thigle wrote:(plus you exclude subjectivity from the realm of science).
Indeed I do. Science has to be replicable: If someone else does the same experiment using the same methodology, he should get the same results as you do. If not, at least one of you are wrong.
thigle wrote:by contrast, you are just subjective, confused, and unprecise in your knowing (science):
Well, let's deal with those one by one. However, please remember that the centerpiece of science (or at least physics) is mathematics. Since I have not yet used any equations in this thread (except in the second post of the thread, and I don't think that one really counts, since I was only using the function 1/x as an example), it should be quite clear to you that I haven't shown the full extent of what I know about science.
thigle wrote:subjective: ('I trust...') well, exactly !
You don't like the word trust? How about I
know?
thigle wrote:confused: '...scientists to know science...) well, the aim of science is not to know science.
If you don't like that phrase, how about "scientists to understand scientific theories". Then, you go on to talk about the "aim of science", which is not what I was talking about anyway. What I said was a response to your phrase "that is a common, but incorrect, claim often made by scientists". Apparently, you were referring to a claim I made in my previous post, although it is not clear which claim you were referring to. However, it appears that there are two likely possibilities:
1) "The Second Law doesn't state that the entropy of all parts of an isolated system (such as the Universe) must increase, only that the
net entropy of an isolated system must increase." If you don't think that I reported the Second Law correctly, maybe you'll be more inclined to believe the Georgia State University's Department of Physics and Astronomy:
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hb ... eclaw.html2) "The Earth is not a closed system; it receives energy from the Sun in the form of electromagnetic radiation." Perhaps you would like to dispute that the Earth receives energy from the Sun? Or that the Sun's entropy increases due to this process?
thigle wrote:can you think of any better objectives for science then self-reference ?
Since we're on this subject now; yes, I can think of a better objective. The goal of science is to provide precise and accurate descriptions of natural phenomena using the scientific method.
thigle wrote:realize that world is not here because of science,
If by that, you mean "the world is not here because scientists have developed scientific theories", then I certainly agree. If you mean "the world is not here because there exist natural laws that can be discovered using the scientific method", then I certainly disagree.
thigle wrote:unprecise: you quote me: 'there are no closed systems as such in reality anyway. so concept of entropy is funded on approximation'. then you state '...possible to set up experiments where the energy that leaves or enters the system is very small compared to the energy changes that are being measured in the system. In these cases, the system can be treated as closed to a good enough level of approximation ... well, not good enough. very small is NOT none.
Unfortunately, any quantitative physical measurement (except counting) has some amount of uncertainty. However, you conveniently left out the rest of my sentence: "... good enough level of approximation
to observe what needs to be observe(d)" (I did forget that d in my original post). Suppose you want to show that the specific heat capacity of some substance is, say (967 +- 1) J kg^-1 K^-1. An
exact measurement, with absolutely no approximation, would not be required.
thigle wrote:if approximative method would not be found to be just that - an approximation, no relativity or quantum physics would be here at all and we would be still stuck with good old newtonian physics.
For centuries, the predictions of Newtonian physics approximately agreed with experimental results; the difference between the two was sufficiently small that it could be attributed to experimental error. However, near the turn of the 20th century, various experiments produced results that differed wildly from the predictions of Newton (or more accurately, Newton + Maxwell + many other scientists). The approximations from Newton's theory were so poor that the discrepancies with experimental results could not be attributed to experimental error. Therefore, new theories (relativity and quantum mechanics) came to be accepted.
thigle wrote:plus: 'there is one system that is completely isolated: the entire Universe.' well, this one really made me crack up. i had a tasty belly-tingling laugh. thanx :wink: (you are not really serious with this one, are you.?!)
Of course the Universe is isolated! By definition, the Universe is everything that exists. Things cannot enter or leave the Universe, since there is no "outside", by definition.
thigle wrote:please, try to understand what science is as such, how it appeared and then established, in western world-view first, then on this whole planet,
As a matter of fact, I've read two "history of science" books, hundreds of pages each. They detailed the development of many important scientific theories.
thigle wrote:and especially what its relationship with being and existence as such is. that you never heard of syntropy is prolly just a result of your own ignorance of anything that doesn't fit to what you consider (or was taught) science to be, or perhaps you just simply aren't that well in.formed yet.
Ok, I must concede that I am not yet a professional scientist. Currently, I am an undergraduate student at UCLA who has just finished his freshman year. My major is mathematics, but I have also taken 2 physics courses, and I plan to take more in the future.
I may not be an expert in physics, but I do understand at least the basics of the major theories in physics (classical mechanics, theory of waves, kinetic theory of gases, relativity, quantum mechanics) and how results are derived
mathematically (not through vague inferences).
Hopefully, you realize that vague statements (such as the popular statement of Newton's Third Law: "for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction") are not the theory itself, but a convenient way of explaining the general ideas of the theory to non-scientists, who would be confused by the precise statements. To again use Newton's Third Law as an example, the precise statement (the one that Newton himself actually wrote and used) is in fact an equation relating two vectors, the force of one object on a second object, and the force of the second object on the first. Unfortunately, some people read the popular statement and think they've understood "Newton's Third Law", when all they've really understood is a "watered-down version", if you will. Similarly, entropy is popularly defined to mean "disorder", but this is
not the real definition that is used by people who study and use the theory. The real definition is k * ln (omega), where k is Boltzmann's constant and (omega) is the number of possible states of the system.
thigle wrote:if rigidity of you-like unfree mind would prevail, we would still be running exclusively on euclidean geometries. (you know, at the time, it was not in the textbooks...)
Your grammar is rather awkward there, but I'll assume you meant that if everyone thought like me, nobody would know about non-Euclidean geometries. However, you are mistaken because:
1) The discoverers of non-Euclidean geometries followed the valid rules of reasoning. They started with a non-conventional but consistent set of assumptions (for instance, that given any line and a point not on the line, it is possible to draw infinitely many lines through the point that are parallel to the original line), and through a chain of logical deductions, managed to prove theorems (ex. if two triangles are similar, they must be congruent). What they did not do is throw down vague ideas like "space is curved". In fact, I've read some non-Euclidean geometry proofs. Have you?
2) For every valid new idea, there are a thousand new ideas that are just plain wrong. Of course, we don't hear about these wrong ones because, well, they're wrong! In order to seperate the genuine new discoverers from the "cranks", the burden is placed on the would-be discoverers to demonstrate the validity of their new ideas. The discoverers of non-Euclidean geometry did indeed meet this requirement; in fact, it was proved that if Euclidean geometry is consistent, then the non-Euclidean geometries must also be consistent. In physics, a would-be discoverer typically must show that a) His new idea is consistent of known experimental results, b) His idea leads to predictions that are testable experimentally, c) His idea is logically consistent, etc..
3) Non-Euclidean did eventually make it's way into the textbooks. But before the consistency proof, it's validity was questioned by some mathematicians. But that is the way mathematics (and the scientific method) is supposed to work: All new ideas are scrutinized. Correct ideas survive this scrutiny and become accepted, incorrect ideas don't.