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Indeed. Physics is wrong on many fundamental levels, but everytime physicists find fundamental errors, they propose another entirely theoretical layer of compl

Indeed. Physics is wrong on many fundamental levels, but everytime physicists find fundamental errors, they propose another entirely theoretical layer of complexity, with the "benfit" that no one is able to practically refute it.

williamdclt 8y ago
It's not adding a layer of complexity, it's peeling off a layer of abstraction. With the "benefit" that it describes better what we observe and that it allows to successfully make new predictions. What's your alternative to the scientific method exactly?
- user812 8y ago
  100 or so years ago physics went into the wrong direction, ignoring people like Tesla who argued for the aether model.
geertj 8y ago
> Physics is wrong on many fundamental levels Physics, when practiced according to the principles of the scientific method, is never wrong (or right). Physical laws try to explain the world around us using mathematical models. Those models can be tested over a certain domain of experimental parameters D. A physicist, when speaking accurately, would never say that a physical law L is correct. They would say that L correctly describes our experiments on domain D. New or more accurate measurements can expand or shrink D, and in the worst case D can become empty. This constant refining is the essence of physics and the scientific method. Arguing that physics is wrong implies a lack of understanding of what physics actually is.
- user812 8y ago
  No, it is fundamentally wrong in itself, because it went into the wrong direction 100 or so years ago, when physicists ignored the aether model.
  - dbt00 8y ago
    It wasn’t ignored it was disproven. Come up with experimental evidence or gtfo.
    - user812 8y ago
      It was "disproven" based upon a different philosophy. You can't disprove a philosophy though, you can only try to understand different philosophical models next to each other. The Einsteinian philosophy represents materialism and a world without meaning. It was problematic right from the start when mental gymnastics was needed to explain how energy can move through nothing, or how nothing (space) can have properties. Funny that you mention experimental evidence, as most of physics is basically theoretical nowadays. (That's why it's called theoretical physics, dark matter included)
      - krapp 8y ago
        > It was "disproven" based upon a different philosophy. It was disproven based on experimentation[0], no "philosophy" involved. >The Einsteinian philosophy represents materialism and a world without meaning There is no "Einsteinian philosophy," nor does anything in Einstein's theories relate to "meaning" or any lack thereof, in a philosophical sense. Whether you want to believe in aether, or God, or that the Machine Empire built the universe as a VR simulation, E=MC^2 remains true. It can be tested, has been tested has been proven true. And its probably worth mentioning that the same is true for aether theory, because it also was not a philosophy, but a scientific theory (which was, as mentioned earlier, disproved by experimentation.) The universe is no more or less meaningful or materialistic either way. >It was problematic right from the start when mental gymnastics was needed to explain how energy can move through nothing. On the contrary, the mental gymnastics were needed to continue supporting aether theory after experiments and observations continually failed to produce any evidence of it, and the properties aether would need to have to conform to the current cutting edge of science started to become ludicrous. [0]https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_experiment https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_e...

williamdclt 8y ago

It's not adding a layer of complexity, it's peeling off a layer of abstraction. With the "benefit" that it describes better what we observe and that it allows to successfully make new predictions. What's your alternative to the scientific method exactly?

user812 8y ago
100 or so years ago physics went into the wrong direction, ignoring people like Tesla who argued for the aether model.

geertj 8y ago

> Physics is wrong on many fundamental levels Physics, when practiced according to the principles of the scientific method, is never wrong (or right). Physical laws try to explain the world around us using mathematical models. Those models can be tested over a certain domain of experimental parameters D. A physicist, when speaking accurately, would never say that a physical law L is correct. They would say that L correctly describes our experiments on domain D. New or more accurate measurements can expand or shrink D, and in the worst case D can become empty. This constant refining is the essence of physics and the scientific method. Arguing that physics is wrong implies a lack of understanding of what physics actually is.

user812 8y ago
No, it is fundamentally wrong in itself, because it went into the wrong direction 100 or so years ago, when physicists ignored the aether model.
- dbt00 8y ago
  It wasn’t ignored it was disproven. Come up with experimental evidence or gtfo.
  - user812 8y ago
    It was "disproven" based upon a different philosophy. You can't disprove a philosophy though, you can only try to understand different philosophical models next to each other. The Einsteinian philosophy represents materialism and a world without meaning. It was problematic right from the start when mental gymnastics was needed to explain how energy can move through nothing, or how nothing (space) can have properties. Funny that you mention experimental evidence, as most of physics is basically theoretical nowadays. (That's why it's called theoretical physics, dark matter included)
    - krapp 8y ago
      > It was "disproven" based upon a different philosophy. It was disproven based on experimentation[0], no "philosophy" involved. >The Einsteinian philosophy represents materialism and a world without meaning There is no "Einsteinian philosophy," nor does anything in Einstein's theories relate to "meaning" or any lack thereof, in a philosophical sense. Whether you want to believe in aether, or God, or that the Machine Empire built the universe as a VR simulation, E=MC^2 remains true. It can be tested, has been tested has been proven true. And its probably worth mentioning that the same is true for aether theory, because it also was not a philosophy, but a scientific theory (which was, as mentioned earlier, disproved by experimentation.) The universe is no more or less meaningful or materialistic either way. >It was problematic right from the start when mental gymnastics was needed to explain how energy can move through nothing. On the contrary, the mental gymnastics were needed to continue supporting aether theory after experiments and observations continually failed to produce any evidence of it, and the properties aether would need to have to conform to the current cutting edge of science started to become ludicrous. [0]https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_experiment https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson%E2%80%93Morley_e...