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Lambda-CDM theory - Woo or not?

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Ziggurat said:
Boy, that takes me back. It was hilarious seeing Michael try to define pressure in terms of the ideal gas law.
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Yep. Of course, I'm sure MM would be only too happy to repeat that argument for another 30 pages rather than (say) trying to propose an actual alternative cosmology model and compare it to data.

Michael? Here's a suggestion---a temporary, practical suggestion. There's a long, long list of undergrad-physics-concepts that you think we all have wrong. Let's call them Mozconceptions. The Casimir effect, and its relationship to generalized pressure and quantum vacuum energies, is just one of the Mozconceptions.

I think there are two categories of Mozconceptions. First, there are things that you think are slam-dunk "errors" in standard cosmology. You think that Lambda-CDM is trivially false because, in the entire history of modern cosmology, nobody thought about "negative pressure" long enough to notice that it has the opposite sign of ideal gas pressure. Similarly, you think that nobody ever counted the free parameters in Lambda-CDM so the fits are erroneous; that nobody ever looked at the continuity of B-field lines before dealing with reconnection; etc. So you think "if I can just win ONE of these arguments then LCDM is dead". Let's call these Type A Mozconceptions.

Then, there are Freshman-level concepts that you think do not work against EU/PC. You think there's something wrong with mainstream descriptions of heat conduction, ionization, blackbodies, E&M forces and the equivalence principle, the neutrality of the solar wind, etc. If you don't win ALL of these arguments, your model needs to be substantially revised, at the very least. Let's call these Type B Mozconceptions.

Here's a suggestion, MM. If you want to argue about one of the Type A Mozconceptions, there is an enormous body of literature which will explain these effects to you. You are welcome to read that literature and try to poke holes in it. You can do this on your own; you'll find well-typeset equations and diagrams; and you will not waste everyone's time.

If you want to argue about the Type B Mozconceptions, that's an iota more promising. If you want to talk about the EU/PC model, stand up and defend the Type B Mozconceptions. Tell us why the textbook-standard thermodynamics laws don't heat up your iron sun; tell us why the textbook-standard EM equations yield forces 10^30 times too small to have cosmological effects. Remember, these are things that no one except you has any interest in defending, and no one except us is willing to waste time discussing. That's worth wasting thread space on.

Does that make sense? If we're discussing a Type B Mozconception, like (say) "MM thinks that Coulomb repulsion makes galaxies accelerate", don't abort the discussion by switching back to rehashes of the Type A Mozconceptions. If you do, the EU/PC model goes nowhere; I continue thinking what I was thinking before ("In the absence of evidence to the contrary, EU/PC is proven wrong by X,Y, and Z"); and you get to have standard physics textbook material spoon-fed to you over and over. That's a waste of electrons. If you can stay focused on your own model, maybe we get somewhere.

(For example: you actually learned something, I think, when we forced you to defend your interpretation of the SDO images---a type-B Mozconception---in the "aether batteries" thread. And for 20 or 30 pages the thread did something other than rehash the same arguments. Then you switched from "defending your interpretation" to "generic griping about dark energy"---lots of Type As---with the usual effect that the last 30 pages of the thread look like they were cut-and-pasted from the last 30 pages of any other thread you've ever been in. Next time, stick to Type B.)
 
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Does Michael Mozina believe that stars exist

Other posters have pointed out Michael Mozina's problems with science and logic. So I may as well have a go :) !

Does Michael Mozina believe that stars exist?

According to his definiton of science, only things that can be tested in experiments in labs exist. We have never had a star in a lab and so according to MM they cannot exist!

Maybe that is too strict an interpretation of his personal definition of science. He may deduce that stars exist despite not being detected in labs because
  • We observe bright lights in the sky.
  • Our knowledge of physics tells us that the cause of these bright lights is some form of light emitting objects.
  • We call the cause "stars".
But of course the same logic tells scientists dark energy exists despite not being detected in labs because
  • They observe that the rate of expansion of the universe is increasing.
  • Our knowledge of physics tells us that the cause of this increase is some form of energy.
  • They call the cause "dark energy" (because "energy" is already taken).
So if MM states that dark energy does not exist because some kind of a logic error then he is also stating that stars do not exist.

The other thing that MM does is flip-flop by saying that dark energy does exists but it is anything except what the observations show it to be
It is known to be very homogeneous, not very dense and is not known to interact through any of the fundamental forces other than gravity.
...
Independently from its actual nature, dark energy would need to have a strong negative pressure (i.e. effects, acting repulsively) in order to explain the observed acceleration in the expansion rate of the universe.
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For example he has come up with "EM fields" and been debunked (they are not dark, i.e. cause very visible and easily detected effects).
 
DeiRenDopa said:
There is no such thing! :p

This "metaphysical entity" has never been shown to be real, by "empirical, controlled experiments in the lab"!! :p :p
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You really don't understand how the empirical game is played, do you? Birkeland's model is purely empirical. It works in the lab. You and I are both allowed to "scale' anything that is "empirically demonstrated" in the lab to whatever size might be necessary to explain what we see in space. As long as neither one of us proposes anything that that fails to show up on the Earth on any scale, it's fine. Anything that doesn't show up on Earth on any scale is a horse of a different color (non empirical color). Get the idea yet?

You guys are so hung up on the Casimir effect that you never bothered to even ask yourselves what the "cause" is. It has nothing to do with "negative pressures in a vacuum" and everything to do with the "extra energy" you keep ignoring!

The whole concept of "dark energy" is a myth. There is no such thing. The energy that exists in the "positive pressure vacuum" is all pervasive, and all encompassing and directly related to the carrier particles of the EM field and neutrinos. There's no possible way to ever achieve even a "zero" pressure energy state in space because it's literally full of energy, from neutrinos, to photons of every flavor, and flying electrons and flying electric ions galore. The EM field that exists in nature prevents us from EVER getting to a zero pressure state, let alone a "negative" one.

There is no real mainstream theory DRD. The whole thing is completely devoid of empirical support. It's a mathematical mythology involving three unseen entities.

You folks want to talk about lambda, yet complete ignore the 'cause/effect" relationships that are related to that feature. Likewise you stuff your theory full of exotic forms of matter and ignore the lab experiments that falsify the theory. The whole thing is based on "ignore the cause of the lambda", and "ignore anything that falsifies the concept of exotic matter". In short, the whole thing is a mathematical mythos, propped up by pure denial.

The thing is you can't give up your attachment to 'mathematical perfection' and "simplicity''. It's a lot like the Chapman/Birkeland debate over energy flows to the Earth. In the end Birkeland's theories won the debate, but it took you folks 70 years to accept it. Since you seek 'mathematical perfection' at any cost, even at the cost of empirical science, you'll never give up your invisible friends. It really doesn't matter if your theories fail in the lab. The only thing that matters is making your math fit that power curve and by damn, empirical physics better stay out of the way! :)

In the end DRD, not a single one of the mainstream unseen entities enjoys any empirical lab support. Even Ben's suggested "test" doesn't actually have a "control mechanism' per se, nor does it address any "cause/effect" relationships related to that lambda.

About all I can say here is you've got a pretty religion, all dressed up in red mathematical lipstick. It's still a metaphysical religion that is utterly and completely devoid of empirical support in terms of "cause/effect" relationships.

Guth's inflation lipstick came directly from Guth's human imagination. There was no precedent for the idea. It was simply an ad hoc postdiction that got "popular", probably because of that pretty red mathematical lipstick.

Somewhere in the last 30 years the term "dark matter" morphed into metaphysics based on SUSY theory. It wasn't always like that.

"Dark energy" is simply the latest attempt to ignore empirical physics entirely, and that whole link to the Casimir effect is relevant, although it has absolutely, positively, *NOTHING* to do with "negative pressure in a vacuum". You evidently can't tell the difference between "relative" and "absolute" pressure even after months of explaining it to you. Sheesh.

The basic problem is simple. You *refuse* to consider the one force of nature that is known to be 39 OOM more powerful than gravity. You refuse to give up your love of metaphysics, and you absolutely refuse to accept *ANY* sort of EU theory. It's really a very calculated and willful sort of ignorance.
 
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Michael Mozina said:
You really don't understand [...]
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Michael clearly applies meanings different than the common usage for the words and phrases he puts in quote marks. Below is an ongoing list of words and phrases which he uses but is unable or unwilling to define. Until he does define these terms, all of his arguments using any of them is unintelligible blathering.

  • absolute
  • acceleration
  • act of faith
  • ad hoc
  • background
  • ballpark
  • bang
  • believer
  • best
  • better
  • caught on
  • cause
  • cause/effect
  • control mechanism
  • correct
  • creativity
  • dark energy
  • dark energy of the gaps
  • dark matter
  • dead
  • decent
  • discovery
  • emotional
  • empirically
  • empirically demonstrated
  • extra energy
  • flavors
  • hairy inflation
  • ignore anything that falsifies the concept of exotic matter
  • ignore the cause of the lambda
  • in the ballpark
  • inflation
  • invented
  • lab tested
  • logically impossible
  • mathematical perfection
  • measurable
  • metaphysical baggage
  • narrow the range
  • negative
  • negative pressure
  • negative pressures in a vacuum
  • no show
  • observed acceleration
  • physics in general
  • popular
  • positive pressure vacuum
  • postdicted
  • postdicting a fit
  • predicted
  • pretend
  • pretend entities
  • properties
  • put faith
  • relative
  • religion
  • ruled in
  • scale
  • science
  • sciences
  • simplicity
  • superiority
  • test
  • throw it out
  • tweak
  • tweaked
  • tweaked to fit
  • unseen
  • unusual
  • verification
  • verify
  • woo
  • zero
 
Michael Mozina said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_birds
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As usual, Michael is willing to take any long chain of scientific inferences---and the bird/dinosaur connection is indeed a long chain, just like the speck-of-light/star connection and the redshift/distance connection and the muon-pairs-seen-in-ee-collider/decaying-Z-boson connection---and arbitrarily decide whether he likes the answer. Things he likes get labeled MM-empirical and things he doesn't don't.

That's the only pattern I can discern. I can't see any regularity whatsoever in MM's "empirical" decrees except this one.
 
Michael Mozina said:
Where do I get some form of modern day "inflation" to play with in a lab. I showed you where I would go to find a modern day version of a dinosaur.
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I outlined the whole experiment for you. Go launch those satellites and you've got it.

What's the matter? Can't afford it? That's not the Universe's problem. Unless---you've refused to answer so far---you think the Universe is forbidden from including expensive-to-test-in-a-lab phenomena. I look forward to your quoting the Universe's minimum price for allowable phenomena.

ETA: I misread MM's post. My answer refers to dark energy, not inflation.
 
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Michael Mozina said:
Where do I get some form of modern day "inflation" to play with in a lab. I showed you where I would go to find a modern day version of a dinosaur.
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At a particle accelerator. Unlike dinosaurs, inflatons can be created in sufficiently powerful collisions, as can their lower energy cousins (the particles of the standard model). In fact inflation itself could be restarted in a lab given enough energy (although for the health of the experimenter I do not recommend it).

And just as we have dinosaur fossils, the remnants of inflation are scattered across the night sky for all to see.
 
And as Ben has been emphasizing, the universe is undergoing inflation right now (its expansion rate is accelerating), and there are multiple independent ways to test that - several of which have already been carried out.
 
sol invictus said:
And as Ben has been emphasizing, the universe is undergoing inflation right now (its expansion rate is accelerating), and there are multiple independent ways to test that - several of which have already been carried out.
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So lambda is related to "inflation", not "dark energy"?
 
ben m said:
As usual, Michael is willing to take any long chain of scientific inferences---and the bird/dinosaur connection is indeed a long chain, just like the speck-of-light/star connection and the redshift/distance connection and the muon-pairs-seen-in-ee-collider/decaying-Z-boson connection---and arbitrarily decide whether he likes the answer. Things he likes get labeled MM-empirical and things he doesn't don't.

That's the only pattern I can discern. I can't see any regularity whatsoever in MM's "empirical" decrees except this one.
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I can't say I've found a fully consistent pattern, but I have found some patterns.

For example:

* the more abstract the concept, or connection, the less likely MM is to understand it, and hence the more likely he is to label it 'magic', or 'ad hoc', or 'lacking an empirical basis', or some such

* there's an approximate ordering of acceptability of things, starting with macroscopic objects with well-defined shapes and which are visually obvious, to things which can be represented visually in forms similar to macroscopic objects, through to things which can be said to result in visually strong phenomena (the more visually striking, and familiar, the better; the linking logic is only weakly relevant), to concepts which can be expressed well as metaphors with macroscopic objects - beyond this everything is unacceptable

* as Zig noted, in another thread, a rather strong math-phobia

* logical consistency has close to zero value, or relevance

* highly idiosyncratic use of key terms and phrases, together with an intense dislike of having to explain them.

As I noted in another thread, I think there are striking similarities with religious belief.
 
Michael Mozina said:
So lambda is related to "inflation", not "dark energy"?
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It's related to both, of course. As someone that has spent uncounted hours deriding inflation and dark energy as nonsense, you really should know that.

One of your problems, Michael, is that you never take the time to learn the basics of these topics, and when people explain them to you you ignore the explanations (which is why I'm not expounding on my comment).
 
Michael Mozina said:
You really don't understand how the empirical game is played, do you? Birkeland's model is purely empirical.
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He certainly did some experiments in his lab.

But they were not experiments to do with your solar "model".

Nor was his model a "cathode solar model" (or a ""cathode" solar model").

Birkeland studied aurorae, and associated phenomena.

It works in the lab. You and I are both allowed to "scale' anything that is "empirically demonstrated" in the lab to whatever size might be necessary to explain what we see in space.
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And here's one problem: how do you, or I, determine what ""scaling'" is OK?

For example, Birkeland had a hollow metal sphere, connected to the rest of his apparatus by a metal rod; how do you scale this?

As long as neither one of us proposes anything that that fails to show up on the Earth on any scale, it's fine. Anything that doesn't show up on Earth on any scale is a horse of a different color (non empirical color). Get the idea yet?
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So tell us all how this works, with specific reference to Mozplasma, Mozeparation, Mozode, Mozwind, Mozcharge, and Moztronium.

You guys are so hung up on the Casimir effect that you never bothered to even ask yourselves what the "cause" is. It has nothing to do with "negative pressures in a vacuum" and everything to do with the "extra energy" you keep ignoring!
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Actually the Casimir effect is a near-perfect example of the difference between trying to do physics with Aristotelian glasses and Newtonian glasses.

Try this: using the (Mozconcept) of ""extra energy"" show us how to work out how strong this effect is, in terms of the numbers that will show on the dials of some idealised instrument, the separation between two plates, etc.

The whole concept of "dark energy" is a myth. There is no such thing. The energy that exists in the "positive pressure vacuum" is all pervasive, and all encompassing and directly related to the carrier particles of the EM field and neutrinos. There's no possible way to ever achieve even a "zero" pressure energy state in space because it's literally full of energy, from neutrinos, to photons of every flavor, and flying electrons and flying electric ions galore. The EM field that exists in nature prevents us from EVER getting to a zero pressure state, let alone a "negative" one.
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Interesting (Moz-)concept.

So why is the Casimir effect observable when the equipment is enclosed in a big Faraday cage (which, by definition, excludes EM fields)?

And can you quantify the relationship between the observed - empirical - Casimir effect and neutrinos?
 
Michael Mozina said:
So lambda is related to "inflation", not "dark energy"?
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Both inflation and dark energy show up in GR as constant-curvature terms; both could be produced by any ordinary particle physics that yields a vacuum energy density. Inflation would have been a large value of this curvature (and/or a large value of the energy density), the ongoing dark energy is obviously a small curvature and/or small energy density.

Since you're denying both as a-priori impossible, I don't see why you could possibly care. You don't care, of course, you're just puttering around waiting for something to trigger a Type A Mozconception discussion. A rehashed discussion consisting entirely of stuff you've heard before---or of stuff you could read in any cosmology textbook whatsoever---is just as good as new stuff.
 
Michael Mozina said:
The basic problem is simple. You *refuse* to consider the one force of nature that is known to be 39 OOM more powerful than gravity. You refuse to give up your love of metaphysics, and you absolutely refuse to accept *ANY* sort of EU theory. It's really a very calculated and willful sort of ignorance.
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Unlike, say, a certain MM?

So why are you wasting precious time and effort posting here?

Why, if you have "seen the light", have you not spent the past five years or so becoming familiar with electromagnetism? why have you not even started to develop a cosmological model based on "*ANY* sort of EU theory"?

ben m said:
If you were serious about this at all, you'd log off this (and all other) discussion boards, and we wouldn't hear a peep from you until you put a paper up on the ArXiV containing the PC/EU equations that allow you to fit the Hubble curve, the CMB temperature/blackbody spectrum, and the CMB angular anisotropy spectrum. Go do it; stop promising that it'll be perfect when it's done; just do it.
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I don't think you responded to ben, did you?
 
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