General relativity survives gruelling pulsar test -- Einstein at least 99.95% right

EurekAlert (AAAS) ^ | 13 September 2006 | Staff

[stripes1776]

And then there the science-deniers who will not believe anything that goes against their preconceived ideas, no matter how well documented.

All reasoning starts from preconceived ideas. Try doing geometry without a point, a line, and a plane.

We see a lot of this lately from some creationists,

This is easily sorted out when you understand that religion and science are two different disciplines. They start from different assumptions (preconceived ideas if you like) and produce different results.

[Southack]

"Separated by a distance of just a million kilometres, both neutron stars emit lighthouse-like beams of radio waves that are seen as radio "pulses" every time the beams sweep past the Earth. ...

Gravitational radiation and orbital decay: The two co-rotating neutron stars lose energy due to the radiation of gravitational waves."

That's such self-contradictory claptrap.

The neutron stars lose energy due to electromagnetic radiation, they claim! But wait, Oh no, the neutron stars must be losing energy due to gravitational waves, they contradict themselves in the next paragraph.

It's pathetic, as is the name-calling and ankle-biting that's already on this thread.

The fools are clueless.

For all that we know Gravitational waves go in toward a star, adding energy. We aren't even sure that a star *can* lose energy due to G waves.

It's not as though we've been able to isolate such a wave.

[PatrickHenry]

Evidence of gravity waves placemarker. Speaking of which, has anyone started a suicide watch for a certain Freeper who shall remain nameless?

It's all your fault.

[RadioAstronomer]

ROTFLMAO! Sorry, but your post was soo bad I busted out laughing out loud.

[Southack]

There's nothing bad about my post. I said that we haven't isolated a Gravity wave.

We haven't.

You can't show otherwise.

Once we have isolated a Gravity wave, then we'll know if Gravity can add energy to a system (e.g. light recieved inside a planet's atmosphere can add heat) or if Gravity is taking away energy from a system (e.g. particle or radio-wave emissions).

These are non-trivial points. You laugh at them only because they make thinly-backed beliefs uncomfortable.

[cue the mocking non-directed posts now]

[tallhappy]

Excellent post.

[Captain Beyond]

Bump.

Einstein Rocks!!!!

[Blind Eye Jones]

Thank you for your theoretical insights but my remark was an unintended oversight and I was wrong with the number posted. Actually, I was just trying to be funny and never expected there might be some scientific implications with any of this. I don't know if I'll ever get to reading Shapiro's "cracking good yarn" but I appreciate you offering it.

[RightWhale]

Some of the journalists who write science articles are trained science writers or tech writers. It is a demanding specialty. Somehow, though, most of the science articles seem to be written by sports analyists, which seems odd for the MSM to do.

[RightWhale]

I think of myself as a Thomist to this extent: Aquinas saw the power in the separate disciplines of philosophy and theology. Prior to Aquinas, and even now, the two fields were overlapping or even merged by many. Science as it is now relies on induction, so cannot achieve apodeictic certainty as we expect from philosophy, nor the subjective certainty of private revelation, such as Pascal achieved, as we might expect from theology, so is a separate discipline and should not be merged with the others if we are to get the maximum utility from it.

[stripes1776]

Science as it is now relies on induction, so cannot achieve apodeictic certainty as we expect from philosophy, nor the subjective certainty of private revelation, such as Pascal achieved, as we might expect from theology, so is a separate discipline and should not be merged with the others if we are to get the maximum utility from it.

I would say we are on the same page.

[stripes1776]

Some of the journalists who write science articles are trained science writers or tech writers. It is a demanding specialty. Somehow, though, most of the science articles seem to be written by sports analyists, which seems odd for the MSM to do.

I used to make my living as a technical writer, so I agree. It is a demanding thing to do. And like all writing, you must keep your audience in mind. If you are writing for specialists in some field, you will be using some technical jargon, and you don't have to explain the basics. If you are writing for a general audience, you have to cut most of the cant without distorting the subject. But in both cases, you still have to write clear, unambiguous English.

Journalists writing on science for the popular press could clarify by striking the word proof from their diction.

[RightWhale]

There are well-written science articles posted on FR now and then. Those by Justin Ray, who writes for spaceflightnow.com are well done and easy for the layman to get hold of. For example:

1244 GMT (8:44 a.m. EDT)

Deployment of the International Space Station's new set of power-generating solar wings has been successfully completed! Extension of the starboard array completed at 8:44 a.m.

1238 GMT (8:38 a.m. EDT)

The starboard array is crunching toward full extension. Deploy restarted at 8:38 a.m.

1209 GMT (8:09 a.m. EDT)

Commander Brent Jett reports a good deploy to 49 percent. The crew will pause for 30 minutes to let the wing warm up before extending the rest of the array.

1203 GMT (8:03 a.m. EDT)

Now the starboard solar wing of the space station's new power truss is beginning to extend outward to the 49 percent mark. The station is flying over the Pacific, west of Peru.

1135 GMT (7:35 a.m. EDT)

With the international space station in free drift, the Atlantis astronauts unfurled the first of two new solar array wings today, beaming back spectacular video showing the gold-colored blankets extending like venetian blinds against the black backdrop of space.

"The international space station beginning to spread its wings," said NASA commentator Kyle Herring in mission control.

---

Everything is technically accurate, including some jargon not entirely unfamiliar to most laymen, yet the reader gets a firm image of what is going on through various literary devices. Maybe this example makes tech writing for the public look too easy.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Sorry, could have said it in one sentence. The +/- 0.05% represents a bound on the experimental accuracy, not Einstein's theory.

[stripes1776]

There are well-written science articles posted on FR now and then. Those by Justin Ray, who writes for spaceflightnow.com are well done and easy for the layman to get hold of. For example:...

Yes, good reporting.

[tet68]

As the monk's computer finished printing the last name of God, outside the stars silently began to wink out.

[RightWingAtheist]

I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. I attended a talk given by Roger Penrose two years ago, and he stated that binary pulsars are among the most beautiful objects in the universe, because the demonstrate nearly everything predicted by general relativity.

[SunkenCiv]

Going Beyond Einstein: Spacetime Wave Orbits Black Hole
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics | January 10, 2005
Posted on 01/14/2005 9:18:08 PM EST by snarks_when_bored
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1321180/posts