🚀 go-pugleaf

sichase@csa1.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE) writes:

>In article <1992Nov12.201646.31516@bas-a.bcc.ac.uk>, ucap22w@ucl.ac.uk (Martin S T Watts) writes...
>>sichase@csa1.lbl.gov (SCOTT I CHASE) writes:
>>>In article <1992Nov09.192052.25358@bas-a.bcc.ac.uk>, ucap22w@ucl.ac.uk (Martin S T Watts) writes...

>>(And if you think that, say, positron-electron annihilation is an example of
>>the destruction of mass, then think again.)

>Sure.  What would *you* call it?  Where do *you* think the mass goes?

I can see you've sweated blood over this problem. Maybe since the products
of e+ e- annihilation are two or three gamma ray photons, the mass of the
pair becomes the mass of the photons. Does that seem unreasonable?

>>It wouldn't surprise me if American Universities were turfing out copies of
>>J. Phys. A! I only included the reference in case people doubted the
>>authenticity of my claim - I hadn't thought people would go to the trouble
>>of looking it up. 

>The purpose of providing a reference is to allow the reader to find details
>that you have omitted for brevity or clarity.  References are not generally
>provided, as you seem to think, merely to look professional.  

Well, I never knew that - thank you for explaining. :-)

>In and of 
>themselves, they provide no authentication of a claim.  

My claim was that Bondi had said "Energy has mass" and that energy and mass
are not interconvertible. My reference provides authentication of that claim.
It's hardly my fault if the University of California, or wherever, chucks
out its copies of Physics Bulletin to preserve valuable space for toilet paper.

>You are welcome
>to explain to us, if you care, what Bondi had to say.

On an international public access bulletin board that's very magnanimous, I
must say.

>  If not, then how
>are we supposed to proceed with this discussion?

For a start, have you looked up the other references I gave? If not, perhaps
*you* could explain to us, in the mean time, where the mass of the positron-
electron pair goes in annihilation. I'd be interested in proceeding with this
discussion and willing to go into more detail, by all means, but at the 
moment your tone seems a little too aggressive to be conducive. If you are
genuinely interested, please say so, and also say what your understanding of
the subject is, so I can put you straight more easily.

Martin Watts.