Re: Natural Philosophy - It's challenge to SR

John Kennaugh wrote:
Tom Roberts wrote:
John Kennaugh wrote:
*something* physically controls the speed of light

What is it that "physically controls" a straight line to be the shortest distance between two points? Can whatever it is be reasonably said to be "physical"?

A straight line is a model of the world not the world itself.

Right. That's what I am talking about.


I reject your notion that "something" "controls" that straight line,

A straight line is purely a mathematical abstraction and it is not my notion that mathematics controls anything - quite the reverse.

There is no "reverse" -- nothing "controls" that straight line other than geometry.


and the speed of light is similar in SR/GR -- they are GEOMETRICAL, not "physical".

Light is physical

But you were NOT discussing light itself, you were discussing THE SPEED OF LIGHT. Speed is at base geometrical and therefore part of the MODEL.


If a FoR cannot control the speed at which light travels then neither can Minkowskie's diagrammatic representation of Einstein's equations nor the modern equivalent.

They are MODELS, not "control".

As I just said in another post, I do not know why these models describe the world we inhabit so accurately, I just know that there have been many experiments and observations that show that they do so (within their domain of applicability).


A straight line, or a point, a FoR or a space-time manifold are not physical. Light is.

But not THE SPEED of light.


Tom Roberts
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Relevant Pages

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