Leave Physics Alone...!

Note: This is a translation/adaptation of an article I wrote in Malayalam. The original is here: http://ihalokam.blogspot.com/2018/10/blog-post.html The references are there too.

This is an article examining the pseudoscientific justifications made in order to justify the claim that women entering Sabarimala temple is “unscientific” in a video shared by a cardiologist named Nisha Pillai.¹Mainly, in this article I focus on the pseudophysics she makes up on the spot, misusing the jargon of real physics. A highschooler’s understanding of the physical sciences is enough to debunk these claims, hence we have to start at the very basics of the issue. After the introduction to the topic, we can move on to examine the veracity of the aforementioned arguments. This, I hope, can also serve as an example of rampant misuse the jargon of physics, and science in general.

But before we get into the meat of the article, we have to address a counterargument: that none of those words are used as jargon but was metaphor. But think about a physicist claiming that a rocket has cancer or something! We can’t use jargon with callous disregard for the actual meaning, whilst reaping the benefit of appearance as a science from the same. This is a strategy frequently used by pseudosciences and we cannot just leave it be; even if used by a cardiologist! Now, let’s move on to the basic physics that a doctor with an M.D. somehow forgot about!

Force is a fundamental concept in physics. The definition and description of what it is can be understood from the first two laws of motion.

The first law of motion is introduces the idea of inertia: the natural state of a body is to remain in it’s current state of motion. If it’s in rest, it stays in rest; and if it’s moving with a constant velocity, it would continue to do so in a straight line. Unless acted by an external force. So, we can see that force is what changes the state of motion, either putting a resting body in motion or slowing or speeding up an already moving body. But, we have a natural tendency to question this law, since we can clearly see that most things come to a stop after we put them in motion; that is because most surfaces in which motion takes place, and even the air itself, exerts a force called friction. So, we experience that objects need to be put in motion and they come to rest. But if there is no friction and other interruptions, things will move forever in a straight line without slowing down; and we know that this is the case in the vacuum of outer space.

So in our normal day to day life, force is generally something that puts things in motion and speeds the motion up or slows it down; and that is what we generally call force anyhow. But from the second law, we can understand the rate of change of velocity can be used to measure how much force is being applied. We call this rate of change acceleration. What is experience as weight is related to another quantity called mass, which is what determines how much force is required to produce a given amount of acceleration. (I’m actually leaving the proper statement of the second law be for the time being, since introducing that means a lot of math and more jargon; so remember that this so far is not the final form of the second law of motion) Which basically means that heavier objects are harder to move – and we have arrived at a common sense conclusion through the most convoluted route possible.

We now have the definitions for force, velocity, acceleration and mass. To understand the flaws in the aforementioned video, we also need definitions and a basic understanding of energy, power and magnetic field.

Work in physics is an indication of force and displacement of an object when a force is applied. For example, if we move a body in rest, what force is applied and what displacement occurs is the work in the instance. And it’s mathematically a product of the two. (That is, if the motion is in a straight line, work = force x displacement) And how much work is being done in a specific amount of time is called power.

Energy is, from a physical standpoint, the ability of a body to do work. Which means, energy needs to be transferred from one body to another in order to perform work. The fundamental types of energy are kinetic energy, energy due to the motion of the object, and potential energy, energy due to the position of the object. If you think the idea that the position of the object changes energy is untrue, see dropping a ball from the ground level and from atop a building. You can have the very reasonable question, “Isn’t that just the height?” And it’s kind of right. The potential energy here is due to gravity of the Earth; and since it’s round, the only way to change your position with respect to the source of the energy, and so see a measurable change in the force, is to climb higher or tunnel lower. Although, since Earth is not a perfect sphere, the potential energy at the poles is measurably different compared to the equator. Which, as you can see, is change in energy due to change in position. We call this energy due gravity, appropriately, the gravitational potential energy.

The energy decreases as we move away from the Earth. (You might think it’s the other way around from dropping the ball, but it’s actually not if we bother to measure it) This potential energy decreases as the object moves far away from it’s source, Earth. To indicate this phenomena and to explain how forces like gravity manage to move objects without touching them directly, physics uses a concept called force fields. (And here we’re leaving high school physics)

Let’s begin to explain fields by describing how to experimentally identify them. Take the gravitational force field for example, if we take an object that weighs 1 kilograms, then weigh it as we climb the altitude, we can see that the weight decreases. Since mass is unchanging here, the change in force, that is weight, is visible. A field is a collection of all these measurements, in a continuous fashion. We consider the points of gravitational force around the Earth together, to form the idea of a field. This continuum can be used to explain what reaches out to an object in a distance to move it, to exchange energy. And since this is measurable, physics considers it a physical reality.

We can use the field concept to explain the changes of any force, and hence it is an extremely useful tool in physics. Magnetic field is one such force field. And yes, now we talk magnets.

Magnetic force is a force applied by a magnet, on magnetic materials. A familiar magnetic material would be iron; but almost all the matter we interact with has different types of magnetism, albeit weak. The magnetism that would be strong enough to have an impact on our life is called ferromagnetism, which is the magnetism of materials like iron. So here, I’m talking in detail about ferromagnetism. But, the method to find the other magnetisms are the same.

If we identify a force at a point, we have seen it’s possible to identify a field. So how do we measure magnetic force? We need to discuss how magnetic force works. (In the case of gravity, bodies with mass attract each other and that’s it) Only magnetic materials behave this way. If a magnet is near such a material, they are attracted to it. Magnets, on the other hand, has two poles. Like poles repel and unlike poles attract each other. Using these understanding of the magnetic force, we can identify the presence of a magnetic field.

What we do is, simply, to see if a magnet is being influenced, and see if we can measure the force. So, see if the magnet is moving when there is no field. (The video here discusses a detailed explanation of a device that measures magnetic field: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fluxgate_Magnetometers.ogv)

So, we can see if there is a field given a magnet. But, everywhere on Earth, we have a very weak field; this is why we can use a magnetic needle inside a compass to find the direction. But looking at a compass needle itself, we can see how weak it is; how even a small disturbance can throw it off the correct orientation. The weak magnetic field is, unlike some people would like to claim, unable to influence the blood flow or make our sleeping position relevant at all. The Earth’s magnetic field is too weak to influence our bodies.

From these fundamentals, let’s review the footage.

(I’ve translated the original video, which is in Malayalam. If I fail at the same, it’s my fault and I’m ready to correct it at reasonable request. The jargon and she misused her English words are italicized, and is a one to one correspondence)

1:07 - “Temples exist within a magnetic field.”

This is isolation is a fine statement, after all the Earth has a magnetic field. But, she uses this to distinguish Hindu temples from other places of worship and that is just flat out wrong. If there is a magnetic field, show it by measurement and not proclamation. By the way, this is where the fact that we can measure any magnetic field in the same way comes into play.

If you can’t show it this way, even if there is some mysterious force that has no evidence for it and is heretofore unknown to science, it cannot be a magnetic field.

1:21 - “We place the idol at a field of high magnetic power in an area.”

First and foremost, the words power and field are used inappropriately. We never use power to denote the strength of the magnetic field, because that would be confusing and science has definitions for a reason. Obviously, we use the term field strength here. But she doesn’t know that. Do you think she is familiar with magnetometry (measuring magnetic fields) given her misunderstanding such basic terminology? I doubt it. This video is nothing but a rant, not presenting evidence for science to consider.

1:46 - “We maintain the temple and the nearby area as an ethereal environment by transferring the life force from the priest who consecrates it to the deity and amplifying it.”

This article begins from my rage in a doctor in the 21st century using “life force” unironically. It is a 19th century concept long discarded by science, and life doesn’t show any signs of being a force as we defined. Life, in modern science, is process. But in an earlier era, centuries ago, we thought life was something material that we lost when we die. Are we to go back now?

Also, she just slipped the claim that the idol and the environment becomes ethereal in there. Using a foreign language to make it sound like you’re saying something profound while you basically insisted that material stuff we can interact with is immaterial, is sneaky to say the least.

3:39 - “A phone needs a battery or an energy source.”

3:44 - “Like that, our body also has an energy body.”

Krebs cycle anyone? Heard of the mitochondrion in our cells? How about carbohydrates? Anyone who has studied basic cell biology would be flabbergasted by a cardiologist feigning complete ignorance to the process of respiration, and the minutiae we know about it. Just in case, we use the carbohydrates we ingest to produce energy through the process of respiration. We don’t need an “energy body”, whatever that means.

If such a body existed, why do people die when they starve for a while? Why should we, all humans, eat? Why do we measure food in terms of energy with the unit calorie? I invite you to make the one reasonable conclusion here by yourself. Something somehow a cardiologist missed!

From a pure high school physical sciences eye, we release the chemical energy stored within the carbohydrates through chemical processes, look up Krebs cycle, and use them to stay alive and energetic.

3:52 - “Modern medicine is a structural science.”

Toolkit of the pseudoscientist #1: Misuse and/or make up jargon. Science don’t, and scientists don’t, use anything like “structural science” to denote modern medicine. And since it incorporates the biological understanding of processes like the above mentioned respiration, calling it a simple study of structure is just very wrong anyway. I have no idea why she lied; as a doctor she must know.

The only way scientists ever use structural science is the rare occasion of studying the inner structure of crystals. A totally unrelated discipline.

6:33 - “Like this, every person we have has different levels of energy, an energy level we express prominently.”

We use energy levels to denote the separation of energies into various discrete levels in quantum mechanical systems, like atoms. To use this jargon in the context of a human body is wrong since quantum mechanical effects are absent in macro level like a human body; we don’t have energy levels. If she doesn’t mean that but just means that as a measurement of energy, although the step by step introduction of chakras and the like says otherwise, she used the wrong jargon! She has no idea what she’s talking about and is just throwing around jargon like she just don’t care.

6:55 - “Spirituality is the process by which we process by which we raise the energy in our lower level to the next level, step by step to grow us to a universal awareness.”

It was energy level a couple of seconds ago. Now, it’s energy in levels. I just pointed this out to show that her logic is, even internally, contradictory and means nothing if you translate the bubo-jumbo it to human language. Also, energy and levels and stuff are still used wrong, duh!

The rest of the claims boil down to her claiming that menstrual blood is brought down by some mysterious force, (physicists, being uber mystics, named it g-r-a-v-i-t-y) and the upward force exerted by the temple (you know, the magnetic field that doesn’t exist) screws everything up somehow. I leave the reader to probe the integrity and credibility of the claim on your own; hoping that you are in fact equipped to do so.

She goes out of her way not to explain the actual nature of the mysterious forces, and also is successful in not producing even a minuscule bit of evidence. How would this force interact with the completely imaginary life force too is left unexplained; we all know why, I hope.

Why is this the standard we hold people to? This is a video seen by 400 thousand people in a single day, and is widely shared. Why is this video proliferating in our literate, most of us graduate, cultural memosphere? All it takes is the ability to listen and have a fundamental grasp of high school physics. Why aren’t most of up equipped to do that? Why can’t we see thorough incoherent ramblings that doesn’t mean anything?

The, rather depressing answer is: we don’t want to. We just want to hear that we’re right and share the views that even barely resonate with us. Do we want to be that way, gullible to the next sweet talker to come by and agree with you? I’ll let you decide.

As a physics student, I request but this. Leave physics alone…! Energy, forces and magnetic fields are useful concepts that need clarification to even the most trained among us, don’t muddy the water further. Please don’t misinform the coming generation to thinking that these words, full of meaning and ready to reveal the majesty of the universe, are useless ramblings. Stop talking about energy if you don’t know what is, don’t mix up action and reaction exploding Newtonian physics in the process.

Scientists have a lot to do. Please stop dragging jargon into meaningless scenarios and make the next batch of scientists unable to handle the reality of these concepts.

Please, please, please. Leave physics alone…!

Footnotes: The video is here: https://www.facebook.com/NishanthNairPaikkattu/videos/10155668173246630/