Plasma Cosmology - Woo or not

[Ziggurat]

And no i have not seen any evidence that the biot savart force law (or amperes) are only short acting 1/r relationships and break down at larger distances.

Because you don't know where that 1/r relationship comes from in the first place. It comes from integrating a 1/r² point source over a line. And you get it for ANY 1/r² point-source field integrated over a line, be it magnetism, electricity, or gravity.

The 1/r relationship seems to stay unchanged from microscopic current systems up to planetary scales where the Biot-Savart law is observed in planetary current systems, and seemingly still obeying 1/r even up to gigantic distant nebulae such as the "elephant trunk" formations observed in the huge Rosette nebula, and many others.

You clearly don't understand what "large" means in the current context. "Large" is determined by the length of the line source. If the line source is 1 meter, "large" is not very large at all. If the line source is bigger than a galaxy, then "large" is quite large indeed.

This 1/r force is by far the longest acting force in nature even compoared to gravities 1/r².

Again, you're simply wrong. Magnetism is a 1/r² force for a point source, just like electricity and gravity. And it's a 1/r force for a line source, just like electricity and gravity. And it's a constant force for a plane source, just like electricity and gravity. The difference is that gravity is NEVER weaker than 1/r², but both electricity and magnetism frequently ARE weaker (dipole fields are only 1/r³). This is freshman physics, and you're failing.

 

[sol invictus]

And no i have not seen any evidence that the biot savart force law (or amperes) are only short acting 1/r relationships and break down at larger distances. The 1/r relationship seems to stay unchanged from microscopic current systems up to planetary scales where the Biot-Savart law is observed in planetary current systems, and seemingly still obeying 1/r even up to gigantic distant nebulae such as the "elephant trunk" formations observed in the huge Rosette nebula, and many others. This 1/r force is by far the longest acting force in nature even compoared to gravities 1/r².

You're wrong. Since you refuse to listen to the experts here, look in any book on electrodynamics. Actually even an introductory physics text would probably suffice.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

interesting, a sarcastic post written in jest about a members posting style to try to create a more positive atmosphere in this thread is a breach of a rule.

A short reply with a similar sarcastic erroneous psycho babble in return to me would have shown at least some lighthearted banter could have relieved the oft emotive and confrontational nature in this thread.

Since during this thread some members have proclaimed i am a crackpot junkie drug user with holes in my brain, who does nothing but lie and has not made a single valid point, whilst making up i have a degree in physics, meaning i am a deceiptful "nutter", a conpiracy nut whos always wrong and is driven by Iconoclastism to give myself a superior self image so i feel special. Something like that anyway.

The reasons that people seem to make such unsubstantiated off topic claims is unclear, but these remarks seem to reveal a odd pattern of being brought up after i have made valid points people have ignored.

going back through this thread (should i have the time) it will reveal so many posts written in this manner i expect some people will get so many warnings and infractions, bans will have to be instated.

But i wont. People just need to chill and take differences in opinion in good faith without seeing them as some sort of attack on their very being they have to defend.

And no i have not seen any evidence that the biot savart force law (or amperes) are only short acting 1/r relationships and break down at larger distances. The 1/r relationship seems to stay unchanged from microscopic current systems up to planetary scales where the Biot-Savart law is observed in planetary current systems, and seemingly still obeying 1/r even up to gigantic distant nebulae such as the "elephant trunk" formations observed in the huge Rosette nebula, and many others. This 1/r force is by far the longest acting force in nature even compoared to gravities 1/r².

http://www.springerlink.com/content/3953jdmkqy8vennp/
Formation of Twisted Elephant Trunks in the Rosette Nebula
Journal - Astrophysics and Space Science, Volume 280, Number 4 / June, 2002



PS, sprry for spelling mistakes am using a very annoying mini keyboard

(bold added)

Z, I do not know why you post here, in the Science etc section of JREF.

I do know, however, that much of what you post is, scientifically speaking, nonsense (or worse)*.

Now that, by itself, is neither here nor there; however, when you do it repeatedly, when you persistently ignore the many and serious posts by others seeking to help you understand that what you post is nonsense, when you continue to (knowingly?) grossly distort the facts (e.g. "many published papers"), when you (apparently) don't even bother to read some of the crackpot stuff you excitedly post, ... is it any wonder that your posts get the response you seem to be complaining about?

Don't get me wrong; posting good, coherent critiques of contemporary astrophysics is something I, for one, wholeheartedly welcome!

However, when you continue to show no apparent desire to grasp even the basics of the astrophysics you seem to like attacking, why in the world do you think other JREF members should take what you post seriously?

* at least so far as the areas of science with which I have some familiarity; namely astronomy, astrophysics, and cosmology (that, of course, includes rather a lot of physics too, but not all - I do not have much less familiarity with condensed matter physics, for example).

 

[Dancing David]

hey Zeuzz, you do know what that link is don't you?
http://www.springerlink.com/content/3953jdmkqy8vennp/

Standard mainstream astro physics, not PC.

The scales are not cosmological now are they Zeuzzz and it show that your search skills are poor, Per Per Carlqvist has many publications on the roatating trunks.

But here is the sad part, not on cosmological scales. I suggest more general reading of astrophysics and not the sources you have been relying on. This is better than the stuff you used to cite.

 

[tensordyne]

a response for now.

I am working on a response to DeiRenDopa's response to my own post but it is really long and arduous. In the meantime this response by sol invictus is much easier to respond to so here is my go at it.

Nonsense. Charge is charge, it cannot be shielded except by the opposite charge. If it's shielded, the object is charge neutral. That's a basic law of electrodynamics (it's called Gauss' law - look it up, since you've plainly never heard of it).

First off, the last part is gratuitous and mean spirited about me never hearing of Gauss' Law. I have. I have a physics undergrad degree and took several classes in E and M. Whatever, it is just an <insert your own favorite bleep word> thing to say. Let's all try and stay civil here, OK.

That said, from what I have read, plasmas have these things called double layers that often develop. For a source on whether double layers exist or not just look them up in wikipedia. OK, so the original point of my post was that you can have charge shielding and yet still have complex behavior such as plasmas have (I hate the quoting system of this forum). Off-hand, I do not see why a plasma having a double-layer will stop it from exhibiting complex and dynamic behavior. I tell you what, I will ask my friend today about it who is getting a masters degree in plasma physics whether plasmas with DL's (and hence have charge shielding) can have complex behaviors and why. Then I will let you know. I suspect you are wrong on this count though.

I think you are thinking of charge shielding like what happens with metals. All the same, I do not see why you can not have a DL between two plasma sections and have one or both sides of the resultant plasma not have complex dynamic behavior. Plus, shielding does not have to be perfect. Your response seems to indicate perfect shielding like what they teach in introductory classes on EM.

Your understanding is wrong. Yes, there are magnetic fields in space. Yes, they are somewhat larger than expected. But they are not large.

The galactic magnetic field near the center of the galaxy is weaker than the earth's field by a factor of more than 1,000, and more like 10,000 or 100,000 in the halo. When was the last time you noticed something heavier than a compass needle move under the influence of the earth's field? When was the last time a "magnetic satellite" was launched? The relative strength of EM fields to gravity gets weaker and weaker the larger and more massive the object is. Their effect on very massive objects like stars or galaxies as a whole is absurdly small.



Wrong.

Anyway, enough of this. Like most PC/EU advocates you haven't the faintest clue about electricity, electric field, magnetic fields, or gravity.

OK, so you have a very weak magnetic field acting over immense distances. Magnetic fields cause electrons to accelerate, so presumably the electrons will have plenty of time to accelerate to pretty high relative speeds, right?

The last sentence is just another assumption about my own personal knowledge and hence attacks me and not my arguments, counter to the rules of this forum. By the way, if one is solidly sure of any position, where is the need for such attacks? Just state your case and be done with it. Maybe I might even agree with you. The couple sentences before that are fiat statements offered without any sources or arguments.

Looking at the general flow of this thread it seems to me that there are two parallel issues going on.

1. Attacks and defenses of the Big Bang Model.
2. Attacks and defenses of PC/EU ideas.

As a general rule of logic, attacks on the Big Bang do not support PC/EU ideas or vice versa. Just wanted to point that out.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

I am working on a response to DeiRenDopa's response to my own post but it is really long and arduous.

Glad to hear it, and I'm very much looking forward to it.

If I may make a suggestion: why not respond piecemeal? Split your response into several different posts, with each one on a specific point of yours (and my comment/response/question)?

That said, from what I have read, plasmas have these things called double layers that often develop. For a source on whether double layers exist or not just look them up in wikipedia. OK, so the original point of my post was that you can have charge shielding and yet still have complex behavior such as plasmas have (I hate the quoting system of this forum). Off-hand, I do not see why a plasma having a double-layer will stop it from exhibiting complex and dynamic behavior. I tell you what, I will ask my friend today about it who is getting a masters degree in plasma physics whether plasmas with DL's (and hence have charge shielding) can have complex behaviors and why. Then I will let you know. I suspect you are wrong on this count though.

And I suspect it's you who are wrong ... but, as you say, let's focus on the actual details of space plasmas, plasma physics, and astrophysics, shall we?

FWIW, you might like to check out JREF member tusenfem. I may be mistaken, but IIRC he has made it clear that he:
* studied under Hannes Alfvén
* has a PhD in plasma physics (focus on double layers)
* is one of the scientists involved in the plasma physics experiments on missions such as Venus Express and Galileo
* has been engaged in detailed, point-by-point rebuttals of "electric universe" and "plasma cosmology" claims for some time now

I think you can even find his IRL name easily enough (I don't think he wishes to keep that private), so you can ask your friend to check out his plasma physics credentials (and read some of his published papers perhaps, or even his PhD thesis).

OK, so you have a very weak magnetic field acting over immense distances. Magnetic fields cause electrons to accelerate, so presumably the electrons will have plenty of time to accelerate to pretty high relative speeds, right?

For some astrophysical plasmas this is undoubtedly so (although for these the magnetic fields are not that weak); for example, those which produce the bipolar jets in AGNs, or accelerate particles to ultrarelativistic speeds in SNRs and PWNs*.

However, the "acting over immense distances" magnetic fields are, AFAIK, turbulent, so particle acceleration is pretty limited (if you'd like some details, I'd be happy to provide you with some references).

Looking at the general flow of this thread it seems to me that there are two parallel issues going on.

1. Attacks and defenses of the Big Bang Model.
2. Attacks and defenses of PC/EU ideas.

As a general rule of logic, attacks on the Big Bang do not support PC/EU ideas or vice versa. Just wanted to point that out.

Indeed.

And yet, was it not you who conflated the two (at least to some extent)?

Did you not write the following?

"Let me see, who am I to trust, Plasma Physicists who have seen experimentally pretty much all of the same phenomena that are observed in the larger scale structures in the Universe, which by all sides in the debate is admitted to be made up in its visible form of 99.999% plasma,

versus

a series of Theoreticians that have come up with increasingly more and more exotic explanations to the point where now the Universe is supposed to be only 1% or less visible; where the Universe came about during a single point of creation (Yay! The Big Bang supports the Church, how great) that breaks the Law of Energy Conservation; that has as one of its ideas that Galaxies have a "Halo" of Dark Matter that is surrounded around galaxies (has never been observed after 20+ years looking for it either!) in just the right way to allow for the rotation curves that are seen and never quite fit; that has an unknown form of energy that allows the universe to speed up; that has been around for 13.4 Billion Years when some observed stars have been observed that have been figured out to be 80+ billion years old; that postulates a field whose sole contribution to existence occurred very shortly after the Big Bang and is called the Inflaton Field; That has gotten its vaunted element abundances obviously wrong because there is way too much Lithium out there; Should I go on?"

* given your self-declared background, I assume you are familiar with these TLAs; if not, I'll gladly spell them out for you

 

[Reality Check]

I tell you what, I will ask my friend today about it who is getting a masters degree in plasma physics whether plasmas with DL's (and hence have charge shielding) can have complex behaviors and why. Then I will let you know. I suspect you are wrong on this count though.

Do not bother asking your friend.

1. Plasmas have complex behaviour.
2. sol invictus never stated that plasmas do not have complex behaviours. He never mentioned plasmas at all in his rather testy post to you:
   

   Nonsense. Charge is charge, it cannot be shielded except by the opposite charge. If it's shielded, the object is charge neutral. That's a basic law of electrodynamics (it's called Gauss' law - look it up, since you've plainly never heard of it).
   
   Your understanding is wrong. Yes, there are magnetic fields in space. Yes, they are somewhat larger than expected. But they are not large.
   
   The galactic magnetic field near the center of the galaxy is weaker than the earth's field by a factor of more than 1,000, and more like 10,000 or 100,000 in the halo. When was the last time you noticed something heavier than a compass needle move under the influence of the earth's field? When was the last time a "magnetic satellite" was launched? The relative strength of EM fields to gravity gets weaker and weaker the larger and more massive the object is. Their effect on very massive objects like stars or galaxies as a whole is absurdly small.
   
   Wrong.
   
   Anyway, enough of this. Like most PC/EU advocates you haven't the faintest clue about electricity, electric field, magnetic fields, or gravity.

   I think he is rather tired of people being fooled by the plasma cosmology non-science and non-cosmology.

The facts are that plasmas are quasi-neutral, i.e. neutral at large enough scales. The Debye length is "is the scale over which mobile charge carriers (e.g. electrons) screen out electric fields in plasmas and other conductors.".
The interstellar meduim has a Debye length of ~10 metres.
The intragalactic meduim has a Debye length of ~10^5 meters.
A light year is 9.4 * 10^15 meters.
Cosmological scales are in the millions of light years.
Thus plasmas are neutral on stellar (let alone cosmological) scales.

Debye length also governs the scale of double-layers.

Hannes Alfven pointed out that: "In a low density plasma, localized space charge regions may build up large potential drops over distances of the order of some tens of the Debye lengths. Such regions have been called electric double layers. An electric double layer is the simplest space charge distribution that gives a potential drop in the layer and a vanishing electric field on each side of the layer. In the laboratory, double layers have been studied for half a century, but their importance in cosmic plasmas has not been generally recognized.".

Once again there are no cosmological significant double-layers.

 

[Reality Check]

Just to remind everyone that the question that this thread was started with has been answered since the middle of 2008:
The "plasma cosmology" as defined by Zeuzzz, BeAChooser and others is definitely a nonscientific, crackpot theory (not woo).

Zeuzzz gave one definition which resulted in "a collection of scientific theories with a common thread" definition. This common thread seems to be that the theory emphasizes the contribution of plasma in the universe and/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.

He then seemed to retract that definition (despite having contributed several theories to the collection) in favor of another (Lerner's?) definition which is hidden somewhere in the thread. I think that it is this post from 3rd July 2008. It is similar to the first definition, i.e. defines itself as non-science. Science fits theories to the data. Science does not assume that a theory is correct and go looking for data to confirm this (ignoring data that does not match or theories that better match the data).


Contrast this to the definition of the Big Bang theory:

• General Relativity (Hubble's Law, etc. which lead to an hot dense state of the universe)
• Dark matter (motion of galaxies in galactic clusters, mass distribution from gravitational lensing, etc.).
• Dark energy (measured accelerating expansion of the universe)
• Inflation (large-scale structure of the universe).

This is a consistent set of theories that best match the data.

tensordyne:
There is really no point in resurrecting the OP since it has been answered.
However if you want to point out the latest "plasma cosmology" textbook containing a consistent set of theories explaining modern cosmological data then I am sure everyone would be interested !

 

[tensordyne]

OK, some residual concerns.

Those last replies are very good. I like the debye length answer because it definitely introduces doubt into my mind, which is always a good thing. I would beg your indulgence for you to consider what I have as lingering concerns. I will not try and cite them in any way because they are just what are on my mind. Think of them as a mostly regurgitation of PC/EU talking points so far as I have been able to determing. I hope that your grasp of the subject may put these concerns to bed if possible Reality Check.

1. Theories can be made to fit any curves you want to a certain extent. Add more layers and you get a better ability for your set of equations to fit whatever curve you may have. The history of BB cosmology on this count does not seem very good to me.

I can understand new discoveries, but when you have a good theory the predictions come first and the discoveries second. From what I have read, this does not seem to be the course for BB. Inflation came only after the shock of the discovery of flatness and spatial homogeneity not working well together.

Plus, I am sorry, but I have a real hard time believing in a theory that has a field existing only around the beginning of time and with particles named Inflatons. It seems very ad hoc to me. Add in Dark matter and energy having most of the universe being non-normal matter and it seems like to me you have some seriously huge fudge factors.

Dark matter I have read has some serious curve fitting issues as well (problems fitting radial velocity versus radius, plus, how many models of Dark matter are there? Which one is it already?). How did those halos get there around the galaxies in the first place? If they are so massive collectively, why don't they just coelesce into the center of galaxies instead of forming these monstrous sized halos? Plus, no one has yet directly detected dark matter. Is that something I should feel confident about when in comparison if you look at the predictions for other types of matter such as with Dirac and antimatter or the rest of the zoo of particles in the Standard model they all were found in pretty much short order time. It makes me very suspicious that dark X is just dark thinking.

2. Comets do not act right according to astronomers. They are not made of water and yet are supposed to give off copious amounts of it because spectrographic techniques reveal that OH radicals are in the coma of comets. That does not make sense. Deep impact hit comet Tempel 1 and exploded far too much given what astronomers predicted beforehand. It even had an initial spark as predicted in one of Wallace Thornhill's 17 predictions came true while none of the astronomers predictions worked out. Comets have been observed to give off X-ray light, how does that make sense when you should just have light from the sun sublimating rocky ice? Which gets to the other point, observations found that comets are not made of ice on the surface but look like asteroids.

3. Halton Arp, what is the deal? I do not think his cosmological ideas are probably correct but he does seem to have been unfairly abused. Why is it that galactic red-shifts absolutely have to be cosmological? Is there no other mechanism to explain it that is maybe less cosmos shaking?

4. Black Holes do not exist. Sorry, you have more of a chance convincing me that the above three set of points are true then that black holes exist. Yes, there are things that have energy-densities that astronomers say they do. I do not doubt that. What I seriously doubt is that Black Holes are a prediction of GR. In fact, I know they are not. I have proven it using GR. I don't expect you to believe me without seeing the proof, or even believe me if you do so the proof but I my honest appraisal is that it is true that Black Holes are not predictions of GR.

I can explain it partly as an analogy without going into the full math. This is just an analogy and NOT my proof. Imagine you solve the E field for a sphere of constant charge density. Apply Gauss' law and you get that outside the sphere the E field is proportional to 1/r^2 but inside it is proportional to r. If you were to screw up and say the outside solution is the same for the inside, the conclusion would then be that there is a charge singularity inside the sphere. Of course this is nonsense. From the derivation I have done something very similar to this is what happens for "Black Holes". If you want my proof I will email it to you Reality Check if you give me your email address.

Aren't black holes supposed to be important and needed for astronomy to explain some aspect of the universe? Look at Black Holes in all seriousness. They have a singularity where the rules of physics are supposed to break down. How is that explained, they are clothed in an event horizon, new unknown physics (new unknown physics seems to be garnered for a lot of problems in astronomy) occurs at the singularity. Something else. Inside a black hole the signature for the metric switches once you get passed the event horizon, which is odd. It takes infinite clockmaker time to traverse a distance outside of the event horizon which has finite clockmaker distance (observer at infinity) but only takes finite proper time to make this happen. What in the world is that about?

If I did not know what I know about the real solution to the Schwarzschild case I would think these are signs that some aspect of GR does not make sense.

So, that is what is on my mind. I know I did not do anything in the way of citing anything. Just think of these (except for my own black hole comments) to be talking points if you want. Talking points that you can at your leisure deal with as you see fit. I can only say that the public at large is being asked to believe in some pretty incredible things if you follow astronomy. As of yet, I am not convinced. Please allay my doubts if you can Reality Check. It is not easy being a heretic. You too often get burned at the stake.

 

[tensordyne]

very good.

Glad to hear it, and I'm very much looking forward to it.

If I may make a suggestion: why not respond piecemeal? Split your response into several different posts, with each one on a specific point of yours (and my comment/response/question)?


And I suspect it's you who are wrong ... but, as you say, let's focus on the actual details of space plasmas, plasma physics, and astrophysics, shall we?

FWIW, you might like to check out JREF member tusenfem. I may be mistaken, but IIRC he has made it clear that he:
* studied under Hannes Alfvén
* has a PhD in plasma physics (focus on double layers)
* is one of the scientists involved in the plasma physics experiments on missions such as Venus Express and Galileo
* has been engaged in detailed, point-by-point rebuttals of "electric universe" and "plasma cosmology" claims for some time now

I think you can even find his IRL name easily enough (I don't think he wishes to keep that private), so you can ask your friend to check out his plasma physics credentials (and read some of his published papers perhaps, or even his PhD thesis).


For some astrophysical plasmas this is undoubtedly so (although for these the magnetic fields are not that weak); for example, those which produce the bipolar jets in AGNs, or accelerate particles to ultrarelativistic speeds in SNRs and PWNs*.

However, the "acting over immense distances" magnetic fields are, AFAIK, turbulent, so particle acceleration is pretty limited (if you'd like some details, I'd be happy to provide you with some references).


Indeed.

And yet, was it not you who conflated the two (at least to some extent)?

Did you not write the following?

"Let me see, who am I to trust, Plasma Physicists who have seen experimentally pretty much all of the same phenomena that are observed in the larger scale structures in the Universe, which by all sides in the debate is admitted to be made up in its visible form of 99.999% plasma,

versus

a series of Theoreticians that have come up with increasingly more and more exotic explanations to the point where now the Universe is supposed to be only 1% or less visible; where the Universe came about during a single point of creation (Yay! The Big Bang supports the Church, how great) that breaks the Law of Energy Conservation; that has as one of its ideas that Galaxies have a "Halo" of Dark Matter that is surrounded around galaxies (has never been observed after 20+ years looking for it either!) in just the right way to allow for the rotation curves that are seen and never quite fit; that has an unknown form of energy that allows the universe to speed up; that has been around for 13.4 Billion Years when some observed stars have been observed that have been figured out to be 80+ billion years old; that postulates a field whose sole contribution to existence occurred very shortly after the Big Bang and is called the Inflaton Field; That has gotten its vaunted element abundances obviously wrong because there is way too much Lithium out there; Should I go on?"

* given your self-declared background, I assume you are familiar with these TLAs; if not, I'll gladly spell them out for you

Good response. You are correct in noting that I do not know all of the TLA's you listed. I recognize AGN as active galactic nuclei I would suppose. I will try and find the other ones if I can, and if not just ask you as you propose.

You know, I am really disappointed by the general level of the forum here. I would have thought it would be better, especially with randi's name attached. The quoting system sucks, bad, horribly bad (don't worry about suggesting fixes around that, someone else already has and it still sucks but helped). Most of the people here are little snipers and trolls it seems like to me who use pseudo-skepticism as a shield and sword in order to bully other people. I hope I can show you though that I am genuinely interested in figuring things out. That I am a genuine skeptic through and through. I will definitely go and look up the fellow you quoted and see if I can get his take on the matter.

My philosophy is to not have an ego about these kinds of matters. If what I am thinking now is wrong, it is wrong, if it is correct, good too. I just do not like to deceive myself. I do not like anyone else deceiving themselves either. Your and Reality Check's responses are among the first civilized responses I have seen on this whole forum. Thank you for that.

As for the last point, you are correct I would suppose. I guess my point was to show that Plasma Cosmology ideas have as a basis a lot less set of exotic ideas based on matter known for certain to exist in the universe. It was two sets of different arguments. I meant it as an argument for preferring one over the other but that is a logical fallacy of sorts. Good catch.

That said, I still find it disturbing that the visible energy and matter are supposed to take up such a tiny fraction of the whole of the universe which in the case of dark matter have still yet to be detected. Dirac proposed antimatter and within a year or two it was found. The more I look at popular depictions of ideas coming from theoretical physics and astronomy the more I see one seemingly crazy idea after another. Michio Kaku drives me nuts as well talking about everything with such wide eyed amazement and sometimes on topics he was definitely never trained in (like robots!). I never liked string theory either and the two books that came out criticizing it sure seemed to affect peoples opinions on that topic. I still have a very bad feeling modern theoretical physics and astronomy might have gone down an emperor has no clothes route.

So thanks again for the civility and I will look up tusenfem and see what he has to say. If I decide to respond to your post after hearing what he has to say I will try out the piecemeal approach you describe. Probably makes it easier to discuss things anyways.

All the best.

 

[DeiRenDopa]

I would beg your indulgence for you to consider what I have as lingering concerns. I will not try and cite them in any way because they are just what are on my mind. Think of them as a mostly regurgitation of PC/EU talking points so far as I have been able to determing. I hope that your grasp of the subject may put these concerns to bed if possible Reality Check.

I'm not RC, but I hope you don't mind me jumping in with some quick responses.

1. Theories can be made to fit any curves you want to a certain extent. Add more layers and you get a better ability for your set of equations to fit whatever curve you may have. The history of BB cosmology on this count does not seem very good to me.

It might be helpful if we take a look at this in some detail, and compare it with some (physics) theories which you consider to not suffer from this perceived problem.

First, however, please recognise that concordance LCDM models ("BB cosmology") are built using more than one theory in physics; at their core are the two most successful theories in physics, General Relativity (GR) and the Standard Model (of particle physics).

I can understand new discoveries, but when you have a good theory the predictions come first and the discoveries second. From what I have read, this does not seem to be the course for BB. Inflation came only after the shock of the discovery of flatness and spatial homogeneity not working well together.

Let's explore this further; I think you'll find that contemporary cosmology (and astrophysics in general) is no different from any branch of physics in this regard.

Plus, I am sorry, but I have a real hard time believing in a theory that has a field existing only around the beginning of time and with particles named Inflatons. It seems very ad hoc to me. Add in Dark matter and energy having most of the universe being non-normal matter and it seems like to me you have some seriously huge fudge factors.

This reveals, to me, a huge misunderstanding of what modern cosmology (and astrophysics, and even physics) is about.

Try this: a theory, in these fields of science, is good (in some important way) if it:
a) is internally consistent
b) is consistent with other, well-established, theories, where their respective domains of applicability overlap
c) is consistent with all relevant observations and experimental results.

So, may I ask you what your criteria are, for judging a theory?

(BTW, "theory" and "model" are, to some extent, similar, or overlap, etc)

Dark matter I have read has some serious curve fitting issues as well (problems fitting radial velocity versus radius, plus, how many models of Dark matter are there? Which one is it already?). How did those halos get there around the galaxies in the first place? If they are so massive collectively, why don't they just coelesce into the center of galaxies instead of forming these monstrous sized halos? Plus, no one has yet directly detected dark matter. Is that something I should feel confident about when in comparison if you look at the predictions for other types of matter such as with Dirac and antimatter or the rest of the zoo of particles in the Standard model they all were found in pretty much short order time. It makes me very suspicious that dark X is just dark thinking.

I started a thread, here in JREF, on the question of dark matter (strictly speaking, cold, non-baryonic dark matter). You may find it informative (I'll dig up a link to it later).

2. Comets do not act right according to astronomers. They are not made of water and yet are supposed to give off copious amounts of it because spectrographic techniques reveal that OH radicals are in the coma of comets. That does not make sense. Deep impact hit comet Tempel 1 and exploded far too much given what astronomers predicted beforehand. It even had an initial spark as predicted in one of Wallace Thornhill's 17 predictions came true while none of the astronomers predictions worked out. Comets have been observed to give off X-ray light, how does that make sense when you should just have light from the sun sublimating rocky ice? Which gets to the other point, observations found that comets are not made of ice on the surface but look like asteroids.

This is one topic that really, really, really presses my hot buttons.

I think there's also a thread, here in this section of JREF, on it.

If I may, I'd like to ask you to put your critical thinking cap on, and read these so-called predictions again.

One aspect: a key part of science is "independently verifiable"; take a look at everything Thornhill has written, and ask if - even in principle - you could, independently, reproduce those predictions. If not, then how does the "prediction" differ from "word from an Oracle"?

3. Halton Arp, what is the deal? I do not think his cosmological ideas are probably correct but he does seem to have been unfairly abused. Why is it that galactic red-shifts absolutely have to be cosmological? Is there no other mechanism to explain it that is maybe less cosmos shaking?

Consider this: redshifts come from electrons "jumping" from one energy level to another, mostly in atoms (or ions). If there is an intrinsic redshift (for a galaxy), then the atoms in that galaxy must be different from the ones here on Earth; if you bring a bunch of them here, and put them into a spectrograph, they'd be unlike anything we've ever seen. Does the term 'ad hoc' apply, do you think?

Also, redshifts of galaxies do have a significant non-cosmological component (to say otherwise is to show extraordinary ignorance of astronomy).

Arp's main claim, however, is that quasars are local; this is easily shown to be, um, inconsistent with all relevant observations (later).

But perhaps the most extraordinary part of this claim is that it should be part of "plasma cosmology"! Are 'intrinsic redshifts' something you can derive from any "plasma cosmology theory"?!?

4. Black Holes do not exist. Sorry, you have more of a chance convincing me that the above three set of points are true then that black holes exist. Yes, there are things that have energy-densities that astronomers say they do. I do not doubt that. What I seriously doubt is that Black Holes are a prediction of GR. In fact, I know they are not. I have proven it using GR.

Start a new thread!

This is, sorry to be so blunt, an extraordinary, astonishing, amazing claim!

If true, you are surely destined for a free round trip to Stockholm!!

Write up your proof, submit it to a relevant, leading physics journal, and await the fame that you would truly deserve.

(to be continued)

 

[DeiRenDopa]

SNR = supernova remnant
PWN = pulsar wind nebula
AGN = active galaxy (or galactic) nucleus

 

[DeiRenDopa]

Non-baryonic cold dark matter ("CDM"), the observational evidence

 

[Ziggurat]

1. Theories can be made to fit any curves you want to a certain extent. Add more layers and you get a better ability for your set of equations to fit whatever curve you may have. The history of BB cosmology on this count does not seem very good to me.

First off, theories are not nearly as flexible as you presume. Which is why no alternative to the BB theory has ever found an explanation for the perfect black-body line shape of the cosmic microwave background. Second, it sounds like you aren't very familiar with the development of, say, quantum mechanics. Continual refinement is a hallmark of physics, not a badge of shame.

I can understand new discoveries, but when you have a good theory the predictions come first and the discoveries second.

Again, you seem ignorant of the history of physics. It is full of examples of experimental discoveries leading to new theories.

Dark matter I have read has some serious curve fitting issues as well (problems fitting radial velocity versus radius

Um... the problem with galactic rotation curves is that they don't fit without dark matter.

How did those halos get there around the galaxies in the first place?

Gravity, obviously.

If they are so massive collectively, why don't they just coelesce into the center of galaxies instead of forming these monstrous sized halos?

Again, the answer is obvious. Why does ordinary matter coalesce? Because it has a mechanism for losing energy, namely through radiation. But dark matter doesn't interact much at all with electromagnetism (which is why it's dark), so it has no mechanism for losing energy, so it won't collapse.

Plus, no one has yet directly detected dark matter.

Depends what you count as a "direct" detection. I would count detection of gravitational lensing as fairly direct. Why don't you?

2. Comets do not act right according to astronomers.

Which has basically nothing to do with cosmology.

They are not made of water

Yes they are. I've already pointed this out, and you didn't respond.

Which gets to the other point, observations found that comets are not made of ice on the surface but look like asteroids.

Note the rather key point there.

3. Halton Arp, what is the deal?

He cherry picks data and uses massively flawed statistical analysis to reveal "patterns" which don't exist.

4. Black Holes do not exist. Sorry, you have more of a chance convincing me that the above three set of points are true then that black holes exist. Yes, there are things that have energy-densities that astronomers say they do. I do not doubt that. What I seriously doubt is that Black Holes are a prediction of GR. In fact, I know they are not. I have proven it using GR. I don't expect you to believe me without seeing the proof, or even believe me if you do so the proof but I my honest appraisal is that it is true that Black Holes are not predictions of GR.

Nobody is going to believe you. GR is hard. The math is ugly. And you have already demonstrated that you can't even handle Newtonian physics in Euclidean space correctly, with your claims about magnetism being stronger because it's 1/r.

I can explain it partly as an analogy without going into the full math.

Your analogy is garbage. You don't need a singularity to start with. Once the Schwarzchild radius is bigger than your object, you've got a black hole. And collapse TO a singularity becomes inevitable after that.

Aren't black holes supposed to be important and needed for astronomy to explain some aspect of the universe?

For some aspects of astronomy, yes. For cosmology? Nope, we don't actually don't need them at all.

Inside a black hole the signature for the metric switches once you get passed the event horizon, which is odd.

Only if you use certain coordinates, which have a coordinate (not real) singularity at the event horizon. Other coordinates like Kruskal coordinates have no coordinate singularity at the event horizon and no signature change across it. This is basic GR, and you seem completely unfamiliar with it. Why do you expect anyone to believe you've disproved a fundamental result of a theory you don't seem to understand?

I can only say that the public at large is being asked to believe in some pretty incredible things if you follow astronomy.

The universe is a pretty incredible place. What's the problem? Are you really resorting to argument by incredulity? That won't fly.

 

[tensordyne]

I think I write too much in a single post for it to be useful. Maybe we can use this last post as a map and go from there. Maybe I will start a new thread on the Black Hole subject in the future. To be honest, let me now only reply to the last part of the message. I think it is a bit naive to assume that even if I was to submit such a proof to a leading physics journal, that it would get in eventually, and even barring some miracle that it did get in, that that would make the slightest bit of difference, let alone a Nobel Prize.

I do not have a lot of trust that anything that I write would be taken even remotely seriously. A lot of peoples jobs depend on black holes existing. I know about the seedy side of the history of science and it does not give me a whole lot of confidence in that regard. Of course, you do not know if you don't try, so maybe I will just for laughs and to help beef up whatever paper I do write (because undoubtedly the review, if it takes it even somewhat seriously, will have good critiques on ancillary issues of the paper).

Psychology unfortunately plays out just as much for scientists as it does for the guy on the street, maybe even more so. Plank and Einstein's work were not heralded when they first came out. Wegener (eeek, I think that is his name) died in the frozen wastes long before his theories of plate tectonics were accepted. I imagine you might have a name to add to this list. Scientists as far as I can tell are surprisingly ideological in a way. I wish most scientists were Popper fans but most to me to be fans of Kuhn instead. In fact, most people in general are Kuhn-like in aspect so far as I can tell.

Thanks for the exclamation points and the critique and I am always happy to have you jump in on any post. Sorry for the dreary mood of this post. I am just trying to be realistic.

 

[Reality Check]

1. Theories can be made to fit any curves you want to a certain extent. Add more layers and you get a better ability for your set of equations to fit whatever curve you may have. The history of BB cosmology on this count does not seem very good to me.

I can understand new discoveries, but when you have a good theory the predictions come first and the discoveries second. From what I have read, this does not seem to be the course for BB. Inflation came only after the shock of the discovery of flatness and spatial homogeneity not working well together.

That is how secince works - by fitting theories to data.

Plus, I am sorry, but I have a real hard time believing in a theory that has a field existing only around the beginning of time and with particles named Inflatons. It seems very ad hoc to me. Add in Dark matter and energy having most of the universe being non-normal matter and it seems like to me you have some seriously huge fudge factors.
...

More sceince.
There are no fudge factors - just observations of the universe .

2. Comets do not act right according to astronomers. They are not made of water and yet are supposed to give off copious amounts of it...

Comets are found to be made of water - look up Deep Impact.
If you are thinking of the totallay insane electric comet idea then have a look at The electric comet fantasy completely debunked!

3. Halton Arp, what is the deal? I do not think his cosmological ideas are probably correct but he does seem to have been unfairly abused. Why is it that galactic red-shifts absolutely have to be cosmological? Is there no other mechanism to explain it that is maybe less cosmos shaking?

No big deal. He is just doing invalid science in regard to the outdated theory of redshift quantization.
Yes there is an "less cosmos shaking" mechanism - we just happen to be at the center of the universe !

4. Black Holes do not exist.

Totally wrong since they are observed to exist, e.g. Sagittarius A* has ~4,000,000 million solar masses packed into a sphere with less than the orbit of Mercury.

I can explain it partly as an analogy without going into the full math. ..

I look forward to your proof using GR that black holes do not exist. You do know that the proof that they doi exist was also done using GR?
Post it here so that the experts can have a look at it, e.g. sol invictus.

 

[Ziggurat]

I do not have a lot of trust that anything that I write would be taken even remotely seriously.

True, but not for the reasons you presume. You wouldn't be taken seriously because you haven't demonstrated that you know what you're talking about.

A lot of peoples jobs depend on black holes existing.

No, tensordyne. NOBODY's job depends on black holes existing. In fact, a disproof of black holes would be a major way to advance one's career. Claiming a disproof based on ignorance is what would (rightly) be a career killer.

Psychology unfortunately plays out just as much for scientists as it does for the guy on the street, maybe even more so.

You should consider the psychology of your own conclusion that you have somehow found a fatal flaw in a theory that many of the brightest minds in the world have hammered on for more than a generation.

Plank and Einstein's work were not heralded when they first came out.

Planck's (not Plank) solution to the blackbody problem wasn't heralded at the time because it was an ad-hoc solution that he couldn't justify. And Einstein's work WAS heralded when it first came out.

Wegener (eeek, I think that is his name) died in the frozen wastes long before his theories of plate tectonics were accepted. I imagine you might have a name to add to this list.

Who? You?

Thanks for the exclamation points and the critique and I am always happy to have you jump in on any post. Sorry for the dreary mood of this post. I am just trying to be realistic.

No, tensordyne, you are not being realistic. The realistic conclusion is that you probably don't understand GR or cosmology, and that your disbelief in things like black holes comes from simple ignorance of a complex field. The alternative, that you've found the fatal flaw that has eluded the best and the brightest for decades, is far less likely, even though it may be more satisfying emotionally.

 

[tensordyne]

Let me respond to a couple posts at once. Starting with Reality Check and ending with Ziggurat.

4. Black Holes do not exist.

Totally wrong since they are observed to exist, e.g. Sagittarius A* has ~4,000,000 million solar masses packed into a sphere with less than the orbit of Mercury.

------------

I already said I agreed that I have no problem with believing the numbers astronomers have come up with in regard to large masses in little spaces. For Sag A* to be a black hole though requires two things, to have the numbers you quoted (agreed), and for GR to predict that black holes exist (not agreed). Quoting those numbers does absolutely nothing for your argument in this regard because the question is about whether GR predicts Black Holes. The only way to advance your argument is to see my paper, review it, and say it has a flaws I would think. I need your email since this is a pdf unless there is another way for me to send it to you or people you trust to review it.

I have no problem having you or anyone else review it and see if it is good or not. If it is not, I will thank you and move on. If it is, well, you be the judge on what that should mean.

-------

No, tensordyne, you are not being realistic. The realistic conclusion is that you probably don't understand GR or cosmology, and that your disbelief in things like black holes comes from simple ignorance of a complex field. The alternative, that you've found the fatal flaw that has eluded the best and the brightest for decades, is far less likely, even though it may be more satisfying emotionally.

-------

Ziggurat, my main complaint with your posts is the constant going into peoples heads. You don't know this, what you do not realize is that. Seriously, I am pretty sure it breaks rule 12, but even if it doesn't, it is really annoying. I know it is hard not to do this, and I do it myself but am trying not to. Just stop doing it please, it doesn't make your point stronger.

That said, PM me an email address and give me a day to freshen the paper up some and then I will send it out. I am doing something late tomorrow, so sometime after 6:00 PM Pacific time. We can start a new thread if you want or continue from here.

Sorry I have not addressed your other points (the many of them), it just seems to me I dropped a bombshell of sorts and it has become the topic of discussion, so let's discuss that and then return to these points another time, they are not going anywhere after all.

 

[Zeuzzz]

I've spoken to my head of physics at kent uni and hes now reading Peratts "physics of the plasma universe" which he got from the plasma section of the astrophysics library. He said that if there are mistakes in it then it will have be be removed from their collection. Since no-one in this thread has some up with rebuttals of it, I doubt he will. Its one of the books that lecturers recommend to students studying astrophysical plasmas he told me, along with others.

Till then we can simply continue with you ignoring the material therein and ignoring the near hundreds of citations it has had in the literature without any rebuttals.

I've also promised to lend him Alfvens cosmic plasma and The Big Bang never happemed (Lerner) as hes found this subject highly interesting since I introduced him to it.

Guess that soon he'll be another respected sceintist to add to Sols now titanic list of crackpots (ie, scientists that dare to have an open mind and consider rival theories)

And DRD, shutup, please, your constant attacks on me and whining are making me feel guilty that i've damaged your mental health in some way due to the material ive posted.

 

[Tubbythin]

Plank and Einstein's work were not heralded when they first came out.

I don't think you could have picked a worse example than Einstein. SR is (IMO at least) one of the most surprising and ground-breaking theories in the entire history of physics which insisted on the rejection of classical mechanics that had stood humankind so well for hundreds of years... and yet it was accepted almost immediately by virtually the whole scientific community.