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Comment by planck01 | Hacker News Reader

No, they're not wrong. Some of these concepts are hardly explainable without math.

Actually the concepts are perfectly explained by plenty of people who, you know, actually know. Read the other links in this thread. But please downvote me some more. It's obvious you're not arguing reasonably because you're clearly leaving out the fact that the terms in all these relevant equations are associated with physical components that we talk about WITH WORDS

Like mass and charge and energy and probability

If you know the math you can share it here and say what the terms mean

If you dont know the math then your comment contains the lie that you know what you're talking about and that people should listen to you

You seem quite upset. Take a break.

no, I'm pretty sure that my defending the senseless subjugation of people who tell the truth is much more important than my avoiding a little bit of stress. after the ridiculous life that I've had to live, I'd rather die 20 years too early then not have a conscience.

1.) You're talking about a nested comment on a hacker news post. A little perspective is helpful.

2.) You are making grandiose and uncharitable assumptions about the interpretations of things other people said, e.g. equating not having the words to to describe something to implying that we should give up trying to understand it more.

3.) Having a physical definition for every term in an equation does not mean the resulting behavior/phenomenon can be conceptually explained with words. Can you conceptually explain what "spin" is for an electron?

3. For starters, the math does not explain "what spin is". So you've introduced a fallacy off the bat, and I suspect it was intentional. But if you tell me how you know about spin then I will explain it conceptually. It's not so complicated. None of this proves anything though. What's the fallacy called? I dont remember.

And I guess you're going to invoke some vague connection to angular momentum to do so? We're talking about empirically derived properties. The math certainly predicts the empirical results but it does not give an accurate conceptual connection to concepts that we, as humans living and interacting with a classical world, can actually understand.

edit to add a bit more: I should also point out that no one introduced a fallacy except you. You are, yet again, stretching other peoples words to build straw man arguments for yourself. I don't remember ever making the claim that the math explains ""what spin is"".

we dont live in a classical world, noob. things tend to decohere and mix at this scale but quantum phenomena are obviously observable. and no, you're the one arguing in bad faith. this discussion was about whether these mathematically modelable concepts can be explained by a knowing person with words. not whether i can magically explain something you dont even have math for. go away and find something productive for your life instead of attaching yourself to discussions to feel more alive.

"Can you conceptually explain what "spin" is for an electron?"

You are really an unpleasant person to interact with. And let me know next time you personally observe a quantum phenomenon with your own senses.

> You are really an unpleasant person to interact with.

I'm sure Meletus felt that way while Socrates was absolutely wrecking him in court and exposing his hypocrisy. Maybe that's why they murdered Socrates?

You are not qualified to take part in the debate I raised. It's obvious you dont understand the little physics you have read nor know the math you're trying to talk about. You should count yourself lucky instead because this conversation is a chance for you to open your eyes to a world of physics which is even more amazing than you realized. Instead you'll probably just keep trolling. 'The starting point of true learning is the realization that you're not actually aware of anything yet.'

> let me know next time you personally observe a quantum phenomenon with your own senses.

to my knowledge, literally every single "sense" measurement is a "quantum" phenomenon which happens via entanglement along with literally everything else at all scales. you still have insufficient understanding of this.

and dont mince words about quantum being a theory and things being beyond theory. you contradict yourself in that way and if consciousness is beyond our science now and that is your point then I invite you to stop arguing with me and will remind you that we are discussing experiments in real life and what physics means, not what I feel in my heart.

please stop now

I remember when I had delusions of grandeur in my mother's basement as well. I'm sure in your mind you're "absolutely wrecking" every person you attack online. As stated by a previous commenter, you should probably spend less time on the internet inventing straw men to "absolutely wreck".

as long as you do not discard your preconceptions and delusional words then you are going to misunderstand that what is being opposed or destroyed while you are being freely educated and benefited is you. just forget about me and go read about entanglement and measurement.

The way to express "cosine squared" in words, without including "cosine" or "squared", would be a lesson in cosines and a lesson in squaring. So you're correct, but why is this point useful?

using your example only, those are words which mean something geometrically and relationally. they are functions for numerical computation of those relationships. they dont describe physical systems that we're all talking about originally. if you show me some QM math about some experiment I will tell you what it means. why is everyone so confused about this? that's one thing here i cant understand easily. it's amazing. first they say we cant use words at all. then they say theyre hardly explainable with words. my mistake earlier was not simply retorting with the question of what % the things are explainable with words and not. mind blowing.

Because, interpreted strictly, what you're insisting is trivially true. Obviously anything can be explained with words. However, sometimes the volume of words required would make the explanation incredibly tedious, and words aren't the most appropriate language.

English/natural language isn't a privileged mode. It's one of many, including math, musical notation, computer code, and chess notation. We use the best language for the context, and who cares that laborious translations are available to others? I could be typing ascii codes in binary, instead of letters right now, but so what?

i stopped reading after your first paragraph. you are doing nothing but insisting on your opinion. language and concepts are compressable and often easily abstracted. just give us an example of something that requires me to talk to you only in math expressions instead of concepts in english and maybe i'll concede the point but i said many times now i already have been proven right by the single example of the plain english description of a nonzero amount of the principle behind something otherwise called "the most complicated concept". that must amount to a supposedly inordinate quantity of complexity described plainly. qed. the real question is why we are having so much trouble agreeing. take care

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