For it would not be fundamentally unimaginable that, for example, a future extension of mathematical logic might give a certain meaning to the statement that in exceptional cases 2x2=5, and it might even be possible that this extended mathematics would be of use in calculations in the field of economics." p. 132. [Given the nature some mathematical logicians and economists and their 'uses' this may be true.]'

"The demand 'to describe what happens' in the quantum-theoretical process between two successive observations is a contradiction in adjecto, since the word 'describe' refers to the use of the classical concepts, while these concepts cannot be applied in the space between the observations; they can only be applied at the points of observation." p.145

"The ontology of materialism [realism] rested upon the illusion that the kind of existence, the direct 'actuality' of the world around us, can be extrapolated into the atomic range." p. 145

"One should simply wait for the development of the language, which adjusts itself after some time to the new situation. Actually in the theory of special relativity this adjustment has already taken place to a large extent during the past 50 years. The distinction between 'real' and 'apparent' contraction, for instance, has simply disappeared." p. 175

"But the problems of language here are really serious. We wish to speak in some way about the structure of the atoms and not only about the 'facts' -- the latter being, for instance, the black spots on a photographic plate or the water droplets in a cloud chamber. But we cannot speak about the atoms in ordinary language." p. 179

You seem to have misunderstood the article. Harriman did not deny experiments of modern physics or its role in electronics. He is talking about indefensible theoretical explanations based on bad philosophy as if they consequences of evidence, which they are not. He presented challenges to them in the form of a brief hypothetical discussion that did not require quoting physicists. He was referring to wave function collapse of QM measurement theory, the common juxtaposition and acceptance of 'wave' and 'particle' properties as "contradictory", and acceptance of Einstein's postulate of the speed of light being uniform with respect to moving reference frames at any velocity because it is "simpler". His point is that it is a big mistake to accept bad philosophy as if it is necessitated by physics.

well chosen;;; well said! -- j
.

hey, it's just convention. -- j
.

yes. . if science is not anchored in reality, it is just
amusement! -- j
.

Forget about the rationalistic speculation and concentrate on the history of modern physics -- what are the facts that give rise to necessary concepts and theories as experiments uncovered them.

All knowledge is based on evidence of the senses, including theoretical concepts for entities we cannot perceive. Things outside the realm of our direct perception cannot be presumed to be or act like macroscopic entities, but fundamental concepts of entity, attribute, action and relation are necessary for conceptual thought. They cannot be abandoned for theoretical concepts. If you are the rhartford once of Boatsburg, penguin nb has been trying to find you.

As a teaching fellow in graduate school at a major university I once encountered a sincerely befuddled undergraduate in a calculus class who insisted that it could not be proved that 2+2 is 4. In retrospect, I was a bit hard on him in the ensuing explanation: "You're taking the honors calculus course and you don't know why 2+2=4?". Time ran out for that class before I could expand on the conceptual basics to the Peano axioms, but it wouldn't have helped the underlying problem. It would have been a good setting to explain some elementary epistemology of concepts and their relation to the development of axiomatic systemization in mathematics.

Epicycles didn't predict or explain anything. They broke down orbits abstractly into a combination of perfect circles to rationalize already known orbits with 'perfect circle' metaphysics. At most they decomposed perturbed ellipses as a device for calculation. To today's Pragmatists they are just another "tool" in a box of "models".

There is no such thing as "behaving" without something to behave and there is no such thing as understanding what something is without regard to its characteristics, including how it behaves in different circumstances. Claiming that we don't know what things "really" are, only how "they" (whatever that is supposed to mean) behave is at best a false alternative. What something is is the sum of its characteristics. Entities are not identityless blobs with characteristics stuck to them and free-floating "behavior". The question "what is that" is not "meaningless".

No one understands anything by confusing concepts as "models" in parallel with a reality about which we don't know what it "really" is. That kind of subjectivist representationalism is right out of Kant. Abstract conceptual thought is our means of understanding reality through a hierarchy of concepts based on perception of entities and their characteristics (see Ayn Rand's Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology). It is a mental grasp of the world through our form of conscious awareness of reality, not a replication of the world as a "model" with identityless pseudo entities that only "behave", all buried in a parallel universe inside of our minds in the name of "physics" and cut off from the external world. 'Truth' is a relationship between our knowledge and the facts of reality, not an independent 'truth in itself' inaccessible to man's knowledge constrained to "models".

Newton realized that gravitational force is caused by masses at a distance, propagated uniformly through a solid angle. His lack of a "mechanism" for gravity only meant that he was not omniscient, not that he had an "incomplete model" that happens to "work" well enough in a Pragmatist "useful relationship" to reality without knowing its "true" nature.

The false notions of Pragmatism and Positivism stemming from Hume and Kant, usually for physics in the form of "operationism", evades the referents of theoretical concepts. It pervades philosophizing about physics, mostly through paying lip service to bad philosophy but while ignored in actual scientific thinking. It is spread today mostly informally and by implication, along with the "model" mentality, in rambling slogans and cliches condescendingly claiming to inform the intellectually unwashed. Yet its corruption is everywhere as it is passed on from generation to generation, uncritically accepted and echoed as it corrupts rational thought. Those who do try to think that way don't have a theory of anything, let alone an omniscient, 'no longer incomplete' "Theory of Everything".

As I see it, this article’s premises are at variance with its own conclusion. After granting that relativity’s predictions on time dilation are real, the article states, “Just so long as the satellites’ clocks remained synchronised with each other and the time-difference relative Earth’s clocks didn’t become too large, GPS receivers would continue to calculate their correct position.” Assuming this is true, there’s still the fact that the satellites’ clocks do not remain synchronized with each other and have to be re-synchronized on a regular basis, due in part to the differences in relativistic effects on each satellite’s internal clock. The satellites are not in perfectly circular orbits around a planet with a uniform gravitational field. Thus the relativistic forces acting on their clocks are constantly changing, affecting the degree of time dilation for each individual satellite’s clock and requiring periodic re-synchronization. Thus relativistic effects do have to be taken into account for the GPS to operate properly, even if it is not necessary for the satellites’ clocks to be perfectly synchronized with those on Earth.

No it is not. One is just a mathematical model, without any understanding. Epicycles will never explain why we have tides for example. Physics is not heuristic models.

http://www.alternativephysics.org/boo...

When you say epicycles are not physics I assume you mean that there is no proposed underlying mechanism that explains how or why they should work. If so the same can be said of Newtonian mechanics. Epicycles are the result of efforts to reconcile observations with what were assumed at the time to be fundamental principals.

True " The old Flat Earth geocentric cosmology is pretty much dead. However, for an architect laying out the plans for a house considering local geodesic curvature is an unnecessary complication."

But epicycles are not physics They are a heuristic model.

"Darwin is offered as science."
Critics of science call modern biology "Darwinism", either to make it sound like a religion or because they really imagine that all knowing comes from worshiping a sacred text. Is this what you're saying? Or are you saying modern biology is wrong about evolution?

Re “Relativity theorists cannot cite observational evidence of the alleged properties of space and time..." This is clearly incorrect. Accommodations for Special and General relativity are essential to the proper functioning of the GPS system. The clocks are so accurate and the satellites move so rapidly that relativity is a significant factor.

Re "Really then Ptolemey epicycles were fine. They predicted the future?" Actually it depends on what you are trying to do. We now know that the Earth is round and orbits the Sun. The old Flat Earth geocentric cosmology is pretty much dead. However, for an architect laying out the plans for a house considering local geodesic curvature is an unnecessary complication. A flat Earth model works just fine. His only concern regarding astronomical realities might be the seasonal variations in the elevation of the Sun at noon so he can compute roof overhang dimensions. Epicycles work just as well as an astronomical ephemeris and it's a lot less complicated. On the other hand if one is to fly from Los Angeles to London understanding the consequences of a spherical Earth and great circle routs is essential. If we plan a mission to Mars we must invoke Newtonian celestial mechanics. But if we are to plan an interstellar mission at near light speed we must go beyond Newton and include the effects of both special and general relativity. One does not measure the splitting of logs for firewood with a micrometer. It's all a matter of choosing the proper tool for the task at hand.

Re (from the article): “Relativity theorists cannot cite observational evidence of the alleged properties of space and time—because such properties belong to entities, not relationships.”

Does this mean that space and time have no properties themselves, and that the properties ascribed to space and time by certain scientists are actually properties of entities that exist within their framework?

?????

Really then Ptolemey epicycles were fine. They predicted the future?

Cogent and amusing comment.

Drunk on bad philosophy.

Thus the reason I chose engineering as my majors and careers.

Our concepts of entity, attribute, action, and relation are derived from the evidence of our senses. In the quantum world, the relationship among “quantum entities” loses the characteristics of those macroscopic concepts. “Quantum entities” are entangled in ways that prohibit use of a macroscopic concept such as “relation.” Extrapolation beyond the range in which concepts like “entity, attribute, action, and relation” are formulated requires a mind open to the possibility that those concepts lose their meaning.