So, unlike modern pundits, Newton and Feynman knew a lot about the actual carefully thought-out views of ancient astronomers. But what, after all, did they really know? None of those people had smartphones.
Tag: Richard Feynman
Massimo Pigliucci: Feynman was wrong about truth and beauty in science
He starts out well but notice how Darwinism, flung into the works like an old shoe, undermines the topic completely. If beauty is really “in the eye of the beholder” full stop, there is really no such thing as beauty. If the “capacity for aesthetic appreciation” evolved “possibly involving natural selection,” then it is unrelated to the object and best understood in terms of how many children artists have.
Feynman, says Massimo Pigliucci, is wrong about beauty and truth in science
Massimo Pigliucci: But as the German theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder has pointed out (also in Aeon), there is absolutely no reason to think that simplicity and beauty are reliable guides to physical reality. She is right for a number of reasons.
New Scientist on the glitch at the edge of the universe
The constant 1/137 may be variable after all. This immutable number determines how stars burn, how chemistry happens and even whether atoms exist at all. Physicist Richard Feynman, who knew a thing or two about it, called it “one of the greatest damn mysteries of physics: a magic number that comes to us with no Read More…