Natural Science Forum / Physics / Relativity / March 2006

Postscientists have found a very successful way of deriving the results
they need: they simply use what logicians call the fallacy of affirming
the consequent. You just take some credible implication antecedent ->
consequent, e.g.

x=0 -> x(x-5)=0

Then in a zombie world the reverse implication

x(x-5)=0 -> x=0

proves just as credible as the original one. The long series of
fallacies of affirming the consequent started in 1850 when Clausius,
the founder of Postscientism, derived:

Heat cannot be transferred from cold to hot in the absence of
additional changes in the surroundings -> Heat cannot be transferred
from cold to hot by using reversible heat engines.

Then the appetite of Clausius increased dramatically and he continued:

Entropy is a state function for an ideal gas -> Entropy is a state
function for any system.

Closed integral of dQ/T is smaller than or equal to zero for cycles not
involving heating (cooling) at constant volume -> Closed integral of
dQ/T is smaller than or equal to zero for any cycle.

The list can be continued - practically all essential results of
thermodynamics have been obtained by using the fallacy of affirming the
consequent.

Albert the Juggler was particularly impressed by the skill of
thermodynamicists. He said:

"Therefore classical thermodynamics has made a deep impression on me.
It is the only physical theory of universal content which I am
convinced, within the areas of the applicability of its basic concepts,
will never be overthrown."

So the fallacy of affirming the consequent became Einstein's favorite
method. Just an example (again, there is a fallacy of affirming the
consequent at the origin of all essential results obtained by
Einstein):

In Appendix 1 in his "Relativity" Einstein derives:

If x-ct=0, then x'-ct'=0, and vice versa -> (x'-ct') = lambda(x-ct).

Pentcho Valev