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Old 17th February 2013, 04:00 PM   #928
ben m
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 6,387
Originally Posted by Farsight View Post
Don't be. Intrinsic spin is intrinsic to something, and makes it what it is.
Great, it's an argument by etymology! In German the term is Eigendrehimpulse.

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For example, a tornado has intrinsic spin. Try taking the spin out of the tornado. What are you left with? A tornado? Nope.
Why would I expect a classical fluid-mechanics analogy to be relevant? Why would I expect this particular analogy to be relevant?

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Snipe snipe snipe, retreat behind mathematics.
The Dirac Equation isn't a "retreat behind mathematics", it's an extremely rich source of (a) physical intuition and (b) actual correct experimental predictions.

Anyway, if you knew I was going to "retreat" there, why didn't you beat me to it? An argument that could find errors in the Dirac equation, or point out dualities which explain why Dirac's predictions work so well, would be a lot less crackpotty than a refusal to engage with it.
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