STUPID SIMULATIONS

To: "'Tesla List'" <tesla-at-poodle.pupman-dot-com>
Subject: STUPID SIMULATIONS
From: Tesla List <tesla-at-stic-dot-net>
Date: Thu, 18 Sep 1997 16:07:20 -0500
Approved: tesla-at-stic-dot-net

From: 	Thomas McGahee[SMTP:tom_mcgahee-at-sigmais-dot-com]
Sent: 	Thursday, September 18, 1997 11:48 AM
To: 	Tesla List
Subject: 	STUPID SIMULATIONS


> 
> 
> From: 	richard hull[SMTP:rhull-at-richmond.infi-dot-net]
> Sent: 	Thursday, September 18, 1997 3:04 AM
> To: 	Tesla List
> Subject: 	Re: Potential Transformer
> 
> At 11:35 PM 9/17/97 -0500, you wrote:
> >
> >From: 	Greg Leyh[SMTP:lod-at-pacbell-dot-net]
> >Sent: 	Wednesday, September 17, 1997 5:10 AM
> >To: 	Tesla List
> >Subject: 	Re: Potential Transformer
> >
> >Tesla List wrote:
> >
> >
> >> "Rubber glove (with a leather over it for *high* voltage),
rubber sleeve,
> >> rubber vest, rubber floor mat, face shield, spotter with rope
and cane.
> >> Different combinations are required for different levels of
voltage."
> >>         All of that for 50 volts, not 50 kilovolts?????  How dan
(then?)
> >> can you do anything with such a rubber glove on your hand?
> >
> >
> >You can't -- that's why government laboratories are leaning more
towards
> >simulating physics on computers these days.  The hazards of
dealing with
> >computers (carpal tunnel, radiation, malignment of social skills)
are far
> >easier to deal with than the dangers of actual research.
> >
> >
> >-GL
> >
> 
> Well spoken Greg!  Kim Goins and I are really hacked at this drift
away
> from hands-on in physics and the sciences.  Still, it seems the
wave of the
> future to simulate instelf of stimulate.
> 
> Richard Hull, TCBOR
> >
> >

Let's see if Richard Hull finds the subject header on this post
interesting enough to get him to read it! My major problem with many
so-called simulations is that they DON'T simululate at all. If
someone with a half-baked understanding of something whips up a
so-called simulation and then runs this on the computer, it may make
him feel good because it gives him the answers he wants, but what
else was it supposed to do, GIVEN THE DATA IT WAS FED???

The true utility of a simulation is that *IF* the model is fairly
complete and accurate, then running the simulation should give you
results that closely mimic the real-world behaviour of the system
upon which the simulation is modelled. This correlation between fact
and theory is paramount. If your mathematical model gives results
that do not correspond closely with what we find in the real world,
then your model is probably flawed. A flawed model cannot produce
very useful results.

Let's say someone has been experimenting with various models that try
to mimic the behaviour of a Tesla coil. From the behaviour of actual
Tesla coils he has formulated a model. If he plugs in the original
data and gets out the original results, that only means that his
model works for that particular case. If he now feeds in different
data and gets results that are verifieable on a wide variety of
actual Tesla coil systems, then that is a good indication that his
model is good. If he then uses the model to predict something like,
say, the optimum H/D ratio for a 6" diameter coil, and then VERIFIES
that through actual experimentation, then he has a DARN good model.
But there will be things that his model doesn't predict properly,
simply because any model begins out simply and then becomes complex
as the author of the simulation tries to factor in more and more
things.

I use a simulator for electronic circuits called the Electronics
Workbench. I can build simulations of circuits that I absolutely know
work in the real world, and the simulator will give me results that
are ridiculous. Like oscillators that don't oscillate. The
Electronics Workbench is nice in that the students can't destroy
expensive components, but give me a genuine protoboard circuit and
REAL components ANY day!!!

Fr. Tom McGahee