In sci.math Tony Orlow (aeo6) <aeo6@cornell.edu> wrote:
: Lester Zick said:
:> I hope Will and even Wolf get a chance to read this because it is
:> about as close to a "useful" "concrete" example of tautological
:> regression I'm likely to be able to provide. This what I mean by
:> subjective mechanics. And it's why I've been so insistent on an
:> essential definition of Newtonian gravitational mechanics to begin
:> with. It's called debugging reality.
:>
:> Regards - Lester
:>
: Very good! I think this is what everyone has been looking for from you.

: very good example of what you have been trying to convey, and I see the

: it now, and what you mean by [not]. It is related to proof by

: except you are already starting with the contradiction, and trying to

: the root cause of it. It's essentially like induction by contradiction,

: makes sense.

It does not make sense to me. There are not only 8 possible
theories of gravity. Just the 'non inverse square' part
alone allows for an infinite number of possible theories.
'non inverse square' includes every function except for 1/(d*d).

In sci.math Tony Orlow (aeo6) <aeo6@cornell.edu> wrote:
: Lester Zick said:
:> I hope Will and even Wolf get a chance to read this because it is
:> about as close to a "useful" "concrete" example of tautological
:> regression I'm likely to be able to provide. This what I mean by
:> subjective mechanics. And it's why I've been so insistent on an
:> essential definition of Newtonian gravitational mechanics to begin
:> with. It's called debugging reality.
:>
:> Regards - Lester
:>
: Very good! I think this is what everyone has been looking for from you. It's a
: very good example of what you have been trying to convey, and I see the sens of
: it now, and what you mean by [not]. It is related to proof by contradiction,
: except you are already starting with the contradiction, and trying to discover
: the root cause of it. It's essentially like induction by contradiction, and it
: makes sense.

It does not make sense to me. There are not only 8 possible
theories of gravity. Just the 'non inverse square' part
alone allows for an infinite number of possible theories.
'non inverse square' includes every function except for 1/(d*d).

Stephen

In sci.math Tony Orlow (aeo6) <aeo6@cornell.edu> wrote:
: Lester Zick said:
:> I hope Will and even Wolf get a chance to read this because it is
:> about as close to a "useful" "concrete" example of tautological
:> regression I'm likely to be able to provide. This what I mean by
:> subjective mechanics. And it's why I've been so insistent on an
:> essential definition of Newtonian gravitational mechanics to begin
:> with. It's called debugging reality.
:>
:> Regards - Lester
:>
: Very good! I think this is what everyone has been looking for from you. It's a
: very good example of what you have been trying to convey, and I see the sens of
: it now, and what you mean by [not]. It is related to proof by contradiction,
: except you are already starting with the contradiction, and trying to discover
: the root cause of it. It's essentially like induction by contradiction, and it
: makes sense.

It does not make sense to me. There are not only 8 possible
theories of gravity. Just the 'non inverse square' part
alone allows for an infinite number of possible theories.
'non inverse square' includes every function except for 1/(d*d).

On Wed, 25 May 2005 12:14:31 -0400, Tony Orlow (aeo6)
<aeo6@cornell.edu> in comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

Lester Zick said:

On Tue, 24 May 2005 13:44:06 -0400, Tony Orlow (aeo6)
<aeo6@cornell.edu> in comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

Lester Zick said:

On Tue, 24 May 2005 01:59:47 -0400, Tony Orlow <aeo6@cornell.edu> in
comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

In article <42925140.61440349@netnews.att.net>,
lesterDELzick@worldnet.att.net says...

On Mon, 23 May 2005 16:53:21 -0400, Robert Kolker
<nowhere@nowhere.com> in comp.ai.philosophy wrote:

Lester Zick wrote:

one way or the other in a multi body system. I'm still wondering if
Newtonian universal gravitation is to be characterized as an inverse
square point mass force how to characterize gravitation in GR?

To use Wheeler's comment. Mass tells spacetime how to bend and spacetime
curvature tells mass how to move. It is a simplification, but that is
the essence of the thing.

This is nothing but a word salad. Mass tells spacetime . . . Spacetime
curvature tells mass how to move??? This is nothing but the naivest
kind of teleological anthropomorphosis. Inverse square point mass
force at least says what Newtonian gravitation actually means.

Regards - Lester

Oh Lord Zester!

I must repectfully point to the particle at the center of that
expanding, circular wave. A stone fell there, which I had thrown some
moments before, only hoping to get the fsh excited. And now it is
meeting another wave and forming an intersection at some point, which
immediately becomes two. How fast will those two points move apart, in
that very first moment, as soon as they meet? Perhaps someone can do the
calculus for me. And, then, I have a harder job for you. Let's regresss
it infinitely, to account for all the dimensions that boiled down to
these few.

To address the issue at hand, rather than harp on more central issues
(heaven forfend!), it is entirely reasonable that, for each given entity
with considerable distance to any other entity, the point-source model
works, as long as one has the computational capacity to simulate all
points and their forces. I rather think that when the particles are
compressed under heat and pressure, and achieve some state of plasma,
they take on different properties, and besides, there are cancelling
effects that may invovle dimesnions, or integrations thereof, as yet
undiscovered. Or, at least that's my guess! ;)

Well, Tony, it's easy enough to guess why what's what. But at the
moment all I ask is for an accurate description of what is what. For
example, Newton's universal gravitation is conceived as a point mass
inverse square force which produces conic section planetary orbits.
Yet we know that even for two body gravitational systems planetary
orbits more resemble what Bob calls rosettes in polar coordinates. So
all I'm asking for at the moment is just a characterization of what
kind of centripetal force would be needed to produce such orbits?

Regards - Lester

I think it does boil down to the inverse square law, since we are in 3
dimensions. If we were in 4D space, it would be an inverse cube law. The
problem comes from the fact that we aren't dealing with point masses, but with
massive volumes. At least that's part of the problem. I think latency due to
the finite speed of light figures into the failures of Netwonian gravitation as
well, but I don't know enough to really comment on that.

Well, Tony, this is the reason I've been so insistent on getting at
some exact idea what we mean by Newtonian gravitational mechanics.
Let's see if we can apply a little subjective tautological mechanics
to see if we can resolve the issue in more definitive terms.

Let's suppose by Newtonian gravitational mechanics we mean exactly
the following and nothing more of any substantial significance: point
centric inverse square force. This we find will give us conic section
orbits adequate to define the vast bulk of cosmic orbits with minor
exceptions such as Mercury's perihelion advance which Bob likens to
polar coordinate rosettes. So we have to find out why and to do this
we have to consider and regress the problem tautologically.

Basically we are faced with a three element predicate structure:
point, centric, and inverse square. So to consider alternatives
subjectively we have to apply tautological alternatives to this
structure because when we do we will find that resolution of the
problem with Newtonian gravitational mechanics has to lie with
one tautological alternative or another.

In subjective mechanics we just consider tautological alternatives to
each part of a complex predicate and ask whether any particular
alternative offers the prospect of correcting the problem. Thus in the
case of "point, centric, inverse square" we apply the predicate "not"
to each predicate component individually (and technically to each
combination as well) to see whether that might resolve the problem.
And we know this has to resolve the difficulty with Newtonian
gravitational mechanics because the tautology itself is always true.
This is what subjective mechanics is all about and why it works.

So let's do it. Let's first say "point, centric, non inverse square"
which I somehow doubt would produce the effects observed on both
large and small cosmic scales. Next let's say "non point, centric,
inverse square". Now Newton proved analytically that gravitation for
spherical bodies could be considered a point source but even so we
know the sun is not exactly spherical yet any deviation from a point
source should have other detectable consequences. So the best we can
do with this alternative is put it in the doubtful category.

And finally let's try "point, eccentric, inverse square" and we can
see immediately that this offers the prospect to resolve the anomaly
of Mercury's perihelion advance in conventional Newtonian gravitation.

Of course this does not say where the eccentricity comes from or how.
These are all issues to be resolved. The critical point though is that
we are not just wildly speculating about hyperspace, time, and a host
of unessential factors unrelated to the problem at hand. We know where
the truth of the matter has to lie because the tautology itself is
always true. So resolution of any problem with Newtonian gravitation
in the form of one alternative "point centric inverse square" force
has to lie with some tautological alternative to those predicates.

I hope Will and even Wolf get a chance to read this because it is
about as close to a "useful" "concrete" example of tautological
regression I'm likely to be able to provide. This what I mean by
subjective mechanics. And it's why I've been so insistent on an
essential definition of Newtonian gravitational mechanics to begin
with. It's called debugging reality.

Regards - Lester

Very good! I think this is what everyone has been looking for from you. It's a
very good example of what you have been trying to convey, and I see the sens of
it now, and what you mean by [not]. It is related to proof by contradiction,
except you are already starting with the contradiction, and trying to discover
the root cause of it. It's essentially like induction by contradiction, and it
makes sense.

I would caution, however, that you may run into situations where two or more of
your predicate components are at fault, so that if you consider them one at a
time, you may not be able to resolve the situation. You may also find that one
of your predicate components can actually be decomposed into simpler
components, only some of which are faulty. If you have n predicate components,
you are going to have 2^n possible permutations of correctness, for each being
correct or not. In the example above, with three predicate components, you
could have the following table, where there are 8 possibilities, 1 represents
the original component, and 0 represents [not] that component:

Possibility point centric inverse square
0 0 0 0
1 0 0 1
2 0 1 0
3 0 1 1
4 1 0 0
5 1 0 1
6 1 1 0
7 1 1 1

It seems in this case that the problematic terms are "point" and "centric".
Large bodies are not points. They only seem like point sources of gravitation
at large distances. I think if the size of the objects is comparable to the
distance between objects, then the simplification of a body as a point breaks
down, and what you really have is a glob of gravitation pulling in more than
one direction.

I recollect that Newton proved that spheres act as points except for
tidal effects.

Now, I am not of the opinion that this really explains why
Newton's theory breaks down. I rather do think that relativity is correct, and
that relativistic effects in the presence of large masses or high velocities is
also at play.

Relativity may be correct if it duplicates non erroneous predicates in
Newtonian gravitations such as inverse square point resolution of
force.

Anyway, thanks for the detailed example of your subjective mechanics and
tautological regression. Science IS like troubleshooting the universe, isn't
it? And, so much more fun that troubleshooting computers.

It's kinda like the wild west at this stage. Thanks for the comments,
Tony. I agree with your observations concerning permutations of
predicates. But I suspect we can get at most combinations through
the negation of each predicate individually since if the combination
is wrong it should show up in at least one or the other.

At a guess I would say that the average professional in a particular
field might be able to analyze ten predicates or so in combination but
the average educated person only three maybe four predicates. You can
imagine how cognitively taxing this process can be. One of the reasons
I was so reluctant to get down to specifics was that I didn't know of
any concrete examples until the day before yesterday. This is one
peculiar aspect of subjective mechanics: we aren't actually aware of
what we're doing. We're aware of the stress involved but not what is
actually going on moment to moment. So even though I had solved the
problem of Newtonian gravitation and Mercury's perihelion advance
close to twenty years ago, I was still unclear on how I had solved it.

I understood the process in theoretical terms.I just couldn't put into
words exactly what had happened until a couple of days ago several
began discussing Newtonian gravitation in typically vague general
terms and I asked exactly what Newtonian gravitation amounted to.
And that put me in mind of what happened in terms of tautological
regression for the actual predicates of Newtonian gravitation.

Where most educated people can handle two, three, or four predicate
tautological regressions in parallel, empiricists can only handle one
predicate at a time. This is what makes empiricism largely useless
because it can't say what is true only what is false.

Let's suppose we take several predicates in parallel one or more of
which is in error. Empiricism considers such theories wrong in
general. If Newtonian gravitation is contradicted by Mercury's
anomalous perihelion advance, the theory itself is wrong. Then there
is no choice but to start over in cognitive terms.

This is why empiricism takes so long to get anywhere. If we consider
parallel predicate evaluation even in the context of a wrong theory we
can say what is definitely right. For example, if we consider Newton's
gravitational theory solely in terms of "point centric inverse square"
forces, and we know it's wrong on the empirical basis of Mercury's
anomalous perihelion advance, we can see exactly what's right by
regressing those predicates tautologically since the tautology itself
is necessarily true.Thus subject to the evaluation of other predicates
we can definitely say "point eccentric inverse square" gravitation is
definitely true. We don't understand the origin or exact meaning of
"eccentric" but we know the truth has to lie in that direction.

Empiricism gives us no direction whatever.

Regards - Lester