental starting points and ideas from which the science we recognize today could eventually evolve over the last 2,000 years.
Don't you see just how much this mirrors modern chemistry and physics, and honestly, isn't it a massive leap forward compared to those rigid little squares and pyramids from the Plato-Aristotle's era? We aren't stuck with some unmoving prime mover or these incomprehensible eternal forms floating in an abstract realm; instead, we have atoms and empty space locked in constant motion. Just look at theseDemocritus's core concepts:
1. Matter can't be created; you can't just pull something out of thin air. 2. Matter cannot be destroyed. 3. The universe is composed of solid bodies and empty space, and there are likely countless other worlds just like ours. 4. These cosmic solid bodies are built from simple or complex arrangements. 5. You can't divide matter infinitely. 6. The smallest particle of a substance that can't be split any further is called an atom. 7. There is an infinite number of atoms existing independently throughout the universe or clustering together to form solid objects. 8. Empty space stretches out infinitely. 9. Atoms are in constant, restless motion. 10. In empty space, atoms move linearly, but within solid bodies, they vibrate. 11. Atoms possess three fundamental properties: shape, size, and weight. 12. It is the combination of shape, size, and weight that dictates the chemical properties of an element. 13. The variety of different types of atoms isn't infinite, but it is incredibly vast. 14. Solid celestial bodies, including stars and planets, were formed through the grouping and collision of atoms. 15. Life on Earth emerged through that same process—atoms colliding and bonding, evolving from simple organisms to more complex ones, starting with plants, then animals, and finally humans, which hits right at the heart of evolutionary theory. 16. The Milky Way is essentially a collection of stars similar to our Sun. 17. There are many worlds out there like ours, and they probably host intelligent beings too.
By establishing that matter is indestructible, that atoms are in perpetual motion, and that nothing comes from nothing, Democritus actually anticipated the modern principles of The conservation of Energy.
Absolutely nothing Democritus didn't hand down some grand law regarding the conservation of energy; that was formulated way back in the 19th century. So, you've managed to fail spectacularly for two and a half millennia. John Walker74 Oh, please. You know, sometimes while I'm scrolling through your posts, I actually start to regret ever telling you that your head is completely empty. Honestly, it’s more like your skull is just filled to the brim with helium. Otherwise, there's no way you could even manage to walk upright down a sidewalk without tripping over your own feet. And sure, let's not forget that single little piece of wire running from your left ear to your right; heaven forbid that wire snaps, because then your ears might actually fall off. That's pretty much how I picture your brain's anatomy.😬😬
So, why don't you be a sweetheart and write out exactly what this "law" looks like for us? Maybe if you try hard enough, you'll win a Nobel Prize. You seem to think that because people identified certain forces and types of energy in the 19th century, the whole thing is wrapped up in a neat little bow. But that's not how science works, is it? As new forces and energies were discovered in physics, the law of conservation of energy evolved through various different forms.
Thermodynamics has its own laws for the conservation of energy, mechanics has its own, electromagnetism has its own, and nuclear physics has its own. The one thing they all share is a single principle: energy can change from one form to another, but it can never be destroyed. And so far, nobody has been able to prove that wrong.
Now, let's talk a bit about Democritus's understanding of physics and the conservation of energy. I really don't feel like typing this all out myself, so I'm just going to copy and paste this from a serious source:
”Democritus was born in Abdera, Thrace. He wrote extensively, but only fragments of his works remain. According to his exposition of the atomic theory of matter, all things are composed of minute, invisible, indestructible particles of pure matter (atoma, “indivisibles”), which move about eternally in infinite empty space (kenon, “the void”). Although atoms are made up of precisely the same matter, they differ in shape, size, weight, sequence, and position. Qualitative differences in what the senses perceive and the birth, decay, and disappearance of things are the results not of characteristics inherent in atoms but of quantitative arrangements of atoms. Democritus viewed The creation of Worlds as The Natural consequence of The ceaseless whirling motion of atoms in space. Atoms collide and spin, forming larger aggregations of matter.”
his atomic theory anticipated The modern principles of The conservation of Energy and The irreducibility of matter.
Your whole issue is that you just don't get that this wave function isn't some tangible, physical thing; it's nothing more than a mathematical probability function we had to cook up specifically because of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle. You seem to think light is just flipping back and forth between being a wave and a particle, and then you start picturing particles as little little pyramids or tiny cubes—you know, exactly the kind of nonsense Plato used to dream up. He identified five regular polyhedrons and foolishly assigned four of them to represent water, fire, air, and Earth. Since he couldn't figure out what to do with the fifth one, Aristotle just dubbed it ether and claimed there was no such thing as empty space because objects move through the ether in the heavens. If you take a bit of water, a bit of air, a bit of Earth, and a bit of fire, mix them in certain proportions, and you suddenly get gold? Just add a stationary Earth at the center of the universe and voilà—you’ve got Plato-Aristotle physics, chemistry, and astronomy all wrapped up in one.Isn't it just the ultimate scam to feed humanity such a moronic vision of the world and actually manage to prevent anyone from questioning it for two thousand years?!👎
The next time I hear a physicist rambling on about spin, angular momentum, or the radius of an electron, I might just start imagining electrons as little cubes just to make N&N feel better—or better yet, let's go with pyramids. After all, Plato was aaaayy much obsessed with Egypt. 😛
Nobody and Nothing That whole statement about how "particles remain particles" is completely meaningless. Richard Feynman actually suggested the term wavicles just to prevent people from picturing these "particles" as little solid balls.
John Walker74 Ha, ha, ha 😂..... Honestly, I’m practically wetting myself laughing here. Look, Nobody and Nothing, just stop it already, for crying out loud..... What exactly is going on in your head instead of a brain? Is it just a piece of wire used to keep your ears from falling off? 🙂
Let me lay this out clearly for you: your claim that light acts as a wave in one instance and a particle in another is outdated thinking from before the era of quantum physics; the entire point of quantum physics was to develop a single, unified theory that remains consistent across every experiment, rather than us having to switch between using wave equations in one scenario and treating light as swarms of particles in another.
Anyone with even a passing familiarity with physics can see from this conversation just how deeply you misunderstand the principles of modern physics. Of course, you don't have a clue, and since you can't actually disprove any of this, you just sit there without a comment.
After I took the time to explain how things actually work—specifically how particles in quantum physics, unlike those in classical mechanics, possess an associated wave function that we use to calculate the probability of finding a specific particle at a certain location in space—you have the audacity to "wisely" point out that Feynman suggested calling them wawecle.
And then what? He was simply trying to emphasize that particles behave exactly the way I just described. And by the way, he didn't call them wawecle, he called them wavicles. You know, in English, the word for wave isn't "wawe," it's "wave." Honestly, have some shame; you don't even know English.😛. And you clearly can't even translate a quote:
In order to save ourselves from inventing new words such as wavicles, we have chosen to call these objects “particles.” R. Feynman So, he wasn't suggesting we call them wavicles; he was saying there was absolutely no need to go through the trouble of inventing new terms like wavicles.
nothing at all Modern physics is fundamentally built on a foundation of experimentation and mathematics—and the reason I focused solely on the math was purely due to the context of my previous point regarding Platonism and science. John Walker74 Stupidity is stupidity, regardless of what kind of context you wrap it in. And honestly, your little attempt to frame modern physics as nothing more than mathematical physics is transparent at best. You want to claim Plato inspired Kepler? Well, Plato dealt with mathematics, so by your twisted logic, does that make him a great physicist? It’s absolutely ridiculous to proclaim someone a great physicist when they essentially stabbed the entire field in the back by teaching us to rely exclusively on pure reason while completely tossing empirical evidence out the window.
nobody and nothing An experiment proves something is true, but you don't actually reach a meaningful understanding just by running trials. A complete idiot could collect thousands of pieces of empirical data and still fail to grasp a single thing. John Walker74 If you're applying the rules of Aristotelian logic here, then you're basically calling Aristotle a total moron. He had thousands of empirical observations regarding nature, plants, and animals—all carefully selected—yet he failed to draw any significant conclusions in biology or physics. Now, of course, he wasn't stupid; he was a genius, but he simply lacked the scientific method. Plus, he had a terrible teacher whose influence he never quite managed to shake off.
nobody and nothing The idea that physical knowledge moves linearly from experiments to laws is fundamentally flawed; the path actually works the other way around. John Walker74 I didn't specify which direction physical knowledge travels, but let's be real: an unexpected experimental result often pushes a theory in the right direction. So, the path can absolutely be a two-way street.
Take the famous Michelson–Morley experiment, for instance; it left everyone completely baffled, and a new theory had to be constructed specifically to account for those results. Philosophers could have spent another hundred years just theorizing, and not one of them would have realized that time is relative. If that experiment hadn't happened, we might never have gotten there, because the theory of relativity flies so wildly in the face of our everyday experience. But honestly, why even bother discussing Einstein with someone who hasn't even mastered the first Newtonian law they learned in middle school?😛😛😛
absolutely nothing This conclusion from Galileo is just a direct result of his thoughts on the principle of inertia, which he was actually the first to formulate. It states that an object upon which no force acts continues to move at a constant velocity. Did he figure this out through some grand experiment? Please, nobody has ever actually seen an object that isn't being acted upon by some kind of force. John Walker74 I honestly thought the law was stated this way: an object at rest tends to stay at rest, and an object in motion will continue moving at a constant velocity, provided that the vector sum of all forces acting on the object equals zero. You don't even seem to grasp the first Newtonian law, yet here you are trying to lecture me on quantum mechanics? 🙂Good grief… what an absolute amateur. But go ahead, keep talking to him if you want.
Right this second, I am looking at an object where the vector sum of the forces equals zero. This mysterious item, "which nobody has ever seen," is the book sitting right here on my desk. Gravity is pulling the book toward the floor, but the molecular forces within my desk are neutralizing that gravitational pull. So the book stays still, and I am witnessing the law of inertia in action; experimental verification has proven the law is true. In the exact same way, it’s possible to experimentally verify the other half of the definition, but I won't bore you with that right now, since this is clearly way over your head.😁😁
Are you asking me if Galileo arrived at the law of inertia through experimentation? No, he didn't reach it through experiments, but rather because his eternal soul, which just happens to be temporarily inhabiting his body, revealed a secret he learned from Plato.🤣
Oh, give me a break. If the poor guy Galileo hadn't spent years rolling spheres down inclined planes, he never would have stumbled upon the law of inertia, no matter if he had sat there abstracting and meditating on his own head for a million years like his predecessors did.
What would even happen to the inertia of a body if no actual force were acting upon it? Nobody knows. You can only speculate, but you can't claim anything as fact precisely because there is no experimental verification. Then again, a discussion on this topic is probably far too heavy for someone like you.😬 😬
Nothing at all Anyone who has actually bothered to try and replicate such an experiment knows perfectly well that those two stones aren't going to hit the ground at the exact same time. Sure, they’d drop simultaneously in a vacuum, but they won't in open air, and Galileo didn't have access to a vacuum. John Walker74 And where on Earth was poor Galileo supposed to find a vacuum? You were claiming in previous posts that empty space doesn't even exist, so why don't you just pick a side and stick to it for once? But fine, that's not really the point right now.
The real issue here is that you, being the stubborn Platonic follower that you are, have clearly never actually attempted this experiment yourself. Your Great Teacher taught you to disregard any form of empirical evidence, didn't he? The impact of air resistance on stones falling at low speeds is so negligible that you wouldn't need some incredibly complex laboratory setup like you seem to imagine.
Just take two stones of different weights, hold one in your left hand and one in your right, release them at the same moment, and you'll see they fall almost simultaneously; the difference would be so microscopic that you wouldn't even notice they weren't perfectly synced.
You don't need to be a genius, or a philosopher, or engage in abstract theorizing or daydreaming; you simply need to trust your own eyes to see that Aristotle's claim—that heavier objects fall faster than lighter ones—is fundamentally flawed. It was largely based on that incorrect conclusion that Aristotle built a completely wrong model of the universe, placing a stationary Earth at the center, a view that would persist for the next 2,000 years.
And look, he was brilliant, incredibly logical, perhaps even too much so. If he had possessed a shred of common sense, he probably would have occasionally thought to check his conclusions against practical reality. But no, Aristotle relied entirely on the power of his own intellect and abstract reasoning. And of course, he was a student of Plato.🙂
That is precisely where the strength of that simple experiment conducted on the Leaning Tower of Pisa lies; by performing it, Galileo challenged the absolute authority of Aristotle and knocked him right off the pedestal the Church had placed him on. What vacuum? What nonsense.
Because of this approach to physics, because he insisted that the Bible shouldn't be used to dictate science, and because he claimed that the Earth moves around the sun rather than remaining stationary at the center of the universe as was believed for two millennia, the Church eventually branded him a heretic, placing him under house arrest for the rest of his life and forbidding him from spreading his ideas under threat of death by burning at the stake.
They managed to burn his books, but they couldn't burn his ideas. Galileo remains the ultimate symbol of the struggle for scientific independence. It wasn't until 1992 that Pope John Paul II finally admitted that Vatican City had been wrong. Sorry, Galileo, we messed up a little bit. What's 400 years to an eternal Church? A millennium up, a millennium down, 400 years more, 400 years less—it's a tiny detail.👎
nobody and nothing Arrogant ignorance is a pretty common sight, but John Walker74 has managed to shatter every single ceiling ever set on this forum. It’s not just that she out-philosophizes Plato, it’s that her grasp of physics makes the likes of Pauli or Heisenberg look like amateurs. Since everything else she’s written is absolute nonsense—and I’ve already dismantled most of it—I’ll only address this specific point. This isn't even about her; it’s about addressing a fairly widespread delusion (which is exactly what we’re here to fix). John Walker74- It’s not my arrogant ignorance that’s getting under your skin, it’s my arrogant knowledge. And honestly, I wouldn't be acting this arrogant if you hadn't decided to try and prove the superiority of some Platonic way of thinking to me. Why on earth did you even need to start this thread? You could have at least picked a more appropriate victim.
Look, just calm down; I don't claim to philosophize better than Plato, nor do I know physics better than Heisenberg, but I certainly know Plato much better than you do, and when it comes to physics, you're basically a total amateur compared to Heisenberg. You’re a mediocre philosopher and an even worse physicist.🙂
In my last post, I told you—and showed you—that you seriously need to go back and refresh that physics degree of yours, because you clearly haven't a clue about the core ideas of modern physics, and this latest post proves you don't understand physics at all. So, take that degree, toss it straight into the toilet, let it flush away—wooooosh...—and leave physics alone. Maybe try picking up metaphysics instead, just like your big hero did. You can philosophize to your heart's content about "forms" existing in some incomprehensible realm, and nobody will be able to disprove you. But physics is dangerous territory; it requires actual hard work and grit to truly grasp anything, where everything has to be proven and calculated, and you won't get far just surfing the web and scavenging articles like you do. nobody anything Since everything she’s written aside from this is pure garbage—and I’ve already explained most of it—I’m only going to respond to this. This isn't about her personally, it's about correcting a relatively widespread misconception (which is precisely why we exist here). John Walker74- You haven't explained or proved a single thing. You didn't even dare to mention the massive amount of quotes I cited, let alone attempt to refute the conclusions drawn from them.As for delusions, we've thoroughly debunked them—both regarding Plato and regarding you.😂