🚀 go-pugleaf

I would like to suggest that Newton's Laws are indeed axioms and that
Newton's approach was an axiomatic deductive one akin to what one finds in
mathematics.  Clearly the questions asked are philosophical ones, not
scientific ones.  The meaning such terms as why and explanation are open
for discussion.  An even more difficult term is "facts".  I for one would
not include any other the facts mentioned below as facts at all.  What does
one mean by fact anyway? another philosophical question!!!!  Sad to say, I
have no answers.


In article <PHYSHARE%94050617432312@PSUVM.PSU.EDU>, LUDVIK KOWALSKI
<KOWALSKI@APOLLO.MONTCLAIR.EDU> wrote:

> How nice it is that a question asked by Connie (a high school teacher ?) is
> at once answered by James (a theoretical physics researcher ?) and that we
> can all join to debate the topic.
> 
> In the May 6 entry Connie wrote:
> 
>  > It seems we are now caught in a semantic argument, specifically:  what
>  > does it mean to ask "why" in the context of physics.  One interpretation
>  > is that "why" means "what is the cause".  Why does an object released from
>  > rest above the earth's surface fall with constant acceleration? Because
>  > that is its natural motion.  That was a satisfactory explanation for two
>  > thousand years.  But Galileo and Newton's dissatisfaction produced new
>  > theories, which in turn have made so much happen for us in the modern
>  > world. These theories don't just make us happy- they empower us: and that
>  > is the criterion by which we judge them valid.
> 
> To me it is not a semantic argument. To ask "why" in physics is to ask for
> a satisfacory validation. What would be satisfactory to Richard Feynman may
> not be satisfactory to me, or to my students. We do not have axioms (self
> evident truths, as in mathematics) but commonly chosen facts, supported by
> experimental data, used as if they were axioms. Attraction and repulsion
> of charges, according to Coulomb's law, is one of these basic facts. The law
> of universal gravitation, Newton's laws of motion, conservation of energy
> and the law of refraction are also such facts.
> 
> To explain something in physics is to show conceptual links between basic
> facts and the subject being discussed. At some level of sophistication, it
> may be appropriate to remove the law of refraction from the list of "axioms"
> but that does not mean that explaining optics in terms of experimentally
> verifiable Snell's law is illogical. If we do not ask "why" then physics
> bacomes factology. Too many "whys", on the other hand, can complicate
> explanations to a point at which they becomes meaningless. As teachers we
> are in the best position to decide what is and what is not appropriate
> in a given situation.
> 
> It is nice to think about "truly ulimate causes" mentioned by Connie, but
> fortunately, our daily work does not depend on the product of very advanced
> speculations. Validating commonly accepted "axioms", and explaining things
> in their terms, is challenging enough to make me happy when I succeed. I
> wish the moment of happiness were more frequent, but that is another matter.

-- 
Joseph Bellina (jbellina@saintmarys.edu)