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- Newsgroups: sci.physics
- Path: sparky!uunet!charon.amdahl.com!pacbell.com!decwrl!netsys!agate!linus!linus.mitre.org!mandolin!chaloux
- From: chaloux@mandolin.mitre.org (Dave Chaloux)
- Subject: Re: TIME HAS INERTIA, ABIAN replies to CHALOUX
- Message-ID: <1992Nov5.171801.29589@linus.mitre.org>
- Sender: news@linus.mitre.org (News Service)
- Nntp-Posting-Host: mandolin.mitre.org
- Reply-To: chaloux@mandolin.mitre.org (Dave Chaloux)
- Organization: The MITRE Corporation, McLean, Va
- References: <abian.719871408@pv343f.vincent.iastate.edu> <1992Oct30.220442.28764@linus.mitre.org> <abian.720678509@pv343f.vincent.iastate.edu> <1992Nov3.174356.26855@galileo.physics.arizona.edu>
- Date: Thu, 5 Nov 1992 17:18:01 GMT
- Lines: 50
-
- Abian replies:
-
- > chaloux@mandolin.mitre.org (Dave Chaloux) writes:
- >
- > >I think there is at least one case where this is wrong. To be specific,
- > >elementary particles decay under no provocation whatsoever. Thus you have
- > >change without provocation and you have a tendency over time to change
- > >rather than to stay the same.
- >
- > What provokes an elementary particles to decay - is exactly the
- > annoying tendency of TIME to stay still and maintain its status quo.
- > So, the elementary particle is annoyed with the stubbornness of TIME and
- > supplies energy to PUSHM TIME FORWARD - and hence the elementary particle
- > DECAYS, and TIME MOVES FORWARD.
-
- There are a number of problems with this reply.
-
- 1) You maintain that time has inertia. You say it takes energy to move time
- forward. Energy is not conserved in your equation over time (the energy used
- to move time forward is lost). Here you say that the energy is supplied by
- radioactive decay. However, energy is conserved in this decay. In otherwords,
- no energy is left over to move time forward.
-
- 2) By saying the above, you have destroyed the ability of your theory to
- make predictions. This is required for it to be in the realm of science.
- If something changes, it can always be explained as due to the stubbornness of
- time. If it stays the same it can always be explained as maintaining the
- status quo. Thus any eventuality can be explained. It might be said that
- the ability to explain any eventuality is the mark of a great theory. Not so.
- What you now need in order to make predictions that can be tested to verify
- the theory is some way of deciding ahead of time when the stubbornness of
- time will act as a provoker and when it will not.
-
- Without such a way of deciding you may be able to always explain things after
- the fact but you cannot make predictions that can be tested. Unless you
- can make predictions that can be tested, your theory is not science. This
- doesn't mean it isn't true. It does mean it isn't science. If it isn't
- science, it doesn't belong is sci.physics.
-
- I am not trying to start a flame war with you. I am trying to show you that
- what you have proposed either has problems with science, or by fixing it in
- such a way that it no longer has problems, you have removed it from the
- realm of science. Again, just because it isn't science doesn't necessarily
- make it wrong. Historical "facts" are not science either and can be true.
- Debating them in sci.physics would be a good way to get people irate.
-
- Now if you can give a way of discriminating ahead of time when time will
- act as a provoker and when it will not, your theory might have predictive
- ability again.
-
-