I said, the Earth's surface would have been covered in perfectly frozen ice (practically a deductive truth, without the Sun to warm it we have no reason to suspect anything else). the Antimoon was therefore NOT grounded. How can I make myself any clearer?
How did metal form above frozen ice? It doesn't matter what the ground is made of. The metal disk would be effectively grounded before it could acquire the immense charge needed for it to levitate. Ice is not that good of insulator. And it is not at all obvious that the disk would be upon ice. I find it more likely that it would be on a sea of molten rock or metal.
It would be effectively grounded. Ice under normal conditions is a poor insulator by virtue of the presence of a small amount of unfrozen liquid water. In an environment where the primary heat source of the Earth (the Sun) was inactive, the ice would, as I stated, be PERFECTLY frozen, i.e., with no (or next to no) liquid water present.
I'm saying the material does not matter. There is no perfect insulator. Even air conducts under high enough voltages and so would ice. The enormous voltage needed for the plate to levitate would certainly arc through ice or any other material. You still didn't answer my question of how a circular metal plate formed on top of ice.
I have considered the evidence and deduced that gravitation must be acting between masses. It couldn't be more Zetetic. You on the other hand are making unqualified assumptions. Accepting the existence of gravitation does not imply "Terrestrial Exceptionalism".
Couldn't be more zetetic? You can't have your cake and eat it, Euclid. Either zetetic method is flawed or it isn't. And as far as I can see, the synthesis of belief in the force of gravity and a Flat Earth does imply terrestrial exceptionalism. You're basically admitting that the magic of gravity is scrunching everything in the cosmos (i.e., Sun, Moon, Antimoon, etc.) into spheres, as predicted, but leaving the Earth out. Now, there's no reason this is necessarily false, but it does mean you need a very good reason for why this is supposedly happening. You haven't given me such a reason, in fact you've freely admitted that your entire worldview is founded on speculation.
Truth doesn't care about what preconceptions the scientist has, such as "Terrestrial Exceptionsism". I see the Earth is flat. I see evidence of gravitation by mass. Therefore I accept both. I have never admitted my worldview is based on speculation. It is based on evidence. I only admit that I am willing to entertain speculations, not believe them.
None can doubt that by making special experiments, and collecting manifest and undeniable facts, arranging them in logical order, and observing what is naturally and fairly deducible therefrom, the result must be more consistent and satisfactory than the contrary method of framing a theory or system--assuming the existence and operation of causes of which there is no direct and practical evidence, and which is only claimed to be "admitted for the sake of argument," and for the purpose of giving an apparent and plausible, but not necessarily truthful explanation of phenomena.
It's on the FIRST PAGE of Earth Not a Globe. It's THAT IMPORTANT.
I disagree, quite simply. Conjecture and imagination have undeniable roles in discovering truth.
Ok then, great. I commend you for breaking with tradition. It seems we've established, then, that I have literally the most eminent zetetic scientist who ever lived on my side. Regardless of who is actually right or wrong, at least we can now see that it is I who am arguing in the spirit of zeteticism, and not you. Rowbotham and I have both already made up our minds about the superiority of zetetic method, as have many of my colleagues, so I guess from here on out, it will be up to everyone else to also make up their minds which type of science (speculative or empirical) they think is better.
Appeals to authority certainly will certainly never get you anywhere on this site, even if it is Rowbotham.
It's not an appeal to authority in the fallacious sense, because if you carefully reread the quoted post, I am not using the statement to support my argument, as shown here:
Regardless of who is actually right or wrong, at least we can now see that it is I who am arguing in the spirit of zeteticism, and not you.
Bringing to light the fact that by virtue of our present argument, I am a zeteticist and you are not, is not intended at all to have a particular bearing on the veracity of my argument about physics. It is merely a clarification of our relative positions; whatever other people wish to draw from the plain fact that you are a speculator and I an empiricist is entirely up to them, and I make no pretense to my embracing of Rowbotham's project and methods ensuring the truth of what I say. Apologies if you mistakenly construed my citation in that way.
That said, since you have indeed decided to attack the zetetic process, I feel compelled to offer defense of it.
Perhaps you should consider that the Zetetic method is flawed. I reject it because it relies too much on the scientist's preconceptions.
Quite the opposite, I don't know how you can reasonably claim this if you properly understand theoreticism and zeteticism. Let us consider the chronology of both:
Theoreticism, which you apparently embrace (and which champions speculation prior to investigation), employs what is known as a hypodeductive method, such that:
Hypothesis -> Experimentation -> Analysis -> Results -> Modified (or affirmed) hypothesis
It is a fundamental conceit of theoreticism that the scientist MUST invent a hypothesis, a priori, before conducting experimentation. The whole point is the testing of an existing hypothesis, it's not as if preconceptions are even supposed to be avoided, they perform a central function in the theoretic process!
It is built into the theoretical scientific method that the preconceptions of the scientist precede actual experimentation. How can you possibly accuse zeteticism of the same, when it takes the following investigative route:
Experimentation -> Analysis -> Results -> Conclusion
Here, conclusions always proceed experimentation. This is the zetetic principle. It is SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED to reduce the role of researcher preconceptions in forming judgements about the universe. The fact that you're trying to accuse it of being a worse offender than speculative theoreticism makes me think that you don't really properly understand the difference between the two models. Explain to me WHY or HOW the zetetic process relies on preconceptions more than theoreticism. I don't think you can, but I'd like you to try.
Sometimes conjecture is necessary to break from traditional methods of thought to discover a better representation of reality. Evidence and data do not always speak for themselves, especially if the scientist has an ingrained worldview.
Baseless conjecture, coming ex nihilo from the mind of a researcher, is damned into conforming to the preconceived notions of that researcher. No, evidence and data do not always speak for themselves, which is why in the zetetic process they are analysed, AFTER they have been collected. The answer to the problem is NOT the invention of prior speculative hypotheses, which is exactly what theoreticism, globularism, and you, are doing.
Of course, preconceptions about the nature of reality are impossible to eliminate. How could we have concluded the Earth was flat, if we had no previous notion of the idea of a flat plane? How could we have come up with possible experiments if we had no idea of what the shape of the Earth might be? It is very rare that we come across a question that we have not previously considered speculative answers to, because often those are the questions that are not interesting to answer. Those notions enter our head during the process of experimentation and observation whether we like it or not.
Also consider the possibility that the available evidence is incomplete or actually supports a false conclusion. The Zetecist is lost. Speculation allows people to doubt the current explanation and search for new evidence, evidence that will eventually lead to a better explanation. In this case, speculation breaks the prevailing misconception, and is the prime engenderer of progress.
What if the observations are so bizarre that no one can make any sense of it? Wild conjecture allows people to break from prevailing notions. Sometimes nature is so strange that we cannot draw conclusions from it.
A Zetecist may irrationally reject an idea when there are actually several plausible explanations that can be drawn from the limited evidence because of some unfounded assumption he has in his head (something I believe you are doing).
My point is that the human mind cannot be expected to draw the correct conclusions from the evidence every time, and there is no good mechanism in Zetecism to subvert this flaw.
Zetecism assumes that truth can be discovered. Truth cannot be discovered. Sure it's nice to say, but truth is unknowable. We can only prove things wrong. Science is an unending process of turning over wrong ideas. How do you know if an idea is wrong? You test it.
Instead of trying to remove preconception and speculation entirely, as Zetecism does, what if we could harness it productively yet avoid its negative attributes? That's what "Theoreticism" does. Sure a conjecture might be totally wrong. But, if it is false, evidence will eventually overturn it. Why eventually? Because eventually, someone will be speculating that the previous theory is wrong, and devise experiments to disprove it. For that reason, there is no such thing as a bad hypothesis; all false hypotheses will die, and all true will live. Thus, speculation is double-edged. Yes, it will lead to false explanations, but it will also serve as the prime force to root them out.