While in quarantine from the Plague, Newton transformed the way we calculate pi

_{Denyse O'Leary

March 23, 2021

Intelligent Design, Mathematics}

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He also developed calculus, and studied optics and gravity then:

When the Great Plague of London ravaged through the British city beginning in 1665, Issac Newton was a student at Trinity College, Cambridge. As described in Gale Christianson’s Isaac Newton, a few months after acquiring his undergraduate degree in the spring of that year, the 23-year-old retreated to his family farm of Woolsthorpe Manor, some 60 miles northwest of Cambridge. Along with being located a safe distance from the carriers of the horrific disease that was wiping out the population of the city, Woolsthorpe provided the sort of quiet, serene environment that allowed a mind like Newton’s to journey, uninterrupted, to the farthest reaches of the imagination. This period is now known as annus mirabilis – the “year of wonders.”
Tim Ott, “Isaac Newton Changed the World While in Quarantine From the Plague” at Biography

And what were you doing during the COVID-19 lockdowns? 😉

Hat tip: Philip Cunningham

Comments

From the Great Course Daily today, an article about Newton. https://www.thegreatcoursesdaily.com/the-discovery-of-gravity-and-laws-of-motion-by-isaac-newton/ From the article.
Newton’s Remarkable Discovery During 1665–1666, the bubonic plague struck England, and that’s the period when Newton retreated to his family farm as a consequence of Cambridge University being shut down. On the farm, he had a year and a half to think and reflect, to ponder the things he’d learned about Kepler’s laws, Galileo’s ideas, and other concepts he had studied as an undergraduate at Cambridge. During those years he burst a remarkable discovery which was deducing a mathematical description of the universal force of gravity. To Newton’s contemporaries, gravity was a terrestrial force; it was restricted to objects near the Earth’s surface. What Newton discovered in the family apple orchard was that gravity is a universal force. It extends all the way out to the planets, to the Moon, to the stars, and farther. The young scholar looked up to see an apple ripening on the tree, and above it, he saw the Moon in its orbit. Newton’s great advance was realizing that it’s a singular force that is acting on both of these objects.
There's a lot more. Maybe the author is not entirely correct but Newton was quite a guy. Should we say remarkable. By the way I always maintained that Newton stood on Galileo's shoulders. (And Galileo was the villain in the Galileo affair.)jerry_{March 26, 2021
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KF, I'm pretty sure that VL was merely stating that the inverse square law does not explain the exact positioning of the earth, moon, and sun, and that he accepts that the inverse square law is valid as to deriving 'how' total solar eclipses happen in the way that they do as viewed from the earth. But the atheist's appeal to chance, (besides being grossly inadequate to explain why the 'nice, neat', inverse square law exists in the first place), still does not explain the exact positioning of the earth, moon, and sun. Nor does his appeal chance explain why our solar system takes the 'life-enabling' form that it does.
How the Moon Supports the Privileged Planet Hypothesis - December 5, 2013 Excerpt: Planetary scientists were optimistic that the Apollo missions would help decide among three leading hypotheses: capture, fission, and accretion. After Apollo, all three were rejected, leaving theorists without a theory until the "giant impact" hypothesis came along in the 1980s. Till recently, the scenario of a Mars-sized object striking the Earth at a glancing blow was hailed as accepted truth. TV documentaries animated the event handsomely, in vivid color. However, new observations have cast doubt on the (impact) idea. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/12/our_moon_still079861.html Textbook theory of moon’s origin is challenged – Aug. 4, 2017 Excerpt: In the past five years, a bombardment of studies has exposed a problem: The canonical giant impact hypothesis rests on assumptions that do not match the evidence. If Theia hit Earth and later formed the moon, the moon should be made of Theia-type material. But the moon does not look like Theia — or like Mars, for that matter. Down to its atoms, it looks almost exactly like Earth. https://uncommondescent.com/physics/textbook-theory-of-moons-origin-is-challenged/ Milankovitch Cycle Design - Hugh Ross - August 2011 Excerpt: In all three cases, Waltham proved that the actual Earth/Moon/solar system manifests unusually low Milankovitch levels and frequencies compared to similar alternative systems. ,,, Waltham concluded, “It therefore appears that there has been anthropic selection for slow Milankovitch cycles.” That is, it appears Earth was purposely designed with slow, low-level Milankovitch cycles so as to allow humans to exist and thrive. http://www.reasons.org/milankovitch-cycle-design? THE EARTH-MOON SYSTEM AND THE DYNAMICAL STABILITY OF THE INNER SOLAR SYSTEM - 1998 Excerpt: Evidence from self-consistent solar system n-body simulations is presented to argue that the Earth- Moon system (EM) plays an important dynamical role in the inner solar system, stabilizing the orbits of Venus and Mercury by suppressing a strong secular resonance of period 8.1 Myr near Venus’s heliocentric distance. The EM thus appears to play a kind of “gravitational keystone” role in the terrestrial precinct, for without it, the orbits of Venus and Mercury become immediately destabilized. … First, we find that EM is performing an essential dynamical role by suppressing or “damping out” a secular resonance driven by the giant planets near the Venusian heliocentric distance. The source of the resonance is a libration of the Jovian longitude of perihelion with the Venusian perihelion longitude. http://iopscience.iop.org/1538-3881/116/4/2055/pdf/1538-3881_116_4_2055.pdf? “You might also think that these disparate bodies are scattered across the solar system without rhyme or reason. But move any piece of the solar system today, or try to add anything more, and the whole construction would be thrown fatally out of kilter. So how exactly did this delicate architecture come to be?” R. Webb - Unknown solar system 1: How was the solar system built? - New Scientist – 2009 Is the Solar System Stable? By Scott Tremaine - 2011 Excerpt: So what are the results? Most of the calculations agree that eight billion years from now, just before the Sun swallows the inner planets and incinerates the outer ones, all of the planets will still be in orbits very similar to their present ones. In this limited sense, the solar system is stable. However, a closer look at the orbit histories reveals that the story is more nuanced. After a few tens of millions of years, calculations using slightly different parameters (e.g., different planetary masses or initial positions within the small ranges allowed by current observations) or different numerical algorithms begin to diverge at an alarming rate. More precisely, the growth of small differences changes from linear to exponential:,,, As an example, shifting your pencil from one side of your desk to the other today could change the gravitational forces on Jupiter enough to shift its position from one side of the Sun to the other a billion years from now. The unpredictability of the solar system over very long times is of course ironic since this was the prototypical system that inspired Laplacian determinism. Fortunately, most of this unpredictability is in the orbital phases of the planets, not the shapes and sizes of their orbits, so the chaotic nature of the solar system does not normally lead to collisions between planets. However, the presence of chaos implies that we can only study the long-term fate of the solar system in a statistical sense, by launching in our computers an armada of solar systems with slightly different parameters at the present time—typically, each planet is shifted by a random amount of about a millimeter—and following their evolution. When this is done, it turns out that in about 1 percent of these systems, Mercury’s orbit becomes sufficiently eccentric so that it collides with Venus before the death of the Sun. Thus, the answer to the question of the stability of the solar system—more precisely, will all the planets survive until the death of the Sun—is neither “yes” nor “no” but “yes, with 99 percent probability.” https://www.ias.edu/about/publications/ias-letter/articles/2011-summer/solar-system-tremaine
And as the following article noted, "In the General Scholium, Newton explains that, while the laws of motion explain why celestial bodies move in Keplerian orbits, they cannot explain how celestial bodies come to be in their present orbits. And so, he writes, “This most elegant system of the sun, planets, and comets could not have arisen without the design and dominion of an intelligent and powerful being”,,,
‘To treat of God from Phenomena’ - 2017 Excerpt: I’m going to start with the famous passage from the General Scholium to the Principia: “to treat of God from phenomena is certainly a part of natural philosophy”. The meaning of the first part of the statement is clear: we have epistemic access to God via our observations of the world. And so, from the phenomena, we can learn about God’s nature and divine will—in the same way that we can learn about, say, gravity.,,, "In the General Scholium, Newton explains that, while the laws of motion explain why celestial bodies move in Keplerian orbits, they cannot explain how celestial bodies come to be in their present orbits. And so, he writes, “This most elegant system of the sun, planets, and comets could not have arisen without the design and dominion of an intelligent and powerful being”,,, https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/to-treat-of-god-from-phenomena/
It is also interesting to note that LaPlace's supposed 'I have no need for that hypothesis' remark against God is, most likely, whig history. Even according to wikipedia, Laplace's quote is, in all likelihood, based on folklore not on fact,
In 1884, however, the astronomer Hervé Faye[76][77] affirmed that this account of Laplace's exchange with Napoleon presented a "strangely transformed" (étrangement transformée) or garbled version of what had actually happened. It was not God that Laplace had treated as a hypothesis, but merely his intervention at a determinate point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre-Simon_Laplace#Religious_opinions
In fact, Laplace cites with approval Leibniz's criticism of Newton's invocation of divine intervention to restore order to the Solar System, i.e. "This is to have very narrow ideas about the wisdom and the power of God."
"Leibniz, in his controversy with Newton on the discovery of infinitesimal calculus, sharply criticized the theory of Divine intervention as a corrective of the disturbances of the solar system. "To suppose anything of the kind", he said, "is to exhibit very narrow ideas of the wisdom and power of God'." - Pierre-Simon Laplace https://books.google.com/books?id=oLtHAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA73&lpg=PA73
Thus I hold that, from what has now been revealed by modern science about the delicate balance of which the solar system is maintained in its stable configuration, Newton, Leibniz, and even the oft misquoted Laplace, would all be very pleased by what modern science has now revealed about the wisdom and power of God in creating our solar system. To repeat,
“You might also think that these disparate bodies are scattered across the solar system without rhyme or reason. But move any piece of the solar system today, or try to add anything more, and the whole construction would be thrown fatally out of kilter. So how exactly did this delicate architecture come to be?” R. Webb - Unknown solar system 1: How was the solar system built? - New Scientist – 2009
Verse:
Proverbs 3:19 "By wisdom the LORD laid the earth's foundations, by understanding he set the heavens in place;"
bornagain77_{March 26, 2021
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Jerry, abstract spaces pervade our world, in fact they ground our ability to infer that material ruler edges, ball bearings etc are imperfect relative to the geometric ideal. For an analogue, ponder how a plane mirror poses behind it a virtual half universe in an image space superposed on the physical cosmos. I assume, here, that you have done the classic high school science exercise to locate images behind a mirror. (NB: The next step would be to put a pin on the point the image of the toothpick is, then move from side to side to see that no parallax occurs.) KFkairosfocus_{March 26, 2021
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exhibit powerful quantitative structures that pervade reality
Here we go again. You cannot point to a line let alone a straight line in our world. Thus no circles, no polygons in our world. Thus, no pi in our world. They are all abstract mental concepts that we can imagine. Extremely useful but no continuums in the real world. We can act as if continuums exist and life gets much better if we do. Hope this does not bring back this discussion which has been discussed thoroughly on other threads. https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/the-problem-with-most-theological-doctrines-and-the-theological-argument-for-mental-reality/#comment-715409 https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/sabine-hossenfelder-asks-do-complex-numbers-exist/#comment-725678 Any discussion should be on those threads. Not here.jerry_{March 26, 2021
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I’m afraid that opportunity has long gone. My understanding is that natural selection has not been thought of a the major driver of evolution for quite a while.
We have a breakthrough. Another advocate that Darwin and natural selection should be removed from the curriculum of all classrooms in the world. This is something that nearly all supporters of ID want. Namely, that how evolution happened is a mystery that science has no answer for. Welcome to the ID side.jerry_{March 26, 2021
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VL, I was working from rough memory, 2.5 not 3 diameters. KFkairosfocus_{March 26, 2021
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VL, actually a lot. First, the law of gravitation explains eclipses. Second, in the ideas train getting there, eclipses pop up. As is now widely known, Eratosthenes used shadow lengths at Summer Solstice to calculate Earth's circumference. An occultation experiment mimicking a Solar eclipse -- dangerous, do not do -- will show that the shadow cone is 108 diameters, which gives geometry for Solar eclipses pretty nearly, zone of totality is narrow. Then, in a Lunar Eclipse Earth's shadow is a circle about three times the Moon's disk, and BTW Aristotle noted that only a sphere always casts a circular shadow. We can estimate Moon's relative size from the shadow cone, also its distance in the cone, scaled to the diameter of the Earth. We have measured the Earth-moon system. Now, plonk, the proverbial apple falls, at g. Scale the field intensity out to the Moon's distance, and we have an explanation for its orbital centripetal acceleration. This reinforces our inference of inverse square law, though of course empirical support is not demonstrative proof. Connect to conic section trajectories including ellipses and then Kepler's empirical laws. Along the way, infer the three laws of momentum to move from kinematics to dynamics. Spice with Calculus or in his terms, fluxions. Reduce back to then standard geometry. Voila, one scientific revolution, per order. KFkairosfocus_{March 25, 2021
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Seversky, there has been no observation of blind chance variation and differential reproductive success as culling, leading to descent with unlimited variation sufficient to account for a novel body plan. Minor adaptations mostly due to breaking existing mechanisms do not support the grand, ideology-driven extrapolation imposed by the new magisterium. KFkairosfocus_{March 25, 2021
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SA2, really, that's your response to an extraordinarily powerful and striking result? (I wonder why they did not show us this back in Math class when we first met Pascal's Triangle and the Binomial Theorem.) KF PS: No grand persuasive discovery is necessary beyond the multiple Nobel Prize winning work that elucidated the genetic code, decades since. What is the only credible, empirically warranted source of codes, algorithms, language, associated execution machinery again? That's why I first have declared independence of the purblind system that ideologically locks out something as manifest as that. Second, I recognise the power of a crooked yardstick taken ill advisedly as standard of straightness, uprightness and accuracy, to lock in warped thinking. Even, to induce rejection of the message of a naturally straight and upright plumb line. Homework, go to a hardware store and inspect a speed square. Notice the little notch for a plumb line. Then, connect a few dots in the style of Newton, who again, here, shows his genius at making connexions.kairosfocus_{March 25, 2021
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News, you got there first. This video powerfully shows how the whole numbers, integers, rationals and reals -- which are demonstrably present in any possible world -- exhibit powerful quantitative structures that pervade reality. KFkairosfocus_{March 25, 2021
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Jerry/25
A Nobel prize and immortality awaits the first person to validate natural selection as a major driver of evolution.
I'm afraid that opportunity has long gone. My understanding is that natural selection has not been thought of a the major driver of evolution for quite a while. If, on the other hand, all those researchers beavering away trying to find compelling evidence of an alien intelligent designer were to actually come up with something that should be worth at least a Nobel Prize and a Templeton grant.Seversky_{March 25, 2021
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Well Bob, It just occurred to me that the important thing in all this is, somewhat, as Jerry said, "nearly all great innovations were the result of the efforts of several people." But rather than just 'several people', I would like to note that the culture in which these people lived is more important still to the rise of modern science than even 'several people' are And Bob although we may disagree as to the importance of Newton's overall contribution to modern science, the important thing to realize in all this is that Newton, and all the other founders of modern science, were thoroughly immersed in the Christian culture of medieval Christian Europe. In which God was integral to their understanding of nature and thus integral to any contribution to modern science they may have made. In fact, many of the founders of modern science viewed their work in science, i.e. in 'natural philosophy', as a priestly vocation. As Boyle stated, "‘Discovering to others the perfections of God displayed in the creatures is a more acceptable act of religion, than the burning of sacrifices or perfumes upon his altars.’
What Difference Did Protestantism Make To Modern Science? - December 8, 2019 Excerpt: Calvin strongly supported this ‘priesthood of all believers’. This general principle meant that for the first time the formal study of nature could be regarded as a priestly activity. The ideal of the scientist-as-priest would subsequently become a common motif among 17th-century Protestant natural philosophers. Kepler, for example, had originally studied theology at Tübingen with the intention of becoming a Lutheran minister: ‘I wished to be a theologian; for a long time I was troubled, but now see how God is also praised through my work in astronomy.’ Robert Boyle, one of the founders of modern chemistry and a pioneer of experimental methods, spoke in similar terms of the priestly role of scientific investigators. The study of nature, he claimed, was ‘the first act of religion, and equally obliging in all religions.’ Boyle captured the Protestant spirit of the new science perfectly: ‘Discovering to others the perfections of God displayed in the creatures is a more acceptable act of religion, than the burning of sacrifices or perfumes upon his altars.’ Kepler, Boyle and others saw their scientific work as part of a religious mission to uncover the divine order of the natural world. Again, then, values derived from Protestant ideas of vocation motivated at least some of the most influential scientists of the period, and provided a religious rationale for pursuing the study of nature. Peter Harrison, “Reformation of science” at Aeon https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/what-difference-did-protestantism-make-to-modern-science/
And as Paul Davies put it, "in doing science, they supposed, one might be able to glimpse the mind of God - an exhilarating and audacious claim."
"All the early scientists, like Newton, were religious in one way or another. They saw their science as a means of uncovering traces of God's handiwork in the universe. What we now call the laws of physics they regarded as God's abstract creation: thoughts, so to speak, in the mind of God. So in doing science, they supposed, one might be able to glimpse the mind of God - an exhilarating and audacious claim." - Paul Davies - quoted from an address following his award of the $1 million Templeton Prize in 1995 for progress in science and religion.
Newton was explicit that, "to treat of God from phenomena is certainly a part of experimental philosophy”
Isaac Newton: His Science and Religion - Stephen D. Snobelen Excerpt: At this point Newton launches into a majestic description of the God he found in Nature and Scripture. This Being, Newton begins, “rules all things, not as the world soul but as the lord of all. And because of his dominion he is called Lord God Pantokrator”. Then follows an account of God’s eternity and omnipresence that is shot through with biblical language. Newton’s God is sovereign over time and space. This twofold sovereignty, Newton suggests, ultimately underpins all things in time and space: “All the diversity of created things, each in its place and time, could only have arisen from the ideas and will of a necessarily existing being”. … At the end of the explicitly theological section of the General Scholium Newton writes: “This concludes the discussion of God, and to treat of God from phenomena is certainly a part of experimental philosophy” (changed to “natural philosophy” in the 1726 third edition of the Principia). Thus for Newton discussions about God and design are not to be kept separate from natural philosophy, but rather are integral to it. [Snobelen https://isaacnewtonstheology.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/newton-in-science-religion-and-society.pdf
In other words, Newton held that "we have epistemic access to God via our observations of the world. And so, from the phenomena, we can learn about God’s nature and divine will"
‘To treat of God from Phenomena’ - 2017 Excerpt: I’m going to start with the famous passage from the General Scholium to the Principia: “to treat of God from phenomena is certainly a part of natural philosophy”. The meaning of the first part of the statement is clear: we have epistemic access to God via our observations of the world. And so, from the phenomena, we can learn about God’s nature and divine will—in the same way that we can learn about, say, gravity.,,, https://blogs.otago.ac.nz/emxphi/to-treat-of-god-from-phenomena/
Thus Bob, while we may disagree as to the relative importance of Newton's overall contribution to modern science, the important thing to realize in all this is that it was Newton's, (and all the other Christian Founders of modern science), Christian presuppositions about nature and God that enabled them to make the breakthroughs in modern science that they made. As the following article states, modern science, "arose only once in history, and only in one place: medieval Europe, once known as “Christendom,” where that Biblical worldview reigned supreme. That is no accident. Science could not have arisen without that worldview."
The Threat to the Scientific Method that Explains the Spate of Fraudulent Science Publications - Calvin Beisner | Jul 23, 2014 Excerpt: It is precisely because modern science has abandoned its foundations in the Biblical worldview (which holds, among other things, that a personal, rational God designed a rational universe to be understood and controlled by rational persons made in His image) and the Biblical ethic (which holds, among other things, that we are obligated to tell the truth even when it inconveniences us) that science is collapsing. As such diverse historians and philosophers of science as Alfred North Whitehead, Pierre Duhem, Loren Eiseley, Rodney Stark, and many others have observed,, science—not an occasional flash of insight here and there, but a systematic, programmatic, ongoing way of studying and controlling the world—arose only once in history, and only in one place: medieval Europe, once known as “Christendom,” where that Biblical worldview reigned supreme. That is no accident. Science could not have arisen without that worldview. http://townhall.com/columnists/calvinbeisner/2014/07/23/the-threat-to-the-scientific-method-that-explains-the-spate-of-fraudulent-science-publications-n1865201/page/full Several other resources backing up this claim are available, such as Thomas Woods, Stanley Jaki, David Linberg, Edward Grant, J.L. Heilbron, and Christopher Dawson.
And as the following article states, still today "the continued rationality of the enterprise of science depends on convictions that can be reasonably grounded only in theistic metaphysics."
Science and Theism: Concord, not Conflict* – Robert C. Koons IV. The Dependency of Science Upon Theism (Page 21) Excerpt: Far from undermining the credibility of theism, the remarkable success of science in modern times is a remarkable confirmation of the truth of theism. It was from the perspective of Judeo-Christian theism—and from the perspective alone—that it was predictable that science would have succeeded as it has. Without the faith in the rational intelligibility of the world and the divine vocation of human beings to master it, modern science would never have been possible, and, even today, the continued rationality of the enterprise of science depends on convictions that can be reasonably grounded only in theistic metaphysics. http://www.robkoons.net/media/69b0dd04a9d2fc6dffff80b3ffffd524.pdf
And that claim that the continued rationality of science is still dependent on Theistic metaphysics is certainly not an exaggerated claim. In fact, if we adopt the Atheist's worldview of naturalism (as Atheists insist that we do via 'methodological naturalism'), then we soon learn that our entire conception of the world collapses into catastrophic epistemological failure, Specifically, we find that Darwinian atheists, with their naturalistic worldview, are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to:
Basically, because of reductive materialism (and/or methodological naturalism), the atheistic materialist (who believes Darwinian evolution to be true) is forced to claim that he is merely a ‘neuronal illusion’ (Coyne, Dennett, etc..), who has the illusion of free will (Harris), who has unreliable, (i.e. illusory), beliefs about reality (Plantinga), who has illusory perceptions of reality (Hoffman), who, since he has no real time empirical evidence substantiating his grandiose claims, must make up illusory “just so stories” with the illusory, and impotent, ‘designer substitute’ of natural selection (Behe, Gould, Sternberg), so as to ‘explain away’ the appearance (i.e. the illusion) of design (Crick, Dawkins), and who also must make up illusory meanings and purposes for his life since the hopelessness of the nihilism inherent in his atheistic worldview is simply too much for him to bear (Weikart), and who must also hold morality to be subjective and illusory since he has rejected God (Craig, Kreeft). Who, since beauty cannot be grounded within his materialistic worldview, must also hold beauty itself to be illusory (Darwin). Bottom line, nothing is truly real in the atheist’s worldview, least of all, beauty, morality, meaning and purposes for life.,,, Darwinian Materialism and/or Methodological Naturalism vs. Reality – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaksmYceRXM
Thus, although the Darwinian Atheist and/or Methodological Naturalist may firmly believe that he is on the terra firma of science (in his appeal, even demand, for naturalistic explanations over and above God as a viable explanation), the fact of the matter is that, when examining the details of his materialistic/naturalistic worldview, it is found that Darwinists/Atheists themselves are adrift in an ocean of fantasy and imagination with no discernible anchor for reality to grab on to. It would be hard to fathom a worldview more antagonistic to modern science, indeed more antagonistic to reality itself, than Atheistic materialism and/or methodological naturalism have turned out to be.
2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;
Thus in conclusion Bob, the important thing to realize in all this is not what Newton may or may not have contributed to modern science, but is to realize that Newton, nor any of the other founders of modern science, would have been able to make any of the breakthroughs that they made unless they first held onto Christian presuppositions. Christianity is the key linchpin in all this! And THAT is the important thing to realize. As the following article states, "as Whitehead pointed out, it is no coincidence that science sprang, not from Ionian metaphysics, not from the Brahmin-Buddhist-Taoist East, not from the Egyptian-Mayan astrological South, but from the heart of the Christian West, that although Galileo fell out with the Church, he would hardly have taken so much trouble studying Jupiter and dropping objects from towers if the reality and value and order of things had not first been conferred by belief in the Incarnation.",,,
The War against the War Between Science and Faith Revisited - July 2010 Excerpt: …as Whitehead pointed out, it is no coincidence that science sprang, not from Ionian metaphysics, not from the Brahmin-Buddhist-Taoist East, not from the Egyptian-Mayan astrological South, but from the heart of the Christian West, that although Galileo fell out with the Church, he would hardly have taken so much trouble studying Jupiter and dropping objects from towers if the reality and value and order of things had not first been conferred by belief in the Incarnation. (Walker Percy, Lost in the Cosmos),,, Jaki notes that before Christ the Jews never formed a very large community (priv. comm.). In later times, the Jews lacked the Christian notion that Jesus was the monogenes or unigenitus, the only-begotten of God. Pantheists like the Greeks tended to identify the monogenes or unigenitus with the universe itself, or with the heavens. Jaki writes: Herein lies the tremendous difference between Christian monotheism on the one hand and Jewish and Muslim monotheism on the other. This explains also the fact that it is almost natural for a Jewish or Muslim intellectual to become a pa(n)theist. About the former Spinoza and Einstein are well-known examples. As to the Muslims, it should be enough to think of the Averroists. With this in mind one can also hope to understand why the Muslims, who for five hundred years had studied Aristotle’s works and produced many commentaries on them failed to make a breakthrough. The latter came in medieval Christian context and just about within a hundred years from the availability of Aristotle’s works in Latin,, If science suffered only stillbirths in ancient cultures, how did it come to its unique viable birth? The beginning of science as a fully fledged enterprise took place in relation to two important definitions of the Magisterium of the Church. The first was the definition at the Fourth Lateran Council in the year 1215, that the universe was created out of nothing at the beginning of time. The second magisterial statement was at the local level, enunciated by Bishop Stephen Tempier of Paris who, on March 7, 1277, condemned 219 Aristotelian propositions, so outlawing the deterministic and necessitarian views of creation. These statements of the teaching authority of the Church expressed an atmosphere in which faith in God had penetrated the medieval culture and given rise to philosophical consequences. The cosmos was seen as contingent in its existence and thus dependent on a divine choice which called it into being; the universe is also contingent in its nature and so God was free to create this particular form of world among an infinity of other possibilities. Thus the cosmos cannot be a necessary form of existence; and so it has to be approached by a posteriori investigation. The universe is also rational and so a coherent discourse can be made about it. Indeed the contingency and rationality of the cosmos are like two pillars supporting the Christian vision of the cosmos. http://www.scifiwright.com/2010/08/the-war-against-the-war-between-science-and-faith-revisited/
bornagain77_{March 25, 2021
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ba77 @ 26 -
Well Bob, I conceded the 1666 point as to being spread out over several years,
Thank you.
but as to your claim that your own paper does not hold 1666 to be a remarkable year for Newton
My own paper? I've never written. a paper on Newton, I don't know enough about him.Bob O'H_{March 25, 2021
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As to: "His achievements were remarkable but not sensational." Well Bob, I conceded the 1666 point as to being spread out over several years, but as to your claim that your own paper does not hold 1666 to be a remarkable year for Newton, well, in their own words, they state, " He had thoroughly learnt all of the work available on the modern analytical mathematics, extended it and systematised it. This was an extraordinary achievement by any standards"
“Freed by the scholarship, Newton now discovered his love and aptitude for the modern mathematics and set off on a two-year intensive study of the subject,”,,, In October 1666 Newton’s total immersion in mathematics stopped as suddenly as it had begun when he wrote a manuscript summarising all that he had internalised. He had thoroughly learnt all of the work available on the modern analytical mathematics, extended it and systematised it. This was an extraordinary achievement by any standards and, although nobody knew about it at the time, established Newton as one of the leading mathematicians in Europe. Although quite amazing, the manuscript from 1666 is still a long way from being the calculus that we know today or even the calculus that was known, say in 1700.”
Certainly the term "extraordinary achievement" qualifies as to being 'remarkable' does it not? And perhaps it could be strongly argued that his mathematical work in 1666 greatly helped him later on in optics and gravity, (someone more knowledgeable than I can probably answer that, but I would guess that it probably did help him quite a bit), but, none-the-less, your paper itself does concede that, mathematically speaking, 1666 was a year of "extraordinary achievement by any standards" for the young Newton. Whether his overall work is to be considered 'sensational' or merely 'remarkable' all seems really quite a bit subjective to me. For me personally, not being near Newton's mathematical caliber, I consider his mathematical work, as demonstrated in the Pi video itself, to be 'sensational'. After all, he basically transformed the entire way Pi had been calculated for centuries previously. Someone with more mathematical ability than I might call his work merely 'remarkable'. But then again, he did transform the entire way Pi had been calculated for centuries prior to him. i.e. 6 in one hand, half a dozen in the other.bornagain77_{March 25, 2021
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Only the willfully ignorant don’t accept ID.
A Nobel prize and immortality awaits the first person to validate natural selection as a major driver of evolution.jerry_{March 25, 2021
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Acartia' sock:
During Covid lockdown I expect Kairosfocus or Bornagain77 to make the ID breakthrough that will convince everyone of the truth if ID.
Only the willfully ignorant don't accept ID. They definitely can't refute ID and they have all of the power to do so! To refute ID all those willfully ignorant people have to do is step up and demonstrate that their position's mechanism can account for what ID says requires an intelligent designer! In other words they just have to support the claims of their asinine position! And yet they can't.ET_{March 25, 2021
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His achievements were remarkable but not sensational.
Are they trying to cancel Newton? I personally like Leibniz in addition to Newton. Matt Ridley wrote a book on innovation with the conclusion that nearly all great innovations were the result of the efforts of several people. The analogy maybe best be with Edison who was not the first to experiment with incandescent bulbs but was the driving force behind the expansion of electricity to make the incandescent light a common household item. Yes, Tesla won the AC/DC war and is getting his due. But the reason the world has electricity is mainly due to Edison. His expression is that innovation is a team sport. But only some teams have a Pele or a Jim Brown, or a Babe Ruth, or a Michael Jordan or a Wayne Gretzky. And who is Otto Frederick Rohwedder? He may be more influential than Newton. He’s the best thing since sliced bread. But he did not invent the knife.jerry_{March 25, 2021
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SA2 said:
During Covid lockdown I expect Kairosfocus or Bornagain77 to make the ID breakthrough that will convince everyone of the truth if ID.
Are they working on a drug that relieves cognitive bias against ID?William J Murray_{March 25, 2021
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Thanks, BA, for uncoupling eclipses and the inverse square law in your post and notes.Viola Lee_{March 25, 2021
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ba77 @ 17 - the title of this blog piece is "While in quarantine from the Plague, Newton transformed the way we calculate pi", and then continues with "He also developed calculus, and studied optics and gravity then". But none of this is true - Newton didn't do all of these when in quarantine.
But that criticism turned out, in regards to the actual claims NEWS made, to be ‘splitting hairs’ since the paper you yourself linked to conceded that 1666 was, none-the-less, a remarkable year for Newton
No it doesn't, it say that he progress over the six years from 1660 to 1666 were remarkable. This is what Thorny C wrote:
All in all the developments that the young Newton achieved in mathematics and physics in the 1660s were actually spread out over a period of six years. They were also not as extensive or revolutionary as implied in Neil deGrasse Tyson brief tweeted claim. In fact a period of six intensive years of study would be quite normal for a talented student to acquire the basics of mathematics and physics. And I think we can all agree that Newton was very talented. His achievements were remarkable but not sensational.
Bob O'H_{March 25, 2021
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You are right Viola Lee. I am mistaken. For some reason I was reading (way) too much into the inverse square law when I first made that comment a few years ago. I will delete that comment from my notes so that I do not make that mistake again. Sorry for that. The fact that the "sun’s diameter is about 400 times larger than that of the moon – the sun is also about 400 times farther away", is what it is and is why we have our amazing, (and unique in this solar system), solar eclipses. No need to invoke the inverse square law to explain such an amazing coincidence that has allowed us to have total solar eclipses and make some fairly profound scientific discoveries as a result.
The Privileged Planet - The Correlation Of Habitability and Observability “The same narrow circumstances that allow us to exist also provide us with the best over all conditions for making scientific discoveries.” “The one place that has observers is the one place that also has perfect solar eclipses.” “There is a final, even more bizarre twist. Because of Moon-induced tides, the Moon is gradually receding from Earth at 3.82 centimeters per year. In ten million years will seem noticeably smaller. At the same time, the Sun’s apparent girth has been swelling by six centimeters per year for ages, as is normal in stellar evolution. These two processes, working together, should end total solar eclipses in about 250 million years, a mere 5 percent of the age of the Earth. This relatively small window of opportunity also happens to coincide with the existence of intelligent life. Put another way, the most habitable place in the Solar System yields the best view of solar eclipses just when observers can best appreciate them.” - Guillermo Gonzalez - Astronomer - Privileged Planet
bornagain77_{March 24, 2021
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BA writes,
In regards to the inverse square law being ‘set up’ for discovery, the inverse square law also plays out in the ‘perfect’ solar eclipses that we observe here on earth.
At this particular moment in Earth’s history – although the sun’s diameter is about 400 times larger than that of the moon – the sun is also about 400 times farther away. So the sun and moon appear nearly the same size as seen from Earth. And that’s why we on Earth can sometimes witness that most amazing of spectacles, a total eclipse of the sun.
What does the inverse square law have to do with eclipses? More or less total eclipses happen because the ratio of the diameter to the distance from earth is the same for the sun and the moon. This is not related to the inverse square law. So explain, BA. What does the inverse square law have to do with eclipses?Viola Lee_{March 24, 2021
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Bob, you might want to read my response, i.e. "The only criticism against NEWS’s linked article that Bob’s paper can realistically muster is the somewhat trivial criticism that all this activity of Newton’s was limited ONLY to the year 1666, but even Bob’s paper itself does not dispute that 1666 was a year of amazing and intense intellectual breakthroughs for the young Newton." i.e. The only real criticism is that 1666 was a 'year of wonders' But that criticism turned out, in regards to the actual claims NEWS made, to be 'splitting hairs' since the paper you yourself linked to conceded that 1666 was, none-the-less, a remarkable year for Newton, and thus not nearly as consequential to the other 'modest' claims that NEWS was actually making for Newton. Again, your criticism is far more fairly directed towards Tyson's over the top hyperbole, (i.e. that Newton "discovered the laws of gravity, optics, and he invented calculus.”), not any supposed hyperbole that NEWS may have inadvertently conveyed through her reference to a 'year of wonders'. Again, NEWS merely claimed, via the article, that “Newton helped develop calculus,,, He analyzed color, light and the spectrum,, Newton studied gravity, which aided in the creation of his laws of motion,,” Those specific claims News made, via her linked article (unlike Tyson's over the top hyperbolic claims that Newton "discovered the laws of gravity, optics, and he invented calculus.”), are modest and are certainly NOT over the top hyperbole like Tyson's claims. In fact, those modest claims, more or less, accurately reflect what Newton actually accomplished during that time period. I guess we can call them 'years of wonder' instead of just a single year of wonder? :)
Isaac Newton wrote: I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.
bornagain77_{March 24, 2021
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And it also interesting to note that Pi is also found in Euler's Identity, which is considered the “most beautiful theorem in mathematics”.
Euler's identity - Mathematical beauty Excerpt: Euler’s identity is often cited as an example of deep mathematical beauty.[3] Three of the basic arithmetic operations occur exactly once each: addition, multiplication, and exponentiation. The identity also links five fundamental mathematical constants:[4] The number 0, the additive identity. The number 1, the multiplicative identity. The number pi, which is ubiquitous in the geometry of Euclidean space and analytical mathematics (pi = 3.14159265…) The number e, the base of natural logarithms, which occurs widely in mathematical analysis (e = 2.718281828…). The number i, the imaginary unit of the complex numbers, a field of numbers that contains the roots of all polynomials (that are not constants), and whose study leads to deeper insights into many areas of algebra and calculus. (Both pi and e are transcendental numbers.) Furthermore, the equation is given in the form of an expression set equal to zero, which is common practice in several areas of mathematics. Stanford University mathematics professor Keith Devlin has said, “like a Shakespearean sonnet that captures the very essence of love, or a painting that brings out the beauty of the human form that is far more than just skin deep, Euler’s equation reaches down into the very depths of existence”.[5] And Paul Nahin, a professor emeritus at the University of New Hampshire, who has written a book dedicated to Euler’s formula and its applications in Fourier analysis, describes Euler’s identity as being “of exquisite beauty”.[6] The mathematics writer Constance Reid has opined that Euler’s identity is “the most famous formula in all mathematics”.[7] And Benjamin Peirce, a noted American 19th-century philosopher, mathematician, and professor at Harvard University, after proving Euler’s identity during a lecture, stated that the identity “is absolutely paradoxical; we cannot understand it, and we don’t know what it means, but we have proved it, and therefore we know it must be the truth”.[8] A poll of readers conducted by The Mathematical Intelligencer in 1990 named Euler’s identity as the “most beautiful theorem in mathematics”.[9] In another poll of readers that was conducted by Physics World in 2004, Euler’s identity tied with Maxwell’s equations (of electromagnetism) as the “greatest equation ever”.[10] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euler%27s_identity#Mathematical_beauty God by the Numbers - Connecting the constants Excerpt: The final number comes from theoretical mathematics. It is Euler's (pronounced "Oiler's") number: e^pi*i. This number is equal to -1, so when the formula is written e^pi*i+1 = 0, it connects the five most important constants in mathematics (e, pi, i, 0, and 1) along with three of the most important mathematical operations (addition, multiplication, and exponentiation). These five constants symbolize the four major branches of classical mathematics: arithmetic, represented by 1 and 0; algebra, by i; geometry, by pi; and analysis, by e, the base of the natural log. e^pi*i+1 = 0 has been called "the most famous of all formulas," because, as one textbook says, "It appeals equally to the mystic, the scientist, the philosopher, and the mathematician.",,, The discovery of this number gave mathematicians the same sense of delight and wonder that would come from the discovery that three broken pieces of pottery, each made in different countries, could be fitted together to make a perfect sphere. It seemed to argue that there was a plan where no plan should be.,,,?Today, numbers from astronomy, biology, and theoretical mathematics point to a rational mind behind the universe.,,, The apostle John prepared the way for this conclusion when he used the word for logic, reason, and rationality—logos—to describe Christ at the beginning of his Gospel: "In the beginning was the logos, and the logos was with God, and the logos was God." When we think logically, which is the goal of mathematics, we are led to think of God. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/march/26.44.html?start=3
Also of note, the brilliant mathematician Leonhard Euler, who is considered one the most gifted mathematicians to ever exist, stated this about atheists: " If these people (atheists) maintained the slightest rigor, the slightest taste for the truth, it would be quite easy to steer them away from their errors; but their tendency towards stubbornness makes this completely impossible."
A DEFENSE OF THE (Divine) REVELATION AGAINST THE OBJECTIONS OF FREETHINKERS, BY MR. EULER Excerpt: "The freethinkers (atheists) have yet to produce any objections that have not long been refuted most thoroughly. But since they are not motivated by the love of truth, and since they have an entirely different point of view, we should not be surprised that the best refutations count for nothing and that the weakest and most ridiculous reasoning, which has so often been shown to be baseless, is continuously repeated. If these people maintained the slightest rigor, the slightest taste for the truth, it would be quite easy to steer them away from their errors; but their tendency towards stubbornness makes this completely impossible." http://www.math.dartmouth.edu/~euler/docs/translations/E092trans.pdf
Verse:
Isaiah 1:18 “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”
bornagain77_{March 24, 2021
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As to Pi in particular, it is also interesting to note that Pi, which is a 'dimensionless constant',,,,
How Many Fundamental Constants Are There? - John Baez - April 22, 2011 Excerpt: On the other hand, certain constants don't depend on the units we use - these are called "dimensionless" constants. Some of them are numbers like pi, e, and the golden ratio - purely mathematical constants, which anyone with a computer can calculate to as many decimal places as they want. But others (dimensionless constants) - at present - can only be determined by experiment. These tell us facts about nature that are completely independent of our choices of units.,,, https://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/constants.html
it is also interesting to note that Pi, which is a 'dimensionless constant', also play a very important role in physics. Pi is found in a very wide variety of Physics equations,
List of formulae involving Pi Excerpt: Physics The cosmological constant: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle: Einstein's field equation of general relativity: Coulomb's law for the electric force: Magnetic permeability of free space: Period of a simple pendulum with small amplitude: Kepler's third law of planetary motion: The buckling formula: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_formulae_involving_?#Physics Only in 2015 was the pi in quantum physics finally linked to pure math New derivation of pi links quantum physics and pure math - November 10, 2015 Excerpt: "At the lower energy orbits, the path of the electron is fuzzy and spread out," Hagen explained. "At more excited states, the orbits become more sharply defined and the uncertainty in the radius decreases." From the formula for the limit of the variational solution as the energy increased, Hagen and Friedmann were able to pull out the Wallis formula for pi. The theory of quantum mechanics dates back to the early 20th century and the Wallis formula has been around for hundreds of years, but the connection between the two had remained hidden until now. http://phys.org/news/2015-11-derivation-pi-links-quantum-physics.html
As well, Pi, (i.e. perfect, or almost perfect, circles and/or spheres), unexpectedly turn up is some rather interesting places in the universe
Sun's Almost Perfectly Round Shape Baffles Scientists - (Aug. 16, 2012) — Excerpt: The sun is nearly the roundest object ever measured. If scaled to the size of a beach ball, it would be so round that the difference between the widest and narrow diameters would be much less than the width of a human hair.,,, They also found that the solar flattening is remarkably constant over time and too small to agree with that predicted from its surface rotation. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120816150801.htm Bucky Balls - Andy Gion Excerpt: Buckyballs (C60; Carbon 60) are the roundest and most symmetrical large molecule known to man. Buckministerfullerine continues to astonish with one amazing property after another. C60 is the third major form of pure carbon; graphite and diamond are the other two. Buckyballs were discovered in 1985,,, http://www.3rd1000.com/bucky/bucky.htm
The delicate balance at which carbon is synthesized in stars is truly a work of art. Fred Hoyle (1915-2001), an atheist turned Theist, who was a famed astrophysicist who discovered the nucleosynthesis of carbon in stars, stated that,
"I do not believe that any physicist who examined the evidence could fail to draw the inference that the laws of nuclear physics have been deliberately designed with regard to the consequences they produce within stars." Sir Fred Hoyle - "The Universe: Past and Present Reflections." Engineering and Science, November, 1981. pp. 8–12
As well, exceptional roundness has now also been found for the electron,
What the electron’s near-perfect roundness means for new physics The particle’s most precise measurement yet suggests the LHC isn’t large enough BY LISA GROSSMAN 1:00PM, OCTOBER 17, 2018 Excerpt: "The finding improves the team’s last best measurement (SN Online: 12/19/13) by a factor of 10 to find an EDM (electric dipole moment) of 10-29 electron charge centimeters. That’s as round as if the electron were a sphere the size of the Earth, and you shaved less than two nanometers off the North Pole and pasted it onto the South Pole, says Yale University physicist David DeMille, a member of the ACME team." https://www.sciencenews.org/article/electron-shape-round-standard-model-physics?tgt=nr
Moreover, the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMBR), has now revealed that the universe is a circular sphere
The Known Universe by AMNH – video - (please note the 'centrality' of the Earth in the universe compared to the CMBR at the 3:36 minute mark in the video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jymDn0W6U?
And the Bible predicted that the universe would be a circular sphere long before it was discovered by modern science,
Proverbs 8:26-27 While as yet He had not made the earth or the fields, or the primeval dust of the world. When He prepared the heavens, I was there, when He drew a circle on the face of the deep,?? Job 26:10 He has inscribed a circle on the face of the waters at the boundary between light and darkness.
bornagain77_{March 24, 2021
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ba77 @ 5 - Thanks. This link (which you gave) gives Newton's approximation for pi, so he did calculate it. It's not obvious to me that this approach was used and extended afterwards, but I haven't looked closely.Bob O'H_{March 24, 2021
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ba77 @ 7 - You might want to read the article. It specifically claims that Newton made these discoveries in a "year of wonders" whilst staying at Woolsthorpe Manor. But, as Thorny C explains, this isn't true: he developed these ideas over several years, not one, and did so in both Cambridge and Woolsthorpe Manor. So well done on totally ignoring the part that was problematic: Newton didn't develop his ideas in one year whilst evading the plague.Bob O'H_{March 24, 2021
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Of related note to Newton and Gravity
"Newton proposed that Gravitational force is inversely proportional to the Square of the distance between two masses (Inverse Square Law). For an orderly, designed universe, this makes sense – why wouldn’t it be something nice and even, like the square of the distance? For someone who believes in a random universe though – why the Square? Why not r ^ 2.148273.. or r ^ 1.932157.. The universe is full of nice, neat relationships like this, at very fundamental levels – moreso than not. I find the ability of the atheist to accept so many coincidences nothing short of astonishing." - drc466 - UD blogger Inverse Square Law http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/forces/isq.html
And the inverse square law, for the most part, also holds for Einstein's General Relativity, i.e. " in the limit of low velocities and weak gravitational fields, Einstein’s theory still predicts that the gravitational force between two point objects obeys an inverse-square law.”
“When Isaac Newton realized that the acceleration of the Moon as it orbited around the Earth could be related to the acceleration of an apple as it fell to the ground, it was the first time that two seemingly unrelated physical phenomena had been “unified”. The quest to unify all the forces of nature is one that still keeps physicists busy today. Newton showed that the gravitational attraction between two point bodies is proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them: F = GMm/r2, where F is the force, G is Newton’s gravitational constant, M and m are the masses of the objects, and r is the distance between them.,,, ,,, in the limit of low velocities and weak gravitational fields, Einstein’s theory still predicts that the gravitational force between two point objects obeys an inverse-square law.” https://physicsworld.com/a/testing-the-gravitational-inverse-square-law/
From the ‘purely materialistic’ perspective of atheists, why should there even be such a nice, neat, and tidy, thing as the inverse square law?
Designer gravity - Don DeYoung The force F between two masses m1 and m2, when separated by a distance r, can be written as F = (G m1 m2)/r2 Where G is the gravitational constant, first measured by Henry Cavendish in 1798.(1) This equation shows that gravity decreases as the separation distance, r, between two objects becomes large but never quite reaches zero. The inverse-square nature of this equation is intriguing. After all, there is no essential reason why gravity should behave in this way. In a chance, evolving universe, some random exponent like r1.97 or r2.3 would seem much more likely. However, precise measurements have shown an exact exponent out to at least 5 decimal places, 2.00000. As one researcher put it, this result seems ‘just a little too neat.’2 http://creation.com/gravity-the-mystery-force
And indeed, the inverse square law is just a little too neat to be an accident. It is obvious that the inverse square law of Gravity must have been ‘set up’ for man to, fairly easily, discover it. Newton himself certainly did not hold Gravity to be an accident. Here is what Newton himself said about Gravitation in his book Principia, “This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being.,,, This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called Lord God pantokrator, or Universal Ruler;,,, The Supreme God is a Being eternal, infinite, absolutely perfect;,,,
“This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being. And if the fixed stars are the centres of other like systems, these, being formed by the like wise counsel, must be all subject to the dominion of One; especially since the light of the fixed stars is of the same nature with the light of the sun, and from every system light passes into all the other systems: and lest the systems of the fixed stars should, by their gravity, fall on each other mutually, he hath placed those systems at immense distances one from another. This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called Lord God pantokrator, or Universal Ruler;,,, The Supreme God is a Being eternal, infinite, absolutely perfect;,,, from his true dominion it follows that the true God is a living, intelligent, and powerful Being; and, from his other perfections, that he is supreme, or most perfect. He is eternal and infinite, omnipotent and omniscient; that is, his duration reaches from eternity to eternity; his presence from infinity to infinity; he governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done. He is not eternity or infinity, but eternal and infinite; he is not duration or space, but he endures and is present. He endures for ever, and is every where present”: Sir Isaac Newton – Principia; 1687, GENERAL SCHOLIUM.
In regards to the inverse square law being ‘set up’ for discovery, the inverse square law also plays out in the ‘perfect’ solar eclipses that we observe here on earth.
At this particular moment in Earth’s history – although the sun’s diameter is about 400 times larger than that of the moon – the sun is also about 400 times farther away. So the sun and moon appear nearly the same size as seen from Earth. And that’s why we on Earth can sometimes witness that most amazing of spectacles, a total eclipse of the sun.
Moreover, the amazing coincidence of perfect solar eclipses, which is an outplaying of the inverse square law. has allowed us to make further amazing scientific discoveries:
The Illuminating Power of Eclipses – 2017 Excerpt: The invention of the spectroscope in the mid-19th century brought new solar discoveries. A glass prism splits light into a rainbow of colors emitted by specific atoms and molecules — bar codes, in a way, that identify the elements making the light. In 1868, a French scientist, Pierre Janssen, traveled to India to view an eclipse through a spectroscope. The sun’s prominences, he concluded, are largely made of hot hydrogen gas. But a bright yellow line seen through the spectroscope, initially thought to be an identifier of sodium, did not match the wavelength of sodium. That signified the discovery of helium, the universe’s second most common element. It would not be found on Earth for another 13 years.,,, Einstein’s ideas set the stage for the most famous eclipse experiment of all time, in 1919, during which Sir Arthur Eddington observed the bending of starlight around the sun. The findings verified the theory’s predictions. Solar eclipses have been used not just to deduce what is going on in the solar system but also to study Earth.,,, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/14/science/eclipse-discoveries-science.html
So it is readily apparent that the laws of the universe, particularly the inverse square law of Gravity, is set up in such a way so as to allow us to, number one, discover it, and number 2, make further scientific discoveries, via ‘perfect eclipses’, about the mysteries of the universe from the earth. This overall thesis, i.e. that the earth is ‘privileged’ in order to enable humans to make scientific discoveries, has been more fully developed by Gonzalez and Richards,
The very conditions that make Earth hospitable to intelligent life also make it well suited to viewing and analyzing the universe as a whole. – Jay Richards – Privileged Planet The Privileged Planet – The Correlation Of Habitability and Observability “The same narrow circumstances that allow us to exist also provide us with the best over all conditions for making scientific discoveries.” “The one place that has observers is the one place that also has perfect solar eclipses.” “There is a final, even more bizarre twist. Because of Moon-induced tides, the Moon is gradually receding from Earth at 3.82 centimeters per year. In ten million years will seem noticeably smaller. At the same time, the Sun’s apparent girth has been swelling by six centimeters per year for ages, as is normal in stellar evolution. These two processes, working together, should end total solar eclipses in about 250 million years, a mere 5 percent of the age of the Earth. This relatively small window of opportunity also happens to coincide with the existence of intelligent life. Put another way, the most habitable place in the Solar System yields the best view of solar eclipses just when observers can best appreciate them.” – Guillermo Gonzalez – Astronomer - "Privileged Planet" And here is a video that goes over the ‘Privileged Planet’ thesis, The Privileged Planet – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmIc42oRjm8
Verse:
Proverbs 3:19 "By wisdom the LORD laid the earth's foundations, by understanding he set the heavens in place;"
bornagain77_{March 24, 2021
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7 billion ordinary people have been trying to do their ordinary jobs and raise their ordinary kids while a million DEMONS have been binding and gagging and impoverishing and humiliatring and killing the ordinary people. That's vastly more heroic than improving the precision of a number.polistra_{March 24, 2021
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So exactly where does the photon and/or atom actually exist prior to measurement if not in the physical universe? Well, prior to measurement, the photon and/or atom is mathematically defined as existing in an infinite dimensional Hilbert space, that takes an infinite amount of information to describe properly.
The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences – Eugene Wigner – 1960 Excerpt: We now have, in physics, two theories of great power and interest: the theory of quantum phenomena and the theory of relativity.,,, The two theories operate with different mathematical concepts: the four dimensional Riemann space and the infinite dimensional Hilbert space, http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html Wave function Excerpt "wave functions form an abstract vector space",,, This vector space is infinite-dimensional, because there is no finite set of functions which can be added together in various combinations to create every possible function. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_function#Wave_functions_as_an_abstract_vector_space Explaining Information Transfer in Quantum Teleportation: Armond Duwell †‡ University of Pittsburgh Excerpt: In contrast to a classical bit, the description of a (quantum) qubit requires an infinite amount of information. The amount of information is infinite because two real numbers are required in the expansion of the state vector of a two state quantum system (Jozsa 1997, 1) http://www.cas.umt.edu/phil/faculty/duwell/DuwellPSA2K.pdf Quantum Computing – Stanford Encyclopedia Excerpt: Theoretically, a single qubit can store an infinite amount of information, yet when measured (and thus collapsing the superposition of the Quantum Wave state) it yields only the classical result (0 or 1),,, http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-quantcomp/#2.1
Now, as a Christian Theist, that certainly sounds very much like the photon, (and/or atom), though not existing in the physical universe prior to measurement, is existing in the infinite Mind of God prior to measurement, and that it is God Himself who is collapsing the 'infinite dimensional' Hilbert space and Who is, therefore, sustaining this physical universe in its continual existence. Just as Christian Theism has predicted all along:
God Sustains All Things And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.(Colossians 1:17) The Bible teaches that God not only created the universe but that he upholds and sustains it day by day, hour by hour. Scripture says that Christ, the son of God, upholds the universe by the word of his power. (Hebrews 1:3) As theologian A.H. Strong said, “Christ is the originator and the upholder of the universe…..In Him it consists, or holds together, from hour to hour. The steady will of Christ constitutes the law of the universe and makes it a cosmos instead of chaos, just as His will brought it into being in the beginning.” https://www.pccob.org/2020/04/30/god-sustains-all-things/
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