Friday, April 16, 2010

knowledge thus far

Firstly there is the axiom. Whether it is from revelation, inductive experimentation or a deducement from other facts, this is the start of other knowledge. Isaac Newton must have thought up his 3 axioms of motion ie 1) an object in motion continues in motion until some force acts on the object, through the observation that things on earth start off in one direction but slow down AND watching planets w/c appear never to slow down. This appears to be a general deduction from observation/maybe even natural revelation in which he posited his first law of motion. Clearly, there is no experimentation here.
2) F=ma can be derived from experimentation. Recall he did know of Galileo's though experiment ie "...Imagine two objects, one light and one heavier than the other one, are connected to each other by a string. Drop this system of objects from the top of a tower. If we assume heavier objects do indeed fall faster than lighter ones (and conversely, lighter objects fall slower), the string will soon pull taut as the lighter object retards the fall of the heavier object. But the system considered as a whole is heavier than the heavy object alone, and therefore should fall faster. This contradiction leads one to conclude the assumption is false." We note here too that it is derived from reason and not experimentation.
3) Lastly, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Again impossible to test b/c there are infinite amts of weights and material in w/c to test this. Is it true for steel on steel? Steel on lead? 10lbs on 50 lbs? From Newton's view, it is an assumption based on a limited amt of observations of his environment.
So here we have axioms entering knowledge from areas other than inductive experimention.

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