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→Newton and Falsification: info on eclipse
:::Of course if you have a better date for when relativity superseded Newton’s laws that is what you ought to add to the article rather than deleting information and replacing it with nothing (For if Newton’s laws were superseded, then they were falsified, and that information belongs in the article). I still have seen no evidence, however, offered that the 1919 experiments were flawed (again, I’m open to the idea that they may be flawed, but would like some evidence of that—especially since I have evidence to the contrary).--[[User:Reginod|Reginod]] 22:40, 11 March 2007 (EDT)
:::Of course if you have a better date for when relativity superseded Newton’s laws that is what you ought to add to the article rather than deleting information and replacing it with nothing (For if Newton’s laws were superseded, then they were falsified, and that information belongs in the article). I still have seen no evidence, however, offered that the 1919 experiments were flawed (again, I’m open to the idea that they may be flawed, but would like some evidence of that—especially since I have evidence to the contrary).--[[User:Reginod|Reginod]] 22:40, 11 March 2007 (EDT)
::::Putnam is entitled to his opinions, but I just don't see how an 1816 anomaly could have falsified Newtonian gravity. There were other possible explanations for that anomaly, such as an unknown asteroid or an oblateness of the Sun. Those explanations might not have required any change to Newtonian gravity.
:::: Here is a good account of the 1919 eclipse. [http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0102462] It says of Eddington's announcement:
:::::The reaction from scientists at this special meeting was ambivalent. Some questioned the reliability of statistical evidence from such a small number of stars. This skepticism seems in retrospect to be entirely justified. Although the results from Sobral were consistent with Einstein’s prediction, Eddington had been careful to remove from the analysis all measurements taken with the main equipment, the astrographic telescope and used only the results from the 4-inch. As I have explained, there were good grounds for this because of problems with the focus of the larger instrument. On the other hand, these plates yielded a value for the deflection of 0.93 seconds of arc, very close to the Newtonian prediction. Some suspected Eddington of cooking the books by leaving these measurements out.
::::At any rate, this is an article on Newton, not relativity or philosophy. The exact date in which physicists became convinced of a non-Newtonian explanation for Mercury's precession doesn't seem very relevant to me. [[User:RSchlafly|RSchlafly]] 02:34, 12 March 2007 (EDT)
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