DiscussMormonism.com

As far as teaching goes, technically I can teach whatever I want. I'm required to offer what amounts to one course each semester, but I have Lehrfreiheit —the freedom to decide for myself exactly what it is that I'll teach. In my department nobody is enough of a jerk to teach useless courses and for...

"The age of the universe" is the age that would be measured by a co-moving observer—that is, by an observer for whom the expansion of the universe is equal in all directions. That kind of co-moving observer is a lot like the old Newtonian concept of an observer who is at absolute rest. And it's true...

We had to derive so many equations that I wouldn't be surprised if I have derived [Kepler‘s Laws] lol. The ones I remember working on are the laws of thermodynamics. Ugh. I’m sure you can derive them. You’re a physicist. (It’s okay if it might take you a while to remember and think. Me too. I’m goi...

Kepler's Laws are not "scholarship about scholarship". They are how the planets move. People have watched those things up there for millennia. Ancient Egyptians marked the patterns quite well. The planets drift around in the night sky, over weeks and months and years, gradually cycling back around t...

I have only read a bit about the philosophy of free will, but I have thought a lot about physical determinism. Lately I've had an idea that seems to me to put things in a new light; but perhaps it's not as good as I think. The idea is: Whatever is controlling you is you. It seems to me to make sense...

Can you derive Kepler's Laws from your theory? hahaha I don't have to do s h 1 t in order to start trying to explain how to go beyond general relativity. All I have to do is be a BS detector. :D Everything's a Scam :mrgreen: :geek: :ugeek: I'm going to take that as a "No." Isaac Newton derived Kepl...

Yes, General Relativity needs some kind of improvement. Without equations, though, you are not going beyond General Relativity. You are failing to come up as high as its boot heels. Can you derive Kepler's Laws from your theory? That would at least be a start, matching the physics of 1687. Then we c...

Current physics is not a "convoluted mess of models". It's a lean and elegant structure with few assumptions. It only seems convoluted if you don't know enough math. It does have a big problem reconciling General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. No mere phrases and images about aether annihilating ...

If you want to know what gravity is, you need to learn about General Relativity . Gravity is the geometry of spacetime. What we mostly think of as gravity is actually a very slight difference in how fast time flows in different places. It flows very slightly slower the closer you are to a heavier ma...

Why do stars get big when they start to “run out of fuel”? It’s an interesting mechanism. Stellar fusion is self-limiting. It would go faster and hotter if the star were denser, but with heat there is pressure. The star’s own gravity packs it together but the pressure from all that fusion limits the...