Regressive physics does not know what energy is

PSI Blog 20170628 Regressive physics does not know what energy is

Thanks be to George who gave us the heads-up on the usual difficulty that regressive physicists have with defining energy:

“GC: Hi Glenn

This is from The Physics Hyper Textbook http://physics.info/motion/:

‘The term energy refers [to] an abstract physical quantity that is not easily perceived by humans. It can exist in many forms simultaneously and only acquires meaning through calculation. A system possesses energy if it has the ability to do work. The energy of motion is called kinetic energy.’

Based on this definition, energy is abstract matter, which means it is an idea of an abstraction for all things (i.e. matter.) That suggests that the word "energy" refers to a thought, which can be quantified. That makes no sense.”

[GB: George, I love these regressive faux pas that you keep digging up! I really get a kick out of this guy’s definition of energy as “an abstract physical quantity that is not easily perceived by humans.” You bet. That is because energy does not exist despite his confused belief that ‘It can exist in many forms’. He gets a bit closer when he mentions calculation, because that is all that energy is, a calculation. It is neither matter nor motion, but a way of understanding those mechanical phenomena through calculation.]

GC: “Do you know how it is possible that so many people can be so idealistic that they easily accept that motion can occur without matter?”

[GB: George, remember that such idealism is a necessary part of indeterministic philosophy. Without it, the idea of a “soul” would be intellectually impossible, as I discussed in this Blog:

http://thescientificworldview.blogspot.com/2015/04/the-soul-of-regressive-physics.html

I must admit that when I was religious I did not think twice about how one could “go to heaven” after dying. I never thought about how this physically could happen. It didn’t seem to involve the material body lying there in the casket. I think we all just thought that the “spirit” (i.e., motion) that folks displayed was simply what made the heavenly trip. After all, that was the great expectation we shared with family and friends. How wonderful that would be! We could visit our departed relatives and live with them for an eternity! It is all that anyone ever talked about when someone died. As believers, we wanted to believe.

We tended not to believe the Fourth Assumption of Science, inseparability (Just as there is no motion without matter, so there is no matter without motion). After all, even if you had physics, the evil mechanistic view (that the universe consists only of matter in motion) had been abandoned by Einstein and followers. It was said that mass could turn into pure energy, which like the imagined soul, could miraculously leave the atom, travelling through perfectly empty space as matterless motion.

All this shows why relativity and its regressive ideas got so popular and why Einstein is always purported to be right. Both relativity and religion are founded on the same indeterministic assumptions. Even though the most accomplished scientists are atheists, they live in religious countries and most probably were once believers. Those assumptions we were born with and are surrounded by don’t just disappear. They hang around as unconscious presuppositions.[1] Working physicists and cosmogonists don’t have time to bring those presuppositions into the light of day. They remain as the foundation of cosmogony, which will not be rejected until they are abandoned. As Kuhn maintained, paradigms do not change until the underlying assumptions change.[2]

So George, that “abstract physical quantity that is not easily perceived by humans” is akin to the soul we were all taught to believe in. We cannot escape from the myth that the universe exploded out of nothing without finally realizing that energy is nothing but a calculation.]

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[1] Collingwood, R.G., 1940, An essay on metaphysics: Oxford, Clarendon Press, 354 p.

[2] Kuhn, Thomas S., 1962 [2012], The structure of scientific revolutions (With an Introductory Essay by Ian Hacking) (50th Anniversary ed.): Chicago; London, The University of Chicago Press, 264 p.