Freedom of Science

In his Lectures on Physics Richard Feynman wrote that Cavendish measured the Newtonian force for the first time. I don’t have that book handy but a search in Google Books revealed Feynman’s The Character of Physical Law where he repeats the same claim and he even uses the same graphic for the experiment.

Feynman starts with a good scientific question:

… Newton said that everything attracted everything else. Is it really true that two things attract each other?

This is a good question. And it is also the end of Feynman’s scientific questioning. Feynman then falls into repeating the same Newtonian physics mythology.

Can we make a direct test?

Feynman asks. His answer?

A direct test was made by Cavendish.

This is an unambiguous statement. Richard Feynman, a Nobel Laureate and a physicist who is still popular and who wields tremendous authority through his lectures and books says that Cavendish measured the Newtonian force in an experiment.

What is the source of Feynman’s information? Did Feynman read Cavendish’s original paper? No. Did he duplicate the experiment? No. How does he know that Cavendish observed the Newtonian force?

Feynman writes that

because of the attraction of the balls there would be a slight twist to the fiber. … It was possible to measure the force between two balls.

By a direct experiment Cavendish was able to measure the force, the two masses and the distance, and thus determine the gravitational constant, G.

This is wrong. Cavendish never determined G. He did not know about G. This is now well established.

What interests me here is this: how can Feynman be so sure that Cavendish observed the Newtonian attraction between two weights?

As we know force is an occult scholastic quality invented by Newton. Occult does not exist in nature. Therefore, we also know that Cavendish never observed the Newtonian occult as Newtonian physicist Feynman claims here with full authority.

Feynman’s source is physics textbooks. Feynman is repeating standard physics textbook mythology without questioning the underlying Newtonian religious doctrines.

This shows how broken physics is. Physics is controlled by the Big Media. Big Media controls

• textbooks
• peer reviewed journals
• the popular media.

Therefore all three channels of distribution of physics is controlled by the Big Media. In every stage of their career physicists either buy the product of the Big Media or supply free content to the Big Media.

In the 19th century the British Newtonian priests inserted the Newtonian propaganda about Cavendish measuring the Newtonian occult force into the physics textbooks. Big Media canonized this Newtonian propaganda and Richard Feynman read it in his student days in the same standard physics textbooks and is repeating the same mythology and perpetuating the same Newtonian mythology.

If you have any interest in physics you owe it to yourself to look at the original Cavendish experiment and question it as any good scientist would do. No need to take Newton’s authority or Feynman authority. Science means questioning authority. Help free the Cavendish experiment from the ownership of Newtonian priests.

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