Positive psychology and romantic scientism: Reply to comments on Brown, Sokal, & Friedman (2013)

This is a response to five comments [American Psychologist 69, 626-629 and 632-635 (2014)] on our article arXiv:1307.7006.Comment: PDF, 9 page

Calculation of compressible flow in and about three-dimensional inlets with and without auxiliary inlets by a higher-order panel method

A three dimensional higher order panel method was specialized to the case of inlets with auxiliary inlets. The resulting program has a number of graphical input-output features to make it highly useful to the designer. The various aspects of the program are described instructions for its use are presented

The persistence of wishful thinking: Response to "Updated thinking on positivity ratios"

This is a response to Barbara Fredrickson's comment [American Psychologist 68, 814-822 (2013)] on our article arXiv:1307.7006. We analyze critically the renewed claims made by Fredrickson (2013) concerning positivity ratios and "flourishing", and attempt to disentangle some conceptual confusions; we also address the alleged empirical evidence for nonlinear effects. We conclude that there is no evidence whatsoever for the existence of any "tipping points", and only weak evidence for the existence of any nonlinearity of any kind. Our original concern, that the application of advanced mathematical techniques in psychology and related disciplines may not always be appropriate, remains undiminished.Comment: LaTeX2e, 10 pages including 6 Postscript figure

Nonaxisymmetric Neutral Modes in Rotating Relativistic Stars

We study nonaxisymmetric perturbations of rotating relativistic stars. modeled as perfect-fluid equilibria. Instability to a mode with angular dependence $\exp(im\phi)$ sets in when the frequency of the mode vanishes. The locations of these zero-frequency modes along sequences of rotating stars are computed in the framework of general relativity. We consider models of uniformly rotating stars with polytropic equations of state, finding that the relativistic models are unstable to nonaxisymmetric modes at significantly smaller values of rotation than in the Newtonian limit. Most strikingly, the m=2 bar mode can become unstable even for soft polytropes of index $N \leq 1.3$, while in Newtonian theory it becomes unstable only for stiff polytropes of index $N \leq 0.808$. If rapidly rotating neutron stars are formed by the accretion-induced collapse of white dwarfs, instability associated with these nonaxisymmetric, gravitational-wave driven modes may set an upper limit on neutron-star rotation. Consideration is restricted to perturbations that correspond to polar perturbations of a spherical star. A study of axial perturbations is in progress.Comment: 57 pages, 9 figure

Testing Einstein's time dilation under acceleration using M\"ossbauer spectroscopy

The Einstein time dilation formula was tested in several experiments. Many trials have been made to measure the transverse second order Doppler shift by M\"{o}ssbauer spectroscopy using a rotating absorber, to test the validity of this formula. Such experiments are also able to test if the time dilation depends only on the velocity of the absorber, as assumed by Einstein's clock hypothesis, or the present centripetal acceleration contributes to the time dilation. We show here that the fact that the experiment requires $\gamma$-ray emission and detection slits of finite size, the absorption line is broadened; by geometric longitudinal first order Doppler shifts immensely. Moreover, the absorption line is non-Lorenzian. We obtain an explicit expression for the absorption line for any angular velocity of the absorber. The analysis of the experimental results, in all previous experiments which did not observe the full absorption line itself, were wrong and the conclusions doubtful. The only proper experiment was done by K\"{u}ndig (Phys. Rev. 129 (1963) 2371), who observed the broadening, but associated it to random vibrations of the absorber. We establish necessary conditions for the successful measurement of a transverse second order Doppler shift by M\"{o}ssbauer spectroscopy. We indicate how the results of such an experiment can be used to verify the existence of a Doppler shift due to acceleration and to test the validity of Einstein's clock hypothesis.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure

The complex dynamics of wishful thinking: The critical positivity ratio

We examine critically the claims made by Fredrickson and Losada (2005) concerning the construct known as the "positivity ratio". We find no theoretical or empirical justification for the use of differential equations drawn from fluid dynamics, a subfield of physics, to describe changes in human emotions over time; furthermore, we demonstrate that the purported application of these equations contains numerous fundamental conceptual and mathematical errors. The lack of relevance of these equations and their incorrect application lead us to conclude that Fredrickson and Losada's claim to have demonstrated the existence of a critical minimum positivity ratio of 2.9013 is entirely unfounded. More generally, we urge future researchers to exercise caution in the use of advanced mathematical tools such as nonlinear dynamics and in particular to verify that the elementary conditions for their valid application have been met.Comment: LaTeX2e, 35 pages. American Psychologist (in press); published Online First on July 15, 201

Soil Moisture Workshop

The Soil Moisture Workshop was held at the United States Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Library in Beltsville, Maryland on January 17-19, 1978. The objectives of the Workshop were to evaluate the state of the art of remote sensing of soil moisture; examine the needs of potential users; and make recommendations concerning the future of soil moisture research and development. To accomplish these objectives, small working groups were organized in advance of the Workshop to prepare position papers. These papers served as the basis for this report

Faraday spectroscopy of atoms confined in a dark optical trap

We demonstrate Faraday spectroscopy with high duty cycle and sampling rate using atoms confined to a blue-detuned optical trap. Our trap consists of a crossed pair of high-charge-number hollow laser beams, which forms a dark, box-like potential. We have used this to measure transient magnetic fields in a 500-micron-diameter spot over a 400 ms time window with nearly unit duty cycle at a 500 Hz sampling rate. We use these measurements to quantify and compensate time-varying magnetic fields to ~10 nT per time sample.Comment: 6 pages, 8 figures Accepted in Phys. Rev.