Ask any question you want about Physics

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
a reply to: Nochzwei
As I said I could write a book about what's wrong with that experiment but I'm not going to. I already wrote enough about the candles to show the experimenter doesn't know how to identify potential sources of variation and perform controlled experiments. Similar lists of variables can be made for the rest of the experiment just as for the candles.

Lol now you are making excuses to protect the flaws in your argument. Invoking the experimenter does not know how to perform controlled expt is a ruse to justify your ignorance in the question at hand. Besides I don't think you have the foggiest idea about what all the experimenter / researcher has done to conduct this research / expt.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

The word 'gravity' does not refer to a singular object, as the word 'apple' does. (though the word 'apple' also includes many 'things' such as the atoms that make up the apple, arguably details about how the apple was created, when and where, particular blemishes etc.).

The word 'gravity' appears to refer to a relation between objects.

Generally, according to Einstein, the relation between an object (mass) such as an apple, and 'some other 'objectivity''.

In order for the term 'gravity' to refer to the phenomenon, the event, the interaction, it refers to;

There must be an object (apple), and another 'object/s' which interact with one another, in such a particular way as to result in our observations of the phenomenon of objects interacting in such ways referred to as, gravity.

If only pure absolute nothing existed, and 1 apple, there could be no 'gravity'.

There needs to be something, the mass, apple, interacts with, to get the need for an independent word, gravity.

Generally, simply, conceptually, theoretically, imaginatively, detailessly, Einstein intuited 'some type of material, object/s which are related in such a way that another object (apple) which interacts with the 'some type of material' warps, bends, alters the density of, alters the geometry of, the 'some type of material'; like a stretchy fabric.

If not made of particles, what theoretically, hypothetically, could the fabric be made of?

The term gravity, is referring to the relation and interaction between an object (apple) and the fabric (must be object-tive...meaning not nothing).

If the fabric is not composed of particles... is there any theory as to a large object which is not composed of particles? What and how can it be composed?

Is it thought that 'graviton' is the term to refer to the particular make up of the fabric?

Follow up question is then;

A 'fabric' must exist, a material must exist, which is responsible for interacting with planets and apples, that necessitates the word gravity existing.

If such fabric is made of particles or not; where does discussions of it waving come in?

What would have to be the case, for it to not wave?

If the 'fabric' exists, which it must, because the phenomenon of gravity exists, and the phenomenon of gravity requires the fabric to move (as it must, I hope you see and know why, if not I will explain later), for an apple to interact with the fabric, requires the fabric to move (as gravity requires the fabric to not be eternally homogenous, or if not homogenous, to not be eternally in its unhomogenous form, it changes... mass moves, the local feature, geometry of the fabric must change, as that is how bodies follow bodies), my question here is;

What would qualify, the fabric moving (at local points, as it must), and not being considered a wave?

Is the concept and discussion of gravity wave, then, the concept of the density of the fabric, the spring loadedness? If the necessarily 3d/4d fabric is more like a weak metal, or jello, or water, or clay?

Do you see what I mean with that last question? If the fabric is like taking a mass and throwing it into a wall of damp and malleable clay, compared to throwing a mass into water, though dont you see that in both cases or potentially all cases, it can be considered that the material interacting with the material, will cause reverberations of some kind, which can potentially be considered waves?

When does a material interact with another material, without producing waves? Or is the concept of waves in these senses balanced on sketchy conjecture?

Is the concept of wave generally 'something that goes (according to at least 1 reference frame) up and down'?

So the concept of gravity waves is;

3d/4d fabric exists, mass interacts with this fabric to alter its geometry, which other masses follow and alter;

Does the fabric go up and down?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

If a very sensitive array of sensors was made to detect all subatomic particles within a given space and a quantum supercomputer array to track all of its movements and fluctuations near real-time according to the Von Neumann–Wigner interpretation would or could that demarcated space be manipulated on the quantum level by its very observation?

I've got a question.

In the novel Contact, (spoiler), a message is found encoded into the value of PI. Is that possible in reality?

I guess my question is, what about the universe could be varialbe in a way that could make it possible?

a reply to: Tearman

In the novel Contact, (spoiler), a message is found encoded into the value of PI. Is that possible in reality?

Anything can be encoded in anything. That does not mean it is. Or that it means anything.

Pi is an irrational number. That means it has an infinite number of digits to the right of the decimal. You know what they say about an infinite number of monkeys typing on an infinite number of typewriters?

a reply to: Nochzwei
You either understand all the experimental problems I explained about the candles, or you don't. If you don't, there's not much point in citing more experimental problems which you would also likely not understand.

If you do understand the experimental problems with the candles, you should also understand those problems are a reflection of the lack of competence of the experimenter. If you think they got all that wrong but got everything else right, you're dreaming.

a reply to: ImaFungi
I don't know about any of that. All I know is that Einstein's model of gravity works well mathematically to predict observation. Einstein said space time is affected by the presence of a mass, but beyond the math in relativity I'm not sure how to characterize it. "Fabric" is a popular means to try to visualize space-time, and it's often depicted a grid distorted by mass, but I don't think it's really a fabric, that's just a visualization tool. I know you don't like to think of space as having properties but Einstein's model says it does and the model is consistent with observation.

originally posted by: dashen
according to the Von Neumann–Wigner interpretation

Wigner rejected his own idea which is nonsensical and also proven false by observation.

Wigner's rejection of his own idea

Wigner actually shifted to those interpretations (and away from "consciousness causes collapse") in his later years. This was partly because he was embarrassed that "consciousness causes collapse" can lead to a kind of solipsism, but also because he decided that he had been wrong to try to apply quantum physics at the scale of everyday life (specifically, he rejected his initial idea of treating macroscopic objects as isolated systems).

a reply to: Tearman
I don't see how, it's just a relationship between circumference and diameter of a circle. If you start trying to encode any message into that and end up with something different for PI it will no longer be PI.

I thought Carl Sagan must have put some thought into that idea. So I was wondering where he might have been coming from with it. I suppose it might have been purposeful nonsense on his part.

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
a reply to: Nochzwei
You either understand all the experimental problems I explained about the candles, or you don't. If you don't, there's not much point in citing more experimental problems which you would also likely not understand.

If you do understand the experimental problems with the candles, you should also understand those problems are a reflection of the lack of competence of the experimenter. If you think they got all that wrong but got everything else right, you're dreaming.

More excuses eh. Are you gonna focus on the ques at hand and not sight non understanding of the person asking the ques. If you say no point in answering leaves me to conclude you are evading for whatever reason, which may be ' this subject ought not to be discussed'

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Then what causes waveform collapse?

a reply to: dashen
See the video by Sean Carroll in the opening post. In his preferred interpretation, there is no collapse, but he also briefly discusses the other ideas in which there is collapse. He also explains that nobody knows which idea is right. He also mentions that Wigner's idea was nonsense (he calls it "bogus").

a reply to: Tearman
The part about Pi containing messages isn't complete nonsense. Pi is an infintely long sequence of numbers, and in such a series you're likely to find "Phrases" because even if the digits are randomly arranged, they will spell something out at random just because the sequence is infinite. (You obviously have to assign some relationship between numbers and letters to get words out of Pi, which in the book I think was some kind of base 11 expansion). Once you do that it's nearly certain you can find any short phrase you want somewhere in Pi, so that much is true.

The part that makes it fictional is that will happen mathematically without any intent from anybody to encode anything, so it's not really a message; a good analogy might be looking at clouds and seeing they are shaped like things. Yes sometimes the clouds are shaped like things, but it's not an encoded message from anybody, it just happens from random statistical variability, just like "phrases" in Pi.

a reply to: Nochzwei
Even careful experimenters can have errors in their experiments. Podkletnov's antigravity experiments have been discussed and he's probably a much more careful experimenter than the person in the video you linked to, but still there are doubts that he was careful enough since nobody has replicated his experimental results showing antigravity. More recently he's talked about even more dramatic experimental results and I don't see anybody stopping him from talking about it, so I don't infer this topic "shouldn't be discussed". Antigravity an interesting idea but any rational discussion of the topic leads to the lack of repeatable experimental evidence.

Experimental science is almost an art form in itself. Understanding what the equipment is doing is of extreme importance if you want the results to mean anything at all.

A candle is not at all a standardized object, and it does not produce a standardized unit of light. It is quite interesting and also concerning Nochzwei that you question the nature of light at the most fundamental level, along with the existence of GR as a viable model, and yet you stand fast by an experiment which any experimenter worth anything at all would throw out as being so full of problems that it is simply not able to prove anything.

The brightness of a candle depends on many factors removing reflections from the room the experiment is done in you still have lots of problems. The brightness depends upon
1) The length of the wick
2) The temperature of the wax
3) The viscosity of the wax
4) Movement of the air around the flame
5) The oxygen content of the room

There are probably others too but i suspect in terms of observable differences in brightness percevable by the human eye... some GR effect will be way way way down at the 10s of photons level difference... oh wait yeah but you dont believe in photons right.

Arbitrageur has a good point regarding Podkletnov's anti gravity experiments, they have been recreated at increasingly higher and higher levels of scrutiny and experimental control. What we are getting to is that I think the latest tests of it have concluded that the anti-gravity effect or the negation of mass is down at the 10^-9 level and is at the point where even the experimenters state they cannot conclusively say if it is a real effect, or an uncertainty in the measurement given the errors are at the 10^-7 or so level.

Calibration in Particle physics is extremely important, and is something iv been heavily involved in in the past. and let me tell you, a laser that is able to pulse at a rate that gives you 10% brightness variations per pulse is not good enough for most applications when filtered down to the 10s of photons level. A candle... I suspect has a much worse brightness accuracy even white burning constantly.

well perform the candle expt as suggested earlier and let me know he result.
So if only I can see a perceptible difference, I might be a vampire, no.
You see anti gravity being achieved in the video, isn't it? So what is the reason, if not time dilation?
btw podklenov did not produce any video of his supposed effect, as far as I know.
a reply to: ErosA433

just thought i'd drop this here:

phys.org...

originally posted by: Nochzwei
You see anti gravity being achieved in the video, isn't it? So what is the reason, if not time dilation?

I don't see anti-gravity or time dilation. What I see is a fair amount of power being fed into a machine (he doesn't say how many watts of power but I can see what looks like maybe a few hundred watts of light bulbs inside the machine which put out something like 90% of their energy as heat and 10% as light). see screenshot:



The light bulbs are not the only source of heat. There's a loud whirring sound as if something inside the machine is spinning, so this spinning action is probably creating additional heat through friction (the loud sound is evidence of some friction), and there's probably more heat from the bearings of whatever is spinning.

So if this machine is like a big cube, what happens to it when it gets heated up? It expands. All his instrumentation is based off the top of the machine and the bottom is fixed by the ground, so the bottom can't move closer to the ground. Therefore when the machine heats up and expands, the top of the machine will move up. Only extreme incompetence by the experimenter would conclude that the well-known effect characterized as "Thermal expansion" is a form of anti-gravity. It's quite a ridiculous and exceedingly ignorant claim.

There may be and probably are other sources of experimental error but not accounting for thermal expansion is the most obvious flaw in the experiment. Thermal expansion could explain the movement of both the height gauge and the effect on the weight scale.

a reply to: Nochzwei

if you mean those linked in the thread from your sig, yes iv seen them, and neither show anything.

1) the anti-gravity device doesn't show anti-gravity is achieved, it shows what looks like an ion truster, might look like anti-gravity, but it isn't. If it was anti-gravity - the object would simply move upwards, nothing else. Any tipping etc would be caused by wind effects. If it is only anti-gravity why do all the objects spin randomly, what is happening really is that spin is being used to stabilize the object because it weighs next to nothing and its own structure is not balanced.

This said, truly negate gravity enough to achieve lift, the object would go UPWARDS primarily, it would not flip over and crash into the ground, if it does, then you need to claim the object is producing directional gravitational fields, which... thus far science has no evidence for... the direction is simply towards an massive object. Remove that force vector and away you go.

2) A large box that makes a noise and causes two gauges to move.

2.1) The dial gauge at the top, is not very convincing for me because the stand it is placed on doesn't at all look very sturdy, a large cantilever arm made from rusty mild steel/iron, will easily be deflected by a magnetic field.
2.2) The set of scales is likewise difficult to interpret, not only is the loading transferred via springs, but again, it is via a large bar. The type of scales there it is hard to tell what method it would be using. BUT I do hazzard a guess that what is observed is something being deflected and not moving back, OR something inside the scales being magnetised or altered by the operation of the machine. A this can happen to strain gauge. We see it sometimes in our experiment when we turn our magnetic field compensation coils on. The gauges jump up/down. Doesn't mean we suddenly changed the mass of our equipment.
2.3) if it isn't one of those exotic effects, then thermal expansion can easily do both at the same time

At the end of the experiment he says the mass loss is permanent... alright... sure... so why not keep it running and eventually have it float away?

The candle ontop of the equipment is meaningless, I couldn't really see any change due to the automatic shutter speed adjustments made by the recording equipment, but if it does change brightness, it is most likely caused by magnetic fields. Why? well carbon plasma is easily manipulated by magnetic fields, most likely the machine is just putting out a huge B field which in the case of the candle is causing the flame to stretch out. OR [edit] being changed by a nice amount of air flow convection out of the side of the box as the light bulbs warm everything up


Podklenov did not no, but his experiments have been recreated many times. We are talking about scales changing their readings not things floating around

originally posted by: Phage

That means it has an infinite number of digits to the right of the decimal. You know what they say about an infinite number of monkeys typing on an infinite number of typewriters?

I can say the number 5.1717171717171717171 (barred) is infinite and we would then see that just because a number is infinite does not mean it contains 'all possible patterns of numbers'.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

I was asking;

What does 'gravity wave' mean?

I was asking;

Because some 3d/4d material substance must exist, which is 'warped' in the presence of mass; how would such a substance have to warp, in order to be considered not to be a wave?

I was asking;

Is the idea of 'gravity wave/s' the question of; 0 amount of reverberation involved in the mass warping presence?

A planet moves.

There is a substance that surrounds the planet, which also moves.

Another smaller planet, is moved by the substance that moves.

This is called gravity.

Is the idea of 'gravity waves' that;

When the substance (3d/4d material 'fabric') moves, does it move like a wave? (wave meaning; something that moves up and down?)

Could energy i.e. us/the universe = equal energy (neurotransmitters)= transmission that reflects =particle mass (reality)(the atom = infinity, expansion? = infinity ?

a reply to: stormbringer1701

interesting how physics or better said physicians work this days...
they are...

...claiming to have directly sampled electric-field vacuum fluctuations

by..

...using a long pulse of light to study a shorter pulse of light by firing both through a crystal at the same time.

and

The researchers adjusted the timing of the light pulses to map out fluctuations in the electric field. To offset vacuum fluctuations related to their own existence, they put in just the probe pulse—nothing else.

what happened is

When repeated many times, the researchers found the polarization varied slightly,
which the researchers attributed to vacuum fluctuations.

really ??

they saw the crystal atoms interactions, nothing more.
sort to speak.. they made a stop motion "picture" of the farces interaction in the crystal.

but hey, Nobel price is still a highly desired target