Re: What happened to Paul Miller?
From: Dirk Van de moortel (dirkvandemoortel_at_ThankS-NO-SperM.hotmail.com)
Date: 10/23/04
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Date: Sat, 23 Oct 2004 12:03:58 GMT
"Paul Miller" <aksuited@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:4602c429.0410230355.3cd0278e@posting.google.com...
> > It's nice to be friends with yourself. ;)
>
> sorry?
>
> > > > Paul claimed that he was " ... not a physicist, nor a mathematician, nor
> > > > do I claim any understanding of relativity." The only problem is that
> > > > Paul was somewhat unwilling to commit himself to any substantive
> > > > negotiations in that challenge.
> > >
> > > Well, I would suggest that you specify the conditions of your
> > > experiment that would predict the largest deviations from SR.
> >
> > That wasn't the agreement.
>
> As far as I know, we don't have an agreement yet. I thought we were
> trying to work towards one. Like I said, that may take time.
>
> > > In terms
> > > of accuracy, as I'm offering 100-1 I would need accuracy at least one
> > > order of magnitude larger, i.e. p<< 0.001 where p is prob. of getting
> > > a wrongly falsifying result. I know I promised to get back to you with
> > > more detail, but I really will.
> >
> > Sure, you will. ;)
> >
> > I presume a repeatable measurement of a value of the variation outside the
> > current 'best' value will be sufficient? That's all I'm asking for. Give
> > me a specific value of 'c' and a range of values around that main value.
> > Within that range you (and SR) will be declared the winner (and you will
> > receive $1,000 US from me). Outside of which, I will be declared the winner
> > (and receive $100,000 US from you). This is a trivial excercise for you and
> > your "pal."
> >
> > I will then design an experiment (and you and your "pal" will approve) such
> > that the experimental precision will be tight enough to meet your
> > "challenge."
>
> As I understand it, we are trying to distinguish between two possible
> worlds, one in which SR is correct, and one in which it is wrong. The
> best way to distinguish between them is to find the conditions under
> which they look as different as possible from each other. Setting the
> range of acceptable values of c depends on many factors, such as: the
> value of c that you would predict that differs from SR, the nature of
> experimental noise etc. Without investigating these issues, it's not
> 'a trivial exercise' for us. I did say in advance that it would take
> some time to sort this out, did't I? Given that I'm risking a
> considerable amount of money, is it unreasonable for me to ask for
> some discussion about these issues? Why don't you try telling me your
> thoughts on this, rather than always trying to pick a fight?
>
> > > In the meantime, please show me some
> > > reason to think that you have the resources to actually carry this
> > > experiment out.
> >
> > What a pathetic attempt at evasion. If I had no resources, you would not
> > have to risk any money. And how can I provide you with an estimate of the
> > resources required, when you won't provide even the minimum to design the
> > experiment? (Aside from the fact a few locals agreed to assist with
> > equipment scrounging and purchase.)
>
> What I'm talking about here is our time, not money. If this experiment
> can't actually be done for real, then we're wasting our time. How
> about you telling me about a couple of designs that could be done? At
> least that would give me a start.
>
>
> > > > "Paul Miller" did briefly resurface on September 10th:
> > > >
> > http://www.google.com/groups?selm=4602c429.0409101048.5892c2ad%40posting.goo
> > > > gle.com
> > > >
> > > > However, this post certainly does not sound like it is written by
> > > > someone who " ... is not a physicist, nor a mathematician, nor
> > > > ... claim(s) any understanding of relativity."
> > > > ===========================
> > > > "All you are saying here is that you could build an adaptive controller
> > > > to make the corrections without having any knowledge of GR. So what?
> > > > The claim 'GPS wouldn't work without GR' means no more than 'the
> > > > controller would land up learning exactly the same corrections as
> > > > those predicted by GR'. This puts GR in the same category as any other
> > > > well-supported and well-accepted theory. You could train a neural
> > > > network to model the predictions of any theory, past or future, so you
> > > > 'empirical' statement applies to all theories. It tells us nothing
> > > > about the status of those theories."
> > > > ===========================
> > >
> > > Sorry, but wrong again.
> >
> > Wrong that you posted something? You claimed that you did not have "any
> > understanding of relativity." Yet you posted an authoritative post on GR
> > and the support for physics theories in general. That appears to contradict
> > your prior claims.
>
> Wrong about these rather odd 'conspiracy theory'-like comments. As I
> said from the start, I'm not a physicist, but my friend is. My
> background is cognitive science, which is a branch of psychology, so
> it's typically taught without any maths. I know nothing about GR, and
> there's nothing in that post to suggest otherwise. My comments in that
> post come from a basic understanding of the philosophy of science,
> which is a common element in a cog.sci. degree. I'm not sure why I'm
> now having to convince you that I'm telling the truth about this.
> Firstly, I'm not sure if I care - if you want to think I'm a physicist
> with an invisible friend, that's fine by me. Secondly, I don't
> understand the relevance of this to the bet.
>
> > If you were "real", you would simply provide what you agreed to before.
> > After all, you want your money, right? Try again when you can simply live up
> > to your newsgroup claims. Like with a pass/fail criterion.
>
> Setting a pass/fail criterion depends on lots of factors, such as
> experimental noise. That's one reason why I was asking whether you
> have the resources to do this - it would be good to see how accurate
> your measurements are able to be. Not on paper, but for real. Setting
> up experiments like this isn't that straightforward - maybe we should
> try to work together to define the criterion, rather than assuming
> that I'm lying about everything. I would suggest that would involve
> you talking to me about a few possible designs, then we can think
> about what predictions SR would make, and what you would predict. Then
> we can think about what kind of accuracy we can expect. We might even
> have to collect some data before we set the criteria. This is how real
> world experiments are done, at least in my experience. If you go back
> to my original, first post, I did say that it was *your* job to
> completely specify the experiment, in detail. The idea was that I
> would take that experimental design - including criteria for
> falsification - and talk to my pal about that. Now I can see that it's
> going to take a bit more effort on our part, which is going to make
> demands on our time. That's not a problem, as long as your willing to
> work with us a bit. If you would rather assume that I'm lying about
> all of that for some inexpicable reason, then walk away from the
> challenge.
>
> Paul
hm, you're not Mingst.
But you're not going to have a bet with any of these idiots,
that's for sure :-)
Cheers,
Dirk Vdm
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