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Re: (meteorobs) TRUTH THE0RY

At 08:10 1999/01/20 -0800, you wrote:
>Before about half-a-year ago, I brought up to my father a question,
>which was quite unclear. I tried to tell him: "what happens if all of
>our ideas of science we're looking in a totally wrong way?",
>That means, we look at the things around us, conclude conclusions, and
>there we have a theory. But what happens if our view of the world is
>totally wrong?

Asaf - Guess what.  You're right!

If you look at the history of science, this is really what you see.
Theories are developed that rather well explain the observed world.  Later,
more experiments and observations discover that there is a "deeper level of
understanding" that isn't yet understood, and so additional theories must
then be formulated to begin to explain these phenomina.  Another generation
passes, and yet another level is discovered.  Etc.  Where is the end?  Is
there an end?  How much of it then is "real" and how much is just math that
seems to explain it but yet doesn't give you anything really solid?

An example would be the epicycles of the planets, which explained the
motions, but had problems(!)   Newton formulated ideas about gravity, which
works fine for everything, even for sending probes to other planets.  But
then Einstein shows that there is a (at least one) level of understanding
beyond that.
Or, the ancient Greeks gave us the concept of the "atom", the smallest part
of matter that can't be divided.  And they were right.  But they were also
wrong, as we began knocking atoms apart.  At least the proton was as far as
you could go - until bags of quarks began bouncing around in some of those
minds whose intellect I can't begin to understand.  But these, finally, are
the end.  Or, are they?  And are, say, electrons, little "bits of matter",
or single packets of energy, or only a cloud of probabilities?  (Those of
us who work with electrons every day may tend to feel that they are very
real.  Ouch!)  And to manifest itself as either a "particle" or "wave",
"deciding" which it will be when we check on it (and also telling a partner
this info at faster-than-light speeds) - If you understand all this, you're
a better man than I, Charlie Brown!

>(wow, this is hard to explain).

>Today we might think we have a lot of knowldege, but comparing our
>knowledge to the things we don't know, there is an enormous, almost
>infinite gap.

Makes us seem rather backward and insignificant sometimes, doesn't it?

>So what I'm saying is, that maybe the laws of physics we have are only
>correct in the level of knowldege we have, and if our knowledge of
>everything was much bigger, the laws of physics are wrong, and won't
>fit in...

Or, maybe they're more or less "correct" for that level of understanding,
observing, and life.  But there might be a deeper level which we have not
reached yet.

>Aliens come to Earth.
>their viewing of the world developed differently,, and they found a
>"different kind of physics" than we have.

Yes, there's no assurance that they would be created in our image; thus
they might experience the created order very differently.  But anywhere in
this universe, the laws of chemistry and physics should be the same.  (Now,
if there were an infinity of other universes created thru inflation, some
say that the chemistry and physics could be completely different "over
there".  But since we/they could not cross from one to the other, it
wouldn't even exist, so far as our universe is concerned.  So this is for
the realms of math or faith, and is, by definition, outside of science).

 In our simple words:
>M-A-G-I-C.

"Technology, sufficiently developed, is indistinguishable from magic."
(Believe Arthur Clark said that).

>It's quite hard to believe that the world works by laws and those laws
>our the ones known to us.

Perhaps yes, because we can describe the world pretty well.  Perhaps no,
because the more we learn, the more we see that we really don't know very
deeply.  We probably have a lot of it right - but probably are at a very
superficial level in many instances!

>Well, the reason we see the laws of physics everywhere is since our
>tools to SEE physics, are based on OUR physics,

Ah, now you're getting to something that lots of people don't want to
consider.  How come this universe, this Earth, exists, and is just right
for us frail humans?  How come that certain "constants" seem to keep
re-appearing in working out the "math of the universe"?  Why is it that so
many of these things are just the way they are and not some other way? 
And the answer is - 
The answer is something that cannot now (if ever!) be answered by science.
Now you're getting into philosophy and into faith.  
Because even Science, with a capital S, is based on faith, whether a
"scientist" will admit it or not (probably has never thought about it as
deeply as you have).  

>if we DO see something new not understandable, we have a
>simple answer: we make up more laws!!

Exactly.  A "physical law" is simply a tighty-woven explanation of
something that has been observed, and has proved itself capable of
correctly predicting a chain of events.  It is based on the best
observations and experiments available at that time.  It differs from a
"theory" in that a theory says that given a certain set of circumstances, a
certain thing may happen.  A "law" says that given a certain set of
circumstances, a certain thing *Will* happen.  And yet a physical "law" is
still only a  "theory", for until we know Everything about Everything, we
can't be sure that Everything has been covered.  We all "know" that if
Newton sits under an apple tree and an apple right above him falls, it's
going to bop him on the head.  The "Law of Gravity" tells us that, and we
all know this to be true from lots and lots of experiences.  But now some
are again looking at the tiny possibility of some type of *repulsive* force
in the universe, at work way out among the stars.  So is this "Law of
Gravity" really an absolute, 100%, final, total, End?  In our daily
experiences, probably so.  But under certain circumstances...probably so,
but maybe not!  Even in math, supposedly the definitive explanation for all
theories, you can push the QEDs back only so far.  You "know" the rest is
true (at least, the professor said so), but there is a limit to what anyone
can *prove*.  After that, even that is faith.

So you bring up some very good questions, things that people have wrestled
with for many generations.  The truly honest seeker will try to learn and
discover all he can about this universe.  We have an unbelievable brain,
capable of leaps of imagination and understanding that seem to transcend
its physical and physiological underpinnings.  Yet it is finite, and can do
only so much.  Each couple of generations now seem to take us another step
farther.  And yet each one is only a small step on a seemingly unending
path.  How far can we understand?  No one knows; for if we truly knew the
answer to this, we would have "arrived".  Keep the questions flying.  Just
remember that all our understanding is incomplete.  We know much about many
things that help us get along in our everyday world.  We think we know a
lot about the processes beyond that level.  We have ideas, theories, and
guesses beyond that.  And we have faith that allows us to operate with an
imperfect understanding, yet knowing that we know enough to handle our
daily routines.  And this also allows us to realize that for many
questions, we probabably will never have an answer.  Or that some of these
answers will seem to be completely contradictory to each other.  But this
is part of what being human is all about.  We can accept these
contradictions and use them to help us understand something else!

Now, if all of this world's peoples - all of us - could just accept each
other....

Shelby


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