swansont

Photon round trips are the same as clocks. And one-way trips or trip segments require communication, and synchronization, and all of the relativistic effects come into play.

No, I don't think that "read my mind" is a reasonable option, nor do I find it reasonable to place the blame on others for your admitted imprecision. People can only go by what you wrote. I did point out your inconsistency, and so you are now free to clarify it. I would translate this as "I don't want to discuss anything that negates my thesis." Which is an example of why you probably should want people to go by your words alone, rather than trying to decipher the intent, because then we start arguing about this rather than the original topic. In any event, you are using the "no true Scotsman" gambit here, by equating explained with uninteresting and eliminating those from discussion

! Moderator Note You're moving the goalposts. You originally said emphasis added In your original statement, "the beginning of the universe and life in it" was a subset of the evidence you sought. You subsequently changed it to be the entirety of your argument. So let's get back on track. Can we agree that the examples given by Mr Skeptic fall into the category of "material explanation for events?"

The question still stands. Where in Maxwell's equations is it required that there be a charge co-located with the field? IOW, a field, even a varying one, present in a region doesn't mean the charge is there. It could be somewhere else. Bob already mentioned the example of which I was thinking — an antenna.

It's called an analogy — a comparison because there are similarities. It's not meant to be taken as exactly the same.

I think that the another view is that you can exchange the same information without the invective. Especially on a forum, where the message is written, and can be edited before submission. Can we all get over avoiding comment on content because of some offense at the fact that harsh words are sometimes used when frustrated and exasperated? Try responding to the core of what he said.

Can't have a round trip under those conditions.

I think you are ignoring the effect of the acceleration of the train.

That's a commonly used summary which unfortunately has been oversimplified to the point that it's wrong. It depends on what you mean by "nothing" (or "something") and "be." Mass cannot travel at c, and massless objects travel at c. But phenomena that are not causally connected can happen faster than c, e.g. a lighthouse sweeps out 2pi radians in a unit of time, and will make a streak of light on a distant target. If you are far enough away, that streak will be faster than c. This is not in violation of relativity.

! Moderator Note We have a religion section. When you have reached the eligibility threshold, you may discuss religion there

Cut spending by eliminating all those handouts … except the ones I'm getting. — I think Jon Stewart and Bill O'Reilly touched on this the other night. Elected officials have to raise massive amounts of money, which makes them promise things to donors and takes up a significant amount of time. They have to "govern" in a way that makes their donors happy, and that can conflict with what's best for the people.

I agree, it's not going to be a simple function of either population or area, it's going to depend on population density and distribution, and other variables, and probably not in a simple way.

IIRC, it's one research group which has presented such results. Nobody else has been able to replicate them, so "It has been determined " is too strong a statement, IMO. (The recent results were not Hubble, they were Keck and VLT.)

And we find it exceedingly useful to have references that can be realized by anyone.

(emphasis added) And that's the deal-breaker.

No. Teleportation is about transferring information about the state of a particle.

Why? How do you know there's no charged particle?

It does exist. The two phenomena are very, very different. We've had a number of discussions on this in the past; a search should point you to them.

That's not how a Cesium atomic clock works. You excite them into a superposition of the hyperfine ground states, they oscillate between these two states, and you count the oscillations. Anyway, the whole point of measurement is to have a standardized system. "One trip" doesn't do that.

This is comparing a clock against itself, which is not a good way to evaluate a clock. All real clock measurements use two or (preferably) more different clocks.

! Moderator Note Already have a thread on this No need to open more

Yes, it is strange if you aren't used to it. losfomot is correct — both observers must agree on the number of times the train passed through the station. The train observer will reconcile the number as being due to the length contraction, while the station observer will say that the train's clock ran slow.

A: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_potential#Magnetic_vector_potential V: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_potential

For the lay population, sure. Horoscopes and creationism and homeopathy and a whole host of others get swallowed whole by a credulous public. But I can't think of a single example of facts or theories that are accepted within the science community simply because they have "better branding." Theories have to work. Do you have an example in mind?

I was joking about the use of "midterm" for exams that do not take place mid-term (and take place more than once). That always annoyed me when I was TA-ing in grad school, because all of the physics professors seemed to do it.