| You say: > I learned a lot in that, and one thing that actually surprised me is that in many cases, I was able to make a good argument that Einstein was wrong, and there was no empirical evidence to support his view on the particular point we were discussing. Then: > I'm not interested in getting into a physics debate. Its been too many years, and I've spoken vaguely because the specifics are not what I'm addressing. You can't go making a claim like "there was no empirical evidence to support his view" about nearly any of Einstein's physics papers and then not want to debate it. That's like saying "I have proof that bigfoot exists, but it's been too many years and I don't want to actually present that proof, so just believe me because my background is in being a bigfoot expert". In any case, your assertion is false - there is a great deal of empirical evidence for all of Einstein's important theories. Sure none of this evidence is proof, but it is good evidence. We know that if Einstein's theories of relativity are not true they are at least very good approximations over a very wide range of scales. It would take truly extraordinary evidence to justify a conclusion about the falsehood of relativistic theories at large scales. Some of this has been done (physics, like all science, is an ongoing debate), but many of those original theories are still believed to hold. > So, I'm not declaring victory. I think this is good news, though, because it might be the beginning of the revelation of an error in understanding that, when resolved, results in a big jump forward in physics. Taking the position that a piece of science will be eventually proven wrong and gloating when it is proven wrong isn't big or clever. Every theory of the past has gone the way of Phlogiston, and we can reasonably expect every theory of today to go the same way. However, saying "I think this is wrong" isn't contributing until you say "and here is my evidence". By the way, "I'm not declaring victory, but" is the same as "I'm not a racist, but". |
You're taking a statement I made about a particular view in a set of topics that were chosen for the purposes of debating where he might be wrong, and applying it to the entirety of his "papers".
"In any case, your assertion is false - there is a great deal of empirical evidence for all of Einstein's important theories."
I never asserted there was no empirical evidence for Einstein's theories.
The fact that you didn't address the point I was trying to make, and instead are giving me what seems to be an unsophisticated laymen view of "einstein couldn't have been wrong about anything!!!" is exactly why I'm not interested in debating physics here. Plus, its irrelevant to the actual topic.