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Re: Challenging the laws of physics



Ludwik Kowalski wrote:

Excitement caused by Ponn and Flishmann had a positive
effect on many minds;

Huh? The cost/benefit ratio was horrific.

it triggered a debate,

Scandals commonly trigger debates. That's hardly
enough to qualify them as "positive".

As teachers we should look for such episodes
and make them known to students, when possible.

When challenging the "laws" of physics there's a right
way and a wrong way to go about it. (The same applies
to any other activity.)

There is an abundance of genuinely positive examples of
challenges to the established rules. Actually there are
four main classes:
A1) The rules need changing, and the scientific
community handles it well. Examples: Michelson
and Morley overthrew the ether theory. Rutherford
overthrew the plum-pudding model of atomic structure.
Rumford overthrew the idea that heat was conserved
separately from other forms of energy.
A2) The rules don't need changing, and it is handled
well. Example: The null results of Eötvös.
B1) The rules need changing, and it is handled poorly.
Relatively recent example: the idea of continental
drift was not adopted nearly as fast as it should
have been.
B2) The rules don't need changing, and it is handled
poorly. Examples: N-rays, cold fusion.

And there is a fifth class, where the scientific community
responds scientifically but fails to bring the broader
society along. Examples: copper bracelet therapy, magnetic
bracelet therapy, homeopathic medicines.

The task of challenging established ideas is not assigned
only to giants like Michelson and Rumford and Rutherford,
but also to every worker-bee in the scientific community.
In my own professional life, several of the most-important
things I've ever done involved overturning seemingly
well-established rules.

To summarize:
-- Primarily we should discuss the right way to challenge
the established rules. And the necessity for doing so.
-- Secondarily we should discuss N-rays, cold fusion,
homeopathy, etc. as counterexamples, as perversions.
We shouldn't call them "positive".