Cont: Why James Webb Telescope rewrites/doesn't the laws of Physics/Redshifts (2)

[Mike Helland]

Mike Helland is right about my obvious stupidity.

Well, I don't think you're stupid. My point with that comment is there's no justifiable reason for us to speak to each other that way.

If you're in error, it's usually a mistake.

If I'm in error, it's often out of ignorance.

But neither of us deserves those types of comments.

 

[Mike Helland]

Similarity between Compact Extremely Red Objects Discovered with JWST in Cosmic Dawn and Blue-excess Dust-obscured Galaxies Known in Cosmic Noon

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ad0e00

 

[Mike Helland]

https://tritonstation.com/2023/12/20/holiday-concordance/

We have painted ourselves into a corner. The usual interpretation is that we have painted ourselves into the correct corner: we live in this strange LCDM universe. It is also possible that there really is nothing left, the concordance window is closed, and we’ve falsified FLRW cosmology. That is a fate most fear to contemplate, and it seems less likely than mistakes in some discordant results, so we inevitably go down the path of cognitive dissonance, giving more credence to results that are consistent with our favorite set of LCDM parameters and less to those that do not.

 

[jonesdave116]

https://tritonstation.com/2023/12/20/holiday-concordance/

I wish you'd flagged up that the article was by Stacy McGaugh! I'd have saved ten minutes of my life reading stuff from a bloke whose 'model' was initially invented to do away with dark matter and relativity, and now requires both! And still fails.

So, I offer instead;

'There's A Debate Raging Over Whether Dark Matter Is Real, But One Side Is Cheating'
Ethan Siegel
Forbes Magazine (2018)

https://www.forbes.com/sites/starts...dark-matter-is-real-but-one-side-is-cheating/

The so-called dark matter vs. modified gravity war, as highlighted in August's Scientific American story by Sabine Hossenfelder and Stacy McGaugh, sets up a false narrative of a debate between these two camps.......It's only if you ignore all of modern cosmology that the modified gravity alternative looks viable. Selectively ignoring the robust evidence that contradicts you may win you a debate in the eyes of the general public. But in the scientific realm, the evidence has already decided the matter, and 5/6ths of it is dark.

 

[Mike Helland]

I wish you'd flagged up that the article was by Stacy McGaugh! I'd have saved ten minutes of my life reading stuff from a bloke whose 'model' was initially invented to do away with dark matter and relativity, and now requires both! And still fails.

The article also has nothing to do with MOND vs Dark Matter.

That's just your cognitive dissonance winding up.

 

[Steve]

The article also has nothing to do with MOND vs Dark Matter.

That's just your cognitive dissonance winding up.

jonesdave116 did not claim that it did. He merely provided a different article that speaks to the, shall we say, unreliability of the author of the article you posted.

 

[jonesdave116]

The article also has nothing to do with MOND vs Dark Matter.

That's just your cognitive dissonance winding up.

McGaugh, in a long-winded way, is pointing out the Hubble tension. Wow! We didn't know about that! And he can't explain it. So.......?

Yes, it may turn out to require new physics. Early-time versus late-time stuff. That does not help him. He is essentially saying, "here is a problem with LCDM, but I'm sorry, I cannot help to explain it." Very helpful.

He also cannot explain a whole bunch of other stuff that supports LCDM. So, as a critic, I do not find him particularly convincing. Same applies to the other MOND mouthpiece that tends to get dragged out any time there appears to be a problem with LCDM and/ or favours MOND - Pavel Kroupa. Who also cannot explain anything. He was all over the media when the paper supposedly favouring MOND from the studies of wide binaries was published. He was nowhere to be seen when a fellow MONDist dismissed that paper and its claims to 16 sigma!

Something else I found somewhat strange about that McGaugh article, is that he appears to be saying how he was shocked at presentations at a 2017 (?) conference. And how it means we must look at a new model, as if he had been a consensus cosmologist up until then, and had seen this data and thought, 'Wow!, we need to change this.' He has been pushing MOND since long before then! The article comes across as an LCDM supporter who is turning away from it due to recent-ish findings. He has long been against LCDM. Even before the Hubble tension and the Planck results.

An interesting update to the article Siegel was writing about, was that it was co-written by Sabine Hossenfelder. She dumped MOND not that long afterwards, pretty much for the reasons that Siegel outlined. It fails at large scales. She invented her own 'model' along with one of her students. Some kind of fluid DM. She co-wrote a paper with McGaugh comparing the two models (MOND and her model). They disagreed. Neither fits what we observe. Sigh.

 

[catsmate]

I wish you'd flagged up that the article was by Stacy McGaugh! I'd have saved ten minutes of my life reading stuff from a bloke whose 'model' was initially invented to do away with dark matter and relativity, and now requires both! And still fails.

It was interesting stuff back in '16.

 

[catsmate]

The article also has nothing to do with MOND vs Dark Matter.

That's just your cognitive dissonance winding up.

More straw....

 

[Mike Helland]

Yes, it may turn out to require new physics. Early-time versus late-time stuff.

That's what's commonly said. We need to add something to LCDM. It's fundamentally sound. It's just missing something. It just needs a patch.

Not all cosmologists are hard-liners on that. I'm not sure why I, as a layman, should be more close-minded about the future of the field than those that work in it.

Do you think zealousness and certitude on the topic is persuasive? That seems to be your "pitch". Make sure to trash anyone who isn't totally in-line with the particle nature of dark matter, as a warning to anyone else that they should stay in line.

I've suggested that dark matter are electron-positron pairs, possibly from the big bang that never got split apart. Non-baryonic, electrically neutral, with the mass of two electrons.

Gasp! Did I just admit the big bang happened?

No.

Because I'm not a zealot. Neither for or against it.


At the bottom of Stacy's article he writes:

I believe in giving theories credit where credit is due. Putting on a cosmologist’s hat, the location of the first peak was a great success of LCDM. It was the amplitude of the second peak that came as a great surprise – unless you can take off the cosmology hat and don a MOND hat – then it was predicted. What is surprising from that perspective is the amplitude of the third peak, which makes more sense in LCDM. It seems impossible to some people that I can wear both hats without my head exploding, so they seem to simply assume I don’t think about it from their perspective when in reality it is the other way around.

I think anyone reading this should be know the difference between astrophysics and cosmology, and why different hats are necessary.

Astrophysics involves stuff like the galaxy rotation.

Cosmology involves stuff like how did the universe begin.

Dark matter has a legitimate life in astrophysics. In cosmology, this unknown, undetected particle is responsible for shaping the universe we see today right back when it began.

Clearly there should be some type of demarcation between astrophysics and cosmology.

She dumped MOND not that long afterwards

I'm skeptical that "black and white" vision of the topic is representative of these distinguished scientists, or the scientific method itself.

 

[Ziggurat]

Not all cosmologists are hard-liners on that. I'm not sure why I, as a layman, should be more close-minded about the future of the field than those that work in it.

You aren't actually skeptical. Skepticism requires that you actually understand the subject you're skeptical about to some degree. And that doesn't describe you.

I've suggested that dark matter are electron-positron pairs, possibly from the big bang that never got split apart. Non-baryonic, electrically neutral, with the mass of two electrons.

Another example of your cluelessness.

Bound electron-positron pairs have a name: positronium. And they act like a super-light hydrogen atom, in terms of their energy levels. Except positronium isn't stable, but instead decays from self-annihilation, emitting gamma rays. So positronium cannot be dark matter: its decay is VERY bright (no surprise), but even if it magically didn't decay, it's not going to be invisible. It's going to absorb and emit light just like ordinary matter. Hydrogen atoms are neutral, but they still interact with light. So does positronium.

tl;dr: positronium cannot possibly be dark matter. And you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

 

[Mike Helland]

You aren't actually skeptical. Skepticism requires that you actually understand the subject you're skeptical about to some degree.

Says who?

If I'm skeptical of big foot, how deep of an understanding of big foot do I need for my skepticism to be acceptable to you?

I think you just made that up because it was a convenient way to insult me.

Bound electron-positron pairs have a name: positronium. And they act like a super-light hydrogen atom, in terms of their energy levels. Except positronium isn't stable, but instead decays from self-annihilation, emitting gamma rays.

First of all, I didn't say it was right. I just used it as an example of me having an idea (as stupid as it is) that involved the big bang and dark matter as a particle. That doesn't mean I have to believe the big bang happened and dark matter has to be a particle. Maybe it is. Maybe it's not. What does it benefit me to decide and only allow for one possibility?

Secondly, in positronium the electron and positron are not occupying the same position in space. That's evident by them decaying into self-annihilation. If they were actually in contact with each other, they would cease to exist.

Third. This isn't a discussion about dark matter.

 

[Ziggurat]

Says who?

If I'm skeptical of big foot, how deep of an understanding of big foot do I need for my skepticism to be acceptable to you?

Since bigfoot isn't real, no understanding of bigfoot is possible.

But some rudimentary understanding of mammalian biology and ecology would go a long way.

First of all, I didn't say it was right.

The point isn't that you were wrong about this. The point is that you never know what you're talking about. It's a consistent feature of your posts. This is really, really basic stuff, and you're screwing it up completely, and not for the first time. There's a pattern here. You're not in any position to evaluate any of physics. You parrot heterodox professionals, but you can't even understand them. They are indistinguishable to you from the complete cranks. That isn't skepticism. It's arrogance.

Secondly, in positronium the electron and positron are not occupying the same position in space.

I have no idea why you think that's in any way relevant. I'm sure the reason is stupid, though.

Third. This isn't a discussion about dark matter.

Sure. And yet, your opinions on dark matter still manage to illuminate your fundamental problem, which cuts across all the topics in this thread and many others: you're opinionated about things you're completely ignorant of. Again, that's arrogance.

 

[Mike Helland]

I have no idea why you think that's in any way relevant.

Because the idea is that they are stuck together, at the same place.

In positronium they are still separate things. The electron is not where the positron is.

In any case, there's a non-zero chance that there was no big bang, or inflation, or dark energy, and it's just bigfoot masquerading as physics.

 

[Ziggurat]

Because the idea is that they are stuck together, at the same place.

In positronium they are still separate things. The electron is not where the positron is.

As usual, you're completely wrong. Their wave functions overlap perfectly. And confining them to a smaller space than they are in positronium would require increasing their energy, which ain't happening. And it wouldn't prevent annihilation either.

In any case, there's a non-zero chance that there was no big bang, or inflation, or dark energy, and it's just bigfoot masquerading as physics.

It's conceivable that we're wrong, sure. But none of the evidence points to anything other than a big bang of some sort. If cosmology is wrong, it's not wrong in the way you think it's wrong. You aren't Doug Forcett.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

With my highlighting.

I've suggested that dark matter are electron-positron pairs , possibly from the big bang that never got split apart. Non-baryonic, electrically neutral, with the mass of two electrons.

First of all, I didn't say it was right. I just used it as an example of me having an idea (as stupid as it is) that involved the big bang and dark matter as a particle. That doesn't mean I have to believe the big bang happened and dark matter has to be a particle. Maybe it is. Maybe it's not. What does it benefit me to decide and only allow for one possibility?

Secondly, in positronium the electron and positron are not occupying the same position in space. That's evident by them decaying into self-annihilation. If they were actually in contact with each other, they would cease to exist.

The half-life of positronium is on the order of a microsecond or less.

So Mike Helland deserves credit for suggesting that, within the next few microseconds, roughly 80% of the matter in our universe will decay into gamma rays.

His hypothesis is indubitably novel, and it should be easy to devise some empirical test that might falsify it.

Third. This isn't a discussion about dark matter .

I guess that explains why Mike Helland is talking about dark matter.

In any case, there's a non-zero chance that there was no big bang, or inflation, or dark energy, and it's just bigfoot masquerading as physics.

In any case, there is zero chance that dark matter consists of positronium.

Because gamma rays aren't dark.

 

[Mike Helland]

As usual, you're completely wrong. Their wave functions overlap perfectly. And confining them to a smaller space than they are in positronium would require increasing their energy, which ain't happening. And it wouldn't prevent annihilation either.

If they perfectly overlap why don't they annihilate?

It's conceivable that we're wrong, sure. But none of the evidence points to anything other than a big bang of some sort. If cosmology is wrong, it's not wrong in the way you think it's wrong. You aren't Doug Forcett.

The idea of a mature universe popping up in 500 million years would have turned off all of its proponents back in the 1960's or 70's.

We're just strung along, saying "this is fine."

When you do come around to the obvious, you'll be one of the folks saying LCDM was always wonky and should have been abandoned much sooner.

 

[Ziggurat]

If they perfectly overlap why don't they annihilate?

They do. Have you not been paying any attention?

And what made you think they could combine into dark matter without annihilating?

The idea of a mature universe popping up in 500 million years would have turned off all of its proponents back in the 1960's or 70's.

Why? You can't actually explain, except to appeal to statements about theories you don't understand yourself.

When you do come around to the obvious, you'll be one of the folks saying LCDM was always wonky and should have been abandoned much sooner.

As I keep saying, and you keep ignoring, LCDM being wrong wouldn't make you right. Nor would being wrong mean that it's wrong the way you think it's wrong.

 

[Mike Helland]

Why?

The same reason Santa doesn't visit billions of households every night.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

The idea of a mature universe popping up in 500 million years would have turned off all of its proponents back in the 1960's or 70's.

Why? You can't actually explain, except to appeal to statements about theories you don't understand yourself.

The same reason Santa doesn't visit billions of households every night.

Because Christmas comes only once a year, not every night?