webolife wrote:You say your rope/chains actually exist, they are objects, they have shape.
Careful, the chain is the hypothesis of the theory. Hypotheses are the assumptions we make. We assume the chain exists and see if we can explain observations with it. We don't prove things exist, they either exist or they don't. A minor point.
webolife wrote:No mass, I presume, but if they are like my rays, they are responsible for the observation/detection of mass, and charge also?
There are exactly two ways to define "mass". The first is the "quantity" definition and the second is the "resistance to motion" definition. The first definition of math is a matter of counting. If something is comprised of 100 H atoms its mass is 100. If it's comprised of 10000000 links of chain then its mass is 10000000. In this sense the chain has mass. This definitions' distinguishing characteristic is that it is a
static concept. It is not terribly useful to us in general because it is not generally what we measure or detect, generally we observe the
motion (dynamic) of objects.
The second definition of mass is inertial mass or resistance to motion. You have to push or pull on an object to detect inertia, whereas "quantity" mass is a matter of counting. We detect inertia because every atom in the universe is pulling on every other atom in the universe via an anti-parallel chain (this is how thread/chain theory incorporates Mach's principle, which Einstein ultimately failed to do). Every time you move your pinky you are overcoming the aggregate tug of every atom in the universe, this is the reason for the detection of inertial mass.
webolife wrote:Your rope/chains are the aether of TT, n'est-ce pas?
I don't think it's fair to call the rope or the chains "aether" because
nobody has
ever proposed such a structure and called it aether. Everyone wants to say its aether just because the term "aether" has been bandied about for a thousand years. Just because they knew there must be
something "out there" that causes these strange behaviors, and they threw out a term "aether", doesn't mean everything gets branded "aether". What matters is the structure and how it explains what we observe. The structure is a chain. Aether supporters never stated such a thing and they do not get credit for it, whether the chain hypothesis is True or not.
webolife wrote:Action occurs along the rope/chains, but what physically starts the action along any particular path? What initiates the motion?
There are 2 ways to interpret your question. The first is largely philosophical i.e. you may be asking what the "origin of movement is". This is an invalid question because the question implies a contradiction. Everything has a cause so there can be no "original cause" because it would not have a cause!
The second way to interpret it is, what causes the torsion. I have explained that the electron shell expands, which torques the chains adjacent to the atom. For instance, the chain had a length of L with n links. Its "wavelength" was L/n. When the electron shell expands it must pull in some chain in order to do so, decreasing the chain's length. If it pulls in m links the new "wavelength" is L/n-m.
An atom can never be "at rest" because every atom is pulling on every other atom. Gravitation is inescapable. Every electron shell is trying to expand and become a straight chain against the pulling of every other electron shell.
webolife wrote:How are the "links" detected, measured? Specifically what is the connection between what we observe and the rope/chain model?
A lot of these questions are answered in the threads devoted to thread theory. The link itself is not directly detectable. We observe the universe by the phenomenon known as light. We cannot "see" a link because the torsion propagates along the links in the chain to our eyeball. Ultimately it doesn't matter if we can "detect" (whatever that really means) the aether, the chain, etc. What matters is can we hypothesize one or more structures that can explain what we observe.
We observe that light "arrives and leaves" as a particle i.e. it *appears* to be quantized. This is explained under TT. When the electron shell expands it can do so only at the expense of a certain number of "wavelengths". By wavelength I am talking about the distance between crests along the chain-rope. Where the chain-rope meets the atom one of the chain-threads is wrapped around in the loop I described previously and the other chain-thread continues to the center of the loop. The electron chain-thread goes "up" (or maybe "down") relative to the nuclear chain-thread. To maintain this orientation demands that the loop only takes in or lets out an integral number of wavelengths. This orientation is maintained by the "rattle" I have also described. Does this make sense? It's hard in words.
webolife wrote:Does time exist, other than as a math construct??
Time is a concept invented by humans just like love and justice. These concepts exist as a relationship among objects. If your concept is not a relationship among objects what is it?
webolife wrote:Is the measurements of two locations for the same object really all that time is?
Not quite. Two locations for the same object is the physical definition of motion. The
measurement of two locations is a way to
quantify motion (mathematical definition). What you cited is the
mathematical definition (and one I have used also). I have cited the mathematical definition because it still involves objects at least, and thus still has physical significance. The problem with most "definitions" I see is that they do not even involve objects at all! What are you doing if you're not studying something? Are you studying "nothing"? In any event this is the difference between a physics definition and a mathematical definition. Math demands quantification and, by extension, measurement. Physics is about understanding qualitatively. This is a semantic but immensely important distinction!
Time demands a comparison between motion of TWO objects. The definition of time is a comparison of the motion of two objects. This is the
physical definition (doesn't involve measuring). Time and motion can be understood
qualitatively as physical concepts (doesn't require measuring). To
quantify time, however, we have to make assumptions and/or have a reference standard. The mathematical definition is how we use the physical concept in our daily lives, by measuring it quantitatively. We measure the locations of A and B. A traverses the distance D and B traverses D/2. The velocity of A is 1 and the velocity of B is 0.5. B takes time 2 and A takes time 1 to traverse D. Of course this demands the assumption that A and B are not accelerating. Instead we could assume that A is not accelerating. Maybe our first measurement says A: D B: D/2 and our second one says A: 2*D B: D+D/2 and our third says A: 3*D B: 3*D+D/2. If A is moving uniformly then B is accelerating. If A is not moving uniformly then we cannot get a conclusive measurement without a third reference. Something has to be assumed or known so we can measure locations at even intervals (like rock-falls or earth-rotations or grains of sand falling through an hourglass or "photons"). But we can only understand it by having a reference standard that we assume behaves a specific way. Quantitative time is a convenient
concept.. We don't move through justice or dilate respect etc. These are all concepts that are used as convenient shorthands for (potentially complex) relationships among objects.
I am not against using these concepts. I make ample use of vectors, matrices, and differential equations as a necessity as a graduate student. But we can't get too carried away and reify these concepts into objects themselves. It is the objects that are important! Structures are what matter, they are what do things. My ball or fist can knock someone over but not my anger! My velocity vector or my force cannot DO anything. My FIST does something.
webolife wrote:Doesn't it take time to measure the two locations?
This question is kind of moot now and you should understand why if I've been clear. We don't have to actually measure locations to define motion or, by extension, time. What you are getting at here is that, conceptually, there is always a location between any other two locations. There is no "fundamental unit" of time (or distance for that matter) in physics. This only occurs in mathematics when we try to
quantify these concepts. We can't quantify the distance from A to B if its smaller than our smallest measuring brick (a continuous object, the fundamental building block). But Nature doesn't care if you can quantify it! A and B are separated by a distance, whether you can actually measure it or not.
Unfortunately mathematics is so deified today that the result of "fundamental units" is taken seriously. People actually believe that, because your smallest ruler is X long, nothing can be shorter or separated by a smaller distance than X!
This is what leads to the incongruous conclusions when a person applies math to physics without understanding what they're actually doing. They mix physical and mathematical definitions and mistake one for the other. Then they toss out definitions altogether when they forget that physics is the study of objects so mathematics can have no physical significance without objects! When we place ALL our faith in math we are placing ALL our faith on our ability to measure/quantify Nature. As I've shown this has limitations. In physics we explain what happened
qualitatively. We try to understand Nature regardless of measurement.
We must distinguish between qualitative (physics) definitions and quantitative (mathematical) definitions. Math is a tool that we use to quantify our qualitative concepts and apply them in life. As you said "doesn't it take time to measure the locations?" This is exactly the point, measurements are inherently subjective, we do it because it is
useful. The qualitative definitions explain what happens, it does not demand an observer/measurement. Unfortunately the usefulness of mathematics has clouded people's judgments into equating mathematical measurement/quantification with reality and qualitative understanding. I don't count deer to understand WHY the deer population fluctuates. I count deer to tell the hunters when it's hunting season, but it doesn't let me *understand* anything.
Likewise the definitions of addition and subtraction (objects moving toward and away from each other) reveals the limitation of mathematics very clearly:
2+2=4
This tells me that two groups of 2 objects move toward each other until they fill some spatial criteria. It tells me the initial state (2 groups separated by some distance from each other and separated from every object in the set Z each with two objects separated by some distance) and the final state (4 objects all separated by some small distance, the whole group of which is separated from every object in some defined set of objects Z). But it doesn't tell me HOW they got there i.e. which object(s) moved in which way to give us the final arrangement? Why are they moving? All the equation does is
describe what happened because it is a concept. Here I have a row of circles:
O O O
Now I say "the row of circles moved to the right":
_O O O
(The underscore is there because the forum interprets a space as nothing)
I have used the concept "row of circles" to
summarize what happened. But it doesn't tell me which circle moved first, how fast, etc. I could even say the "row of circles" moved into a "triangle of circles":
O O O
__O
O O
This doesn't tell me which circles moved which way, it doesn't tell me HOW or WHY this happened. It just tells me the initial state and the final state. This is what an equation does. It is a useful concept because it condenses something complicated into a compact form. But we cannot forget what we are losing when we do so. If all we want are the initial and final states then this is enough, but if we want to actually explain what happened, we will have to talk about the individual circles (objects) themselves, not about the concepts "row of circles" or "triangle of circles". This is why objects are so important in physics. Concepts are convenient shorthands, they leave out information. Eventually the mathematicians go to the ridiculous extreme of foregoing objects altogether. What would it mean, in the above example, to simply say a row became a triangle? You would have to assume the meaning or infer it by context at best. At worst you just trust the mathematician "knows what's going on".
webolife wrote:Perhaps what I offer is a description without a hypothesis, as in your misquote of Newton, who said [from Koyre''s translation] "I feign no hypotheses...[for the cause of gravity]", then went on immediately to suggest an all-pervasive aether.
I am aware of what Newton actually said. His usage of the word "feign" is considered archaic today so I always paraphrase him with "frame" to remain clear to a wider audience. Modern usage of "feign" essentially means inventing a lie or imagining. Newton used the definition at the time "to present".
And yes, I believe you have a description without a hypothesis. Please do not take this as an insult, I respect you, I am just offering my evaluation.
webolife wrote:Is the superiority of one or the other "hypothesis" to be judged on how precisely its terms are defined vs. its compatibility with observed phenomena?
When the presenter of a theory cannot define his/her terms in a single way and use them that way then he/she doesn't have a theory. It's called a "non starter". When someone tells you their theory involves square circles you don't have to listen anymore. It's not a matter of superior/inferior, a theory where the proponent cannot (or refuses) to define the strategic terms he/she uses is simply wrong.
As far as compatibility with observed phenomena, that is the last step in the scientific method. A theory that makes it to this step is considered a
valid theory. It's called "valid" because it can define its terms in a consistent way and involves no contradiction. Now we may consider its superiority or inferiority. If a theory can qualitatively explain more observations than another with equally many/complex assumptions we accept the new theory. If it can explain the same observations as another theory with fewer/simpler assumptions we accept the new theory. Note that this is subjective. This is the part where people decide what to believe. This is the step where the physics discussions occur. People in pubs and on forums are (ideally) discussing only valid theories, what they can/can't explain, and which assumptions are more simple/complex.
