On Jan 6, 2015, at 5:06 PM, Always Learning centos@u62.u22.net wrote:
On Tue, 2015-01-06 at 16:07 -0700, Warren Young wrote:
"There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.”
— William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, 1900Now means the current time. Now is not, and never will be, The (unknown) Future.
Yyyyeah.
Let’s rewrite the quote with that interpretation:
“We have already discovered everything we are going to discover up to and including February 18, 1900.”
— William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, 1900
Not exactly the sparkling sort of statement we expect from one of the most brilliant scientists ever to walk the planet, is it? Rather on the vapid side, yes? Could it be that that is not actually what he meant?
Don’t like Kelvin? ‘Kay, how about this one:
“The advancement of the arts, from year to year, taxes our credulity and seems to presage the arrival of that period when human improvement must end.”
— Henry J. Ellsworth, Commissioner of the U.S. Patent Office, in the office's 1843 Annual Report
I think we’ll figure out something new to do with computers tomorrow. Certainly by Friday at latest.