June 7th
Review of “The Final Theory” rejected with the reason that: “… the comments you submitted did not review the title itself. Instead, your comments focused on another reviewer and were more suited to a chat room discussion.”
June 6th
Review of “The Final Theory” submitted to Amazon.com yesterday, the 5th of June around 1 PM.
As described earlier, I’ve been trying to post a review of the crackpot book “The Final Theory” by Mark McCutcheon. My review appeared on the website of Amazon.com on May 7th, only to disappear a few hours later. I’m sure this was because my review was a one-star review. As this review was deleted, I’ll try posting a new one and include it here, so that the author of this book, at least, – or whoever else – cannot make it disappear into oblivion 😉
“The Final Theory” (by Mark McCutcheon)
This book is “not even wrong” (to use a famous quote of physicist Pauli). I’ll explain what that is supposed to mean.
A meaningful statement can be said to be either correct, or wrong. “The Final Theory” is full of so many meaningless and wrongful statements, that I consider it to be not even wrong. And I cannot consider it as being anything else.
First of all, it does not contain any valid physical arguments. Plainly speaking, it misrepresents current theory again and again. For example, it argues that gravity violates the law of conservation of energy, because it causes kinetic energy. As an example, the author asks: “How does it [gravitation] cause falling objects and orbiting planets without drawing on any known power source?”. This is simply explained by the fact that it is the kinetic plus the potential energy which is conserved – a falling object decreases its potential energy as it increases its kinetic energy.
Secondly, the author confuses the basic concepts of work and energy (which you normally learn about in elementary school). For example, it is postulated that if you want to move an object, you must spend energy, and that this is the only way how energy may be invested. This is obviously wrong. When you try to push a wall, no work is done – since the displacement is zero – but surely it costs energy!
Thirdly, the book relies on what one could call “common sense appeals”. The author seem to think that science shouldn’t be mysterious or hard to understand. From common sense we have learned many “important” things: that women are less intelligent than men, that homosexuality is “unnatural”, that the earth is flat, that the earth is the center of the universe, that airplanes cannot fly etc. etc. Serious scientist never use common sense as a guiding principle.
Amazingly, the book argues that modern physics – including the pillars of the special and general theories of relativity, and quantum mechanics – is incorrect. The actual situation is that the validity of the special theory of relativity and quantum mechanics has been experimentally established beyond any reasonable doubt; and there are numerous positive tests of the general theory of relativity.
The most complicated thing you’ll find in this book is the “Geometric Orbit Equation”, or
v^2 x R = K,
where v is the velocity, R is the distance separating two bodies and K is a universal constant. I find it very hard to believe that the fundamental workings of the universe can be understood from such a simple equation.
There is basically only one correct, and in the slightest degree, important statement in this book: It is, that we – including the author – do not know everything, or understand everything yet. But we physicists definitely know enough to say that this book is not even wrong.
Finally, let me mention something quite suspisious about the other reviews of this book. As of today (the 31st of May, 2006), there is a total of 95 reviews. 71 of these are 5-star reviews. This is – of course – quite stunning. Out of the 71 reviews, 63, or 90%, have written only one review in total; furthermore, one person wants to give a 1-star review, but is being counted as a 5-star review, twice; another person is counted with a 1-star and a 5-star review, and yet another 5-star review is counted twice. One top-10 reviewer grants the book another 5 stars, but as far as I can tell, all of this persons reviews (which there are more than 2500 of) are 5-star reviews.
If you really want to learn about modern physics, I recommend books by Weinberg, Randall, Greene or Hawking.
In conclusion, I cannot give this book anything more than one star. And sadly enough, nothing less.
Thoughts on science and life 
I so admire your patience in replying to the nonsense in the book. To do it, you needed to have the full scientific knowledge and understanding.
The fake-science writer whose book you condemn is typical of the person against whom Pope warned “a little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep or touch not the Pierian spring”.
However, I (of little learning myself) accuse current astro-physics of getting it wrong. I hear them speaking as if time were a real phenomenon, rather than an abstract concept sprining from the way matter flows and in its flow we experience changes in ourselves and our context.
Since they talk such flat-Earth tripe about time (and in deed space) I cannot trust anything they say either about the big bang or about the age and extent of the comos. No point in trying to go into details here. I do not have the academic command.
I will add one thing for those who say something MUST be, because the numbers WORK:
We can buy 6 apples and eat two, and report the matter as 6 – 2 = 4
-but if we write 4 – 6 = (-2) we are no longer reporting reality, nor are we predicting a possible reality, we are simply messing about like silly suasages and we ought to find something better to do with our flow.
cyquick.wordpress.com
Cy, thank you for your comments…
But – I dont understand your distinction between what should be considered real, and what is an abstact concept. If you dont like 4-6 = -2, then how do you feel like rational numbers like
4/6 = 0.6666… or irrational numbers like PI = 3.14159265…..??
Cheers, Kasper
Hi, Kasper
As I said, I am of little learning myself. What I mean by that is that I cannot argue at the level of the academics. I am like your ordinary bloke who cannot contest a point with the doorstep evangelist because he has no knowldge of the “Holy Bible” or the things claimed of it. (I have, in this instance, having been indoctrinated in childhood, so I could spend all day. But I prefer to avoid all that silliness by saying “I have my own views so I will not waste your time” and off they go.
I recall the “pie are squared (no they are not, they are round)” business (my mother’s favourite school joke) and doing Geometry was a pleasant way to pass the day until they brought equations into it and called it Trigonometry. It was better than being in Secondary Modern school.
But the point is that we do not need to work PI out to lots of decimal places for most of the engineering we undertake at our macro level of human life. And the values after about the tenth place are lost in the noise. You cannot file metal down in the Metalwork class to such a value. The scratches of the finest emery paper are grand canyon stuff compared to those values. Even when we are able to do engineering at the nano-level we shall not need very many decimal places of PI. I believe the same is true of the further levels down in scale that we might one day be able to operate at. Irrational numbers do not impress me, or confuse my steady, implacable gaze and grip on reality, sir!
The difference between the real and the abstract is perfectly plain and simple. I hope you have not been seduced by the sexy “quantum uncertainty” talk. Any suggestion of its existing is in error. It arises from the present day limitations of the technology of measurement at the descending subatomic levels. The only uncertainty is whether or not we have yet gotten a particular physical reality measured and/or perceived correctly in all its particulars.
As is often said, our perception is internal to the brain, depending on input via the senses. As we seem to have a limited number of dithering days in our lifeime we say “it is more likely that I am, than that I am not” or however we put it. All scientific conclusions are tentative, but it is only honest to admit that some are less tentatiove than others. But the price of freedom from being mocked by science to come, is eternal care in the use of with words. I wish I were better with wrods.
To say that (using a poor example, but it is all I can think of, sorry) a spherical Earth was abstract or theoretical or uncertain until the Space Age, therefore we cannot be certain that anything is real (which is pretty much the type of thing that faux scientists will burble, probably with some sort of a triumphant grimacing smirk on their kisser, poor, misled soon-to-be-forgotten souls) is simply mucking about with words for the sake of being provocative and adolescent.
There cannot be a precise real representation of an irrational number. The fact that Maths contains irrational numbers is beside the point. So what? No what. (Another of my fave sayings this week.) Maths is made for reality not the other way round, just as the sabbath (the first known working conditions law) was made for the workers so no compulsory aerobics and jogging at the weekend.
I say again, Maths is only useful as a tool for reporting reality. When people begin to treat it like a god, Maths is not useful, it is misleading and a waster of time.
Thankyou for responding. This is the best I can do.
Cheers, Cy
Hey,
I really liked your review, pity that amazon rejected, especially since it is well written and thought out. Oh well.
I haven’t bothered to write a review of the book, perhaps I shall in the future. What you can do is tag the book, like I did, with “unscientific” etc. which amazon doesn’t remove. Perhaps people will use those to judge its merits rather than the gushing 5-star reviews which smack a little too much of self promotion to me (which is why they probably have only given one review).
Regards
Dave.
[…] In pseudoscience the examples of “bubbles of nothing” are abundant. I’ll just mention two examples. One is the crackpot book The Final Theory by Mark McCutcheon; another one seem to be the research carried out at The Quality of Life Research Center in Copenhagen, directed by holistic physician Søren Ventegodt. […]
Physics is not one of my favourite subject even before when I was in high school. But I have to say that you have a very interesting blog and you have recommended so many effective links.
[…] In pseudoscience the examples of “bubbles of nothing” are abundant. I’ll just mention two examples. One is the crackpot book The Final Theory by Mark McCutcheon; another one seem to be the research carried out at The Quality of Life Research Center in Copenhagen, directed by holistic physician Søren Ventegodt. […]
Well, I think you are a complete moron. You know nothing about physics and understand very little of McCutcheon’s concepts. Just as you were describing how he confuses the work and energy concept. He actually states that when you push against a wall (according to the work equation) there is no WORK being done and yet there is energy input.
The book does appeal to common sense. Your views of “common sense” is that people used to view the earth as being flat and considered it common sense….well, that was just ignorance, NOT common sense. TFT appeals to very real common sense of geomotry and math among other things.
And just because you find it “hard to believe” how such a simple equation can explain the fundimental workings of our universe, refering to the geometric orbit equation, doesn’t mean that it is invalid. On the contrary, NASA uses this equation for it’s missions. How are you going to argue that?
And you preach Special Relativity theory and Quantum Mechanics as if they have been proven scientific facts……well, sorry to burst your bubble but they haven’t been proven. That is why they are still called THEORIES!
And if gravity is an attractive force as some may claim then it HAS to get energy from somewhere. This is one of the fundamental reasons why Einstein disagreed with Newton’s theory of gravity. So this goes to show exactly what I mean when I say you know nothing about physics because anybody with even a high school level of physics knowledge would have known this.
So then you get many pats on the back from your ignorant followers that believe in your illogical assumptions and arguments and you feel proud. Well, good for you. Now go back to school so you can graduate high school and work at you local McDonalds.
BTW, Amazon rejected your BS for good reason. It was an ignorant review.
excuse me, but in scientific usage, a theory does not mean an unsubstantiated guess or hunch, as it can in everyday speech. A theory is a logically self-consistent model or framework for describing the behavior of a related set of natural or social phenomena. It originates from and/or is supported by experimental evidence. In this sense, a theory is a systematic and formalized expression of all previous observations that is predictive, logical and testable. In principle, scientific theories are always tentative, and subject to corrections or inclusion in a yet wider theory. None of this means that theory hasn’t been PROVEN. Quantum Mechanics has been “proven” to 9 decimal places. Perhaps someday it will be “proven” to many more decimal places. That still won’t make it ONE HUNDRED PERCENT accurate. Nothing is, and maybe never will be. It can always become more accurate. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t “True,” or that it is “unproven.”
By your criteria, NOTHING is “proven.” A higher truth can always arise which refines a current truth, but it doesn’t disprove the current theory.
Relativity and Quantum are “true” in the above sense. Can you state another scientific “fact” which is more “true?”-you cannot. You impy that there are proven scientific “facts” which are more accurate than Quantum theory.
What are they?
Zamknisie is embarrassing – expecially to himself. At least eighty percent of General Relativity’s predictions have been observed in nature through rigorous experimentation. Quantum theory is perhaps the most successful theory ever in predicting the composition and behavior of microcosmic matter. Einstein never criticized Newton’s theories of gravitation on the ground that they violated the energy conservation principle. He simply reworked the theories to conform to relativistic thinking, and nothing in current gravitation theory violates the energy conservation principle. He did reject the concept of instantaneous action at a distance, and instead, he proposed that gravity travels at the speed of light. Energy and matter are ubiquitous and interchangeable. Energy exists in abundance throughout the observable universe without the need for an external power supply. Neither attractive nor repulsive forces require an external power supply. The conservation of energy principle requires only that the energy/mass of a system remain constant regardless of whether work is done. Zamknisie is like McCutcheon’s book – ignorant and arrogant.
Zamknisie…Please please please read Lawrence’s reply to you – over and over and over. When I talk to intelligent lay people it is this point that I find is so important before one begins to explore science. It is OK that you do not have any formal training in science but please listen. You cannot use “prove” in the way that you are. Nothing is provable in this sense by the scientific method. THIS IS WHAT MAKES SCIENCE SO GREAT AND WHAT ALLOWS IT TO PROGRESS AS QUICKLY AS IT DOES. A scientist can put forth a hypothesis and we can test it. If it stands the test of time it become a theory. Eventually a new theory comes along that surpasses it and is able to deal with newly discovered (or old) problems. But the new theory must be testable. Religion is based on the idea of some “Final Theory” – some absolute truth. How can you test something if it is to be an ultimate theory? It is implying that it is the end of the line – that’s it. No testing needed – close the shop.
I know this discussion is getting in to it’s second year, but I just found this book on the internet and think it is the funniest thing I have read in months. Even if I were a high school physics student I could see several glaring flaws in the first chapter of this book – the one that is used to entice me to buy the rest of it.
MacCutcheon’s core objection to gravity is that it violates conservation of energy. He states that this goes unnoticed because we misuse the work function. A person can attempt to lift an object that is too heavy to move. After several hours the person will be exhausted but the planet will have used no energy at all.
This lack of energy source is the critical problem that the rest of the book hinges on. It’s also garbage. Take gravity out of the equation by protruding a steel horizontally from a wall. Glue a 1Kg mass to the end. Push as hard as you can. The amount of work done will be the force applied by you multiplied by the distance you shifted the 1Kg mass (i.e. compress the steel beam). Keep pushing until tired. but the steel beam has not been compressed at all. You have expended energy, BUT NO WORK HAS BEEN DONE. Shock horror. There must be an energy source inside the steel beam to account for this, right? There isn’t? Well in that case our theory that humans getting tired = energy being input to a system is clearly flawed.
I should also add that it is quite probable that the steel beam gains some energy in the form of heat caused by all your energy output. I invite anyone to make this objection. Please? No takers? Well just in case I can’t hear those in the cheap seats, we’ll pretend someone did. This gain of heat is exactly where the energy the person in MacCutcheon’s book was expended. Chemical potential energy became heat in both cases. There was no need for an energy source anywhere else.
He also states somewhere that when a car turns a corner it expends energy. This is only true in the limited sense that friction is the mechanism by which cars turn corners. If you were on a frictionless, horizontal ferris-wheel then you could go around in circles for ever. There is no need for energy to be provided by the beams that anchor you.
I have seen a page in which someone actually tried to debate his theory (which is a rehash of expansion theory – something the author was unaware of). The arguments against the theory can’t gain traction because the theory itself is poorly formed. Any attempt to argue results in “let me explain a different way.”
These two failures of reason are not things that the author can explain away, because I am demonstrating that he doesn’t understand physics, not that his theory is wrong. He can’t argue that he has explained things that modern physics doesn’t, because he clearly has no idea what modern physics explains.
QED.
Wow!
I am quite impressed, not only you read the book The Final Theory, but you came up with a negative critic about it? I thought it was so clearly stated in there, there would be no doubt in anyone’s mind that Mark McCutcheon was right, when you bother to read the book. It has not convinced you then, fair enough, though it surprises me. I feel your comment should have remained on Amazon, since it is clear you read the book. Perhaps they mistook your post for other critics of people who clearly did not read the book but somehow felt threatened by this new theory of everything, and then went on to write stupid things, as I would if I were to critic a book I have never read before. I have read the book, I feel you have not understood what Mark McCutcheon meant. I also believe you went into this book already knowing you would disagree with all of it. History will prove who is right, you cannot deny that Expansion Theory solves so many unexplainable mysteries in physics, I wonder how you were able to bypass all that in your critic and why you stumbled upon a few details which I feel are not that relevant to the overall theory, especially when McCutcheon spent a great deal of time talking about these very points and justifying where physics went wrong. There me be many proofs to relativity and quantum mechanics, but I feel Mark McCutcheon has identified them all and one by one explained where and how these proofs actually were misinterpreted and led to the wrong conclusions. I don’t think Mark McCutcheon is the one not understanding Physics, I believe none of us do, or else we would not still be searching for a Theory of Everything and struggling to answer all these unexplainable phenomena still plaguing Standard Theory including most especially Quantum Mechanics. It is only weird because we have not understood the underlying laws yet, and McCutcheon is the best answer I have found so far to explain all of it and more.
Roland Michel Tremblay
Thank you Roland for your comment. Very well stated.I purchased McCutcheon’s book with the intent of debunking it page by page.
After reading it, I find his observations to be far more plausible than current Physics’ reliance on imaginary numbers, unidentifiable forces, multiple dimensions curled up around each other and mathematical assumptions that were invented to balance theoretical equations. I don’t blame modern physicists for feeling threatened by new ideas. No one wants to be proven wrong after an academic lifetime of guessing. I’m a firm believer in Occam’s Razor. Expansion Theory is the simplest solution I’ve been offered so far. I’m not saying I am a true believer, but simply that Expansion Theory is far more plausible than the currently accepted models of our physical Universe
Everyone else: Please drop the emotional arguments and prove it [Expansion Theory] wrong through science.
I’ve read your article only so far as to realize the type of book you are describing. Every intelligent person has picked one up at some time and been absolutely disgusted.
Just know that you aren’t alone. I PROMISE that anyone who gave it a good review was a religious “scientist.” Anything that introduces a new unknown builds on the Gap Theology of God that so many of us humans cling to.
As a Catholic by birth and indoctrination I had to choose between sense and tradition. Believe me, these are impossibly hard choices. As such, I can appreciate the deep desire these people have to explain away real science with pseudoscience; they cling to double definitions, wrong words, confusion, and often appeal to a lack of understanding in the common person.
I will purchase this book (used) so the author does not benefit. Read it, and review it. This is the type of nonsense that needs to be removed from our culture before we can ever hope to truly advance past our superstitions.
Shawn, what the hell art thou on about. There is no mystical God plausifying psudoscience in this publication. Although I congratulate your desire to expose such piffle! 🙂
So….. If I read the book will it be a good seditive or a cup of joe???
It’s not even the average joe, it’s a waste of time…
We don’t need science debunkers, provers of how it’s actually wrong and theorists of everything, we need someone who knows how to think…
This guy, sadly, doesn’t…
Having read the various comments above, I really am confused. Physicists are so obviously threatened by the very notion that their lifetimes have been (possibly) wasted in chasinjg theories that may be ‘wrong’ orflaky at best. The rest of the world (the majority) are desperate to find an easy way to understand ‘Everything’ that they will jump at books such as this which allegedly answer so many questions .
Personally, I take the ‘one step at a time’ approach and right now I just want to discover how Gravity works and no-one seems to be able to explain it whether quad-brained physicist or Nasa scientist. Is it any wonder that most people would rather side with a liberal thinking anti schientific type author than with a ‘superior’ physicist who can’t actually explain much and takes refuge in complicating matters and then accusing the listener of ignorance or lack of education?
The lift in my Tower keeps breaking down and I would love for a know-it-all physicist to come up with a solution or at least tell me whether I need to invent artificial Gravity, Anti-Gravty or Gravity Shielding. Any takers?
This nonsense book must be banned – how a big company like Amazon sell and promote such “not even wrong” absurd titles is a disgust. Amazon was a great company – was. We need more informed people, and the bookstores have a social responsibility too, but this case shows how irresponsible a company can do these days. It is a shame to Amazon. Hope they use this pseudo science to “disappear” soon and let serious and ethic booksellers do their work.
On page 32 of McCutcheon’s book (in the free chapter downloadable as PDF or DOC) is “The Geometric Orbit Equation is a previously unrecognized, purely geometric equation”. Anyone who has done first year university physics or mathematical mechanics would recognize that his ‘Geometric Orbit Equation’ is derivable from the equations of motion, that incorporate Newtonian gravity, for a body of insignificantly small mass orbiting a body of significantly large mass. It is nothing more than a restatement of Kepler’s third law of planetary motion. Unfortunately for McCutcheon, the equation is wrong for the case when the mass of the smaller body is not insignificant, as has been observationally verified. It might be argued that he book deserves five stars for fiction. It provides a bit of a laugh as an example of unclear thinking, and a bit of an exercise for those who like finding faws in reasoning. But it loses those stars because it is counterproductive to the average person’s grasp of physics and maths.
The truth is that the final theory isn’t there,only what we need to find is a simple equation that explains all the physics theories. The problems of physics are coming from the units it uses,remember you can generate many new theories by just using the three constant that is G(gravity),h(planck),and c(speed of light), these in physics prove to be the three constants that make up the final theory,If you take a quick look at Hawkings theories explaining black holes, you find out that all his final equations that is temperature,entropy,time of evaporation etc,are all explained by the constants G,h,and c; this therefore shows that the final theory can’t exist beyond these constants,we will forever obtain the same constants but explaining the same theories.check out the wide theory at [ http://www.freewebs.com…..] and see what i mean.
Some people think that starting with a famous equation, like
E=mc^2 and multiplying it with interesting numbers like G, h or whatever, you can obtain a “new” interesting theory. Well, you don’t. At least if you don’t make any mistakes along the way…
They say “Intelligence doesn’t guarantee Creativity”
Reading this book I declare Creativity doesn’t guarantee Intelligence either.
This book “The Final Theory” is complete crap, dont buy and dont recommend it, in fact, recommend against buying it. Mark McCutcheon is a fake writer, who cant even tell the difference between + and -, let alone writing about science.
Amazon claims he has a degree in Physics. Seems his degree is also like his book, plain down right crap!! damn j**k**s!
Hahahahahah
All your comments are laughable. You more critisize the author than the theory he tries to convey. No…. I have not read the book but I do have read your comments.
The rejections are more of the kind of a religious fanatic speaking than of an intelligent person.
What I hate about arguments using maths is that you forget that maths is only a tool. Using it, eg. complex numbers or real, whatever, is just employing a mathematical tool. It is not physics you are describing but just the symptoms using mathematical tools…..
Potential energy, kinetic energy, work principles are just tools. it is not the alpha and omega. Most of these principles have been developed by making a number of assumptions in their original experiment and then extended to other fields still incorporating their initial assumptions.
I have read somewhere were the guy was using units as a means of arguing the physical point. Units are definitions derived from mathematical equations describing certain special physical circumstances. It is not always possible to transfer them across boundaries. It is like using engineering equations to describe physics. It is like assuming g is constant
And no…. Einstein has NOT been proven correct. There is a lot of information available( and I can argue some if you want) where his theory fails in concept and that is why the string theory, quantum theory, etc. have been developed. Actually it has been recorded that Einstein was not happy with his own theory of General Relativity. His mentor, Lorenze, did not even recognise his work…..
I like to side with CY for his philosophical approach because that is wat is needed here, ot the fear that is expressed for being proven wrong.
If you like we can argue some theoretical physics issues… I would like that……
Interesting comments, pro et contra. I want just to add some fact, missed from the book and people here with comments : pushing a body with the force not sufficient to move it doesn’t mean that there was no energy consumed by the body; there is also a movement of molecules of the body caused by force and change in temperature of the body which consumed this “push” ( = energy)…
Sorry for my poor English, it is not my mother language.
I see a few who seem to be saying that by attempting to discredit this work we only succeed in further validating it. They say that we (physicist) feel threatened by it. They say that his theory could be correct and all physics up until now are theory and not proven.
I would beg them to study real science ( this means physics b/c it is the only true science and all other arts such as biology and chemistry are simply applications of physics, and even math should only be considered a tool for the proper application of physics).
It is not my intent to debunk the theories given in this book, and I honestly don’t care if some non-physicist believes it or not(belief in something doesn’t make it true).
I only ask for the respect that true science deserves.
Sadly, I fear that the simplest equations will be so far beyond their scope that they will no doubt dismiss it as gibberish. If any of them make it past the first few chapters of introductory mechanics in their attempt to defend this work, then they will have no choice but to dismiss it (for reasons so obvious that I won’t mention).
I would also add that a degree in physics below masters doesn’t constitute expertise, and even some PhD’s don’t always catch the concepts.
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