Lambda-CDM theory - Woo or not?

[GeeMack]

It means [...]

Excuse me [...]

[*snipped a series of terms which seem to be gibberish but apparently have some meaning to the poster*]

A few more terms added...

Michael applies meanings different than the common usage for the words and phrases that he puts in quote marks. Below is an ongoing list of terms which he has surrounded with quotes but is so far unable or unwilling to define. Until he can define these terms, all of his arguments using any of them amount to meaningless nonsense.

The list...

• absolute
• acceleration
• accepted
• act of faith
• ad hoc
• assumed
• attractive
• background
• ballpark
• bang
• believer
• best
• better
• caught on
• cause
• cause/effect
• confused
• control mechanism
• correct
• create
• creativity
• dark energies
• dark energy
• dark energy did it
• dark energy of the gaps
• dark flow
• dark matter
• dead
• decent
• demonstrate
• discovery
• emotional
• empirical science
• empirically
• empirically demonstrated
• empirically qualified
• empirically quantified
• empty space
• expand
• expanding
• expanding space
• explaining
• extra energy
• falsified
• fantasy
• fix
• flavors
• gravity
• guess
• guessing
• gumby
• hairy inflation
• hairy moflation
• ignore anything that falsifies the concept of exotic matter
• ignore the cause of the lambda
• in the ballpark
• inflation
• inflation did it
• interpret
• invent
• invented
• invisible
• it's not my fault
• lab tested
• lamba
• logically impossible
• making up
• mathematical perfection
• measurable
• metaphysical
• metaphysical baggage
• modified to fit
• narrow the range
• negative
• negative pressure
• negative pressures in a vacuum
• no show
• not having faith
• observational evidence
• observed acceleration
• physics
• physics in general
• popular
• positive pressure vacuum
• postdicted
• postdicting a fit
• predicted
• pretend
• pretend entities
• properly
• properties
• pseudoscience
• put faith
• qualification
• qualify
• relative
• religion
• ruled in
• scale
• science
• sciences
• simplicity
• space
• space expands
• spacetime
• spin
• static
• superiority
• test
• theory
• throw it out
• tweak
• tweaked
• tweaked to fit
• unseen
• unseen entities
• unusual
• verification
• verify
• wind down
• woo
• woo with make believe math
• zero

 

[edd]

Excuse me edd, but this really does sound like pure denial on your part. Einstein's universe was "static". It didn't move. "Spacetime" did not expand, and "space" (whatever the hell that is) certainly didn't "expand". Nothing expanded.

Yeah, it doesn't move. Until someone sneezes.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

http://arxiv.org/abs/1005.4345

None of you intends to comment intelligently on this paper I presume?

What, pray tell, does this preprint have to do with whether "Lambda-CDM theory" is scientific woo or not?

It couldn't be - perish the thought - that you're setting up another diversion, to avoid having to address your manifest failure to communicate your own, idiosyncratic, views?

I mean, seriously, MM do you think any reader of this thread - those who've posted, the JREF lurkers, the 'guests' - anyone, understands what you mean by "empirical" (to take just one example)?

 

[Ziggurat]

http://arxiv.org/abs/1005.4345

None of you intends to comment intelligently on this paper I presume?

I'll comment:
"So if the age estimates of these objects are correct, the cosmic age puzzle still remains in the standard cosmology."

The rather obvious possibility to consider is that the age estimates of these objects are NOT correct. How are the ages of globular clusters estimated? By using what are called simple stellar population (SSP) models.

I've pointed this out to you before in regards to similar claims, Michael, but you didn't clue in. This paper does NOT indicate that standard cosmology models are wrong. It indicates that there is a conflict between cosmology models and (in this case) SSP models. It's quite possible SSP models are wrong. But you seem to be treating this paper as if SSP models can't be, as if estimating the age of something like a globular cluster is as easy as counting tree rings. It's not.

Edit: the hilarious thing about this post is that if the SSP models are shown to be correct, then this would indeed falsify current cosmology models. But Michael claimed that these models are not falsifiable. So he's making contradictory claims, and he doesn't even know it.

 

[edd]

The rather obvious possibility to consider is that the age estimates of these objects are NOT correct. How are the ages of globular clusters estimated? By using what are called simple stellar population (SSP) models.

And dating a quasar is a heck of a lot harder than that, I think.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

Excuse me edd, but this really does sound like pure denial on your part. Einstein's universe was "static". It didn't move. "Spacetime" did not expand, and "space" (whatever the hell that is) certainly didn't "expand". Nothing expanded.

No, that's pure denial on your part.

Without lambda, Einstein's universe collapses (is not static). With negative, zero, or sufficiently small positive values of lambda, Einstein's universe still collapses. The critical value of lambda is the unique value for which the expansive effect of the lambda term precisely offsets the collapsing effect of the other terms. If the value of lambda is larger than the critical value, then his universe expands forever.

To get his static universe, Einstein just postulated that lambda has the critical value. He pulled that out of total vacuum, with no supporting experiments. His static universe was balanced on a knife edge between collapse and expansion. The slightest perturbation would send it into collapse or expansion.

It's hard to explain that to someone who's allergic to all variations of the letter D, but here goes: The tiniest decrease in the value of lambda would send Einstein's static universe into collapse. The tiniest increase in the value of lambda would send Einstein's static universe into eternal expansion. What I just said can be stated with mathematical precision. When so stated, it is a mathematical fact that lambda's effect is expansive, not static or attractive.

 

[Michael Mozina]

No, that's pure denial on your part.

Without lambda, Einstein's universe collapses (is not static). With negative, zero, or sufficiently small positive values of lambda, Einstein's universe still collapses. The critical value of lambda is the unique value for which the expansive effect of the lambda term precisely offsets the collapsing effect of the other terms. If the value of lambda is larger than the critical value, then his universe expands forever.

To get his static universe, Einstein just postulated that lambda has the critical value. He pulled that out of total vacuum, with no supporting experiments. His static universe was balanced on a knife edge between collapse and expansion. The slightest perturbation would send it into collapse or expansion.

It's hard to explain that to someone who's allergic to all variations of the letter D, but here goes: The tiniest decrease in the value of lambda would send Einstein's static universe into collapse. The tiniest increase in the value of lambda would send Einstein's static universe into eternal expansion. What I just said can be stated with mathematical precision. When so stated, it is a mathematical fact that lambda's effect is expansive, not static or attractive.

You're still missing the key point IMO. The "cause" he proposed was simply "gravity" from "other mass" that we simply could not observe. There are no special claims being made, other than perhaps the existence of mass beyond our visible universe which is assumed in *EVERY* cosmology theory as far as I know.

He did not propose an entirely new force of nature, nor any sort of 'repulsive gravity'. Nothing "'expanded", not spacetime, and certainly not "space". The worst you can accuse him of is coming up with a case of "'special pleading" related to the exact balance of mass necessary to create a "static" universe. At no time however did he propose anything that was outside of the rest of GR. Even lambda in Einsteins model was associated with mass and therefore with GR.

What you're proposing is something very different, and something (several things) "new" as the "cause" of lambda. As such, those parts of your claims also require empirical support. They have no empirical support. In fact the CDM side of your theory also "failed" recent critical lab tests.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18839-dark-matter-claims-thrown-into-doubt-by-new-data.html

What would you like me to do, simply ignore the failures of your theory?

 

[edd]

Even lambda in Einsteins model was associated with mass and therefore with GR.

Untrue. It was explicitly outside the stress-energy tensor in the form Einstein proposed it. Arguably it's closer to being some unsourced property of space than one sourced by matter.

edit: Actually I'm not quite sure about that, on reading more, so I'll take it back.

edit 2: Well it's hard to find exactly what Einstein was thinking, but I don't see any indication his cosmological constant was in any way "associated with mass".

 

[GeeMack]

[...] IMO [...]

Added a few more terms. Interestingly the term "failed" was added in this round. Of course it was eventually bound to show up as one of the words Michael uses without being able or willing to define it. Here is the update...

Michael applies meanings different than the common usage for the words and phrases that he puts in quote marks. Below is an ongoing list of terms which he has surrounded with quotes but is so far unable or unwilling to define. Until he can define these terms, all of his arguments using any of them amount to meaningless nonsense.

The list...

• absolute
• acceleration
• accepted
• act of faith
• ad hoc
• assumed
• attractive
• background
• ballpark
• bang
• believer
• best
• better
• caught on
• cause
• cause/effect
• confused
• control mechanism
• correct
• create
• creativity
• dark energies
• dark energy
• dark energy did it
• dark energy of the gaps
• dark flow
• dark matter
• dead
• decent
• demonstrate
• discovery
• emotional
• empirical science
• empirically
• empirically demonstrated
• empirically qualified
• empirically quantified
• empty space
• expand
• expanded
• expanding
• expanding space
• explaining
• extra energy
• failed
• falsified
• fantasy
• fix
• flavors
• gravity
• guess
• guessing
• gumby
• hairy inflation
• hairy moflation
• ignore anything that falsifies the concept of exotic matter
• ignore the cause of the lambda
• in the ballpark
• inflation
• inflation did it
• interpret
• invent
• invented
• invisible
• it's not my fault
• lab tested
• lamba
• logically impossible
• making up
• mathematical perfection
• measurable
• metaphysical
• metaphysical baggage
• modified to fit
• narrow the range
• negative
• negative pressure
• negative pressures in a vacuum
• new
• no show
• not having faith
• observational evidence
• observed acceleration
• other mass
• physics
• physics in general
• popular
• positive pressure vacuum
• postdicted
• postdicting a fit
• predicted
• pretend
• pretend entities
• properly
• properties
• pseudoscience
• put faith
• qualification
• qualify
• relative
• religion
• repulsive gravity
• ruled in
• scale
• science
• sciences
• simplicity
• space
• space expands
• spacetime
• special pleading
• spin
• static
• superiority
• test
• theory
• throw it out
• tweak
• tweaked
• tweaked to fit
• unseen
• unseen entities
• unusual
• verification
• verify
• wind down
• woo
• woo with make believe math
• zero

 

[W.D.Clinger]

You're still missing the key point IMO. The "cause" he proposed was simply "gravity" from "other mass" that we simply could not observe.

That's a false statement. I think you're confusing his original attempt, which made no use of lambda and contained no observable mass, with his static cosmology based on the de Sitter solution with the critical value for lambda, in which space was closed and all mass was observable.

There are no special claims being made, other than perhaps the existence of mass beyond our visible universe which is assumed in *EVERY* cosmology theory as far as I know.

You're wrong about that also.

He did not propose an entirely new force of nature, nor any sort of 'repulsive gravity'.

Einstein proposed lambda without connecting it to any force of nature at all, new or old.

Even lambda in Einsteins model was associated with mass and therefore with GR.

Nonsense. Lambda's just a number he added so his equations would have a nontrivial static solution. It made sense mathematically, but Einstein had no physical justification for it.

What you're proposing is something very different, and something (several things) "new" as the "cause" of lambda. As such, those parts of your claims also require empirical support. They have no empirical support. In fact the CDM side of your theory also "failed" recent critical lab tests.

Not my proposals, not my claims, not my theory. Not relevant to your misrepresentations of Einstein and lambda, either.

What would you like me to do, simply ignore the failures of your theory?

Not my theory. Having turned this conversation to the meaning of lambda and Einstein's reasons for introducing it, you're now trying to run away from those subjects. That's fine with me, but you should run away honorably, without blaming us for your failures.

 

[Dancing David]

Well?

Maybe your lack to accept that any valid points are made by *the other side* even when you know some points are valid could change? I've made plenty of concessions. Your mantra that all that is posted is completely wrong in every way is obviously false, especially when it comes to the long peer reviewed published papers that you seem to repeatedly gloss over and ignore.

So here we go again Zeuzzz, what valid point would you like to make?

You know like teh specific point you want to make.

Then you could try to stay around and defend it.

Which specific papers are you reffereing to, take them one at a time.

So which specific paper are you wanting to start with first?

Your history of defense of the ideas you present is rather lacking, so I suggest you choose one paper and read it before you suggest which specific one you think we should take on.

ETA:

Most of the ideas discussed in that Lerner paper have been discussed in this thread and others, so which specific idea in the Lerner paper would YOU like to discuss. Or have you forgotten already?

 

[Dancing David]

bah so many people are using words that are not helping matters i'm thinking this discussion will never be settled, not due to the science, but to the emotively induced responces that this confrontational attitude invokes. Back and forth, back and forth. FOREVER

What is noticable Zeuzz is that you will not present a specific idea for discussion, so pick one from Lerner's paper, we have discussed them before and will discuss them again.

The only emotional one is you with these appeals to emotion. so try a specific idea of PC you would like to discuss, or a specific failing of the BB that you feel PC explains.

The real problem Zeuzzz is that you hide, you do not present specific ideas for critique, we can go through each point Lerner makes if you want, in anew thread.

Is that agreeable?

 

[Tubbythin]

You're still missing the key point IMO.

No, the only one missing the point is you.

The "cause" he proposed was simply "gravity" from "other mass" that we simply could not observe.

This is completely false. This is the rather crucial point you're missing.

There are no special claims being made, other than perhaps the existence of mass beyond our visible universe which is assumed in *EVERY* cosmology theory as far as I know.

You couldn't be more wrong. Einstein postulated a cosmological constant that exactly balanced gravity. That is a very "special" claim indeed- namely that for no good reason, two parameters of physics should conspire to exactly balance each other and leave the Universe on a knife edge. It doesn't get more special than that.

He did not propose an entirely new force of nature, nor any sort of 'repulsive gravity'. Nothing "'expanded", not spacetime, and certainly not "space". The worst you can accuse him of is coming up with a case of "'special pleading" related to the exact balance of mass necessary to create a "static" universe. At no time however did he propose anything that was outside of the rest of GR. Even lambda in Einsteins model was associated with mass and therefore with GR.

You're arguing out your rear end Michael.

What you're proposing is something very different, and something (several things) "new" as the "cause" of lambda.

Nope. At least, not for the normal definitions of "new" and "cause".

As such, those parts of your claims also require empirical support. They have no empirical support.

Wrong. And you do not know what empirical means.

In fact the CDM side of your theory also "failed" recent critical lab tests.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18839-dark-matter-claims-thrown-into-doubt-by-new-data.html

Are you utterly incapable of the most basic of science reading comprehension? The article does not rule out dark matter whatsoever. Just before LEP closed down at CERN, there were claims of the production of the Higgs boson. These appear, given subsequent non-observation at Fermilab, to be false positives. That does not mean the Higgs does not exist. It just means previous claims that i t may have been seen seem to have been false. This is exactly the same kind of situation.

What would you like me to do, simply ignore the failures of your theory?

I think you need to combat your own gargantuan failures in basic reading comprehension before you start worrying about anybody else's.

 

[Kwalish Kid]

You're still missing the key point IMO. The "cause" he proposed was simply "gravity" from "other mass" that we simply could not observe.

Well, that's pure fantasy. The Lambda term is not tied in any way to mass or energy, it is a free constant. Einstein was well aware of this.

He did not propose an entirely new force of nature, nor any sort of 'repulsive gravity'.

Saying this means that you do not understand the very basics of the science involved here. Everyone knew that Lambda introduced a repulsive force and it was widely discussed in letters at the time it was introduced. Einstein's own correspondence indicates that he was well aware of this.

(For those genuinely interested, a good history of Lambda was published as John Earman, "Lambda: The constant that refuses to die", Arch. Hist. Exact Science 55 (2001), 189-220. It's a shame it's not available in a more public fashion.)

 

[sol invictus]

Well what?

Well are you going to answer the questions I posed?

Is there anything we can explain to you, any equation we can write, any reference we can give you, that will get you to understand and admit that you are mistaken? If not, do you think there is any point in continuing the conversation?

Would you continue to argue with someone who claimed that the primary language spoken in France was Japanese, and stubbornly kept insisting on that no matter what evidence and logic to the contrary you presented? To make the analogy more exact you are a linguist, you live in France, speak French fluently, have many French friends from all walks of society and from all over the country, and travel regularly across France doing research on French dialects. The other person lives in Australia, speaks only English, and has never traveled outside her small town in the outback.

Yes or no?

 

[Perpetual Student]

Mozina thinks that Einstein's lambda was conceived as some kind of manifestation of gravity of stuff outside the observable universe. Isn't it amazing that Mozina could sustain 77 pages about Lambda-CDM theory in this forum and be so utterly ignorant about lambda. It now turns out he does not have a clue about Einstein's inclusion of the cosmological constant, from the historical perspective or the conceptual one. How pathetic!

 

[Michael Mozina]

So here we go again Zeuzzz, what valid point would you like to make?

I think that the point is that the EU haters on the internet tend to ignore the published work on this topic, and tend to trivialize that entire body of work to the point of absurdity. It gets old. I think Alfven published 250+ papers of his own on this topic.

While you may not personally believe that Learner's work is on par with your invisible friend theory, EU/PC theory is pure empirical physics and it does go a long way to explaining the things we observe in space.

What also gets old is the notion that you can "fairly" compare a pure empirical physics theory to a metaphysical kludge that you call Lambda-CDM theory. That particular metaphysical monstrosity is based on no less than three different invisible and unseen entities, some of which have failed recent "tests" in the lab like those xenon 100 tests.

About all I can say at this point is using Einstein's work to promote your invisible space expanding friends is about as ethical as what you're doing to MHD theory at this point with "magnetic reconnection" pseudoscience. In other words, it's not ethical at all. You've taken two perfectly good branches of physics and turned them into woo central, where the magnetic cart pulls the electric horse around the universe, and where gravity does repulsive tricks with invisible friends. It's pathetic behavior IMO, and also in the opinion of most EU oriented individuals.

This is not a sterile "magnetic" universe that we live in DD, it's an "electromagnetic" universe, where "current flow" generates magnetic fields. Until you figure out that "current flow' part, the whole universe is certainly going to seem "dark" and mysterious to you. Once you finally wake up to the concept of "current flows", it's not that mysterious.

 

[Michael Mozina]

Mozina thinks that Einstein's lambda was conceived as some kind of manifestation of gravity of stuff outside the observable universe.

How far do you figure you're going to be able to observe into an 'infinite' static universe exactly?

What is absolutely amazing to me at this point is that you seem to not care one iota about the history behind his introduction of a positive lambda or the reason he rejected it. You seem oblivious to the fact it *never* produced "expanding space" (or expanding anything for that matter), simply a "static" universe! It certainly wasn't used to create 'faster than light expansion"!

The mainstream has utterly kludged what was once a perfectly good theory about physics and turned it into complete woo, where woo makes up 96% of the universe! It's a woo universe that is controlled by dead inflation genies and "dark evil thingies" galore, and us mere mortals are stuck with the 4% of the universe we can ever "hope" to demonstrate in the lab. Lambda-gumby theory has to be the biggest "crock" ever conceived by humanity. It's the ultimate "woo" theory, where the woo can't even be physically falsified in any logical manner. Even ben's "test" simply "assumes" that any lambda *must be* due to his invisible friends! Hoy.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

I think that the point is that the EU haters on the internet tend to ignore the published work on this topic,

Poppycock and balderdash.

All published material on the Electric Universe, that has been proposed in fora such as this, has been extensively, exhaustively, and thoroughly trashed; almost all of it is so awful that it's hard to see why anyone can claim, with a straight face, it to be science.

and tend to trivialize that entire body of work to the point of absurdity. It gets old. I think Alfven published 250+ papers of his own on this topic.

More poppycock and balderdash.

Alfvén published not one word on the Electric Universe.

True, he published much on one plasma cosmology concept (his).

The widespread tendency (among EU fans) to conflate the scientific work of people like Alfvén with non-scientific crackpot EU nonsense is one particularly despicable tactic those fans use. That they do so knowing that the two cannot be aligned (as some do; MM clearly does not) adds to evidence that belief in the EU is quasi-religious (creationists use similar tactics).

While you may not personally believe that Learner's work is on par with your invisible friend theory,

While some of Lerner's work is, for sure, pretty bad science, not once in any of his publications^ has he descended into the woo-woo land that is the EU.

Some of Lerner's published papers are well worth reading; however, his ideas stand or fall by the same criteria Tegmark's or Peeble's does - consistency with the relevant experimental and observational results. And by those criteria, none^ of his ideas survive.

EU/PC theory is pure empirical physics and it does go a long way to explaining the things we observe in space.

That may be so ... except that "EU/PC theory" is yet another of your own, highly idiosyncratic ideas. Since no one - except you, MM - knows what this is, no one can tell (objectively, in an independently verifiable way) whether it "is pure empirical physics", or whether it can "go a long way to explaining the things we observe in space".

What also gets old is the notion that you can "fairly" compare a pure empirical physics theory to a metaphysical kludge that you call Lambda-CDM theory.

What is just as old is the notion that anyone but you, MM, knows what you mean when you write "a pure empirical physics theory".

If you don't take the trouble to say what you mean, in a way that others can understand, why do you bother writing this sort of thing?

About all I can say at this point is using Einstein's work to promote your invisible space expanding friends is about as ethical as what you're doing to MHD theory at this point with "magnetic reconnection" pseudoscience. In other words, it's not ethical at all. You've taken two perfectly good branches of physics and turned them into woo central, where the magnetic cart pulls the electric horse around the universe, and where gravity does repulsive tricks with invisible friends. It's pathetic behavior IMO, and also in the opinion of most EU oriented individuals.

(bold added)

Which, in turn, is a pretty good acknowledgement - by you, MM - that the EU is non-science. It's good to see that you've recognised this, at last.

This is not a sterile "magnetic" universe that we live in DD, it's an "electromagnetic" universe, where "current flow" generates magnetic fields. Until you figure out that "current flow' part, the whole universe is certainly going to seem "dark" and mysterious to you. Once you finally wake up to the concept of "current flows", it's not that mysterious.

And what, pray tell, is ""current flow""? And does it differ from ""current flow'"?

^ at least, those which fans have brought to the attention of JREF members, in this section of JREF

 

[Michael Mozina]

You couldn't be more wrong. Einstein postulated a cosmological constant that exactly balanced gravity. That is a very "special" claim indeed- namely that for no good reason, two parameters of physics should conspire to exactly balance each other and leave the Universe on a knife edge. It doesn't get more special than that.

In the sense it was such a special case, I agree with you, it was a little "too convenient". Compared to your woo however, it wasn't even in your league.

That "balance" however is in no way related to your faster than light, space expanding friends! You're comparing metaphysical apples to empirical oranges. Einstein's constant could have technically been related to *ANY KNOWN* force of nature, gravity, EM fields, etc. In no way did it require any sort of "new and improved inflation genie", or anything remotely like "dark energy".

Ironically, quantum energy would probably have done the trick in his lambda. No, QM energy isn't "dark energy" either! Unfortunately for Einstein, he didn't really grok QM and he abandoned lambda anyway.

About all I can say here is I can try to lead you to the pure physical waters, but I can't make you drink it. If you prefer that dark metaphysical woo, I can't make you give it up. It's become like a drug to you folks IMO. You "need" it to "quantify" everything to the next sigma, even if that means giving up empirical physics entirely. How sad.