Thanks - now I just need to find the money to buy the electron
microscope required for observing my prize!
Cheers
George Levy wrote:
>
> John Mikes and Russell Standish deserve the prestidigitation prize for finding
> Plank's constant! The prize is worth ten million in gold,which they will share
> and which, I am glad to announce, is in my financial capacity to award them.
> Since their prodigious feat was performed by simply selecting the units used in
> expressing h, the prize will also be formulated in a similar fashion. The unit
> used to express the prize will be the gold atom. Ten million gold atoms shared
> between them will make each of them a multimillionaire. Congratulations to both
> of you!
>
> George Levy
>
> John Mikes wrote:
>
> > > George Levy wrote (Re: Leibnitz semantics): - SNIP, - Russell answered:
> > > In what way is the digits of Planck's constant an objective? The
> > > numerical value of Planck's constant is determined by the system of
> > > measurements you choose. If you use Planck units (Planck length, planck
> > > time, Planck mass), Planck's constant is trivially 1.
> > >
> > > Of more interest is to ask why the human body is an astronomical
> > > number of Planck units high, and why our body mass is so high, and why we
> > > think so slowly. After all, the units of metre, kilogramme and second
> > > are chosen to be within an order of magnitude or two of our own
> > > physiological measurements.
> > >
> > > Of course I can give numerous speculations as to why this might be,
> > > but I won't for the moment.
> > >
> > > Cheers
> > >
> > Thank you, Russell, for your wise comment. Indeed, IMO Planck's 'units' are
> > a quantized semantics of a philosophical identification about our physical
> > system.
> > Our present observation does not go further than the (now unobservable)
> > Planck measures. So the Planck unit is - yes - trivially "1" (for us), but I
> > cannot take it for granted in a wider view with a possible further
> > "structural" resolution of it.
> >
> > On your second par: we are still hooked into our anthropocentric system of
> > quantities. We may think so slowly, because our mass (inertia, whatever) is
> > so "big". Relative to what? the universe thinks (changes) much slower.
> >
> > John Mikes
> > <jamikes.domain.name.hidden>
> > "http://pages.prodigy.net/jamikes"
>
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Dr. Russell Standish Director
High Performance Computing Support Unit, Phone 9385 6967
UNSW SYDNEY 2052 Fax 9385 6965
Australia R.Standish.domain.name.hidden
Room 2075, Red Centre
http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks
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Received on Mon Apr 02 2001 - 19:12:10 PDT