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Pres. Barack Obama:
“Our health care is too costly…and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet…
“We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its costs. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age…
“Our challenges may be new, the instruments with which we meet them may be new, but those values upon which our success depends, honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism—these things are old. These things are true.”
—Produced by Steve Mirsky
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12 Comments
Add CommentWhat a wonderful address and a bright day for our country after too many years of science hating.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGlad to have a president who can openly embrace and respect science rather than fear it. Science has far too much potential to serve the human community for it to be suppressed. And although his words are still words for now, I consider them to be the first step in the right direction.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"We must not forget that when radium was discovered no one knew that it would prove useful in hospitals. The work was one of pure science. And this is a proof that scientific work must not be considered from the point of view of the direct usefulness of it. It must be done for itself, for the beauty of science, and then there is always the chance that a scientific discovery may become like the radium, a benefit for humanity."
And how has science been feared? As far as the government is concerned they are simply woefully ignorant of technological advances in general. That is not something Obama can fix unless he plans on eliminating from government service every one over 50 years of age.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGovernment is slow to adapt and quick to over react to hype. that is something he should strive to fix. Get laws passed that make it illegal for the government to support one business over another just like it is illegal to support any one religion over another.
you want to solve this countries problems you have to start at the top and work your way down: Government spending needs to be drastically reduced, followed by tax breaks for all corporations regardless of size, because love 'em or hate 'em you're employed by 'em. The more taxes they pay the fewer jobs we the people have.
Once those two things are accomplished you initiate a flat tax on every one else. the reason for this is simple (so obviously politicians miss it). right now i am below the poverty line, but i hope to be wealthy some day, and so do most Americans from what i can tell. a flat tax means no matter how much money i make i keep the same percentage every time. this means i can get ahead in life, instead of starting out at a 15% then a 25% then a 35% tax as i climb the latter of life.
With more money in my pocket i can buy better housing (making jobs for people who build houses, and sell houses, and harvest the wood for houses and make furniture etc etc) i can buy nicer cars (nicer cars have a higher profit margin for the companies making them allowing them to hire more people) and i can afford to send my future children to better schools so they can again climb the ladder and contribute to the economy in the same way.
hate of science is not the issue (nor does it exist IMHO), it is hate of wealth right now that is the countries issue. science did not cause nor could it cure the current financial crisis. maybe Obama will do great things for science, maybe he wont, but his focus on it shows he is still ignorant of the true necessities of the country, especial during tough financial times.
fix the economy and he will have all the scientific resources he could ever want, as well as all the money he could ever need for whatever projects he wants to accomplish. but as i see his plan now, the next president is going to have on he!! of mess to clean up.
"hate of science is not the issue (nor does it exist IMHO)"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou have either not been paying attention to anything that has been going on in science/government interplay in the last 8 years, or you are wildly deluding yourself.
But thanks for the simplistic generalizations on how to fix all the nations problems. Good thing you have all the answers, such a shame no one with the power to actually do anything about it is willing to turn out federal republic into a full-blown aristocracy.
Nice to have a president who can think, talk, and be deliberate and purposeful in it's actions.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI don't think it's a hate of science or the economy. The average person isn't interested in science. They want to watch NASCAR and drink beer. They don't want to think about problems that don't affect them directly. To get an idea of how things would end up just watch the movie "Idiocracy" They don't want to put forth the effort.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhat a relief it is to have the US regain its rightful place in the world of scientific research. What a relief it is to enable our scientists who had to go abroad to have the freedom to do research without governmental restraints to be able to now do unrestrained research in their own country. What a relief it is to know women can now utilize the full extent of reproductive freedom and new scientific discoveries for their own health and the health of their children. What a relief it is to know there will be less emphasis on teaching creationism in our schools but to instead be able to teach real science as it is continuing to evolve. I could go on and on but what a relief it is for the US to come out of the dark ages and join the 21st century.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVery good idea the presentation of those selected parts of the address of the new president of the US!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe because it is absurd.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this/ Tertullian. (ca.160 ca.220 AD) /
=======..
I believe in Physics because its absurd
Would you ever say such a thing to a modern man ?
I doubt it. Most of us would be asking Gods
forgiveness for even thinking it.
But.
=============&
The basis of the physics consists of:
1.
Abstract separated absolute space and time of Newton.
2.
Abstract ideal gas and ideal particles.
3.
Abstract black body.
4.
Abstract SRT negative 4 - dimensional space,
abstract 5D, &&.and 11 - dimensional spaces.
5.
Abstract virtual particles, dark matter, dark energy.
6.
Abstract inertial movement.
7.
Abstract big bang.
8.
Abstract " method of renormalization".
9.
Etc.
=========..
And therefore we can read.
#
We don't know what we are talking about"
/ Nobel laureate David Gross referring to the current state of string theory./
#
It is important to realize that in physics today,
we have no knowledge of what energy is.
We do not have a picture that energy comes in little
blobs of a definite amount.
( Feynman. 1987)
#
When asked which interpretation of QM he favored,
Feynman replied: "Shut up and calculate."
#
When I was first learning quantum mechanics as a graduate student
at Harvard, a mere 30 years after the birth of the subject.
"You'll never get a PhD if you allow yourself to be distracted
by such frivolities," they kept advising me, "so get back to serious
business and produce some results."
"Shut up," in other words, "and calculate."
And so I did, and probably turned out much the better for it.
/ N. David Mermin /
#
The problem of the exact description of vacuum, in my opinion,
is the basic problem now before physics. Really, if you cant correctly
describe the vacuum, how it is possible to expect a correct description
of something more complex?
Paul Dirac .
#
Young man, in mathematics you don't understand things,
you just get used to them.
/ John von Neumann ./
#
Since the mathematical physicists have taken over,
theoretical physics has gone to pot.
The bizarre concepts generated out of the over use and
misinterpretation of mathematics would be funny if it were not
for the tragedy of the waste in time,
manpower, money, and the resulting misdirection.
/ Richard Feynman./
#
" I feel that we do not have definite physical concepts at all
if we just apply working mathematical rules;
that's not what the physicist should be satisfied with."
/Dirac /
#
In his 1997 book The End of Certainty Nobel Laureate
Ilya Prigogine wrote:
"The more we know about our universe, the more difficult
it becomes to believe in determinism."
And The quantum paradox is real nightmare for classic mind
#
In his book Quantum theory ( published in 2002 )
John Polkinghorne wrote:
Quantum theory is certainly strange and surprising,&
/ chapter 6, part Quantum hype , page 92 /
#
Etc.
======================..
The physical education.
The more I study the more I know.
The more I know the more ideas I have.
The more ideas I have the more they abstract.
The more they abstract the less I know the truth.
=====.
Some years ago I told with young physicist (!!!).
He said very confidently: You cannot be physicist (!)
if you cannot understand the beauty of Minkowski
mathematics.(!!!)
======.
It seems that he is right, because physicists must know
mathematics very well. The problem is that nobody
knows what is real physical meaning of 4-D negative
space continuum. in the Nature. SRT is correct theory
but Minkowski space continuum is abstract. And together
they are paradoxical. More than 100 years we live with
this paradox. Nobody confuses.
==========.
During our conversation I understand that this young physicist
is strong and clever man and he want to reach success. And
I think he will do it. So, in the future he will create new
D/ M-spaces or new symmetries or discover new particles.
And one day he will be a professor and will teach new
generation ( your son or your daughter) in order that they also
have possibility to create new D/ M-spaces or new symmetries
or discover new particles. But if in the beginning the abstract
ideas were put into the fundament of physics then &&..
we can create new and new theories for 1000 years but
the result will be the same - paradoxical.
=========..
Physicists and Laws.
Physicists do not dictate to Nature their laws.
Laws of nature are reality, which exists independently
from the researcher. The Nature cannot be arranged so
strange, as the physicists think of it. Their thoughts
are so strange, that they offer paradoxical ideas.
Einstein wrote: In the Science the man has freedom
to solve well made crossword. In this crossword
physicists dont know what Light quanta, Electron, Energy are.
( It is important to realize that in physics today,
we have no knowledge of what energy is.
We do not have a picture that energy comes in little
blobs of a definite amount. / Feynman. 1987/ ,. . . .
"The electron that can be told is not the true electron."
/ David Harrison / , . . . . . . . . ..Etc.)
And instead to understand what Light quanta, Electron,
Energy are, the physicists try to add to the crossword of the
Universe new cells and fill them with new abstract models.
For example;
on horizontal dark matter
(The Dark Matter is another official dogma
of our astronomy. /V. H. Vergon/)
or dark energy
( Dark energy may be vacuum
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-01/uoc-dem011607.php )
and on vertical string theory
( We don't know what we are talking about"
/ Nobel laureate David Gross referring to the current state
of string theory./ )
Or on horizontal quark,
and on vertical - Higgs boson or Higgs mechanism.
Etc.
This is reason that I wrote:
The more I study the more I know.
The more I know the more ideas I have.
The more ideas I have the more they abstract.
The more they abstract the less I know the truth.
And as a result conclusion from some article:
" One of the best kept secrets of science is
that physicists have lost their grip on reality."
Or
When the next revolution rocks physics,
chances are it will be about nothingthe vacuum,
that endless infinite void.
http://discovermagazine.com/2008/aug/18-nothingness-of-space-theory-of-everything
http://discovermagazine.com/topics/space
===============. .
Best wishes.
Israel Sadovnik. / Socratus.
http://www.socratus.com
http://www.wbabin.net
http://www.physforum.com/index.php?showtopic=2548
================ . .
The mad CERN ’s project.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn 1906, Rutherford studied internal structure of atoms,
bombarding them with high energy a- particles.
This idea helped him understand the structure of atom.
But the clever Devil interfered and gave advice to physicists
to enlarge the target. Bomb them!
And physicist created huge cannon-accelerators of particles.
And they began to bomb micro particles in the vacuum, in hoping
to understand their inner structure. And they were surprised with
the results of this bombing. Several hundreds of completely new
strange particles appeared. They lived a very little time and do not
relate to our world. Our Earth needs its real constants of nature.
But this was forgotten.
What God carefully created, is destroyed in accelerators.
And they are proud of that. They say: we study the inner structure
of the particles. The clever and artful Devil is glad. He again has deceived man.
Physicist think, that an accelerator - is first of all the presence of huge energy.
And the Devil laughs. He knows, that an accelerator - is first of all the Vacuum.
But this, he has withheld from man.
He has not explained that the Vacuum is infinite and inexhaustible.
And in infinity there is contained an infinite variety of particles.
And by bombing the vacuum, one can find centaurs and sphinxes.
But my God, save us from their presence on Earth.
========= .. ========.
Rutherford was right.
His followers are mistaken.
Why?
Imagine, that I want to plant a small apple- tree.
For this purpose I shall dig out a hole of 1 meter width and 1,20 m depth.
It is normal.
But if to plant a small apple- tree, I shall begin to dig
a base for a huge building (skyscraper),
or if to begin drill ground with 10 km. depth,
will you call me a normal man?
========== .. ===============.
Imagine a man who breaks watches on the wall.
And then he tries to understand the mechanism of the watches
by thrown cogwheels, springs and small screws.
Does he have many chances to succeed?
As many as the scientists have who aspire to understand
the inner structure of electron by breaking them into accelerators.
If not take into account the initial conditions of Genesis,
the fantasies of the scientists may be unlimited.
========== . ======== .
The Nature works very economical.
For example, biologists know 100 ( hundred ) kinds of
amino acids. But only 20 ( twenty) kinds of amino acids
are suitable to produce molecules of protein, from which all
different cells created on our planet. What are about another
80 % of amino acids? They are dead end of evolution.
The physicists found many ( 1000 ) new elementary particles in
accelerators. But we need only one ( 1) electron and one (1 )
proton to create first atom, to begin to create the Nature.
All another elementary particles (mesons, muons , bosons, taus,
all their girlfriends - antiparticles, all quarks and antiquarks…etc)
are dead end of evolution.
============.
What was before - “ the big bang” or the vacuum ?
The physicists created “ Europe’s Large Hadron Colider “
Please, look at how our physicists made this accelerator.
They made the vacuum and after they generated a big reaction
between two colliding particles in some small imitation of the
“big bang”. They didn’t make this process in the reverse.
So, what was prior in the Universe: “ big bang” or vacuum?
===========================..
The Universe as whole is Vacuum, first of all.
Best wishes.
Israel Sadovnik. / Socratus.
If it has anything to do with Democrats or liberals, you know what this will entail. Revisionist interference into science that meets the "code of ethics" of liberalism. So there goes the scientific debate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs you have all seen, even in this magazine, science is blurred for social activism. Best example of this the deliberate manufacturing of statistics that support so called world climate change. Or the personal attacks on rebutting scientists or the shunning of scientists by the MSM for exampe done to Dr. David Bellamy of the UK.
There's a lot of dirty politics being done in the name of science to support so called environmental causes, and this magazine is supporting those environmental activists.
First thing useful would be to clean house of the social activists and get back to scientific reporting.
nice work...
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