Blog 20140625
Bill continues to have difficulty accepting "The
Ten Assumptions of Science" as he boosts systems philosophy in his review
of Chapter 5 on “Neomechanics: The Reduction.”
I am ever so grateful to Bill Westmiller, whose
comments are marked "BW: ". The quotes marked TSW are
from "The Scientific Worldview" and my comments are marked "[GB:
".
Neomechanics: The Reduction
TSW: "... the greatest advance known to science:
Isaac Newton’s mechanics."
BW: Three
cheers for Newton! However, I think you misrepresent his view of reality, in
several respects.
TSW: "... real bodies, microcosms, have
properties ranging from nearly inelastic to nearly elastic, from nearly solid
to nearly insubstantial, and from nearly inert to nearly dynamic. By taking his
cue from the atomists and their notion of the ultimate, finite particle, Newton
ignored the insides of his model."
BW: While it
is true that Newton's general Laws applied to distinct objects
("bodies"), his conceptual achievement was to identify the
fundamental characteristics of mass and motion, irrespective of size. He
certainly didn't ignore the "insides" of objects. In fact, he
articulated the objective essentials of elasticity, viscosity, sheer stress,
wave transmission in a media, and even the velocity of sound (see multiple
notes below)[1].
So, far from imagining that all objects were rigid,
solid, and inert, Newton clearly recognized (and quantified) the essential
characteristics of complex material compositions. He certainly made incidental
errors, but his basic principles are still the dominant "unmitigated
truths" of modern science.
[GB: The beauty of Newton’s three laws of motion was
in their simplicity. They were idealizations that most folks could understand
and accept even though they were religious. You could observe them in action in
your everyday life. Nonetheless, they really only amounted to rough, finite
approximations of reality. We have been “mitigating” them ever since. You are
right that Newton subsequently did many of the modifications himself. He even
came up with the real cause of gravity before Steve and I came up with it
independently.[2]
But, as I mentioned previously, none of this has ever produced a single
“unmitigated truth.” In science, we determine truth via observation and
experiment. Because of infinity, no two observations or experiments are
identical. All scientific measurements have a plus or minus. These facts provide
support for the Second Assumption of
Science, causality (All
effects have an infinite number of material causes) and the Third
Assumption of Science, uncertainty (It is impossible to
know everything about anything, but it is possible to know more about
anything).]
TSW: "[Newton's First Law] first makes a very
simple statement about the motion of the microcosm, and then, almost as an
afterthought, qualifies it by noting the influence of the macrocosm."
BW: Newton
never thought in terms of microcosm or macrocosms: all of his laws were
universal. That objects interact was not an "afterthought", it was
critical to his First Law of motion. In essence: nothing changes unless it's
changed.
[GB: You are right about the microcosm/macrocosm bit.
Of course, the microcosm-macrocosm concept is no less universal. That’s why I
call it univironmental determinism (UD), the universal mechanism of evolution. UD
is the observation that what happens to a portion of the universe is determined
by the infinite matter in motion within and without.]
TSW: "Newton brings in the concept of
"force." The word force, however, is an anthropomorphism ..."
BW: Energy is
always matter in motion. Newton never idealized "forces" as anything
other than objects in motion relative to an inertial object at the point of
encounter. Newton's Law was always mass times velocity. He even recognized and
articulated the idea of "relativity" ... that all lateral motion had
to be viewed in context. So, it isn't true that he idealized "absolute
space" or absolute motion. He did distinguish "force" (F=ma)
from "energy" (E=mv) as distinct terms, but the force of
"a" = acceleration is just a persistent change in the motion of
matter.
[GB: Sorry, but energy is not matter in motion, it is
a description of matter in motion (BTW: E=½mv2 or E=mc2, not mv, which is momentum, P). Remember, the picture of a running dog is
not a running dog. That is why I prefer to say that energy is a calculation. It
is neither the microcosm nor the motion of the microcosm. Similarly, momentum
and force do not exist or occur either. You seem to have forgotten the Fourth
Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as there is no
motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). There is no such
thing as a magical, anthro-like “force” that causes acceleration. The
acceleration is caused by some other chunk of matter (i.e., a microcosm). The
Star Wars “force” cannot be with you, you will have to do it yourself. The
matter-motion terms, momentum, force, energy, and spacetime, are not the names
of things or of motions. Again, they simply are calculations. It is too bad
that their shorthand use has led to a kind of fetishism that has fallen right
into the hands of indeterminists.]
TSW: "Today we assume that no microcosm can
exist by itself, and slowly we are beginning to realize that no microcosm can
even hold together as a body by itself."
BW: I don't
know who "we" is, but the idea that existence requires persistent
interaction was a momentary amusement of Perdurantism, an obscure back alley of
ontology:
Of course, it is true that no ONE thing could be said
to "exist" in the absence of any other things, if existence is
construed as the "perception of being". I wrote a six page memoir
when I was 12, arguing that a "God" could not be said to exist *prior
to* the existence of other things ... part of a refutation of Aquinas'
"First Cause" argument.
[GB: Sorry, but your “Perdurantism” appears to be more
indeterministic hogwash. Something about it being the view “that an individual has
distinct temporal parts throughout its existence.” The
“temporal parts” are objectifications of motion. No, I was vaguely thinking of
the necessity for the aethereal pressure that eventually became our
"Neomechanical Gravitation Theory."[3] In a way, the
perdurantists were reaching out toward neomechanics in their realization that
every microcosm must contain submicrocosms in motion.
Congrats for solving the
god problem at such a young age. Hope you did not require any “perception of
being” in your definition of existence. The correct definition of existence is
that which has xyz dimensions and location with respect to other things. Looks
like maybe you were heading toward Infinite Universe Theory, which destroys the
"First Cause" argument of the Big Bangers as well as Aquinas.]
TSW: "... the word unless should be changed to
until."
BW: It makes
no difference to the First Law, except that "unless" doesn't assume
that every body must *necessarily* encounter another body, only that *if* it does,
whenever that might be, this effect will occur. Assuming eternity (infinite
time) is true, it's highly unlikely that such an encounter would *never* occur.
But, Newton's Law doesn't care whether time is eternal or not: it works in any
case.
[GB: You are so right. The First Law of Motion works
in either case. In a way, Newton’s “unless” was the essence of classical
mechanics and its assumption of finity.
By using that word, he was able to satisfy indeterminists and their desired
cosmogonies for over three centuries. The “unless” is a tipoff to the other end
of that law as well. The First Law says nothing about where that inertial
motion came from in the first place. The correct answer is that it is motion
received via transfer from some other object in the infinite universe. The
First Law therefore was not as “natural” as it could have been. Today, however,
we are leaving the supernatural behind, gradually crawling out of that finite
box. Once Infinite Universe Theory is accepted, the “unless” will disappear
along with the finity assumption that
previously hindered the development of neomechanics.]
TSW: "[Newton's Second Law] ... the result was motion
along a *perfectly* straight line."
BW: That's
Newton's First Law, which is correct: absent any contact, objects move in a
straight line: inertia.
[GB: Sorry, Bill, but that was not a restatement of the
Second Law, it was a sentence intended to demonstrate the idealism needed for
the First Law.]
TSW: "... these changes occur to each body as
a whole and do not require the participation of parts or of submicrocosms
within."
BW: As I
pointed out above, Newton didn't disregard - much less deny - internal motions
in a body. He described them and articulated their relationships and
characteristics.
TSW: "Six Interactions"
BW: I'm
going to skip over large parts of this section, because it's all standard,
classical mechanics. Newton didn't deny absorption or emission; those kind of
interactions were based on Newton's ideas. However, I will point out that your
segregation of absorption or emission "of motion" or "of
matter" contradicts your earlier commentary about their unity.
[GB: Bill, how do you think that absorption or
emission violates the Fourth Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as
there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion)? Do
you really think that a “particle of motion jumps from one thing to another”?
When the bat hits the ball, part of its motion is transferred to the ball. When
the coffee cools, part of the motion of its submicrocosms is transferred to the
macrocosm of air and aether. Only an aether denier could see a
contradiction in that.
TSW: "[Neomechanics] ... endeavors to make it
virtually impossible to conceive of a microcosm that does not contain other
microcosms."
BW: That may
be your endeavor, but I think you're simply trapped in this purely subjective
relationship of micro to macro, essentially an anthropomorphism. Size is just a
relative *quantization* of dimensions. I've already discussed the evidence and
logic against "micro-divisibility" in the section on infinity.
[GB: Sorry, but micro and macro
have nothing to with subjectivity or anything anthro. Too bad that you were not
able to maintain your belief that “size is just a relative *quantization* of
dimensions.” In other words, it is just a matter of scale, which you
conveniently give up when it suits you in your ultimately futile quest for a
Finite Particle Theory.]
TSW: "... [I] have merely moved [idealization]
to the level of the submicrocosm. This is true."
BW: An
interesting admission, that your segregation of reality is just a vague
abstraction.
[GB: Boy, did you miss that one! Remember what the
title of this chapter was (Neomechanics: The Reduction). All of mechanics,
whether new or old is an abstraction. Classical mechanists tend not to admit
that because they assume finity. Both
must be abstractions because the universe is infinite, whether or not one
believes that or not. For neomechanics, the assumption of infinity
is overt and it would be silly of us to declare otherwise. How “vague” an
abstraction might be is a matter of practicality. If you only hope for a
“clear” abstraction, I am afraid that you will have a long wait in the face of
infinity.]
TSW: "The motion was transferred from whole
body to whole body and submicrocosms had nothing to do with the transfer."
BW: As noted
above, a misrepresentation of Newton and classical mechanics.
[GB: Sorry, but I stand by that characterization.
Newton’s three laws mention nothing whatsoever about the insides of his model.
At times, the model is even considered an infinitesimal point. And as you have
noted and as I mentioned previously, the rest of classical mechanics amounts to
a detailed modification of the three laws. Those were movements toward
neomechanics, which could not be completed without an overt assumption of infinity.]
TSW: "One could say that there is not enough
*time* for the infinite progression to proceed through an infinity of
microcosms within microcosms..."
BW: Correct.
Your "micro" conception requires an *infinite* amount of time for any
cause to have an effect, which is a fundamental violation of causality. It's a
variation of Zeno's Paradox: IF your step is half the remaining separation, you
never make contact. This is a mathematical truth derived from the mathematical
premise of division: that every divisor "deducts" a portion and
leaves a remainder that is always divisible. But, reality is not (cannot) be infinitely
divisible (as you pointed out in an earlier example) ... which is the basis for
my Unimid Model.
[GB: Bill, pray tell where I ever said that “reality
is not (cannot) be infinitely divisible”? Not possible, in view of the Eighth
Assumption of Science, infinity (The universe is infinite,
both in the microcosmic and macrocosmic directions) I have been using for
decades. Surely, by now you have learned the resolution of Zeno’s Paradox.
Paradoxes always contain an incorrect assumption. Zeno forgot about motion. While
he was taking half steps, the rest of the universe was in motion, not waiting
for those half steps. Bang! A collision occurs whether you are ready for it or
not. End of Zeno.]
TSW: ".. the divided portions of the microcosm
I call submicrocosms ..."
BW: Meaning
that every "microcosm" is divisible, into a
"sub-microcosm", into a "sub-sub-microcosm", into a
"sub-sub-sub-microcosm" ... to infinity. However, what you consider a
"cosm" is purely arbitrary, unless there is some objective
distinction between the parts. That must (at least) be spatial, which is Zeno's
problem.
[GB: As I have mentioned before, each division
produces what we consider matter and space, ad infinitum. You never reach infinity because that fact
is inherent in the concept of infinity. Take the smallest subsubmicrocosm you
can imagine. Now look up at the night sky. That is what that subsubmicrocosm
looks like. There is no reason to think otherwise, unless you are an
indeterminist who imagines there could be solid matter, which we have never
found anywhere.]
TSW: "... some of the deceleration causes the
microcosm to rotate."
BW: Which I
think is a distinct, non-relative form of motion ... whether micro or macro.
Newton didn't ignore angular momentum or acceleration, but he didn't expand on
his concept of the *relativity* of motion applying only to translational
(straight line) motion.
[GB: There is no such action as non-relative motion,
as I have pointed out before. The submicrocosms within any vortex move relative
to each other, just like the circling cattle in the typical western roundup.
The motion within a vortex is just as inertial as the non-existent
straight-line motion that Newton imagined in his First Law of Motion.]
TSW: "... the Newtonian model must be one of
an 'ultimate' particle, the atom filled with an indivisible substance through
which motion can be transferred perfectly and instantaneously."
BW: That's
not what Newton intended, but it is a logical inference and the basis for my own
theory. However in UT, collisions are never "perfect", in the sense
that they can transfer ALL motion from one object to another. They have to
induce a portion of lateral (subjective) and rotary (objective) motion to both
objects. The transfer is "instantaneous" in the sense that there is
no smaller subdivision of motion (time).
[GB: Well, you have certainly imagined quite a lot.
Your Unimid Theory, with its assumption of finity
is no different than Newton’s initial idealization. Let’s hope that you eventually
find some submicrocosms in those little finite, solid unimids, just like Newton
and his followers eventually did, at least to some extent.]
Next: Chapter 5 Neomechanics continued…
cotsw 032
[1]Newton's View of the "Insides" of things, using
his universal Laws:
[2]
Borchardt, Glenn, and Puetz, Stephen J. , 2012, Neomechanical gravitation
theory ( http://www.worldsci.org/pdf/abstracts/abstracts_6529.pdf ), in
Volk, G., Proceedings of the Natural Philosophy Alliance, 19th Conference of
the NPA, 25-28 July: Albuquerque, NM, Natural Philosophy Alliance, Mt. Airy,
MD, v. 9, p. 53-58.
[3]
Ibid.
