21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-24 04:16:13

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IMPORTANT NEW THEORY. “Generalized second law of thermodynamics in black-hole physics, by Jacob Bekenstein. Black-hole physics mirrors thermodynamics in many respects. For example, Christodoulou has shown that the efficiencies of processes for extracting energy from a black hole are limited by their irreversibility; the most efficient processes are the "reversible" ones.” https://lnkd.in/dAr7QTt View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments
linkedin post 2021-05-24 04:14:00

linkedin post 2021-05-24 04:14:00

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BLACK HOLE THERMODYNAMICS. We continue with some extensive in depth examinations of additional important work by Professor Jacob Bekenstein, a remarkable theoretical physicist, who made “who made fundamental contributions to the foundation of black hole thermodynamics and to other aspects of the connections between information and gravitation.” He was a student of the remarkable Princeton physicist John Archibald Wheeler, who supervised his precocious PhD. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Bekenstein View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-23 05:19:39

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SO ENDS this immensely interesting and difficult paper, where a reader like me is simply hanging on by their fingernails to follow this radiant stream of thought. Understanding how physicists see the world is somewhat of a rare sport: Einstein introduced relativity in 1905, and we are still choking on digesting what it all means, but be assured, while it will undoubtedly continue to change, it is a radical and important view of reality. View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-23 05:14:37

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NO HOWLERS, YET. “Broadly speaking, our conclusion is twofold. First, we concede that there are large conceptual difficulties in both programmes’ attempts to have classical spacetime ‘emerge’ (as well as ferocious technical difficulties). But second, more positively, we see no knock-down conceptual errors, or philosophical howlers, in these attempts, as they have been developed so far. In that sense, there are good prospects for work for the future.” https://lnkd.in/dMm_YkR View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-23 05:09:55

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THE TOWER OF ASSUMPTIONS. “But similarly, when one can asks for an explanation of a law, the explanation will typically invoke another such law (relating them deductively, or by the one being a limiting case of the other), and one can ask for an explanation of that law—so again a regress beckons, and apparently one must eventually accept a ‘mere happenstance’ of laws also.” https://lnkd.in/dMm_YkR View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-23 05:07:17

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THE LOGICAL STACK. “Second, this thought is indeed questionable! After all, one can explain a particular fact; and one can ask for an explanation of a law. Agreed, the explanation of a particular fact will typically invoke another such fact (usually an earlier one, as in what philosophers call ‘causal explanation’), and one can ask for an explanation of that fact—so that a regress beckons, and one is tempted to think that one must eventually accept a ‘mere happenstance’.” https://lnkd.in/dMm_YkR View in LinkedIn
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21Sep 2022 by Nigel Fleming No Comments

linkedin post 2021-05-23 05:05:03

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HAPPENSTANCE. “Laws and explanation are central controversial issues in philosophy of science, which of course we cannot enter here. But we only need two uncontroversial points. First, there is a strong temptation to think of the laws (in our special case: differential equations) as being truly explanatory, while the statements of particular fact (boundary conditions) are not explanatory, because they are matters of ‘mere happenstance’.” https://lnkd.in/dMm_YkR View in LinkedIn
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