The wild flower is back! And Newtonian Mass-Bearing Bodies in Abstraction Developer is back! And systems in xcon is back. And most readers probably have no idea what I am talking about. Let’s go forward!
Archive for July, 2008
What The Moon Landing Means to Me
Do you realize that everybody you have ever known, everybody you have ever heard about, and everybody you have ever seen on TV, are all inhabitants of a single planet, the third planet from our sun? Sun Tzu, Leonardo da Vinci, Descartes, Buddha, Blaise Pascal, Albert Einstein, Lance Henriksen, George W Bush, Osama Bin Laden, Michael Bolton, my aunt Katerina Van Breda, Nelson Mandela, Maja Engelo, Pink Floyd, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Michael Collins, Avril Lavigne, your gardener, the bus driver, you, me, the beggar and the prince, everyone – we are all human.
More than the technological and intellectual achievement, that is what the moon landing signifies to me. When the astronauts looked upon Earth from space, that is what they felt as well. Borders, governments, individual differences – these are insignificant things. We are one planet.
So you think you are smarter than Einstein? Bleh.
I have had enough.
For a long time – for years, actually, because the consequences of the theory is important – I have studied Albert Einstein’s relativity theory. I have read many books, from Stephen Hawking’s ‘A Brief History of Time’ to Simon Singh’s ‘Big Bang’. And many books and websites in between. MANY. I have also read Einstein’s original papers. After years of study, and after years of not getting answers to my questions, I am officially declaring, for the whole world to see, that I think relativity theory is utter bloody nonsense.
When I couldn’t figure it out myself, I wrote to Simon Singh. And Brian Dunning. And James Randi. These are all people I have respect for. They could not help me. Brian and James said that they can not answer my questions because they are not experts in the field, which are legitimate answers. Simon, the expert, never replied to my emails. There is a facebook group called “I UNDERSTAND EINSTEINS THEORY OF RELATIVITY!!!”. I went there and asked if anybody would be willing to simply answer a few questions I have and enlighten me. Nobody replied.
Brian Dunning once asked me “Are you still smarter than Einstein?”. Please understand, I am not targeting Brian here. But, if apparently nobody is capable of answering a few simple questions I have, is it really unreasonable for me to be skeptical? Especially since it seems more likely that a UFO lands on my lawn, than that a second is really not a second, and that time itself can slow down and speed up.
I think everybody who claims to be a scientist and a skeptic, yet who just does not want to go against ‘great Einstein’, is making a mistake. If the implications of relativity theory is really as important as its proponents claim, then every reasonably intelligent person should make sure that he/she understands it (and therefore agree with its statements). Just blindly accepting that it must be true because ‘apparently smart people’ say so is – like Penn and Teller would say – bullshit! Excuse my language.
Question: Do YOU understand relativity theory? If YES, then: e-mail me, I have a few questions. I would be forever grateful to you for making me understand it also. If NO, then: do not simply blindly assume that it is true but you just don’t understand it. Be skeptical.
Time to Introduce the Scientific Community to Farve
I think it is time to start showing the world the results of the artificial intelligence research I have done the last 10 years. So I have joined the ResearchGATE scientific network, which will serve as the central point from where I introduce Farve to the scientific community.
Fractus
I still maintain that irrationals (numbers) are aptly named; because they are irrational. An irrational number is an approximation, not an actual value. Numbers are value statements, and so saying that “0.3… is an irrational number” is a misnomer.
1/3 is not 0.3…, even though your calculator will tell you it is. It is not because standard decimal notation has a huge flaw – it is actually forcing representing fractions as a fraction of 10. 3 goes into 10, 3 times, and 1 tenth remains. 3 times 1/10 = 0.3. 0.3 goes into 1, 3 times, and 1 hundredth remains. Ad infinitum – ie infinite regress of the decimal expression. Your math teacher might teach you that this means that 1/3 = 0.3… It is a blatant lie. The result indicates that the decimal system, being confined to base 10, is flawed.
“Fraction” is derived from the latin “fractus”, meaning ‘broken’. The standard decimal system is broken.
Lorena vs Evolution
Isn’t she just the most beautiful girl you have ever seen? No creationist claim stands up to scrutiny; but I can not explain Lorena. She must have been created by a perfect God. Evolution explains mere mortals, but it does not explain her.
(I must state that I am joking. I am not religious at all, and I know that, like all of us, Lorena is the product of billions of years of evolution. But for me to even jokingly say something like above, is a great compliment.)
