We’ve all heard of the claim of “settled science” when it comes to global warming/climate change, and we’ve all heard of the “Big Bang Theory”, and I’m not just talking about the popular TV show. The scientific theory goes all the way back to 1927.
This is an artist’s concept of the metric expansion of space, where space (including hypothetical non-observable portions of the universe) is represented at each time by the circular sections. Note on the left the dramatic expansion (not to scale) occurring in the inflationary epoch, and at the center the expansion acceleration. The scheme is decorated with WMAP images on the left and with the representation of stars at the appropriate level of development. Credit: NASA
The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model for the birth of the universe. It states that at some moment all of space was contained in a single point from which the Universe has been expanding ever since. Modern measurements place this moment at approximately 13.8 billion years ago, which is thus considered the age of the universe. After the initial expansion, the Universe cooled sufficiently to allow the formation of subatomic particles, and later simple atoms. Giant clouds of these primordial elements later coalesced through gravity to form stars and galaxies. The Big Bang theory does not provide any explanation for the initial conditions of the Universe; rather, it describes and explains the general evolution of the Universe going forward from that point on. (Source: Wikipedia)
Now, it seems there’s a challenge to this ‘settled’ science, and a new quantum equation predicts the universe has no beginning.
(Phys.org) —The universe may have existed forever, according to a new model that applies quantum correction terms to complement Einstein’s theory of general relativity. The model may also account for dark matter and dark energy, resolving multiple problems at once.
The widely accepted age of the universe, as estimated by general relativity, is 13.8 billion years. In the beginning, everything in existence is thought to have occupied a single infinitely dense point, or singularity. Only after this point began to expand in a “Big Bang” did the universe officially begin.
Although the Big Bang singularity arises directly and unavoidably from the mathematics of general relativity, some scientists see it as problematic because the math can explain only what happened immediately after—not at or before—the singularity.
“The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there,” Ahmed Farag Ali at Benha University and the Zewail City of Science and Technology, both in Egypt, told Phys.org.
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William Astley
February 10, 2015 6:31 pm
There are currently almost a hundred different anomalies and paradoxes: Astronomical observations vs Big bang theory. To keep the big bang theory on life support the laws of physics were changed allowing ‘inflation’, dark matter, and dark energy to be created.
As the astronomical observations improved the number of anomalies have increased not decreased.
This paper for example lists 13 paradoxes and anomalies concerning the formation and evolution of galaxies. http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.0623v2
This paper for example lists 10 paradoxes and anomalies concerning quasars. An example of an in your face quasar paradox is quasar spectrum does not exhibit time dilation (three peer reviewed papers confirm quasars do not exhibit time dilation, all possible explanations have been eliminated). If quasars were distant objects they would exhibit time dilation. There is no explanation as to why quasar spectrum does not exhibit time dilation and are no paper disputing the observational fact that quasars do not exhibit time dilation.
Time dilation is a consequence of the fact that the universe is expanding. http://phys.org/news190027752.html http://arxiv.org/abs/0910.4297
Pending problems in QSOs
Quasars (Quasi Stellar Objects, abbreviated as QSOs) are still nowadays, close to half a century after their discovery, objects which are not completely understood.
There are half dozen fundamental paradoxes concerning the ‘cosmic’ microwave background radiation.
The cosmic microwave background radiation (referred to as CMB) on small angles is too uniform (varies as 1 part of 100,000) vs 1 part of 5000 to 1 part of 7000 based on distribution of the matter if there is no ‘inflation’.
On large angles are vast cold and hot spots and the hot and cold spots in the CMB mysteriously alignment of the large features in the CMB with the axis of our solar system and with our galaxy. http://arxiv.org/abs/1303.4786
Large-Angle CMB Suppression and Polarization Predictions
The anomalous lack of large angle temperature correlations has been a surprising feature of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) since first observed by COBE-DMR and subsequently confirmed and strengthened by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe. This anomaly may point to the need for modifications of the standard model of cosmology or may indicate that our Universe is a rare statistical fluctuation within that model. Further observations of the temperature auto-correlation function will not elucidate the issue; sufficiently high precision statistical observations already exist.
“The mystery of the WMAP cold spot”
We find that, unlike its Northern counterpart, the Southern Galactic hemisphere of the CMB map is characterized by significant departure from Gaussianity of which the CS is not the only manifestation: we have located a ring, on which there are “cold” as “hot” spots with almost the same properties as the CS. Exploiting the similarity of the WCM and the ILC maps, and using the latter as a guide map, we have discovered that the shape of the CS is formed primarily by the components of the CMB signal represented by multipoles between 10 ≤ ℓ ≤ 20, with a corresponding angular scale about 5−10◦. This signal leads to modulation of the whole CMB sky, clearly seen at |b| > 30◦ in both the ILC and WCM maps, rather than a single localized feature. After subtraction of this modulation, the remaining part of the CMB signal appears to be consistent with statistical homogeneity and Gaussianity. We therefore infer that the mystery of the WMAP CS reflects directly the peculiarities of the low-multipole tail of the CMB signal, rather than a single local (isolated) defect or manifestation of a globally anisotropic cosmology.
William Astley
February 10, 2015 6:33 pm
There is a shortage of ionizing sources in the local universe (this problem would go away if the most distant observed quasar was at z=1 and something that happens to a quasars when they turn on that causes the higher than z=1 observed quasars.) http://arxiv.org/abs/1404.2933
THE PHOTON UNDERPRODUCTION CRISIS
We examine the statistics of the low-redshift Lyman-alpha forest from smoothed particle hydrodynamic simulations in light of recent improvements in the estimated evolution of the cosmic ultraviolet back-ground (UVB) and recent observations from the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS). We find that the value of the metagalactic photoionization rate (HI) required by our simulations to match the observed properties of the low-redshift Lyman-alpha- forest is a factor of 5 larger than the value predicted by state-of-the art models for the evolution of this quantity. This mismatch in HI results in the mean ux decrement of the Lyman-alpha forest being underpredicted by at least a factor of 2 (a 10 sigma discrepancy with observations) and a column density distribution of Lyman- alpha forest absorbers systematically and significantly elevated compared to observations over nearly two decades in column density. We examine potential resolutions to this mismatch and that either conventional sources of ionizing photons (galaxies and quasars) must be significantly elevated relative to current observational estimates or our theoretical understanding of the low-redshift universe is in need of substantial revision.
There is a factor of 24 too much high redshift infrared radiation. This problem would go away if what causes some quasars to appear high redshift also causes some galaxies to appear too high redshift. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7087/full/4401002a.html
Astronomy: Trouble at first light
Nevertheless, several groups have claimed to have found the footprints of baby galaxies at near-infrared wavelengths, using data from NASA’s Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE)3 , 4, 5 and Spitzer Space Telescope6, and Japan’s Infrared Telescope in Space (IRTS)7. Their evidence comes in two forms. First, there is an excess signal above the combined emission of normal foreground galaxies that would require energetic events to have occurred in the early Universe. Second, the very uneven distribution of the radiation could arise from the spatial clustering properties of primordial stellar systems.
But rather than helping to decipher the epoch of cosmic first light, such observations have in fact created another puzzle. Simply stated, the dawn of galaxies seems to be too brilliant: the excess signal outshines the cumulative emission from all galaxies between Earth and the extremely distant first stars. If primordial sources are to account for all of this infrared radiation, current models of star formation in the young Universe look distinctly shaky. Too many massive stars ending their brief lives in a giant thermonuclear explosion would, for instance, eject large amounts of heavy elements such as carbon and oxygen into space, polluting the cosmos very early on and altering forever the composition of the raw material available for second-generation stars. But if the first-generation stars were to collapse to massive black holes instead, gas accretion onto such black holes would produce large amounts of X-rays. Both variants seem to be in conflict with current observations8, 9 , 10.
Sweet Old Bob
February 10, 2015 6:35 pm
So….some ones branes are about to explode ? They wouldn’t be p-branes?…..
Oh , right…that might be me……(8>))
Dave Worley
February 10, 2015 6:40 pm
This one requires a little imagination.
If the universal clock were slowly speeding up, then a given wavelength of light emitted 100,000,000 years ago would appear red shifted under today’s faster universal clock. It would take more “clicks of the clock” today for that same wave to pass a given point (longer wavelength). IMHO Red shift is misinterpreted as expansion. Red shift might be the only way to detect that the universal clock runs a bit faster today.
Since time is not really incremental, it could have been speeding up forever, and could continue to do so forever. Time has no mass, so no loss of energy to speed it up. Why would the clock speed up? I don’t know, why not?
Time is a very simple, and mostly overlooked variable in most motion equations. It’s treated as a constant in our current paridigm.
I’ve often wondered what the momentum of the universe is in the direction of time.
And is it constant in all locations? Can’t see how it would be with time going slower near gravity wells.
So where would that momentum go?
Since it is not incremental, it could just continue to speed up forever. There is no consequence other than an observed red shift of emissions depending upon the age of emisssion.
Forgot to mention, that under the sped-up clock theory, Light emitted very very long ago (from extreme distances) would appear as very low frequency (such as the background radiation) under today’s faster clock. That’s why the sky can appear dark even with an infinite universe.
Maybe you should review Randall Mills explanation of an oscillating universe that predicted increased expansion prior to observations. I know a lot might think he is a crackpot, but his equations explain tings at the sub atomic level through the universal level. All that has to be believed to accept Mills is that the electron is a 2 dimensional partial versus a 1 dimensional object that can be anywhere at once. I think the predictive power of his theory shows he might be on the right track.
Paul Westhaver
February 10, 2015 6:45 pm
Anthony,
This subject is interesting to me.
I have stumbled onto the work of Alexander Vilenkin, professor of cosmology at Tufts.
Borde Guth Vilenkin Theorem
Leonard Susskind
According to string theory we no longer live in a universe but in a diverse. Since the laws of physics are different in each diverse string theory may not apply there. Oh the conundrum. We will have to get more money to follow the doodle. Better yet we will have to get more money to build a diverse detector.
Golden, according to one branch of String Theory, CO2 causes catastrophic global warming, but only if it is anthropogenic in origin. Natural CO2 can rise to 7000 ppm without heating the Earth above 24C because that CO2 has additional dimensions that prevent bad consequences. It is amazing what can happen in String Theory worlds. I believe the possibilities are literally limitless. Sorta like CAGW funding.
Alan Robertson
February 10, 2015 6:52 pm
Well folks, it’s time for some answers to… so here we go, some answers and big ones, too and this is the way it is.
You see, the universe is finite (there’s a concept) and it is not the only universe and not only that, but in this universe are many layers and levels and we’re just barely aware of the one we’re in and sometimes a couple more, though don’t really catch on to that, very often.
There was a group of adventuros that did know a few of these things so set out to find more answers, and they spun themselves up way way faster than the speed of light and went through the black hole and whattaya know, there was the universe hanging on a thread, right alongside a bunch of other little (big) universes, and they were looking just like one of those little puffy white balls along the edge of old timey curtains. These travelers, quakin’ in their socks though they were, noticed the form that all of these little U’s were danglin from and danged if there weren’t a lot of those things, too and this sequence kept up for a time and so it went and suddenly, the intrepid ones found themselves standing in a city and were duly greeted and somebody told ’em – you’re the first ones from your scheme of things to make it this far and the explorers thought- This Far? now it wasn’t really a thought and nobody was really talking, but the city folks said yeah and by the way, you aren’t eternal yet, but now you’re immortal and poof all the travelers were instantly spun back in their bodies and looked at each other and said, well, that was sure something and now we’re immortal, let’s go eat lunch. Oh, and by the way, size is the only illusion. And those are some answers, boys and girls.
These words were not written to be believed or to be disbelieved. [42]
Tom Asiseeitnow
February 10, 2015 6:58 pm
The Divine Paradox — A physicist, who I shall not identify, recently said this: “Although the Big Bang singularity arises directly and unavoidably from the mathematics of general relativity, some scientists see it as problematic because the math can explain only what happened immediately after—not at or before—the singularity.” Duh? Well isn’t that conundrum easily explained? How can a math that explains the world that now exists, be expected to work in a world before it exists. It is stupid to even think that it could or would. Sometime, I fear, people get so over educated and wedded to a world view that they cannot imagine the obvious. Once you get back in time to singularity, then there can be no logical or mathematical explanation for what or who caused it. The answer to that requires a divine answer. If God did not create the physical world, then maybe the physical world does not really exist at all. And, if that is true, then who created Twitter to allow me to write this?
The physics that we understand for our present universe is not the physics that prevailed prior to Plank time. The “primordial soup” of that time was governed by different laws of which we can never know. Only when this soup cooled enough for the forces to separate did we see the current physics emerge. The real question is how many times did the so called big bang happen only to produce a universe where the physics did not allow any intelligent life to develop. One thing is for sure, this time the physics was just right for intelligent life to develop. So is this the first big bang, the 1000th or the 1,000,000th? Alas, we will never know the answer to that either but it is enjoyable to wonder about it.
It’s not just climate science that’s controlled by a corrupt, greedy establishment funding by an outrageous amount of government money. Cosmology and astrophysics is as well. Any field of science taking big money from government is corrupt.
I think that’s only part of it (a significant part), that there’s also a tendency to want to be in fashion as the recent article about Hubert Lamb which Jo Nova posted talked about.
The most basic desire of human nature is to feel important.
Smith
February 10, 2015 7:15 pm
False. Climatologist use various ecological and climatilogical evidences as well as many peer reviews and observations including geological and glacial evidence to construct the idea of climate change. And cosmologicers work with many different groups of physicist and astronomers to theorize of the universe with actual physical evidence and tested mathematical models. Science doesn’t work of assumptions it works off logic and raw information.
False. Climatologist use various ecological and climatilogical evidences as well as many peer reviews and observations including geological and glacial evidence to construct the idea of climate change.
They just cannot find any evidence for catastrophic man-made climate change. They DO create all sorts of mythical pal-reviewed Big Government self-called “Big Science” for the billions they are paid to create their Climastrology.
Anthony,
Can you not lambaste/ban the electric universe discussion full stop and acknowledge that, even if he may be a complete lunatic on some levels (and he may be), Wallace Thornhill has done a lot better job of making predictions of what NASA would find at comets (at least comets) than NASA itself has done? (And let’s not even get into star formation, which seems to take place along long glowing filaments rather than at the centre of slowly concentrating nebulae).
That however loony some of the EU ideas may be, they’re right in that electricity and plasma seem to play a larger role in the universe relative to the role assumed played by gravity in several mainstream models? That both are important and—even if they be mad as hatters and/or charlatans—that they’re pointing out some flaws in mainstream models (including the Big Bang) that need to be pointed out?
That Matt Taylor of shirtgate fame, a plasma physicist, having such an important role in that mission is a tacit admission of this by NASA, and more is likely to come, albeit too little, too late, and without the correct credit going to all the right people?
Please and thank you.
Christoph
D*mn! I had a bet going that “42” would appear within the first 100 comments, what took you so long, you cost me $100!
Had a bet on H*ll being endothermic or exothermic making an appearance too, lost that one also.
Alan Robertson February 10, 2015 at 7:56 pm
I’d edited “42” out of an earlier comment… if I’d made it and you’d won, would you have lent me $3?
Not only would I have, in at least one other universe I undoubtedly did.
[But in this universe, and in the interest of $3.00, the mods put it back in. 8<) .mod]
Sorry. I had to go through an infinite number of moments to get to it. Takes a while.
TRG
February 10, 2015 7:28 pm
Professor Susskind must know that if the universe wasn’t as we see it, then we would not be here to even think about it. It is necessarily special in the ways that make it possible for us to exist.
holts7
February 10, 2015 7:39 pm
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”(Genesis 1:1)
“Genesis 1:26
John 10:34
1 Corinthians 6:19”
Lenny Bruce reruns at 8:00
William Astley
February 10, 2015 7:43 pm
The fact that galaxies properties are tightly structured rather than random is a paradox. Something controls the development of galaxies and properties of galaxies. This observation supports the assertion that stars, include our sun, are fundamental different than assumed.
There are piles and piles of anomalies that support the assertion that the primary formation mechanism for galaxies is not mergers and the in fall of gas into the galaxy. There are observed massive flows of gas and objects out of ‘quasars’. It appears the objects that are ejected from quasars form the quasar seed for a new galaxy. There are strange strings of massive stars (paradox of youth stars, very hot stars that emit copious amounts of gas, that matches the elemental composition that of the ‘early’ universe) that have ‘formed’ at the core of our galaxy. These strings of stars exhibit weird structure. There are very hot weird objects in the core of the nearest galaxy to us Andromeda.
There are observed strings of galaxies that form in voids. There appear to be mother galaxies and baby galaxies which is consistent with an eternal universe, rather than a universe that formed 13.7 billion years ago from nothing. http://arxiv.org/abs/0811.1554
Galaxies appear simpler than expected
Galaxies are complex systems the evolution of which apparently results from the interplay of dynamics, star formation, chemical enrichment, and feedback from supernova explosions and supermassive black holes1. The hierarchical theory of galaxy formation holds that galaxies are assembled from smaller pieces, through numerous mergers of cold dark matter2,3,4. The properties of an individual galaxy should be controlled by six independent parameters including mass, angular-momentum, baryon-fraction, age and size, as well as by the accidents of its recent haphazard merger history. Here we report that a sample of galaxies that were first detected through their neutral hydrogen radio-frequency emission, and are thus free of optical selection effects5, shows five independent correlations among six independent observables, despite having a wide range of properties. This implies that the structure of these galaxies must be controlled by a single parameter, although we cannot identify this parameter from our dataset. Such a degree of organisation appears to be at odds with hierarchical galaxy formation, a central tenet of the cold dark matter paradigm in cosmology6.
jakee308
February 10, 2015 7:51 pm
Next up; Is the Theory of the Evolution of Species all it’s cracked up to be. (note I’m not referring to genetics or the moderate changes that a species undergoes due to environmental pressures but to the theory that we evolved by chance patterns of interactions. Forming complex systems without undergoing transitory stages of less complexity).
I’ve personally believed that evolution qualifies as one of the first instances of where a group of individual believers under the guise of “scientists” managed to convince through coercion, persuasion and outright lies that certain fragments of bone were proof positive of ancestral lines extending back to single cell bacteria. There’s some factor missing that spurred evolution and that massive complex changes could occur in relatively short periods of time over large number of vastly differing species is simply unacceptably simplistic and relies on a belief that borders as much on faith as opposing ideas.
Time for some real research and some debunking of some of the icons of paleontology and their various specious claims which just so happened to coincide with their long held beliefs and the “evidence” that rewarded them with fame and fortune.
Bill Murphy
February 10, 2015 8:13 pm
I postulate a Created Universe on even-numbered days, a tail-swallowing eternal-and-uncreated Universe on odd-numbered days — since each hypothesis, while equally paradoxical, neatly avoids the paradoxes of the other — with, of course, a day off each leap year for sheer solipsist debauchery… Jubal Harshaw (aka Robert Heinlein)
I find this a useful technique, and since the Big Bang fits rather neatly in both of Harshaw’s categories, I can remain within the current “consensus” every day except Feb 29th… Useful.
Steve Thayer
February 10, 2015 8:17 pm
I don’t see how the Big Bang theory is considered an explanation of how the universe was created when it doesn’t explain where the matter in the singularity came from. Its where the mass come from that needs an explanation. Its like someone walking into their home and seeing a bunch of geodes they’ve never seen before scattered all over the place and asking “Where did all this come from? How did this get like this?”, and some future cosmetologist smart ass kid says “They were all in a big pile until about 20 minutes ago when Johnny knocked them over!” If the people who wrote the Big Bang theory were around today they would be working for Microsoft, telling us smart sounding information that does JACK about answering your question.
Bill Illis, William Astley, george e. smith, Steve Thayer,lsvalgaard
The Pompous Git
Stephen Hawking:
It doesn’t matter whether you throw television sets, diamond rings, or your worst enemies, into a black hole. What comes back out will be the same.
There goes my plan for Elvis Impersonators…
OK. So, if the singularity “barrier” around a black hole means that “no matter what you throw into the gravitational sink around a black hole, it will never get there because the matter “stretches” towards infinity (I almost mis-typed that as “towards insanity” … which might be more correct anyway) around the black hole … Then how did the black hole get larger in the first place?
How did a super-massive black hole at the center of the galaxy get that big if mass only appears to get across the singularity zone going into the black hole, but can’t actually exceed the speed of light and cross over the mathemagical barrier around the black hole?
Second. Assume you throw a planet the size of Jupiter into a black hole – or three Elvis’s , which is about the same size. How big a “lump” (mountain) does that form on the black hole’s perfect spheroid – assuming the mass actually gets through the mathingamagical barrier around the black hole?
What if two black holes were approaching each other, then both tried to suck each other in?
The two separate-but-smaller singularity boundaries would be suddenly “too small” for the total mass as they got nearer, but both black hole masses would be distinct entities by themselves and outside the other’s singularity boundary. But suddenly, at a single point as they close towards each other, there suddenly would be “more black hole” inside the final singularity boundary than there would be volume within the two singularity boundaries.
What happens next? Everything goes invisible and we get “dark matter”?
Excellent questions to which I have no answer, but I do have a response. I remember thinking some decades ago that if I ever read “First Real Evidence for Black Holes” (and paraphrases) again, I would scream! It’s a bit like “First Ever Traverse of the Northwest Passage” when any historian knows it’s happened at least a hundred times before.
PEng
What a lovely post. I am enjoying this lot’s considered thoughts on the subject more than anything in the past month. Mind-stretching, almost as much as when Elvis’ disappears into the black hole egos of his impersonators.
The development of theologies, not only CAGW, but many things, has sponsored the parallel development of a system of apologetics for the insiders who justify their faith from within and try to prove the revelation is self-consistent, and an external theological analysis that examines it from outside looking for a rational explanation of its content and again, self-consistency (or not). CAGW fails mostly because of a lack of self-consistency.
Climate theology is winning over climate apologetics which too many times has to resort to gnostic knowledge and capabilities to elevate bald claims to the status of eternal physical truths.
@Pompous Git.
Ah, sixties racket and psychedelic art. Alright then.
Since you started it, how about… – a titanic theory, which is punctured and goes down, to the adherents’ shock and disbelief.
Darkness Darkness, LIsa Torban “The R.M.S Titanic”
“The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there.”
Professor Susskind must know that if the universe wasn’t as we see it, then we would not be here to even think about it. It is necessarily special in the ways that make it possible for us to exist.
It is our cosmology. We fancy ourselves so evolved, yet ours is equally implausible by any rational standard than any paleo cosmology. BTW, where do parallel universes fit in the graphic?
Dr. Strangelove
February 10, 2015 9:57 pm
“The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there,” Ahmed Farag Ali at Benha University and the Zewail City of Science and Technology,
The observational evidences for Big Bang. dark matter and dark energy are cosmic microwave background radiation, flat velocity curve of galactic rotation, supernova redshift, among others. The most serious problem with your model is how to explain all these observations.
“Although it’s not a true theory of quantum gravity, the model does contain elements from both quantum theory and general relativity. Ali and Das also expect their results to hold even if and when a full theory of quantum gravity is formulated.”
In short, you don’t know if your model will hold because it is not a full theory of quantum gravity. Speculations are interesting. Observations are essential.
If you are claiming the Big Bang is not a singularity, it violates general relativity. You have to formulate a full theory of quantum gravity to replace general relativity. Short of that, it’s all speculations – “I don’t know but I can make guesses”
There are currently almost a hundred different anomalies and paradoxes: Astronomical observations vs Big bang theory. To keep the big bang theory on life support the laws of physics were changed allowing ‘inflation’, dark matter, and dark energy to be created.
As the astronomical observations improved the number of anomalies have increased not decreased.
This paper for example lists 13 paradoxes and anomalies concerning the formation and evolution of galaxies.
http://arxiv.org/abs/1301.0623v2
This paper for example lists 10 paradoxes and anomalies concerning quasars. An example of an in your face quasar paradox is quasar spectrum does not exhibit time dilation (three peer reviewed papers confirm quasars do not exhibit time dilation, all possible explanations have been eliminated). If quasars were distant objects they would exhibit time dilation. There is no explanation as to why quasar spectrum does not exhibit time dilation and are no paper disputing the observational fact that quasars do not exhibit time dilation.
Time dilation is a consequence of the fact that the universe is expanding.
http://phys.org/news190027752.html
http://arxiv.org/abs/0910.4297
Pending problems in QSOs
Quasars (Quasi Stellar Objects, abbreviated as QSOs) are still nowadays, close to half a century after their discovery, objects which are not completely understood.
There are half dozen fundamental paradoxes concerning the ‘cosmic’ microwave background radiation.
The cosmic microwave background radiation (referred to as CMB) on small angles is too uniform (varies as 1 part of 100,000) vs 1 part of 5000 to 1 part of 7000 based on distribution of the matter if there is no ‘inflation’.
On large angles are vast cold and hot spots and the hot and cold spots in the CMB mysteriously alignment of the large features in the CMB with the axis of our solar system and with our galaxy.
http://arxiv.org/abs/1303.4786
http://arxiv.org/abs/0712.1118
There is a shortage of ionizing sources in the local universe (this problem would go away if the most distant observed quasar was at z=1 and something that happens to a quasars when they turn on that causes the higher than z=1 observed quasars.)
http://arxiv.org/abs/1404.2933
There is a factor of 24 too much high redshift infrared radiation. This problem would go away if what causes some quasars to appear high redshift also causes some galaxies to appear too high redshift.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7087/full/4401002a.html
So….some ones branes are about to explode ? They wouldn’t be p-branes?…..
Oh , right…that might be me……(8>))
This one requires a little imagination.
If the universal clock were slowly speeding up, then a given wavelength of light emitted 100,000,000 years ago would appear red shifted under today’s faster universal clock. It would take more “clicks of the clock” today for that same wave to pass a given point (longer wavelength). IMHO Red shift is misinterpreted as expansion. Red shift might be the only way to detect that the universal clock runs a bit faster today.
Since time is not really incremental, it could have been speeding up forever, and could continue to do so forever. Time has no mass, so no loss of energy to speed it up. Why would the clock speed up? I don’t know, why not?
Time is a very simple, and mostly overlooked variable in most motion equations. It’s treated as a constant in our current paridigm.
I’ve often wondered what the momentum of the universe is in the direction of time.
And is it constant in all locations? Can’t see how it would be with time going slower near gravity wells.
So where would that momentum go?
Since it is not incremental, it could just continue to speed up forever. There is no consequence other than an observed red shift of emissions depending upon the age of emisssion.
Forgot to mention, that under the sped-up clock theory, Light emitted very very long ago (from extreme distances) would appear as very low frequency (such as the background radiation) under today’s faster clock. That’s why the sky can appear dark even with an infinite universe.
Maybe you should review Randall Mills explanation of an oscillating universe that predicted increased expansion prior to observations. I know a lot might think he is a crackpot, but his equations explain tings at the sub atomic level through the universal level. All that has to be believed to accept Mills is that the electron is a 2 dimensional partial versus a 1 dimensional object that can be anywhere at once. I think the predictive power of his theory shows he might be on the right track.
Anthony,
This subject is interesting to me.
I have stumbled onto the work of Alexander Vilenkin, professor of cosmology at Tufts.
Borde Guth Vilenkin Theorem
Leonard Susskind
According to string theory we no longer live in a universe but in a diverse. Since the laws of physics are different in each diverse string theory may not apply there. Oh the conundrum. We will have to get more money to follow the doodle. Better yet we will have to get more money to build a diverse detector.
Golden, according to one branch of String Theory, CO2 causes catastrophic global warming, but only if it is anthropogenic in origin. Natural CO2 can rise to 7000 ppm without heating the Earth above 24C because that CO2 has additional dimensions that prevent bad consequences. It is amazing what can happen in String Theory worlds. I believe the possibilities are literally limitless. Sorta like CAGW funding.
Well folks, it’s time for some answers to… so here we go, some answers and big ones, too and this is the way it is.
You see, the universe is finite (there’s a concept) and it is not the only universe and not only that, but in this universe are many layers and levels and we’re just barely aware of the one we’re in and sometimes a couple more, though don’t really catch on to that, very often.
There was a group of adventuros that did know a few of these things so set out to find more answers, and they spun themselves up way way faster than the speed of light and went through the black hole and whattaya know, there was the universe hanging on a thread, right alongside a bunch of other little (big) universes, and they were looking just like one of those little puffy white balls along the edge of old timey curtains. These travelers, quakin’ in their socks though they were, noticed the form that all of these little U’s were danglin from and danged if there weren’t a lot of those things, too and this sequence kept up for a time and so it went and suddenly, the intrepid ones found themselves standing in a city and were duly greeted and somebody told ’em – you’re the first ones from your scheme of things to make it this far and the explorers thought- This Far? now it wasn’t really a thought and nobody was really talking, but the city folks said yeah and by the way, you aren’t eternal yet, but now you’re immortal and poof all the travelers were instantly spun back in their bodies and looked at each other and said, well, that was sure something and now we’re immortal, let’s go eat lunch. Oh, and by the way, size is the only illusion. And those are some answers, boys and girls.
These words were not written to be believed or to be disbelieved.
[42]The Divine Paradox — A physicist, who I shall not identify, recently said this: “Although the Big Bang singularity arises directly and unavoidably from the mathematics of general relativity, some scientists see it as problematic because the math can explain only what happened immediately after—not at or before—the singularity.” Duh? Well isn’t that conundrum easily explained? How can a math that explains the world that now exists, be expected to work in a world before it exists. It is stupid to even think that it could or would. Sometime, I fear, people get so over educated and wedded to a world view that they cannot imagine the obvious. Once you get back in time to singularity, then there can be no logical or mathematical explanation for what or who caused it. The answer to that requires a divine answer. If God did not create the physical world, then maybe the physical world does not really exist at all. And, if that is true, then who created Twitter to allow me to write this?
The physics that we understand for our present universe is not the physics that prevailed prior to Plank time. The “primordial soup” of that time was governed by different laws of which we can never know. Only when this soup cooled enough for the forces to separate did we see the current physics emerge. The real question is how many times did the so called big bang happen only to produce a universe where the physics did not allow any intelligent life to develop. One thing is for sure, this time the physics was just right for intelligent life to develop. So is this the first big bang, the 1000th or the 1,000,000th? Alas, we will never know the answer to that either but it is enjoyable to wonder about it.
It’s not just climate science that’s controlled by a corrupt, greedy establishment funding by an outrageous amount of government money. Cosmology and astrophysics is as well. Any field of science taking big money from government is corrupt.
I think that’s only part of it (a significant part), that there’s also a tendency to want to be in fashion as the recent article about Hubert Lamb which Jo Nova posted talked about.
The most basic desire of human nature is to feel important.
False. Climatologist use various ecological and climatilogical evidences as well as many peer reviews and observations including geological and glacial evidence to construct the idea of climate change. And cosmologicers work with many different groups of physicist and astronomers to theorize of the universe with actual physical evidence and tested mathematical models. Science doesn’t work of assumptions it works off logic and raw information.
Smith.
They just cannot find any evidence for catastrophic man-made climate change. They DO create all sorts of mythical pal-reviewed Big Government self-called “Big Science” for the billions they are paid to create their Climastrology.
Anthony,
Can you not lambaste/ban the electric universe discussion full stop and acknowledge that, even if he may be a complete lunatic on some levels (and he may be), Wallace Thornhill has done a lot better job of making predictions of what NASA would find at comets (at least comets) than NASA itself has done? (And let’s not even get into star formation, which seems to take place along long glowing filaments rather than at the centre of slowly concentrating nebulae).
That however loony some of the EU ideas may be, they’re right in that electricity and plasma seem to play a larger role in the universe relative to the role assumed played by gravity in several mainstream models? That both are important and—even if they be mad as hatters and/or charlatans—that they’re pointing out some flaws in mainstream models (including the Big Bang) that need to be pointed out?
That Matt Taylor of shirtgate fame, a plasma physicist, having such an important role in that mission is a tacit admission of this by NASA, and more is likely to come, albeit too little, too late, and without the correct credit going to all the right people?
Please and thank you.
Christoph
42
D*mn! I had a bet going that “42” would appear within the first 100 comments, what took you so long, you cost me $100!
Had a bet on H*ll being endothermic or exothermic making an appearance too, lost that one also.
I’d edited “42” out of an earlier comment… if I’d made it and you’d won, would you have lent me $3?
Alan Robertson February 10, 2015 at 7:56 pm
I’d edited “42” out of an earlier comment… if I’d made it and you’d won, would you have lent me $3?
Not only would I have, in at least one other universe I undoubtedly did.
[But in this universe, and in the interest of $3.00, the mods put it back in. 8<) .mod]
Actually, you did it an infinite number of universes. Just not in this one. Today isn’t your lucky day, is it? ☹
Sorry. I had to go through an infinite number of moments to get to it. Takes a while.
Professor Susskind must know that if the universe wasn’t as we see it, then we would not be here to even think about it. It is necessarily special in the ways that make it possible for us to exist.
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”(Genesis 1:1)
Genesis 1:26
John 10:34
1 Corinthians 6:19
[And we will close that Book with this comment. .mod]
“Genesis 1:26
John 10:34
1 Corinthians 6:19”
Lenny Bruce reruns at 8:00
The fact that galaxies properties are tightly structured rather than random is a paradox. Something controls the development of galaxies and properties of galaxies. This observation supports the assertion that stars, include our sun, are fundamental different than assumed.
There are piles and piles of anomalies that support the assertion that the primary formation mechanism for galaxies is not mergers and the in fall of gas into the galaxy. There are observed massive flows of gas and objects out of ‘quasars’. It appears the objects that are ejected from quasars form the quasar seed for a new galaxy. There are strange strings of massive stars (paradox of youth stars, very hot stars that emit copious amounts of gas, that matches the elemental composition that of the ‘early’ universe) that have ‘formed’ at the core of our galaxy. These strings of stars exhibit weird structure. There are very hot weird objects in the core of the nearest galaxy to us Andromeda.
There are observed strings of galaxies that form in voids. There appear to be mother galaxies and baby galaxies which is consistent with an eternal universe, rather than a universe that formed 13.7 billion years ago from nothing.
http://arxiv.org/abs/0811.1554
Next up; Is the Theory of the Evolution of Species all it’s cracked up to be. (note I’m not referring to genetics or the moderate changes that a species undergoes due to environmental pressures but to the theory that we evolved by chance patterns of interactions. Forming complex systems without undergoing transitory stages of less complexity).
I’ve personally believed that evolution qualifies as one of the first instances of where a group of individual believers under the guise of “scientists” managed to convince through coercion, persuasion and outright lies that certain fragments of bone were proof positive of ancestral lines extending back to single cell bacteria. There’s some factor missing that spurred evolution and that massive complex changes could occur in relatively short periods of time over large number of vastly differing species is simply unacceptably simplistic and relies on a belief that borders as much on faith as opposing ideas.
Time for some real research and some debunking of some of the icons of paleontology and their various specious claims which just so happened to coincide with their long held beliefs and the “evidence” that rewarded them with fame and fortune.
I find this a useful technique, and since the Big Bang fits rather neatly in both of Harshaw’s categories, I can remain within the current “consensus” every day except Feb 29th… Useful.
I don’t see how the Big Bang theory is considered an explanation of how the universe was created when it doesn’t explain where the matter in the singularity came from. Its where the mass come from that needs an explanation. Its like someone walking into their home and seeing a bunch of geodes they’ve never seen before scattered all over the place and asking “Where did all this come from? How did this get like this?”, and some future cosmetologist smart ass kid says “They were all in a big pile until about 20 minutes ago when Johnny knocked them over!” If the people who wrote the Big Bang theory were around today they would be working for Microsoft, telling us smart sounding information that does JACK about answering your question.
Stephen Hawking:
There goes my plan for Elvis Impersonators…
Bill Illis, William Astley, george e. smith, Steve Thayer,lsvalgaard
OK. So, if the singularity “barrier” around a black hole means that “no matter what you throw into the gravitational sink around a black hole, it will never get there because the matter “stretches” towards infinity (I almost mis-typed that as “towards insanity” … which might be more correct anyway) around the black hole … Then how did the black hole get larger in the first place?
How did a super-massive black hole at the center of the galaxy get that big if mass only appears to get across the singularity zone going into the black hole, but can’t actually exceed the speed of light and cross over the mathemagical barrier around the black hole?
Second. Assume you throw a planet the size of Jupiter into a black hole – or three Elvis’s , which is about the same size. How big a “lump” (mountain) does that form on the black hole’s perfect spheroid – assuming the mass actually gets through the mathingamagical barrier around the black hole?
What if two black holes were approaching each other, then both tried to suck each other in?
The two separate-but-smaller singularity boundaries would be suddenly “too small” for the total mass as they got nearer, but both black hole masses would be distinct entities by themselves and outside the other’s singularity boundary. But suddenly, at a single point as they close towards each other, there suddenly would be “more black hole” inside the final singularity boundary than there would be volume within the two singularity boundaries.
What happens next? Everything goes invisible and we get “dark matter”?
Excellent questions to which I have no answer, but I do have a response. I remember thinking some decades ago that if I ever read “First Real Evidence for Black Holes” (and paraphrases) again, I would scream! It’s a bit like “First Ever Traverse of the Northwest Passage” when any historian knows it’s happened at least a hundred times before.
PEng
What a lovely post. I am enjoying this lot’s considered thoughts on the subject more than anything in the past month. Mind-stretching, almost as much as when Elvis’ disappears into the black hole egos of his impersonators.
The development of theologies, not only CAGW, but many things, has sponsored the parallel development of a system of apologetics for the insiders who justify their faith from within and try to prove the revelation is self-consistent, and an external theological analysis that examines it from outside looking for a rational explanation of its content and again, self-consistency (or not). CAGW fails mostly because of a lack of self-consistency.
Climate theology is winning over climate apologetics which too many times has to resort to gnostic knowledge and capabilities to elevate bald claims to the status of eternal physical truths.
What of Information’s Origin?
Neither of those equations give any explanation for the origin of complex specified information.
See Werner Gitt, In the Beginning was Information. and publications by William Dembski and Michael Behe.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
🙂
In the beginning the Universe was created.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.
Douglas Adams
Jon Simonson
And then the Big Bang happened. Simple, isn’t it?
Jon Simonson
But we will not permit you to criticize God for having done so. (Nor may you criticize Him for how He did it.)
I don’t care.
(Was it not pointed out earlier that we are gods?
Robertson is playing faaaast and loose.
Alan
But I thought God is dead. So if you are dead, how come I can read your words?
@ur momisugly Zeke
Aah, Fast and Bulbous…
Little g.
@Pompous Git.
Ah, sixties racket and psychedelic art. Alright then.
Since you started it, how about… – a titanic theory, which is punctured and goes down, to the adherents’ shock and disbelief.
Darkness Darkness, LIsa Torban “The R.M.S Titanic”
“The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there.”
Professor Susskind must know that if the universe wasn’t as we see it, then we would not be here to even think about it. It is necessarily special in the ways that make it possible for us to exist.
And then another shoe dropped on the “settled science” of dietary cholesterol:
http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2015/02/11/poised-withdraw-longstanding-warnings-about-cholesterol/AdDWztSEXxDeM2waVH5ifP/story.html
Seems “man-made” cholesterol accounts for only about 20% of the blood cholesterol level – 80% being natural variability (DNA). Sound familiar? Long-held beliefs and long-standing guidelines to be revised – stay tuned.
It is our cosmology. We fancy ourselves so evolved, yet ours is equally implausible by any rational standard than any paleo cosmology. BTW, where do parallel universes fit in the graphic?
“The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there,” Ahmed Farag Ali at Benha University and the Zewail City of Science and Technology,
The observational evidences for Big Bang. dark matter and dark energy are cosmic microwave background radiation, flat velocity curve of galactic rotation, supernova redshift, among others. The most serious problem with your model is how to explain all these observations.
“Although it’s not a true theory of quantum gravity, the model does contain elements from both quantum theory and general relativity. Ali and Das also expect their results to hold even if and when a full theory of quantum gravity is formulated.”
In short, you don’t know if your model will hold because it is not a full theory of quantum gravity. Speculations are interesting. Observations are essential.
If you are claiming the Big Bang is not a singularity, it violates general relativity. You have to formulate a full theory of quantum gravity to replace general relativity. Short of that, it’s all speculations – “I don’t know but I can make guesses”