THE AUGEAN-STABLE SYNDROME IN SCIENCE

http://www.edge.org/response-detail/23857
Steve Giddings, theoretical physicist; Professor, Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara: "What really keeps me awake at night (...) is that we face a crisis within the deepest foundations of physics. The only way out seems to involve profound revision of fundamental physical principles."

This view is shared by almost all theoretical physicists and philosophers of science (although most of them sleep well at night). Some even go as far as to predict the death of physics:

http://www.worddocx.com/Apparel/1231/8955.html
Mike Alder: "It is easy to see the consequences of the takeover by the bureaucrats. Bureaucrats favour uniformity, it simplifies their lives. They want rules to follow. They prefer the dead to the living. They have taken over religions, the universities and now they are taking over Science. And they are killing it in the process. The forms and rituals remain, but the spirit is dead. The cold frozen corpse is so much more appealing to the bureaucratic mind-set than the living spirit of the quest for insight. Bureaucracies put a premium on the old being in charge, which puts a stop to innovation.. Something perhaps will remain, but it will no longer attract the best minds. This, essentially, is the Smolin position. He gives details and examples of the death of Physics, although he, being American, is optimistic that it can be re,versed. I am not. (...) Developing ideas and applying them is done by a certain kind of temperament in a certain kind of setting, one where there is a good deal of personal freedom and a willingness to take risks.. No doubt we still have the people. But the setting is gone and will not come back. Science is a product of the renaissance and an entrepreneurial spirit. It will not survive the triumph of bureacracy. Despite having the infrastructure, China never developed Science. And soon the West won't have it either."

"Profound revision of fundamental physical principles" implies looking for, finding and, in the end, abandoning some false principle. Is there such activity in physics? Yes there is - campaigns, quite noisy sometimes, (re)start but then never reach their goal (the false principle remains well and kicking):

http://www.amazon.com/Trouble-Physic.../dp/0618551050
Lee Smolin, The Trouble With Physics, p. 226: "Einstein's special theory of relativity is based on two postulates: One is the relativity of motion, and the second is the constancy and universality of the speed of light. Could the first postulate be true and the other false? If that was not possible, Einstein would not have had to make two postulates. But I don't think many people realized until recently that you could have a consistent theory in which you changed only the second postulate."

http://www.amazon.com/Faster-Than-Sp.../dp/0738205257
Joao Magueijo, Faster Than the Speed of Light, p. 250: "Lee [Smolin] and I discussed these paradoxes at great length for many months, starting in January 2001. We would meet in cafés in South Kensington or Holland Park to mull over the problem. THE ROOT OF ALL THE EVIL WAS CLEARLY SPECIAL RELATIVITY. All these paradoxes resulted from well known effects such as length contraction, time dilation, or E=mc^2, all basic predictions of special relativity. And all denied the possibility of establishing a well-defined border, common to all observers, capable of containing new quantum gravitational effects."

http://www.fqxi.org/community/articles/display/148
"Smolin wishes to hold on to the reality of time. But to do so, he must overcome a major hurdle: General and special relativity seem to imply the opposite. In the classical Newtonian view, physics operated according to the ticking of an invisible universal clock. But Einstein threw out that master clock when, in his theory of special relativity, he argued that no two events are truly simultaneous unless they are causally related. If simultaneity - the notion of "now" - is relative, the universal clock must be a fiction, and time itself a proxy for the movement and change of objects in the universe. Time is literally written out of the equation. Although he has spent much of his career exploring the facets of a "timeless" universe, Smolin has become convinced that this is "deeply wrong," he says."

http://www.amazon.com/Relativity-Sim.../dp/0415701740
International team of leading philosophers and physicists who have come together to reassess the contemporary paradigm of the relativistic concept of time: "Unfortunately for Einstein's Special Theory, however, its epistemological and ontological assumptions are now seen to be questionable, unjustified, false, perhaps even illogical."

Special relativity is a deductive theory based on two postulates so it cannot be "the root of all the evil" unless at least one of the postulates is false. For the sake of argument, let us assume that the second (speed-of-light) postulate is false and the speed of photons, like the speed of ordinary projectiles, varies with the speed of the emitter (c'=c+v). Let us assume further that most, if not all, theoretical physicists and philosophers of science know about the falsehood. Is there any chance that things will be fixed, some exit from the blind alley found and, why not, a revolution in Kuhnian sense launched?

In my view, the answer is no. False theories die in the end but Augean stables remain that no Hercules is able to clean up. Einstein's 1905 false light postulate and its absurd consequences have become an integral part of the spirit of our civilization. In this sense they are infallible and eternal, and would disappear no sooner than the civilization itself would end.

Pentcho Valev

Buried under the Augean stables' dung accumulated for more than a century, scientists are unable to react to even blatant contradictions and absurdities in Divine Albert's Divine Theory. So Einsteinians can safely teach that the acceleration suffered by the travelling twin is both responsible and not responsible for her youthfulness:

http://www.pitt.edu/~jdnorton/teachi...yon/index.html
John Norton: "Then, at the end of the outward leg, the traveler abruptly changes motion, accelerating sharply to adopt a new inertial motion directed back to earth. What comes now is the key part of the analysis. (...) Careful attention to the differing judgments of simultaneity of the two twins shows that there is nothing paradoxical in the twin effect. The brief moment of acceleration of the traveling twin completely alters the traveler's judgments of simultaneity and this alteration is key to seeing how relativity provides a consistent account of the effect. Nevertheless, many still get confused by the twin effect."

http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/research/...tivity2010.pdf
Gary W. Gibbons FRS: "In other words, by simply staying at home Jack has aged relative to Jill. There is no paradox because the lives of the twins are not strictly symmetrical. This might lead one to suspect that the accelerations suffered by Jill might be responsible for the effect. However this is simply not plausible because using identical accelerating phases of her trip, she could have travelled twice as far. This would give twice the amount of time gained."

A theory harboring such a blatant absurdity is obviously dead but critics trying to show this sooner or later stop their "line of inquiry" as they find themselves in the position of Mr. Praline. In the end the theory proves beautiful and by no means dead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npjOSLCR2hE
Owner: Oh yes, the, uh, the Norwegian Blue...What's,uh...What's wrong with it?
Mr. Praline: I'll tell you what's wrong with it, my lad. 'E's dead, that's what's wrong with it!
Owner: No, no, 'e's uh,...he's resting.
Mr. Praline: Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.
Owner: No no he's not dead, he's, he's restin'! Remarkable bird, the Norwegian Blue, idn'it, ay? Beautiful plumage!
.........................
Mr. Praline: No, I'm sorry! I'm not prepared to pursue my line of inquiry any longer as I think this is getting too silly!

Pentcho Valev

All clever scientists know that relativity and quantum mechanics are incompatible because the former is infected with the idiotic relativisic time, a consequence of Einstein's 1905 false light postulate, whereas the latter uses the Newtonian universal time. Frank Wilczek, a theoretical physicist and a Nobel laureate, explains this quite well:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/physics...thor/fwilczek/
Frank Wilczek: "Einstein's special theory of relativity calls for radical renovation of common-sense ideas about time. Different observers, moving at constant velocity relative to one another, require different notions of time, since their clocks run differently. Yet each such observer can use his "time" to describe what he sees, and every description will give valid results, using the same laws of physics. In short: According to special relativity, there are many quite different but equally valid ways of assigning times to events. Einstein himself understood the importance of breaking free from the idea that there is an objective, universal "now." Yet, paradoxically, today's standard formulation of quantum mechanics makes heavy use of that discredited "now." Playing with paradoxes is part of a theoretical physicist's vocation, as well as high-class recreation. Let's play with this one. (...) As we've seen, if a and b are space-like separated, then either can come before the other, according to different moving observers. So it is natural to ask: If a third event, c, is space-like separated with respect to both a and b, can all possible time-orderings, or "chronologies," of a, b, c be achieved? The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is No. We can see why in Figures 5 and 6. Right-moving observers, who use up-sloping lines of constant time, similar to the lines of constant t2 in Figure 2, will see b come before both a and c (Figure 5). But c may come either after or before a, depending on how steep the slope is. Similarly, according to left-moving observers (Figure 6), a will always come before b and c, but the order of b and c varies. The bottom line: c never comes first, but other than that all time-orderings are possible. These exercises in special relativity are entertaining in themselves, but there are also serious issues in play. They arise when we combine special relativity with quantum mechanics."

That is, all clever scientists know that the problem has a simple solution - just getting rid of Einstein's 1905 false light postulate and its absurd consequences. Yet of all clever scientists all over the world not one could think of a reason why the falsehood should be abandoned. 40 years of unsuccessful attempts to reconcile relativity and quantum mechanics means 40 years of regular salaries for everybody. Solving the problem, that is, abandoning special relativity's absurdity, would cause big trouble, as Peter Hayes explains:

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/con...ent=a909857880
Peter Hayes "The Ideology of Relativity: The Case of the Clock Paradox" : Social Epistemology, Volume 23, Issue 1 January 2009, pages 57-78: "The gatekeepers of professional physics in the universities and research institutes are disinclined to support or employ anyone who raises problems over the elementary inconsistencies of relativity. A winnowing out process has made it very difficult for critics of Einstein to achieve or maintain professional status. Relativists are then able to use the argument of authority to discredit these critics. Were relativists to admit that Einstein may have made a series of elementary logical errors, they would be faced with the embarrassing question of WHY THIS HAD NOT BEEN NOTICED EARLIER. Under these circumstances the marginalisation of antirelativists, unjustified on scientific grounds, is eminently justifiable on grounds of realpolitik. Supporters of relativity theory have protected both the theory and their own reputations by shutting their opponents out of professional discourse."

And there is more than just "the embarrassing question of WHY THIS HAD NOT BEEN NOTICED EARLIER". Even if clever scientists wished to abandon Einstein's 1905 false light postulate and its absurd consequences, they would be unable to do so. Buried under the Augean stables' dung accumulated for more than a century, clever scientists can only make slow movements in search for food. Any excessive activity would look like, and would have the effect of, a terrorist attack against the values of our civilization (Einsteinians sometimes explicitly compare antirelativists with terrorists):

http://bourabai.narod.ru/wallace/farce05.htm
Bryan Wallace: "Einstein's special relativity theory with his second postulate that the speed of light in space is constant is the linchpin that holds the whole range of modern physics theories together. Shatter this postulate, and modern physics becomes an elaborate farce! (...) The speed of light is c+v." [Note: Bryan Wallace wrote "The Farce of Physics" on his deathbed hence some imperfections in the text!]

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/astro-ph/p.../0305457v3.pdf
Joao Magueijo: "In sharp contrast, the constancy of the speed of light has remain sacred, and the term "heresy" is occasionally used in relation to "varying speed of light theories". The reason is clear: the constancy of c, unlike the constancy of G or e, is the pillar of special relativity and thus of modern physics. Varying c theories are expected to cause much more structural damage to physics formalism than other varying constant theories."

Pentcho Valev