The rule about avoiding retroactive redo predictions is effective at preventing a mistake where we adjust predictions to match observation.
But, take it to extremes and you get another problem. Suppose I did the calculations, and got 36 seconds by accidentally dropping the decimal point. Then, as I am checking my work, the experimentalists come along saying “actually it’s 3.6”. You double check your work and find the mistake. Are we to throw out good theories, just because we made obvious mistakes in the calculations?
Newtonian mechanics is computationally intractable to do perfectly. Normally we ignore everything from Coriolis forces to the gravity of Pluto. We do this because there are a huge number of negligible terms in the equation. So we can get approximately correct answers.
Every now and then, we make a mistake about which terms can be ignored. In this case, we assumed the movement of the stand was negligible, when it wasn’t.
The rule about avoiding retroactive redo predictions is effective at preventing a mistake where we adjust predictions to match observation.
But, take it to extremes and you get another problem. Suppose I did the calculations, and got 36 seconds by accidentally dropping the decimal point. Then, as I am checking my work, the experimentalists come along saying “actually it’s 3.6”. You double check your work and find the mistake. Are we to throw out good theories, just because we made obvious mistakes in the calculations?
Newtonian mechanics is computationally intractable to do perfectly. Normally we ignore everything from Coriolis forces to the gravity of Pluto. We do this because there are a huge number of negligible terms in the equation. So we can get approximately correct answers.
Every now and then, we make a mistake about which terms can be ignored. In this case, we assumed the movement of the stand was negligible, when it wasn’t.