Comments on: How to Discover Our Universe

By: David Bradley

David Bradley — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 08:40:03 +0000

@Reality Check (aka Ian Fisk?) Thanks for the reality check. Among the many thousands of people out there claiming to have overturned modern theories in one fell swoop, it seems Witt is one of the most persistent, we thus need the persistence of people like you to keep chipping away at any errors in his argument.

By: Reality Check

Reality Check — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 06:14:24 +0000

Hi Sara,
Dr Morse would be a good reviewer of a book on death-related visions or perhaps even medicine in general. But he is not knowledgeable about mathematics or physics to review Terence Witt’s “Our Undiscovered Universe, Introducing Null Physics, The Science of Uniform and Unconditional Reality” since he did not mention the many obvious mathematical and physical flaws in the book. Here are a few of Terence Witt’s mathematical errors:
* Treating the concept of infinity as a number.
* Redefining the concept of infinity which does not have units of measurement to have the units of length. It is just as “valid” to redefine zero as 0.00000001 feet.
* Stating that infinity has a “magnitude”, i.e. a size. This means infinity is finite according to Terence Witt. But if he is willing to redefine infinity then I am sure that he is willing to redefine magnitude (perhaps as “uncountable”).
* Defining a line as a series of points written as zeros and separated by plus signs, treating them as numbers so that they add up to zero and then treating the number zero as a point again! I can define a line as a series of points written as zeros and separated by division signs and come up with the amazing conclusion that lines are undefined since anything divided by zero is undefined).
* His “null geometry” is missing a few things, e.g. a definition of length. But that is alright because he essentially ignores (or even contradicts) it in the rest of the book.
* Equation L.10 in his appendix has misprints and an obvious missing substitution.

The only physics flaw I will mention is so basic that writing it is close to lying to the reader: The spectra from stars are not perfect black body spectra and so cannot decay to the CMB (which has a perfect black body spectrum). This is something a first year physics student learns.

For a fuller list of flaws see: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~fiski/ouu_review.html

“Some readers have even spent their valuable time tracking down Mr. Witt online and posing reviews every time they see his name” may be refering to me. I am intrigued to see that my small efforts are making a certain PR firm nervous!

By: Sara

Sara — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 20:30:41 +0000

I wanted to post this current review. Everyone in the scientific community seems very upset over the book. Some readers have even spent their valuable time tracking down Mr. Witt online and posing reviews every time they see his name. I wonder why? Is it because Witt has discovered something important they don’t want the world to read about? In response to the previous post, I do work as Mr. Witt’s publicist. I write his press releases and am featured on his web site but do not write any of Mr. Witt’s articles/blogs. Witt has also recently received favorable reviews by Midwest Book Review and Kirkus Discoveries.

More info about the reviewer: Dr. Morse’s research has been featured in documentaries in Japan, Australia, France, Canada, England, and the United States. He has appeared on numerous television and radio shows, including 20/20, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Turning Point, The Tom Snyder Show, the Larry King Show, Good Morning America, Dateline, and Unsolved Mysteries, and has been the subject of lengthy profiles in the Seattle Times, Tacoma News Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times. He has numerous scientific publications on death-related visions, including The Lancet and the American Medical Association’s Pediatric Journal

Sara

By: David Bradley

David Bradley — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 08:16:49 +0000

Basically, it’s a vanity (self-published) book. It’s fundamentally a cracked conjecture of no real substance based, not on evidence and observation but whimsy. Sarah Lien is the book’s publicist.

By: Sarah

Sarah — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 01:14:32 +0000

I noticed his website in the sponsored portion of my myspace home page and was intriuged. So, i went to his site and read the theories. So I did some research to see how credible he is. The first page of sites that popped up on ask.com made him out to be an accomplished physics genius. I was almost convinced when i suddenly noticed all the articles were written by the same “Ms. S Lien”. Earlier on his site I noticed under the “contact” section an address that caught my eye. slien@briobooks.com. Seems a lil fishy to me. Theres no credible information about this guy anywhere out there. who is he really?

By: lfmorgan

lfmorgan — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 01:15:14 +0000

Being popular in science, especially on internet forums is so telling! Great forums are not likely to be scientifc—but they are better than nothing and let you know that Academia is totally lost where science is concerned. Also tiny pieces of unintegrated truth pop up all over the place. Upshot– these pieces help immensely in writing new book manuscripts for long term posting for absolutely free global access! I believe that well integrated truth will internet-out to the tiny few given enough time.

By: lfmorgan

lfmorgan — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:51:46 +0000

Physics has become a playpen for the intellectually annoyed deplored!

By: David Bradley

David Bradley — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:44:11 +0000

I don’t think I was taken in by it…it looks like so much nonsense to me too!

By: Reality Check

Reality Check — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 21:33:43 +0000

Terence Witt's book is a prime example about how not to discover the universe. Normally I would Ignore something that is so obviously flawed. However it does seem that some people have been taken in by his snake oil patter. It is after all a really nice looking and pretty book. So I have also written a review:. More on "Our Undiscovered Universe" by Terence Witt

By: Andrew Sun

Andrew Sun — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 06:38:49 +0000

To all:
Things are getting familiar and my involvement into pseudoscience debate seems to have become bilingual.
I did learn a lot during this process about what is science and what is not, in Chinese context.

To Will:
What’s contrary to invective me which I should apologize for may still be anything possible, but what’s contrary to the essence of science is, simply, not science. The question of what’s the essence of science should be fixed before actually ‘doing’ science. By fixed I mean an agreement among the people you wish your ‘science’ to be accepted and discussed. If such an agreement as to ‘what is the essence of science’ cannot established between you and the rest of whom you talked with about your specific science, you just have to solve with the former and more general question first.

My advice for Witt, if he wants to be accepted by scientists as science (for example get funded from NSF or NASA or I don’t know how it goes in the US), he may try to write another book describing what he think is the essence of science, and by his definition, why and how his theory of null physics fits his understanding of science. Or, in contrary to invective me again which I apologize in advance, he doesn’t want to be accepted by all scientists or he feels just fine currently and in the future and is not seeking for anything, that’s quite okay in a nation full of free voices. Because, fortunately for all of us, human is not going to die out very recently and we have HISTORY which is amazingly great in testing people over there.

To Ben:
I admire you very much because I always dream to pacify all those poor great-theory-not-accepted people by going over their works and telling them what’s the essential error in their work. But I seldom have time and opportunity to do so. Or if I have, I’m not a good physicist. I study chemistry. One curious thing is there is literally NO great-theory-carrier in the field of chemistry which is disappointing. Anyway, you did once Ben! Well done but, according to my experience in coping with these people, I believe the effect of your review is only your feeling better (mine too). They, although ‘not idealistic’, are ‘rather epistemological’.