starship-design: PseudoScience?

[Steve VanDevender <stevev@efn.org>]

kyle writes:
 > I did not say I believed everything in those web pages. Some of these so
 > called "Contactees" are about the weirdest people around. 
 > 
 > I'm currently having to contend with two groups: 
 > A: So called "pseudoscientists", who believe every crazy idea that comes
 > along
 > B: So called "hard scientists", who refuse to listen to facts that are
 > unusual or hard to accept.
 > 
 > Both groups are wrong. We need to have conclusive proof of theory before
 > accepting it, but the scientific community needs to listen to new ideas
 > and try them. I really don't care if it violates physics, as several
 > things have before, and we use them today. The scientific community has
 > become hotheaded in thinking we know almost everything there is to know.
 > We don't know 1/1000th of what we think we know. I suppose this is human
 > nature.

Your conception of a "hard scientist" is based entirely on your
stereotypes, not on the way that scientists act.  I listen to facts when
people actually present them.  But your continual attempt to present
unsubstantiated, pseudoscientific concepts as "fact" are what I argue
against.  I don't listen to a lot of your "facts" because you all too
often don't present any.

Historically the burden of proof for a new, radical theory is on the
presenter of the theory.  More wrong and untenable ideas come along than
anyone can hope to test.  You can't expect instant acceptance of
something that doesn't fit with what we already know or think we know.
You may find that reluctance galling, but it's exactly that reluctance
to accept ideas without proof that makes science work at all.

 > I wonder why no one is cut down when bringing in a concept like
 > "cellular universe" or Lorentz contraction, (neither of which has been
 > proven, which violates everything said here), but when I bring up a
 > concept, I'm instantly shot down with a barrage of messages
 > whose basic line is: don't bring up something you can't prove. If you
 > want some example of commonly accepted science that has never been
 > proved, e-mail me. There's something not right here if unproven ideas
 > invented by proffesionals are accepted, but amatuer's ideas are canned.

The cellular-automata model of the universe was just plain silly, and
not even the participants were arguing its relevance to the real topic
of this mailing list, which is designing working starships.  Claiming
that the Lorentz contraction is unproven is just plain wrong and shows
your ignorance.  There are two things to remember about the Lorentz
Contraction: First, the Lorentz contraction is something you measure,
not something you see.  The finite speed of light combined with
relativistic contraction of frame coordinates produces the visual
appearance of rotation (as well as some other distortion) rather than
simple compression along the direction of motion.  Second, as has been
pointed out repeatedly, we do observe astrophysical phenomena involving
relativistic velocities, and if Lorentz contraction of frame coordinates
didn't happen, they wouldn't look the way they do.  Lorentz contraction
is even observable by the distortions it creates in the electromagnetic
fields of particles accelerated to near lightspeed; if it didn't happen,
then particle accelerators wouldn't work either.  You're going to have
to find a better example of something that you claim the experts are
just making up if you want to make that point.

 > P.S.: I'm not taking this personally, but speaking in the name of
 > science.

If you're going to speak in the name of science, then please do a better
job of understanding how it works.