Plasma Cosmology - Woo or not

Zeuzzz said:
Sigh.

Reality check. I said I don't care about your views on plasma cosmology. Or to make a bullet point list.

And what do you do? :eye-poppi

I didn't even say it was a science in that post, so straw-man.

Wait, forget the above sentence, else your going to start arguing with that.

I'll try again:

Is the epistemic approach to cosmology that Afven started, which was subsequently followed up by a fair few models in support of this by Lerner and Peratt et al, laregly ignored today by the cosmological community at large, who now invest all their interest in BBT derived theories, based on their interpretation of multitudes of astrophysical data they have assigned cosmological significance to?

(I understand you will disagree with the italicized part, so please answer the non italicized as a separate question, if you feel the need. The answer to the first should be a very very simple answer, even a yes or no will suffice)
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Zuezzz,

What specifically do you think should be paid attention to that is not?

Such broad statements are hard to parse and understand.

So if you wish to discuss this then please discuss the specific theories of Perrat, Lerner and Alven you think are getting short shrift.

For example, which of Perrat's work is not getting attention you feel that it should? The study he did with plasma and the appearance of galaxy shaped structures does not scale to reality, he used a 10 cm vessel and very strong magnetic fields to produce the wholes that sort of look like galaxies but have no bearing on the actual galaxies, size and magnetic fields.

Lerner has spent a lot of time just talking about why he doesn't agree with the big bang, which aspects of his work in regards to plasma cosmology would you like to get more attention. He is totally wrong about black holes, for example.
 
Zeuzzz said:
You know what I mean. Or do I have to, again, link you to Alfvens original paper where he explains the epistemic differences in approach? ie, Origin in time is not allowed, due to violation of the laws of physics as we currently know it, and that the originator of the idea himself (Hoyle) only proposed it as a joke idea, that seemed to gain what he considered completely irrational support from cosmologists at large ever since, which he saw as nothing more than an idea based on (what was at the time) just a brain thought inferred from one possible way to look at, what was at the time, very limited data. There are more, but being the "expert" you are I expect you know them all, so quote them.
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I hope this passage isn't showing two stunning pieces of ignorance.

1. The idea that there is an origin time in the standard cosmological model. There isn't; t0 refers to the present time.

2. The idea that Hoyle proposed an origin time as a joke idea. Hoyle proposed an eternal model and he did not propose it as a joke.
 
Kwalish Kid said:
I hope this passage isn't showing two stunning pieces of ignorance.
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Me too :)

1. The idea that there is an origin time in the standard cosmological model. There isn't; t0 refers to the present time.
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You need to define that more clearly.

As t17 refers to the time taken for x number of future based turtles that comprise the past universe; its NOT turtles all the way down in the standard turtle model of the universe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtles_all_the_way_down

2. The idea that Hoyle proposed an origin time as a joke idea. Hoyle proposed an eternal model and he did not propose it as a joke.
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He coined the term the Big Bang to mock the idea of such an unscientific ex nihilo derived basis for the universe. He was subsequently amazed that people seemed so accepting of interpreting the data in support of this idea, and continued his amazement as cosmological EM data was sculpted round this spuriously grounded axiomatic framework to the detriment of seeking non-finite derived cosmological explanations for such data, either from more local galactic theories of origin or other means that do not lead to such paradoxical situations as the Big Bang does.

Is that clearer?

And david, trying to find the paper so I don't misquote, but got to shoot out now so will have to wait.
 
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Zeuzzz said:
S
Is the epistemic approach to cosmology that Afven started, which was subsequently followed up by a fair few models in support of this by Lerner and Peratt et al, laregly ignored today by the cosmological community at large, who now invest all their interest in BBT derived theories, based on their interpretation of multitudes of astrophysical data they have assigned cosmological significance to?
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What a scientist wants to do is to actually describe what's going on in the natural world---to state what's out there, to state what laws it obeys, and to have those statements turn out to be right.

They don't want to invent an "epistemic approach", by which I think you mean a thought process by which to generate new hypotheses. And I don't think that's what Alfven actually wanted to do---I think he was trying to generate an actual hypothesis himself. And his hypotheses largely failed to describe the natural world we observe.

How did this get twisted into an "epistemic approach"? I think that's a position of retreat, or of spin-doctoring. "New epistemic approach" sounds much better than "failed set of hypotheses"! It absolves you from having to defend anything specific Alfven said. ("Sure, maybe Alfven said that intergalactic voids must contain 0.1 g/cc of electron-positron pairs, any maybe this isn't perfect, but it illustrates his epistemic approach.") Heck, it absolves you from having to find actual science calculations about Alfven's ideas. ("We still can't tell you whether the Milky Way is magnetized, or what would happen if it was, or ways to test it one way or another, but the important thing is to think about it.")
 
Zeuzzz, Cite Alfvén's epistemic approach to cosmology paper

Zeuzzz said:
Ok, you ignore and refuse to answer my question.
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I did not ignore your question.
I noted that it is moot because you presented no evidence for Alfvén's epistemic approach to cosmology.
AFAIK Alfven never started any epistemic approach to cosmology. He stated an alternative cosmological model that has been shown to be wrong using the standard scientific approach.

Zeuzzz said:
Or do I have to, again, link you to Alfvens original paper where he explains the epistemic differences in approach? ie, Origin in time is not allowed, due to violation of the laws of physics as we currently know it, and that the originator of the idea himself (Hoyle) only proposed it as a joke idea, ....
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Yes you do have to cite Alfvens original paper where he
  • states a obvious error because the laws of physics as we currently know them say nothing about time having an origin or not.
    P.S. BB does not not state that time has an origin.
  • thinks that a joke by Hoyle somehow invalidates BB theory?
Actually the term "Big Bang" was a joke by Hoyle. He did not "originate the idea" (of BB?)

You are the one making the assertion that Alfven had an epistemic approach to cosmology. You need to back it up with evidence.

ETA: Maybe you mean his presentation for the Golden Jubilee of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Cosmology: Myth or Science? (PDF), in 1984. This is an opinion piece, nor a peer-reviewed paper.
The big problem is that you may be citing a 1984 presentation that has been made redundant by the progress of science. He points out that there were alternative theories for the CMB but these were all falsified by later observations (perfect black body spectrum = universe once in a hot dense state = BB theory = plasma cosmology is falsified!). There are some other debunked theories, e.g. hierarchical cosmologies need a certain fractal dimension to the distribution of galaxies but we now know that this criteria is unlikely to be meet.
It contains a couple of rather inane implications, e.g. that theorists should not use mathematical models to speculate about physics, (i.e. the solutions to GR should not be looked at!). But that is what theorists need to do. They have to explore the implications of a new theory so that when experiments are performed they results can be used to falsify the theory.
 
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Reality Check said:
But that is what theorists need to do. They have to explore the implications of a new theory so that when experiments are performed they results can be used to falsify the theory.
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When that happens let me know..... It seems as though standard cosmology has never falsified anything except that which it(the status quo) doesnt agree with...
 
brantc said:
When that happens let me know..... It seems as though standard cosmology has never falsified anything except that which it(the status quo) doesnt agree with...
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That is quite untrue, many estimates of the age of the universe have changed over time, why is that BrantC ?

Why is it that theories of the accretion of planets change so often? Or the origin of the moon? Or the steady state universe?

I think you made a political statement of rhetoric, what data does PC match? Show us, please. I don't think you have anything or an example of what should have been falsified in mainstream cosmology. My guess is that you know little of either.

Just the politics of Thunderbolts or something like that.
 
brantc said:
When that happens let me know..... It seems as though standard cosmology has never falsified anything except that which it(the status quo) doesnt agree with...
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No, it's the other way around. The set of things that have been falsified are not put into the standard cosmology any more.

It's like saying, "Supposedly the NTSB regulates car safety. I ask you what safety defects it found, and you cite the Ford Pinto! But nobody drives Ford Pintos, they're death traps. Apparently the NTSB only tests things that the 'status quo' didn't want to drive anyway."
 
plasma cosmology does not exist

brantc said:
When that happens let me know..... It seems as though standard cosmology has never falsified anything except that which it(the status quo) doesnt agree with...
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Read what I wrote:
Originally Posted by Reality Check
But that is what theorists need to do. They have to explore the implications of a new theory so that when experiments are performed they results can be used to falsify the theory.
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It is the empirical data that falsifies the theory. Thus "standard cosmology has never falsified" is wrong.

There is a large body of evidence supporting standard cosmology.
There are a couple of bits of evidence that throw doubt on standard cosmology, primarily the Li abundance.
So standard cosmology is sort of in the position that Newtonian gravity was at around 1900. There is strong evidence for it but an few observations show that it is not perfect. So what will happen is that a cosmological "GR" will replace standard cosmology. This of course will match all of the existing evidence for standard cosmology and have similar features, e.g. a Big Bang, dark matter, dark energy, etc.

Contrast this plasma cosmology which is not even cosmology (a scientific model about the cosmos) :eye-poppi!
Originally Posted by Reality Check
Just to remind everyone that the question that this thread was started with has been answered:
The "plasma cosmology" supported by Zeuzzz, BeAChooser and others is definitely a nonscientific, crackpot theory (not woo).
The scientific theory of Plasma Cosmology is that of Hannes Olof Gösta Alfvén. This was expanded upon by Anthony Peratt, especially in the area of galaxy formation.

But the "plasma cosmology" that has emerged in this thread is not Plasma Cosmology and is not a scientific theory. Since it's proponents claim that it is a scientific theory that makes it crackpottery.

The definition of "plasma cosmology"is that it is a collection of scientific theories (not one consistent scientific theory) with a common thread. This thread seems to be that the theory either emphasizes the contribution of plasma in the universe or is a steady state cosmological theory.

This collection allows the addition of any new theory that matches the criteria regardless of consistency with existing theories in the collection.
...list of the many mutally exclusive and mostly debunked theories snipped...
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I will go as far as stating that plasma cosnology does not exist because no one has given the actual definition of it in this thread and it has not been found elsewhere.
 
Heh this was a pleasant surprise last night when I was watching Russia Today.

Plasma Fusion -- hoax or breakthrough reality?
 
Zeuzzz said:
Plasma Fusion -- hoax or breakthrough reality?
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From their own video, they don't have the densities required to turn this into a power generator. All of their claims might be accurate, but it might be impossible for them to scale up the densities to the point of working for power generation. So I'm not ready to claim it's a hoax, but I'm not terribly impressed by it either.

Oh, and all that stuff about profitable wars and oil companies suppressing fusion? Typical Russian Television paranoia and conspiracy propaganda. Wars are money losers, and government funding for fusion is low because it's been a non-productive field of research in terms of practical payoff. Oil companies aren't suppressing fusion research because no oil company with a lick of sense is going to see fusion research as any sort of threat.
 
Ziggurat said:
From their own video, they don't have the densities required to turn this into a power generator. All of their claims might be accurate, but it might be impossible for them to scale up the densities to the point of working for power generation. So I'm not ready to claim it's a hoax, but I'm not terribly impressed by it either.

Oh, and all that stuff about profitable wars and oil companies suppressing fusion? Typical Russian Television paranoia and conspiracy propaganda. Wars are money losers, and government funding for fusion is low because it's been a non-productive field of research in terms of practical payoff. Oil companies aren't suppressing fusion research because no oil company with a lick of sense is going to see fusion research as any sort of threat.
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I sort of agree, Lerner's experiment is still below the Lawson criterion. As others have learned in the past 50+ years of fusione efforts, getting the temperature is the easy part - the density and confinement time are key to real energy production. This criterion is significantly higher for this reaction.
 
Ziggurat said:
Oh, and all that stuff about profitable wars and oil companies suppressing fusion? Typical Russian Television paranoia and conspiracy propaganda. Wars are money losers, and government funding for fusion is low because it's been a non-productive field of research in terms of practical payoff. Oil companies aren't suppressing fusion research because no oil company with a lick of sense is going to see fusion research as any sort of threat.
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Your thinking too scientifically, try to envisage the corporate dimension to such a fusion and how many people would loose a hell of a lot of government based traditional-fusion based funding. There is definitely a large business incentive to ridicule such cheap alternative fusion methods when so much money is involved.
 
Zeuzzz said:
Your thinking too scientifically, try to envisage the corporate dimension to such a fusion and how many people would loose a hell of a lot of government based traditional-fusion based funding. There is definitely a large business incentive to ridicule such cheap alternative fusion methods when so much money is involved.
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And there is an even larger business incentive to make up claims of 'doing it better than those scientists'. The profit ratio is very high when you don't have to study, do the research or make something that works.
 
Acleron said:
And there is an even larger business incentive to make up claims of 'doing it better than those scientists'. The profit ratio is very high when you don't have to study, do the research or make something that works.
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Are you alleging academic misconduct?

That's quite a serious allegation, and to just be hand waving it away carefree on a pubic forum without even checking the science first ... just seems bizarre.

I have the journal publication if you want it.

http://www.lawrencevilleplasmaphysics.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=68&Itemid=86
BOOK

The Big Bang Never Happened, Random House/Times Books, 1991

SCIENTIFIC PAPERS

Fusion reactions from >150 keV ions in a dense plasma focus plasmoid, E. J. Lerner, S. K. Murali, D. M. Shannon, A. M. Blake, and F. Van Roessel, Phys. Plasmas 19, 032704 (2012)
Theory and Experimental Program for p-B11 Fusion with the Dense Plasma Focus. Eric J. Lerner, S. Krupakar Murali and A. Haboub. JOURNAL OF FUSION ENERGY. January 2012, Volume 30, Number 5, 367-376.
Tolman Test from z = 0.1 to z = 5.5: Preliminary Results challenge the Expanding Universe Model. Lerner, E. J. 2nd Crisis in Cosmology Conference, CCC-2. ASP Conference Series, Vol. 413, Proceedings of the conference held 7-11 September 2008, at Port Angeles, Washington, USA. Edited by Frank Potter. San Francisco, Astronom1ical Society of the Pacific, 2009., p.12
Evidence for a Non-Expanding Universe: Surface Brightness Data From HUDF Authors: Lerner, Eric J. 1st CRISIS IN COSMOLOGY CONFERENCE, CCC-1. AIP Conference Proceedings, Volume 822, pp. 60-74 (2006).
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Zeuzzz said:
Your thinking too scientifically
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No, I'm thinking economically. The economics of the conspiracy theory make no sense.

try to envisage the corporate dimension to such a fusion and how many people would loose a hell of a lot of government based traditional-fusion based funding.
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The people who would lose that money aren't corporations, they're the research scientists. Who don't have a lot of political clout.

There is definitely a large business incentive to ridicule such cheap alternative fusion methods when so much money is involved.
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No, there really isn't. And I guarantee you that their method won't be cheap to scale up to higher densities. Besides, nobody is ridiculing them.
 
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