On 21/06/15 20:43, Tudor Hughes wrote:
On Sunday, 21 June 2015 17:38:31 UTC+1, RedAcer wrote:
On 21/06/15 15:02, Col wrote:
Dawlish wrote:
There's no 'right' and no wrong in science, as I've attested to
on here any times.there is no proof, though deniers want there
to be. The best you'll get is a consensus amongst scientists.
In this case, the consensus is huge, at 99.9% in the latest
literature survey. What does that suggest about CO2 being the
major cause of global warming.

A good analogy is gravity. The theory of gravity is not proven
and never will be. However, if I was stood under a falling
piano, I'd be inclined to do my best to get out of the way. A
denier, however would be still telling anyone in hearing
distance that the theory is a bunch of crap. Right up to the
end. ??

In the instance of gravity, how much proof do you want??

We know how it works,

Do we?

we know what the equations are. We can 'slingshot' spaceprobes
around planets in order to accelerate them. And lo and behold the
probes end up where we want them.

Yes you can use the equations of Newtonian gravity and calculate
these trajectories with sufficient accuracy in the solar system,
but not in a strong gravitational field where you have to use the
more accurate theory of general relativity, where gravity is
modelled not as a force but as the curvature of spacetime.


How could we do that if the theory wasn't 'proven'?
Newtonian gravity was proven to be wrong ~100 years ago.


I think "wrong" is the wrong word. Newtonian gravity simply didn't
go far enough but it had gone down the right road and,

Not sure it's correct to say it had gone down the right road. Newtonian
theory models gravity as a force obeying an inverse square law. This
didn't work - hence Einsteins theory of general relativity which hasn't
failed in any of its predictions.

as far as it
goes it is correct.

Tudor Hughes, Warlingham, Surrey.


It was 'wrong' in the sense that it made predictions that didn't conform
to observations.