Models Understood as Reality (was "non-transfer" of energy)

[Brian Whatcott <betwys@DIRECTVINTERNET.COM>]

At 08:46 PM 11/29/02, David Bowman, you wrote:

> What is water but an ensemble of states possessing a lot of
> excitations, i.e. quanta, of the electron and quark Dirac fields?
> Why would excited states of these fields be any more or less real
> than any other eigenstates of other observables, e.g. the
> Hamiltonian?  If a system's state is an eigenstate of a self-adjoint
> physical observable, why isn't the correponding eigenvalue 'real'?
> I think it is (in more than one way, even).
> ...
> Why is energy not to be reified any more than any other physical
> property?  What is physical reality other than a collection of
> physical properties that happen to exist?
...
> David Bowman


I find it comforting to discount the folks who feel they are talking
about physical reality. I remind myself that even the most righteously
 indignant, in favor of their very own understanding of what is real,
what is physical, are in the end talking about models, models that
may provide a gratifying sense of connectedness to other valued
 physical models: daring models, models couched in the most
 recherche' maths.
I do try to be attentive when an educator tells me that one
embodiment of a model, say latent heat of fusion, or  heat transfer
 or dissipation, may sound traditional and reasonable at some stage,
 but may become a confusion factor at some other stage.

But in the end, if a model serves its purpose now, then that is a
very pragmatic advantage that easily overwhelms suggestions from
other quarters that they have a direct line to ultimate truth.
I know, as strongly as I know anything, that they do not, and cannot.


Brian Whatcott
  Altus OK                      Eureka!

This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.