Eckard,

Thanks. I'm afraid Tom is a member of the church of mathematical platonism. Fortunately they have not yet copyrighted the definitions of all words, such as 'assumption,' as they seem to have done with the term 'model.'

Regards,

John M

"I consider not even assumptions strictly speaking ex nihilo."

Where do your assumptions come from, Eckard?

"I found out that Schroedinger in 1939 concluded from the discreteness of spectral lines that the universe must be finite, and I consider this wrong. Isn't this a question that you should be qualified enough to deal with?"

Sure, and Schrodinger is correct. Remember, wave equations -- Maxwell's and Schrodinger's -- are time reversible (retarded and advanced solutions are equally valid). A continuous and reversible spectrum is finite. As to your view, why isn't blackbody radiation enough to convince you that the spectrum isn't infinite?

Best,

Tom

"I'm afraid Tom is a member of the church of mathematical platonism."

One would have to understand what Platonism is, to make that judgment.

True Platonists (mathematical realists) are Godel and Penrose, for whom mathematical constructions live in a world apart from the physical.

My view is closer to that of Max Tegmark, for whom the physical is an organic extension of mathematical construction. My philosophy is clearly explained in the abstract and first page of my 2006 paper. It doesn't contain a single equation.

Tom,

I see you're accused of belief not science based physics. I couldn't possibly comment, but do point out that the flood of eminents questioning Einstein is quickening to a 'torrent' (in Cosmic time).

Last week Professor Paul Davies (Astrobiology etc) received the British Royal Society's Michael Faraday Award "for his efforts in furthering the public communication of science, engineering or technology in the United Kingdom."

As leader of a research team he has just stated; "The crux of Einstein's theory of relativity -- that E = mc2聽- is under challenge, following evidence that the speed of light might be slowing down."

a 12 billion-year-old stream of light. did not have the properties it was expected to, and by a process of elimination deduced that the speed of light must have been much faster billions of years ago.

A lifeline exists if any co-believers to take it, phone-a-friend perhaps? Soon it will be sink or swim as the ground is inexorably taken away.

Best wishes

Peter

Tom,

Frequency (and energy) relates to time via Fourier transformation (and also via cosine transformation). Something that is assumed to be continuous and infinite in time domain does necessarily correspond to discrete values in frequency domain and vice versa.

You wrote: "A continuous and reversible spectrum is finite. As to your view, why isn't blackbody radiation enough to convince you that the spectrum isn't infinite?"

The frequency spectrum of cavity radiation is continuous like sunlight and has no known to me upper or lower limit.

Is there a mirror-symmetric function of frequency, in your words, is the frequency spectrum reversible: f(omega)=f(-omega)? The fathers of QM denied this, although there wouldn't be a mathematical reason for that.

Best,

Eckard

" ... the flood of eminents questioning Einstein is quickening to a 'torrent' (in Cosmic time)."

(Yawn.) So what? That was true even in Einstein's lifetime. The "eminents" are as prone to boneheadedness as anyone. Mostly, they and you demonstrably do not understand the value of mathematical completeness.

(Paul Davies:) "The crux of Einstein's theory of relativity -- that E = mc2 - is under challenge, following evidence that the speed of light might be slowing down."

I admire Davies and have read all of his books, but this is just a stupid statement. That is *not* the crux of Einstein's theory; the crux is E = m. The speed of light need not be constant (save in a vacuum) for E = m to hold. It means absolutely nothing to special relativity -- *nothing* -- for light to slow in transit across the universe; an averaged speed over time is not equivalent to an instantaneous constant speed.

At least, thank you for not punctuating your claims with all caps and multiple punctuation marks.

Best,

Tom

(reposted in correct thread)

"Is there a mirror-symmetric function of frequency, in your words, is the frequency spectrum reversible: f(omega)=f(-omega)? The fathers of QM denied this, although there wouldn't be a mathematical reason for that."

That is why the assumptions of the fathers of QM (other than Einstein) are soon to be superseded by the mathematical completeness of a theory of continuous measurement functions.

Tom,

"It means absolutely nothing to special relativity -- *nothing* -- for light to slow in transit across the universe;"

Wouldn't that be 'tired light?'

Peter,

What if the intergalactic medium were expanding, wouldn't that create the impression light has slowed? Not space, per se, but the 'fluctuations' permeating space.

Regards,

John M

Peter, I hope you're not emulating Pentcho Valev's bad habit of dropping outrageous statements, sending people like me to search for the source and find the result is considerably less than advertised.

The substance is contained in:

"On its long journey, the light from those quasars has passed through gas clouds full of metals. The photons in the light - little packets of energy that make up the light itself - interact with the electrons in the gas clouds, charged particles that orbit the nuclei of the metal atoms. This leaves a fingerprint on the light as it arrives on Earth, called the fine structure constant, Murphy explains.

When they measured the fine structure constant of this 12 billion-year-old light, Webb and Murphy found it was slightly smaller than it would be today. Mathematically, there were two possible reasons for this - either the electric charge of the electrons had increased, or the speed of light had fallen.

Using Stephen Hawking's formula for black hole thermodynamics, Davies, Davis and Lineweaver ruled out the electric charge possibility. By adapting Hawking's formula, they determined that an increase in electric charge would break the second law of thermodynamics, which says energy can only flow from hot spots to cold spots.

"'That's illegal. It would be like a cup of coffee sitting on your desk getting hotter,'" Lineweaver says."

Right. Big problem:

The fine structure is empirical and cannot be derived. The vacuum speed of light *is* derived from the equivalence of mass and energy. So at any point of the continuum of the light on its journey, one should find that the measure of mass-energy equivalence precisely corresponds to the measure of the vacuum speed of light.

As I have said consistently, I lend no hope to the completeness of any theory that defies either the theory of relativity or thermodynamics.

Tom

Tom,

Do help yourself, then Mathematics will help you. Yes, I substituted Him by Mathematics. Help yourself means start with real time physics rather than naively hoping for superseding flawed tenets by "the mathematical completeness of a theory of continuous measurement functions". Start with real time physics means to accept that the block universe corresponds to lacking awareness that Heaviside's trick was just a trick. One cannot reasonably analyze a not yet determined future of reality as if it was already as unchangeable as a model of it. Data of future measurement do not exist in advance.

Not just Schroedinger's reasoning was sometimes effective because not as carefully as you intended to be when you wisely wrote "the measure of mass-energy equivalence precisely corresponds to the measure of the vacuum speed of light." Schroedinger admitted in his 4th communication in 1926 being uncertain about the correct interpretation of his equation. In 1939 he dared again stating something crucial without completely revealing the background.

Shouldn't mathematical completeness demand awareness of some peculiar implications of Fourier- instead of cosine transformation? Logics tells us that there are neither negative elapsed time nor negative frequencies while Fourier transformation together with Heaviside's trick creates them alternatively, not together.

Best,

Eckard

"Help yourself means start with real time physics rather than naively hoping for superseding flawed tenets by 'the mathematical completeness of a theory of continuous measurement functions'."

That helps you, Eckard, not me. It helps you believe that the world is made from the neatly ordered history inside your head, rather than the continuous and nonlinear history outside of it.

Best,

Tom

Tom,

If the world was made at all as those like you seem to believe then those could be close to the truth. Given the putative creator of the world revealed its plan, they didn't need endlessly bothering with the topic of this blog: real time physics. A world without now is Einstein's paradise as naive set theory was the paradise that Georg C's created from which nobody should expel the believers.

As I expected, you are even unable to defend Schroedinger.

Eckard

Eckard, Schrodinger doesn't need defending, the world doesn't need a creator, and time is continuous with space.

Tom & Eckard,

Tom: "...the world doesn't need a creator, and time is continuous with space."

Me: "...the world doesn't need a creator...". This statement reflects the infusion of ideology substituting for science.

Me: I understand "...time is continuous with space." to result from a trust in relativity theory. If so, then it is a statement about a theoretical idea. The real nature of time is not known yet because it has not yet been subjected to experimentation.

James Putnam

James,

"'...the world doesn't need a creator...'. This statement reflects the infusion of ideology substituting for science."

Actually, it's science overcoming superstition. A creator god doesn't explain anything in any rational, objective way.

"Me: I understand '...time is continuous with space.' to result from a trust in relativity theory."

Indeed. And the physical results that the theory explains.

"If so, then it is a statement about a theoretical idea."

There are no scientific statements that aren't.

Best,

Tom

Eckard,

I missed seeing this:

"Only those who are trying to deny the now, as e.g. did David Hilbert, Albert Einstein, and Thomas Ray, are interested in considering the now as an illusory perception."

You've got that wrong. It isn't the now that is illusion ("All physics is local"); it is the perception of time as past, present and future that is illusion.

Best,

Tom

Tom,

""'...the world doesn't need a creator...'. This statement reflects the infusion of ideology substituting for science.""

"Actually, it's science overcoming superstition. A creator god doesn't explain anything in any rational, objective way."

Superstition has nothing to do with my point. My point is that your view of science is restricted by your ideology. You know only about effects and yet want to make a grand pronouncement about the nature of cause. We are presently stuck with a mechanical foundational science that is incapable of accounting for the birth of life.

""Me: I understand '...time is continuous with space.' to result from a trust in relativity theory.""

"Indeed. And the physical results that the theory explains."

You have no experimental results demonstrating effects on either time or space. All effects have to do with patterns in changes of velocities of objects. You know only about effects on objects. Your theory is a mystical belief system in a chalkboard model. Theory is the practice of inventing substitutes for the unknown. Spacetime is an invention substituting for the unknown The theory of relativity can be replaced, the effects will remain. Learn what is being communicated by those effects instead of thrusting non-empirically supported properties into physics equations.

Just adding some balance against unfalsifiable claims of theorists.

""If so, then it is a statement about a theoretical idea.""

"There are no scientific statements that aren't."

For those who choose to believe in inventions of the mind as if they are physically real, then theory governs their scientific statements. A theoretically free statement: Mass should not have been made into a theoretical fundamental indefinable property.

James Putnam

"We are presently stuck with a mechanical foundational science that is incapable of accounting for the birth of life."

Absolutely untrue, James. Like all naive realists, you identify "life" with your own personal consciousness and its ability to discern sentience. We dwell in a living universe, however, whose mechanics guarantee the construction of organic and sentient life, from the manufacture of heavy elements in solar furnaces, to the self assembly of chemical systems and self organization and evolution of systems and subsystems.

"You have no experimental results demonstrating effects on either time or space."

Oh, of course we do, as you have been informed many times.

"All effects have to do with patterns in changes of velocities of objects."

Patterns are what *we* theorize and construct, not what nature necessarily produces on purpose.

"You know only about effects on objects. Your theory is a mystical belief system in a chalkboard model. Theory is the practice of inventing substitutes for the unknown."

So is God. Theory, though, actually explains something in a rational way.

Best,

Tom

Me: "We are presently stuck with a mechanical foundational science that is incapable of accounting for the birth of life."

Tom: "Absolutely untrue, James."

Etc.

I say everything about my message was correct. You say everything about my message was wrong. I can leave matters where they stand. It is up to others to decide for themselves.

James Putnam

"It is up to others to decide for themselves."

I expect there will always be many who stand on the side of superstition. There's lots of room for all of us, though.