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Talk:Theory of relativity (view source)
Revision as of 01:17, March 22, 2009
, 01:17, March 22, 2009change of heart: someone will explain it to you. otherwise, how would you learn? Undo revision 643006 by BHarlan (Talk)
:Yeah. Sure. You, with only a mediocre grasp on the process of writing have a proof simple enough to put on wikipedia, yet it has evaded the planet's most brilliant scientists and mathematicians, essentially the brightest men in human history, for a century. I'd like to see this. [[User:RodWeathers|RodWeathers]] 17:57, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
:Yeah. Sure. You, with only a mediocre grasp on the process of writing have a proof simple enough to put on wikipedia, yet it has evaded the planet's most brilliant scientists and mathematicians, essentially the brightest men in human history, for a century. I'd like to see this. [[User:RodWeathers|RodWeathers]] 17:57, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
::Okay, I did some basic googling, and find that you've been going on about this for several years now, but have a pitifully poor grasp of relativistic theory. Well... welcome to Conservapedia, I guess. We're nothing if not openminded. [[User:RodWeathers|RodWeathers]] 18:03, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
::Okay, I did some basic googling, and find that you've been going on about this for several years now, but have a pitifully poor grasp of relativistic theory. Well... welcome to Conservapedia, I guess. We're nothing if not openminded. [[User:RodWeathers|RodWeathers]] 18:03, 31 October 2008 (EDT)
== More regarding the criticism of LIGO ==
As a student of physics, I feel myself almost obliged to add something to the discussion regarding LIGO, particularly as I work for a Professor that is part of the LIGO collaboration and have actually attended scientific conferences where the subject is addressed (though to be fair my work with her specifically deals with another one of her collaborations, Borexino).
First, as mentioned in previous discussion, it is indeed true that it was understood that LIGO, like many scientific undertakings, would need to be refined and calibrated before reaching its design sensitivity. To claim the LIGO is a failure before it has reached its design sensitivity is just as ridiculous and ignorant as criticizing any other tool or piece of equipment for not functioning before it is properly calibrated. It isn't like the LIGO collaboration is trying to pull any fast ones on anyone by being secretive about this - just do a Google search for LIGO to bring up their web page, where they discuss the details of this matter.
Secondly, it is true that the "success" of the experiment cannot be known prior to its being conducted, but if it could, what would be the point in conducting the experiment in the first place? Experimentation is a necessary aspect of science because scientific investigation fundamentally deals with the discovery of knowledge not previously known to us, and because it is not known to us, even its ultimate usefulness cannot be known a priori. The rate of observed events under the initial design sensitivity is predicted to be very low, so it would not be very surprising if we did not observe anything until advanced LIGO debuts. Even still, there is a fundamental uncertainty in the rate of events that will be seen. Maxwell was once asked what the usefulness of electromagnetism could ever be, to which he replied "What good is a newborn baby?" I do not believe I need to highlight the usefulness of electromagnetism in the modern world.
Which brings me to my third point, which is the enormous significance LIGO holds in terms of scientific potential. If LIGO is successful, it will revolutionize modern day astronomy by providing a new method for detecting cosmological phenomena. Gravitational radiation would offer another method of "imaging" the heavens, independent of electromagnetic radiation. To say that LIGO would have limited scientific benefit would be a serious rebuke to the field of astronomy in general. Optical astronomy would be coupled with gravitational astronomy as a valuable check on astronomical results attained by optical methods alone. But of course, the fundamental uncertainty we have as to what the observed rate of events will be reflects the fact that we do not know with complete certainty what cosmological objects exist, hence the very reason that LIGO would be useful.
Even more revolutionary would be if LIGO failed to detect gravitational waves. If you only assume the existence of a gravitational field, and that disturbances in that field cannot propagate faster than the speed of light, then by the very definition of wavelike phenomena, you have gravitational waves. Gravitational radiation is a prediction of General Relativity, and as such, were it to be disproved, it would falsify a prediction of a scientific theory. To say that this is not valuable would be to suggest that, for example, Michelson's experiments in search of the aether were not valuable, whereas in reality they gave supporting evidence to the idea that there is indeed no aether. At the very least, the experiment should be able to place certain restrictions on the rate of observed events. If gravitational radiation were not found, and this represented a serious contradiction with the rate of events predicted, it would be ABSOLUTELY ENORMOUS in terms of scientific relevance, and I cannot stress that enough. Something huge, somewhere in our understanding of the world, would have to be revised, be it the idea of the gravitational field, causality itself, etc. As a practicing scientist, I would almost hope that LIGO fails to see gravitational radiation, just because the scientific implications would be so unimaginably radical and weird, and force us to completely reexamine how we perceive the universe. But this subject could be argued until it reaches the realm of some very deep scientific philosophy - scientific theory is generally not viewed as being "completely true" or "completely wrong," but as a method of predicting physical phenomena, which eventually is replaced with a more accurate theory. Newtonian mechanics is not so much wrong, as it is not a good enough approximation in certain specific applications. If you want a metaphor, think about scientific progress as continuing to improve our Taylor expansion of the universe.
Though I suspect given the general tone of this article, somehow the death of GR would also please most of the contributors to this encyclopedia, as if General Relativity, a scientific theory, is somehow inherently a "liberal" idea. I'm sure that when Einstein formulated it, he envisioned it being used by Barack Obama to support a woman's legal right to terminate her pregnancy. Though, I hope for the sake of those contributors that General Relativity is either disproved, or is shown to be a "conservative" idea, because if it does adequately describe our universe, is a "liberal" idea, and God created the universe, then either God is a liberal, or he has a very weird sense of humo(u)r.
Just to get this nonsense out of the way now, I'm a registered independent. I vote, based on all of the relevant information I have been able to attain via what I believe to be credible sources, for whoever I honestly believe will be able to fulfill the duties of the office they seek, and I don't think anyone can ask any more of me than that. If any of this leads some of you to believe that I am incapable of discussing the theory of General Relativity, then I surely and sincerely have nothing but pity for you.