Arronax and Nasrudin are HUMAN

*Snorts*

Yeah, like a thread EVER got back on topic here once we found something better to discuss. You've just proved your lack of knowledge about how the board really works - any regular regular knows that the chances of any given thread staying on topic are so remote that it rarely happens. It's one of the boards talents - a tangent to explore can be found before the end of the first page.

 

'Scuse me? I don't think I actually need to quantify this, as it's obvious enough as it is.
Alright, let's take this step-by-step.
1. Do you agree with me that as the distance between items increases, shape dependency decreases because the difference in distance caused by shape becomes smaller compared to the distance between the centers of mass?
2. Do you agree with me that this doesn't happen in your model, as there is no real "force" that is distance-dependent?
3. Do you agree that 1. and 2. mean that the two theories are mathematically unequivalent?

Oh, and could you please explain the periodic motion stuff to me again? Because I don't get it. I don't see linear motion, with energy imparted by the big bang and some expansion, causing the periodic behaviour of multi-satellite systems.

And since we generally link the tides of oceans to the moon's gravitational attraction, how do you explain that in your model?

 

ok, since you people have totally lost the point: I'll explain it as I understand it (note: this is from an idea I had after I shut off my internet, so I'm copying it from a word document

[SPOILER CONTAINED]
I didn't have the patience to read all five pages, so bear with me if I repeat something that someone else started... (this is a SPOILER) when you speak with Nasrudin, he says that he retreated into his 'shell' for nearly two thousand years.... it could be that he was elven, but his 'shell' looks human b/c it has no racial distinctions such as pointy ears... and the same with Arronax... he tells you in the Void that he too had spent nearly two thousand years in his shell.... and it's prolly the same case... but speaking of such things... why was Kerghan a snake-like creature? I didn't understand that (I apologize to anyone who has read this and hasn't beaten the game, you now you the ending, but you were warned!!)

 

Matt, the topic isn't goin to go back on track. Just enjoy watching Chalupa being beaten senselessly by the intelligent people on the boards.

 

Calis, if you read your first point carefully you will notice that you have said "shape dependency decreases because" of shape dependency. Your argument is circular and your invitation for me to contradict what I have said earlier is denied. The force of attraction, g, is entirely dependent on distance and so your assertion that "there is no real 'force' that is distance-dependent" is grossly inaccurate. ALL forces are dependent on distance and if you don't know that yet I suggest that you take another tack in your studies. But perhaps I don't see exactly what you're driving at; if that is so, then show it to me plainly and simply; please, no more of this "difference in distance caused by shape becomes smaller compared to the distance between the centers of mass".

To better convey how periodic motion finds its niche in the ToEE, I will offer you an analogy. Consider the explosion of a fragmentation grenade in a perfect vacuum; this is the Big Bang. Once the fuse is burnt the energy of the explosives is released and the outer shell of the grenade is torn asunder and flung in all directions. Many of the fragments are sent spinning by the expanding forces imparted by the explosion. Each fragment that spins has a period; so it is with celestial masses. The reason that celestial masses haven't STOPPED spinning is that there is no resistance in a perfect vacuum.

Your question about the tides is a good one yet it assumes that gravity is a cause as opposed to an effect. With gravity as an effect the tidal forces become the effect of an effect. This is far removed from a simple analysis of cause and effect. The tides themselves are the result of the Coriolis force, geologic factors, and temperature fluctuations too numerous to count. Who is to say that exponential expansion isn't the conservator of a periodic motion in our oceans which mimics the location of the moon?? Orbital motion is perpetual and so is expansion under the ToEE; this source of "free" energy could have any number of effects on the effects that govern the tides. The links of effects to effects can go on forever if one can look hard enough. It is the paradox of this argument. Schrodinger's cat cannot be both dead and alive and yet it is; single causes can have many effects and single effects can have many causes. The tides may or may not be caused by the moon; my connecting them to the ToEE would do little to prove things either way.

 

I think I said

But by all means, continue.

Well yeah. I was talking about your model, my forum physics sparring partner. If you claim gravity is a phenomenon caused by expansion, that would mean there's no force the masses exert on each other. I know perfectly well that in classical gravitation we're talking about a force. Your theory is about the appearance of a force, unless I've been grossly misreading the last few pages.

Right. In high school physics you take the mass as concentrated at the center of mass. Because of the fact that the mass is in the entire object instead of being a point mass, you have to integrate. When the length over which the mass is distributed becomes smaller compared to the distance between the centers of mass, the integration outcome will be closer to the two-point-masses model. It won't be exactly the same, but it sure as hell won't be anywhere near the effect orientation and shape have in your model.

That would just explain spinning. It would not explain going in circles. You'll need a change of direction for that. I don't believe you can explain periodic motion in more complex systems without that actual change in direction, which requires an actual force rather than independent expansion.

Seems far-fetched to me, but ultimately impossible to prove without a detailed model of it all, so I'll concede here.

 

actually, that was a double-post on accident... I dunno how it happened... I think I clicked submit twice or something... but how did you get from Arronax to ? -nevermind... someone struck the point that this board rarely stays on topic... ugh, you've K'ung Foozed us!! :lol: :lol: (we're schizts! )

 

I think Calis is saying that mass integration equations come closer and closer to point mass equations as the object-size-to-separation-distance ratio becomes zero and that "it sure as hell won't be anywhere near the effect orientation and shape have" in my model. I'd just like to know what "effect" Calis finds implicit in the ToEE. I feel that I provided a fairly simple example earlier with two spherical masses and then Calis brought in the example of a cylinder and a sphere. Since, Calis has maintained that the cylinder/sphere system has different properties under ToEE and Newtonian analysis but he has not gone so far as to tell us -- specifically -- what those differences are. I have invited him to clarify several times now and I do so again: please, Calis, tell us how the cylinder/sphere system behaves differently under the ToEE than it does in the Newtonian model.

The universe is in a constant state of expansion (and not just that which goes on under the ToEE). Orbits which appear to be circular are actually waves which propagate from the universal core, the site of the Big Bang. The form is that of a sine wave if the orbit is perfectly circular. An object doesn't orbit another object -- two objects orbit a common center. Astronomers are able to tell that extremely distant stars have planetary bodies because the suns appear to "wobble" even though the planets aren't visible at such distances. Now, while the path of a single orbital body would depict a wave, two such bodies depict two waves which cancel each other out to form a line extending from the universal core. Throw more orbital bodies into the equation and the values of the waves will always cancel each other out to form a line extending from the universal core. Periodic motion DOES require an "actual force" but that force does not come from Newtonian gravitation or the ToEE; it comes from the Big Bang. Newtonian gravitation and the ToEE only explain how things are bound from flying apart in all directions. It may appear that bodies are changing their direction but in actuality they are all headed in the same direction just as a glass of water is roiling and moiling at the atomic level but seemingly motionless from our more holistic perspective.

Forces which are apparent are known; those that aren't aren't. Funny, but true.

 

Well, the fact that the actual acceleration of the cylinder will be much larger if the axis is aligned towards the other object, regardless of distance, would be the main difference.

So why are they expanding in a wave? The big bang tells the masses: "Behave like a wave", and they do? You're moving away from linear motion just "because"?

I still don't think you can describe complex orbital systems with linear motion and sine waves. Well of course you could add up a buncha sines and arrive at any periodic system (Fourier proved that) but it seesm fairly far-fetched to me.

What's your point?

 

OK, I apologize for coming into this so late. I guess somehow I feel I've earned it just by virtue of the fact that read through all this garbage. Now, I only had a minor in physics and major in philosophy of science, but I'd have to say, in my twopenny throw here, this ToEE is neither T nor EE.

Rather it's bonghit science.

I had plenty of that back in college. Heck, I thought I was so smart that I'd just stick it to the man and drop out. Of course I went back, as truly I was just sticking it to myself in terms of knowledge. The good thing about the academy is that they can guide you, tell you what books are out there, and make sure you attack every problem with the intellectual rigor to produce a sound idea. I remember when I was 18, I decided my "theory" was that the universe was in an infinite string of expansions and contractions with no beginning and no end. Don't bother me about the science if you know it. I was 18. Is till think it's a beautiful idea, but it's no bloody theory. It's something I wanted to believe beause I liked it. It was, at least with the science we knew then (and likely now) untestable.

Just like ToEE. ToEE should be called HoEE (hypothesis). A theory is not a theory until it is rigorously tested in some way, either through experimentation or math. Then it may be proven a law, but only when it is logically impossible for it to be otherwise. Otherwise it's no more than an idea. Now, I won't say that Chalupa (cadenta) isn't bright, but as she is obviously missing anything even related to rigor, what she has here is an idea, pure and simple. It's a neat idea, but it has exactly no explanatory power. The theories we have now already sufficiently powerfully explain what she seeks to explain. Also, if the universe is expanding exponentially, all of the universe, every iota, every photon and every quark, then it simply cannot be observed, as all observation material would be expanding at exactly the same rate as the item observed.

Chalupa, check out the cosmological constant. Oddly, it's coming back into vogue becasue of string theory. It was Eintein's mixup. He used it to try to make the universe stable, which it doesn't seem to be. It still isn't seen as stabvle, but that same number is coing back into play by the work of some of the physicists working on string theory, well, m-theory now.

Also, it's worth pointing out that, according to some of the latest work on cosmology, both by String theorists and their enemies, that the graviton may very well be logically necessary to unify gravity and EM. Already, string theory has shown that gravity can unify with the strong and weak forces. The graviton, or actually any other theory that successfully establishes gravity at all scales, obviates the need for your theory. The universe is expanding, and its expansion is measurable. Gravity's effect in this universe is observable, and may soon be observable at planck distances as well as the larger distances it works for now (and it does work).

To sum up: The difference between an idea and a theory is twofold. The theory MUST BE RIGOROUSLY TESTABLE and the theory must explain something that is hitherto inexplicable. "ToEE" does neither.

PS: c is not relative. No, no, it is not. Except in very bizarre instances, I am not sure you'd grasp (hell, I don't. Fuck that, most physicists don't) light always travels at the same speed. It is around that speed that AVERYTHING ELSE is relative.

 

lab, there is no need to apologize for coming into the discussion at this point; this is, after all, a FORUM. I've invited others to join the discussion before and you shouldn't consider yourself an exception to that. Anyone that's waded through the previous five pages has every right to speak up at this point.

You say that you have two science-related degrees and I find this hard to believe when you don't know that the words "hypothesis" and "theory" are synonymous. Look each up and you will find that the definition for each contains the other word. And don't tell me that the scientific definition is different -- science is founded on language, not the other way around. I considered dubbing it the HoEE at the beginning and ToEE happened to roll off the tongue more smoothly.

I know that the graviton is necessary for the Newtonian model. Every form of energy has its associated particle and science has found each one -- except for the graviton. The absence of this discovery was part of the reason that I formulated my theory. If there really is a graviton and it has eluded us up to now then perhaps its speed and small size exceed that of the photon; this is absurd and yet not outside the realm of possibility.

I believe that the universe has taken the form of a fractal and that expansion which goes on at the largest scale is mirrored at the smallest. All unifying theories seek the trunk of the tree of knowledge; induction is our best tool for finding similarities in the elements of nature. Certainly, something must be provable for it to become scientific fact and yet science begins with theories and hypotheses or its investigations become aimless.

Calis, if the cylinder of your example were expanding faster along its length than along its width then what you say would be true, but it isn't. If objects were expanding non-uniformly under the ToEE then there would be no sense of proportion and the universe would have long since ceased being. The cylinder WILL expand towards the sphere faster when it is end on but not as significantly as you insist. I think you forget that the exponential effect is diverted along three dimensions (possibly more) and that its scale is becoming smaller at a rate which is scaled to its own expansion.

I never said that the universe is "expanding in a wave". I meant to show in my previous post that the universe's expansion occurs along lines and the waves of my example were meant to be the dynamic forces found in orbits. I was attempting to explain to you how periodic motion, too, can mesh with current cosmology. My first attempt at this was the example of the perfect-vacuum grenade. It may seem unorthodox but, as you say, Fourier has already worked out the mathematics for just such a system.

I was waxing poetic at the end of my previous post. It was just another way of saying we only know what we know.

 

i also noticed that while arronax is lvl 50 he still has 55 points to spend and he has no scheme

 

thank god! someone who is FINALLY back on topic!! thank you Senior Wolf. I hadn't noticed that... I doubt Arronax is capable of using them, since the game doesn't seem to use skill points after a certain level... oh, btw, do you think Arronax and Nasrudin are human? or do you follow my belief? or something different?

 

OK, I looked them up. Very different. Also, for any word that has a specific scientific (or any field-specific) definition, if you are working in science, you should use that deifntion. If you are discussing science, you should use that defintion. It would be very difficult to prove that science is founded upon language. Certainly it uses language. It is language dependant, but that is not the same.

AND

Sorry to anyone who is offended that I posted nothing but definitions in two posts in two days, but I was challenged on my vocab in the same period.

 

Nasrudin ruled the Elven Council for almost 2000 years, so we can safely assume that he is elven. Especially seen in the light of the things Khergan wrote in his journal (the one that you find in the lab at the Stone Cutter Clan), namely that he was the first human to sit in the Elven Council.
And yes, Nasrudin was there at the time, since he (and Arronax) helped banish Khergan into the void.

-Stuart

 

OK, this thread is plenty spoiled, but SPOILER anyway.


The question isn't whether Nasrudin and Arronax were human or elvin in the plot. It is obvious they were elves. However, the designers, for some reason no one has yet been able to fathom truly, made them human. Check the character sheet. That's what the thread was about. And so people had fun speculating why Troika folks would have done this, even though it was likely just a mistake.

 

I believe that they were both Elves, but they retreated into thier magi "shells' which I believe to be race-less... I think it's just a generic humanoid shape, with no racial distinctions.

 

The definitions in MY dictionary go as follows (Webster's II New Riverside Dictionary):

theory 1. A general principle formulated to account for certain observable phenomena: hypothesis. 2. A body of principles governing the study or practice of an art or discipline. 3. Abstract reasoning. 4. An assumption or guess.

hypothesis 1. A theory that explains a set of facts and can be tested by further investigation. 2. An assumption used as a basis for investigation or argument.

Even the definitions that you provide aren't "very different". The first points of each one match up in meanings and words although it is implied that theories have a more realistic basis. Point five for "theory" matches up with point two for "hypothesis". I'd also like to indicate that point three for "theory" uses the same word in defining itself in a seemingly contradictory statement; that's dirty pool in the world of dictionaries. I'm inclined to think that you procured your definitions from a Web-based utility with little or no qualifications.

Still, this definitive quibbling is besides the point as are the comments which relate to the thread title. The first page, for the most part, was following the title's lead but the posts turned to a hard science discussion shortly after that -- anyone paying the slightest attention would have realized this. The House of Lords isn't known for its continuity as regards staying on topic but I would hope that newcomers to this thread would respect the post count of this thread and its seniority; it has, after all, been around for a few months and is currently one of the most continuous discussions, nearly rivaling mrnobodie's joke thread (simply because few other threads come even CLOSE to the aforementioned's 30+ pages).

I really think that the ToEE could be the basis for a unifying theory and I invite any and all discussion on this topic.

 

i was reading ferret and chalupas argument and someone said that black is all colors. Wrong. the correct answer is brown

 

Alright, I'm just gonna drop the entire cylinder issue. I still don't think the two theories are reconcilable in terms of observation, but two pages are enough for this issue, and I'm tired of it already.

Yes, dynamic forces found in orbital systems cause the periodic motion.. What, praytell, is the cause of these forces in a model where an actual force of gravitational attraction doesn't exist? Spinning bodies are all swell, but they don't explain the periodic motion in planetary systems. Not even Fourier's ghost could make them.

I guess what I'm really asking is:
"Within the TOEE, do celestial bodies do anything else than move in a line and spin around? If so, what causes their change in direction? If not, how does this result in complex orbital systems? "

The most obvious problem I guess I still have with your theory is that the perceived acceleration of two objects towards each other is volume-dependent rather than mass-dependent. That's a pretty nasty break from the model we've used so far. Convince me it makes more sense.

Also, you name-dropped a few times with quantum mechanics and special relativity. Care to elaborate on that at one point or another?

Quantum mechanics has had some success by defining forces by defining elementary particles for them. However, quantum theories on gravity have also been formulated that don't require a graviton. Since we're name-dropping anyway, I'm gonna say: "Loop quantum gravity, tralala."

Once again: General relativity relies, among other things, on gravity being a real force that propagates with c (Lorentz already thought of this). Recent measurements conform *exactly* to this theory. It doesn't conform exactly to newtonian gravitation, which you claim the TOEE is consistent with in terms of observed behaviour. Why would a theory that relies on gravity being a real force that propagates with c, conform *exactly* to our observations, if gravity isn't, in fact, a cause rather than a perceived effect?

I got some more questions but I'll leave them for now, or this'll get too messy to be any kind of coherent debate. (some would say we're already well past that point)