• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

My argument against materialism

punshhh said:
so a photon is a form of energy like a packet of energy, a particle of energy?
Click to expand...
Yes.

What does that mean, I am refering to what appears to be real as a whole, not just the atoms, I am including spacetime and our understanding of reality.
Click to expand...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_relativity
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantum_mechanics

Mind you, if you can merge those two into a single theory, there's a Nobel Prize in it for you. It's possibly the single most significant question in 21st century physics.
 
punshhh said:
Ok Ok I got the message, so our known universe is composed of activity and any kind of solid/substance/physical presence is an illusion/false.

This isn't quite what I expected a materialist to say.
Click to expand...

See my previous post about you not understanding anything you claim to understand.

You didn't "get it" at all. Physical presence IS an action. They are not two different categories.
 
PixyMisa said:
The tensile strength of a body as large as the Earth over its entire size is essentially zero. In other words, the Earth as a body is held together by gravity; the electromagnetic force simply doesn't signify at that scale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roche_limit
Click to expand...
RE PixyMisa post # 1865 Not so ... tensile strength in context to Roche limit comes in to play when forces other than gravity are holding the orbiting body together (e.g. a man-made spacecraft). Spacecraft consist of molecules bonded by EM. The earth is chock full of molecules and so EM signifies on a global scale. Okay you corrected yourself in post # 1867.

RE PixyMisa post # 1867 You wrote: "Gravity holds planets together. The electromagnetic force keeps them from collapsing into tiny little neutron stars. It does signify, but only as a repulsive force, not as an attractive one."

EM only acts repulsively when two unlike charged particles interact (i.e + & -) It is impossible for the Earth's EM field to be globally repulsive. It's nonsense.

See my post # 1872 to read my reply about your other nonsense regarding planets and little neutron stars.
 
kenkoskinen said:
dlorde and others, we have been discussing what would happen if the electromagnetic force (EM) were to suddenly turn off on earth. This is in part a thought experiment to test whether gravity or EM holds our planet together. The answer is both are involved, especially in planets that consist of many molecules.

For info on EM there's an online video lecture: "What Holds Our World Together? Electric charges (Historical), Polarization, Electric Force, Coulomb's Law." The presenter is Walter Lewin and his lecture is one of a MIT series.

http://videolectures.net/mit802s02_lewin_lec01/

In my last reply to dlorde post #1855 I indicated that the volume of our planet would instantly shrink. I didn't realize how much. When the EM force turned off we have to try to imagine charged Standard Model particles: electrons, quarks & therefore protons, the weak forces W- & W+ vector bosons all suddenly losing their charges. Some would say this is crazy. I agree but follow along. When electrons lose their charge all of the space in the electron clouds get invaded by the new neutral electrons and other particles. This would cause the planet to shrink by many orders of magnitude. An atom's space encompassing the electron cloud is 10,000 times the volume of the nucleus. It is almost all space! So when I wrote that gravity would draw all the particles into a central area, this is no joke. The instant shrinkage in volume would cause a massive collision in the central area; followed by a huge rebound. Much of the matter would be ejected into outer space. Good bye Earth. Whatever survived would be a comparative miniscule ball but it would slowly dissipate, its particles being picked off by the solar wind.

The EM force is vital to holding Earth together!
Click to expand...

There would be no solar wind.

I get this, but the collisions would not be that spectacular, I agree that the EM forces are there and provide structure, but gravity is just as essential.

There could be no collisions as that is provided by the charge on the eelctrons. You would essentially have some form of dark matter.

let us take a less extreme example, what happens if the partcicles of a planet are neutral, they come together because of gravity and they stick to each other because of short range consequences of the EM forces.

That seems to be more balanced. SMT is Science Medice and Technology at the JREF,

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=5
 
punshhh said:
I do understand I'm just looking for clarification, if an atom is not energy what is it?

And if its a particle, a particle of what?
Click to expand...

They are all the same, they are quanta of the unknowable yglem of 'energy', the 'partciles' are just constrained events of the quanta of yglem. They are wave forms all the time.

We don't know.
 
PixyMisa said:
Read the rest of the article. It discusses explicitly where the electromagnetic force is sufficient to hold a body together inside the Roche limit - and that's only for bodies less than 1/100th the diameter of the Earth.

Edit: Specifically, you can see that some of the smaller moons of the gas giants are inside the Roche limit for a fluid body, but outside an estimated Roche limit for a rigid body of that size. These small moons are being held together by the electromagnetic force. That doesn't work for larger bodies, because the tensile strength doesn't scale but the tidal stresses do.

Yes. Was there a point to all that?
Click to expand...
Originally Posted by kenkoskinen
PixyMesa Your http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roche_limit reference is not about any comparisons in the gravity vs. EM discussion. The Roche limit is where gravitational tidal forces succeed in breaking up orbiting bodies. Gravity is assumed to be the only glue ... but it's immaterial; orbiting bodies break up where they do.

PixyMisa wrote: "Read the rest of the article. It discusses explicitly where the electromagnetic force is sufficient to hold a body together inside the Roche limit - and that's only for bodies less than 1/100th the diameter of the Earth."

Okay ... was there a point to this? I'm saying the Earth is held together by both gravity & EM.

PixyMisa in your earlier post you claimed EM can signify on the planetary scale but repulsively. This can't be, but on Earth EM does hold molecules together and they are here on the large scale. To test the Roche limit on an Earth-like planet, it would have to be in close orbit around a massive star, a neutron star or black hole. Such a scenario has never been observed but I'm saying the case involves tensile strength via EM and gravity. Their standard math doesn't compute the case. I wouldn't get too high on the Roche limit stuff as it stands.

The article states: "Some real satellites, both natural and artificial, can orbit within their Roche limits because they are held together by forces other than gravitation. Jupiter's moon Metis and Saturn's moon Pan are examples of such satellites, which hold together because of their tensile strength."

Although there is an estimate on the mass of Pan, Metis' is unknown (see Wikipedia articles Pan (moon) & Metis (moon). It's hard to imagine that gravity isn't a factor in their cohesion. Maybe we already have an example (perhaps two) where EM & gravity working together have out foxed the Roche limit.

I wrote:
"You claim that gravity holds planets together and the electromagnetic force keeps them from collapsing into tiny little neutron stars. Do you have any idea what it takes to create a neutron star? You need a large star to go supernova and a neutron star is left in the aftermath. If the star were larger yet, it would form a stellar black hole. A planet can't become even a tiny neutron star and the EM bonds in molecules couldn't possibly prevent it. (reference required, preferably citing astronomic observations)

On earth there are lots of molecules. EM force binds atoms and molecules together. It acts like an atomic glue holding things together. It works along with gravity in holding our world together. http://videolectures.net/mit802s02_lewin_lec01/

You wrote: "Yes. Was there a point to all that?"

The point is on Earth EM works with gravity to hold our world together. How could you have missed it ... again? View the video EM is worldwide on Earth and not repulsive.
 
punshhh said:
so a photon is a form of energy like a packet of energy, a particle of energy?
Click to expand...
Yes. But the statement "a photon is a form of energy" is not the same as the statement "a photon is made out of energy". The statement "a photon is a form of energy" is true. The statement "a photon is made out of energy" is nonsense.

You're still thinking of energy as if it's something like sand. And when someone says "sandcastles are a form of energy", you say, "yes, I understand," thinking that we're telling you that energy is a building material like sand. But energy isn't something like sand. It's not a type of thing like sand.

Eggs are a form of money. But money isn't something you can use to build a dozen eggs--I can't order a truckload of money, dump it in my yard, and rake it into a truckload of eggs. But if I have a truckload of sand, I could trade it for a truckload of eggs of equivalent value.

Eggs are a form of money, and sand is a form of money, but eggs are just whatever eggs are, and sand is just whatever sand is. Sand is made of tiny chunks of quartz, rocks, shells, and so forth, not this abstract thing called money. Eggs are made of egg shell, egg yolk, and egg whites, not an abstract thing called money. That eggs and sand are forms of money doesn't mean they're made out of the same type of thing--it simply means they can both buy things--like each other.

Stop treating energy as if it's sand. Energy isn't a building material. When we say that eggs are a form of money, stop assuming that we're telling you eggs are made of sand. We're not. We're telling you that eggs can buy things.

ETA: We can also say that eggs are money, and they are--because we can buy things with it, and money is "something you buy things with". But that claim doesn't mean that eggs are rearrangements of tiny amounts of "money".
 
Last edited:
Dancing David said:
They are all the same, they are quanta of the unknowable yglem of 'energy', the 'partciles' are just constrained events of the quanta of yglem. They are wave forms all the time.

We don't know.
Click to expand...

Yes exactly you only need to read up on the Plank epoch, to understand this.
 
Dancing David said:
There would be no solar wind.

I get this, but the collisions would not be that spectacular, I agree that the EM forces are there and provide structure, but gravity is just as essential.

There could be no collisions as that is provided by the charge on the eelctrons. You would essentially have some form of dark matter.

let us take a less extreme example, what happens if the partcicles of a planet are neutral, they come together because of gravity and they stick to each other because of short range consequences of the EM forces.

That seems to be more balanced. SMT is Science Medice and Technology at the JREF,

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=5
Click to expand...
Dancing David

You wrote:There would be no solar wind.

The solar wind comes from the Sun and in this thought experiment we agreed the EM force was turned off only on Earth. Therefore cosmic rays from the Sun would increase as the new Earth would no longer have a protective magnetic field.

You wrote: I get this, but the collisions would not be that spectacular, I agree that the EM forces are there and provide structure, but gravity is just as essential.

I agree!

You wrote: "There could be no collisions as that is provided by the charge on the eelctrons. You would essentially have some form of dark matter."

Well yes ... if the EM field were on. But we are imagining that it is turned off therefore protons and electrons emitted by the Sun would strike simply because the new Earth was in their path.

You wrote: "let us take a less extreme example, what happens if the partcicles of a planet are neutral, they come together because of gravity and they stick to each other because of short range consequences of the EM forces."

Yes gravity interacts with neutral & charged particles alike. I'm not aware of neutrons, for example, sticking together because of any EM short range consequences. Do you have a source? Neutral particles are supposed to be blind to and don't interact with EM. In atomic nuclei the residual nuclear force can and does bind neutrons.
 
yy2bggggs said:
Yes. But the statement "a photon is a form of energy" is not the same as the statement "a photon is made out of energy". The statement "a photon is a form of energy" is true. The statement "a photon is made out of energy" is nonsense.

You're still thinking of energy as if it's something like sand. And when someone says "sandcastles are a form of energy", you say, "yes, I understand," thinking that we're telling you that energy is a building material like sand. But energy isn't something like sand. It's not a type of thing like sand.

Eggs are a form of money. But money isn't something you can use to build a dozen eggs--I can't order a truckload of money, dump it in my yard, and rake it into a truckload of eggs. But if I have a truckload of sand, I could trade it for a truckload of eggs of equivalent value.

Eggs are a form of money, and sand is a form of money, but eggs are just whatever eggs are, and sand is just whatever sand is. Sand is made of tiny chunks of quartz, rocks, shells, and so forth, not this abstract thing called money. Eggs are made of egg shell, egg yolk, and egg whites, not an abstract thing called money. That eggs and sand are forms of money doesn't mean they're made out of the same type of thing--it simply means they can both buy things--like each other.

Stop treating energy as if it's sand. Energy isn't a building material. When we say that eggs are a form of money, stop assuming that we're telling you eggs are made of sand. We're not. We're telling you that eggs can buy things.

ETA: We can also say that eggs are money, and they are--because we can buy things with it, and money is "something you buy things with". But that claim doesn't mean that eggs are rearrangements of tiny amounts of "money".
Click to expand...

I see this, I have not been thinking of the energy which "is"/constitutes an atom changing into another form of energy and visa versa. The atoms were formed shortly after the BBE, before this during the Plank epoch there were no atoms and all was energy.

The particles known as atoms are forms of energy, correct?

ie they were formed from energy during the big bang, but can be regarded now as particles, correct?
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom