Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The warp drive will have to wait

translate.google.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 88 posts

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#61

Post by cousin_it »

danharaj wrote: post #57
cousin_it wrote: post #56

Come on folks. John Baez has dismissed it [1]. For those who don't know who John Baez is, it's as if Terry Tao dismissed your math homework. For those who don't know who Terry Tao is... whatever. Just stop. [1] https://plus.google.com/app/basic/stream/z13gzfm4xt2tuxehl04...

John Baez and Terence Tao are as nice as they are smart and i think you're doing them a disservice by using them to be condescending.

Have you read Baez's post that I linked? It's way more harsh than my comment. "Mumbo jumbo", "Failed a course in quantum field theory and then smoked too much weed"...

Also I'm getting seriously creeped out by the amount of EmDrive non-skeptics on HN. Maybe we should make a poll whether 0.999... = 1, and then say that anyone who insists on the correct answer is "condescending".

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#62

Post by aminorex »

cgriswald wrote: post #51
jdmichal wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not quite sure what you're suggesting. The universe and the science that describe it are the same thing. Much as I am the same thing as the chemicals and reactions that describe me. However, our understanding of the science may be flawed, and perhaps that's what you're really meaning to say.

That seems a bit like saying a CAD file describing a roller coaster is the roller coaster. We have a model of our perception of the universe

In that model, our model is the universe.

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#63

Post by vardump »

cousin_it wrote: post #61
danharaj wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

John Baez and Terence Tao are as nice as they are smart and i think you're doing them a disservice by using them to be condescending.

Have you read Baez's post that I linked? It's way more harsh than my comment. "Mumbo jumbo", "Failed a course in quantum field theory and then smoked too much weed"... Also I'm getting seriously creeped out by the amount of EmDrive non-skeptics on HN. Maybe we should make a poll whether 0.999... = 1, and then say that anyone who insists on the correct answer is "condescending".

Ad hominems and appeals to authority are such letdowns.

Almost as those who might even admit they know nothing about it, but feel they're qualified to judge validity of some scientific claim. And provide mantra as "evidence".

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#64

Post by cousin_it »

vardump wrote: post #63
cousin_it wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you read Baez's post that I linked? It's way more harsh than my comment. "Mumbo jumbo", "Failed a course in quantum field theory and then smoked too much weed"... Also I'm getting seriously creeped out by the amount of EmDrive non-skeptics on HN. Maybe we should make a poll whether 0.999... = 1, and then say that anyone who insists on the correct answer is "condescending".

Ad hominems and appeals to authority are such letdowns. Almost as those who might even admit they know nothing about it, but feel they're qualified to judge validity of some scientific claim. And provide mantra as "evidence".

I do know quite a bit about physics. But if I just said the EmDrive is nonsense due to conservation of momentum (which is the 100% correct answer with no caveats), people would shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing". That would be an appeal to authority. So I mention Baez preemptively, but it seems like that's not a winning tactic either. What would convince you, pray tell?

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#65

Post by vardump »

cousin_it wrote: post #64
vardump wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ad hominems and appeals to authority are such letdowns. Almost as those who might even admit they know nothing about it, but feel they're qualified to judge validity of some scientific claim. And provide mantra as "evidence".

I do know quite a bit about physics. But if I just said the EmDrive is nonsense due to conservation of momentum (which is the 100% correct answer with no caveats), people would shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing". That would be an appeal to authority. So I mention Baez preemptively, but it seems like that's not a winning tactic either. What would convince you, pray tell?

> you'd shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing"

I've said nothing like that.

A working experiment that provides irrefutable data is needed to convince me in any way. Refutation I'd need to leave for others to do, not my competence.

I really like EmDrive as an idea and hope it will work out. It's very inspiring when someone has the guts to push it despite the dominant (scientific) opinion. If it does work out, these people will be some of our greatest heroes.

After all, sometimes people like these have been right in the past in adverse scientific atmosphere. I'm just content to follow it from the sidelines.

If I had to bet on EmDrive, I'd have to bet against it.

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#66

Post by cousin_it »

vardump wrote: post #65
cousin_it wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do know quite a bit about physics. But if I just said the EmDrive is nonsense due to conservation of momentum (which is the 100% correct answer with no caveats), people would shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing". That would be an appeal to authority. So I mention Baez preemptively, but it seems like that's not a winning tactic either. What would convince you, pray tell?

> you'd shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing" I've said nothing like that. A working experiment that provides irrefutable data is needed to convince me in any way. Refutation I'd need to leave for others to do, not my competence. I really like EmDrive as an idea and hope it will work out. It's very inspiring when someone has the guts to push it despite the dominant (scientific) opinion. If it…

I understand your position.

The real question is how much you should weigh a single experiment vs. the abstract idea of conservation of momentum. It's tempting to trust the experiment all the way, and imagine that science demands such open-mindedness. But the more physics you study, the more likely you are to trust the abstract idea instead, because you realize just how incredibly well-supported it is. It's a kind of certainty that has almost no analogue in other sciences. Even in a very careful experiment, measurement error is many times more likely than overturning conservation of momentum. (Also measurement error is much more devious than people imagine, but that's another story.)

I'm very confident ($100 to $1 at least) that the EmDrive is a story of measurement error, compounded by ignorance and optimism.

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#67

Post by vardump »

cousin_it wrote: post #66
vardump wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you'd shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing" I've said nothing like that. A working experiment that provides irrefutable data is needed to convince me in any way. Refutation I'd need to leave for others to do, not my competence. I really like EmDrive as an idea and hope it will work out. It's very inspiring when someone has the guts to push it despite the dominant (scientific) opinion. If it…

I understand your position. The real question is how much you should weigh a single experiment vs. the abstract idea of conservation of momentum. It's tempting to trust the experiment all the way, and imagine that science demands such open-mindedness. But the more physics you study, the more likely you are to trust the abstract idea instead, because you realize just how incredibly well-supported it is. It's a kind of…

We're largely in agreement.

On a philosophical point of view, it worries me that physics might be optimizing towards a local maxima. Which might or might not be the global one. That there even might be something big it has missed. How would we know?

Even more so because physicists seem to be more and more specialized to a narrow sub-field. Everything is already so advanced it takes more and more years to just to master it. Individual contributions appear to be getting smaller and smaller.

Is it possible there's something they don't see because they're too near looking at it? Studying a mountain with a microscope. Is possible we're stuck in a some sort of dead end?

I really can't judge it either way. I just can't stop wondering about that.

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#68

Post by tunesmith »

cousin_it wrote: post #66
vardump wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you'd shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing" I've said nothing like that. A working experiment that provides irrefutable data is needed to convince me in any way. Refutation I'd need to leave for others to do, not my competence. I really like EmDrive as an idea and hope it will work out. It's very inspiring when someone has the guts to push it despite the dominant (scientific) opinion. If it…

I understand your position. The real question is how much you should weigh a single experiment vs. the abstract idea of conservation of momentum. It's tempting to trust the experiment all the way, and imagine that science demands such open-mindedness. But the more physics you study, the more likely you are to trust the abstract idea instead, because you realize just how incredibly well-supported it is. It's a kind of…

This discussion is like rationality vs empiricism in action.

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#69

Post by tzs »

cousin_it wrote: post #64
vardump wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ad hominems and appeals to authority are such letdowns. Almost as those who might even admit they know nothing about it, but feel they're qualified to judge validity of some scientific claim. And provide mantra as "evidence".

I do know quite a bit about physics. But if I just said the EmDrive is nonsense due to conservation of momentum (which is the 100% correct answer with no caveats), people would shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing". That would be an appeal to authority. So I mention Baez preemptively, but it seems like that's not a winning tactic either. What would convince you, pray tell?

> I do know quite a bit about physics. But if I just said the EmDrive is nonsense due to conservation of momentum (which is the 100% correct answer with no caveats), people would shut me down because "NASA scientists know what they're doing".

I wouldn't. However, I would ask why you think violation of conservation of momentum is completely dispositive, rather than just a strong reason for great skepticism?

From Noether's Theorem [1] we know that conservation of momentum is a consequence of physics being invariant under space translation. As far as I've been able to find, we don't know that a universe that results from a big bang must be isotropic. Observationally, ours appears to be, but there are some hints that it might not be, and scientists are taking those seriously.

[1] http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/noether.html

Re: The warp drive will have to wait

#70

Post by cousin_it »

tunesmith wrote: post #68
cousin_it wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand your position. The real question is how much you should weigh a single experiment vs. the abstract idea of conservation of momentum. It's tempting to trust the experiment all the way, and imagine that science demands such open-mindedness. But the more physics you study, the more likely you are to trust the abstract idea instead, because you realize just how incredibly well-supported it is. It's a kind of…

This discussion is like rationality vs empiricism in action.

Yes, that's exactly it. In science, rationalism (Descartes, Leibniz) has been much more fruitful than empiricism (Locke, Hobbes, Hume...) It's really strange when you think about it. The guys who trusted in divine order ended up discovering tons of things, while Francis Bacon, the father of empiricism and the modern "scientific method", didn't discover anything. That's a big part of the reason why I identify as a rationalist.
Post reply on HN