[gondramB]

>>Modern physicists especially enjoy coming up with explanations for things that don't make any sense, and then saying something like, "It doesn't have to make sense. It just has to describe reality. Reality doesn't necessarily make sense."

I think Einstein got that started when he came up with the Special Theory of Relativity, which seemed to contradict our common understandings. But the irony is that Einstein insisted that the Theory of Relativity not only made sense, but it was the only possible explanation that did make sense.<<


Its important that the equations describe reality rather than "making sense" to at a macroscopic level.

For example after Einstein finished his field equations, he followed them to their conclusion and concluded the universe was stable. This made sense to him. Then another physicist Alexander Friedmann realized that Einstein had divided by zero - the correction didn't make as much sense but it did describe reality and Einstein accepted it.

[Brilliant]

I am not saying they should ignore reality. However, I do think that in a lot of instances, it's difficult to say what reality is. Experimenters often read too much into their results. They are too anxious to obtain results that confirm their own theories.

The "action at a distance hypothesis" is one that comes to mind. The weight of opinion is that spin information is transmitted instantaneously from one particle to another over a sizable distance. A lot of the physicists will tell you that it's beyond doubt at this point, yet it seems to defy the Theory of Relativity.

On the other hand, the proof is merely statistical, and even then based upon theoretical assumptions that have not themselves been proven. In fact, we really don't even know what "spin" is. And as Einstein pointed out, it seems absurd. The experimenter's retort: Yes it's absurd, but nevertheless true.

I think I would be a little more hesitant to conclude that it's true, if I agreed that it is absurd, particularly when all I've got is statistical evidence to support it. It wasn't all that long ago that scientists finally concluded that cyclamates don't cause cancer, despite the 1970's claim that they were undeniably a significant cause of cancer.