Science is Real Folks

This may seem like a strange sub-forum in which to place this thread, but the reason is that I'm getting a bit frustrated with people flying off into Philosophy and Metaphysics without first being convinced that Physics and Mathematics are actually describing the real, the really real.

I suppose since this video is public, and there are articles about this particular operation online that it must be declassified. So here goes:

One of the most remarkable feats of military engineering during the Cold War was the shootdown of an actual satellite by a fighter jet. The incident was the first and only use of the AGM-135 anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon. Although anti-satellite weapon development slowed after the end of the Cold War, it's restarted in a big way, with new weapons being fielded by the U.S., Russia, and China.
An F-15 Eagle Once Shot Down a Satellite

I was on this project, one of the thousands of people involved in the months of planning, calculating, and testing. I didn't actually get to see the AGM-135 myself, because the phase I was in on was the perfecting of the targeting system. So what I saw on the F-15 centerline was a smaller shape consisting of the targeting system.

Another part of the planning, going on simultaneously, was the calculation of the debris field that would result. That had to be done to satisfy the Congress before the go ahead could be issued. Nobody wants a bunch of space debris falling on their heads, or the heads of their constituents after all.

I was a bit freaked out to see my old Calculus teacher was on that team. Who knew that a regular College teacher teaching Freshman students simple Differential Calculus was actually a cutting edge Mathematician with Pentagon security clearances? We shouldn't assume that teachers teaching simple things don't know a hell of a lot more than what they are telling us at the moment.

GPS? Yep, I was in on that. There are a couple of other things too, for which I wrote the Technical Orders (T.O.s) for functional checks for the Air Force. I don't know if those are de-classified yet or not. It's not like I'm on a mailing list or anything, with updates on what I can or can't talk about.

So I'll just jump to the preaching now.

Science is real. Physics, Geology, Botany, Aeronautics, Chemistry, Meteorology, Paleontology, and a whole bunch more. They describe the real World, our biosphere.

Post-modern ideas that nothing is real, it's all personal opinion is a bunch of crap. Anthropogenic Global Warming is real folks. It is going to be the end of human civilization as we know it. We've fossil fuel burned our way back to the stone age. If you knew the Calculus, you would know how long it takes to bend the curve. Things will continue to get hotter for the next 30 years before there will be any bending of that curve.

Back in the old days, we knew what real Epidemiology could do when we worked together. We freaking ended small pox in my lifetime.

New Age gurus and politicians may want to push notions that only your or their opinions of the right now matter. The right now means nothing without the causation of the past actions. And right now ain't nothing without a planning for a future.

Denigrating Science is the surest way to future destruction. So who do you see doing that right now?

And this isn't the mud pit. So keep your answers to yourselves. Just think about it.

a reply to: pthena

People are easily fooled. I didn't attend school in the US for most of my schooling, but from what I've seen
science is severely lacking in most of the population.

Where I live they are spraying glyphosate on crops to speed up the desiccation before harvest.
The crops literally start turning yellow the next day.

People actually believe it when they are told this
is just winter seeding.

a reply to: pthena

Someone once told me things that I did not believe until I saw it with my own eyes.

Stuff right out of "science fiction". His claim was that if those technologies or better say, scientific knowledge would be dropped on humanity right now, the pillars of our society would topple.

This is why we get a slow introduction (think decades, not years) and if you look close you can already find stuff, official stuff on youtube, that is evident of a new kind of science / technology.

We do not need to burn fossil fuels, rape the earth for rare metals like we do now. The thing is, as long as we are on our throats and not unite as humanity, some stuff can not be published. This is why we can not have safe hydrogen storage, yet, is just one example.

And the stuff I saw is not secret by any means. It's out there, privatized companies are allowed to develop these technolgy, it's used and it blew my mind at the time I saw it. Levitating stuff and driving it around like it's normal. Some say supercooled magnets but it's not the end of the story, it's just the low level application of what is really possible.

a reply to: JAGStorm

I had to look up glyphosate. I'm no farmer or chemist.
Glyphosate Facts Everyone Should Know

Stauffer Chemical Co. first patented glyphosate as a mineral chelator in 1964. Then in 1974, Monsanto introduced this chelator as an herbicide. Conventional farmers spray glyphosate on genetically engineered corn, oats, soybeans and wheat before it is harvested. Consumers also use glyphosate on their lawns and gardeners.

Both the nature and severity of human health impacts following exposures to glyphosate herbicides are unknown. Despite a 20-fold increase in use over the last two decades, there has been no systematic effort by U.S. research or public health agencies to answer lingering questions. The reality is that glyphosate uses and exposures are way up. Glyphosate and metabolite residues concentrate in the liver and kidney and both animal studies and human investigations have highlighted liver and kidney problems.

Looks like big corporations have the clout to get their people in positions to stop research from being done.

Money, money, money.

a reply to: ThatDamnDuckAgain

Thanks. I'm so out of loop. I'm just an old Cold War-rior.

His claim was that if those technologies or better say, scientific knowledge would be dropped on humanity right now, the pillars of our society would topple.

The pillars seem to be toppling as is.
So does it come down to money? The established corporations too big to fail get the loans and grants, while the actual innovators are left begging for start up money?

This thread wasn't supposed to be political. Money and politics! Money in politics!
No offramp?

Now I'm depressed.

a reply to: pthena

Science as Science is fine, it is real but not all of it's claim's are accurate and remain theoretical.
Observation and practical science though perhaps not called that in the ancient past is the most real, theoretical science that pan's out, that gives real results is REAL.

But Science the religion is another matter entirely.

Science does not have all the answers and it can never provide them the closest it can come to doing so is theoretical modelling based on observation and conjecture of what forces may not be seen directly but can be inferred by there interaction's.

Science based religions and cult's therefore are Croc's of S**t such as Scientology and other cult's such as the even more destructive and controlling heaven's gate cult etc.

Religion still has a place.

Science is a TOOL nothing more, a TOOL for looking at the world around us, a TOOL for passing information and helping us shape our reality to our own needs as we have always done but like any tool it can be and has been abused by those that see it as a weapon.

Atheists misuses science in the most unscientific fashion imaginable, they try to use it to DISPROVE when the main tenet of all science is that a Theory may be supported by evidence but NEVER proven beyond a doubt, any theory that fail's to hold up against evidence that disproves it's claims is therefore false BUT to get around this we have the invention of CHAOS theory which was used to support older theory's based on the now outdated view of immutable laws of the universe, they are not immutable at all and are in fact variable laws, time and space is rather more fluid according to this and the incalculable number of interactions between a possible infinite number of parallel reality's, other dimensions and even other universes renders any possible calculation based theory obsolete except as a rounded up concept and model were Chaos interactions are used to explain away rogue out of bound's results.

You won't see this in practical science but in the higher realm's of subatomic and quantum theory it has it's place, not all scientists are 'believers' in this new theory.

The fact is Science is true for those that live in a universe, in a reality that they project around themselves and endeavour to live within that accepts and believes it to be true but in fact in this argument it is no more true than the little people are to superstitious Icelanders and Irish whose reality differs from yours and mine and whom accept them as true and real being's.

Go and take a crack at the Fortean time's, read it and come and tell us that Science is true after you have REALLY put it to the inquisition of a universe that quite frankly does not seem to care if it is true or not because it neither believes nor disbelieves the modelling of the tiny human mind's that live on a tiny world somewhere within it's vastness.

Science is a tree, it has many branches but they sometimes fight for space with competing explanations about reality.

The truth is we are ALL crazy and sane at the same time, who is right and who is wrong is rather a subjective matter.

Perhaps one over simplified model of God would be that he was the one that created order out of Chaos, that ordered super space and made the membranes vibrate whose word strummed the superstring of reality making it play a melody we perceive as reality.

And perhaps this is a load of crap and the truth is destined to remain beyond us.

One thing about science, it is like a cornucopia and Pandora's box rolled up into one, the deeper you look the more you open it the more questions and chaos emerge, order always gives way to more answers and answers ask even deeper questions in an endless spiral into a fractal insanity.

a reply to: pthena
It's not so much money but power, is how I understood it.

The things you unlock with these types of inventions, the stuff we could not do yet.

Imagine you have a sealed container. In order to get stuff done, you need to move something inside. You can not just topple or shake the box to get it move as it is precise movement and needs to be controlled. You can not use seals, you need some magic happening. The box is too big to use simple magnets and they would interfere with other things if you made them bigger, also the stuff needs to be moved might be non magnetic, use your imagination.

These kind of problems, like storing hydrogen and releasing it again in a safe way, have solutions already but they are kept in the dark because some bad guys or enemy country is not allowed to get their hands on it.

Power, not money.

a reply to: pthena

Scientism blurs the lines, and, it seems to me : most of us can't tell the difference anymore.

Adding to our confusion : technocrats have usurped scientific 'good-will', and are using it to advance their agendas.

a reply to: pthena

People really don't know how it's being used these days.

I actually think it started out innocently enough. There are a lot of problem weeds in agriculture.
I believe these chemicals were developed to actually just treat these weeds. Eventually they started using it in a more sinister way.
Spraying it right on the crop to speed up thing. Just imagine your home garden and spraying roundup all over it before harvesting. That is exactly what is being done. That is what we are all eating in soy, wheat etc. Soy is a massive number of foods these days. It is in things you would never believe.
I think this is where all the food allergies/sensitivities come from. I'm not saying people weren't gluten intolerant before, but just look how many are now.
I don't think many of them are from the food itself, but how the food is processed. Many of these reactions are probably from the sprayings.

a reply to: pthena

You say science but you talk about technology. And I don't believe anybody is doubting technology.
Science however, that part that isn't so lucky that it can claim "it works" by use of gadgets is speculation and interpretation. On good days supported by data on bad days that data could support more than one hypothesis.

The problem with science in today’s world is that it is bought and paid for by those that want their narrative told. Sciences is real, but the money and funding corrupts the outcome.

I'd agree that Einsteins relativity is real.
I'd also agree that Planck's Quantum Mechanics is real.
But I wouldn't agree that relativity is real in the quantum world.

So it seems "realness" is relative to the observer. But why is your mind at war over what is real or not. Its not the destination which is importance, only the journey. So don't let dogma weigh against your mind. Be real to yourself and the path you need to walk. If that be science. Then that science be real.

a reply to: LABTECH767

Science based religions and cult's therefore are Croc's of S**t such as Scientology and other cult's such as the even more destructive and controlling heaven's gate cult etc.

So a college drop out Science Fiction writer starts a religion and that's a Science based religion? It's no more Science based than the four or five religions I made up.

The Hale-Bopp Comet was real so I guess that makes Heaven's Gate Science based. Hell, I saw the comet myself.

What you describe is Pseudo-Science. So if certain theories of quantum something are true, then if you have the proper mental attitude, such as nothing is solid until you see it as solid, and then get distracted while walking, then you too can walk through walls. Then is that a Science based religion? It does have the word quantum in it.

The fact is Science is true for those that live in a universe, in a reality that they project around themselves and endeavour to live within that accepts and believes it to be true but in fact in this argument it is no more true than the little people are to superstitious Icelanders and Irish whose reality differs from yours and mine and whom accept them as true and real being's.

So if I throw a rock at you, and the rock hits you, does that mean that my projected universe was big enough to contain you, or that your projected universe was big enough to contain me throwing a rock?

My "projected universe" includes all these things like my captain's chair, my bed, my computer. How far must I be away from these things in order for them to dissolve into insubstantiality? I've made trips to the other side of the World, as far away as a person can get without leaving the planet. All the solid things were still there when I got back, stuff aged even, like stuff that had to get thrown out from the frig.

Bah, I am rusty at getting complex ideas out.

I used to think one side liked education and the other side didn't. Now I think both "sides" are striving for blind compliance, one using fear and dogmatic religion, and the other half truths and algorithms, in general. I know one side is more "bad" than the other, but it's getting to be a wash.

Religion was the most powerful tool of social control ever devised. Algorithms and the internet might outperform.

Aside from power games, it's partly the fault of horrifically difficult concepts not getting parsed into layman's terms very well. The fact we use specialized language to describe aspects of scientific disciplines reflect the walls put up around knowledge to monetize it. It may have worked too well.

Labtech made a decent point. I was a child of Asimov, Clarke, Sagan and PBS. I was glad we had left the world of witch hunts and superstition behind, but when one looks at the anomalies that seem to defy physics at it's base levels, the evidence becomes overwhelming that we only have the barest hold on a small portion of reality.

For instance, when I realized that ritual magic and occult ideas could hold some amount of truth, it was astounding. It's interesting that some branches of physics might have explanations for this. I've long thought that mysticism is just describing physics with another vocabulary... to some extent!

Some hopeful ideas are that ignorance provides options ... and curiosity with ignorance provides more options than certainty does. The world seems large enough for many reality constructs, and any cultural anthropologist or sharp traveler will tell you that humans can make a go of it within the most "ridiculous" reality constructs.

So? Do some good around you... and perhaps even concentrating hard on good outcomes might have an effect, heh.

originally posted by: pthena
Anthropogenic Global Warming is real folks. It is going to be the end of human civilization as we know it. We've fossil fuel burned our way back to the stone age.

I just knew what the lead up to was going to be directed to, AGW, an acronym that has been studiously forgotten with the invention of GW, which it is not, it is regional if anything, and God knows what tinkering science has done to the climate, notwithstanding the dearth of information on definitive repercussions of all the various nuclear testing that was done since WW2...they still, 'debate' on the damage to the ozone layer with one expertise adamant that the ozone layer was damaged by nuclear testing, others say no, it wasn't, and while even damage to the ozone layer would not be the worst scenario, while carbon black would in huge quantity be pretty lethal in many ways, and likely lead to the famous, 'nuclear winter'.
Thing is, I want proper answers, not showbiz for public consumption along with their spuds.

a reply to: smurfy

Here you go, a layman's explanation:
from Slayer69's thread: Mummified leaves offer a glimpse of Earth’s ancient climate—and our future

It seems the Earth has dealt with worse things than what we've been doing and Life will find a way of course.

Quite simple.
All those sequestered hydro-carbons that humans dig up and pump into the biosphere were once part of the biosphere before humans had a suitable environment to live in.

Human terraforming results in life without humans.
We be cool, man.

----------
I just did a Startpage search "Rapid moments of shear upheaval"

The whole first page is studies by Oil Industry Engineers investigating pipeline buckling.
Weird!

a reply to: JAGStorm

I was pretty shocked when I first heard about roundup being used as a dessicant here in canada because I use straw as bedding for my animals and they often eat it which should be ok but now isn't. Asked at the feed store I buy it at and no one knows any of this nor can trace back the source.

People here also use straw as mulch on their gardens and the straw is just those very plants killed by the round up. This practice isn't super widespread but it has me wondering as I have a few patches in my garden that I dumped some old straw and nothing grows in it. I was delighted by that at first until I realized this might be the reason.

Glyophosphate, I put that # on everything.

a reply to: Baddogma

For instance, when I realized that ritual magic and occult ideas could hold some amount of truth, it was astounding.

The difference between a miracle (unexplained as to cause event) and magic, is that miracles are one time things, whereas magic is repeatable, so it should theoretically be a subject of study.

This one time my daughter had to go to some office for some reason and she took me along. I didn't want to go into the building because I look like a vagrant (cross between Gandalf the Gray and Aqualung). So I was sitting on a decorative rock outside the office building.

This kid, about 9 or 10, comes up to me, wearing a costume black robe, carrying a costume prop wand. "Ah, Dumbledore! Hey mom, here's Dumbledore" Then he waved the wand, saying "Avada Kedavra"

I didn't die. Then I reached into my coat for my real magic wand, only to discover that I had left it at home. But I knew where it was, pictured it in my mind and gave my finger a slight twitch. The boy's toy wand flew out of his hand and he ran screaming, "Mom! Mom! Dumbledore did the expelíamos spell."

Not really. The kid ran as soon as I put my hand in my coat.

a reply to: Peeple

So technology then, that works, and works, over and over repeatedly and repeatably because it follows the laws of physics and chemistry, and metallurgy (structural engineering).

In real life my avocation is ballistics, in conjunction with ammunition manufacturing . Not so much internal ballistics, because I don't have the pressure testing tools, but external, charting downrange trajectories based on ballistic coefficients, muzzle velocities, and range.

There's a discipline called benchrest shooting. Get 5 shots into the smallest group possible. At 100 yards, you ain't even in the running unless you can get the five shots into a 3/4 inch group, measured center of hole to center of hole.

I did that off of sandbags with a 14 inch barrel chambered for 7x30 Waters. I fireformed the brass myself using empty 32 Winchester Special brass, then loaded them up with H4895 powder with 120 grain Sierra hollow point spitzer bullets.

Physics and Chemistry, repeatable. Not magic.