The opposition of Nikola Tesla against Relativity in error or misunderstood genius? Gifted experiments disproving einstein or contrivances? [Discussion] Tesla opposed relativity theory and quantum mechanics, and was arguing for the aether theory. He made several unsupported claims that he discovered effects which violate SR. But then, he didnt even accept the fact that atoms are mutable and consist of smaller particles and believed electrons are physically impossible... From The New York Sun (July 10, 1935): `He found time while surveying his own past to express his sharp disagreement with the theories of Prof. Albert Einstein. He announced that the theory of relativity is a mass of error and deceptive ideas and opposed to common sense, and that not a single one of the relativity propositions has been proved. From The New York Times (July 11, 1935): `He described relativity as a beggar, wrapped in purple, whom ignorant people took for a king. In support of his statement he cited a number of experiments he had conducted, he said, as far back as 1896 on the cosmic ray. He has measured cosmic ray velocities from Antarus, he said, which he found to be fifty times greater than the speed of light, thus demolishing, he contended, one of the basic pillars of the structure of relativity, according to which there can be no speed greater than that of light.` From New York Herald Tribune (September 11, 1932) `I hold that space cannot be curved, for the simple reason that it can have no properties. It might as well be said that God has properties. He has not, but only attributes and these are of our own making. Of properties we can only speak when dealing with matter filling the space. To say that in the presence of large bodies space becomes curved is equivalent to stating that something can act upon nothing. I, for one, refuse to subscribe to such a view.` Some quite `bizarre` thoughts from Popular Science (November 1928), on electrons and radioactivity, showing remarkable misunderstanding of some already widely accepted at that time theories: To account for its apparently small mass, science conceives the electron as a hollow sphere, a sort of bubble, Tesla says. Now, a bubble can exist in such a medium as a gas or liquid because its internal pressure is not altered by deformation. But if, as supposed, the internal pressure of an electron is due to the repulsion of electric masses, the slightest conceivable deformation must result in the destruction of the bubble! Just to mention another improbability, the force tending to tear an electron apart is, in pounds per square inch, represented by the staggering figure of 256,899 followed by twenty-one zeros - and this is 513,798,000,000,000,000,000 times greater than the tension that tungsten wire can withstand? And yet it does not burst! Not even when it is hurled against an obstacle with a speed hundreds of thousands times greater than that of a bullet! And – more widely interesting in this day of radio – this strange, many-sided man clings to the opinion he expressed in his scientific investigations published from 1896-1898, that the source of all rays we know is always a stream of tangible particles or ‘corpuscles,’ rather than waves or vibrations. Even before the discovery of radium, Tesla expressed his belief that radioactive rays were of this sort, a view ridiculed at that time. When radium was discovered it was found actually to emit particles of matter – flying nuclei of helium atoms, called ‘alpha’ rays. Tesla has maintained ever since that radium is not a generator but a transformer of energy, the emanations being caused by cosmic rays of immense power capable of penetrating all obstacles however thick. And more strange thoughts from Galveston Daily News (March 13, 1932): As I revolve in my mind the thoughts in answer to your question I find the most wonderful thing is the utter aberration of the scientific mind during the last twenty-five years. In that time the relativity theory, the electron theory, the quantum theory, the theory of radioactivity and others have been worked out and developed to an amazing degree. And yet probably not less than 90 per cent of what is thought today to be demonstrable scientific truth is nothing but unrealizable dreams. What is thought in relativity, for example, is not science, but some kind of metaphysics based on abstract mathematical principles and conceptions which will be forever incomprehensible to beings like ourselves whose whole knowledge is derived from a three-dimensional world. The idea of the atom being formed of electrons and protons which go whirling round each other like a miniature sun and planets is an invention of the imagination, he said, and has no relation to the real nature of matter. Perhaps no other has given rise to so many erroneous ideas and chimerical hopes. Everybody speaks of electrons as something entirely definite and real. Still, the fact is that nobody has isolated it and nobody has measured its charge. Nor does anybody know what it really is. In order to explain the observed phenomena, atomic structures have been imagined, none of which can possibly exist. But the worst illusion to which modern thought has led is the idea of indeterminacy. To make this clear, I may remark that heretofore we have in positive science assumed that every effect is the result of a preceding cause. As far as I am concerned, I can say that after years of concentrated thought and investigation there is no truth in nature of which I would be more fully convinced. But the new theories of indeterminacy state this is not true, then an effect cannot be predicted in advance. If two planets collide at certain time and certain place, this is to the student of positive science an inevitable result of preceding interactions between the bodies; and if our knowledge would be adequate, we would be able to foretell the event accurately. But in the spirit of the new theories this would simply be an accident. Indeterminacy introduces into the world of inert matter a principle which might virtually be compared with the universal illusion of free will. Of course, there is no such thing. In years of experimenting I have found that every thought I conceive, every act I perform, is the result of external impressions on my senses.
Posted on: Thu, 08 Jan 2015 02:27:55 +0000
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