The problem with physics is that the metaphors used in popular science are a poor substitute for the mathematics and this person is very confused because his understanding of the metaphors leads them to inferences which are just wrong.
The problem is one of cognitive linguistics, not of physics. How Lakoffian of me.
There is also the perceived arrogance of physicists who just tell them to go read some book or other and brush them off. The problem is that what is needed is to pick apart this person's mental models, take them down and rebuild new ones so that he stops complaining about "common sense"; that this is exceedingly difficult to do without the mathematics; and that, if you're going to use mathematics, there are books out there that do a better job of marrying mathematics and intuition than your average physicist can do in an off-the-cuff conversation.
I hope that makes sense. The peak-to-trough part of the business cycle is an outlier. Carnot would have died laughing.
I know that light is both a wave and a particle. I can do the numbers on that stuff. I've done the experiment when you shoot laser light at a wall and get a fuzzy red point on the wall, and then put a grating in front of it and instead get a number of separare sharp points spread all over the bloody wall. Even if I understand the process, it still doesn't make any kind of sense to me.
Even things we usually think makes sense, like gravity, is often more that we've gotten used to the senselessness rather than actually understanding it. It took years and years for me to understand gravity even from a Newtonian point of view. I had my apple moment when lying on my back on a counter with my head down the drain, observing the water running "upwards". I was actually not trying to get a deeper understanding of the universe, I was just thirsty and drunk. But there you go. Peak oil is not an energy crisis. It is a liquid fuel crisis.
bridging these disciplines is very important for the future of science and enthusiasm to learn it, i think. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
The problem is one of cognitive linguistics, not of physics
there are two right there, if i'm not mistaken.
then there was your comment about ontology and QT, two more...
or aren't they disciplines?
you could have just said: 'it'll never happen, unless you do the math homework first', but you tried to help brodix understand why his questions were mis-premised, and in doing so, helped me inch forward.
sometimes even realising how ignorant one is, is a kind of knowledge, (how valuable i guess depends...)
;) ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
but i went to the agonist to groove on possible further discussion of your mega comment, and it's not there.
°çéé&&%$! ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
just kidding...
good stuff. gracias. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
