you'd just argue with them ad infinitum over really silly things
(my emphasis)
But how to decide what's a "really silly thing" and what's the tiny thing - that you discover by being pedantic - which ushers in a revolution in physics? (an example, from the early years of the 20th century: http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2008/01/light-deflection-at-sun.html).
IM(vH)O, getting a working arrangement on how to decide if something is "evidence" or not, on how to analyse ("interpret") it, on how to construct and test hypotheses, and so on is essential for there to be any meaningful dialogue. And you'll see that this is included in my list of To Dos, in an SD comment of mine from earlier today.
You view astrophysical interpretations as if they are statements of facts. Like much of the remainder of your own discipline, you frequently ignore the huge number of assumptions involved within these theories. This is not an effective strategy for getting at the truth.
Pot, meet kettle; kettle, meet pot.
Your comments contain much unintended humour; this is a great example!:clap:
I seem to remember someone writing several SD comments about an interpretation of an "image" from the NACO instrument attached to one of the VLTs. When it was pointed out to this writer that they had misunderstood what the image was - in essence ignoring the huge number of assumptions involved with it - was the writer grateful for the opportunity to learn more about how astronomical images are obtained?
Indeed, ignoring the long chains of logic, inextricably tied to physics theories, that are part and parcel of every modern astronomical observation is "not an effective strategy for getting at the truth".
You could wake up on any particular morning and come to find that a new paradigm-changing observation has been made, and that your paradigm lost out
And do you know what I'll do on that day*? Go out and celebrate!
I would guess that a majority, perhaps a large majority, of astronomers (astrophysicists, cosmologists, planetary scientists,...) would do the same.
For myself, I don't have to guess, because the future is already in my (personal) past. HINT: I think you've read about high-z SNe, haven't you?
And a reasonably intelligent person can see that you value feeling and sounding right over actually being right, because to prioritize *being* right, a person has to be willing to admit that they can be wrong -- even on the big questions.
No need to read tea leaves; I'll say it straight: APODNereid can be wrong. In fact, I'll go one better, and point you to a comment I made, that you responded to, where I said exactly that: "You know, I could well be wrong about this." (http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=426528&no_d2=1&cid=22145892)^
you can't even explain simple things like the temperature distributions for planets
Why do you think it's a simple thing? How do you determine what's "simple" and what's not?
Again, this goes to how your alternative approach to science differs from that of real scientists (more later, no doubt).
[threats of fire and brimstone, of dismissal and beheading, of shoes and ships and sealing wax, and cabbages and kings]
Oh dear, you've got me quaking in my (low-heeled, today) boots! Oh woe is me!!
Does that mean that you won't indulge me - and readers of this SD comment - in outlining what you'd observe if you were given a million seconds of HST, Chandra, Spitzer, SKA, JWST, VLT, Gemini, MAGIC, AMANDA, LIGO, LOFAR, etc 'telescope' time?**
* well, not that day anyway; more likely a year or two later, once the independent verifications and validations had come in,
Indeed, there is no alternative, scientific cosmology being presented.
When you get a chance, would you mind providing links to material on any such alternative that addresses (quantitatively, of course) the following: * why the night sky is dark * the Hubble relationship (i.e. the relationship between observed redshift and distance, for galaxies, quasars, GRBs, etc) * the primordial abundance of light nuclides (H, D, 3He, 4He, and 6Li) * the SED (spectral energy distribution) of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) - i.e. its 2.73K blackbody spectrum * the CMB dipole * the CMB angular power spectrum * the observed large-scale structure of the universe (here's an example: http://www.sdss.org/news/releases/20031028.powerspectrum.html).
You act as if there is only one possible cosmology that can possibly be created
No need to read the APODNereid tea leaves... I'll say it directly, loudly, and clearly: I think the number of possible cosmologies (to use pln2bz's term) is certainly greater than one. Further, only a few decades ago at least two possible cosmologies seemed consistent with the relevant astronomical observations and experimental results (today there's only one, that I know of).
many very intelligent people have backed the plasma-based cosmology approach
I thought you'd've given up using this kind of argument; you've certainly been beaten up for it many times, here in SD.
Once upon a time, many very intelligent people backed the "Earth is flat" idea too, and the élan vital approach. The universe cares not one jot what people, intelligent or not, back.
I can tell that you have not read the materials because you consistently assume that the arguments are less powerful than they actually are.
your objections to it would give way to more nuanced feeling towards it
If you care to read my previous SD comment, in this thread, you'll see what I'm planning to do. In a nutshell, I will examine - using standard methods found in science - "the plasma-based cosmology approach"; specifically, the extent to which it is internally consistent, independently verifiable (or can be independently validated, if you prefer), and key characteristics of the methods used to classify things as "facts" (and "evidence"). I intend to use an empirical approach.
the telescopes are getting better
Indeed they are!
Let's do a little "what if" experiment, shall we?
Imagine you were granted 1 million seconds of time on the Hubble Space Telescope, using any instruments (or combination), and spread out over as much as a year. What would you use your time to observe?
Being a first draft on how to be more effective in addressing Electric Universe (Plasma Universe, etc) comments, posted in threads on stories in the Science section of SD.
Empirically, such threads stay open for comments from 4 to at least 10 days; anyone have insights into how to accurately predict this lifespan?
Empirically, you get ~3500 characters of text before "Read rest of this comment" kicks in (unless your score is high).
SD itself gives guidelines on how a comment's score is arrived at (it's a dynamical process).
So in the Mechanics of Writing Department, -=*write early, write briefly, write often, and write well*=- would seem to sum it up.
On to the content.
Here's a provisional list of EU faves (I'm leaving out mythology, for now): * magnetic reconnection * solar wind accelerates past planets * electrical neutrality * spiral galaxy rotation curves * plasma physics, per laboratory experiments * Alfvén and Birkeland hero worship * Z-pinches
So in the Prepare your URLs Department, an SD comment on each of these would be very handy.
Now for my fave: the Electric Universe method of research and investigation.
Essentially nothing seems to be available, in terms of an outline of what the core attributes of this alternative form of science is supposed to be, though leokor's comment is quite helpful (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=388752&cid=21836590).
However, we can formulate hypotheses on what these attributes are, and test them using the body of SD comments from EU proponents as input data (in addition to the prolific pln2bz and leokor (1 comment only), I have found iantresman (also 1 comment only) and mgmirkin; any reader know of others?).
So in the Turn a Mirror on Them Department, some research into what the ideal world of Electric Universe 'science' looks like is called for (stay tuned).
Of course, anyone reading this is welcome to add comments!
Cosmic variance (Daniel Holz', JoAnne Hewitt's, John Conway's, Julienne Dalcanton's, Mark Trodden's, Risa Wechsler's, and Sean Carroll's blog) has just been upgraded to support LaTeX! (http://cosmicvariance.com/2008/01/22/succumbing-to-latex/)
Comment 8, by Julienne: "This has to be the most fabulously geeky comment thread, EVAH!"
In future, when I respond to your comments, I shall state explicitly that the intended audience does not include you.
With that preamble over...
Down here, at the bottom of the ocean of air, distant "point sources" in the optical (or visible) and near-infrared wavebands are smeared out by what astronomers call "seeing". You notice this as the twinkling of stars in the night sky. Assuming radial symmetry*, the 1D distribution of intensity of such a seeing smeared point source looks like a Gaussian, but isn't (it's a Kolmogorov distribution, as the primary source of distortion is turbulence). Adaptive optics is a term used to describe a range of techniques to deconvolve the seeing, to recover the "beyond the atmosphere" 2D distribution of source intensity; the most ambitious of these aim to deliver diffraction limited images, using phase conjugation and laser guide beacons to "measure and compensate for turbulence-induced phase aberrations in three dimensions".
The image cited by pln2bz was taken by NaCO (NAOS-CONICA, Nasmyth Adaptive Optics System Near-Infrared Imager and Spectrograph), attached to one of the VLTs (http://www.eso.org/instruments/naco/index.html). Note the following comment: "Publications based on data obtained with the NACO instrument should quote the following reference papers: Lenzen, R. et al. 2003, SPIE 4841, 944 and Rousset, G. et al. 2003, SPIE 4839, 140." Clearly, pln2bz did not bother (perhaps he felt his SD comments did not constitute a "publication"); he's in good company, as his source was undoubtedly TPOD (or similar), which also did not bother.
Why does this matter?
Fundamentally, it goes to the issue of "evidence", which EU proponents (not only pln2bz, not only on Slashdot) get so worked up about.
As I said above, the two objects in the VLT/NACO image are statistically the same as two point sources.
One could, as pln2bz has done, claim to see something other than two point sources.
I estimate that you have alleged at least 100 times (here in SD) that (many of) those who respond to your SD comments do not take the trouble to even read the material you present, much less understand it.
May I present a mirror, for your consideration?
Just a few days ago, in comments on another SD story (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=423972&cid=22125844), I suggested that you had misunderstood that image, not least because you did not know how it was created. I gave you a link, to a website dedicated to explaining what the instrument (NACO) is and how it works.
Did you try to understand it? or even bother to read it?
We can conduct an unscientific test. The hypothesis is that you did not read the material; the test is whether a subsequent comment by you contains objective evidence to that effect. Let's see...
If you look carefully at the image, you can see that there is still a slight connective filament between them in the infrared. That suggests that the red dwarf has yet to achieve an electromagnetically stable orbit -- which probably means that the expulsion did not occur all that long ago. I'm not asserting certainty here; this is my own personal speculation based upon what I already know. But I think that I am right here. Not 100% clear-cut, but pretty close, don't you think?
Somewhat disheartening, if not entirely unexpected... do you realise just how much credibility you lose with a readership like Slashdot's? How much of a hypocrite you appear?
I mean, if someone takes the trouble to try to explain to you how an astronomical image is created, and points out that your interpretation is inconsistent with how the image was created, and you not only ignore them, but (seem to) continue to assume it shows certain features which are, in fact, merely artifacts, why should any reader not be highly sceptical of other things you write?
Here's the straight dope: the two objects in the "image" are completely consistent with POINT SOURCES! More specifically, the two sources have 2D fourier transforms that are statistically the same as point sources, given the estimated PSF (which PSF has also been measured, during the engineering run prior to NACO being signed over to the scientific team).
Your favored set of theories over time became less physical and more metaphysical until now things like dark energy and dark matter are required to keep the thing moving forward. I can't speak for AC (though I don't know how you managed to see inside her head sufficiently deeply to know what set of theories she favours), but I am puzzled by what you wrote here (my emphasis).
Would you be kind enough to elaborate on what you mean by "physical" and "metaphysical"? In your reply would you mind including at least a brief mention of gluons, colour charge, the chirality of neutrinos (and anti-neutrinos), and quarks?
Oh, and as usual, some pointers to where an SD reader may review alternative explanations to the wide range of excellent astronomical observations that underpin dark (non-baryonic) matter and 'dark energy'. Quantitative explanations, of course.
When the spiral arms of galaxies were observed to rotate unusually, everybody should have taken a very deep breath and reconsidered the fundamental force of the universe. It was never done. Hmm, I guess you've not heard of Moti Milgrom, or Jacob Bekenstein, or R. H. Sanders, or S. McGaugh, or... I'm talking about MOND, of course, which fits your bill perfectly ("reconsider[] the fundamental force of the universe") (http://www.astro.umd.edu/~ssm/mond/).
One more categorical pln2bz assertion busted.
Astrophysics is a complete and utter mess! Is that - solely - because you don't understand it?
And if I declare, with two exclamation marks, and in all caps ASTROPHYSICS IS A SUBLIME SYMPHONY!! does that trump your lower case, one exclamation mark claim?
We don't even get clear and concise explanations for what gravity and mass are! Hmm... have you read a textbook on the General Theory of Relativity? If you have, I'm astonished to read that you think it is not a "clear and concise explanation for what gravity [is]". If you haven't, I'd be happy to make some recommendations. I'm even more astonished when you consider how well it has passed every experimental test to date ("The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment" http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0510072).
I'll grant you that the Higgs mechanism is somewhat less than clear and concise, in terms of explaining how particles acquire (or have) mass ("a relativistically invariant quantum fluid" requires quite a bit more math than non-Euclidean geometry), but it is still a remarkable proposal. Perhaps this year or next will see the first announcements of experimental results confirming (or not) the consistency of this proposal with the universal reality.
One more thing: your comment reads like you somehow expect that the universe should be (easily) comprehensible to at least a large subset of Homo sapiens individuals. Where does this expectation come from?
Each internet discussion forum has its own rules, and within those rules, a wide range of writing styles and delivered content are possible.
There's also the effectiveness of what's written, in terms of the writer's (or writers') intentions and goals.
"Electric Universe" (and plasma universe, plasma cosmology, etc) ideas are all over the internet, with prolific proponents in a great many discussion fora. For some reason, such proponents seem to be particularly active in fora (or sections of fora) devoted to science, and within science to physics, astronomy, astrophysics, and cosmology. At least, that's my perception.
On those fora which have rules to enforce their avowed science-based scope and purpose, it seems EU proponents are, by and large, no longer active... either because they've been banned (for persistent rule violations) or can no longer make their case.
This is not surprising, given the disconnect between the content and presentation of EU "theories" and the methods etc of the relevant sciences.
pln2bz has been writing in SD for some time now, and it seems that most of those who bother to respond to his comments have already concluded just how non-scientific the content of those comments is. This is, no doubt, partly due to the numbingly repetitious nature of his comments; it's as if nothing of significance has happened in "EU theory" for the last decade or three - certainly no new papers.
Worse, pln2bz doesn't even seem to modify his faves (magnetic reconnection, the Deep Impact mission, Peratt's galaxy simulations, solar wind acceleration, to name just a few) in light of the often very strong critiques of these, from other SD writers. In one way, this makes rebuttal easy - simply re-write the last rebuttal, to improve its impact with SD readers.
The most curious thing to me is the extreme reluctance to say anything about how, from the POV of "EU theory" as the harbinger of an alternative, science (astronomy, physics, etc) should be done: is there a role for independent verification and validation? for independent review? for (public) disclosure of methods and data? What is the role of hypotheses (or equivalents)? of models (whether quantitative or not)? of theories (in whatever form)? How is the legitimacy (or otherwise) of testing to be determined? And so on.
To me, this extreme reluctance to even acknowledge the pertinence of these (and related) questions is a good indication that the proponents of this stuff know - in their hearts - that honest answers would greatly damage their cause, possibly fatally.
So, why bother? I'm still trying to answer that question.
check the January 2008 issue of Astronomy Magazine. Although I don't have a copy, there is apparently an article in there that asks the question if Jupiter is powered by a Z-Pinch Is it an article entitled "The biggest planet's 5 deepest mysteries", written by Michael Carroll?
In any case, Astronomy Magazine is hardly a relevant peer-reviewed journal is it! I mean, they almost never have any equations, do they?
Do you know which (published) paper(s) present a case for this?
How many people must be talking about it before you decide to actually investigate it and contemplate it for yourself, Nereid? I'm not sure why you keep thinking this is in any way relevant.
I mean, tens or hundreds of millions of people (or more) talk about astrology, and have been doing so for a long time.
Back to the same question I've asked many a time; in the pln2bz view of alternative science:
What constitutes evidence?
What methods are legitimate wrt investigating such evidence?
What methods are legitimate wrt presenting, reviewing, critiquing, (and so on) conclusions drawn from investigations of evidence?
Oh, and the handle is APODNereid, if you please.
Double oh, may we expect to see, sometime soon, a preprint on the arXiv server, with you as an author, showing that all those plasma physics lab experiments on magnetic reconnection are fatally flawed?
Grad students are flocking to the www.thunderbolts.info site [...] You're not paying attention to what's happening. Why are *grad* students flocking to the Thunderbolts site? Perhaps it will be upgraded, to allow discussions involving equations, numbers, and stuff (such as those found in papers by Alfvén), say by permitting LaTeX coding?
Perhaps some of those new folk will get around, soon, to writing papers which they submit for publication in relevant peer-reviewed journals?
Perhaps some of them will try to explore - quantitatively - the numerous internal inconsistencies in "EU theory"?
Perhaps the text which accompanies the TPODs will start to contain fewer gross inaccuracies?
What they've found is that we do not need to postulate that the universe is filled with 95% invisible matters. Care to explain - quantitatively - the dozens of detailed observations of weak and strong gravitational lensing of rich clusters of galaxies?
Care to explain - quantitatively - Zwicky's 1930s detailed observations on the radial velocity distribution of the Coma galaxy clusters (since repeated, for hundreds of other clusters)?
Care to explain - quantitatively - the angular power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background (CMB)?
Care to explain - quantitatively - the observed trend in the average density of the universe, as the scale over which that density is measured increases?
Care to explain - quantitatively - why the night sky is dark (except, of course, in Manhattan)?
They can generate spiral galaxies with the proper rotation curves using nothing more than the characteristics of laboratory plasmas. You know one thing that rather annoys me is your repetition of stuff that you've been called on before, had shown to be (often grossly) wrong, and have never addressed.
This is another example of such dishonesty.
Peratt's papers on this topic do NOT, repeat do NOT, "generate spiral galaxies with the proper rotation curves using nothing more than the characteristics of laboratory plasmas"!
If you continue to think that they do, let's have a discussion on these assertions. If you are unprepared to do so, please don't get offended if I (and others) start to treat what you say accordingly.
The apparent problem is that you appear to not realize that laboratory plasma physicists are the ones arguing for the Electric Universe concepts against the mathematicians who play with beautiful equations all day long. Translation: pln2bz has read that a few (less than ten) people who seem to have affiliation with a plasma physics lab are "arguing for the Electric Universe concepts".
Fact: even in the MRX (Magnetic Reconnection Experiment, attached to the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab http://www.pppl.gov/projects/pages/magnetic_reconnect.html) there are (apparently) no laboratory plasma physicists so arguing.
EU is highly testable. Translation: only if those doing the marketing of the idea are not required to show how, in any meaningful detail.
Fact: to the extent that the rich variety of theories, models, hypotheses, etc that comprises mainstream science is inconsistent with "EU", then said EU has been tested, repeatedly... and has failed every test.
The problem isn't that Electric Universe isn't testable. It's that people like yourself haven't *read* the evidence that clearly points out what has been tested in it Translation: if I say this enough times, my critics will get tired of wasting their time responding.
Fact: Some of those who've commented on the EU ideas presented by pln2bz have not, in fact, "read the evidence". However, many have, and have questioned it and challenged it. So far, your track record in answering these direct, pertinent questions and challenges has been nearly perfect (you've failed to answer, almost every time).
It is absolutely ASTOUNDING that you look past the fact that the conventional theories don't understand 95% of the universe! Time and time again, I have to help you guys perform a reality check. Understanding just 5% of something in any discipline other than astrophysics typically means that you do not understand it at all! You guys think that you have created this theory that is above reproach -- even by people who work within plasma laboratories. What you've actually done is confused the masses and induced them to become apathetic about space! What can we conclude from your track record of comments on this SD thread?
You have made many assertions.
Others have questioned, or challenged, or rebutted, your assertions.
Of the assertions challenged, where independent verification or validation seems possible, I think the best that could be said is that you were unable to answer the questions or address the challenges.
More disturbing, however, is that most direct questions or challenges or rebuttals have gone unanswered, unaddressed.
Instead, it seems you simply ignore the challenges etc; sometimes you change the topic, sometimes you make even wilder assertions, and so on.
... to get to the meat of your comments, pln2bz; namely, to what extent do you suggest that astronomical phenomena be investigated using scientific methods?
And if the answer is at least "completely!" (or equivalent), then can we discuss what you consider to be scientific methods?
It may be that the universe is ruled by electric currents; it may be that it's not (and it may be that it's something in between). Surely a few comments discussing how smart people (nerds or not) could go about finding out would be time and typing well spent?
That you, yourself, reject the standard scientific (astronomy, astrophysics, cosmology, space/plasma physics) paradigm seems clear*.
What's not clear - to me at least - is what you suggest should be used instead.
May I ask, again, that you do your SD readers a favour by putting fingers to keyboard and at least outlining your preferred alternative?
{turning to some specifics}
All of the clues are right before us to assemble a competing cosmology to the conventional theories. Why is it not done? Whatever the reason, it's certainly not because it *cannot* be done. So why not do it, pln2bz? Let's see... assume 400 SD comments by pln2bz; assume 30 minutes per comment... that's 200 hours, just on the comments themselves! Imagine how much of such a competing cosmology you could have assembled with that 200 hours.
The Plasma Universe point of view is incredibly effective at describing planetary features within our local solar system. Whether or not people here realize it matters little. Do you mean "incredibly effective" in the same way that you (grossly) mis-interpreted image processing artifacts as "infrared filaments indicative of lightning from a corona"?
Or do you mean incredibly effective in the same way Birkeland's model of the rings of Saturn are self-luminous (when they're not)?
Or do you mean incredibly effective in the same way that the orbit of the Moon can be modelled - without plasmas - to a ~2 cm accuracy (in the sense of observed - expected)?
Perhaps people here don't realise it because it's not true?
there are in fact alternative possible explanations for our observations which astrophysicists tend to ignore
Or, more pertinently, these so-called alternatives fail several key tests, such as internal consistency, consistency with relevant theories whose domains of applicability overlap (quantum mechanics, in this case), and (above all) consistency with good, relevant observations.
They are complicit with ignoring these alternative explanations because math already exists for the conventional paradigms
And you know this because? Your objective evidence is... what, exactly?
The public has this misconception that astrophysicists have *ruled out* alternative explanations in an honest manner by completing a comprehensive review of all of the theories out there, and what one discovers over time is that in fact, that has not occurred in the slightest
So, once again, if you please... references to papers, published in relevant peer-reviewed journals, which lay out this/these 'alternative explanation(s)' and which show internal consistency, consistency with quantum mechanics (in the relevant domains of applicability), and (above all) consistency with good, relevant observations and experimental results.
I think I have asked for this nearly ten times now; not once (that I recall) have you answered.
We've seen stars erratically jump all over the HR diagram, including FG Sagittae, V605 Aquilae and V4334 Sagittarii and V838 Monocerotis ("The Electric Sky" by Don Scott points to a total of seven counter-examples to predicted stellar evolution)
Hmm... not a bad track record then, for standard models of stars... given that there are detailed records on what, about a billion stars?!
And if any SD reader is interested, a quick check on the relevant, peer-reviewed literature will show that pln2bz's assertion here is, shall we say, only coincidentally consistent with the truth.
In fact, we see unusual things with stars on a weekly basis, and this should rationally induce some self-doubt. And yet, it does not! Every enigmatic observation is just rolled into the standard model as quickly as it goes into the books, and at the expense of people actually proposing creative solutions that better explain *all* of our observations.
Well, I hate to break it to you, but science is a process of discovery... only by testing, modifying, testing again, and so on, is progress made. After all, if the 'enigmatic observations' cannot be 'rolled up into the standard model', then it's time to change it!
As for 'people actually proposing creative solutions', let's have them roll up their sleeves, write up their solutions, and get them published, shall we? That way everyone can review them, critique them, test them, and so on.
And yet, there are laboratory plasma physicists who argue against things like magnetic reconnection as being redundant of exploding plasma double layers (Alfven included). It is wrong to completely ignore these people. We should foster a public debate on these issues and honestly assess who is right without preferences to either. Instead, what we get is millions of dollars pumped into magnetic reconnection with little to no consideration of exploding plasma double layers.
So, in the last few hours, you've gone from claiming magnetic reconnection cannot possibly be right (because Alfvén said so), to reading the hundreds (or thousands) of published papers on the topic (including the results of lab experiments), and concluded that they all fail because of something else that Alfvén said?
You sure are a fast reader.
So, yeah, parsing criticism until it no longer makes sense is all fun and games. But the big picture is not so funny at all.
What people on Slashdot need to realize is that Nereid refuses to actually read what the Electric Universe says from one of the books that have been written on it I do? How do you know? Did I state that I refused to read some book? Did I state that I have not read some book?
and yet viciously maintains that it cannot possibly be true. Caveat Emptor! I do? Can you back up that assertion with SD comments I've written?
Or, perhaps, all I have said is that a) there are (AFAIK) no published papers, in relevant peer-reviewed journals, that support the {insert quoted EU assertion here}; and b) if there are, would you, pln2bz, please be kind enough to provide references to such papers (so I, and any other SD reader who may be interested, can read them and apply whatever critical thinking seems apt).
In a nutshell, the SSM matches a wide range of relevant observables, from the Sun's mass, its 'sound spectrum' (helioseismology - the solar equivalent of seismology), its radius, its energy output, the constancy of that energy output (time periods of years to billions of years), its (estimated, inferred) composition, and so on*.
In 1996, there was one, very annoying, exception - the flux of neutrinos from the Sun seemed to be way too low!
This very nice article by John Bahcall^, on the Nobel website, tells the story of how 'the solar neutrino problem' was solved (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/articles/bahcall/index.html; it turns out that the original author of the the 'MSW' neutrino oscillation theory was actually Bruno Pontecorvo... but as he published it, in Russian, in a physics journal that had essentially no circulation outside the (then) USSR, in the 1950s, he missed getting the glory for it).
There is, as SD readers know from pln2bz's comments, an alternative view of what powers the Sun: giant electric currents throughout the galaxy. As far as I know, this 'Electric Universe' idea (EU) has no basis, either in terms of quantitatively matching any significant subset of the relevant observations, or in terms of the underlying theory (ask an EU proponent about how much experimental support there is for the EU idea of what supports the Sun against gravitational collapse, to take just one example; or to characterise the current which powers the Sun, in terms of charge carriers, flux, speeds, and so on, and how well this characterisation matches what inter-planetary probes such as Ulysses or Galileo or Cassini have detected).
* If any reader is interested in reading more on this, right up to the latest ApJ papers, just holler! ^ Bahcall was one of the greats of 20th century astronomy; although he didn't share the Nobel for discovering the solution, his decades-long work on the problem (including his encouragement of Davis, who did get the Nobel) was crucial to that solution.
In which of his publications may one read more?
I am not sure why no one is researching it Perhaps because there's no evidence of any net motion of matter in to the Sun? There is a solar wind, and it flows outward; the Sun is losing mass (matter), not gaining it (the occasional comet or asteroid it eats nowhere nearly makes up for what it loses in the solar wind).
the fact that the solar wind continues to accelerate even as it passes the planets! Er, no.
This is just as inaccurate as your earlier comment about magnetic reconnection.
If you - or any other reader - are interested, I could provide you with references to (recent) papers published in relevant peer-reviewed journals... that describe what the dozen or so space missions have found, via in situ observations.
The rest of your comment goes downhill from here... (chapter and verse to follow, in case any SD reader hasn't yet cottoned on to just how cranky (shall we say) these ideas you keep pushing are).
Are astrophysicists just unaware, or are they being malicious? Neither.
They have spent a decade or three researching magnetic reconnection - in the lab, via in situ space probes, and by remote sensing (a.k.a. using telescopes) - and have developed descriptions of the behaviours of plasmas, building on Alfvén's work and these discoveries, that match the observed phenomena nicely.
Take a look at the Magnetic Reconnection Experiment (http://mrx.pppl.gov/), as an example of lab-based plasma physics work on magnetic reconnection.
But maybe you know something about the behaviour of plasmas that the thousands of researchers - experimentalists, theorists, 'observers', and those who simulate plasmas in computers - don't, or have missed?
Why not write a paper to Nature, or Science, giving chapter and verse of the holes in their work?
As if it isn't already obvious, I won't have anything else to say about planetary formation or Plasma Model/Electric Universe/??? vs. Standard Model/??? until, at least, the next thread. Enjoy your reading and research!
Unlike astronomy, where there are just a few journals that cover most of the field, it seems that papers on the general topic of planetary system, and planets/moons/etc, formation are found in many.
In addition to Icarus, there is MNRAS (Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society), ApJ (Astrophysics Journal), JGRE/JGRA (Journal of Geophysical Research), P&SS (Planetary and Space Science), GeoRL (Geophysical Research Letters), E&PSL (Earth and Planetary Science Letters),... as well as the big guns such as Nature and Science.
Somewhere among all these there must be a good review paper or three, published in the last year or so.... however I couldn't find any.
A very readable, recent, book, with oodles of references is The Big Splat (Or How Our Moon Came to Be), by Dana Mackenzie. Of course, its focus is much narrower than the topic of this thread!
The TVF page was written in 1997, with an update to a table in 2004.
According to this IAU "Working Group on Extrasolar Planets" webpage (http://www.dtm.ciw.edu/boss/planets.html), only a pulsar had a detected planetary system in 1997, with the first 'regular' system detected in 1999 (Ups And).
According to this tracking website (http://exoplanet.eu/catalog.php), ~25 multiple planet systems have now been discovered, of which eight have three or more planets.
While this - likely - isn't enough to do a statistically rigorous test of the TVF's idea, the rate of discovery, and the number and quality of soon-to-be-onstream new projects, suggests that such a test may be possible in less than a decade.
TVF's assessment ("it is difficult to separate out periods for bodies of similar mass that are either close to the same value or are in resonance with one another") is unduly pessimistic... at the time, 'radial velocity' was the only game in (detection) town; today, microlensing and transits are both proven, and neither is affected by the difficulty TVF mentions.
And a correction: I wrote 'weak lensing'; I should have written 'microlensing'.
Slashdot Mirror
you'd just argue with them ad infinitum over really silly things
(my emphasis)
But how to decide what's a "really silly thing" and what's the tiny thing - that you discover by being pedantic - which ushers in a revolution in physics? (an example, from the early years of the 20th century: http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2008/01/light-deflection-at-sun.html).
IM(vH)O, getting a working arrangement on how to decide if something is "evidence" or not, on how to analyse ("interpret") it, on how to construct and test hypotheses, and so on is essential for there to be any meaningful dialogue. And you'll see that this is included in my list of To Dos, in an SD comment of mine from earlier today.
You view astrophysical interpretations as if they are statements of facts. Like much of the remainder of your own discipline, you frequently ignore the huge number of assumptions involved within these theories. This is not an effective strategy for getting at the truth.
Pot, meet kettle; kettle, meet pot.
:clap:
Your comments contain much unintended humour; this is a great example!
I seem to remember someone writing several SD comments about an interpretation of an "image" from the NACO instrument attached to one of the VLTs. When it was pointed out to this writer that they had misunderstood what the image was - in essence ignoring the huge number of assumptions involved with it - was the writer grateful for the opportunity to learn more about how astronomical images are obtained?
Indeed, ignoring the long chains of logic, inextricably tied to physics theories, that are part and parcel of every modern astronomical observation is "not an effective strategy for getting at the truth".
You could wake up on any particular morning and come to find that a new paradigm-changing observation has been made, and that your paradigm lost out
And do you know what I'll do on that day*? Go out and celebrate!
...) would do the same.
I would guess that a majority, perhaps a large majority, of astronomers (astrophysicists, cosmologists, planetary scientists,
For myself, I don't have to guess, because the future is already in my (personal) past. HINT: I think you've read about high-z SNe, haven't you?
And a reasonably intelligent person can see that you value feeling and sounding right over actually being right, because to prioritize *being* right, a person has to be willing to admit that they can be wrong -- even on the big questions.
No need to read tea leaves; I'll say it straight: APODNereid can be wrong. In fact, I'll go one better, and point you to a comment I made, that you responded to, where I said exactly that: "You know, I could well be wrong about this." (http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=426528&no_d2=1&cid=22145892)^
you can't even explain simple things like the temperature distributions for planets
Why do you think it's a simple thing? How do you determine what's "simple" and what's not?
Again, this goes to how your alternative approach to science differs from that of real scientists (more later, no doubt).
[threats of fire and brimstone, of dismissal and beheading, of shoes and ships and sealing wax, and cabbages and kings]
Oh dear, you've got me quaking in my (low-heeled, today) boots! Oh woe is me!!
Does that mean that you won't indulge me - and readers of this SD comment - in outlining what you'd observe if you were given a million seconds of HST, Chandra, Spitzer, SKA, JWST, VLT, Gemini, MAGIC, AMANDA, LIGO, LOFAR, etc 'telescope' time?**
* well, not that day anyway; more likely a year or two later, once the independent verifications and validations had come in,
there is no workable cosmology being presented
Indeed, there is no alternative, scientific cosmology being presented.
When you get a chance, would you mind providing links to material on any such alternative that addresses (quantitatively, of course) the following:
* why the night sky is dark
* the Hubble relationship (i.e. the relationship between observed redshift and distance, for galaxies, quasars, GRBs, etc)
* the primordial abundance of light nuclides (H, D, 3He, 4He, and 6Li)
* the SED (spectral energy distribution) of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) - i.e. its 2.73K blackbody spectrum
* the CMB dipole
* the CMB angular power spectrum
* the observed large-scale structure of the universe (here's an example: http://www.sdss.org/news/releases/20031028.powerspectrum.html).
You act as if there is only one possible cosmology that can possibly be created
No need to read the APODNereid tea leaves ... I'll say it directly, loudly, and clearly: I think the number of possible cosmologies (to use pln2bz's term) is certainly greater than one. Further, only a few decades ago at least two possible cosmologies seemed consistent with the relevant astronomical observations and experimental results (today there's only one, that I know of).
many very intelligent people have backed the plasma-based cosmology approach
I thought you'd've given up using this kind of argument; you've certainly been beaten up for it many times, here in SD.
Once upon a time, many very intelligent people backed the "Earth is flat" idea too, and the élan vital approach. The universe cares not one jot what people, intelligent or not, back.
I can tell that you have not read the materials because you consistently assume that the arguments are less powerful than they actually are.
Right, like the one about magnetic reconnection has never been observed in a laboratory (URL:http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=426528&no_d2=1&cid=22144874>), or the solar wind continues to accelerate even as it passes the planets! (http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=426528&no_d2=1&cid=22148864), or Arguing that space must be charge neutral on some scale is tantamount to declaring that we've reached a conclusion on a metaphysical question (http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=358211&cid=21392029).
your objections to it would give way to more nuanced feeling towards it
If you care to read my previous SD comment, in this thread, you'll see what I'm planning to do. In a nutshell, I will examine - using standard methods found in science - "the plasma-based cosmology approach"; specifically, the extent to which it is internally consistent, independently verifiable (or can be independently validated, if you prefer), and key characteristics of the methods used to classify things as "facts" (and "evidence"). I intend to use an empirical approach.
the telescopes are getting better
Indeed they are!
Let's do a little "what if" experiment, shall we?
Imagine you were granted 1 million seconds of time on the Hubble Space Telescope, using any instruments (or combination), and spread out over as much as a year. What would you use your time to observe?
Imagine the same, on any (or combo) of the VLTs (http://www.eso.org/public/astronomy/teles-instr/whitebook/).
On Spitzer (http://ssc.spitzer.caltech.edu/), XMM-Newton (http://xmm.vilspa.esa.es/), any of the ATNF (
Being a first draft on how to be more effective in addressing Electric Universe (Plasma Universe, etc) comments, posted in threads on stories in the Science section of SD.
Empirically, such threads stay open for comments from 4 to at least 10 days; anyone have insights into how to accurately predict this lifespan?
Empirically, you get ~3500 characters of text before "Read rest of this comment" kicks in (unless your score is high).
SD itself gives guidelines on how a comment's score is arrived at (it's a dynamical process).
So in the Mechanics of Writing Department, -=*write early, write briefly, write often, and write well*=- would seem to sum it up.
On to the content.
Here's a provisional list of EU faves (I'm leaving out mythology, for now):
* magnetic reconnection
* solar wind accelerates past planets
* electrical neutrality
* spiral galaxy rotation curves
* plasma physics, per laboratory experiments
* Alfvén and Birkeland hero worship
* Z-pinches
So in the Prepare your URLs Department, an SD comment on each of these would be very handy.
Now for my fave: the Electric Universe method of research and investigation.
Essentially nothing seems to be available, in terms of an outline of what the core attributes of this alternative form of science is supposed to be, though leokor's comment is quite helpful (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=388752&cid=21836590).
However, we can formulate hypotheses on what these attributes are, and test them using the body of SD comments from EU proponents as input data (in addition to the prolific pln2bz and leokor (1 comment only), I have found iantresman (also 1 comment only) and mgmirkin; any reader know of others?).
So in the Turn a Mirror on Them Department, some research into what the ideal world of Electric Universe 'science' looks like is called for (stay tuned).
Of course, anyone reading this is welcome to add comments!
(not even 2k characters; should be fine)
Cosmic variance (Daniel Holz', JoAnne Hewitt's, John Conway's, Julienne Dalcanton's, Mark Trodden's, Risa Wechsler's, and Sean Carroll's blog) has just been upgraded to support LaTeX! (http://cosmicvariance.com/2008/01/22/succumbing-to-latex/)
;-)
Comment 8, by Julienne: "This has to be the most fabulously geeky comment thread, EVAH!"
Then read comment 10, by Sean
In future, when I respond to your comments, I shall state explicitly that the intended audience does not include you.
...
... there is no objective method (that I know of) to choose between these claims.
With that preamble over
Down here, at the bottom of the ocean of air, distant "point sources" in the optical (or visible) and near-infrared wavebands are smeared out by what astronomers call "seeing". You notice this as the twinkling of stars in the night sky. Assuming radial symmetry*, the 1D distribution of intensity of such a seeing smeared point source looks like a Gaussian, but isn't (it's a Kolmogorov distribution, as the primary source of distortion is turbulence). Adaptive optics is a term used to describe a range of techniques to deconvolve the seeing, to recover the "beyond the atmosphere" 2D distribution of source intensity; the most ambitious of these aim to deliver diffraction limited images, using phase conjugation and laser guide beacons to "measure and compensate for turbulence-induced phase aberrations in three dimensions".
The image cited by pln2bz was taken by NaCO (NAOS-CONICA, Nasmyth Adaptive Optics System Near-Infrared Imager and Spectrograph), attached to one of the VLTs (http://www.eso.org/instruments/naco/index.html). Note the following comment: "Publications based on data obtained with the NACO instrument should quote the following reference papers: Lenzen, R. et al. 2003, SPIE 4841, 944 and Rousset, G. et al. 2003, SPIE 4839, 140." Clearly, pln2bz did not bother (perhaps he felt his SD comments did not constitute a "publication"); he's in good company, as his source was undoubtedly TPOD (or similar), which also did not bother.
Why does this matter?
Fundamentally, it goes to the issue of "evidence", which EU proponents (not only pln2bz, not only on Slashdot) get so worked up about.
As I said above, the two objects in the VLT/NACO image are statistically the same as two point sources.
One could, as pln2bz has done, claim to see something other than two point sources.
However, one could also claim that there's a face in the image (example1: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070421.html; example2: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap990315.html), or a planet with rings (example: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap071023.html), or even invisible pink fairies
Amusing aside: some of you have seen this "neutrino image" of the Sun (or similar) http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980605.html, http://elvis.phys.lsu.edu/svoboda/superk/sun.gif. At least one prolific EU proponent interpreted this to show that neutrinos are emitted from the surface of the Sun, not its core! {insert ROFL smilies here}^
Concerning BAUT
There is a very long thread there, on the Electric Universe (nearly 2400 posts! http://www.bautforum.com/against-mainstream/28596-electric-universe-model.html), as well as instructions to all those who wish to post on the topic, and links to all other EU-related threads (http://www.bautforum.com/against-mainstream/45529-read-first-re-posting-electric-universe-ideas-here.html).
In addition, this thread may be of interest to readers of this comment: http://www.bautforum.com/about-baut/55206-reflections-year-half-s-experience-baut-s-atm-section.html.
* whic
I estimate that you have alleged at least 100 times (here in SD) that (many of) those who respond to your SD comments do not take the trouble to even read the material you present, much less understand it.
May I present a mirror, for your consideration?
Just a few days ago, in comments on another SD story (http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=423972&cid=22125844), I suggested that you had misunderstood that image, not least because you did not know how it was created. I gave you a link, to a website dedicated to explaining what the instrument (NACO) is and how it works.
Did you try to understand it? or even bother to read it?
We can conduct an unscientific test. The hypothesis is that you did not read the material; the test is whether a subsequent comment by you contains objective evidence to that effect. Let's see
Somewhat disheartening, if not entirely unexpected
I mean, if someone takes the trouble to try to explain to you how an astronomical image is created, and points out that your interpretation is inconsistent with how the image was created, and you not only ignore them, but (seem to) continue to assume it shows certain features which are, in fact, merely artifacts, why should any reader not be highly sceptical of other things you write?
Here's the straight dope: the two objects in the "image" are completely consistent with POINT SOURCES! More specifically, the two sources have 2D fourier transforms that are statistically the same as point sources, given the estimated PSF (which PSF has also been measured, during the engineering run prior to NACO being signed over to the scientific team).
Would you be kind enough to elaborate on what you mean by "physical" and "metaphysical"? In your reply would you mind including at least a brief mention of gluons, colour charge, the chirality of neutrinos (and anti-neutrinos), and quarks?
Oh, and as usual, some pointers to where an SD reader may review alternative explanations to the wide range of excellent astronomical observations that underpin dark (non-baryonic) matter and 'dark energy'. Quantitative explanations, of course. When the spiral arms of galaxies were observed to rotate unusually, everybody should have taken a very deep breath and reconsidered the fundamental force of the universe. It was never done. Hmm, I guess you've not heard of Moti Milgrom, or Jacob Bekenstein, or R. H. Sanders, or S. McGaugh, or
One more categorical pln2bz assertion busted. Astrophysics is a complete and utter mess! Is that - solely - because you don't understand it?
And if I declare, with two exclamation marks, and in all caps ASTROPHYSICS IS A SUBLIME SYMPHONY!! does that trump your lower case, one exclamation mark claim? We don't even get clear and concise explanations for what gravity and mass are! Hmm
I'll grant you that the Higgs mechanism is somewhat less than clear and concise, in terms of explaining how particles acquire (or have) mass ("a relativistically invariant quantum fluid" requires quite a bit more math than non-Euclidean geometry), but it is still a remarkable proposal. Perhaps this year or next will see the first announcements of experimental results confirming (or not) the consistency of this proposal with the universal reality.
One more thing: your comment reads like you somehow expect that the universe should be (easily) comprehensible to at least a large subset of Homo sapiens individuals. Where does this expectation come from?
Thanks for the kind words, AC! :-)
... either because they've been banned (for persistent rule violations) or can no longer make their case.
Each internet discussion forum has its own rules, and within those rules, a wide range of writing styles and delivered content are possible.
There's also the effectiveness of what's written, in terms of the writer's (or writers') intentions and goals.
"Electric Universe" (and plasma universe, plasma cosmology, etc) ideas are all over the internet, with prolific proponents in a great many discussion fora. For some reason, such proponents seem to be particularly active in fora (or sections of fora) devoted to science, and within science to physics, astronomy, astrophysics, and cosmology. At least, that's my perception.
On those fora which have rules to enforce their avowed science-based scope and purpose, it seems EU proponents are, by and large, no longer active
This is not surprising, given the disconnect between the content and presentation of EU "theories" and the methods etc of the relevant sciences.
pln2bz has been writing in SD for some time now, and it seems that most of those who bother to respond to his comments have already concluded just how non-scientific the content of those comments is. This is, no doubt, partly due to the numbingly repetitious nature of his comments; it's as if nothing of significance has happened in "EU theory" for the last decade or three - certainly no new papers.
Worse, pln2bz doesn't even seem to modify his faves (magnetic reconnection, the Deep Impact mission, Peratt's galaxy simulations, solar wind acceleration, to name just a few) in light of the often very strong critiques of these, from other SD writers. In one way, this makes rebuttal easy - simply re-write the last rebuttal, to improve its impact with SD readers.
The most curious thing to me is the extreme reluctance to say anything about how, from the POV of "EU theory" as the harbinger of an alternative, science (astronomy, physics, etc) should be done: is there a role for independent verification and validation? for independent review? for (public) disclosure of methods and data? What is the role of hypotheses (or equivalents)? of models (whether quantitative or not)? of theories (in whatever form)? How is the legitimacy (or otherwise) of testing to be determined? And so on.
To me, this extreme reluctance to even acknowledge the pertinence of these (and related) questions is a good indication that the proponents of this stuff know - in their hearts - that honest answers would greatly damage their cause, possibly fatally.
So, why bother? I'm still trying to answer that question.
In any case, Astronomy Magazine is hardly a relevant peer-reviewed journal is it! I mean, they almost never have any equations, do they?
Do you know which (published) paper(s) present a case for this? How many people must be talking about it before you decide to actually investigate it and contemplate it for yourself, Nereid? I'm not sure why you keep thinking this is in any way relevant.
I mean, tens or hundreds of millions of people (or more) talk about astrology, and have been doing so for a long time.
Back to the same question I've asked many a time; in the pln2bz view of alternative science:
What constitutes evidence?
What methods are legitimate wrt investigating such evidence?
What methods are legitimate wrt presenting, reviewing, critiquing, (and so on) conclusions drawn from investigations of evidence?
Oh, and the handle is APODNereid, if you please.
Double oh, may we expect to see, sometime soon, a preprint on the arXiv server, with you as an author, showing that all those plasma physics lab experiments on magnetic reconnection are fatally flawed?
Perhaps some of those new folk will get around, soon, to writing papers which they submit for publication in relevant peer-reviewed journals?
Perhaps some of them will try to explore - quantitatively - the numerous internal inconsistencies in "EU theory"?
Perhaps the text which accompanies the TPODs will start to contain fewer gross inaccuracies?
Or maybe they flock there for light relief?
Care to explain - quantitatively - Zwicky's 1930s detailed observations on the radial velocity distribution of the Coma galaxy clusters (since repeated, for hundreds of other clusters)?
Care to explain - quantitatively - the angular power spectrum of the cosmic microwave background (CMB)?
Care to explain - quantitatively - the observed trend in the average density of the universe, as the scale over which that density is measured increases?
Care to explain - quantitatively - why the night sky is dark (except, of course, in Manhattan)? They can generate spiral galaxies with the proper rotation curves using nothing more than the characteristics of laboratory plasmas. You know one thing that rather annoys me is your repetition of stuff that you've been called on before, had shown to be (often grossly) wrong, and have never addressed.
This is another example of such dishonesty.
Peratt's papers on this topic do NOT, repeat do NOT, "generate spiral galaxies with the proper rotation curves using nothing more than the characteristics of laboratory plasmas"!
If you continue to think that they do, let's have a discussion on these assertions. If you are unprepared to do so, please don't get offended if I (and others) start to treat what you say accordingly.
Fact: even in the MRX (Magnetic Reconnection Experiment, attached to the Princeton Plasma Physics Lab http://www.pppl.gov/projects/pages/magnetic_reconnect.html) there are (apparently) no laboratory plasma physicists so arguing. EU is highly testable. Translation: only if those doing the marketing of the idea are not required to show how, in any meaningful detail.
Fact: to the extent that the rich variety of theories, models, hypotheses, etc that comprises mainstream science is inconsistent with "EU", then said EU has been tested, repeatedly
Fact: Some of those who've commented on the EU ideas presented by pln2bz have not, in fact, "read the evidence". However, many have, and have questioned it and challenged it. So far, your track record in answering these direct, pertinent questions and challenges has been nearly perfect (you've failed to answer, almost every time).
You have made many assertions.
Others have questioned, or challenged, or rebutted, your assertions.
Of the assertions challenged, where independent verification or validation seems possible, I think the best that could be said is that you were unable to answer the questions or address the challenges.
More disturbing, however, is that most direct questions or challenges or rebuttals have gone unanswered, unaddressed.
Instead, it seems you simply ignore the challenges etc; sometimes you change the topic, sometimes you make even wilder assertions, and so on.
What do they say about trolls?
And if the answer is at least "completely!" (or equivalent), then can we discuss what you consider to be scientific methods?
It may be that the universe is ruled by electric currents; it may be that it's not (and it may be that it's something in between). Surely a few comments discussing how smart people (nerds or not) could go about finding out would be time and typing well spent?
That you, yourself, reject the standard scientific (astronomy, astrophysics, cosmology, space/plasma physics) paradigm seems clear*.
What's not clear - to me at least - is what you suggest should be used instead.
May I ask, again, that you do your SD readers a favour by putting fingers to keyboard and at least outlining your preferred alternative?
{turning to some specifics} All of the clues are right before us to assemble a competing cosmology to the conventional theories. Why is it not done? Whatever the reason, it's certainly not because it *cannot* be done. So why not do it, pln2bz? Let's see
Or do you mean incredibly effective in the same way Birkeland's model of the rings of Saturn are self-luminous (when they're not)?
Or do you mean incredibly effective in the same way that the orbit of the Moon can be modelled - without plasmas - to a ~2 cm accuracy (in the sense of observed - expected)?
Perhaps people here don't realise it because it's not true?
* You've said so, several times, in SD comments.
there are in fact alternative possible explanations for our observations which astrophysicists tend to ignore
Or, more pertinently, these so-called alternatives fail several key tests, such as internal consistency, consistency with relevant theories whose domains of applicability overlap (quantum mechanics, in this case), and (above all) consistency with good, relevant observations.
They are complicit with ignoring these alternative explanations because math already exists for the conventional paradigms
And you know this because? Your objective evidence is ... what, exactly?
The public has this misconception that astrophysicists have *ruled out* alternative explanations in an honest manner by completing a comprehensive review of all of the theories out there, and what one discovers over time is that in fact, that has not occurred in the slightest
So, once again, if you please ... references to papers, published in relevant peer-reviewed journals, which lay out this/these 'alternative explanation(s)' and which show internal consistency, consistency with quantum mechanics (in the relevant domains of applicability), and (above all) consistency with good, relevant observations and experimental results.
I think I have asked for this nearly ten times now; not once (that I recall) have you answered.
We've seen stars erratically jump all over the HR diagram, including FG Sagittae, V605 Aquilae and V4334 Sagittarii and V838 Monocerotis ("The Electric Sky" by Don Scott points to a total of seven counter-examples to predicted stellar evolution)
Hmm ... not a bad track record then, for standard models of stars ... given that there are detailed records on what, about a billion stars?!
And if any SD reader is interested, a quick check on the relevant, peer-reviewed literature will show that pln2bz's assertion here is, shall we say, only coincidentally consistent with the truth.
In fact, we see unusual things with stars on a weekly basis, and this should rationally induce some self-doubt. And yet, it does not! Every enigmatic observation is just rolled into the standard model as quickly as it goes into the books, and at the expense of people actually proposing creative solutions that better explain *all* of our observations.
Well, I hate to break it to you, but science is a process of discovery ... only by testing, modifying, testing again, and so on, is progress made. After all, if the 'enigmatic observations' cannot be 'rolled up into the standard model', then it's time to change it!
As for 'people actually proposing creative solutions', let's have them roll up their sleeves, write up their solutions, and get them published, shall we? That way everyone can review them, critique them, test them, and so on.
And yet, there are laboratory plasma physicists who argue against things like magnetic reconnection as being redundant of exploding plasma double layers (Alfven included). It is wrong to completely ignore these people. We should foster a public debate on these issues and honestly assess who is right without preferences to either. Instead, what we get is millions of dollars pumped into magnetic reconnection with little to no consideration of exploding plasma double layers.
So, in the last few hours, you've gone from claiming magnetic reconnection cannot possibly be right (because Alfvén said so), to reading the hundreds (or thousands) of published papers on the topic (including the results of lab experiments), and concluded that they all fail because of something else that Alfvén said?
You sure are a fast reader.
So, yeah, parsing criticism until it no longer makes sense is all fun and games. But the big picture is not so funny at all.
Hmm ... are you s
Or, perhaps, all I have said is that
a) there are (AFAIK) no published papers, in relevant peer-reviewed journals, that support the {insert quoted EU assertion here}; and
b) if there are, would you, pln2bz, please be kind enough to provide references to such papers (so I, and any other SD reader who may be interested, can read them and apply whatever critical thinking seems apt).
Oh, and it's APODNereid, if you please.
You know, I could well be wrong about this.
Would you be kind enough to give references to papers published in relevant peer-reviewed technical journals that support your original assertions?
Please, only papers which report results from space probes that have sampled the inter-planetary medium, over significant time-frames.
What powers the Sun?
... but as he published it, in Russian, in a physics journal that had essentially no circulation outside the (then) USSR, in the 1950s, he missed getting the glory for it).
Here is a good overview, written in 1996, of the standard solar model (SSM) (http://www.ap.stmarys.ca/~guenther/Level01/solar/what_is_ssm.html).
In a nutshell, the SSM matches a wide range of relevant observables, from the Sun's mass, its 'sound spectrum' (helioseismology - the solar equivalent of seismology), its radius, its energy output, the constancy of that energy output (time periods of years to billions of years), its (estimated, inferred) composition, and so on*.
In 1996, there was one, very annoying, exception - the flux of neutrinos from the Sun seemed to be way too low!
This very nice article by John Bahcall^, on the Nobel website, tells the story of how 'the solar neutrino problem' was solved (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/articles/bahcall/index.html; it turns out that the original author of the the 'MSW' neutrino oscillation theory was actually Bruno Pontecorvo
There is, as SD readers know from pln2bz's comments, an alternative view of what powers the Sun: giant electric currents throughout the galaxy. As far as I know, this 'Electric Universe' idea (EU) has no basis, either in terms of quantitatively matching any significant subset of the relevant observations, or in terms of the underlying theory (ask an EU proponent about how much experimental support there is for the EU idea of what supports the Sun against gravitational collapse, to take just one example; or to characterise the current which powers the Sun, in terms of charge carriers, flux, speeds, and so on, and how well this characterisation matches what inter-planetary probes such as Ulysses or Galileo or Cassini have detected).
* If any reader is interested in reading more on this, right up to the latest ApJ papers, just holler!
^ Bahcall was one of the greats of 20th century astronomy; although he didn't share the Nobel for discovering the solution, his decades-long work on the problem (including his encouragement of Davis, who did get the Nobel) was crucial to that solution.
In which of his publications may one read more? I am not sure why no one is researching it Perhaps because there's no evidence of any net motion of matter in to the Sun? There is a solar wind, and it flows outward; the Sun is losing mass (matter), not gaining it (the occasional comet or asteroid it eats nowhere nearly makes up for what it loses in the solar wind).
This is just as inaccurate as your earlier comment about magnetic reconnection.
If you - or any other reader - are interested, I could provide you with references to (recent) papers published in relevant peer-reviewed journals
The rest of your comment goes downhill from here
They have spent a decade or three researching magnetic reconnection - in the lab, via in situ space probes, and by remote sensing (a.k.a. using telescopes) - and have developed descriptions of the behaviours of plasmas, building on Alfvén's work and these discoveries, that match the observed phenomena nicely.
Take a look at the Magnetic Reconnection Experiment (http://mrx.pppl.gov/), as an example of lab-based plasma physics work on magnetic reconnection.
But maybe you know something about the behaviour of plasmas that the thousands of researchers - experimentalists, theorists, 'observers', and those who simulate plasmas in computers - don't, or have missed?
Why not write a paper to Nature, or Science, giving chapter and verse of the holes in their work?
Unlike astronomy, where there are just a few journals that cover most of the field, it seems that papers on the general topic of planetary system, and planets/moons/etc, formation are found in many.
... as well as the big guns such as Nature and Science.
.... however I couldn't find any.
In addition to Icarus, there is MNRAS (Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society), ApJ (Astrophysics Journal), JGRE/JGRA (Journal of Geophysical Research), P&SS (Planetary and Space Science), GeoRL (Geophysical Research Letters), E&PSL (Earth and Planetary Science Letters),
There are also at least two regular meetings/conferences; examples from recent ones: 39th DPS meeting, session 32 (Planet and Satellite Creation and Evolution, on 10 October 2007) http://www.abstractsonline.com/viewer/viewSession.asp (link may not work); Fall 2007 AGU meeting, session P54A (Planetary Formation and Evolution) http://www.agu.org/cgi-bin/sessions5?meeting=fm07&part=P54A&maxhits=400.
Somewhere among all these there must be a good review paper or three, published in the last year or so
A very readable, recent, book, with oodles of references is The Big Splat (Or How Our Moon Came to Be), by Dana Mackenzie. Of course, its focus is much narrower than the topic of this thread!
And that'll have to do for now.
Thanks.
... at the time, 'radial velocity' was the only game in (detection) town; today, microlensing and transits are both proven, and neither is affected by the difficulty TVF mentions.
The TVF page was written in 1997, with an update to a table in 2004.
According to this IAU "Working Group on Extrasolar Planets" webpage (http://www.dtm.ciw.edu/boss/planets.html), only a pulsar had a detected planetary system in 1997, with the first 'regular' system detected in 1999 (Ups And).
According to this tracking website (http://exoplanet.eu/catalog.php), ~25 multiple planet systems have now been discovered, of which eight have three or more planets.
While this - likely - isn't enough to do a statistically rigorous test of the TVF's idea, the rate of discovery, and the number and quality of soon-to-be-onstream new projects, suggests that such a test may be possible in less than a decade.
TVF's assessment ("it is difficult to separate out periods for bodies of similar mass that are either close to the same value or are in resonance with one another") is unduly pessimistic
And a correction: I wrote 'weak lensing'; I should have written 'microlensing'.