Welcome James!
I am a physicist, too.
Posts by Martin
Sunday Weekly Zoom. 12:30 PM EDT - August 31, 2025 - Discussion topic: "Pleasure is the guide of life" To find out how to attend CLICK HERE. To read more on the discussion topic CLICK HERE.
We are now requiring that new registrants confirm their request for an account by email. Once you complete the "Sign Up" process to set up your user name and password, please send an email to the New Accounts Administator to obtain new account approval.
Regularly Checking In On A Small Screen Device? Bookmark THIS page!
-
-
Welcome Singleton!
-
Quote
The idea that light is massless will be thrown away eventually along with the rest of Einstein's magic tricks.
According to the model which is the most consistent with observations, light has mass while the elementary particle which makes up light, the photon, has a nominal rest mass of zero. While we can carry out experiments in which it appears that light is slowed down or photons are trapped, a single photon cannot actually be at rest. In every frame of reference except for its own, it moves with the speed of light throughout its existence.
It might happen that in future, a photon rest mass of more than zero is discovered. The current model can accommodate this by separating the speed of light from the maximum speed of information transport, which would then be slightly higher than the speed of light, and which would then be used instead of the speed of light in the Lorentz transforms and some other formulas. However, a photon rest mass of more than zero would certainly motivate the search for a superior model.
Although from a theoretical perspective, Einstein's theories and quantum mechanics have replaced Newton's theory of gravity/mechanics, in actual practice, Newton's theory is still far more often applied than the newer theories because Newton's mechanics is accurate enough and more efficient to use for problems which are within its limits. Therefore, Newton's mechanics has never been thrown away. Similarly, it appears unlikely, that Einstein's "magic tricks" will be thrown away, because they do work well. We just do not know whether they have a range beyond which they become inadequate.
-
Welcome Ranko!
-
Welcome Al-Hakiim!
-
Asexuality and Epicureanism | Blog of the APA
The link to this article was found at "Philosophy Matters" on:
-
Welcome Jason!
-
Welcome M.Repetzki!
-
Quote
...the chatbot thinks...
The chatbot does not think. Probably, it uses "oversimplified" because it has more detailed texts on the topic in the training data.
-
Welcome GnothiSeauton!
-
Welcome Henrique!
-
TauPhi's comment on the big bang theory is correct.
-
This may be a related snippet of the "story" (but tentatively, the timing does not match):
Quotea certain Theotimus, convinced that he had composed infamous letters, addressed to some of the women who frequented his gardens, was condemned to lose his life.
from Charles' thread on the article on Epicureanism in Diderot's encyclopedia:
I recall another snippet indicating that someone (probably Theotimus) was sentenced to death because he was found guilty of slander. However, the search did not reveal that other snippet on epicureanfriends.com.
-
Welcome Sulaiman!
-
Welcome Briefvacation!
-
Welcome Shier!
-
Welcome Mellreh!
-
Quote
Why does Diogenes of Oenoanda want to help those who are "well-constituted"? Doesn't that mean helping those who don't need help? Shouldn't he want to help those who are badly constituted? Or does he want to help the rich to lead good lives, such that their examples might spread, and their wealth/power not be abused?
I guess that "well-constituted" refers to people who are still willing to learn and adapt as they see fit if they encounter ideas which are new for them or which they have neglected in the past.
-
Welcome SillyApe!
-
Quote
Likewise, energy and forces are best thought of as falling under "atoms" since as Epicurus meant the term it was simply indivisible particle
Energy is not indivisible except for transition energies between states of matter. Likewise, forces are not indivisible either. It is good to be aware that forces at a distance (fields) and energy are not covered by Epicurus' and would need to be added as new items to update Epicurean physics.
Unread Threads
Finding Things At EpicureanFriends.com
What's the best strategy for finding things on EpicureanFriends.com? Here's a suggested search strategy:
- First, familiarize yourself with the list of forums. The best way to find threads related to a particular topic is to look in the relevant forum. Over the years most people have tried to start threads according to forum topic, and we regularly move threads from our "general discussion" area over to forums with more descriptive titles.
- Use the "Search" facility at the top right of every page. Note that the search box asks you what section of the forum you'd like to search. If you don't know, select "Everywhere." Also check the "Search Assistance" page.
- Use the "Tag" facility, starting with the "Key Tags By Topic" in the right hand navigation pane, or using the "Search By Tag" page, or the "Tag Overview" page which contains a list of all tags alphabetically. We curate the available tags to keep them to a manageable number that is descriptive of frequently-searched topics.