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Beleth · 10th March 2003, 12:07 PM

What percentage of the total laws of physics do you believe we know as of March 10, 2003? Explain your decision.

(Yes, I know I misspelled physics in the title of the poll...)

Tricky · 10th March 2003, 12:19 PM

I voted for "Less than 1%". My reasoning behind this is based on the fact that ever time we learn the answer to one question, it opens up a whole bunch of other questions. Thus, the number of things we don't know is growing exponentially compared to the number of things we learn.

I really cannot think of any fields where we have decided we know everything there is to know.

Upchurch · 10th March 2003, 12:22 PM

I think we have all the main categories identified. It's entirely possible that someone will discover an as yet unidentified field of science, "goisnskeyksluislology", but I doubt it.

Most of what we still don't know is in the fine details, IMHO. Of course, a hundred years ago, it was those small details that brought about some of the biggest revolutions in science ever.

I voted 90% - 99% and that's probably accurate as of today, but I could be way off tomorrow.

10th March 2003, 12:34 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Tricky
I voted for "Less than 1%". My reasoning behind this is based on the fact that ever time we learn the answer to one question, it opens up a whole bunch of other questions. Thus, the number of things we don't know is growing exponentially compared to the number of things we learn.

I really cannot think of any fields where we have decided we know everything there is to know.

I don't know. I tend to think we are closer to "closure" than ever.

Of course people have thought this before.

Franko · 10th March 2003, 12:45 PM

Quote:

What percentage of the total laws of physics do you believe we know as of March 10, 2003? Explain your decision.

The High Priests of Pseudo-Materialism have resolved 3 of the four forces. They understand these forces, and they have unified them (essentially the equations for each enfolds into a simpler system (simpler law) from an earlier period in the history of the Universe).

They have Gravity figured out for large scale (classical, non-quantum) objects, but no Pseudo-Materialist has gotten even close to resolving Quantum Gravity, and until a precise equation is found there is no way to unify Gravity with the other 3 forces.

Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved.

c4ts · 10th March 2003, 04:37 PM

Apparently 99% of TLOP is "atoms obey TLOP." Everything else can be deduced from our knowledge of TLOP. Praise the Goddess, for without her, we wouldn't understand the stuff we still don't understand.

Beleth · 10th March 2003, 04:46 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Franko
Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved.

So that's it, then? A Grand Unified Theory will answer all remaining physics mysteries?

Now, personally, I tend to think that we find science answers in roughly exponential time. It took a certain number of years to find the laws that cover 90% of what we observe, then a similar amount of time to find the laws that cover 90% of that remaining 10%, and so on. I too am in the "less than 1%" crowd but the 1% we have discovered adequately covers about 99.9% of what goes on in the observable universe. We are high on the quality chart but low on the quantity chart.

justsaygnosis · 10th March 2003, 05:42 PM

Personally I agree with Tricky but I voted 10% on the incredible advances made in the last twenty years.
Utilizing the ongoing discoveries in practical applications remains a cute trick though.

c4ts · 10th March 2003, 06:12 PM

Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total. We would have to know exactly how many laws of physics there were to begin with, and divide the number of current laws that are already discovered by man by that number. Who knows how many laws are left to discover? Until we know, any percentage less than or equal to 100 and greater than 0 will be as correct as any other percentage. Franko says it's %87.5, so that means Franko must know exactly how many laws are left to discover. So Franko, what is the total number of laws of physics, how many are left, what are the ones that have already been discovered, and how did you know that after a certain number of undiscovered laws, there could be no more laws of physics left to discover?

10th March 2003, 09:49 PM

Look at the periodic table of elements, and there are 113 unique atoms proven to exist. That's 12,769 first-order combinations to start with (for elements that we even know about).

Add a third and fourth atom, and the count of combinations are ridiculous. What can be done with these combinations is just one tiny subset of knowledge that utterly dwarfs all the texts in all of the scientific papers ever published in far fewer combinations than you could coat the surface of the head of a pin with. Not even bringing in reactions due to temperature, pressure, light, electrical, etc. forces.

<1%? The real question is, how many zeroes between the decimal point and the first significant digit?

c4ts · 10th March 2003, 09:53 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by evildave
Look at the periodic table of elements, and there are 113 unique atoms proven to exist. That's 12,769 first-order combinations to start with (for elements that we even know about).

Add a third and fourth atom, and the count of combinations are ridiculous. What can be done with these combinations is just one tiny subset of knowledge that utterly dwarfs all the texts in all of the scientific papers ever published in far fewer combinations than you could coat the surface of the head of a pin with. Not even bringing in reactions due to temperature, pressure, light, electrical, etc. forces.

<1%? The real question is, how many zeroes between the decimal point and the first significant digit?

Yeah, but how many laws do we already know?

10th March 2003, 10:06 PM

Well, it's according to what you want to decompose and define as a "law". As always, it boils down to definition here.

As a sum total of possible knowledge available to be known about how things physically interact, we know diddly/squat.

If you mean "general rules that describe how things generally work", while ignoring all of the details, then a claim could be made that the cavemen knew most of what they ever needed to.

c4ts · 10th March 2003, 10:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by evildave
Well, it's according to what you want to decompose and define as a "law". As always, it boils down to definition here.

As a sum total of possible knowledge available to be known about how things physically interact, we know diddly/squat.

If you mean "general rules that describe how things generally work", while ignoring all of the details, then a claim could be made that the cavemen knew most of what they ever needed to.

What about those things about motion Newton came up with? Aren't those laws? Why don't we base our definition on what a physical law is by what constitutes a single discovery in the field of physics?

crocodile deathroll · 11th March 2003, 03:16 AM

If it was a question of how much TLOP to I personally know I would not hesitate to say less the 1%.

I would like to ask the question of all the laws of physics that is known to science, what percentage of them to you know personally?

MRC_Hans · 11th March 2003, 04:48 AM

It is a really a hard question, because how do you measure the volume of knowledge? I voted 90-99% (more likely 90 than 99), because I think that the grand framework has been established. I dont expect we'll see any big revolutions or even something that will seriously rock our picture of the world. But that is not to say that I expect we are going to cover the last piece of the way anytime soon -- if ever. So, in a way I could also have voted 1%. IMO, it has got to be one of the two, depending on how you evaluate knowledge. The in-betweens wont do, because saying that we know, say 60%, would be to say that since we took aboust 300 years to get this far, we'll know all in another 200 years.

Hans

CWL · 11th March 2003, 08:16 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Franko

The High Priests of Pseudo-Materialism have resolved 3 of the four forces. They understand these forces, and they have unified them (essentially the equations for each enfolds into a simpler system (simpler law) from an earlier period in the history of the Universe).

They have Gravity figured out for large scale (classical, non-quantum) objects, but no Pseudo-Materialist has gotten even close to resolving Quantum Gravity, and until a precise equation is found there is no way to unify Gravity with the other 3 forces.

Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved.

Assuming that you hold the remaining 1/8th of the puzzle - exactly why do the Logical Deists not share this with the rest of the world?

gnome · 11th March 2003, 11:53 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by c4ts
Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total. We would have to know exactly how many laws of physics there were to begin with, and divide the number of current laws that are already discovered by man by that number. Who knows how many laws are left to discover? Until we know, any percentage less than or equal to 100 and greater than 0 will be as correct as any other percentage. Franko says it's %87.5, so that means Franko must know exactly how many laws are left to discover. So Franko, what is the total number of laws of physics, how many are left, what are the ones that have already been discovered, and how did you know that after a certain number of undiscovered laws, there could be no more laws of physics left to discover?

Not so much speaking from knowledge as making a sort of bet, a pool maybe.

At some theoretical point where we might know "all" of the laws of physics, looking back, how close would we say we are now?

I voted less than 1% btw

Beleth · 11th March 2003, 11:59 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by c4ts
Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total.

That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know.

I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be.

Tricky · 11th March 2003, 01:21 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Beleth
That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know.

I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be.

Yes, it also brings out a questioin of semantics (Ed: Not semantics again!) as to what is a "law". Is it a new law every time you tweak a law? How much does the "tweak" have to be before it is a full fledged law? Is Special Relativity merely a tweaking of Newtonian physics?

My argument is that if you change so much as one number or operator in one equation, then you have discovered a new law. Furthermore, since biology, geology and astronomy are all "physical sciences", every new type of cure, every new fact about the Earth's structure, every new bit of information about black holes also is a new "law". That is why I say "less than 1%". We don't seem to be slowing down in the things we are discovering. Just the opposite. Omniscence doesn't seem to be at our doorstep.

c4ts · 11th March 2003, 02:26 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Beleth
That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know.

I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be.

Apparently your experiment provoked too much thought.

rich, powerful, influential	5	22.73%
seductive, charming, witty	3	13.64%
handsome, athletic, sexy	1	4.55%
warm, caring, compassionate	5	22.73%
clever, intellectual, educated	6	27.27%
diligent, sincere, plain	2	9.09%
Voters: 22. You may not vote on this poll

10th March 2003, 12:07 PM	#1
Beleth FAQ Creator Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Not in a cave Posts: 4,134	How many of TLOP do we know? What percentage of the total laws of physics do you believe we know as of March 10, 2003? Explain your decision. (Yes, I know I misspelled physics in the title of the poll...)
	__________________ Administrator and Head Moderator, The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe Forum Big Fan, Stop Sylvia Browne I will come back only after the words "Hi, Nyarl!" are returned to the post http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...5&postcount=14 .

10th March 2003, 12:34 PM	#4
Guest Posts: n/a	Quote: Originally posted by Tricky I voted for "Less than 1%". My reasoning behind this is based on the fact that ever time we learn the answer to one question, it opens up a whole bunch of other questions. Thus, the number of things we don't know is growing exponentially compared to the number of things we learn. I really cannot think of any fields where we have decided we know everything there is to know. I don't know. I tend to think we are closer to "closure" than ever. Of course people have thought this before.
Guest Posts: n/a

10th March 2003, 12:45 PM	#5
Franko Master Poster Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 2,338	Quote: What percentage of the total laws of physics do you believe we know as of March 10, 2003? Explain your decision. The High Priests of Pseudo-Materialism have resolved 3 of the four forces. They understand these forces, and they have unified them (essentially the equations for each enfolds into a simpler system (simpler law) from an earlier period in the history of the Universe). They have Gravity figured out for large scale (classical, non-quantum) objects, but no Pseudo-Materialist has gotten even close to resolving Quantum Gravity, and until a precise equation is found there is no way to unify Gravity with the other 3 forces. Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved.
Franko Master Poster Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 2,338

10th March 2003, 04:37 PM	#6
c4ts Philosopher Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Your base Posts: 8,427	Apparently 99% of TLOP is "atoms obey TLOP." Everything else can be deduced from our knowledge of TLOP. Praise the Goddess, for without her, we wouldn't understand the stuff we still don't understand.
	__________________ Ha ha ha ha.... Stupid signature size limit.

10th March 2003, 12:19 PM	#2
Tricky Briefly immortal Moderator Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: The Group W bench Posts: 42,405	I voted for "Less than 1%". My reasoning behind this is based on the fact that ever time we learn the answer to one question, it opens up a whole bunch of other questions. Thus, the number of things we don't know is growing exponentially compared to the number of things we learn. I really cannot think of any fields where we have decided we know everything there is to know.

10th March 2003, 12:22 PM	#3
Upchurch Papa Funkosophy Join Date: May 2002 Location: Funky Town (STL, MO) Posts: 23,480	I think we have all the main categories identified. It's entirely possible that someone will discover an as yet unidentified field of science, "goisnskeyksluislology", but I doubt it. Most of what we still don't know is in the fine details, IMHO. Of course, a hundred years ago, it was those small details that brought about some of the biggest revolutions in science ever. I voted 90% - 99% and that's probably accurate as of today, but I could be way off tomorrow.

10th March 2003, 04:46 PM	#7
Beleth FAQ Creator Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Not in a cave Posts: 4,134	Quote: Originally posted by Franko Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved. So that's it, then? A Grand Unified Theory will answer all remaining physics mysteries? Now, personally, I tend to think that we find science answers in roughly exponential time. It took a certain number of years to find the laws that cover 90% of what we observe, then a similar amount of time to find the laws that cover 90% of that remaining 10%, and so on. I too am in the "less than 1%" crowd but the 1% we have discovered adequately covers about 99.9% of what goes on in the observable universe. We are high on the quality chart but low on the quantity chart.
	__________________ Administrator and Head Moderator, The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe Forum Big Fan, Stop Sylvia Browne I will come back only after the words "Hi, Nyarl!" are returned to the post http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...5&postcount=14 .

10th March 2003, 05:42 PM	#8
justsaygnosis Critical Thinker Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 263	Personally I agree with Tricky but I voted 10% on the incredible advances made in the last twenty years. Utilizing the ongoing discoveries in practical applications remains a cute trick though.
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10th March 2003, 06:12 PM	#9
c4ts Philosopher Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Your base Posts: 8,427	Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total. We would have to know exactly how many laws of physics there were to begin with, and divide the number of current laws that are already discovered by man by that number. Who knows how many laws are left to discover? Until we know, any percentage less than or equal to 100 and greater than 0 will be as correct as any other percentage. Franko says it's %87.5, so that means Franko must know exactly how many laws are left to discover. So Franko, what is the total number of laws of physics, how many are left, what are the ones that have already been discovered, and how did you know that after a certain number of undiscovered laws, there could be no more laws of physics left to discover?
	__________________ Ha ha ha ha.... Stupid signature size limit.

10th March 2003, 09:49 PM	#10
evildave Guest Posts: n/a	Look at the periodic table of elements, and there are 113 unique atoms proven to exist. That's 12,769 first-order combinations to start with (for elements that we even know about). Add a third and fourth atom, and the count of combinations are ridiculous. What can be done with these combinations is just one tiny subset of knowledge that utterly dwarfs all the texts in all of the scientific papers ever published in far fewer combinations than you could coat the surface of the head of a pin with. Not even bringing in reactions due to temperature, pressure, light, electrical, etc. forces. <1%? The real question is, how many zeroes between the decimal point and the first significant digit?
evildave Guest Posts: n/a

10th March 2003, 09:53 PM	#11
c4ts Philosopher Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Your base Posts: 8,427	Quote: Originally posted by evildave Look at the periodic table of elements, and there are 113 unique atoms proven to exist. That's 12,769 first-order combinations to start with (for elements that we even know about). Add a third and fourth atom, and the count of combinations are ridiculous. What can be done with these combinations is just one tiny subset of knowledge that utterly dwarfs all the texts in all of the scientific papers ever published in far fewer combinations than you could coat the surface of the head of a pin with. Not even bringing in reactions due to temperature, pressure, light, electrical, etc. forces. <1%? The real question is, how many zeroes between the decimal point and the first significant digit? Yeah, but how many laws do we already know?
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10th March 2003, 10:06 PM	#12
evildave Guest Posts: n/a	Well, it's according to what you want to decompose and define as a "law". As always, it boils down to definition here. As a sum total of possible knowledge available to be known about how things physically interact, we know diddly/squat. If you mean "general rules that describe how things generally work", while ignoring all of the details, then a claim could be made that the cavemen knew most of what they ever needed to.
evildave Guest Posts: n/a

10th March 2003, 10:24 PM	#13
c4ts Philosopher Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Your base Posts: 8,427	Quote: Originally posted by evildave Well, it's according to what you want to decompose and define as a "law". As always, it boils down to definition here. As a sum total of possible knowledge available to be known about how things physically interact, we know diddly/squat. If you mean "general rules that describe how things generally work", while ignoring all of the details, then a claim could be made that the cavemen knew most of what they ever needed to. What about those things about motion Newton came up with? Aren't those laws? Why don't we base our definition on what a physical law is by what constitutes a single discovery in the field of physics?
	__________________ Ha ha ha ha.... Stupid signature size limit.

11th March 2003, 03:16 AM	#14
crocodile deathroll Muse Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Darwin Posts: 620	If it was a question of how much TLOP to I personally know I would not hesitate to say less the 1%. I would like to ask the question of all the laws of physics that is known to science, what percentage of them to you know personally?
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11th March 2003, 04:48 AM	#15
MRC_Hans Penultimate Amazing Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Whithin earshot of the North Sea Posts: 16,604	It is a really a hard question, because how do you measure the volume of knowledge? I voted 90-99% (more likely 90 than 99), because I think that the grand framework has been established. I dont expect we'll see any big revolutions or even something that will seriously rock our picture of the world. But that is not to say that I expect we are going to cover the last piece of the way anytime soon -- if ever. So, in a way I could also have voted 1%. IMO, it has got to be one of the two, depending on how you evaluate knowledge. The in-betweens wont do, because saying that we know, say 60%, would be to say that since we took aboust 300 years to get this far, we'll know all in another 200 years. Hans
	__________________ Don't. Just don't.

11th March 2003, 08:16 AM	#16
CWL Funkateer Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Stockholm, Sweden Posts: 1,370	Quote: Originally posted by Franko The High Priests of Pseudo-Materialism have resolved 3 of the four forces. They understand these forces, and they have unified them (essentially the equations for each enfolds into a simpler system (simpler law) from an earlier period in the history of the Universe). They have Gravity figured out for large scale (classical, non-quantum) objects, but no Pseudo-Materialist has gotten even close to resolving Quantum Gravity, and until a precise equation is found there is no way to unify Gravity with the other 3 forces. Essentially you’ve got 7/8ths of the puzzle solved. Assuming that you hold the remaining 1/8th of the puzzle - exactly why do the Logical Deists not share this with the rest of the world?
	__________________ "All is not true which resembles truth" - Swedish Code for Judges (probably composed around 1540) "The obscurely spoken is the obscurely thought" - Swedish poet Esaias Tegnér (1782 - 1846) "Precisely because of human fallibility, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" - Carl Sagan

11th March 2003, 11:53 AM	#17
gnome Philosopher Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 9,879	Quote: Originally posted by c4ts Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total. We would have to know exactly how many laws of physics there were to begin with, and divide the number of current laws that are already discovered by man by that number. Who knows how many laws are left to discover? Until we know, any percentage less than or equal to 100 and greater than 0 will be as correct as any other percentage. Franko says it's %87.5, so that means Franko must know exactly how many laws are left to discover. So Franko, what is the total number of laws of physics, how many are left, what are the ones that have already been discovered, and how did you know that after a certain number of undiscovered laws, there could be no more laws of physics left to discover? Not so much speaking from knowledge as making a sort of bet, a pool maybe. At some theoretical point where we might know "all" of the laws of physics, looking back, how close would we say we are now? I voted less than 1% btw
gnome Philosopher Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 9,879	__________________

11th March 2003, 11:59 AM	#18
Beleth FAQ Creator Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Not in a cave Posts: 4,134	Quote: Originally posted by c4ts Percentage is meaningless without knowledge of a total. That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know. I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be.
	__________________ Administrator and Head Moderator, The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe Forum Big Fan, Stop Sylvia Browne I will come back only after the words "Hi, Nyarl!" are returned to the post http://forums.randi.org/showpost.php...5&postcount=14 .

11th March 2003, 01:21 PM	#19
Tricky Briefly immortal Moderator Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: The Group W bench Posts: 42,405	Quote: Originally posted by Beleth That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know. I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be. Yes, it also brings out a questioin of semantics (Ed: Not semantics again!) as to what is a "law". Is it a new law every time you tweak a law? How much does the "tweak" have to be before it is a full fledged law? Is Special Relativity merely a tweaking of Newtonian physics? My argument is that if you change so much as one number or operator in one equation, then you have discovered a new law. Furthermore, since biology, geology and astronomy are all "physical sciences", every new type of cure, every new fact about the Earth's structure, every new bit of information about black holes also is a new "law". That is why I say "less than 1%". We don't seem to be slowing down in the things we are discovering. Just the opposite. Omniscence doesn't seem to be at our doorstep.

11th March 2003, 02:26 PM	#20
c4ts Philosopher Join Date: Jul 2002 Location: Your base Posts: 8,427	Quote: Originally posted by Beleth That's why this is a poll, that asks you what percentage you believe we know. I am asking you to make a guess. If you don't want to, that's okay, but don't try to read more into this than the thought-provoking experiment it's intended to be. Apparently your experiment provoked too much thought.
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