4 ms·

Definitely not holding my breathe this time.

unsupp0rted 3y ago
I hold my breath every time- because one of these times is likely to be the one. There's no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. It could end up being trivially easy in the end. https://www.eyeofmidas.com/scifi/Turtledove_RoadNotTaken.pdf https://www.eyeofmidas.com/scifi/Turtledove_RoadNotTaken.pdf
- naasking 3y ago
  No known reason.
  - unsupp0rted 3y ago
    Can you state a reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard? If not, then there is no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard.
    - naasking 3y ago
      > If not, then there is no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. That does not follow. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
      - Brian_K_White 3y ago
        Having a reason is evidence. Not knowing a reason is not evidence, and saying so is not declaring evidence of absense. It's perfectly correct to state that there is no reason, if as of time of speaking there is no known reason. No known reason today IS no reason. If you discover a reason tomorrow, then tomorrow it would no longer be correct to say there is no reason. For it to be wrong to say "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" you would have to have some theory that suggests it will end up being impossible. Do you know of any such theory? For instance, is there a math argument that prevents it because regardless of the chemistry or process or pressures or temperatures or electric fields etc, it would require electrons or something to travel faster than the speed of light, or would somehow produce more energy than it consumes, or something like that? Even if it hasn't been proven experimentally, is there any such theory at all or any basis for proposing it? Without something like that, then it is in fact a plain true valid consistent statement that "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" That does not preclude that we may end up discovering it's impossible, or even before that we may end up thinking up a theory that will end up suggesting it will end up being impossible.
        naasking 3y ago
        > For it to be wrong to say "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" you would have to have some theory that suggests it will end up being impossible. We don't have a theory suggesting it is possible either. We don't even have a theory explaining how superconductors actually work upon which we could ground claims like, "absent very surprising unknown physics, current physics suggests this is possible". And the evidence hinting at the contrary is not easily dismissed: we've known about superconductors for over a century and we still don't have a complete theory for how and why they work, and all previous discoveries have barely moved the needle on temperature. LK-99 was the first hint of possibly even approaching room temperature and pressure, and it was clearly wrong. This most recent round is almost certainly also wrong. This situation is simple: we have yet to see a room temperature, ambient pressure superconductor. There are two possible explanations for this observation: either such superconductors are possible and we have not yet discovered how to make them, or they are not possible and we have not yet discovered why. How do you take this and then infer that "there is no reason to think they are impossible"? That simply does not follow, for there is a reason to think they are impossible per the above two possibilities: we have seen no evidence that they are possible and since we don't understand how superconductors work, room temp superconductors might actually be impossible to construct. Edit: let's just cut to the heart of the matter, "there is no reason room temp superconductors are impossible" is a proposition about reality, that, among all possible knowns and unknowns, there exist no reasons entailing their impossibility. This far exceeds our knowledge of reality and superconductors specifically. It is simply incorrect to make this claim at this time, at least until such a thing has been created. My correction was that they should say, "there is no known reason ...", which is instead a proposition about our state of knowledge, and is the correct description of the state of things.
        Brian_K_White 3y ago
        We don't need a theory suggesting it's possible.
        naasking 3y ago
        Yes we do. See my edit.
      - unsupp0rted 3y ago
        If/when there is a reason then there will be a reason. Until then, there is no reason.
        naasking 3y ago
        Again, that's invalid. "There is no reason room temp superconductors are impossible" is a proposition about reality, that, among all possible knowns and unknowns, there exist no reasons entailing their impossibility. The truth value of this proposition is literally unknown therefore you cannot assert this as if it's true. My correction was that you should say, "there is no known reason ...", which is instead a proposition about our state of knowledge. This is a correct and accurate claim.
        unsupp0rted 3y ago
        “is” is the present tense of “to be”, which covers our present state of knowledge.
        naasking 3y ago
        Since you specified no object in your statement (eg. "knowledge") then "is" must be formally translated as an existential quantifier, eg. "there exists". My correction adds the missing object which properly restricts the quantifier.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  > There's no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. To me, the amount of research into it over decades, plus the current lack of reproducible results, is prima facie evidence that it is at least hard.

I hold my breath every time- because one of these times is likely to be the one. There's no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. It could end up being trivially easy in the end. https://www.eyeofmidas.com/scifi/Turtledove_RoadNotTaken.pdf https://www.eyeofmidas.com/scifi/Turtledove_RoadNotTaken.pdf

naasking 3y ago
No known reason.
- unsupp0rted 3y ago
  Can you state a reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard? If not, then there is no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard.
  - naasking 3y ago
    > If not, then there is no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. That does not follow. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
    - Brian_K_White 3y ago
      Having a reason is evidence. Not knowing a reason is not evidence, and saying so is not declaring evidence of absense. It's perfectly correct to state that there is no reason, if as of time of speaking there is no known reason. No known reason today IS no reason. If you discover a reason tomorrow, then tomorrow it would no longer be correct to say there is no reason. For it to be wrong to say "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" you would have to have some theory that suggests it will end up being impossible. Do you know of any such theory? For instance, is there a math argument that prevents it because regardless of the chemistry or process or pressures or temperatures or electric fields etc, it would require electrons or something to travel faster than the speed of light, or would somehow produce more energy than it consumes, or something like that? Even if it hasn't been proven experimentally, is there any such theory at all or any basis for proposing it? Without something like that, then it is in fact a plain true valid consistent statement that "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" That does not preclude that we may end up discovering it's impossible, or even before that we may end up thinking up a theory that will end up suggesting it will end up being impossible.
      - naasking 3y ago
        > For it to be wrong to say "there is no reason to think it will be impossible" you would have to have some theory that suggests it will end up being impossible. We don't have a theory suggesting it is possible either. We don't even have a theory explaining how superconductors actually work upon which we could ground claims like, "absent very surprising unknown physics, current physics suggests this is possible". And the evidence hinting at the contrary is not easily dismissed: we've known about superconductors for over a century and we still don't have a complete theory for how and why they work, and all previous discoveries have barely moved the needle on temperature. LK-99 was the first hint of possibly even approaching room temperature and pressure, and it was clearly wrong. This most recent round is almost certainly also wrong. This situation is simple: we have yet to see a room temperature, ambient pressure superconductor. There are two possible explanations for this observation: either such superconductors are possible and we have not yet discovered how to make them, or they are not possible and we have not yet discovered why. How do you take this and then infer that "there is no reason to think they are impossible"? That simply does not follow, for there is a reason to think they are impossible per the above two possibilities: we have seen no evidence that they are possible and since we don't understand how superconductors work, room temp superconductors might actually be impossible to construct. Edit: let's just cut to the heart of the matter, "there is no reason room temp superconductors are impossible" is a proposition about reality, that, among all possible knowns and unknowns, there exist no reasons entailing their impossibility. This far exceeds our knowledge of reality and superconductors specifically. It is simply incorrect to make this claim at this time, at least until such a thing has been created. My correction was that they should say, "there is no known reason ...", which is instead a proposition about our state of knowledge, and is the correct description of the state of things.
        Brian_K_White 3y ago
        We don't need a theory suggesting it's possible.
        naasking 3y ago
        Yes we do. See my edit.
    - unsupp0rted 3y ago
      If/when there is a reason then there will be a reason. Until then, there is no reason.
      - naasking 3y ago
        Again, that's invalid. "There is no reason room temp superconductors are impossible" is a proposition about reality, that, among all possible knowns and unknowns, there exist no reasons entailing their impossibility. The truth value of this proposition is literally unknown therefore you cannot assert this as if it's true. My correction was that you should say, "there is no known reason ...", which is instead a proposition about our state of knowledge. This is a correct and accurate claim.
        unsupp0rted 3y ago
        “is” is the present tense of “to be”, which covers our present state of knowledge.
        naasking 3y ago
        Since you specified no object in your statement (eg. "knowledge") then "is" must be formally translated as an existential quantifier, eg. "there exists". My correction adds the missing object which properly restricts the quantifier.
AnimalMuppet 3y ago
> There's no reason to believe room-temperature superconductivity is impossible or hard. To me, the amount of research into it over decades, plus the current lack of reproducible results, is prima facie evidence that it is at least hard.