Hypothesis: near orbital resonances are more stable than perfect resonances.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbot.2022.8504...
Yes, there are surprising correspondences in physics, mathematics and music. But they've never held predictive value - they're the kind of thing that seems beautiful and obvious once you know about it, but to my knowledge, no music theorist has ever made a useful prediction about sympathetic resonance in ship building.
The Karate Kid couldn't really learn karate by painting a fence.
I apologize for ranting about pseudo-intellectualism, that was harsh. I do hope you can see why this type of empty quip can provoke people. People actually study this stuff for years with rigor. If someone shows up without obvious credentials, makes a provocative non-point that seems to ignore the fundamentals of your field, and expects you to treat their points as valid, then you might think that person is displaying hubris. For me that was too much before my second coffee.
Regarding Karate Kid: I don't remember the movie, but I think you are bring too reductionist about reductionism. You can't learn karate by painting a fence, but leaning karate can teach you something about your body mechanics that can help you better paint a fence. And while geology is not astrophysics, learning about groundwater flow and dam construction might provide insights or new considerations into orbital mechanics with regard to how to handle the interaction of masses in a frame of gravity. I am friends with an astrophysicist and acoustics engineer and they seem to gain a lot from each other in their discussions of waves and analysis of measurements.
Regarding music and ship-building: Less known is that Leonardo da Vinci, famous for his paintings and engineering, painted "The Last Supper" with the mathematical help of his friend (possibly lover) Luca Pacioli. The Franciscan monk whose widely disseminated "Summa de arithmetica" gave us double-entry bookkeeping, even he really mostly repackaged the work of the artist Piero della Francesca, who in turn was riffing on Archimedes.
Of course the fields aren't predictive of each other, not exactly. But it can offer new questions or insights. An Archimedean "Eureka" often precedes the proving (or disproving) of the rule. And while that is a mere moment and it takes years of work to follow, regardless of whether you prove something out with words, figures, or art, I think it's that moment that gives the impetus to everything that follows. Sadly, I never trained as an artist, and I have trouble "reading" paintings as communications of geometry. The Tower of Babel seems to extend beyond mere words.
It's easy to see why people might overfit on the Eureka moment, but it might not ultimately be an overfit for humanity at large: it takes a collective to build a body of knowledge.
> Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work.
Second of all, it’s not random. In music, near resonances are more consonant than perfect resonances. And, orbital resonances tend to disrupt stability (eg, if earth and Venus were in an orbital resonance, then they would often pull at mercury really hard, potentially pulling it out of orbit).
Previously, I opted not to give my rationale for the hypothesis in case someone had any reason to refute it.
Secondly, the word "consonant" has many different definitions, so again, your statement could mean almost anything. The concept of consonance has no obvious connection to whether or not a system is stable.
"Orbital resonances tend to disrupt stability" - that's not true, especially not the thing about Mercury. The influence of the pair on each other would be great, and either cause the resonance to fall apart or, more rarely, to lock in. But mercury's orbital period is not in a simple ratio with the resonant pair, so nothing would be meaningfully different.
Look, I can tell from your profile that you're a professor in some kind of social science. Is it possible that you're, like many people in academia, under the influence of a cognitive bias that makes you think your expertise in one field should somehow transfer into insights in a completely different field?
And, again, showing up and just saying "hypothesis: whatever" is something people can either ignore or engage with, but if you really wanted to engage, you would try to say something concrete instead of just making yourself look clever.
Orbital resonances tend to be unstable: “Orbital resonances greatly enhance the mutual gravitational influence of the bodies (i.e., their ability to alter or constrain each other's orbits). In most cases, this results in an unstable interaction, in which the bodies exchange momentum and shift orbits until the resonance no longer exists” — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_resonance
Try curiosity over judgement.
As an aside, it is the the fact that you say things like this with confidence really sets me off - people who do know what they're talking about are careful to point out speculation. Our intuitions don't map so well to borderline non-newtonian complex interactions. Only a fool would claim otherwise.
You can't just show up to another field and use your observations and a wikipedia page to make good points. I'd be happy to recommend astrophysics literature if you want.
Your uses of words "stable", "unstable" and "consonant" and "dissonant" are the key here - I have no idea what "stable" means in music theory, and I don't think you'd know what I mean when I say "metals", because every field has its own jargon. But I'm not trying to make a point about music, whereas you are trying to make a point about astrophysics. Fine - but you can't expect to be understood or paid attention to if you don't learn the jargon and the underlying physics.
Maybe I misunderstand but it sounds like you are saying that you thought the reasoning for your hypothesis would not be accepted, you didn't want others to critique its potential problems, but you wanted people to read it anyway.
What value does it add to the discussion then?