Facts (Actuality) and Groupthink (Orthodoxy) ## Albert Einstein (please make sure “java-scripting” is enabled in order for the tool-tips to function properly; mouse-hover on the yellow rectangular image to open; left-click on the image to hold). RICHARD: Mr. Albert Einstein (well-known for his ‘imagination is more important than knowledge’ quote) had this to say, in 1920, when reminiscing about the birth of his relativity theory in 1907: • [Mr. Albert Einstein] ‘There occurred to me the ‘glücklichste Gedanke meines Leben’, the happiest thought of my life ... for an observer falling freely from the roof of a house there exists – at least in his immediate surroundings – no gravitational field. Indeed, if the observer drops some bodies then those remain relative to him in a state of rest or uniform motion, independent of their particular chemical or physical nature (in this consideration the air resistance is, of course, ignored). The observer therefore has the right to interpret his state as ‘at rest’. [endquote; italics in the original] (page 178, ‘Subtle Is The Lord’, by Abraham Pais; ©1982 Oxford University Press). The observer (irregardless of the ... um ... the ‘right’ to subjectively interpret what is actually occurring as being a state of rest) is, of course, falling at a rate of thirty two feet per second per second because of the very gravitational field Mr. Albert Einstein somewhat solipsistically intuited/ imagined did not exist for such a person. He also intuitively/ imaginatively attributed reality to a mathematical device (‘quanta’) devised by Mr. Max Planck to solve a hypothetical problem (known as the ‘ultraviolet catastrophe’) about a perfect, and thus non-existent, black-box radiator – which statistical solution was never intended to be taken as being real until Mr. Albert Einstein appropriated it for his own purposes in his 1905 Nobel-prize-winning paper for Theoretical Physics on the photoelectric effect, wherein he explained that light consists of quanta (packets with fixed energies corresponding to certain frequencies) – and thus was quantum mechanics spawned. Mr. Werner Heisenberg, of the uncertainty principle fame, dispensed with the main plank of science – causality (cause and effect) – altogether: • ‘The law of causality is no longer applied in quantum theory’. (page 88, ‘Physics and Philosophy, the Revolution in Modern Science’, by Werner Heisenberg; ©1966 Harper and Row, New York). Now, quantum theory may be a lot of things – a mathematical model useful for predicting certain events for instance – but, being sans causality, science it surely ain’t. January 24 2004 RESPONDENT: You make assertions about Relativity and Einstein based on your own narrow worldview. RICHARD: I provided a referenced quote of Mr. Albert Einstein reminiscing, in 1920, about the birth of his relativity theory in 1907, which shows in his own words that his theory is not based on fact ... if pointing this out really is me making ‘assertions’ – and from a ‘narrow worldview’ at that – then modern science is in a more parlous state than I have previously taken it to be. RESPONDENT: You are basically saying that you can assert whatever you like, without the need for scientific grounding. RICHARD: No ... you are saying that, not me. RESPONDENT: That’s fine ... RICHARD: And here you are agreeing with your latest invention as if you were agreeing with me. RESPONDENT: ... we can agree then that you are a purveyor of science fiction .. RICHARD: Not ‘we’ ... you; you can agree, then (as you invented that fantasy you can, of course, agree with it all you like). RESPONDENT: ... but you are creating the impression that you have scientific knowledge and have the grounds to critique Relativity, Einstein and quantum mechanics when in actuality you do not. RICHARD: I am doing no such thing as I have made it quite clear that I am but a layperson when it comes to physics ... as well you know from a quote of mine you posted only two and a half hours before you posted this e-mail,. Viz.: • [Respondent]: ‘Here’s an illuminating disclosure from Richard: [quote] ‘I am also willing to be wrong in the many areas which lie beyond my expertise. *I am a lay-person when it comes to physics* as I am a high-school drop-out. I started working for a living at age fifteen and have never pursued these matters beyond what is available in the popular press ... if you are looking for an advanced discussion you are talking to the wrong person’. [emphasis added]. As you have now reduced yourself to blatantly inventing things about me there is no need for me to make any further comment. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 56b, 24 January 2004) March 17 2004 RESPONDENT: I suppose that I should make it clear that I am not claiming that Einsteinian relativity is fact. RICHARD: Sure ... what you are (or were) claiming, however, is that the article at the link you initially provided which started this thread was a [quote] ‘good’ [endquote] article about Einsteinian relativity. Given that you do not know enough about it to comment on the (above) issue are you still claiming that? RESPONDENT: What I would say definitively though, is that there has been a good deal of evidence over the last 100 years or so that has been proposed as proving that Einsteinian relativity is fact. My intention in this conversation is merely to explore the reasons you say what you say, to understand why you dispute relativity and the purported evidence for it. It is delightful for me to discover that there are other models to explain what has been purportedly evidence for Einsteinian relativity. If one doesn’t understand that there are other models available or possible, it is indeed difficult to jettison what the most respected scientists are calling proof of relativity – so I appreciate this chance to learn more about what and why you are saying what you are about relativity. RICHARD: For what it is worth I was not cognisant of the general relativity theory/expanding-contracting universe theory/big-bang-big-crunch theory until I went public on the internet, other than a vague recollection that there had been a person called Mr. Albert Einstein who was held in high esteem for matters I knew virtually nothing of and was concerned even less about, whereupon I was told (in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in my last post) that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual because of the ‘expanding universe’ theory and, as a post-script, was challenged to explain quasars and pulsars (both of which I had never heard of before). In other words it never occurred to me all those years ago that, as Mr. Albert Einstein’s mathematical model proved the universe not to be infinite, eternal, and perpetual, I would be unable to ever become actually free from the human condition and naively went ahead and did so anyway. Ain’t life grand! * RICHARD: You are aware that the topic under dispute is whether or not the universe is spatially infinite, temporally eternal, and materially perdurable (and not just Einsteinian relativity per se)? RESPONDENT: I was not aware that of that, no. RICHARD: Oh? Why would Einsteinian relativity be such a hot topic on this mailing list, then, if not because of my oft-repeated observation that the infinitude of the universe is directly experienced here in this actual world? Just curious. RESPONDENT: I originally thought that it was only the big-bang theory that contradicted your experience – but I see now that you are saying that relativity (by itself regardless of the big bang theory) contradicts your experience. I do understand that Einsteinian relativity is intertwined with the big-bang theory, so I thought that is why relativity is such a ‘hot topic’. Though I also went into this conversation understanding that the big-bang theory depends on relativity, I also thought it is possible that relativity could be correct, without necessarily implying that the big-bang theory is correct. RICHARD: Put specifically: that the universe is expanding is inextricably part and parcel of Mr. Albert Einstein’s equations ... the big-bang theory came later and arose out of the implications of that mathematical artefact. Viz.: • ‘When Einstein tried to describe the simplest possible mathematical model of the universe using his new equations, however, he ran into a problem. At that time, in 1917, the received wisdom was that our Milky Way galaxy was the entire universe, a stable collection of stars. But the equations describing a complete cosmology of space, time and matter refused to produce such a picture. They insisted that the universe must be either expanding or contracting. The only way Einstein could hold the model universe still, to mimic the appearance of the Milky Way, was to add an extra term to the equation, called the ‘cosmological constant’. (...) A dozen years later, observers, led by the pioneer Edwin Hubble in California, discovered that the Milky Way was not the entire universe, but simply one galaxy among many millions, and that distant galaxies are all receding from each other. The universe is expanding, exactly as the pure equations of general relativity predicted in 1917, when Einstein refused to believe the evidence of his own theory. There is no need for cosmological constant, and Einstein’s equations now provide the basis for the highly successful ‘big bang’ description of the birth and evolution of the entire universe ...’. (page 135, ‘Einstein: A Life in Science’ by Michael White & John Gribbin; published 1994 by Simon & Schuster Ltd). RESPONDENT: So, I have been particularly interested in focusing on relativity excluding the big-bang theory – so that I could understand just exactly where you say relativity goes wrong. RICHARD: In short: the universe is neither expanding nor contracting. RESPONDENT: According to what you are saying now, you are saying that Einstein’s theory of relativity directly contradicts your experience, correct? RICHARD: Correct. RESPONDENT: So, I want to ask – specifically how does Einstein’s relativity alone contradict: 1) The universe is spatially infinite & 2) The universe is temporally eternal. RICHARD: An expanding universe is neither spatially infinite nor temporally eternal. (Richard, The Actual Freedom List, No. 27h, 17 March 2004) May 18 2001: RESPONDENT: From what I know of it (if the big bang theory is to be believed to be true) universe was created once upon a time and will cease to be once thence a time. RICHARD: The ‘Big Bang Theory’, first proposed by the French Abbé Mr. Georges Lemaitre in 1927 and strikingly similar to the Biblical Creation myth, is shot full of gaping holes ... which are progressively becoming more and more incapable of being forever plugged by mathematicians’ increasingly frantic coefficients. RESPONDENT: The older, steady state theory of the universe being in perpetual existence, doesn’t seem to have borne out by scientific observation, although scientists like Hoyle and Narlikar did advance convincing mathematics to support their view. RICHARD: Are you so sure that it is not ‘borne out by scientific observation’? Because, apart from the current passionate preoccupation by academia with Quantum Theory (which gets ever more frenetic due to the mathematicians who, having taken over physics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, are bemiring themselves more and more in their futile efforts to prove their god to be a mathematician) modern astronomy is showing the universe to be immensely vast. For example, in 1986 a huge conglomeration of galaxies that are 1,000,000,000 light years long, 300,000,000 light years wide and 100,000,000 light years thick were found (which finding was confirmed in 1990). This ‘wall of galaxies’, as it became known, would have taken 100,000,000,000 years to form under the workings of the ‘Big Bang’ theory ... which makes the mathematically estimated ‘age’ of the universe – 12 to 14 billion years – simply look sillier than it already did. I am no mathematician ... yet it is obvious, is it not, that a mathematical model of the universe is not the actual universe? (Richard, List B, No. 33d, 18 May 2001) March 16 2000: RICHARD: Although, speaking of ‘subtle realms’, I notice that Mr. Aristotle the Stagirite’s ‘aether’ is under-going a revival as Quantum Theory gets ever more frantic due to the mathematicians who, having taken over physics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, are bemiring themselves more and more in their futile efforts to prove their god to be a mathematician. (Richard, List C, No. 3, 16 March 2000) January 21 2004 RESPONDENT: Richard, it might help (me at least) to clarify your following statement in your correspondence with Respondent No. 56: [Richard]: ‘... facts are few and far between for most scientists, and many of their ‘facts’ later turn out to be flawed methodology arising out of their expectations based upon their belief systems and/or mind-set’. [endquote]. It is clear and plain to see that the second part of what you are saying is correct. Specifically, that many of scientists ‘facts’ ‘later turn out to be flawed methodology arising out of their expectations based upon their belief systems and/or mind-set’. I don’t see any room for disagreement on that point. Anyone who has studied or read about science and the history of science would be able to agree with that statement. But, you are additionally saying that ‘facts are few and far between for most scientists’, which is by no means obvious. Would you mind stating more clearly what you mean? RICHARD: I am none too sure how I can put it more clearly ... in any area of research I have ever looked into I have, more often than not, found that not only are facts rather thin on the ground but that it is mainly the hypothesis/ theory which gets most of the attention (which is possibly why many of the ‘facts’ later turn out not to be facts at all). I could provide many examples – global deforestation for instance – yet hesitate to do so as I would become deflected into attending to all the minutiae the presenting of such examples require in order to make a case ... instead I would invite anyone genuinely interested to find out for themselves by conducting their own research into various topics. If anyone were to do so I would suggest reading the following booklet ‘Science Without Sense’ before they start: https://web.archive.org/web/19970412002851/http://www.junkscience.com/sws.html RESPONDENT: For example, a literal reading: 1) Most (more than 50%) of scientists (people who work or consider themselves ‘scientists’) are few and far between on their facts (there are many more or significantly more errors in their scientific studies than facts). If that is what you mean, can you demonstrate that to be the case? RICHARD: Nope ... and neither can anybody demonstrate that to not be the case either (more on this immediately below). RESPONDENT: In other words, can you demonstrate that more than 50% of people who consider themselves scientists are in error significantly more often than they are correct regarding their ‘scientific’ study? RICHARD: The last time I looked-up the subject there were over 100,000 scientific journals published each year containing more than 6,000,000 articles ... and no single person can ever even read all those articles let alone make sense of them as no single person has expertise in all areas of scientific research (there are over 1,000 areas of specialised study and no single person has cross-disciplinal expertise in all areas). Viz.: • ‘There are now, for example, well over 100,000 scientific journals published each year, producing over six million articles to be digested – clearly an impossible task’. ('Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of our Time' by W. H. Freeman, 1997). And: • ‘It is estimated that 408,000 references are added each year to the National Library of Medicine ‘Medline’ database from among the more than 100,000 scientific journals now published’. (Arndt KA: ‘Information excess in medicine. Overview, relevance to dermatology, and strategies for coping’. Arch Dermatol 128:1249-1256, 1997; www.compophupdate.com/bridging.htm). And: • ‘The scientific journal was invented in the mid-1600’s as a means of speeding scholarly communication: Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. As science grew, so did the volume of literature and the specialisation of journals. Today there are over 100,000 scientific journals’. (www.library.ucsb.edu/classes/chem184/184lec2.html). And: • ‘The world wide available information doubles every 3 years. From 1991 to 1994, there has been as much information generated as from 1440 (Gutenberg) to 1991. More than 100,000 scientific journals are being distributed every year’. (www.mu.niedersachsen.de/cds/webpages/3.htm). RESPONDENT: Or maybe you mean: 2) Scientists ‘facts’ often turn out to be errors due to flawed methodology arising out of their expectations. RICHARD: Yes, I also mean that. Expectations can, and often do, lead to cherry-picking the data, for example ... especially in the area of epidemiological studies (such as the tobacco issue for instance). RESPONDENT: Or possibly: 3) Scientists are victims of the human condition like everyone else, so in as much as they are living an illusion, they must also be significantly in error about much of what they do and say inside and out of their ‘scientific’ study. RICHARD: I also mean that as well, yes, and the intuitive/ imaginative facility is often the main culprit ... plus there is the matter of position, prestige, and attracting research dollars as well, to mention but a few of the impediments to unbiased study, and there is also the down-side of peer-review to take into account (which prevents many discoveries outside the mainstream paradigm from being published in the prestigious journals). RESPONDENT: It might also be useful to demarcate between various kinds of ‘science’ – as you seem to have more disagreement with theoretical physics and such than say, biological sciences – like work done in genetics or evolutionary theory – though these are also not exempt from error. RICHARD: I do understand the value of pure science (theoretical science), as contrasted to applied science (practical science), in the area of research and development – just as I understand the value of pure mathematics as opposed to applied mathematics – as evidenced by the technological revolution and the main point I am emphasising is the dangers of taking the latest (supposedly) scientific discovery to be fact, as propagated by the popular press for instance, because theoretical science does not describe the universe ... mathematical equations have no existence outside of the ratiocinative and illative process. [...] I will repeat what I said earlier for emphasis: in any area of research I have ever looked into I have, more often than not, found that not only are facts rather thin on the ground but that it is mainly the hypothesis/ theory which gets most of the attention. Which is possibly why many of the ‘facts’ later turn out not to be facts at all. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27f, 21 January 2004) January 24 2004 RICHARD: I will repeat what I said earlier for emphasis: in any area of research I have ever looked into I have, more often than not, found that not only are facts rather thin on the ground but that it is mainly the hypothesis/ theory which gets most of the attention. RESPONDENT: I suppose this is what it boils down to? RICHARD: Aye ... no one person can read, let alone comprehend so as to determine validity, all the millions upon millions of scientific articles. RESPONDENT: I can readily agree with your conclusion regarding ‘any area of research’ that I have looked into as well being thin on facts – especially regarding major theses. RICHARD: I am pleased we are in agreement on this ... it is glaringly obvious when one twigs to what to look for (the factual basis of the hypothesis or theory/the basic premise of the argument or proposition) and it saves wading through a lot of quite often well-written but fatally-flawed articles trying to make sense of something that can never make sense. RESPONDENT: This is quite different though from saying that science itself is thin on facts – which of course, you did not say. Open a college physics I textbook or Chemistry I textbook or a textbook on anatomy or cell biology and quite interesting facts abound. It is easy to infer from your statement of most scientists being thin on facts that science itself is thin on facts – but it appears that you are mostly referring to ‘scientific’ research, though not necessarily exclusively. Is that a correct assessment? RICHARD: Yes ... I was, and am, most definitely referring to facts being few and far between in the research most scientists do and not science itself (as out of those 6,000,000 or so articles a year, multiplied by x-number of years, comes the abundance of those ‘quite interesting facts’ which you mention). I do appreciate science and have the highest regard for facts – it is what enabled western civilisation to get out of superstition and medieval ignorance – hence the concern that it not be taken over by the metaphysicists who would have future generations slip back into the supernatural. RESPONDENT: Possibly the distinction I’m looking for is between ‘descriptive’ science and ‘theoretical science.’ What I’m thinking of as ‘descriptive’ science are things like anatomy, biology, geology, palaeontology, basic physics and chemistry and electromagnetism – possibly these could all be called ‘physical’ sciences. I am also aware that these cannot completely do without theory. RICHARD: They certainly cannot ... it is, after all, what one does with the facts which counts. RESPONDENT: I just don’t see that your statement that ‘most scientists’ are thin on facts could possibly apply to the ‘physical’ sciences. It seems that it would be more accurate to apply that sort of statement to the instances when theory outruns observation. RICHARD: Yes ... ‘when theory outruns observation’ is another way of saying that facts are few and far between/thin on the ground in that area of the research. RESPONDENT: An illustration on this point might be your example of the ‘smoker’s lung’ and ‘non-smoker’s lung’ versus the ‘unhealthy lung’ and ‘healthy lung.’ In other words, facts regarding the structure, composition, and function of a lung are not hard to come by, but research into the causation of lung cancer and it’s connection to smoking tends to be mired with confusion, emotion, and error. RICHARD: Indeed ... just as it is in many other areas of supposedly scientific study (the ecological/environmental issues for another current example). (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27g, 24 January 2004) September 29 1999: RESPONDENT: If the universe is 10 billion years old as scientists suggest ... RICHARD: Scientists have made mistakes before ... and will do so again. RESPONDENT: Do you have any proof which contradicts their claims? RICHARD: I am no mathematician and have no intention of doing the requisite study just to contradict their fantastical claims ... there are other mathematicians who are already doing so (the theories of Mr. R. S. Hall, for example). Most scientists like to say that in their mathematical model of the universe it all started twelve to fifteen billion years ago (Big Bang) and has about another ten to fifteen to go before it ends (Big Crunch). They say it came out of nothing and will go back into nothing. This is not scientific talk ... it is metaphysical talk (abstract mathematics). Spiritual people also say that we came out of nothingness and will go back into nothingness. Virtually nobody is willing to see that this physical universe is already ‘it’ ... because to do so is the ending of not only ‘I’ as ego, but ‘me’ as soul. Blind nature’s survival instinct persuades them to seek immortality – and deny physical death’s oblivion – thus their universe has to die. As I said before: There has been many people who have tried to convince me that I am arrogant ... yet I do not equate my end as being of the same-same magnitude as the imagined end of this humungous universe! Therefore there never was a ‘Big Bang’ outside of the venerable halls of academia (other than in popular imagination) ... nor a ‘Creation’ outside of venerated holy scriptures (other than in popular imagination). This material universe is already always right here ... and just now. (Richard, List C, No. 3, 29 September 1999) No. 01 RICHARD: This physical universe is infinite and eternal. It has no beginning and no ending ... and therefore no middle. There are no edges to this universe. RESPONDENT: But there are boundaries to the universe and it is finite. RICHARD: Ah, I see that you believe in the latest cosmological theories ... maybe those regarding the big bang and the big crunch? They are only theories, you know, not fact. They are based on mathematical models ... which require increasingly frantic coefficients to prop up their postulations. No scientist has ever actually seen their ‘expanding boundary’ of the universe through a telescope ... nor has anyone ever been there and come back with a souvenir teaspoon embossed with ‘Greetings From The Edge Of The Universe’. There have been many people throughout human history who have hypothesised about the universe having a beginning and an end – to make it fit into their cosmogonical model – without any success. It was Mr. Albert Einstein, if I remember correctly, who came up with the fatuous observation that if one shone a torch out into space it would eventually shine on the back of one’s head! Some early Greeks had the earth supported by their god’s shoulders – Atlas – while the Hindus had it supported on four elephants standing on a turtle’s back swimming in the cosmic ocean ... or some such thing; Mr. Yeshua the Nazarene was a flat earth god ... and so on. Such is the stuff of genius. All the while, of course, the universe has remained both infinite and eternal. * RICHARD: There are mathematical models that have created the belief among most cosmologists that the universe was once created by a ‘Big Bang’ ... but it is a belief only. They too believe in ‘Creation’ ... a belief which colours their thinking (or rather, their imagination, for none of their speculation is factual). RESPONDENT: And what makes your speculations factual? RICHARD: Nothing at all. When I speculate I know it to be nothing but that – a speculation – and I say so. Other people, making speculations, start believing in them ... and the action of believing in something somehow makes it appear to be true. They then take this ‘truth’ to be a fact ... which is the mistake many eminent scientists make. Mr. Einstein’s ‘General Theory of Relativity’, for example, was just that – a theory – and not a description of something actual ... a fact that many people overlook in their rush to believe in someone else’s ‘truth’. * RICHARD: Yes, stars do die and new ones are born ... and spectacularly at that. But the universe does not evolve ... it is the contents of the universe that are born and die and evolve. The universe itself is infinite and eternal ... qualities that you (and the cosmologists) attribute to an unknowable divinity. RESPONDENT: Again, if something is infinite, by definition, there can’t be anything else other than whatever that infinity is. Infinity exists as a unit inseparable undifferentiable, unchangeable. Nothing could exist in it that was different than the whole. But what is it? Do you think that infinity is empty space? RICHARD: No. I said that the universe – which is space and everything in it – is infinite. That is: infinite ‘empty space’ and an infinite number of bodies in that ‘empty space’ . It is these bodies that are ‘born and die and evolve’ ... it is matter rearranging itself into a different form. Great stuff, is it not? Personally, I am so glad to be able to be alive and living in this era wherein all kinds of discoveries have been made which threw off the stranglehold religion had upon the Western mind for centuries (people used to be burnt at the stake for much less heretical writing than what I do). This emerging clarity of Western thought has been swamped recently by the insidious doctrines of the Eastern mind creeping into scientific research ... but I am confident that it is but a passing phase. It is sobering, however, to realise that the intelligentsia of the West are eagerly following the pundits of the East down the slippery slope of ‘spiritual science’ and ‘spiritual philosophy’ ... thinking that it has nothing to do with religion. ‘Spirituality’ is the religion of the East, thus any wisdom designated ‘True Wisdom’ translates easily as ‘God’s Word’. The trouble with people who discard the god of the West is that they do not realise that by turning to the Eastern spirituality they have effectively jumped out of the frying pan into the fire. If it were not for the appalling suffering engendered it would all be highly amusing. The Christian conditioning actually sets up the situation for a thinking person to be susceptible to the beguiling philosophies of the East. At the end of the line there is always a god of some description, lurking in disguise, and wreaking its havoc. (Richard, List A, No. 16, No.01) September 09 1998: KONRAD: Einstein was once asked whether he was able to explain his general relativity as simple as possible. He said, that the essence was that classical physicists believed, that if you remove all matter from the universe, you are left with space, devoid of matter. But according to general relativity when you remove all matter from space, then space itself has disappeared, too. The same relation exists between thought and consciousness. I have discovered, that if all thoughts are removed from consciousness, then consciousness itself has disappeared too. Apparently consciousness requires thoughts in order to exist, in the same way as space requires matter in order to exist. Without matter no space; without thoughts no consciousness. RICHARD: The only problem with Mr. Albert Einstein’s theory is that it is just that ... a theory. You cannot ‘remove all matter from space’ no matter how many bull-dozers and dump-trucks you bring into action. Where would you put all that matter? Dump it somewhere outside of the universe? There must be an ‘outside’ for Mr. Albert Einstein to even think up this nonsense ... more abstract hypothesising once again. KONRAD: You calling this vision nonsense only betrays that you are not able to think in the abstract, or understand that the abstract has very real consequences. E = mc^2 is the basic equation of the atomic bomb. This abstract formula has caused the very concrete destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And it caused the very concrete other atomic explosions that have taken place since then. RICHARD: As I understand it, it was Mr. Neils Bohr’s understanding of the atomic nucleus, which he likened to a liquid droplet, that was a key step in the understanding of many nuclear processes, and not Mr. Albert Einstein’s famous equation. In particular, in 1939 Mr. Neils Bohr’s formulations played an essential part in the understanding of the splitting of a heavy nucleus into two parts, almost equal in mass, with the release of a tremendous amount of energy ... thus nuclear fission. In fact, in 1943 Mr. Neils Bohr and one of his sons, Mr. Aage Bohr took part in the projects for making a nuclear fission bomb. They worked in England for several months and then moved to Los Alamos in the USA with a British research team. Mr. Albert Einstein greatly admired Mr. Neils Bohr’s early work, referring to it as ‘the highest form of musicality in the sphere of thought’, but he never accepted Mr. Neils Bohr’s claim that quantum mechanics was the ‘rational generalisation of classical physics’ demanded for the understanding of atomic phenomena. They discussed the fundamental questions of physics on a number of occasions, sometimes brought together by a close mutual friend, Mr. Paul Ehrenfest, professor of theoretical physics at the University of Leiden ... but they never came to basic agreement. Be that as it may ... the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were killed by applied physics and not abstract concepts. Mr. Albert Einstein’s famous concept is yet to be demonstrated ... let alone used. It remains – like most of his theories – conceptual in nature and not established in fact. His concept of curved space-time, for example, is still only a mathematical formulation ... and unable to be demonstrated. KONRAD: The question is not whether such a scheme like removing all matter can be practically done, but whether this hypothesis can cause predictions of phenomena formerly thought to be unrelated. And indeed it does. The basic equation of Einstein’s general relativity G = 8 Pi T, states that all of space, (spacetime) represented by G is connected with all of the energy T (stress-energy) through this equation. This equation then explained a connection between the perihelic motion of Mercury, the red shift of heavy stars, and the fact that clocks run more slowly when the gravitational field is more intense. Predictions that were all quantitatively vindicated. Consider also this: concretely speaking it is incomprehensible that the colour of light can be connected with motions of planets, and those two things can be connected to running clocks, and still this equation says that these phenomena ARE connected. Not only that, this equation even says something quantitatively about it, and this is then indeed found, this equation is therefore proved as good as anything can be proved in physics. RICHARD: Aye ... well said: ‘as good as anything that can be proved in physics’. There are as many theories expressly contradicting the above as there is supporting it. Physicists just do not know these things for certain ... they are experimental models only (and the more honest physicists state this clearly). KONRAD: In other words, that these things are connected in the way that Einstein says is 100% certain. But then his statement about the connection between all space and all energy is also 100% certain. RICHARD: Only if you say so, Konrad ... you obviously believe in him like many physicists do. Believing in Mr. Albert Einstein amounts to a religious-like certitude for the faithful. (Richard, Konrad Correspondence, Page 3, 9 September 1998) May 23 1999: RESPONDENT No. 34: Could you please explain Einstein’s statement in logical terms. RESPONDENT: Sure. Before General Theory of Relativity: Premise: Matter and space are different. Conclusion: Matter does not affect space. After General Theory of Relativity: Premise: Matter and space are related. Conclusion: Matter affects space. RICHARD: Does Mr. Albert Einstein mean that the space of the universe vanishes when all the stars and planets are removed from it ... and not local matter and space like apples and fruit bowls here on earth? If so, then immediately three points come to mind: 1. With what enormous bull-dozers and with what enormous dump-trucks shall this feat be carried out? (Or is this only an intellectual exercise in abstract thinking?) 2. Where shall all that matter (the stars and planets) be placed after it is removed from the universe? (If this is not an intellectual exercise then more space outside of the universe is required to store them ... can he demonstrate that there is a parallel universe?) 3. From what vantage point shall human beings be observing his abstract theory being empirically demonstrated? (As human beings are made of matter and all matter is removed then no one will be present to witness this ... unless human beings really are ‘not the body’ and that consciousness exists independently of matter and space). So, what is Mr. Albert Einstein’s ‘genius’ wanting to convey? He says: ‘take away matter and space vanishes as well’ ... which logically means that there is no matter and no space in existence. So, what remains? Logically: nothing remains. Now, given that ‘no matter’ is another way of saying ‘formless’ and that ‘no space’ is another way of saying ‘spaceless’ then what he is presenting in the guise of theoretical physics is the ‘Ancient Wisdom’ of the ‘formless and spaceless’ ... um ... ‘nothingness’? RESPONDENT: I think you know pretty well what the state-of-the-science is at present. RICHARD: I am a lay-person dabbling in the science as presented by the popular press ... I have no formal training or academically acquired knowledge whatsoever. From this privileged position I discern two strands of science: 1. Physical science (which properly contains ‘pure science’ and ‘applied science’) 2. Metaphysical science (which properly contains ‘science fiction’ and ‘mystical science’). RESPONDENT: Einstein died many years ago. RICHARD: Indeed he did. Mr. Albert Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany, on March 14, 1879 and died in his sleep at Princeton Hospital, USA, on April 18, 1955. However, his theories did not die with him. RESPONDENT: I watched a program on the String Theory. RICHARD: Ah, yes ... the ‘String Theory’. When I was but a youth in High School in the late 50’s and early 60’s I was taught – as fact – that the atom was the smallest piece of matter ... it was the source of all things. Then came, thick and fast, a bewildering array of particles with peculiar names and properties wherein they were sometimes matter and sometimes energy waves ... which state depended upon the human observer, apparently ... and these particles were the source of all things. And today there is this ‘String Theory’ ... a ‘string’ of energy so tiny that if one is to compare it to the size of the known universe it would be the size of a tree ... if it had form. Predictably, it is being posited as being the smallest ... um ... ‘thingamajig’ beyond which there is no smaller. And thus it, now, it is the ultimate source of all things. May I ask? Would Mr. Albert Einstein’s theory have this energy ‘string’ vanish, along with space itself, when all matter is removed from space? In other words, does this energy ‘string’ still fall within the range of matter? (Particles are, apparently, sometimes matter and sometimes energy ... a sort of ‘now it is’ and ‘now it is not’ simultaneously). If it is not considered as being matter (an energy wave is not/has no form), then will it remain after matter – and space – vanish? Which brings in the question of time (inextricably linked by Mr. Albert Einstein with space in a ‘space-time’ continuum). I did ask in my previous post if time ceases when all matter and space vanishes ... does it? If so, and if this energy ‘string’ (not being matter) does remain, then is this energy ‘string’ (the source of all matter) ... um ... ‘timeless’? I will put the question in another way: Is there a timeless and spaceless and formless energy that ‘exists for all eternity’ that is the source of all time, all space and all matter ... according to theoretical physics? RESPONDENT: There was another one on the state of the matter and space – and nothingness – inside a black hole. RICHARD: Uh, huh ... that is the $64,000 question, is it not? What lies inside a ‘black hole’? Is it the end of everything ... or is it the passage to a parallel universe where all is bright and beautiful? * RESPONDENT No. 34: Did matter affected space before Einstein was born? RESPONDENT: Yes, it did. In the same way that apples fell on the ground before Newton. RICHARD: Apparently Einsteinium physics (relative time and relative space) co-exists with Newtonian physics (absolute time and absolute space) ... a sort of ‘is’ and ‘is not’ simultaneously. This is all starting to sound familiar. Given that Mr. Albert Einstein proposes that space and time are inextricably linked in a ‘space-time’ continuum, when space vanishes upon removing all matter from it, according to Mr. Albert Einstein’s brilliant mind, time must cease to exist too. If so, then what he now has, logically, is a ‘formless and timeless and spaceless nothingness’ wherein human beings have no actual existence as a flesh and blood body. Thus, apart from the unanswered question of consciousness-without-a-body, is this not unlike a description of the Nirvanic ‘Sunyata’? But, then again, he is reported as saying: ‘The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion (...) if there’s any religion that would cope the scientific needs it will be Buddhism ...’ (http://stripe.colorado.edu/~judy/einstein/god.html) Maybe he meant ‘the science of the future will be a cosmic religion ... if there is any science that would cope with the religious needs it will be General Relativity’? It would all be an hilarious joke if only it were not taken so seriously ... I notice that NASA has appropriated millions of dollars with the notion of sending space-ships through ‘worm-holes in the space-time continuum’ ... if only they can find one existing somewhere else than in the fantasy-driven world of higher mathematics dreamed up in the halls of academia. Meanwhile, all the wars and murders and rapes and tortures and domestic violence and child abuse and sadness and loneliness and grief and depression and suicides continue unabated for want of funding into an investigation of what causes malice and sorrow in human beings in the first place. And to think that all this while Mr. Joseph LeDoux has been hot on the trail of empirically finding this cause. Viz.: (Richard, List B, No. 33, 23 May 1999) August 31 2003 RICHARD: There is nothing metaphysical about being apperceptive ... indeed, if anything the normal way of perception – a mediated, or indirect and thus separative, perception – being once-removed from the physical, is arguably already well on the way to being beyond time and space and form. RESPONDENT: I define metaphysics as ‘meta ta physsika’, a Greek word meaning beyond nature and physics. RICHARD: As the word ‘physics’ – plural of ‘physic’ from the Latin ‘physica’ from the Greek ‘ta phusika’ (‘the natural’ understood as ‘things’) – is derived from the Greek ‘phusis’ (‘nature’) it properly refers to the science of the natural world (as in knowledge of the physical world of animal, vegetable and mineral) ... thus to say nature *and* physics is to separate it from the physical. And I am not just nit-picking over the meaning of words here as it is glaringly obvious that the late nineteenth-century/ early twentieth-century physics departed from being a study of the natural world (the physical world) and entered into the realm of the mathematical world ... an abstract world which does not exist in nature. Indeed the word ‘metaphysical’ also refers to that which is ‘based on abstract general reasoning or a priori principles’ (Oxford Dictionary) as well as the more common meaning of that which transcends matter or the physical (as in immaterial, incorporeal, supersensible, supernatural and so on). And quantum theory, for an instance of this, is most definitely based on a mathematical device (Mr. Max Planck’s ‘quanta’) initially designed to solve the hypothetical problem of infinite ultra-violet radiation from a non-existent perfect ‘black-box’ radiator and never intended to be taken as being real (until Mr. Albert Einstein took it up for his own purposes). RESPONDENT: You have entered in a field beyond science. RICHARD: As science is the state or fact of knowing – knowledge or cognisance of something physical – based upon observed facts, and/or with demonstrated truths, in that it is both an intellectual and practical activity encompassing those branches of study which apply objective observation (the scientific method) to the phenomena of the physical universe (the natural sciences), in what way is determining that the universe has boundless space, unlimited time, and perpetual matter (mass/ energy), by both intellectual reasoning and direct observation entering into a field beyond science? As you cannot be saying that all those people with the scientific training sufficient to qualify for the title ‘scientist’, who also say the universe is infinite, eternal, and perpetual, are not operating in the field of science (and only those people with the scientific training sufficient to qualify for the title ‘scientist’ who say that the universe is finite, temporary, and depletable are operating in the field of science) it would appear that, according to your rationale, only non-apperceptive observation (a mediated, or indirect and thus separative, perception) is within the field of science and apperceptive observation (an unmediated, or direct and thus non-separative, perception) is not. In other words, for it to be scientific, observation must be done by an entity within the flesh and blood body, eh? RESPONDENT: You are perceiving something with other means than body senses. RICHARD: First of all, as I am ‘body senses’ I am unable to perceive ‘with’ them – I perceive *as* them – and as there is no identity in situ inside this flesh and blood body I would be most interested to hear your theory as to what ‘other means’ you say I perceive with. Meaning that as there is no affective faculty whatsoever operating in this flesh and blood body – thus no epiphenomenal imaginative/psychic facility – there are no other means than sensorially (and reasoning therehence). And sensible reasoning at that. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 44c, 31 August 2003) January 14 2004 RESPONDENT: What is the most refined form of matter, is it light, intergalactic ‘void’ or is it something else? RICHARD: Such a question has no application in actuality – terms like ‘refined’ and ‘gross’ are spiritual terms, in discussions about the fundamental nature of everything, and say more about the elitist character of spirituality than anything else – as matter can be either mass or energy without any gain or loss of quality both phases of matter are equally elementary. RESPONDENT: Does anti-matter exist as an actuality? RICHARD: No ... it is a theoretical construct. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 25d, 14 January 2004) * January 19 2004 RESPONDENT: What do you think of the so-called Black Holes hanging around in the Universe? RICHARD: I do not think of them – except in a discussion about such things – just as I do not think of unicorns. RESPONDENT: Ha-ha ... am I to understand from your analogy that these black holes have no existence? RICHARD: The Encyclopaedia Britannica has this to say: • ‘Black holes remain hypothetical, but observations suggest that such phenomena may possibly exist in the star system Cygnus X-1 and at the centre of the Galaxy’. [emphasis added]. (Encyclopaedia Britannica). RESPONDENT: I ask you this as one of the Next Generation Space Telescope objectives would be to take a better look at these black holes and if they are able to see them now, I guess that they exist. RICHARD: You may find the following to be of interest: • ‘Consider the following example: Dr. John A. Wheeler, emeritus professor of physics at Princeton University and originator of the concept of black holes, has said: ‘To me, the formation of a naked singularity is equivalent to jumping across the Gulf of Mexico. I would be willing to bet a million dollars that it can’t be done. But I can’t prove that it can’t be done’. What he is actually saying is – YOU can’t prove that black holes don’t exist, so I am free to use the concept as often as I like! It is a non-falsifiable hypothesis. When astrophysicists conjure up invisible entities, the existence of which no one can disprove (black holes, dark matter), they open themselves to accusations of being pseudo scientists. Why are invisible gnomes in my garden any less scientifically acceptable than the concept of ‘black holes’ that no one can see or measure? It should be noted that the word ‘singularity’ as used by Wheeler (above) is directly stolen from pure mathematics. In mathematics it has a precise meaning. There are various types of mathematical ‘singularities’, e.g., ‘log-canonical singularities’, ‘removable singularities’, ‘essential singularities’, ‘poles’, etc. Each of these describes the anomalous behaviour of certain terms in mathematical equations. Wheeler just kidnaps this mathematical term and transforms it into being a real world entity. People would laugh if some theoretician announced that he had discovered a ‘partial fraction expansion’ sitting in some galaxy, or a ‘Riemann integral’ located inside some globular cluster. The same ridicule should have greeted Wheeler’s announcement that he had found a ‘naked singularity’ in deep space. Recently astrophysicists have been invoking the existence of black holes at an ever increasing rate. They seem to ‘find’ them everywhere. They have become encouraged by our passive acceptance of their non-falsifiable ‘the invisible black-hole ghost did it’ explanations. They seem increasingly childlike in their enjoyment of using the zoo of invisible particles and other arcane entities they have gotten away with inventing. That this enlarging class of invisible gnomelike nonsense has long ago crossed the boundary into pseudo-science does not seem to occur to them.’ (https://web.archive.org/web/20050206042450/http://electric-cosmos.org/introduction.htm). RESPONDENT: Actualism states that physical matter in the form of mass and energy is all there is and as these unicorns eat a lot of it, I wondered where all that matter goes and what a black hole consists of, if not matter? RICHARD: According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica the centre of a black hole consists of a point of zero volume and infinite density called the singularity (which is ‘a point or region of infinite mass density at which space and time are infinitely distorted by gravitational forces and which is held to be the final state of matter falling into a black hole’ according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary) the details of the structure of which are calculated from Mr. Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Viz.: • ‘black hole: cosmic body of extremely intense gravity from which nothing, not even light, can escape. A black hole can be formed by the death of a massive star. When such a star has exhausted its internal thermonuclear fuels at the end of its life, it becomes unstable and gravitationally collapses inward upon itself. The crushing weight of constituent matter falling in from all sides compresses the dying star to a point of zero volume and infinite density called the singularity. Details of the structure of a black hole are calculated from Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity. The singularity constitutes the centre of a black hole and is hidden by the object’s ‘surface’, the event horizon. Inside the event horizon the escape velocity (i.e., the velocity required for matter to escape from the gravitational field of a cosmic object) exceeds the speed of light, so that not even rays of light can escape into space’. (Encyclopaedia Britannica). RESPONDENT: Let’s hope that matter doesn’t just disappear in the unicorn’s stomach. I’ve also heard that they like actualists baked in fine Swiss chocolate. ‘Tis only a rumour, mind you. RICHARD: Ha ... you had better watch out, spreading rumours like that, for it may very well become a factoid one day. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 25d, 19 January 2004) January 06 2004 RICHARD: Mr. Albert Einstein (well-known for his ‘imagination is more important than knowledge’ quote) had this to say, in 1920, when reminiscing about the birth of his relativity theory in 1907: [quote] ‘There occurred to me the ‘glücklichste Gedanke meines Leben’, the happiest thought of my life ... for an observer falling freely from the roof of a house there exists – at least in his immediate surroundings – no gravitational field. Indeed, if the observer drops some bodies then those remain relative to him in a state of rest or uniform motion, independent of their particular chemical or physical nature (in this consideration the air resistance is, of course, ignored). The observer therefore has the right to interpret his state as ‘at rest’. [endquote]. The observer (irregardless of the ... um ... the ‘right’ to subjectively interpret what is actually occurring as being a state of rest) is, of course, objectively falling at a rate of thirty two feet per second per second because of the very gravitational field Mr. Albert Einstein somewhat solipsistically intuited/ imagined did not exist for such a person. RESPONDENT: ‘Objectively’ falling? RICHARD: Yes, Mr. Albert Einstein sets the scene for his gedankenexperiment (‘thought experiment’) by describing [quote] ‘an observer falling freely from the roof of a house’ [endquote] which clearly indicates that there be an (objective) human being (objectively) moving in the direction of the (objective) ground upon which the (objective) house is built due to the (objective) force of attraction for all bodies exerted by the (objective) mass of the (objective) planet known as ‘planet earth’ ... else the entire ‘thought experiment’ be but a subjective fantasy from the very beginning. RESPONDENT: From what arbitrary point in the universe do you determine the direction / velocity of anything? RICHARD: In the ‘thought experiment’ which inspired Mr. Albert Einstein’s relativity theory it could be either from the roof of the house in question, a window somewhere in the appropriate wall of that house, the ground upon which the house sits or, better yet, a viewing platform built especially for the purpose facing the house. In other words wherever the force known as gravity exists there must correspondingly be a mass from which to determine the ‘direction/velocity of anything’ being attracted (aka ‘falling’) by that very force ... and there is nothing ‘arbitrary’ about any such mass. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60, 6 January 2004) January 15 2004 RESPONDENT: From what arbitrary point in the universe do you determine the direction / velocity of anything? RICHARD: In the ‘thought experiment’ which inspired Mr. Albert Einstein’s relativity theory it could be either from the roof of the house in question, a window somewhere in the appropriate wall of that house, the ground upon which the house sits or, better yet, a viewing platform built especially for the purpose facing the house. RESPONDENT: In which case, the motion of the falling object is measured relative to a fixed position on the earth. RICHARD: Given that the house, from which roof an observer is freely falling, occupies a fixed position on the earth it is no surprise that the point from which the motion of that falling observer is measured be also a fixed position on the earth. RESPONDENT: But no point on the earth is actually fixed. RICHARD: Where is the house, from which roof an observer is freely falling, situated then (if not occupying an actually fixed position on the earth)? RESPONDENT: The earth itself is moving, relative to other bodies in space. RICHARD: Aye, and both the house, from which roof an observer is freely falling, and the point from which the motion of that falling observer is measured (plus the very force known as gravity which is occasioning what is called ‘falling’ in the first place), are moving right along with it ... actually fixed in their positions on the earth. RESPONDENT: No point anywhere is actually fixed. RICHARD: You may appreciate this quote then: • [Richard]: ‘... given space’s boundlessness, this actual universe has no ‘inside’ as there is no ‘outside’ to infinity. Therefore there is no centre (no middle) and thus, with infinity, somewhere as a place is no ‘where’ (nowhere) in particular. There is no measurement possible with infinite space, for there is no reference point (an edge) to compare against. Living on planet earth, humans measure space in comparison to the localised distance between here and there. It is this measurement that is relative, not the universe. ‘Here’ is, as a fact, anywhere in infinity. (Richard, General Correspondence, Page 9a, 23 May 2000) RESPONDENT: The motion of one object can only be measured relative to something else. RICHARD: All measurement implies comparison ... yet even so objects were falling on planet earth (being ‘in motion’, and not being ‘at rest’, for the duration of the fall) due to its gravitational field (which did not cease to exist whilst they were in motion) long before humans appeared on the scene to measure the direction/ velocity of their motion. RESPONDENT: As I understand it, you’re saying that the observer’s subjective experience of rest or motion does not affect what is actually happening in the universe. RICHARD: No, what I am saying is that objects move in the direction of the earth, because of what goes by the name ‘gravity’, whether there be a human being present to measure their direction/velocity or not ... it was you who introduced the subject of measurement into what was otherwise a very simple matter. Viz.: • [Respondent]: ‘‘Objectively’ falling? From what arbitrary point in the universe do you determine the direction / velocity of anything’? My comment, that objects were falling on planet earth (being ‘in motion’, and not being ‘at rest’, for the duration of the fall) due to its gravitational field (which did not cease to exist whilst they were in motion) long before humans appeared on the scene to measure the direction/velocity of their motion, was only made so as to illustrate what ‘objectively falling’ can mean. RESPONDENT: Whether the observer perceives himself to be at rest or in motion, he is subject to whatever actual forces are operating upon him, regardless of how they seem from his vantage point. Is that so? RICHARD: This is what I am saying: Mr. Albert Einstein sets the scene, for the happiest thought in his life, by describing [quote] ‘an observer falling freely from the roof of a house’ [endquote] which clearly indicates that there be a human being moving in the direction of the earth, upon which the house is built, due to that which goes by the name ‘gravity’ (as that is what the word ‘falling’ refers to) ... yet he says that for the observer there exists – at least in their immediate surroundings – no gravitational field (even though the observer is only in motion in the first place because of the very gravitational field he then says does not exist for that observer). Perhaps if I were to put it this way: suppose a tile were to come loose from the roof of the very-same house and move in the direction of the very-same earth, upon which the house is built, in the very-same gravitational field ... would there exist for that roofing tile – at least in its immediate surroundings – no gravitational field? * RESPONDENT: What that ‘something else’ happens to be is arbitrary. RICHARD: Not so: if it were not for a mass, from which to measure ‘the motion of one object’ being attracted/pulled (aka ‘falling’) by the force it exerts, which force is known as gravity, there would be no falling (no motion) to measure in the first place ... and there is nothing ‘arbitrary’ about any such mass, any such attraction, and any such motion it occasions. RESPONDENT: Nothing arbitrary about the mass, nor the actual interactions between masses. What is arbitrary is the observer’s location when he takes a measurement. (Again, bearing in mind that his measurement says nothing about the actual nature or cause of the motion – which remains precisely what it is, regardless of how it seems to the observer). RICHARD: As the falling observer’s location is somewhere between the roof of a house and the earth it is built upon – the mass you say there is nothing arbitrary about – why do you say that the observer’s location is arbitrary when they take a measurement whilst moving in the non-arbitrary direction of that non-arbitrary mass which is occasioning the non-arbitrary motion in the first place? Perhaps if I were to ask the obvious question: why is the observer falling if not because of that which goes by the name ‘gravity’? RESPONDENT: To take a very down-to-earth example: suppose one man is standing in a field watching the rain fall. RICHARD: If I may interject? Do you see that, when you set the scene by using the word ‘fall’, you are describing droplets of water moving from a cloud to the surface of the earth in a gravitational field? If so, do you further see that to then say that for those falling droplets of water (known as ‘rain’) there exists – at least in their immediate surroundings – no gravitational field you would not be making an observation in accord with the fact? RESPONDENT: [To take a very down-to-earth example: suppose one man is standing in a field watching the rain fall]. From his perspective, with face upturned to the sky, the rain droplets are falling perpendicular to his face. The same rain seen from a passing car travelling at high speed, would not seem to be falling straight down, it would seem to be slanting toward him at an angle approaching horizontal. In actual fact, relative to his (moving) frame of reference (the car), each droplet of rain does not merely seem to be slanting across his car at an angle, it actually is moving thus, relative to him rather than relative to the fixed position on the earth. RICHARD: A gale-force wind can deflect rain from the perpendicular to the near-horizontal ... yet in either scenario the very gravitational field which occasions rain to fall (to be in motion from a cloud to the surface of the earth) does not cease to exist just because an observer has [quote] ‘the right to interpret’ [endquote] the state of being ‘in motion’ to be a state of ‘at rest’. RESPONDENT: It seems to me you are reading solipsism into this, but there is no solipsism here as far as I can see. RICHARD: I am, of course, using the word ‘solipsism’ in its ‘self-centredness’ meaning (and not its more usual ‘the view or theory that only the self really exists or can be known’ meaning) ... as in ‘she/he thinks the universe revolves around him/her’. Surely it is somewhat solipsistic to intuit/ imagine that, just because one has [quote] ‘the right to interpret’ [endquote] the state of being ‘in motion’ to be a state of ‘at rest’ that it is then so in actuality? One could interpret the state of motion known as ‘falling’ as being a state of motion called ‘flying’, for instance, yet interpretation does not miraculously turn fantasy into fact ... unless one be a theoretical physicist in the hallowed halls of modern-day academia, of course, where causality is no longer applied. Viz.: www.sciencecartoonsplus.com/gallery.htm RESPONDENT: The person in the field and the person in the passing car are seeing the same rain, which is behaving precisely as it is behaving, being acted upon by precisely the same actual forces, regardless of the observers’ different experience of its motion relative to themselves. RICHARD: To say the rain is ‘behaving precisely as it is behaving’ is to say nothing (whilst appearing to say something): are the droplets of water in the vicinity of the car, just as the droplets of water in the vicinity of the field are, moving towards the surface of the earth in a gravitational field or not? RESPONDENT: The perspective of the observer does not change anything in actuality except his own experience of actuality. RICHARD: Do you realise you are saying, in effect, that Mr. Albert Einstein was not making an observation in accord with the fact – that which is so ‘in actuality’ – when he had the happiest thought in his life? What if I were to insert what the words ‘falling freely from the roof of a house’ refer to – moving freely towards the surface of the earth in a gravitational field – into the happiest thought of Mr. Albert Einstein’s life for the sake of illustration? For example.: • [example only]: ‘For an observer moving freely towards the surface of the earth in a gravitational field there exists – at least in their immediate surroundings – no gravitational field’. Put simply: if there be, in fact, no gravitational field there is no movement towards the surface of the earth to be interpreted any whichways at all. * RESPONDENT: (Of course, the arbitrariness of the fixed point of measurement says nothing whatsoever about the cause of an object’s motion. It would be absurd to say that a falling object is in fact stationary, and the earth is rushing up to meet it for reasons unknown. But that obviously isn’t what Einstein is saying. Neither is he saying that two objects that are stationary relative to each other are not actually moving relative to something else). So what’s your disagreement with Einstein? RICHARD: Simply this: an observer falling freely from the roof of a house (irregardless of the ... um ... the ‘right’ to subjectively interpret what is actually occurring as being a state of rest) is, of course, objectively in a state of motion because of the very gravitational field Mr. Albert Einstein (well-known for his ‘imagination is more important than knowledge’ quote) somewhat solipsistically intuited/imagined did not exist for such a person. RESPONDENT: There’s nothing contradictory here, AFAICT. RICHARD: If an observer is in motion due to a gravitational field then that very gravitational field does not cease to exist just because the observer subjectively interprets their state of motion as being a state of rest and concludes there exists – at least in their immediate surroundings – no gravitational field. RESPONDENT: Whatever actual forces are operating upon and between large masses are unaffected by the observer’s frame of reference. They remain the precisely what they are, regardless of where the observer is and how he measures them. Solipsism is justified with regard to measurement of actual phenomena, relative to the observer. This is not the same as solipsistic conclusions about the actual nature of the forces operating upon and between masses, based on the observer’s subjective experience of same. (At least that’s how I understand it). RICHARD: Yet Mr. Albert Einstein went on to propose all manner of ‘solipsistic conclusions about the actual nature of the forces operating upon and between masses’ (such as proposing there be a curved ‘space-time’ so as to accommodate his subjectivity theory) ... and many otherwise intelligent peoples from many parts of the world concurred with his conclusions. * RICHARD: Perhaps the relativity theory might be more appropriately named the subjectivity theory? RESPONDENT: Aye, but with regard to measurement only. RICHARD: Oh? Why not with regard to, for instance, his curved ‘space-time’ (which, apparently, bends right back upon itself ... so much so that an observer pointing a powerful enough torch to their front will have the beam shine upon the back of their head)? It puts a whole new dimension to the expression ‘he thinks the universe revolves around him’, eh? RESPONDENT: Measurement of motion and cause of motion are completely orthogonal concepts. RICHARD: Yet Mr. Albert Einstein said that the ‘cause of motion’ – the [quote] ‘gravitational field’ [endquote] – does not exist (at least in their immediate surroundings) for an observer in motion due to the very same gravitational field as the observer has the ... um ... the ‘right’ to interpret the state of being ‘in motion’ as being a state of ‘at rest’. RESPONDENT: The very same actual phenomena yield different measurements from different frames of reference. That’s all. RICHARD: Since when has a ‘right to interpret’ been classified as a valid measurement? Perhaps a real-life situation might demonstrate: in the late fifties/early sixties the United States Air Force conducted an operation called ‘Project Manhigh’ and on August 16, 1960, Mr. Joseph Kittinger stepped out of an open gondola, suspended beneath a helium balloon named Excelsior III, at a height of 102,800 feet (almost 20 miles away from the earth’s surface) where he was at the edge of space with 99% of the earth’s atmosphere below him. With only a five foot wide stabilising drogue deployed, so as to prevent uncontrollable spinning and tumbling in such an ultra-thin atmosphere (the centrifugal force of a flat spin, up to 200 revolutions per minute, would have rendered him unconscious), he virtually free-fell for 4 minutes 36 seconds, reaching a maximum speed of 714 miles per hour (exceeding the speed of sound) in temperatures as low as minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit. The 28-foot main parachute did not open until he reached the much thicker atmosphere at 17,500 feet and he landed safely after a 13 minute 45 second descent. When he first stepped out of the gondola, face down with arms and legs akimbo, his immediate thought was that something had gone wrong in their calculations about the extent of the effect of the gravitational field and that he would be suspended in space forever as he had absolutely no sense of speed for he could not hear any of the whooshing or whistling of the wind of his descent, so familiar from previous free-falling experiences at a lower altitude, nor see or feel any buffeting of his pressure suit. And when he flipped over and looked back at the balloon – and the space above it was black as night whilst he and it were bathed in sunshine – he initially took it to be streaking away from him at hundreds of miles per hour (whereas it had been ascending at less than ten miles an hour while he was on board) but he quickly realised that it was he who was streaking away from the balloon. In other words he (objectively) knew he was falling – moving towards the surface of the earth in a gravitational field – even though his (subjective) interpretation of what was actually occurring had been that he was suspended in space ... which objectivity was certainly justified because 13 minutes 45 seconds later he landed on the surface of the earth. As would the observer falling freely from the roof of a house in the happiest thought of Mr. Albert Einstein’s life. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60, 15 January 2004) January 25 2004 RESPONDENT: In our personal correspondence, I suspected that there is a deep misunderstanding that creeps into your critique of Einstein before any of the more controversial aspects of Relativity are encountered. In my discussion with you, I was angling toward sorting that out. I haven’t sorted it out yet, but it was enough to (almost) confirm my suspicion. RICHARD: I see ... so your assessment of what I say about Mr. Albert Einstein is based on a (almost confirmed) suspicion? RESPONDENT: In our correspondence, you did not demonstrate any understanding of the simple fact that different observers record different measurements of the same motion, and that this says nothing whatsoever about the objective cause of movement. RICHARD: It did for Mr. Albert Einstein in the happiest thought of his life ... he said that the objective cause of movement did not exist for a falling observer (at least in their immediate vicinity). RESPONDENT: If we cannot get past this point, there is no hope of going any further. RICHARD: So it would seem. RESPONDENT: With this in mind, can we be as down to earth as possible? RICHARD: Whereabouts, in my e-mail discussion with you, have I ever departed from being anything other than totally down to earth? RESPONDENT: What is your absolute velocity right now? RICHARD: I will re-post the following quote from our e-mail discussion (only highlighted this time around): • [Richard]: ‘... given space’s boundlessness, this actual universe has no ‘inside’ as there is no ‘outside’ to infinity. Therefore there is no centre (no middle) and thus, with infinity, somewhere as a place is no ‘where’ (nowhere) in particular. There is no measurement possible with infinite space, for there is no reference point (an edge) to compare against. Living on planet earth, humans measure space in comparison to the localised distance between here and there. It is this measurement that is relative, not the universe. ‘Here’ is, as a fact, anywhere in infinity. [emphasis added]. (Richard, General Correspondence, Page 9a, 23 May 2000) * RESPONDENT: The ‘boneheaded’ aspect of this is that you don’t see that these are anything but objective facts. RICHARD: As I recall the only ‘objective facts’ I wrote about in that discussion were in regards to what was actually happening for (a) an observer falling from the roof of a house... and (b) objects falling long before humans were on this planet ... and (c) a roof-tile falling ... and (d) rain-drops falling ...and (e) a United States Air Force pilot falling from the edge of space. And I cannot see how writing about what actually happens is anything but being down-to-earth or sensible (let alone being somewhat more accurately described as boneheaded absolutism). Which is why I am bemused as to how it sounds otherwise to you. RESPONDENT: The reason it sounds ‘otherwise’ to me is that you cannot seem to acknowledge that there is no fixed point in space from which to measure the absolute velocity of anything. RICHARD: Perhaps, upon a re-read of what I re-posted (further above), you may care to come up with some other reason? RESPONDENT: You seem unable or unwilling to differentiate between the cause of motion and the measurement of the motion of one body relative to something else. (And this is an obstacle to further discussion before we get into the weirder aspects of relativity). RICHARD: Hmm ... have you ever wondered why it is weird? Apart from that ... what you seem to be ‘unable or unwilling’ to acknowledge is that, when an observer is falling, that which occasions the falling does not cease to exist just because the observer [quote] ‘has the right’ [endquote] to interpret the state of being ‘in motion’ as a state of being ‘at rest’. It seems to me that it was Mr. Albert Einstein who took a position. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60a, 25 January 2004b) January 26 2004 RICHARD: What I am saying is that the ‘Big Bang’ theory (...) depends upon the summum bonum of human experience being spiritual enlightenment (a permanent ASC). It is the ASC which informs that consciousness gives rise to matter. RESPONDENT: Aha!! Thank you for clarifying where you’re coming from. I do not agree that the ‘Big Bang’ theory implies that consciousness gives rise to matter, but if you do think that, I can understand why you describe it as mysticism, and incompatible with down-to-earth experience. RICHARD: Just as a matter of interest: as I did not say that the ‘Big Bang’ theory ‘implies that consciousness gives rise to matter’ what makes you say that I think that? RESPONDENT: In the context of discussing the Big Bang theory, you said that it is the ASC which informs that consciousness gives rise to matter. By contrast, the PCE informs that matter gives rise to consciousness. The fact that you juxtaposed the Big Bang theory with both the ASC and the idea that consciousness gives rise to matter suggests that you think they are, in fact, linked. If that isn’t what you meant, what did you mean? RICHARD: Up until recently the summum bonum of human experience has been spiritual enlightenment – a permanent altered state of consciousness (ASC) that goes by many names – which informs that consciousness gives rise to matter ... thus the prevailing wisdom, derived from this revealed knowledge, is that all time and all space and all matter had a beginning. Dependent upon the culture all time and all space and all matter was either created by that which is timeless and spaceless and formless, or arose out of that which is timeless and spaceless and formless, or is a manifestation (a phenomenon) of that which is timeless and spaceless and formless, or is a dream being dreamed by that which is timeless and spaceless and formless, or whatever variation on the theme a particular culture may make of it (such as with shamanistic knowledge for example). It can be summarised as the ‘something out of nothing’ theme ... and the ‘Big Bang’ theory is but the latest variation as even a cursory glance at what more than a few theoretical physicists have to say shows that the concept of a god (by whatever name) almost invariably appears somewhere in their philosophising. Mr. Albert Einstein, well-known for his ‘God does not play dice with the universe’, is no exception. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60a, 26 January 2004a) February 04 2004 RESPONDENT: Good article, stating how GPS relies on relativity (Relativity in ‘everyday life’): www.physicscentral.com/writers/writers-00-2.html RICHARD: May I ask what you found good about how Mr. Clifford Will (one-sidedly) states it relies upon (Einsteinian) relativity in the article you provided a link to? I only ask because there was, apparently, an intriguing controversy which he would have to be cognisant of that arose before the Global Positioning System (GPS) was even launched as Einsteinian relativity gave reason to doubt whether it would work at all. There was an article written by Mr. Tom Bethell, in ‘The American Spectator’, which referred to a paper published in ‘Physics Letters A’ (December 21, 1998) written by Mr. Tom Van Flandern, a research associate in the physics department at the University of Maryland, who worked as a special consultant to the GPS in the 1990’s. Here is part of what Mr. Tom Bethell had to say: • ‘At high altitude, where the GPS clocks orbit the Earth, it is known that the clocks run roughly 46,000 nanoseconds (one-billionth of a second) a day faster than at ground level, because the gravitational field is thinner 20,000 kilometres above the Earth. The orbiting clocks also pass through that field at a rate of three kilometres per second – their orbital speed. For that reason, they tick 7,000 nanoseconds a day slower than stationary clocks. To offset these two effects, the GPS engineers reset the clock rates, slowing them down before launch by 39,000 nanoseconds a day. They then proceed to tick in orbit at the same rate as ground clocks, and the system ‘works’. Ground observers can indeed pin-point their position to a high degree of precision. In (Einstein) theory, however, it was expected that because the orbiting clocks all move rapidly and with varying speeds relative to any ground observer (who may be anywhere on the Earth’s surface), and since in Einstein’s theory the relevant speed is always speed relative to the observer, it was expected that continuously varying relativistic corrections would have to be made to clock rates. This in turn would have introduced an unworkable complexity into the GPS. But these corrections were not made. Yet ‘the system manages to work, even though they use no relativistic corrections after launch’, Van Flandern said. ‘They have basically blown off Einstein’. (‘Rethinking Relativity’ by Tom Bethell; The American Spectator, April 1999). What I found interesting about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern had to say was that Lorentzian relativity (where velocity is subsumed under time and space in contrast to Einsteinian relativity subsuming time and space under velocity) is not only the more simple theory to represent the process the GPS operates by – and not only for pragmatic reasons – but is of major importance for the future of physics. Viz.: • ‘In addition to a great difference in practicality for use in systems such as the GPS (in favour of LET), the two theories differ about whether or not material bodies can exceed the speed of light in forward time. In SR [Einsteinian relativity], that is proved impossible because time ceases to advance for any entity travelling at the speed of light. By contrast, in LR [Lorentzian relativity], no speed limit for material bodies exists. It is true that speed relative to the preferred frame causes electromagnetic-type clocks (which include all ordinary mechanical, biological, and atomic clocks) to slow, metre sticks to contract, and the momentum of bodies to be increased by the relativistic factor just as in SR. But in LR, time, space, and the matter content themselves are not affected. So the question of which theory better represents nature is of major importance to the future of physics, which is presently invested in the belief that speeds faster than light in forward time are not possible’. (https://web.archive.org/web/20040214022609/www.dipmat.unipg.it/~bartocci/ep6/ep6-vanfl.htm). It would seem that the jury is still out on this – and other – matters. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27g, 4 February 2004) February 04 2004 RESPONDENT: Good article, stating how GPS relies on relativity (Relativity in ‘everyday life’): www.physicscentral.com/writers/writers-00-2.html RICHARD: May I ask what you found good about how Mr. Clifford Will (one-sidedly) states it relies upon (Einsteinian) relativity in the article you provided a link to? RESPONDENT: ‘Good’ because it states the case well that Einsteinian relativity is applicable to ‘everyday life’. By posting the URL, I am by no means endorsing it as fact. RICHARD: Sure ... by posting what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say does not mean I am endorsing it as fact either. RESPONDENT: As I have never personally worked on the GPS system – I do find interesting the perspective of those that have – just as I am quite interested in what Mr. Tom Bethell has to say about it. I have located his article you referred to – of which I was previously unaware. I am happy to see relativity go by the wayside if need be, but it seems to me that there first must be a convincing alternative to what is normally offered as ‘confirmation’ of Einsteinian relativity. RICHARD: What I see, being but a lay-person in all these matters, is theoretical physicists, mathematicians, logicians, and so on, discussing amongst themselves the validity/ invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory ... when they start presenting equations to each other (I do not even know what most of the symbols refer to) I have no recourse, other than to read what they have to say in general, but to observe that such-and-such a topic is by no means settled. The democratic process – as in majority rules – which works well enough in the political arena at the present stage of human development has no valid application in science. * RICHARD: I only ask because there was, apparently, an intriguing controversy which he would have to be cognisant of that arose before the Global Positioning System (GPS) was even launched as Einsteinian relativity gave reason to doubt whether it would work at all. RESPONDENT: I was unaware of the controversy – thanks for bringing it to my attention. RICHARD: Oh, there are quite often such controversies in many areas ... for example, when the first uranium bomb was detonated in ‘Project Manhattan’, there was reason for some physicists to be concerned (at the time) that a chain reaction might be set-off in the atmosphere and engulf the entire planet. That it did not indicates that whatever it is that happens in such a bomb is peculiar to uranium (and not contagious, so to speak). * RICHARD: It would seem that the jury is still out on this – and other – matters. RESPONDENT: Yes. At least some of the ‘jury’ is still out – others have returned, and they are contradicting each other :o) RICHARD: Aye ... and, presumably, on and on it will go (we could post URL’s to each other until the cows come home and still the matter would be not settled either way). What I do find cute, in all this, is that my report/ description of this actual world sometimes attracts those who want scientific proof of something experiential – whilst oft-times proffering mathematical proof, as to why the experiential evidence is invalid, in lieu of scientific proof (as if they were one and the same thing) into the bargain – and disregard what I actually have to say ... so on occasion, to give but one example, I point out that mathematics do not describe the universe and that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process. How someone – anyone – could consider that a mathematical computation (or any abstract logic for that matter) renders experiential evidence null and void has got me beat ... because when I go to bed each night I have had, as always, a perfect day. And I do not use the word ‘perfect’ lightly. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27g, 4 February 2004a) February 11 2004 RESPONDENT: Good article, stating how GPS relies on relativity (Relativity in ‘everyday life’): www.physicscentral.com/writers/writers-00-2.html RICHARD: May I ask what you found good about how Mr. Clifford Will (one-sidedly) states it relies upon (Einsteinian) relativity in the article you provided a link to? RESPONDENT: ‘Good’ because it states the case well that Einsteinian relativity is applicable to ‘everyday life’. By posting the URL, I am by no means endorsing it as fact. RICHARD: Sure ... by posting what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say does not mean I am endorsing it as fact either. RESPONDENT: Understood – though I’m not at all sure that Clifford Will deserves the accusation of being ‘one-sided’. He is merely stating the evidence as he sees it – there is no need to take into account dissidents if one is already convinced. RICHARD: And do all those peoples who were convinced of geocentricity even after the publication of Mr. Nicolaus Copernicus’s ‘Six Books Concerning The Revolutions Of the Heavenly Orbits’ in 1543, and even after Mr. Galileo Galilei’s publication supporting heliocentricity via astronomical observations (‘Dialogue Concerning The Two Chief World Systems – Ptolemaic and Copernican’) in 1632, also not deserve the accusation ‘one-sided’, then? After all, they were merely stating the evidence as they see it, no? RESPONDENT: Here are a couple of URLs where it can be seen that No. 56 is correct about Mr Tom Bethell – who really is a conservative creationist ‘with an axe to grind’ so to speak. (snip). RICHARD: As Mr. Tom Bethell is a magazine columnist (somewhat akin to a newspaper reporter) writing about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern published it is beside the point what he is or is not as what is relevant is whether his summation in that magazine article (the part I quoted) is in accord with what Mr. Tom Van Flandern had to say or not ... and, speaking personally, the moment I read the article I went straight to the source and checked it out for myself. ‘Tis oh-so-easy to get side-tracked by red-herrings, eh? * RICHARD: The democratic process – as in majority rules – which works well enough in the political arena at the present stage of human development has no valid application in science. RESPONDENT: The more I think about it, the more I think you could be wrong about this. What is fact is not so because the majority think it true, but isn’t it possible that the majority think something true because it actually IS true? RICHARD: Somehow I am reminded of that passage in Mr. Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Jungle Book’ where the Bandar-log (the monkeys) all shout, twenty at a time, to Mowgli (the man-cub) ‘we all say so, and so it must be true’ and ‘this is true; we all say so’. If the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago had not discovered that something the majority think to be true (as in ‘you can’t change human nature’ for example) was not actually true we would not be having this conversation ... both The Actual Freedom Trust web site and The Actual Freedom Trust mailing list would not exist. In short: on more than a few occasions in human history it has been the maverick, the non-conformist, the iconoclast, who breaks new ground. * RICHARD: It would seem that the jury is still out on this – and other – matters. RESPONDENT: Yes. At least some of the ‘jury’ is still out – others have returned, and they are contradicting each other :o) RICHARD: Aye ... and, presumably, on and on it will go (we could post URL’s to each other until the cows come home and still the matter would be not settled either way). RESPONDENT: Possibly – or possibly it might get settled by looking further at the evidence. One doesn’t know until it is examined. RICHARD: The ... um ... ‘the evidence’ in this particular instance is what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say (and not ‘the evidence’ regarding a magazine columnist) ... and what I found interesting was that he says Lorentzian relativity (where velocity is subsumed under time and space, in contrast to Einsteinian relativity subsuming time and space under velocity), is not only the more simple *theory* to represent the process the GPS operates by – and not only for pragmatic reasons – but is of major importance for the future of physics. Some years ago, whilst in a government office for bureaucratic reasons, I noticed a rather droll sign (which could very well have been a bumper sticker) propped up on a nearby clerk’s desk which asked what would happen if one were to switch on the headlights in a space-ship travelling at the speed of light. * RICHARD: What I do find cute, in all this, is that my report/ description of this actual world sometimes attracts those who want scientific proof of something experiential – whilst oft-times proffering mathematical proof, as to why the experiential evidence is invalid, in lieu of scientific proof (as if they were one and the same thing) into the bargain – and disregard what I actually have to say ... so on occasion, to give but one example, I point out that mathematics do not describe the universe and that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process. How someone – anyone – could consider that a mathematical computation (or any abstract logic for that matter) renders experiential evidence null and void has got me beat ... because when I go to bed each night I have had, as always, a perfect day. And I do not use the word ‘perfect’ lightly. RESPONDENT: I understand what you are saying here as a bid for ‘experiential evidence’ over abstract logic as it applies to your experience of an actual freedom. RICHARD: No, what I am saying is that, from time-to-time, some peoples inform me that the direct experience of actuality, such as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE), is invalid because a mathematical computation, or any abstract logic for that matter, devised by a person who (apparently) does not comprehend that mathematics do not describe the universe, or that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process, renders that experiential evidence null and void. RESPONDENT: Fine. What is being offered for confirmation of relativity is ‘experiential evidence’ – observation – confirmation. RICHARD: You are aware that the topic under dispute is whether or not the universe is spatially infinite, temporally eternal, and materially perdurable (and not just Einsteinian relativity per se)? I only ask because the whole notion of it not being so comes out of the ‘big bang’ theory ... which is based upon the ‘expanding universe’ theory which was based upon Mr. Albert Einstein’s relativity theory ... it is, in other words, a notion drawn from a mathematical computation based upon a mathematical computation based upon a mathematical computation. And the ‘experiential evidence’ you refer to are theories and not observation (for example ‘red-shifted galaxies’ is the observation; ‘galaxies moving away at high speeds’ is the theory, or, for another instance ‘microwave radiation’ is the observation; ‘cosmic background radiation’ is the theory). RESPONDENT: Why do you continue to dispute it? RICHARD: Because I care about my fellow human being and want only the best for them ... to settle for second-best because of mathematical theories, or because of any abstract logic for that matter, is absurd. RESPONDENT: Is it impossible for Einsteinian relativity and an actual freedom to coexist? If so, why? RICHARD: As this is somewhat similar to asking me if the Ptolemaic System is in accord with actuality I will make no further comment. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27g, 11 February 2004) February 17 2004 RESPONDENT: ... By posting the URL, I am by no means endorsing it as fact. RICHARD: Sure ... by posting what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say does not mean I am endorsing it as fact either. RESPONDENT: Understood – I’m not at all sure that Clifford Will deserves the accusation of being ‘one-sided’. He is merely stating the evidence as he sees it – there is no need to take into account dissidents if one is already convinced. RICHARD: And do all those peoples who were convinced of geocentricity even after the publication of Mr. Nicolaus Copernicus’s ‘Six Books Concerning The Revolutions Of the Heavenly Orbits’ in 1543, and even after Mr. Galileo Galilei’s publication supporting heliocentricity via astronomical observations (‘Dialogue Concerning The Two Chief World Systems – Ptolemaic and Copernican’) in 1632, also not deserve the accusation ‘one-sided’, then? RESPONDENT: If you are referring to the ‘well-informed’ that were aware of contrary evidence and voluntarily suppressed it, then yes they were ‘one-sided’. If you are referring to the masses that were poorly informed – they were not ‘one-sided’ – they were wrong. RICHARD: No, I am not referring to people of either scenario you now sketch ... I am referring to the peoples whom you say, because they are already convinced, have no need to take into account dissidents and are merely stating the evidence as they see it. * RICHARD: After all, they were merely stating the evidence as they see it, no? RESPONDENT: It is possible to be wrong, yet not ‘one-sided’. As I see it – the question is not whether Clifford Will is ‘one-sided’ – the question is whether he is correct. RICHARD: As the question as you see it is whether the proponent of the prevailing wisdom of the time – the Ptolemaic System in the above instance – is correct and not whether such a person is one-sided because they need not take into account the dissident – the one with the alternative system (the Copernican System in the above instance) – when they are already convinced then the following will surely be of interest: • [Mr. Clifford Will]: ‘The modern history of experimental relativity can be divided roughly into four periods: Genesis, Hibernation, a Golden Era, and the Quest for Strong Gravity. (...) beginning around 1960, astronomical discoveries (quasars, pulsars, cosmic background radiation) and new experiments pushed GR to the forefront. Experimental gravitation experienced a Golden Era (1960-1980) during which a systematic, world-wide effort took place to understand the observable predictions of GR, *to compare and contrast them with the predictions of alternative theories of gravity*, and to perform new experiments to test them. (...) The results all supported GR, *and most alternative theories of gravity fell by the wayside* (for a popular review, see ‘Was Einstein Right’? by C. M. Will, 1993). Since 1980, the field has entered what might be termed a Quest for Strong Gravity. [emphases added]. (http://relativity.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrr-2001-4/node1.html). It would appear that, at least since the end of the ‘Golden Era’ in 1980, Mr. Clifford Will has indeed been convinced the prevailing wisdom of the time is correct and does not need to take an alternative theory into account ever again. Which would mean that he is, after all, merely stating the evidence as he sees it, eh? * RESPONDENT: Here are a couple of URLs where it can be seen that No 56 is correct about Mr Tom Bethell – who really is a conservative creationist ‘with an axe to grind’ so to speak. (snip). RICHARD: As Mr. Tom Bethell is a magazine columnist (somewhat akin to a newspaper reporter) writing about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern published it is beside the point what he is or is not as what is relevant is whether his summation in that magazine article (the part I quoted) is in accord with what Mr. Tom Van Flandern had to say or not ... and, speaking personally, the moment I read the article I went straight to the source and checked it out for myself. ‘Tis oh-so-easy to get side-tracked by red-herrings, eh? RESPONDENT: Maybe so – are you suggesting that I have been ‘side-tracked by red-herrings?’ RICHARD: Shall I put it this way? Nowhere in either your initial reply nor your second response did you refer directly to – let alone comment on – what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say. RESPONDENT: As I have not made up my mind yet about Tom Van Flandern and what he says about relativity’s role in the GPS – I would hardly say that pointing out Tom Bethell’s ‘agenda’ is a red-herring. RICHARD: Hmm ... the part of the magazine article I quoted could have been written by the columnist known as ‘Cassandra’, for example, without such an article (the part I quoted) detracting from what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say. RESPONDENT: Nowhere have I claimed that what Tom Bethell writes taints what Tom Van Flandern has to say. RICHARD: If I may point out? This, your third e-mail, is the first time you have even mentioned that Mr. Tom Van Flandern himself has something to say. RESPONDENT: You were clearly using what Tom Bethell had to say about Tom Van Flandern in your case to show that Clifford Will was being ‘one-sided’ so I simply wanted to point out Tom Bethell’s ‘agenda’ as noteworthy. RICHARD: I provided a part of a magazine article (the only part I quoted), which summarised what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say as what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say takes up many, many pages and can hardly be described as succinct or concise ... what is relevant is whether or not the magazine article’s summation (the part I quoted) is in accord with what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say and, speaking personally, the moment I read the article I went straight to the source and checked it out for myself as that is what I found noteworthy What you did, however, was locate the magazine article itself and post URL’s to me about both the article’s writer and other things written in that article (the parts I did not quote) because, apparently, that is what you found noteworthy. * RICHARD: The democratic process – as in majority rules – which works well enough in the political arena at the present stage of human development has no valid application in science. RESPONDENT: The more I think about it, the more I think you could be wrong about this. What is fact is not so because the majority think it true, but isn’t it possible that the majority think something true because it actually IS true? RICHARD: Somehow I am reminded of that passage in Mr. Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Jungle Book’ where the Bandar-log (the monkeys) all shout, twenty at a time, to Mowgli (the man-cub) ‘we all say so, and so it must be true’ and ‘this is true; we all say so’. RESPONDENT: I’m not sure why you are reminded of that passage – as it doesn’t illustrate anything I actually said. Maybe I can be more clear about what I meant so as to avoid confusion. Just because the majority think something is true does not make it true – and it doesn’t count as evidence for it to be true. Even so there are times where the reason that the majority think something is true is because it IS true. Take geocentrism for example, prior to Copernicus the majority view was wrong – which demonstrates that the majority can be wrong. Today, the majority think that Copernicus was right, mainly because he WAS right – that is, the cause goes from the fact to the widely shared view. RICHARD: As the equivocation in your clarification (‘just because the majority think something is true does not make it true’/‘even so there are times where the reason that the majority think something is true is because it IS true’) is essentially the same as the equivocation in your initial response (‘what is fact is not so because the majority think it true’/‘but isn’t it possible that the majority think something true because it actually IS true’) there remains only your example – ‘prior to Copernicus the majority view was wrong’/‘today the majority think that Copernicus was right’ – to add the clarity you speak of so as to illustrate why that passage does not illustrate anything you actually said. As what you actually said was that the more you think about it [think about me saying that the democratic process – as in majority rules – has no valid application in science] the more you think I could be wrong about this [could be wrong about the democratic process – as in majority rules – having no valid application in science] it makes no difference at all what example you provide where who the majority think is right is right mainly because they are right as it still does not make the democratic process – as in majority rules – have a valid application in science ... whoever is right is only ever right if what they have to say be in accord with the fact. Needless is it to say that, because of your clarification, I am more than ever reminded of that passage? * RICHARD: If the identity inhabiting this flesh and blood body all those years ago had not discovered that something the majority think to be true (as in ‘you can’t change human nature’ for example) was not actually true we would not be having this conversation ... both The Actual Freedom Trust web site and The Actual Freedom Trust mailing list would not exist. RESPONDENT: And if I didn’t think that you might be right – I wouldn’t be using this mailing list. RICHARD: Yet that is not why I offered this analogy (whether you think I might be right or not is beside the point) as the point I am making is that, irregardless of what the majority think to be true, on more than a few occasions in human history it has been the maverick, the non-conformist, the iconoclast, who breaks new ground. In short: peoples sometimes referred to, by their ‘majority rules’ detractors at the time, as heretics, recusants, rebels, and so on, have on more than a few occasions added enormously to human knowledge. * RICHARD: It would seem that the jury is still out on this – and other – matters. RESPONDENT: Yes. At least some of the ‘jury’ is still out – others have returned, and they are contradicting each other :o) RICHARD: Aye ... and, presumably, on and on it will go (we could post URL’s to each other until the cows come home and still the matter would be not settled either way). RESPONDENT: Possibly – or possibly it might get settled by looking further at the evidence. One doesn’t know until it is examined. RICHARD: The ... um ... ‘the evidence’ in this particular instance is what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say ... RESPONDENT: Whereas ‘the evidence’ I had in mind is the purported evidence for relativity – in this context specifically what Clifford Will has to say. RICHARD: Yet what does Mr. Clifford Will offer in the way of ‘the evidence’ on the web page you provided a link to? Other than merely stating that time on a GPS satellite clock advances about a net rate of 38 microseconds per day faster than a clock on the ground (because Mr. Albert Einstein’s theory of special relativity says that rapidly moving clocks tick more slowly and his general relativity theory says that gravity curves space and time resulting in a tendency for the orbiting clocks to tick faster) such that navigational errors would [quote] ‘accumulate faster than 10 km per day!’ [endquote] unless the Einsteinian relativistic offset in the rates of the satellite clocks be compensated? I ask this because, apart from also saying that without the proper application of Einsteinian relativity the GPS would fail in its navigational functions within about 2 minutes and that when one lands at an airport one might, therefore, think of Mr. Albert Einstein, he adds nothing to an understanding of why he chose that example to be the *only* example he provides for his own question ‘what good is fundamental physics to the person on the street’. Speaking as a person on the street I was left none the wiser ... which is why I asked what you found [quote] ‘good’ [endquote] about that article. * RICHARD: ... (and not ‘the evidence’ regarding a magazine columnist) ... RESPONDENT: Nowhere did I say or imply that it was. RICHARD: Shall I put it this way? As I am not a mind-reader I can only go by what you tap out on the keyboard before clicking ‘send’ ... and nowhere in either your initial response nor your second response did you refer directly to – let alone comment on – what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say. Instead of that what you did was locate the magazine article itself and post URL’s to me about both the article’s writer and other things written in that article (the parts I did not quote) because, apparently, that is what you found noteworthy. * RICHARD: ... and what I found interesting was that he says Lorentzian relativity (where velocity is subsumed under time and space, in contrast to Einsteinian relativity subsuming time and space under velocity), is not only the more simple *theory* to represent the process the GPS operates by – and not only for pragmatic reasons – but is of major importance for the future of physics. RESPONDENT: I find ‘Lorentizian relativity’ interesting too – as the concept is new to me. RICHARD: May I ask what it is that you find interesting about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about Lorentzian relativity? The reason I ask is because, being but a lay-person, I cannot mathematically know whether Mr. Clifford Will is right, in regards Einsteinian relativity being the better model for the GPS, or whether Mr. Tom Van Flandern is right, in regards Lorentzian relativity being the better model for the GPS, and, apart from drawing attention to the fact that there are (at least) two models being proposed, I am suggesting it is important to remember they are both models (just as the various theories regarding the sub-atomic postulates of quantum theory, for example, also are). What is actually happening to the rubidium and cesium in the clocks on board the satellites – why such highly reactive chemical elements ‘tick’ faster than when on earth in a stronger gravitational field – may very well be entirely something else, of course, as mathematical models are only models ... could it be that the measure of time (the rubidium and cesium in this instance) is what is ‘ticking’ faster and not time itself advancing more quickly? I only mention this because this moment has no duration here in this actual world. RESPONDENT: Again, I have not yet made up my mind on it though – and from what I can tell – it may take quite a while on this one. RICHARD: Okay ... the reason why I linked what I found interesting in what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about Lorentzian relativity with a rather droll sign (which asked what would happen if one were to switch on the headlights in a space-ship travelling at the speed of light) that I noticed propped up on a nearby clerk’s desk, whilst in a government office for bureaucratic reasons some years ago, could be put like this: 1. Suppose a vehicle travelling at 75 kilometres an hour (75k) has a head-on crash with a vehicle travelling in the opposite direction also at 75k ... would the collision, the force of the impact, be the same as just the one vehicle crashing into a stationary object at 150k? 2. If so, now suppose a vehicle travelling at three-quarters the speed of light (.75c) has a head-on crash with a vehicle travelling in the opposite direction also at .75c ... would the collision, the force of the impact, be the same as just the one vehicle crashing into a stationary object at 1.50c? I ask this because, according to Einsteinian relativity (in direct contrast to Lorentzian relativity), the force of the impact would only be the same as a .96c collision with a stationary object. * RICHARD: ... what I am saying is that, from time-to-time, some peoples inform me that the direct experience of actuality, such as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE), is invalid because a mathematical computation, or any abstract logic for that matter, devised by a person who (apparently) does not comprehend that mathematics do not describe the universe, or that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process, renders that experiential evidence null and void. RESPONDENT: Are you referring to relativity? RICHARD: I am referring to some peoples informing me that the direct experience of infinitude here in this actual world is invalid because of a notion drawn from a mathematical computation (the ‘big bang’ theory) based upon a mathematical computation (the ‘expanding universe’ theory) based upon a mathematical computation (the ‘general relativity’ theory). RESPONDENT: Are you saying that if relativity were fact, then an actual freedom would be impossible? RICHARD: I am not saying that ... those who seek to disallow the direct experience of eternity – such as in a PCE – are saying that (in effect if not specifically spelt-out). RESPONDENT: Or are you referring to the ‘mathematical computations’ involved in the ‘big-bang’ theory? RICHARD: Also those ... how someone – anyone – could consider that a mathematical computation (or any abstract logic for that matter) renders experiential evidence null and void has got me beat because when I go to bed each night I have had, as always, a perfect day. And I do not use the word ‘perfect’ lightly ... only that which is peerless can be perfect. RESPONDENT: I’m not following what you are saying because I don’t know of any mathematical computation that some people might use to try to invalidate your experience. RICHARD: This is what the Encyclopaedia Britannica has to say: • ‘In 1922 Alexander A. Friedmann, a Russian meteorologist and mathematician, and in 1927 Georges Lemaitre, the aforementioned Belgian cleric, independently discovered solutions to *Einstein’s equations* ...’. [emphasis added]. (©1994-2002 Encyclopaedia Britannica). This is what the Encyclopaedia Britannica has to say about Mr. Georges Lemaitre in regard discovering solutions to Mr. Albert Einstein’s mathematical equations (aka mathematical computations): • ‘Lemaitre, Georges: Belgian astronomer and cosmologist who formulated the modern big-bang theory, which holds that the universe began in a cataclysmic explosion of a small, primeval ‘super-atom’. A civil engineer, Lemaitre served as an artillery officer in the Belgian Army during World War I. After the war he entered a seminary and in 1923 was ordained a priest. He studied at the University of Cambridge’s solar physics laboratory (1923–24) and then at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (1925–27), where he became acquainted with the findings of the American astronomers Edwin P. Hubble and Harlow Shapley on the expanding universe. In 1927, the year he became professor of astrophysics at the University of Louvain, he proposed his big-bang theory, which explained the recession of the galaxies *within the framework of Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity*. Although expanding models of the universe had been considered earlier, notably by the Dutch astronomer Willem de Sitter, Lemaitre’s theory, as modified by George Gamow, has become the leading theory of cosmology. [emphasis added]. (©1994-2002 Encyclopaedia Britannica). I know that I have referred to the following before (only I provided an internet reference back then) but perhaps its import may become more apparent with a second reading: • ‘Firmly denying atheism, Einstein expressed a belief in ‘Spinoza’s God who reveals himself in the harmony of what exists’. The physicist’s breadth of spirit and depth of enthusiasm were always most evident among truly intellectual men. He loved being with the physicists Paul Ehrenfest and Hendrik A. Lorentz at The Netherlands’ Leiden University, and several times he visited the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena to attend seminars at the Mt. Wilson Observatory, which had become world renowned as a centre for astrophysical research. At Mt. Wilson he heard the Belgian scientist Abbé Georges Lemaitre detail his theory that the universe had been created by the explosion of a ‘primeval atom’ and was still expanding. Gleefully, Einstein jumped to his feet, applauding. ‘This is the most beautiful and satisfactory *explanation of creation* to which I have ever listened’, he said. [emphasis added]. (©1994-2002 Encyclopaedia Britannica). Maybe the reason why actualists keep on seeing spiritualists under the bed is because there are indeed spiritualists under the bed? * RESPONDENT: Fine. What is being offered for confirmation of relativity is ‘experiential evidence’ – observation – confirmation. RICHARD: You are aware that the topic under dispute is whether or not the universe is spatially infinite, temporally eternal, and materially perdurable (and not just Einsteinian relativity per se)? RESPONDENT: I was not aware that of that, no. RICHARD: Oh? Why would Einsteinian relativity be such a hot topic on this mailing list, then, if not because of my oft-repeated observation that the infinitude of the universe is directly experienced here in this actual world? Just curious. RESPONDENT: Do you say that because of your reasoning below? RICHARD: Perhaps an example may be of assistance: I first came onto the internet, in 1997, to share my discovery with my fellow human being ... and in a very short time the following exchange happened: • [Richard]: ‘Only this moment exists. This moment has no duration. This physical universe is infinite and eternal. It has no beginning and no ending ... and therefore no middle. There are no edges to this universe. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘But there are boundaries to the universe and it is finite. We can see that galaxies are speeding away from one another. We can see back in time to when the universe was just a young thing. We see that stars die while new ones are born. The universe evolves. What is infinite is eternal. What is eternal does not evolve. Therefore the universe is not infinite. However, what makes the universe possible may indeed be something of an infinite, eternal nature. (Richard, List A, No. 16, #No.01) That instance, in 1997, was but the very first of several such occasions when another would skip past my ‘only this moment exists/this moment has no duration’ (eternity is here on earth in this actual world and not in some other dimension) observation, written as the direct experience of it is happening, and seize upon my ‘this physical universe is eternal (and infinite)’ observation so as to present mathematical proofs (abstract computations) as to why the physical moment cannot be eternal (have no duration) because the mathematical equations ‘prove’ the existence of an underlying reality (as in my co-respondent’s ‘what makes the universe possible may indeed be something of an infinite, eternal nature’ comment above) which timelessly manifests all phenomena. Mr. Victor Stenger has written a book called ‘Timeless Reality’ wherein he makes it quite clear that what he too calls the underlying reality of all time, all space, and all form (the overlying reality) is timeless. Viz.: • ‘... whether or not reality has one universe or many, it had no beginning and was not created. It neither was nor will be. It just is’. (Book Description for ‘Timeless Reality : Symmetry, Simplicity, and Multiple Universes’ by Victor J. Stenger; ©2000 Published by Prometheus Books). That clearly speaks of a beginningless and endless (aka uncreated) reality – a reality that just is – which isness may or may not have many universes (many overlying realities) manifesting as time and space and form (all phenomena) ... for example: ‘... the underlying reality of all phenomena may have no beginning and no end ...’. (From the Inside Flap of ‘Timeless Reality : Symmetry, Simplicity, and Multiple Universes’ by Victor J. Stenger; (C)2000 Published by Prometheus Books). As he elsewhere adjudges fellow theoretical physicists Mr Stephen Hawking, Mr. Roger Penrose, and Mr. Steven Weinberg, to be Platonists (thus apparently excluding himself from that classification) the parallel with eastern philosophy is virtually inescapable ... as in a uncreated underlying reality timelessly manifesting all phenomena (all time and all space and all form). And, as all this is ‘proved’ by mathematical computations, the direct experience of actuality is therefore (supposedly) invalided. * RICHARD: I only ask because the whole notion of it not being so comes out of the ‘big bang’ theory ... which is based upon the ‘expanding universe’ theory which was based upon Mr. Albert Einstein’s relativity theory ... it is, in other words, a notion drawn from a mathematical computation based upon a mathematical computation based upon a mathematical computation. RESPONDENT: Just so I am clear on this – are you saying that since the ‘big-bang’ theory is false (according to you) that also entails that relativity is false? RICHARD: As the mathematical ‘big bang’ theory proposes that there be a beginning to all time, all space, and all form – and a universe which has a beginning is not an eternal universe by any description – and as the ‘big bang’ theory is based upon the mathematical ‘expanding universe’ theory, which is itself based upon the mathematical ‘general relativity’ theory, it would appear that Mr. Albert Einstein’s relativity is indeed false if only for that reason. However, I would suggest it is false for the far more pragmatic reason it is a subjective interpretation of what actually happens. RESPONDENT: The ‘big-bang’ theory may need the theory of relativity – but I wasn’t aware that the theory of relativity needs the big-bang. RICHARD: I am not suggesting it does. RESPONDENT: Are you saying that if relativity is fact, then that implies that the ‘big-bang’ would have to be fact as well? RICHARD: I am not saying that ... those who seek to disallow the direct experience of eternity – such as in a PCE – are saying that (if they did not I would not go looking up such things in encyclopaedias and other places). * RICHARD: And the ‘experiential evidence’ you refer to are theories and not observation (for example ‘red-shifted galaxies’ is the observation; ‘galaxies moving away at high speeds’ is the theory, or, for another instance ‘microwave radiation’ is the observation; ‘cosmic background radiation’ is the theory). RESPONDENT: Yet I am not referring to ‘experiential evidence’ for the ‘big-bang’ as you outline here – I am talking about ‘experiential evidence’ for relativity of the kind proposed by Clifford M Will in the link I previously provided and his book ‘Was Einstein Right?’ – personally, I’m leaving the ‘big-bang’ theory out of the discussion as it seems better to treat the two separately – though I do realize that relativity is needed for the big bang – though not the other way around. RICHARD: Speaking personally I am not at all concerned about either the big bang theory or the relativity theory – or quantum theory for that matter – and it is only when my fellow human being chooses to settle for second best because of a man sitting in a patents office nearly a century ago having the happiest thought in his life (that a person falling from a roof has the right to interpret their state of motion as being a state of rest and thus conclude there is no gravitational field for them) that I go looking up such things in encyclopaedias and other places. Quite frankly, I would rather sit and watch paint dry on a wall than read about the imaginative/ intuitive speculations of theoretical physicists. * RESPONDENT: Why do you continue to dispute it? RICHARD: Because I care about my fellow human being and want only the best for them ... to settle for second-best because of mathematical theories, or because of any abstract logic for that matter, is absurd. RESPONDENT: I do understand this – but I’m specifically asking about what reasons you have for rejecting the evidence (of the type offered by Clifford Will) for relativity alone. RICHARD: Mainly because mathematical theories, or any abstract logic for that matter, are a poor substitute for the actual * RESPONDENT: Is it impossible for Einsteinian relativity and an actual freedom to coexist? If so, why? RICHARD: As this is somewhat similar to asking me if the Ptolemaic System is in accord with actuality I will make no further comment. RESPONDENT: Ok, let me ask it a different way – specifically why do you reject the ‘evidence’ (of the kind offered by Clifford Will in this case) for Einsteinian relativity? RICHARD: Science is, or is supposed to be, objective. RESPONDENT: Would you say that the theory of relativity is of such a nature that it could never possibly be confirmed? RICHARD: As I am not a mathematician I will defer to Mr. Tom Van Flandern here (from the same page I previously quoted from): • ‘(...) What we have just described are careful and correct inferences of SR [Einsteinian relativity] as applied to the twin’s paradox. This also shows the essentially mathematical nature of the theory, because it does violence to what we fondly call ‘common sense’. The most important point to note carefully is that *the theory is internally consistent, and no mathematical contradictions can be found* no matter how the transformation equations are manipulated, or how many frames or twins are introduced. The next important point to note is that SR makes demands on our credulity that LR [Lorentzian relativity] does not. Let’s examine why ...’. [emphasis added]. (https://web.archive.org/web/20040214022609/www.dipmat.unipg.it/~bartocci/ep6/ep6-vanfl.htm). I would hazard a guess that it is well-nigh impossible to either confirm or disconfirm a mathematical theory which is internally consistent and (mathematically) non-contradictory. Which is perhaps why it has such a hold on otherwise intelligent peoples. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27g, 17 February 2004) March 17 2004 RICHARD: May I ask what it is that you find interesting about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about Lorentzian relativity? RESPONDENT: Sure, what I find interesting about what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about Lorentzian relativity is his claim that it can account for all the ‘evidence’ that is purported to demonstrate Einstein’s relativity theory as fact. Not only that, but his statement is that we are allowed to keep more ‘common-sense’ notions about time and space, gravity, and so forth. RICHARD: Okay ... now what Mr. Paul Marmet has to say about the GPS and the (supposed) constant velocity of light for all observers, which constancy is central to Einstein relativity, throws more light (no pun intended) upon his claim that Newtonian physics can also account for all the evidence which is purported to demonstrate the facticity of Einstein relativity (as well as keeping the more commonsense notions about time and space and gravity and so forth). Viz.: http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/illusion/index.html I did make the comment, in an earlier e-mail, that we could post URL’s to each other until the cows came home and the matter would still not be settled ... and the point I am making by providing this particular link (just as I did with the Mr. Tom Van Flandern link) is that, being but a lay-person in all these matters, what I see is theoretical physicists, mathematicians, logicians, and so on, discussing amongst themselves the validity/invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory. And, as I also commented before, when they start presenting equations to each other (I do not even know what most of the symbols refer to) I have no recourse, other than to read what they have to say in general, but to observe that such-and-such a topic is by no means settled. In other words those who seek to disallow the direct experience of infinitude – as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – by telling me that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual (such as in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in my last post) because of this theory or that theory or any other theory might as well take up kite-flying in their spare time. * RICHARD: ... apart from drawing attention to the fact that there are (at least) two models being proposed, I am suggesting it is important to remember they are both models (just as the various theories regarding the sub-atomic postulates of quantum theory, for example, also are). RESPONDENT: I do take (and appreciate) your point here that not only are you pointing out that there are two models purporting to fit the same data, but also that both are ‘models’. Do you know the phrase/term ‘underdetermination of theory by data’? RICHARD: No ... and, as the Encyclopaedia Britannica has no reference to it (nor does any dictionary, other than the Oxford Dictionary, list the word ‘underdetermination’), a search of the internet tended to show that the ‘underdetermination of theory by data’ thesis is an argument which has often been used to combat scientific realism and, as such, is more a philosophical issue about indeterminacy than anything else. For example: • ‘... there are two ways that we might respond to the underdetermination of theory by data. One response, which we can call the agnostic response, is to suspend judgment: ‘Where scientific standards cannot guide us, we should believe nothing’. Another response, which we can call the fideist response, is to believe whatever we would like to believe: ‘If science cannot speak to the question, then we may believe anything without science ever contradicting us’. (www.fecundity.com/job/agnosticism.pdf). I will first draw your attention to the following exchange: • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Is the universe being infinite in all directions a theory, not a fact? • [Richard]: ‘First of all, it is physically impossible to empirically establish the extended attributes of space, time and matter ... one cannot, ever, hop into some ultra high speed spacecraft and travel to some ‘where’ or ‘when’ or ‘that’ and show or demonstrate or exhibit infinitude. Needless is it to say, for those who propose a caused universe, that no one has journeyed to where they can witness such a creation of material ex nihilo? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a temporary universe, that no one has travelled to when that limited time began? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a finite universe, that no one has voyaged to the edge of that bounded universe? (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002) And then to this exchange: • [Respondent]: ‘Is there a way to avoid being an agnostic on the issue [of finitude/infinitude] – since if I’m investigating – then I’m open to finding out the fact of the matter? Does being agnostic necessarily mean being open to belief? Can’t I be agnostic and be open to finding out a fact? Or do I just have to get rid of current scientific theory to find that I already know the answer? • [Richard]: ‘The question of agnosticism applies to all subjects, of course, not only the subject of the infinitude of the universe (which has tended to split the current, and previous, discussions on this mailing list into two separate issues). For something like twenty five years I was an agnostic ... and it is an apparently satisfying position to be in as it makes one feel both intellectually comfortable and intellectually superior at the same time (whilst appearing humble) until one day I realised just what I was doing to myself ... and to others. I was cleverly shuffling all the ‘hard questions’ about consciousness under the rug and going around deftly cutting other people down to size (which is all so easy to do simply by saying ‘well that is your belief/ truth/ idea/ philosophy/ whatever’). But I had nothing to offer in its place – other than the smug ‘nobody knows’ agnosticism – and I puzzled as to why this was so. Finally, I ceased procrastinating and equivocating. I wanted to know. I wanted to find out – for myself – about life, the universe and what it is to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. I now know. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27f, 16 July 2003) In short: there is a third alternative to either agnosticism or fideism. * RICHARD: ... could it be that the measure of time (the rubidium and caesium in this instance) is what is ‘ticking’ faster and not time itself advancing more quickly? I only mention this because this moment has no duration here in this actual world. RESPONDENT: Do I understand correctly that you are saying that since ‘this moment has no duration here in this actual world’ – that it is simply not possible for ‘time itself [to be] advancing more quickly? RICHARD: Exactly ... have you never noticed it is never not this moment? If I understand it correctly caesium, to take but one example, has an innate resonant frequency and it is the ‘ticking’ of this frequency which is used to define a second (officially recognised as being 9,192,631,770 oscillations) in the energy-clocks on board the satellites ... and I say ‘energy-clocks’, as contrasted to ‘astronomical-clocks’, for the ‘what-is-it-that-is-ticking-faster’ reason already mentioned. Presumably someone in the mists of pre-history noticed what the shadow of a stick standing perpendicular in the ground did such as to eventually lead to the sundial – a circular measure of the movement of a cast shadow arbitrarily divided into twelve sections because of a prevailing duo-decimal counting system – and thus to water-clocks/sand-clocks and thence to pendulum-clocks/spring-clocks and thus to electrical-clocks/ electronic-clocks and, currently, atomic-clocks (‘energy-clocks’) ... with all such measurement of movement being a measure of the earth’s rotation whilst in orbit around a radiant star. In short: it is not time itself which moves (thus it neither speeds up nor slows down) but objects through space ... this moment is the arena, so to speak, in which things happen and time (as in past/ present/ future) is a measure of what occurs. * RICHARD: ... the reason why I linked what I found interesting in what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about Lorentzian relativity with a rather droll sign (which asked what would happen if one were to switch on the headlights in a space-ship travelling at the speed of light) that I noticed propped up on a nearby clerk’s desk, whilst in a government office for bureaucratic reasons some years ago, could be put like this: 1. Suppose a vehicle travelling at 75 kilometres an hour (75k) has a head-on crash with a vehicle travelling in the opposite direction also at 75k ... would the collision, the force of the impact, be the same as just the one vehicle crashing into a stationary object at 150k? 2. If so, now suppose a vehicle travelling at three-quarters the speed of light (.75c) has a head-on crash with a vehicle travelling in the opposite direction also at .75c ... would the collision, the force of the impact, be the same as just the one vehicle crashing into a stationary object at 1.50c? I ask this because, according to Einsteinian relativity (in direct contrast to Lorentzian relativity), the force of the impact would only be the same as a .96c collision with a stationary object. RESPONDENT: I simply don’t know enough about it to comment on this issue. RICHARD: In the last 20-30 years a lot of research and development has gone into making vehicles safer for the occupants through designing better ways to have the material a vehicle is made of crumple, fore and aft of the section people are occupying, so as to better absorb the energy of the rapid deceleration occasioned by an impact ... and the same applies to making crash-barriers more flexible and thus more absorbent of that energy. Yet according to Einsteinian relativity the faster a vehicle travels (the more it accelerates) the less force it has (the less deceleration energy there is) ... so much so that, rather than ‘speed kills’, the safety slogans of science fiction traffic authorities should probably read ‘speed saves’, eh? All joking aside however ... where *does* all that energy go (if not into the force of the impact)? RESPONDENT: I suppose that I should make it clear that I am not claiming that Einsteinian relativity is fact. RICHARD: Sure ... what you are (or were) claiming, however, is that the article at the link you initially provided which started this thread was a [quote] ‘good’ [endquote] article about Einsteinian relativity. Given that you do not know enough about it to comment on the (above) issue are you still claiming that? RESPONDENT: What I would say definitively though, is that there has been a good deal of evidence over the last 100 years or so that has been proposed as proving that Einsteinian relativity is fact. My intention in this conversation is merely to explore the reasons you say what you say, to understand why you dispute relativity and the purported evidence for it. It is delightful for me to discover that there are other models to explain what has been purportedly evidence for Einsteinian relativity. If one doesn’t understand that there are other models available or possible, it is indeed difficult to jettison what the most respected scientists are calling proof of relativity – so I appreciate this chance to learn more about what and why you are saying what you are about relativity. RICHARD: For what it is worth I was not cognisant of the general relativity theory/expanding-contracting universe theory/big-bang-big-crunch theory until I went public on the internet, other than a vague recollection that there had been a person called Mr. Albert Einstein who was held in high esteem for matters I knew virtually nothing of and was concerned even less about, whereupon I was told (in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in my last post) that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual because of the ‘expanding universe’ theory and, as a post-script, was challenged to explain quasars and pulsars (both of which I had never heard of before). In other words it never occurred to me all those years ago that, as Mr. Albert Einstein’s mathematical model proved the universe not to be infinite, eternal, and perpetual, I would be unable to ever become actually free from the human condition and naively went ahead and did so anyway. Ain’t life grand! * RESPONDENT: Are you saying that if relativity were fact, then an actual freedom would be impossible? RICHARD: I am not saying that ... those who seek to disallow the direct experience of eternity – such as in a PCE – are saying that (in effect if not specifically spelt-out). RESPONDENT: I am trying to understand exactly how those who claim relativity is a fact seek to ‘disallow the direct experience of eternity’. RICHARD: Simply this: as Mr. Albert Einstein’s mathematics prove the universe is expanding (and hence had a beginning and thence an ending) it cannot be eternal ... and, as Richard is but a scientific buffoon (or whatever other unsolicited character references Richard’s report sometimes elicit), then Mr. Albert Einstein, who had to virtuously practice pacifism so as to achieve some outward semblance of peace and harmony whilst Richard is effortlessly, and thus unvirtuously, happy and harmless, must be right and Richard must be wrong. And, as Richard is wrong, then the person writing to Richard can carry-on living life in the normal way (vainly trying to be virtuous). RESPONDENT: I can only guess that it is because relativity requires a measure of duration (from multiple subjective frames of reference), while there is no such thing in the direct experience of eternity? RICHARD: This moment has no duration here in this actual world ... but I doubt that those who seek to disallow the direct experience of eternity are conscious of that when they write to me. My guess is they are just uncritically regurgitating what they were taught at school. * RICHARD: You are aware that the topic under dispute is whether or not the universe is spatially infinite, temporally eternal, and materially perdurable (and not just Einsteinian relativity per se)? RESPONDENT: I was not aware that of that, no. RICHARD: Oh? Why would Einsteinian relativity be such a hot topic on this mailing list, then, if not because of my oft-repeated observation that the infinitude of the universe is directly experienced here in this actual world? Just curious. RESPONDENT: I originally thought that it was only the big-bang theory that contradicted your experience – but I see now that you are saying that relativity (by itself regardless of the big bang theory) contradicts your experience. I do understand that Einsteinian relativity is intertwined with the big-bang theory, so I thought that is why relativity is such a ‘hot topic’. Though I also went into this conversation understanding that the big-bang theory depends on relativity, I also thought it is possible that relativity could be correct, without necessarily implying that the big-bang theory is correct. RICHARD: Put specifically: that the universe is expanding is inextricably part and parcel of Mr. Albert Einstein’s equations ... the big-bang theory came later and arose out of the implications of that mathematical artefact. Viz.: • ‘When Einstein tried to describe the simplest possible mathematical model of the universe using his new equations, however, he ran into a problem. At that time, in 1917, the received wisdom was that our Milky Way galaxy was the entire universe, a stable collection of stars. But the equations describing a complete cosmology of space, time and matter refused to produce such a picture. They insisted that the universe must be either expanding or contracting. The only way Einstein could hold the model universe still, to mimic the appearance of the Milky Way, was to add an extra term to the equation, called the ‘cosmological constant’. (...) A dozen years later, observers, led by the pioneer Edwin Hubble in California, discovered that the Milky Way was not the entire universe, but simply one galaxy among many millions, and that distant galaxies are all receding from each other. The universe is expanding, exactly as the pure equations of general relativity predicted in 1917, when Einstein refused to believe the evidence of his own theory. There is no need for cosmological constant, and Einstein’s equations now provide the basis for the highly successful ‘big bang’ description of the birth and evolution of the entire universe ...’. (page 135, ‘Einstein: A Life in Science’ by Michael White & John Gribbin; published 1994 by Simon & Schuster Ltd). RESPONDENT: So, I have been particularly interested in focusing on relativity excluding the big-bang theory – so that I could understand just exactly where you say relativity goes wrong. RICHARD: In short: the universe is neither expanding nor contracting. RESPONDENT: According to what you are saying now, you are saying that Einstein’s theory of relativity directly contradicts your experience, correct? RICHARD: Correct. RESPONDENT: So, I want to ask – specifically how does Einstein’s relativity alone contradict: 1) The universe is spatially infinite & 2) The universe is temporally eternal. RICHARD: An expanding universe is neither spatially infinite nor temporally eternal. * RESPONDENT: Would you say that the theory of relativity is of such a nature that it could never possibly be confirmed? RICHARD: As I am not a mathematician I will defer to Mr. Tom Van Flandern here (from the same page I previously quoted from): [quote]: ‘What we have just described are careful and correct inferences of SR [Einsteinian relativity] as applied to the twin’s paradox. This also shows the essentially mathematical nature of the theory, because it does violence to what we fondly call ‘common sense’. The most important point to note carefully is that *the theory is internally consistent, and no mathematical contradictions can be found* no matter how the transformation equations are manipulated, or how many frames or twins are introduced. The next important point to note is that SR makes demands on our credulity that LR [Lorentzian relativity] does not. Let’s examine why ...’. [emphasis added]. I would hazard a guess that it is well-nigh impossible to either confirm or disconfirm a mathematical theory which is internally consistent and (mathematically) non-contradictory. Which is perhaps why it has such a hold on otherwise intelligent peoples. RESPONDENT: OK – I would just like to sum up what I understand of why you object to Einstein’s relativity: 1) It is a subjective theory. 2) Relativity is an abstraction, and as such cannot apply directly to the actual world, it is but a conceptual model. 3) There are other models that can fit the data, so no evidence can be conclusive for a given conceptual model. 4) Relativity denies the direct experience of eternity (how as of yet, I don’t know) and the direct experience of the infinity of space (how as of yet, I don’t know). RICHARD: That pretty well sums up why Einsteinian relativity is irrelevant to actualism ... and I will take this opportunity to point out that if it were not for those who seek to disallow the direct experience of infinitude the matter would not be a topic on this mailing list. I have had to research all manner of things for other people since I first went public with my discovery. RESPONDENT: I would also like to point out that I understand that you are not necessarily advocating Mr Tom Van Flandern’s views on relativity – merely pointing out that there are as of yet competing conceptual models, but that to accept a conceptual model as True is but to trade in the actual for a mathematical / conceptual theory. RICHARD: Yes ... and I am not necessarily advocating all of Mr. Paul Marmet’s claims either because I personally favour the ‘electric-cosmos’ hypothesis, also known as the ‘plasma-universe’ hypothesis, which is based upon the findings of Mr. Halton Arp, as it shows promise of being a far more fruitful line of investigation into what the nuts and bolts of the universe are than anything else I have come across so far. ‘Tis only an opinion, though. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27h, 17 March 2004) March 25 2004 RICHARD: ... what Mr. Paul Marmet has to say about the GPS and the (supposed) constant velocity of light for all observers, which constancy is central to Einstein relativity, throws more light (no pun intended) upon ... RESPONDENT: If I may, if no pun was intended then why not have used the hmm ... backspace key and used a different metaphor then [throws more light]? RICHARD: Because that way of conveying ‘helps explain’ is particularly expressive. RESPONDENT: If I may say, piece of cake to a freed human intelligence? RICHARD: It is a breeze for any human intelligence to use a different figure of speech. * RESPONDENT: On the other hand I can see, that diversion at times can become distortion of hmm clear rational reasoning which well might/could result in irritation/ annoyance/whatever. RICHARD: May I ask? Did you find what Mr. Paul Marmet has to say about the GPS and the (supposed) constant velocity of light for all observers, which constancy is central to Einstein relativity, helped to explain his claim that Newtonian physics can also account for all the evidence which is purported to demonstrate the facticity of Einstein relativity (as well as keeping the more commonsense notions about time and space and gravity and so forth)? For example, did his question [quote] ‘with respect to what, does light travel’ [endquote] make you sit up and take notice (before you read his answer)? * RESPONDENT: I like it that supposed is being bracketed indicating that this velocity being ‘constant’ is not even a posing in other words, merely an assumption which is currently embraced by science so far as to be workable with as an attribute of that what appears as the phenomenon light in this universe. RICHARD: It is an assumption sometimes known as a postulate – the second postulate of the special theory of relativity in fact – and, although I have already posted an example of what Mr. Tom Van Flandern has to say about those two postulates, a re-read might have more import this time around. Viz.: • ‘As history buffs may know, the Lorentz Ether Theory (LET)[2] appeared a year before Einstein’s 1905 publication of SR [Einsteinian relativity]. Of course, LET incorporated both the relativity principle (taken from Poincare, but it was first formulated about a generation earlier) and the Lorentz transformations that bear his name. The essential new element introduced by Einstein the following year was the equivalence of all inertial frames, thereby eliminating the need for the luminiferous ether. This first postulate of SR makes the Lorentz transformations reciprocal; i.e., they work equally well from any inertial frame to any other, then back again; so it has no meaning to ask which of two identical clocks in different frames is ticking slower in any absolute sense. The second postulate of SR makes the speed of light independent of not only the speed of the source (which is also true generally for waves in any medium, including luminiferous ether), but also independent of the speed of the observer (which is a feature unique to SR). Today, many physicists and students of physics have acquired the impression that these two postulates have been confirmed by observations. However, that is not the case. In fact, none of the eleven independent experiments verifying some aspect of SR[1] is able to verify either postulate. It is now widely believed that no experiment is capable of verifying these postulates even in principle[3], because they become automatically true *by convention* if one adopts the Einstein clock-synchronization method, and they become just as automatically false if one adopts a different synchronization convention such as the ‘universal time’ postulate of Lorentz. Of interest here is the point that the GPS uses the latter synchronization convention for pragmatic reasons ...’. [emphasis added]. (https://web.archive.org/web/20040214022609/www.dipmat.unipg.it/~bartocci/ep6/ep6-vanfl.htm). [1] T. Van Flandern, ‘What the Global Positioning System tells us about relativity’, in Open Questions in Relativistic Physics, F. Selleri, ed., Apeiron, Montreal, 81-90 (1998). [2] H.A. Lorentz, Lectures on Theoretical Physics, Vol. III, ‘The principle of relativity for uniform translations’, Macmillan & Co., London, 208-211 (1931). Contains summary of and citation to original 1904 paper. [3] H. Erlichson, ‘The rod contraction-clock retardation ether theory and the special theory of relativity’, AJP 41, 1068-1077 (1973). There is more on this ‘by convention’ observation further below. * RICHARD: I did make the comment, in an earlier e-mail, that we could post URL’s to each other until the cows came home and the matter would still not be settled ... RESPONDENT: Indeed and I find it yet another puny cue as you are using cow(s) in plural, such as I presume to give a hint to the unlikeliness of eventuation of a certain condition. RICHARD: It is an equivalent English expression to the Dutch expression ‘until sint-juttemis day’. RESPONDENT: Particularly as there is no indication as to the quantity of cows that would need to come home. May I ask how many cows did you have in mind? RICHARD: Not all that surprisingly it is as many as the number of days until sint-juttemis day ... a jillion googol of them, to be precise. * RICHARD: ... the point I am making by providing this particular link (just as I did with the Mr. Tom Van Flandern link) is that, being but a lay-person in all these matters, what I see is theoretical physicists, mathematicians, logicians, and so on, discussing amongst themselves the validity/invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory. RESPONDENT: And of course the crucial question is that how is [discussing amongst themselves the validity/invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory] going to make a contribution to world piece \?/peace on earth? RICHARD: No, the crucial question is why a person, seeking to disallow the direct experience of infinitude – as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – by telling me that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual (such as in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in a previous post) because of this theory or that theory or any other theory, would even try flying that kite when it is patently obvious that mathematics do not describe the universe and that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process. For just one example: • ‘Poincaré put forward important ideas on mathematical models of the real world. If one set of axioms is preferred over another to model a physical situation then, Poincaré claimed, this was nothing more than a convention. Conditions such as simplicity, easy of use, and usefulness in future research, help to determine which will be the convention, while it is meaningless to ask which is correct. The question of whether physical space is Euclidean is not a meaningful one to ask. The distinction, he argues, between mathematical theories and physical situations is that mathematics is a construction of the human mind, whereas nature is independent of the human mind. Here lies that problem; fitting a mathematical model to reality is to forcing a construct of the human mind onto nature which is ultimately independent of mind’. (www-gap.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/HistTopics/World.html#s54). * RICHARD: In other words those who seek to disallow the direct experience of infinitude – as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – by telling me that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual (such as in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in my last post) because of this theory or that theory or any other theory might as well take up kite-flying in their spare time. RESPONDENT: I agree there is no sensible thing to say to people who believe in non-infinity of the universe. RICHARD: Au contraire ... there is indeed a sensible thing to say to those who consider that a mathematical theory disproves the direct experience of actuality: • [Richard]: ‘I invite anyone to make a critical examination of all the words I advance so as to ascertain if they be intrinsically self-explanatory ... and if they are all seen to be inherently consistent with what is being spoken about, then the facts speak for themselves. Then one will have reason to remember a pure conscious experience (PCE), which all peoples I have spoken to at length have had, and thus verify by direct experience the facticity of what is written (...). (Richard, Homepage) * RICHARD: For something like twenty five years I was an agnostic ... and it is an apparently satisfying position to be in as it makes one feel both intellectually comfortable and intellectually superior at the same time (whilst appearing humble) until one day I realised just what I was doing to myself ... and to others. I was cleverly shuffling all the ‘hard questions’ about consciousness under the rug and going around deftly cutting other people down to size (which is all so easy to do simply by saying ‘well that is your belief/ truth/ idea/ philosophy/ whatever’). But I had nothing to offer in its place – other than the smug ‘nobody knows’ agnosticism – and I puzzled as to why this was so. Finally, I ceased procrastinating and equivocating. I wanted to know. I wanted to find out – for myself – about life, the universe and what it is to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are. I now know. In short: there is a third alternative to either agnosticism or fideism. RESPONDENT: So ... what is it (the purpose/ meaning/ complexity to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are? RICHARD: As this flesh and blood body only one is this material universe experiencing itself as an apperceptive human being ... as such it is stunningly aware of its own infinitude. And this is truly wonderful. RESPONDENT: To me this person or that person is as much as I am a phenomenon that appears to be as a fragment of the multitude of appearances. RICHARD: As this flesh and blood body only one is not ‘a fragment’ ... one *is* this material universe experiencing itself *as* an apperceptive human being. RESPONDENT: This brain does not differ much from other brains as it is clearly perceived that whatever cunning/ clever/ smart/ complex projection that brain overlays on that what is being perceived, in actuality it has no existence other then this being a projection. RICHARD: The human brain per se neither overlays nor projects ... it is the identity within who does such things (as in feeling itself to be ‘a fragment’ for instance). RESPONDENT: In other words, that grey matter inside of the skull my skull your skull everybody’s skull is not merely passive. RICHARD: In other words the identity within intuits that its activity is the activity of the brain itself. RESPONDENT: Not just brains, but the stuff the universe is made of. RICHARD: Not just the identity’s activity, of course, but the activity of the instinctual passions it is made of. RESPONDENT: So ... what is it (the purpose/ meaning/ complexity to be a human being living in the world as-it-is with people as-they-are? RICHARD: If you were to hold a hand up before the eyes, palm towards the face, and rotate it slowly through space (all the while considering that the very stuff the hand is comprised of is as old as the universe) whilst looking from the front of the eyes, as it were (and not through the eyes), it may very well become apparent that, as this flesh and blood body only, one is perfection personified ... the perfection of the purity, welling in perpetuum mobilis, that the infinitude this material universe actually is. In short: this ambrosial paradise I refer to as ‘this actual world’ has been no further away, all the while, than coming to your senses. * RICHARD: This moment has no duration here in this actual world ... but I doubt that those who seek to disallow the direct experience of eternity are conscious of that when they write to me. My guess is they are just uncritically regurgitating what they were taught at school. RESPONDENT: The brain has difficulties (it seems) to conceptualise eternity, yet as it has done so, it is fairly well capable of making the inference in hindsight that as the universe is eternal and as experience is a phenomenon of that, how could/would this experience possible have had a beginning or could have an end? RICHARD: As this flesh and blood body was born on a particular date, lives for x-number of years, and then dies – and death is the end, finish, of its experience – then the direct experience of eternity does indeed have a beginning and an end ... and, furthermore, such experiencing ceases each night whilst asleep, when under anaesthesia, during a faint, upon being knocked unconscious, while in a cataleptic trance-state, or when in any other way being comatose. So much for hindsight inferences drawn from conceptualisations, eh? RESPONDENT: In other words in experience infinity is embedded as experience. Time then becomes merely measured in terms of how many nickels need to be put into a parking meter in order to acquire institutionalised legislated permission to have a car parked, on a particular location for say i.e. 1 hour such as that one has time to go to do some shopping. RICHARD: There is a distinct difference between the measure of time (as in past/present/future) and time itself: this moment is the arena, so to speak, in which events occur and, just as everything is existing in infinite space, everything is happening in eternal time. There is a vast stillness here ... if you were to listen intently to the jingle of the nickels it may become apparent. RESPONDENT: Interesting then would be the question: suppose one would return (after one hour) and one would find out, that the car has been damaged beyond repair (a clear case of total-loss) and one also finds out that this is not a case that will be covered by insurance (for whatever reason) then have these nickels (spent as parking money) been spent in a sensible way? RICHARD: If you were just here right now all the while then ... yes. * RICHARD: Put specifically: that the universe is expanding is inextricably part and parcel of Mr. Albert Einstein’s equations ... the big-bang theory came later and arose out of the implications of that mathematical artefact. Viz.: [snip quote]. RESPONDENT: I find some charm in the metaphor of the Big Bang, however as I already have stated I found one big bang a bit stingy and with the introduction of a ‘cosmological constant’ it is easy to conceive of an infinite number of Big bangs, as the value of the constant could infinitely be variable or even at time reoccur to have the same value. Thus each time the constant would change i.e. leap from 9 to 8 there would be a new big bang. RICHARD: May I ask? Are you of that school of thought which holds that imagination is more important than knowledge? RESPONDENT: The fact that that stuff (the grey matter in the skull) is not merely passive does not mean that it well can use some challenge to become a bit more active. RICHARD: The direct experience that matter is not merely passive – such as in a PCE – relegates all such imaginings as you propose to the waste-bin of history where they belong. RESPONDENT: Complacency seems to be the greatest danger that is a hindrance on the path of discovery of/exploration into self(es) and other things. RICHARD: Hmm ... and your cure for that is to develop a hyperactive imagination? RESPONDENT: The adagio for the matrix is It ain’t necessarily so (this way or that way). RICHARD: As the ‘matrix’ (a place or medium in which something is bred, produced, or developed) you are referring to is an imaginative realm I will pass without making any further comment. * RICHARD: In short: the universe is neither expanding nor contracting. RESPONDENT: Nevertheless the concepts of expanding and contracting I would not dismiss too lightly. RICHARD: So I have noticed. * RICHARD: An expanding universe is neither spatially infinite nor temporally eternal. RESPONDENT: I’d say too easy. In order to define matter, space is required in order to define space matter is required yet as the universe is only material (in actualism) there can neither be contraction nor expansion of the universe In hmm actuality. RICHARD: Yes ... a universe (all time and all space and all form) which expands/contracts can only do so if there be that which is other than time and space and form (a non-material otherness which is timeless and spaceless and formless). Such a non-physical otherness is sometimes referred to as a matrix. RESPONDENT: Interestingly however there is movement of matter into an unknown and/or unknowable direction. RICHARD: Only in imagination – nothing is coming from, or going to, anywhere or anywhen in actuality – as everything is already just here right now. As it always has been and always will be. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 18e, 25 March 2004) November 03 2004 RESPONDENT: (...) As far as I’m concerned, Richard’s ‘belief’ about time having no duration is purely experiential. RICHARD: May I ask? Why do you say that Richard’s report (an account from the actual world) about time having no duration, being purely experiential, is Richard’s ‘belief’ (albeit in scare quotes)? Why not put it this way (for example): • [example only]: ‘As far as I’m concerned, Richard’s report about time having no duration is purely experiential’ [end example]. Is it because, being tautologous, it lacks impact? RESPONDENT: It has absolutely nothing to do with the way time behaves at all. RICHARD: As you began this e-mail with [quote] ‘If Einstein was ...’ [endquote] it is reasonable to assume that the manner in which Mr. Albert Einstein’s equations dictate the way time behaves is, for you, the way that time does indeed behave. RESPONDENT: I.e. It’s him, not time! RICHARD: Ha ... as Mr. Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity was born out of an insight which he described as being the happiest thought in his life – that a person falling from a roof has the right to interpret their state of motion as being a state of rest as, for them, gravity does not exist (at least not in their immediate surroundings) – there is every reason to say it is him, not time, that his theory is all about. ‘Tis not for nothing that I say the relativity theory would be better named the subjectivity theory. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 49c, 3 November 2004) February 13 2002 RESPONDENT: Is the universe being infinite in all directions a theory, not a fact? RICHARD: First of all, it is physically impossible to empirically establish the extended attributes of space, time and matter ... one cannot, ever, hop into some ultra high speed spacecraft and travel to some ‘where’ or ‘when’ or ‘that’ and show or demonstrate or exhibit infinitude. Needless is it to say, for those who propose a caused universe, that no one has journeyed to where they can witness such a creation of material ex nihilo? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a temporary universe, that no one has travelled to when that limited time began? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a finite universe, that no one has voyaged to the edge of that bounded universe? Similarly, if (note ‘if’) one could roam forever throughout the physical infinitude of immeasurable matter perpetually arranging and rearranging itself in endless varieties of form all over the boundless reaches of infinite space throughout the limitless extent of eternal time ... one would never ‘prove’ anything. Apart from the current passionate preoccupation by academia with Quantum Theory (which gets ever more frantic due to the mathematicians who, having taken over physics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, are bemiring themselves more and more in their futile efforts to prove their god to be a mathematician) modern astronomy is showing the universe to be immensely vast. For example, in 1986 a huge conglomeration of galaxies that is 1,000,000,000 light years long, 300,000,000 light years wide and 100,000,000 light years thick were found (which finding was confirmed in 1990). This ‘wall of galaxies’, as it became known, would have taken 100,000,000,000 years to form under the workings of the ‘Big Bang’ theory ... which makes the mathematically estimated ‘age’ of the universe – 12 to 14 billion years – simply look sillier than it already did. Obviously then, the entire question revolves around being sensible ... and I always plunk for a rational or reasonable approach – the judicious approach – from the word go. RESPONDENT: If the theory that universe is finite is found to be true (backed up with evidences, predictions etc. using scientific method), and a spaceship that leaves in one direction comes back from the other direction after some time, won’t we be in a position but to accept it? RICHARD: You seem to be talking about Mr. Albert Einstein’s curved space here ... whatever you do, do not hold your breath waiting for that to be demonstrated (24 to 28 billions years of travelling at the speed of light is too long a journey for any human being to make and come back alive so as to provide a factual report). (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 13 February 2002) February 27 2002 RESPONDENT: Is the universe being infinite in all directions a theory, not a fact? RICHARD: First of all, it is physically impossible to empirically establish the extended attributes of space, time and matter ... one cannot, ever, hop into some ultra high speed spacecraft and travel to some ‘where’ or ‘when’ or ‘that’ and show or demonstrate or exhibit infinitude. Needless is it to say, for those who propose a caused universe, that no one has journeyed to where they can witness such a creation of material ex nihilo? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a temporary universe, that no one has travelled to when that limited time began? Needless is it to say, for those who propose a finite universe, that no one has voyaged to the edge of that bounded universe? RESPONDENT: Deductive logic works like a chain; if you agree that each ring of the chain to be valid, you reach the last piece of the chain which is not apparent if you did not follow the process. Modern science including quantum cosmogony is not a result of wishful thinking, as the prominent scientists (Einstein: god does not play dice, and similar quotes can be found for relativity) were not able to digest certain findings of these, just as you do. RICHARD: The validity of each link in a deductive chain is dependent upon the initial premise being correct. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 44c, #quanta) RESPONDENT: They are not commonsensical at all, agreed. But experimentation (please refer to: Michelson Morley kind of experiments for relativity, double hole experiments for quantum mechanics) has shown that the common sense understandings do not carry well in very high speeds as well as very small scales, and one is forced to theorize with the set of facts, and predict from the theory, and verify, and verify and verify, till the theory is found to be useful (like nuclear reactors, space ships, cosmic rays). RICHARD: History shows that a model can be found to be useful without it necessarily being correct ... and such a model is later discarded when another model can be found to correspond more accurately to the facts. RESPONDENT: Then the philosophical or metaphysical question arises: this is the theory that is arrived through scientific method to explain certain idiosyncrasies of nature, and works quite well, what does it mean? RICHARD: It means what you just said ... it ‘works quite well’. RESPONDENT: So are the experiments wrong? Was the theory used inappropriately, an abuse of logic and misuse of symbols? We have to go into these. RICHARD: Speaking personally, I never did ‘go into these’ (one does not have to be a theoretical physicist to become free of the human condition). RESPONDENT: We are not dealing with what is evident in PCE anymore, but are viewing through powerful microscopes and more powerful telescopes, which were required in the first place for you to posit about the grandness of the universe in light years in the following paragraphs. RICHARD: Yet powerful microscopes and powerful telescopes entail empirical observation (which was the whole point of what I was saying in the following paragraphs) and not theoretical computations. RESPONDENT: People before us believed that we might fall off the earth if we travelled too long, and that was the prevalent common sense which was very respectable indeed. RICHARD: And today it is popularly believed that the universe is finite in terms of space, time and matter and will come to an end eventually ... nothing much seems to have changed in regards to the vagaries of human speculation. * RESPONDENT: For instance the sizes and distances of the cosmic objects you refer to are a result of application of indirect logical principles, derived, rather than felt by senses. Otherwise the sun would be apple sized, sun would be going around the earth, sun and moon at the same distance, moon emitting light in the same way as sun, sky blue, stars dots. Not to say that we have to eat all that academia throws to us. Was there a critical study of the principles involved before rejecting them because in a PCE it becomes evident that the conclusions are false? RICHARD: Yes (although I make no pretensions of being a mathematician, a logician or a physicist so the extent of my ‘critical study’ would never satisfy an academician). RESPONDENT: I cannot speak for it because, as I said, no PCE seems to be in the surface for me; and if there was one, not that I would know. RICHARD: Okay. * RICHARD: Obviously then, the entire question revolves around being sensible ... and I always plunk for a rational or reasonable approach – the judicious approach – from the word go. RESPONDENT: Not that I don’t sense the rationality and clarity in your arguments. I would like to discuss this matter of science and mathematics with you, if you think it appropriate, since my viewpoint is slightly different from yours on these matters. I do not think it to be unrelated to the actualism discussions, as the subject has been already described and raised, and understanding the universe we live in is as important as we understand our fellow human beings, who are only a small speck of the whole thing. RICHARD: Speaking personally I am not ‘only a small speck of the whole thing’ ... in an actual freedom from the human condition one is the universe experiencing itself apperceptively: as such the universe is stunningly aware of its own infinitude. This is no little thing which I speak of ... the mystery of life or the puzzle of existence is patently open to view. RESPONDENT: A question for you: what subset of modern science you are willing to admit? RICHARD: That which is sensible, practical and in accord with the facts ... I am also willing to be wrong in the many areas which lie beyond my expertise. I am a lay-person when it comes to physics as I am a high-school drop-out. I started working for a living at age fifteen and have never pursued these matters beyond what is available in the popular press ... if you are looking for an advanced discussion you are talking to the wrong person. My expertise lies in the area of human consciousness only (via self-observation). RESPONDENT: Darwinian theory if not big bang? RICHARD: The science of evolution fits well with the facts ... the ‘big bang’ theory is shot full of holes. RESPONDENT: Expanding universe? RICHARD: No. RESPONDENT: Black holes? RICHARD: No. RESPONDENT: Atomic theory (Bohr’s atomic model with nucleus and protons and electrons)? RICHARD: The jury is still out on this issue ... as a model it works well enough for now. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002) March 01 2002 RESPONDENT: ... Michelson Morley kind of experiments for relativity, double hole experiments for quantum mechanics has shown that the common sense understandings do not carry well in very high speeds as well as very small scales, and one is forced to theorize with the set of facts, and predict from the theory, and verify, and verify and verify, till the theory is found to be useful (like nuclear reactors, space ships, cosmic rays). RICHARD: History shows that a model can be found to be useful without it necessarily being correct ... and such a model is later discarded when another model can be found to correspond more accurately to the facts. RESPONDENT: Okay the model maybe wrong but the facts are facts. What do you think about the following facts: light bends around heavy objects which was predicted by Einstein’s general theory of relativity much before this was found and can be demonstrated, measured; light travels with the same velocity even when the source is moving; particles when they approach the velocity of light behave very unlike particles; a tiny mass m annihilates with enormous energy e=mc square which was predicted before anything like this happened, and was used in construction of atomic bomb by (predicted by Einstein’s special theory of relativity); the space is curved but the curvature is so negligible but still can be measured, hey!; the stars in our galaxy are spreading apart with specific speeds that can be measured; more importantly – with all the data we are processing, not a thing is known that works against quantum + relativity. Again I don’t know whether discussing these things are relevant to the mailing list (I am interested!) and to you. Let me know. RICHARD: I have already said that I make no pretensions of being a mathematician, a logician or a physicist and that if you are looking for an advanced discussion on these subjects you are talking to the wrong person ... my expertise lies in the area of human consciousness only (via self-observation). * RESPONDENT: We are not dealing with what is evident in PCE anymore, but are viewing through powerful microscopes and more powerful telescopes, which were required in the first place for you to posit about the grandness of the universe in light years in the following paragraphs. RICHARD: Yet powerful microscopes and powerful telescopes entail empirical observation (which was the whole point of what I was saying in the following paragraphs) and not theoretical computations. RESPONDENT: The reason why telescope works the way we want it to work relies on a lot of theoretical computation. Without all those, one cannot even construct a cheap binocular with precision. RICHARD: Of course ... but in those paragraphs I am talking of the theoretical computations that posit an expanding universe arising out of a capricious ‘big bang’ which occurs in a ‘no form’ and ‘no time’ and ‘no space’ metaphysical nothingness. RESPONDENT: You seem to throw away all the theoretical computations, mathematics once the job is done. RICHARD: No ... I throw away science fiction (such as the mathematical ‘big bang’ theory). RESPONDENT: And moreover, all the theory, mathematics were ‘naturally’ stumbled upon as we progressed in science, as necessary ‘constructs’ – just as our normal language evolved and included more words and more structure, the scientific language of precision, is mathematics and more and more are getting added. Or else, how would you describe a motion of a ball precisely? It went up and down is no good to construct a rocket! It goes in a parabola, whose equation is thus, and with density of medium this happens etc. Sit beautifully in a formula which for a layman looks like Greek. Can the layman say: all Greek is rubbish? RICHARD: No, but the lay-person can say that the mathematical ‘big bang’ theory has nothing to do with the actual universe ... have you never heard of ‘the emperor has no clothes’ syndrome? * RESPONDENT: For instance the sizes and distances of the cosmic objects you refer to are a result of application of indirect logical principles, derived, rather than felt by senses. Otherwise the sun would be apple sized, sun would be going around the earth, sun and moon at the same distance, moon emitting light in the same way as sun, sky blue, stars dots. Not to say that we have to eat all that academia throws to us. Was there a critical study of the principles involved before rejecting them because in a PCE it becomes evident that the conclusions are false? RICHARD: Yes (although I make no pretensions of being a mathematician, a logician or a physicist so the extent of my ‘critical study’ would never satisfy an academician). RESPONDENT: Did you wonder why things like ‘Maxwell’s equation for electromagnetic waves’ cannot be any simpler than what it is? RICHARD: No ... but then again this is because I have never heard of ‘Maxwell’s equation for electromagnetic waves’ as I am not a mathematician or a physicist. RESPONDENT: It is a set of mathematical equations for describing electromagnetic field, if you didn’t know. It posits the existence of these waves (light like) and describes their behaviour. RICHARD: I rather fail to see what all this you are writing about in this section of these e-mails has to do with the universe being infinite in all directions or not (which is the subject under discussion). RESPONDENT: A lot of mathematics is involved in that. It is fundamental to the computer you use, to the television you see, the microwave oven if you use one and so on and so forth. All these instruments were constructed because we had those equations, and as expected, they worked the way the equations demanded. Do you think it could be made any simpler, and what exists is plain obfuscation? RICHARD: I have no problem with the mathematics which are used in the technological area ... it is where the mathematicians seek to use their mathematical equations to explain the universe that I find it all to be somewhat risible. For example, Prof. Sir Brian Pippard explains what the basic premise behind sub-atomic particles is: • ‘It must be realised, however, that the world of experience and observation is not the world of electrons and nuclei. When a bright spot on a television screen *is interpreted as* the arrival of a stream of electrons, it is still only the bright spot that is perceived *and not the electrons*. The world of experience is described by the physicist in terms of visible objects, occupying definite positions at definite instants of time – in a word, the world of classical mechanics. When the atom is pictured as a nucleus surrounded by electrons, this picture is a necessary concession to human limitations; there is no sense in which one can say that, if only a good enough microscope were available, this picture would be revealed as genuine reality. It is not that such a microscope has not been made; it is *actually impossible to make one* that will reveal this detail’. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard; ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Once the not-observable as objects in space and time basis of sub-atomic particles is established – (as distinct from “visible objects occupying definite positions at definite instants of time” that is) – the mathematical processes involved unfold further mysteries accordingly. Vis: • ‘The process of transformation from a classical description to an equation of quantum mechanics, and from the solution of this equation to the probability that a specified experiment will yield a specified observation, is not to be thought of as a temporary expedient pending the development of a better theory. It is better to accept this process as a technique for predicting the observations that are likely to follow from an earlier set of observations. Whether electrons and nuclei have *an objective existence in reality is a metaphysical question to which no definite answer can be given*. There is, however, no doubt that *to postulate their existence* is, in the present state of physics, an inescapable necessity if a consistent theory is to be constructed to describe economically and exactly the enormous variety of observations on the behaviour of matter’. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard; ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Almost needless is it to say, once this postulation is accepted – and as “an inescapable necessity” at that – there is no prize for guessing what will happen. Viz.: • ‘The habitual use of the language of particles by physicists *induces and reflects the conviction* that, even if the particles elude direct observation, *they are as real as any everyday object*’. [emphases added]. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard⁾ ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Videlicet: Thus the sub-atomic particles have become ‘as real as any everyday object’ ... and to a child Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny are ‘as real as any everyday object’ too. Also for a person who believes ardently in their god; for them their god is real – not actual, mind you – but real. Usually they say that their god is more real than ‘everyday reality’ ... that is how real their fervency makes of their belief. * RESPONDENT: A question for you: what subset of modern science you are willing to admit? RICHARD: That which is sensible, practical and in accord with the facts ... I am also willing to be wrong in the many areas which lie beyond my expertise. I am a lay-person when it comes to physics as I am a high-school drop-out. I started working for a living at age fifteen and have never pursued these matters beyond what is available in the popular press ... if you are looking for an advanced discussion you are talking to the wrong person. My expertise lies in the area of human consciousness only (via self-observation). RESPONDENT: You say you are a lay person when it comes to physics. But you are challenging the whole of modern physics. RICHARD: No, basically I am challenging the mystic cosmogony of quantum theory ... not modern physics per se. For example, the ‘Big Bang’ theory, which was first proposed by the French Abbé Mr. Georges Lemaitre in 1927, is strikingly similar to the Biblical creation myth. Which is not surprising given his theological background. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 1 March 2002) January 24 2004 RESPONDENT: Just thought I should express my appreciation for these discussions on modern science ... Richard’s answers and Respondent No. 60 & Respondent No. 27’s questions throw a lot of light on these matters. Very stimulating. What I understood (from Richard’s mails mainly) so far is that: a direct experience is the final arbiter and while logic/ mathematics can sharpen the directly experienced, they are subservient to the direct experience. This is in contrast to the theoretical physicist/ mathematician’s viewpoint which is: logic/ mathematics is the final arbiter – direct experience is prone to error. Please correct this appraisal if necessary. RICHARD: No correction necessary ... you have hit the nail right on the head. •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• P.S.: Just as a matter of interest: the empiricism/ rationalism debate has a long history. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 24 January 2004) September 20 2005 RESPONDENT: Correspondent No. 30 is a wonderful example of brainwashing. RICHARD: Just so there is no misunderstanding of what you are referring to I will provide the following examples of what that word can mean: 1. ‘brainwashing: intensive, forcible indoctrination, usually political or religious, aimed at destroying a person’s basic convictions and attitudes and replacing them with an alternative set of fixed beliefs’. (American Heritage® Dictionary). 2. ‘brainwashing: a forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up basic political, social, or religious beliefs and attitudes and to accept contrasting regimented ideas’. (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). 3. ‘brainwash: systematically and often forcibly replace established ideas in the mind of (a person) by new (usu. political) ideas’. (Oxford Dictionary). 4. ‘brainwash: to make (someone) believe only what you want them to believe by continually telling them that it is true and preventing any other information from reaching them’. (Cambridge Dictionary). 5. ‘brainwash: to impose a set of usually political or religious beliefs on somebody by the use of various coercive methods of indoctrination, including destruction of the victim’s prior beliefs’. (Encarta Dictionary). RESPONDENT: I wonder how he did it. While on the first page he asks some very sensible questions about AF and science – knowing the usual popularized canon ... RICHARD: For an example, from that page, of the first definition (enumerated, for convenience, as No. 1 above): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘If the theory that universe is finite is found to be true (backed up with evidences, predictions etc. using scientific method), and a spaceship that leaves in one direction comes back from the other direction after some time, won’t we be in a position but to accept it? • [Richard]: ‘You seem to be talking about Mr. Albert Einstein’s curved space here ... whatever you do, do not hold your breath waiting for that to be demonstrated (24 to 28 billions years of travelling at the speed of light is too long a journey for any human being to make and come back alive so as to provide a factual report)’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 13 February 2002). As an example of an intensive and forcible indoctrination aimed at destroying my co-respondent’s basic convictions and attitudes, and replacing them with an alternative set of fixed beliefs, my technique does appear to need a lot of polishing, non? For an example of definition No. 2 (also from that first page): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Deductive logic works like a chain; if you agree that each ring of the chain to be valid, you reach the last piece of the chain which is not apparent if you did not follow the process. (...)’. • [Richard]: ‘The validity of each link in a deductive chain is dependent upon the initial premise being correct’. (Wednesday, February 27 2002 AEDST). As an example of a forcible indoctrination to induce my co-respondent to give up their basic beliefs and attitudes, and to accept contrasting regimented ideas, my methodology does seem to leave a lot to be desired, eh? For an example of definition No. 3 (again from that first page): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘They [Quantum cosmogony/Einsteinian relativity] are not commonsensical at all, agreed. But experimentation (please refer to: Michelson Morley kind of experiments for relativity, double hole experiments for quantum mechanics) has shown that the common sense understandings do not carry well in very high speeds as well as very small scales, and one is forced to theorize with the set of facts, and predict from the theory, and verify, and verify and verify, till the theory is found to be useful (like nuclear reactors, space ships, cosmic rays). • [Richard]: ‘History shows that a model can be found to be useful without it necessarily being correct ... and such a model is later discarded when another model can be found to correspond more accurately to the facts. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Then the philosophical or metaphysical question arises: this is the theory that is arrived through scientific method to explain certain idiosyncrasies of nature, and works quite well, what does it mean? • [Richard]: ‘It means what you just said ... it ‘works quite well’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002). As an example of systematically and forcibly replacing established ideas in the mind of my co-respondent by new ideas my performance does look to be severely lacking in efficacity, does it not? For an example of definition No. 4 (yet again from that first page): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘A question for you: what subset of modern science you are willing to admit? • [Richard]: ‘That which is sensible, practical and in accord with the facts ... I am also willing to be wrong in the many areas which lie beyond my expertise. I am a lay-person when it comes to physics as I am a high-school drop-out. I started working for a living at age fifteen and have never pursued these matters beyond what is available in the popular press ... if you are looking for an advanced discussion you are talking to the wrong person. My expertise lies in the area of human consciousness only (via self-observation)’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002). As an example of making my co-respondent believe only what I want them to believe, by continually telling them that it is true and preventing any other information from reaching them, would it be fair to say that my modus operandi does give the impression of being far from perfect? For an example of definition No. 5 (still from that first page): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘... [what subset of modern science you are willing to admit]. Darwinian theory if not big bang? • [Richard]: ‘The science of evolution fits well with the facts ... the ‘big bang’ theory is shot full of holes. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Expanding universe? • [Richard]: ‘No. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Black holes? • [Richard]: ‘No. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Atomic theory (Bohr’s atomic model with nucleus and protons and electrons)? • [Richard]: ‘The jury is still out on this issue ... as a model it works well enough for now’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002). As an example of imposing a set of beliefs on my co-respondent by the use of various coercive methods of indoctrination, including destruction of their prior beliefs, it could be said that my tactics could do with a major overhaul, could it not? RESPONDENT: ... he then goes on, after 4 years, to write: [Co-Respondent]: ‘Just thought I should express my appreciation for these discussions on modern science ... Richard’s answers and Respondent No. 60 & Respondent No. 27’s questions throw a lot of light on these matters. Very stimulating. What I understood (from Richard’s mails mainly) so far is that: a direct experience is the final arbiter and while logic/mathematics can sharpen the directly experienced, they are subservient to the direct experience. This is in contrast to the theoretical physicist/mathematician’s viewpoint which is: logic/mathematics is the final arbiter – direct experience is prone to error. Please correct this appraisal if necessary’. [Richard]: ‘No correction necessary ... you have hit the nail right on the head’. [endquote]. RICHARD: As you seem to have overlooked the inclusion of my clarifying postscript I will re-post it here for reasons of integrity in communication: • [Richard]: ‘... the empiricism/ rationalism debate has a long history. [quote] ‘empiricism: the doctrine or theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience; the doctrine or theory that concepts and statements have meaning only in relation to sense-experience; (opp. rationalism)’. And: [quote] ‘rationalism: the doctrine or theory that reason rather than sense-experience is the foundation of certainty in knowledge; (opp. empiricism). (Oxford Dictionary)’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 24 January 2004). RESPONDENT: Correction is indeed necessary. RICHARD: Perhaps it might be handy to first ascertain just what my co-respondent made of my full response? Here are the relevant portions of what they wrote 26 days later (they wrote the above on Friday, January 23 2004 AEDST) to another: • [Co-Respondent]: ‘I had realized long ago [two years previously] when I corresponded to Richard that I was defending science based on my strong belief in scientists (no other discipline relies on objectivity and explicitly stated goals and experiment as the final arbiter) and decided to step out of my defence till I understand them myself to a great detail (I have good mathematical and scientific training and I have the toolkit to expand my knowledge if I find it necessary). (...) One can divide one’s experience into everyday stuff where one uses common sense and when it comes to subatomic world one says: oh I can’t use my common sense, it is beyond my understanding, here is some mathematical model explaining and predicting stuff that goes as far as creating an atomic bomb, sending space crafts: so I give up my common sense and use logic and mathematics here. And then comes a stage where one says: Logic and Mathematics have succeeded where a common sense approach have not (in explaining subatomic stuff and fast moving stuff). Therefore I will buy the consequences of Logic and Mathematics even if it means that I have to lay down my common sense. I will use the same principles that helped me to get beyond in the subatomic and fast moving universe and extrapolate and apply to this everyday world (and probably justify my spiritual fantasies). This is where Richard says (I think): Direct experience of the everyday world [sic] if you are willing to lay down in favour of your success in micro-worlds, you land up in imaginary world justified by mathematics and logic. The current models may be great in predictions but they are useful models ... that’s all ... do not justify one to jump to imagination sacrificing the common sense. Moreover these models that are based on logic and mathematics themselves use common sense at some level and nothing is just a standalone ‘logic and mathematics’ (as in there is no God that is running the world according to ‘logic and mathematics’)’. (Wednesday, February 18 2004 AEDST). And again 4 days later (also to somebody else): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘... all the mathematical models I was positing exists only in the mind not in actuality ... if human beings don’t think about them, they don’t exist’. (Sunday, February 22 2004 AEDST). Bearing in mind that English is not my co-respondent’s first language is it nevertheless clear enough that they grasped what was conveyed (that mathematical models have no existence in actuality) by the comparison of empiricism with rationalism ... as exemplified by their usage of the word ‘standalone’? Furthermore, as the topics being specifically referred to – the subjects which the co-respondents numbered as 60 and 27 were querying – were, respectively, the origin of the Einsteinian relativity theory (and, thus, the ‘Big Bang’ ex nihilo/’Big Crunch’ ad nihil’ theory) and the situation that, facts being rather thin on the ground, it is mainly the hypothesis/theory which gets most of the attention, are you so sure a correction regarding what was plainly categorised for convenience as the rationalist position, that reason is the foundation of certainty in knowledge (rather than concepts and statements having meaning only in relation to sense-experience), is indeed necessary? RESPONDENT: While theoretical physicists aim for elegance and simplicity and let themselves guide by intuition, these are by no way the final arbiters. RICHARD: Here is what those questions and answers being referred to – the subjects which the co-respondents numbered as 60 and 27 were querying – more or less revolve around: • [Richard]: ‘Mr. Albert Einstein (well-known for his ‘imagination is more important than knowledge’ quote) had this to say, in 1920, when reminiscing about the birth of his relativity theory in 1907: [quote] ‘There occurred to me the ‘glücklichste Gedanke meines Leben’, the happiest thought of my life ... for an observer falling freely from the roof of a house there exists – at least in his immediate surroundings – no gravitational field. Indeed, if the observer drops some bodies then those remain relative to him in a state of rest or uniform motion, independent of their particular chemical or physical nature (in this consideration the air resistance is, of course, ignored). The observer therefore has the right to interpret his state as ‘at rest’. [italics by Mr. Albert Einstein]. (page 178, ‘Subtle Is The Lord’, by Abraham Pais; ©1982 Oxford University Press). The observer (irregardless of the ... um ... the ‘right’ to subjectively interpret what is actually occurring as being a state of rest) is, of course, objectively falling at a rate of thirty two feet per second per second because of the very gravitational field Mr. Albert Einstein somewhat solipsistically intuited/imagined did not exist for such a person’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 60, 6 January 2004). RESPONDENT: Every theory strives to make a prediction which can be empirically measured. RICHARD: Whereas what I was pointing out, in those questions and answers being referred to, is epitomised by a particular query and response (re-posted further above): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘Deductive logic works like a chain; if you agree that each ring of the chain to be valid, you reach the last piece of the chain which is not apparent if you did not follow the process. (...)’. • [Richard]: ‘The validity of each link in a deductive chain is dependent upon the initial premise being correct’. [endquote]. The initial premise in question is, of course, that happiest thought which Mr. Albert Einstein ever had in his life ... because an edifice erected on quicksand, no matter how ornately adorned, is bound to eventually sink without a trace. RESPONDENT: The science game involves the promise that when the prediction is not in accord with reality, the theory will be regarded as ‘refuted’ and dismissed. RICHARD: I will draw your attention to something else re-posted further above (from that first page on which, you claim, some very sensible questions were asked): • [Co-Respondent]: ‘They [Quantum cosmogony/ Einsteinian relativity] are not commonsensical at all, agreed. But experimentation (please refer to: Michelson Morley kind of experiments for relativity, double hole experiments for quantum mechanics) has shown that the common sense understandings do not carry well in very high speeds as well as very small scales, and one is forced to theorize with the set of facts, and predict from the theory, and verify, and verify and verify, till the theory is found to be useful (like nuclear reactors, space ships, cosmic rays). • [Richard]: ‘History shows that a model can be found to be useful without it necessarily being correct ... and such a model is later discarded when another model can be found to correspond more accurately to the facts’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 30, 27 February 2002). And the reason why I draw your attention to it (if it be not already blatantly obvious that there is a vast difference between a theory being useful and being in accord with the facts) is also because of what you go on to say immediately below. RESPONDENT: To use No. 60’s story of the poor dogs, metaphorically: At the beginning, in 2001, correspondent No. 30 still could distinguish a circle from an ellipse. In 2005, he can’t anymore. Woof, woof! RICHARD: Presumably you are referring to this article: • [Mr. Duen Hsi Yen]: ‘Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936) also had dog troubles of his own, as described by one group of researchers working in his lab: [quote] ‘In a famous experiment by Shenger-Krestovnika, published in 1921, a dog was trained to salivate to a circle but not to an ellipse. The ellipse was then made progressively more like a circle. When the ratio of the axes of the ellipse was reduced to 9:8, the dog could discriminate it from a circle only with great difficulty. It showed some signs of success on this problem for about three weeks, but then its behaviour was disrupted. It was unable to respond correctly not only on this difficult task, but also when presented with obvious ellipses and circles that had given it no trouble in the earlier part of the experiment. What is more, instead of coming to stand quietly in the apparatus of the past, the animal now showed extreme excitement, struggling and howling’. [pp.119-120, ‘Ivan Pavlov’ by Jeffrey Gray; ©1979 NY: Viking]. This work was brought to my attention by a University professor/psychotherapist, who also informed me that this dog eventually had to be put to sleep! It never was able to recover from the ‘experimental neurosis’, induced by Pavlov. This result is even more amazing because the conditioning did not involve punishment! The dog was merely trained to perform a discrimination. When it couldn’t do it, it went crazy! Later, he and his co-workers discovered lots of other ways to create neurotic dogs. These results were so remarkable, that at the age of eighty, Pavlov launched himself into an entirely new career in a different field, to understand psychopathology. He soon was visiting psychiatric wards several times a week, discussing the various cases with the psychiatrists! What is even more insidious, is that our entire educational system, as it exists today, is based on this type of learning! Children daily are asked by teachers to make discriminations that they cannot make, and when they make a mistake, they are punished! (The process is often referred to as ‘operant conditioning’ or instrumental learning)’. (www.noogenesis.com/malama/punishment.html). How that example of operant conditioning/instrumental learning even remotely relates to my co-respondent comprehending that mathematical models do not describe the universe/ have no existence outside of the ratiocinative process simply defies sensibility. Perhaps a personal anecdote may be of assistance: when I was but a lad in high school (at 12-15 years of age), when learning about atomic theory, it was expressly explained that the model then being taught – a nucleus made up of protons and neutrons surrounded by electrons – was just that (a model) and was not, repeat not, to be taken as really being the case. And then came, thick and fast, in the ensuing years a bewildering array of sub-atomic postulates with peculiar names and properties wherein they were sometimes matter and sometimes energy – which otherwise causeless state apparently depended upon the human observer – only to be followed by the ‘String Theory’ ... a ‘string’ of energy so tiny that if it were to be compared with the magnitude of the known universe it would be but the size of a tree (if it had form). Predictably, it was being posited as being the smallest ... um ... ‘thingamajig’ beyond which there is no smaller and it, too, was to be the ultimate source of all things (if only it were real). Your commentitious allegation regarding ‘a wonderful example of brainwashing’ (not to forget your distinctly pointed operant conditioning/ instrumental learning allusion) rather begs the question as to who it is indeed that is thus brainwashed/ conditioned – and by whom and how and when – rather than anything else. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 97c, 20 September 2005) September 06 2005 RESPONDENT: Whenever you listen to a CD or your computer, think of old Max Planck ... RICHARD: Or, and more usefully in regards reconsidering what Richard says about quantum mechanics, you could think of what Mr. Jules-Henri Poincaré has to say about mathematical models (search it yourself with a search engine of your choice). RESPONDENT: I will reconsider what Richard says about quantum mechanics when he can explain to me how a CD/DVD player (laser) works without using concepts derived from quantum mechanics. RICHARD: In what way would another mathematical model of how a laser works – such as, for instance, the principle behind the laser (stimulated emission) being understood in terms of a classical field – motivate you to reconsider what Richard says about quantum mechanics? More to the point: just what is it that Richard says about quantum mechanics (and, for that matter, any other mathematical model), anyway? RESPONDENT: Take this nonsense from Richard (search it yourself with a search engine of your choice): ‘And quantum theory, for an instance of this, is most definitely based on a mathematical device (Mr. Max Planck’s ‘quanta’) initially designed to solve the hypothetical problem of infinite ultra-violet radiation from a non-existent perfect ‘black-box’ radiator and never intended to be taken as being real (...)’ [endquote]. RICHARD: Why is it [quote] ‘nonsense’ [endquote] to cite quantum theory as being an instance of physics having departed from being a study of the natural world (the physical world) and having entered into the realm of the mathematical world – an abstract world which does not exist in nature – when, for example, peoples far more knowledgeable on the topic than this layperson have described it as being [quote] ‘strictly phenomenological’ [endquote]? Viz.: • ‘History [of Quantum mechanics]: In 1900, Max Planck introduced the idea that energy is quantized, in order to derive a formula for the observed frequency dependence of the energy emitted by a black body. In 1905, Einstein explained the photoelectric effect by postulating that light energy comes in quanta called photons. In 1913, Bohr explained the spectral lines of the hydrogen atom, again by using quantization. In 1924, Louis de Broglie put forward his theory of matter waves. These theories, though successful, were strictly phenomenological: there was no rigorous justification for quantization’. (www.sciencedaily.com/encyclopedia/quantum_mechanics_1). RESPONDENT: The way in which there is no ‘perfect black-box radiator’ is the same way there is no ‘perfect circle’ ... RICHARD: Here are what some encyclopaedia articles have to say: • ‘black body: in physics, an *ideal* black substance that absorbs all and reflects none of the radiant energy falling on it. Lampblack, or powdered carbon, which reflects less than 2% of the radiation falling on it, approximates an *ideal* black body’. [emphasis added]. (©Columbia Encyclopaedia). And: • ‘A blackbody is a *hypothetical ideal* body or surface that absorbs and reemits all radiant energy falling on it’. [emphasis added]. (©Encyclopaedia Britannica). RESPONDENT: ... mathematics has this inconvenience if you start using it for describing things. RICHARD: But I am not using mathematics for describing things ... on the contrary I (repeatedly) say that mathematics do not describe the universe/have no existence outside of the ratiocinative and illative process. For just one instance: • [Richard]: ‘I do understand the value of pure science (theoretical science), as contrasted to applied science (practical science), in the area of research and development – just as I understand the value of pure mathematics as opposed to applied mathematics – as evidenced by the technological revolution and the main point I am emphasising is the dangers of taking the latest (supposedly) scientific discovery to be fact, as propagated by the popular press for instance, because theoretical science does not describe the universe ... mathematical equations have no existence outside of the ratiocinative and illative process. Perhaps this might go some way towards explaining what I mean: • ‘It must be realised, however, that the world of experience and observation is not the world of electrons and nuclei. When a bright spot on a television screen *is interpreted as* the arrival of a stream of electrons, it is still only the bright spot that is perceived *and not the electrons*. The world of experience is described by the physicist in terms of visible objects, occupying definite positions at definite instants of time – in a word, the world of classical mechanics. When the atom is pictured as a nucleus surrounded by electrons, this picture is a necessary concession to human limitations; there is no sense in which one can say that, if only a good enough microscope were available, this picture would be revealed as genuine reality. It is not that such a microscope has not been made; it is *actually impossible to make one* that will reveal this detail’. [emphases added]. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard; ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Once the not-observable as objects in space and time basis of sub-atomic particles is established – (as distinct from “visible objects occupying definite positions at definite instants of time” that is) – the mathematical processes involved unfold further mysteries accordingly. Vis: • ‘The process of transformation from a classical description to an equation of quantum mechanics, and from the solution of this equation to the probability that a specified experiment will yield a specified observation, is not to be thought of as a temporary expedient pending the development of a better theory. It is better to accept this process as a technique for predicting the observations that are likely to follow from an earlier set of observations. Whether electrons and nuclei have *an objective existence in reality is a metaphysical question to which no definite answer can be given*. There is, however, no doubt that *to postulate their existence* is, in the present state of physics, an inescapable necessity if a consistent theory is to be constructed to describe economically and exactly the enormous variety of observations on the behaviour of matter’. [emphases added]. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard; ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Almost needless is it to say, once this postulation is accepted – and as “an inescapable necessity” at that – there is no prize for guessing what will happen. Viz.: • ‘The habitual use of the language of particles by physicists *induces and reflects the conviction* that, even if the particles elude direct observation, *they are as real as any everyday object*’. [emphases added]. ~ (Prof. Sir Alfred Brian Pippard⁾ ©1994; Encyclopaedia Britannica). Videlicet: Thus the sub-atomic postulates (i.e., ‘particles’ aka ‘corpuscles’) have become “as real as any everyday object” and thereby assume the status of factoids in the minds of theoretical physicists and thusly to the general public – as revealed unequivocally by Prof. Pippard, a leading theoretical physicist in his day, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica of 1994 – via a sleight of hand (or, rather, a sleight of mind) which would be the envy of many a confidence trickster. I will repeat what I said earlier for emphasis: in any area of research I have ever looked into I have, more often than not, found that not only are facts rather thin on the ground but that it is mainly the hypothesis/theory which gets most of the attention. Which is possibly why many of the ‘facts’ later turn out not to be facts at all’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 27f, 21 January 2004). RESPONDENT: It was not at all a ‘hypothetical problem’ that the quanta solved ... RICHARD: All that is required is to type ‘ultraviolet catastrophe’ into an internet search-engine ... for example: • ‘This *theoretical* problem [the ultraviolet catastrophe] was solved by Max Planck, who had to assume that electromagnetic radiation could propagate only in discrete packets, or quanta. This idea was later used by Einstein to explain the photoelectric effect. These theoretical advances eventually resulted in the replacement of classical electromagnetism by quantum mechanics. Today, the quanta are called photons’. [emphasis added]. (www.answers.com/topic/black-body). RESPONDENT: ... but very actual measurements which contradicted the existing theory and which were perfectly explained by introducing the ‘quanta’. The OBSERVED spectrum of black body radiation could NOT be explained with Classical electromagnetism and statistical mechanics. The first sentence of Planck’s 1901 paper, which got quantum physics started, makes this abundantly clear: ‘The recent spectral measurements made by O. Lummer and E. Pringsheim1, and even more notable those by H. Rubens and F. Kurlbaum2, which together confirmed an earlier result obtained by H. Beckmann,3 show that the law of energy distribution in the normal spectrum, first derived by W. Wien from molecular-kinetic considerations and later by me from the theory of electromagnetic radiation, is not valid generally.’ (http://dbhs.wvusd.k12.ca.us/webdocs/Chem-History/Planck-1901/Planck-1901.html). RICHARD: Just for starters ... according to Mr. Max Planck, in his ‘Nobel Lecture’, of June 2, 1920, the measurements of Mr. Heinrich Rubens and Mr. Ferdinand Kurlbaum, which he refers to in the above quote, were of the [quote] ‘infrared residual rays of *fluorite and rock salt*’ [endquote]. Needless is it to add that, whilst fluorite and rock salt may be a quite lot of things, perfect blackbody radiators they are not? (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 97b, 6 September 2005b) September 07 2005 (...) RICHARD: But I am not using mathematics for describing things ... on the contrary I (repeatedly) say that mathematics do not describe the universe/have no existence outside of the ratiocinative and illative process. RESPONDENT: I’m completely with you here ... RICHARD: Good ... because that, in a nutshell, is [quote] ‘what Richard says about quantum mechanics’ [endquote] – and any other mathematical model of course – and nothing else. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 97b, 7 September 2005) September 08 2005 RESPONDENT: Richard, as you would have it, I’m off to more gullible pastures. RICHARD: Never mind how I would have it ... how do you have it? RESPONDENT: Have fun at the keyboard. RICHARD: I already am ... but thank you for your post-factum blessing, anyway. RESPONDENT: However, if you feel the sudden urge to put my challenge regarding quantum physics on your website in its entirety – and not only your part, even if you choose not to respond – it would make the evaluation of AF easier for potential newcomers. RICHARD: Ha ... if you want to have each and every thing, which each and every person chooses to write irregardless of its relevancy, on a website then how about you get your act together and spend the time, the application, and the money, in establishing, maintaining, and managing, a website of your own with its own associated mailing list? RESPONDENT: I’m sure you agree with this ... RICHARD: Your surety is entirely misplaced for I have no intention whatsoever of archiving irrelevant distractions away from what I have to say about mathematical models in general and quantum theory in particular ... that you chose to ignore my clear expression of what [quote] ‘Richard says about quantum mechanics’ [endquote] at the very top of my response is your business, not mine, and any attempt on your part to make it my business will fall on deaf ears. Here it is again: • [Respondent]: ‘Whenever you listen to a CD or your computer, think of old Max Planck ... • [Richard]: ‘Or, and more usefully in regards reconsidering what Richard says about quantum mechanics, you could think of what Mr. Jules-Henri Poincaré has to say about mathematical models (search it yourself at a search engine of your choice)’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 97b, 6 September 2005b). How on earth my quote of what Mr. Jules-Henri Poincaré has to say about mathematical models can possibly be misconstrued (such as for you to waste your time needlessly typing out both a pointless challenge and your codicil to same in this e-mail) has got me stumped. Here it is (in context): • [Richard]: ‘I did make the comment, in an earlier e-mail, that we could post URL’s to each other until the cows came home and the matter would still not be settled and the point I am making by providing this particular link (just as I did with the Mr. Tom Van Flandern link) is that, being but a lay-person in all these matters, what I see is theoretical physicists, mathematicians, logicians, and so on, discussing amongst themselves the validity/invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory. • [Co-Respondent]: ‘And of course the crucial question is that how is [discussing amongst themselves the validity/invalidity of this theory and that theory and any other theory] going to make a contribution to world piece \?/peace on earth? • [Richard]: ‘No, the crucial question is why a person, seeking to disallow the direct experience of infinitude – as in a pure consciousness experience (PCE) – by telling me that the universe is not infinite, eternal, and perpetual (such as in the 1997 e-mail exchange I quoted from in a previous post) because of this theory or that theory or any other theory, would even try flying that kite when it is patently obvious that mathematics do not describe the universe and that a mathematical equation has no existence outside of the ratiocinative process. For just one example: • ‘Poincaré put forward important ideas on mathematical models of the real world. If one set of axioms is preferred over another to model a physical situation then, Poincaré claimed, this was nothing more than a convention. Conditions such as simplicity, easy of use, and usefulness in future research, help to determine which will be the convention, while it is meaningless to ask which is correct. The question of whether physical space is Euclidean is not a meaningful one to ask. The distinction, he argues, between mathematical theories and physical situations is that mathematics is a construction of the human mind, whereas nature is independent of the human mind. Here lies that problem; fitting a mathematical model to reality is to forcing a construct of the human mind onto nature which is ultimately independent of mind’. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 18e, 25 March 2004). [...] RESPONDENT: At least for people who have read more than just David Bohm (aka J. Krishnamurti-inspired interpretations) or Encyclopaedia Britannica articles on quantum physics (and relativity, by the way) ... RICHARD: No amount of expertise in theoretical physics is ever going to make one iota of difference to the fact that mathematical models do not describe the universe/have no existence outside of the ratiocinative process. RESPONDENT: ... and can tell that here is a particularly evident case of taking down a strawman you first put up yourself. RICHARD: There is not, and there never was, a straw man (other than the one you put up that is). RESPONDENT: Well, the experienced AFer will understand that I have it 180 degrees wrong here. So be it. RICHARD: You do not have it 180 degrees wrong – you just have it plain old ordinarily wrong – and speaking of which ... have you noticed that none of the points you have raised, in your e-mails to me over these last 25 days, about me and/or my understanding/ experience have been correct? Not a single one. RESPONDENT: Peter, Vineeto, may you not find your lives completely wasted but profit in the best possible way from your ‘big leap’. RICHARD: As there is no [quote] ‘big leap’ [endquote] in actualism – that is the stuff of religionists/ spiritualists/ mystics/ metaphysicians and their ilk (theoretical physicists for instance) – your condescensive blessing is entirely uncalled for. RESPONDENT: I’m certain you will enjoy life with Richard. RICHARD: As the three of us socialise only for a few hours on an, at most, weekly basis are you also certain they will enjoy life for the remaining 165 hours ... or is a virtual happiness and harmlessness (according to you) dependent upon being with me? RESPONDENT: For taste’s sake, try not to be too hypocritical about honesty – and don’t, if possible to avoid, tell people you’re just being honest about honesty. RICHARD: Hmm ... so taste is to be the determiner of what a virtually free person may or may not inform their fellow human being about, eh? RESPONDENT: Well, I guess it’s impossible to avoid. RICHARD: Your guess is, not all that surprisingly by now, grossly incorrect ... hypocrisy is remarkably easy to avoid (provided there be pure intent of course). RESPONDENT: Caveat emptor. RICHARD: As the honesty referred to on The Actual Freedom Trust web site is self-honesty (being scrupulously honest with oneself) perhaps ‘caveat venditor’ might have been a more applicable finale to your dismissive summary of what you have made of actualism and actualists during your 25-day perusal. And I mention this because, in the final analysis, the only person one ever ends up fooling is oneself. (Richard, Actual Freedom List, No. 97c, 8 September 2005a) RETURN TO FACTS AND GROUPTHINK INDEX RICHARD’S HOME PAGE ACTUAL FREEDOM HOMEPAGE The Third Alternative (Peace On Earth In This Life Time As This Flesh And Blood Body) Here is an actual freedom from the Human Condition, surpassing Spiritual Enlightenment and any other Altered State Of Consciousness, and challenging all philosophy, psychiatry, metaphysics (including quantum physics with its mystic cosmogony), anthropology, sociology ... and any religion along with its paranormal theology. Discarding all of the beliefs that have held humankind in thralldom for aeons, the way has now been discovered that cuts through the ‘Tried and True’ and enables anyone to be, for the first time, a fully free and autonomous individual living in utter peace and tranquillity, beholden to no-one. Richard's Text ©The Actual Freedom Trust: 1997- . All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer and Use Restrictions and Guarantee of Authenticity