Oh No wrote:

RLO wrote:
In science, virtually anything is open to revsion. Scientists do not
deal in absolute knowledge, which is the province of religion.


I think in fact that I did not make myself clear. This is not how
Schwarzschild radius and Planck length are *calculated*, it is how they
are *defined*. A definition is a truism and cannot be incorrect unless
it is inconsistent..

This is a matter of semantics, not one of the physical properties of the
universe. One uses, in so far as is possible, accepted definitions for
the simple reason that if one does not do so, one is talking a different
language from other people, and because that tends to make communication
difficult. It will appear to others that one is talking gibberish, even
if one is not. "A rose by any other name, would smell as sweet". But a
horticulturalist would think one an idiot for calling a rose an apple.

Certainly definitions can be changed. It may be that a defined quantity
turns out not to be useful, and that definition falls into disuse. Then
one is free to redefine the quantity. But if a quantity is in general
use, it is unwise to redefine it since no one will understand what you
are talking about.

This is all very nice academic arm-waving, but the fact of the matter
is that nature is, and can only be, ONE way. The Schwarschild radius
for the proton is a real physical quantity, as is the length scale at
which GR is of equal importance with QED in describing real physical
systems. We can play with definitions all we like, but there is only
one set of actual physical answers that apply to nature, i.e., the real
physical world. Conventional physics gives one set of answers and the
Discrete Fractal paradigm ( www.amherst.edu/~rloldershaw ) gives
another, very different, set of answers. This is not semantics. What
we have here is two very different explanations for how the world
works.

Sivaram and Sinha, for example, have taken note. They wish to use
another value for the gravitational constant. But they have not called
it G. They have defined a new quantity, clearly related to G, but they
have also given it a new name, G(f).

And of course, being an observant and careful scientist, you also noted
my use of the expression G(n-1) to differentiate my coupling constant
from G. You did see that, right?

Robert L. Oldershaw