Newsgroup sci.physics 216570

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On Fri, 17 Jan 1997 21:51:04 -0600, "Bruce C. Fielder"  wrote:
>Excuse me, but I believe that the first proof of relativitry theory (you
>know, mass is equivilent to energy) was in 1917, when the bending of the
>light around the sun indicated that the energy of the sun
>(gravitational, mainly) was bending the light in EXACT agreement with
>Einstein's predictions.  It's been seen.  It does exist. 
Sorry, but the Brucemobile is way off course here.  First of all, the
bending of light around the Sun just shows that light follows the null
geodesic as prescribed by the Sun's gravitation.  The photon does not
need to gravitate to do this.   Secondly, the 1917 observations showed
a wide range of results, and the conclusion declared at the time was
quite subjective.  The predictions of GR were properly validated only
in 1973 (or thereabouts) via radio observations.  And the error bar
still remains -- what is "exact" anyway.
>who knows where Eric lives.
New Zealanders are used to having to educate people that New Zealand
is *not* a part of Australia, etc.    :-)
Eric

On 17 Jan 1997 15:57:05 -0500, Michael Weiss
 wrote:
>Nowadays I wonder why anyone is even tempted to reply to the
>anti-Einstein nutcases. 
What about all the physicists who have been unable to reconcile QM
with GR.   Are they "anti-Einstein nutcases"?   If opposition to GR
makes one a nutcase, then QM must be full of nutcases, right?
Who won, Bohr or Einstein?
Eric

On 18 Jan 1997 02:54:33 GMT, George Penney dropped the penny yet again
when he wrote:
>   Let's carry this to the limit!!.If we increase the acceleration,the radius
>  of curvature will become smaller,thus the beam will hit the opposite wall 
Ouch!  The limit here bespoken is the parabolic curvature, that is,
how fast the vertical is reached.  You will never "hit the opposite
wall".
Eric

In naturre there exists a natural distinction between hem and
marijauana. They are essentially the same plant but they have naturally
differing amounts of THC (Hemp has less). This fact is often overlooked.

In article <5bb71s$bdq@osprey.global.co.za>, valk@global.co.za (Valk) writes:
...
|> Take for eg. the imprisonment of early scientists for saying that the
|> earth is round etc. and more recently (1981) the pope told scientists
...
    Please name any one who was imprisoned for saying that the earth
is round.
    Note that this is being posted and emailed.  
-- 
Tom Scharle         scharle.1@nd.edu       "standard disclaimer"

Cohen's writings and 'stunts' about nuclear matters have always been
'tongue in cheek' and in direct response to the more wild claims and
statistical manipulations of the anti-nuke press.  I once heard a symposium
he gave where he showed conclusively that building thousands of nuclear
power plants would SAVE lives even with a couple 'worse case' accidents. 
The life saver?--mining all that Uranium would severely reduce the Radon
exposure of most people.  What to do with the waste and mining
tailings?--"Throw it in the oceans--its going to end up there eventually
anyway  ;-)" {emoticon added}
RWT
John McCarthy  wrote in article
...
> Bernard Cohen is a professor of physics and former head of the physics
> department at the University of Pittsburgh.  Dennis Nelson refers to
> him as a moron.  What are Dennis Nelson's qualifications?  His style
> of argumentation is that of a middle school student.
> -- 
> John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
> http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
> He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
> 
> 

I am looking for a quote (and its reference) attributed to Eugene Wigner.
It has something to do with 
first testing algebraic conjectures with 2 by 2 matrices.
Pointers to the full quote would be appreciated.
thanks
rob
salgado@physics.syr.edu

On 18 Jan 1997 01:57:47 GMT, George Penney dropped the penny (again)
when he wrote:
>I can tell you why Light has the Velocity it has.
>   When the universe was a singularity and then the big bang,it's expansion
>  must have been C=3x10^8m/s.Thus how could anything go faster than this!!.
>  Thus the INITIAL expansion rate of the universe must have dictated the ve
>  locity of light.
The Big-Bang theory in its present form holds that the initial
expansion (i.e., the laughable "inflation") was far faster than the
speed of light.
Eric

On 18 Jan 1997 09:53:01 GMT, lbsys@aol.com wrote:
>Im Artikel <32E05618.7CD8@well.com>, Jack Sarfatti schreibt:
>>The concept of ‘acceleration relative to space’ then
>>loses all meaning and with it the principle of inertia
>>along with the paradox of Mach.
>
>Anyone willing to elaborate on Mach's paradox? Or is it in the FAQ
>somewhere? Is it the same as the often named 'Mach's principle' And/or
>what's that?
I think JS is referring to and commentating on Mach's principle all at
once.  Mach's principle attempts to formulate the basis of absolute
rotation, that is, why one rotational state leads to no radial forces,
and another does (in plain English, what's the difference between a
spinning top and one which does not spin).
Mach does this by noting that the non-spinning state does not move
with respect to the distant stars.  He jumps from this to the
conclusion that the distant stars *control* the inertial state by some
mysterious controlling force.  This force is dubbed "Mach's
Principle".
The problem with Mach's Principle is that the force cannot be
detected.  While gravity decreases from its source by the inverse
square (g = function(1/r^2)), Mach's principle requires that the
distant stars exert their influence by no less than the straight
inverse ( F = function(1/r)), otherwise the stars cannot do the job.
No conveyance, or any theoretical mechanism for this mysterious force,
has ever been formulated or observed.
The bottom line is that Mach's Principle is ridiculous, but modern
Physics clings to it as it is a foundation of General Relativity,
which today's physicists won't do without even though it is
incompatible with the thoroughly-tested Quantum Mechanics.
Eric