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Category Archives: Science

Science particularly as related to creation and the creation-evolution controversy

Set theory and logic and their dual

May 20, 2020 11:40 am ⋅

(1) Set theory and logic, (2) number and algebra, and (3) space and time are three foundational topics that each have duals. Let us begin with the standard approaches to these three topics, and then define duals to each of them. To some extent, the original and the dual may be used together.

(1) Set theory and logic

A set is defined by its elements or members. Its properties may also be known or specified, but what is essential to a set is its members, not its properties. The notation for “x is an element of set S” is “x ∈ S”. A subset is a set whose members are all within another set: “s is a subset of S” is “s ⊆ S”. If subset s does not (or cannot) equal S, then it is a proper subset: “s ⊂ S”.

The null set (∅) is a unique set defined as having no members. That is paradoxical but not contradictory. A universal set (Ω) is defined as having all members within a particular universe. An unrestricted universal set is not defined because it would lead to contradictions.

The complement of a set (c) is the set of all elements within a particular universe that are not in the set. A union (∪) of sets is the set containing all members of the referenced sets. An intersection (∩) of sets is defined as the set whose members are contained in every referenced set.

Set theory has a well-known correspondence with logic: negation (¬) corresponds to complement, disjunction (OR, ∨) corresponds to union, and conjunction (AND, ∧) corresponds to intersection. Material implication (→) corresponds to “is a subset of”. Contradiction corresponds to the null set, and tautology corresponds to the universal set.

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Three kinds of empirical science

October 17, 2019 12:08 pm ⋅

This post is related to an old post here.

Broadly speaking, there are three kinds of empirical science, which correspond to three views of nature.

(1) The ancient view of empirical science is represented by Aristotle, which includes the careful observation of undisturbed nature. Motion, for example, meant natural motion, not “violent” motion in which there is a change of the natural course of things. Experimentation was not considered a way to understand undisturbed nature.

(2) The early modern view of empirical science includes experimentation because nature is understood to include what happens after an intervention in the course of nature. These experiments allowed early modern scientists to isolate causal factors in nature. The human observer was not considered part of any experiment.

(3) The late modern view of empirical science includes the observer as part of nature. The distinction between natural and artificial is discarded. The origin and nature of humans is included in his view of nature. Empirical science covers all aspects of human beings that can be observed. The scientist has a double life in which they both are and are not the object of science.

The second kind of empirical science is superior because it goes beyond the undisturbed nature of the first kind and does not include the contradiction at the heart of the third kind.

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Terminology contexts

October 8, 2019 5:18 pm ⋅

This post continues the one here. While I avoid coining new terms or new definitions, some have been necessary. To have a consistent vocabulary, I try to imagine contexts in which they easily fit.

Some words are simply variations of words in use: distime is like distance; dischronment is like displacement; chronation is like location; etherance is like mass; levitation is the opposite of gravitation; and oldtons are the units for release, analogous to newtons for force. Metreloge is like horologe, which is a clock.

One context is racing. The term pace is used, particularly in running and (bi)cycling to mean the time interval per unit distance, which is the inverse of speed. The direction is ignored or assumed to follow the course of the race so a new term is needed to indicate the vector version of pace. A term that has been used is lenticity, from Latin lentus, slow. [Note: previously used legerity, which is an old literary term for lightness of movement.]

The second context is transport, such as package delivery. Consider an order to expedite a delivery. That means to reduce the time of transport, analogous to de-retardation. Release is analogous to a force applied. A package stamped with “RUSH” gets a greater effort to reduce the time of delivery, analogous to a negative release. Drawing means a release over a distance, analogous to a force applied over time (which is called impulse). Repose is a release applied over a dischronment, and is the inverse of work. Lethargy is the capacity for repose, which is analogous to energy.

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Intentional and extensional causes

September 30, 2019 1:14 pm ⋅

This post continues previous posts on causes, especially the one here.

Final and formal causes constitute top-down causality, which may lead to efficient and material causes. Material and efficient (mechanism) causes constitute bottom-up causality, which may lead to formal and final causes. Top-down is intentional. Bottom-up is extensional.

The Inverse Causality Principle states that top-down causality is inverse of bottom-up causality.

The Inverse Correspondence Principle states that intentional motion is the inverse of extensional motion and experimentation is the inverse of observation. Similarly, transmission is the inverse of reception, developmental is the inverse of empirical, and time is the inverse of space.

The goal of science is empirical theory. The goal of engineering is development of something practical.

Goal and action go together like form and content or matter.

Consider Galileo dropping two balls, one wooden and one metal, from the tower of Pisa. One observer says it’s a race to the ground. Another observer says it’s an experiment. What is the nature of the balls? Or what does Nature do?

Final and formal causes are the inverse of efficient and material causes.

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Science and history, part N

September 26, 2019 7:59 pm ⋅

Science is inherently dualistic because it is based on distinctions, and cannot keep denying one side of a distinction without denying the distinction altogether.

Duality is as far as science can go. Unification is a temporary state, to be superseded by a more abstract duality.

Low-entropy science seeks fixed relations. High-entropy science seeks stochastic relations.

Science cannot properly speak of the universe because that ventures into metaphysics. Science can only speak of cosmos and chaos. Cosmos has low entropy. Chaos has high entropy. Also called law and chance.

Scientific history is potential history. Historical science is potential science.

Science boosters add metaphysics to science.

Life to a Darwinian is noise that happened to produce some harmonious sounds.

To a materialist chaos predominates. To an idealist cosmos predominates.

Science is a method, not a metaphysics. Science is the duality of induction and deduction.

Science is empirical mathematics. History is multi-experiential narrative.

Science is synchronic, so physics can replace time with a kind of length. History is diachronic, so history can replace space with a kind of duration.

The first scientist was Euclid. Classical geometry is the theory of length.

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Half-duplex relativity

August 21, 2019 1:32 pm ⋅

Galilean relativity requires the speed of light to be instantaneous (i.e., zero pace). Because the one-way speed of light is not known, it may be instantaneous as long as the mean speed of light is finite. Such a situation is possible if light is conceived as in half-duplex telecommunications: one direction at a time is observed or transmitted, but never both simultaneously.

Consider a light clock in this context:

light at restSaw-tooth light path

Let Δt be the time for one cycle of light at rest (top diagram). Let Δt’ be the time for one cycle of light traveling at relative velocity v (bottom diagram). The mean speed of light is c. Then

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Interchange of length and duration

August 16, 2019 12:01 pm ⋅

Length and duration are independent measures of the extent of motion, which are measured by comparing the target motion to a uniform reference motion. Although uniform linear motion is simpler in theory, uniform circular motion is simpler in practice – especially for unstopped motion. With one addition, the classic circular clock with hands serves as a reference motion. The addition is to mark the circumference in length units along with the duration units of the angles between the hands and the vertical. See post on a metreloge here.

Galileo uses horizontal uniform linear motion to mark length and duration below (from his Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences, Fourth Day):

Falling projectile

The horizontal uniform motion of a particle coming from the right at a-b is continued with b-c-d-e as the horizontal component of the particle descending with uniform acceleration b-o-g-l-n. The vertical component represents the dependent variable, which has the form of a semi-parabola. The uniform horizontal motion, which could be any in direction, is the independent variable in units of either length or duration.

To interchange length and duration in an equation with a parametric function of time requires four steps: (1) with a change of variables switch the independent and dependent variables, time and stance; (2) linearize the stance, that is, break its dependent relation; (3) bring time under a functional relation with the new parameter, stance; and (4) expand time to include angular components. Functions are inverted and the independent and dependent status of variables is switched. An inversion and a kind of re-inversion return to the same function.

In the example above, the horizontal uniform motion which was taken by Galileo to represent time is re-conceived to represent the independent length variable, stance. The constant acceleration of the vertical component is re-conceived to represent the dependent duration variable with constant lenticity. The quadratic sequence in units of length becomes a sequence in units of duration at a constant rate.

The result of this interchange process is that the equations of motion for length and duration are interchangeable without functional change. All of the equations of physics in terms of parametric functions of time may be adopted as parametric functions of stance. In that sense it would be best to abstract a functional representation that applies to both length and duration, time and stance.

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Galileo’s reciprocity

August 13, 2019 1:02 pm ⋅

From Galileo’s Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, translated by Stillman Drake (UC Press, 1967):

Salv. Now imagine yourself in a boat with your eyes fixed on point of the sail yard. Do you think that because the boat is moving along briskly, you will have to move your eyes in order to keep your vision always on that point of the sail yard and to follow its motion?

Simp. I am a sure that I should not need to make any change at all; not just as to my vision, but if I had aimed a musket I should never have to move it a hairsbreadth to keep it aimed, no matter how the boat moved.

Salv. And this comes about because the motion the ship confers upon the sail yard, it confers upon you and also upon your eyes, so that you need not move them a bit in order to gaze at the top of the sail yard, which consequently appears motionless to you. [And the rays of vision go from the eye to the sail yard just as if a cord were tied between the two ends of the boat. Now a hundred cords are tied at different fixed points, each of which keeps its place whether the ship moves or remains still.] p.249-250

Galileo is portraying motion as viewed by a human observer. The implication is that the observer in another ship would be observing the same kinds of things. Then two observers in motion with respect to one another who observe one another must face one another. That is, they are positioned opposite one another, effectively each turned 180º from the other.

This is the Galileo Reciprocity Principle, the convention that an observed frame has the opposite orientation as the frame from which it is observed, which ensures that corresponding velocities are equal. It is the opposite of the Einstein Reciprocity Principle, the convention that an observed frame has the same orientation as the frame from which it is observed.

Posted in: Knowing, relativity, science ⋅ Tagged: ,

Relativity of orientation

August 12, 2019 1:51 pm ⋅

The Principle of Relativity states that the laws of physics are the same in all inertial frames of reference (IRF). Since a frame of reference includes an orientation, that is, a convention as to which rectilinear semi-axes are positive (and so which are negative). Since there is no preferred frame of reference, each frame has its own orientation, not the orientation of a particular frame. That means IRF orientations are what is called “body-fixed” orientations.

A frame of reference is called “body-fixed” if it is conceptually attached to a rigid body, such as a vehicle, watercraft, aircraft, or spacecraft. Body-fixed frames are inertial frames if the body to which the frame is affixed is in inertial motion. The body is usually referenced in anthropomorphic terms, such as its left, right, face, or back, although some craft have their own terms, notably, ships with port, starboard, fore, and aft.

Consider the following scenario of cars in five lanes, oriented so that their forward direction is positive, with their unsigned speeds shown relative to the two parked cars in the middle lane:Six cars in five lanesCompare the direction of cars B, C1, C2, and D according to the frames attached to the five cars:

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Velocity reciprocity clarified

August 5, 2019 4:54 pm ⋅

This is a follow-on to posts here and here.

It is common to derive the Lorentz transformation assuming velocity reciprocity, which seems to say that if a body at rest in frame of reference S´ is observed from a frame of reference S that travels with relative velocity +v, then a body at rest in frame of reference S will be observed from the frame of reference S´ to be traveling with velocity –v. But that’s not the case.

Consider the typical scenario in which a person standing on the earth (embankment, station) with frame of reference S observes a person sitting in a railway car with frame of reference S´. Say they are both waving their right hands and their frame of reference follows a right-hand orientation: the positive direction is toward their right.

Person waves to train

The first illustration shows the scenario from behind the observer standing on the earth in frame S, who observes the passenger sitting in the train moving to their right with velocity +v. The scenario is typically presented from only this perspective, that of an observer at rest in frame A, even if the perspective of an observer at rest in frame S´ is described.

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