Misleading Assumptions by Robert L. Oldershaw

Interesting comment.

Others seem to have no trouble finding my essay.

The essay identifies 3 assumptions that I think have led physics badly astray.

I do not waste words, or time with cranks.

If you want to learn something potentially revolutionary about the world you live in, read the essay and then go to the website to see where alternative assumptions lead to.

If you want to toot your own horn [yes I have already seen more than I care to see at sci.physics.foundations], toot it somewhere else, thank you very much.

Morning gentlemen,

For me the crucial criterion is whether or not the idea can yield definitive predictions, defined as prior, feasible, quantitative, non-adjustable and unique to the specific idea.

Without the definitive predictions/testing part of the scientific method, you are in the realm of pure speculation and pseudo-science. If you continue on this path you end up in scientific Disneyland.

The inability to make definitive predictions is a disease that has infected the most highly touted physics (string theory, supersymmetry, multiverse nonsense, anthropic reasoning, QCD, etc.) and the most lowly attempts at understanding our world.

The most interesting question is whether or not theoretical physics can recover from the decades-long deviation from the time-tested principles of science. One would like to think so, but there has been no clear indication of that. The old paradigm is very deeply entrenched and fiercely defended by Swift's confederacy.

See Peter Woit's blog "Not Even Wrong" for a new discussion today on the untestable pseudo-science being hyped by A. Linde, who thinks that the SUSY/SUGRA/strings/multiverse/anthropic reasoning rubbish is the only way to make sense of the cosmos.

It is nice to see that a small minority of physicists sees the danger to science posed by the currently fashionable return to Ptolemaic pseudo-science.

It appears to me that fractal modeling and fundamental self-similarity are not of much interest to people in theoretical physics these days.

This has always seemed a bit odd to me since fractal structure/processes and self-similarity are ubiquitous in virtually every phenomena of nature that can be observed reasonably directly.

The only places that self-similarity, fractals and hierarchical modeling are absent are in the Platonic fantasy fizzics of postmodern pseudo-science like string theory, SUSY and WIMPy cosmology.

Only dramatic observational discoveries (probably relating to the galactic dark matter and/or the unexpected physics of astrophysical systems like exoplanet systems) will lead to a change in the current mediocre group-think that passes for physics.

The basic principles of discrete self-similar cosmology are published and tested and ready to be developed into a more analytically sophisticated theory.

All we can do is wait for nature to convince a deluded theoretical physics community that they have gone way off track and need to rethink everything in the context of a discrete fractal paradigm.

Best,

RLO

Mr Putnam says: "What came first, the empirical evidence or the prediction? Just wondering if the theory is predicated upon prior empirical knowledge, or, if the empirical knowledge was unknown, and, the prediction predated its discovery?"

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Discrete Scale Relativity has passed 3 definitive predictions relating to pulsar-planets, trillions of unbound planetary-mass "nomad" objects, and M-dwarf planet abundance anomalies. In each case, and for anything that qualifies as a definitive scientific prediction, the prediction must be in print before the observational test of the prediction. If a prediction is "adjusted" to fit the empirical results, then that is pseudo-science. The prediction must be an empirically testable extrapolation from the empirically-based foundation of the theory.

You appear to be operating from a foundation of almost no understanding of Discrete Scale Relativity.

The development of DSR was predominantly guided by empirical evidence of nature, especially the physical properties of fundamental systems on the Atomic, Stellar and Galactic Scales of nature's hierarchy.

Once the empirical evidence led to the basic principles of the discrete self-similar paradigm, and once empirical evidence led to the discrete self-similar scaling equations that are the heart of the theory, then it was possible to derive at least 12 definitive predictions that can be tested now, and in principle a huge number of additional predictions.

All this is carefully laid out at my website for anyone with an interest in learning about Discrete Scale Relativity. There are also many papers posted to arxiv.org and Independent.academia.edu.

After you have a working knowledge of DSR, I would be happy to answer your questions and comments.

Mr. Putman,

1. You appear to have little understanding of the Self-Similar Cosmological Paradigm and the theory of Discrete Scale Relativity, which applies in the case of exact cosmological self-similarity.

2. You also seem to have an idiosyncratic understanding of how science works.

3. I do not suffer fools gladly.

4. Please go pester someone else.

James,

Today a young student contacted me and said she thinks that SSCP/DSR holds promise for real unification in physics. She asked permission to do work related to the theory. She is a serious student with abilities that might well compliment mine.

So I am feeling a little less irritated with the human race today, and more hopeful that coming generations of physicists will finaly open their minds to the unifying promise of DSR.

You ask whether I have "broken the pattern or have a new pattern". I certainly think that DSR is the biggest break in old patterns, and identifies the most important new cosmological pattern, in about 400 years. It can be referred to as discrete self-similarity, or discrete scale invariance, or discrete dilation invariance (possibly full discrete conformal symmetry?).

But you can only judge that for yourself by studying SSCP/DSR and coming to your own conclusions.

Robert O

Hi James,

Lest there be no misunderstanding, I am not a "professional", but rather a mere mortal.

Discrete Scale Relativity predicted, in a published paper, that planets would be found orbiting ultracompact stellar-mass objects. Several years later, pulsar-planets were discovered, much to the surprise of the astrophysical community.

In 1987 {Astrophysical Journal 322, 34-36] I predicted that our galaxy would contain a vast population of unbound planetary-mass objects far outnumbering the stars. Sumi et al [Nature 19 May 2011] reported that microlensing research had discovered at least 100 billion unbound planetary-mass objects within our galaxy. Again, much to the surprise of astrophysicists.

In 2000 I posted a paper to arxiv.org (later published) predicting that the lowest mass M dwarf stars would have a highly anomalous and quite diagnostic under-abundance of planetary companions. Observational evidence has increasingly supported this prediction and a paper published in Astronomy and Astrophysics in 2011 (Bonfils et al) has now virtually confirmed this prediction. Again, much to the surprise of astrophysicists.

Discrete Scale Relativity's most crucial prediction (dark matter = primordial Kerr-Newman ultracompacts; 8 x 10^-5, 0.145 and 0.580 solar masses are the primary peaks in the predicted mass spectrum) awaits adequate observational data for a definitive verdict. A related prediction is that the dark matter cannot be "WIMPs", and that prediction has withstood a 30-year onslaught of false-positives and a near-religious faith in the first coming of a "WIMP".

In my "essay" I just stated what my research indicated were the most aggregiously wrong current assumptions. In the present pseudo-science/Tower of Babel state of postmodern physics, I knew that none of the "professionals" would have any interest in my inconvenient ideas. This might help to explain why I only submitted a brief synopsis.

Best, Rob O

Egregiously, that is.