From: metares@well.sf.ca.us (Tom Van Flandern)
Newsgroups: sci.astro
Subject: Quasars: near versus far
Date: 27 Jul 92 05:32:12 GMT
Organization: Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link


Earlier, Joseph Lazio gave a short comparative list of quasar properties in
the standard model and in the Meta Model.  The following is a more extensive
list.  Note the relative quality and plausibility of the two explanations if
prior familiarity is not used as a standard.

OBSERVATIONAL FACT    INTERPRETATION IN     INTERPRETATION IN
                      STANDARD MODEL        META MODEL

(1) Quasars have      Only the center of    Quasars really have
little or no visible  the galaxy-like mass  stellar dimensions,
angular extent.       which produces the    occasionally
                      energy is visible.    surrounded by
                                            nebulosity.

(2) Quasars have      Most quasar light     Light variations are
rapid light           comes from a small    not unusual in high-
variations (Heckman   source of solar       mass stellar-sized
1991).                system dimensions,    objects.
                      even in quasars as
                      big as giant
                      galaxies.

(3) Even high-        Such jets must be the Such jets result from
redshift quasars have largest contiguous    ordinary mass
long jets.            structures in the     ejections.
                      universe.

(4) Features in       Apparent faster-than- Small mass transfers
quasar jets are       light motions must be are occurring at
observed to move      relativistically      ordinary velocities.
outward.              beamed toward us.

(5) The angular size  An evolutionary       Higher mass quasars,
of visible nebulas    effect, since early,  which have higher
surrounding some      distant, high-        redshifts, have
quasars does not      redshift quasars are  larger associated
diminish, and may     more energetic.       nebulas.
even increase, with
increasing redshift
(Heckman 1991, Table
2).

(6) Quasar redshifts  Either the            Supermassive stars
seem to be time-      observations are      are expected to
variable (Tifft       wrong, or infalling   pulsate, causing
1991).                matter must influence slowly variable
                      the redshifts.        gravitational
                                            redshifts.

(7) Some high-        Unknown energy        Not surprising, since
redshift quasars are  mechanism produces    redshift does not
relatively bright.    equivalent of         indicate distance,
                      thousands of          but perhaps mass.
                      supernovas per year,  Some of these objects
                      enabling them to be   are nearby.
                      bright at great
                      distances.

(8) Quasars do not    An evolutionary       Since redshift is not
exhibit the type of   effect caused by      a distance indicator,
brightness-redshift   quasars being         no redshift-distance
relationship found    primarily a feature   relationship is
for galaxies.  The    of the early stages   expected.  Objects
distribution is flat  of the universe.  No  with z > 2 have
out to nearly z = 2,  predictable relation  higher gravitational
then drops sharply    between quasar        masses and opacities,
(Arp 1987).           numbers and space     and are therefore
                      volume exists.        fainter.

(9) Small redshift    Most quasars died out High redshift objects
and large redshift    long ago.  Quasars    emit limited visible
quasars are found     formed and died       light.  Low redshift
infrequently.         during a limited      objects are
                      period of evolution   undistinguished and
                      of the universe.      difficult to find.

(10) Discrete X-ray   Most X-rays come from Only nearby sources
sources are found in  nearby or very far    can give off
our own galaxy and in away, but generally   detectable X-rays.
some quasars and      not from intermediate Most galaxies are too
related objects.      distances.            far away to see their
                                            X-rays sources.

(11) An X-ray flare   These X-rays must be  There is nothing
from a quasar with z  relativistically      unusual about such an
= 0.14 was observed   directed toward us in X-ray flare in a
to increase its       a narrow, short-lived high-mass star.
brightness by 67% in  beam.
just three minutes
(Remillard 1991).

(12) The calculated   Theoretical problem   No special problems
charged particle      getting photons out   arise.
density is a function from interior when
of inferred distance  density gets too
(Arp 1987).           high.

(13) Some low         Statistical           Those galaxies are
redshift galaxies     coincidence and       the parent of the
have associated       optical illusions.    associated quasars.
quasars.  Some of
those appear to be
connected to the
galaxies (Arp 1987).

(14) Quasars, even at Statistical           Association with
high redshifts, are   coincidence and       parent galaxies plus
frequently            gravitational lensing gravitational lens
accompanied by faint  by galaxy clusters.   effects, with
galaxies at small     High-redshift         foreground quasars
separations (Webster  associations cannot   lensing background
1988; Hintzen 1991).  be real.              galaxies.

(15) The magnitudes   An observational      This is the predicted
and angular           selection effect      quasar-parent galaxy
separations of        which will disappear  relationship.
quasar-galaxy pairs   when catalogs are
are correlated with   more complete.
the galaxy redshift
(Burbidge 1990).

(16) Low-redshift     Possible effect of    As expected if the
quasars show a        discovery             redshifts are not
deficiency of large-  incompleteness.       interpreted as
scale pairs or                              distances.
clustering (Roeder
1992).

(17) Where distant    An evolutionary       Quasars of the most
clusters of galaxies  effect, not fully     distant galaxies
are observed, quasars understood.           should be among the
are generally not                           faintest.
found in them.

(18) Quasars with     The significance of   Such quasars are
redshifts greater     galaxy voids is still nearby, and should
than 1.5 show no      being studied.        therefore not display
tendency toward       Clustering is an      clustering.  Redshift
clustering, and no    evolutionary effect,  is not a distance
evidence of voids,    not yet strong during indicator, so no
both of which are     the main quasar era.  voids should be
seen for galaxies                           evident.
(Osmer 1991).

(19) Absorption lines Caused by intervening Lines are due to
in the spectra of     hydrogen clouds.      layers in the massive
quasar light are      Implied cloud         stellar object or its
quite narrow (Smith   temperatures (5,000-  surrounding
1990).                10,000 degrees) are   nebulosity, not
                      below predicted       intervening clouds.
                      30,000 degrees.

(20) The number of    The hydrogen clouds   The absorption
absorption line       doing the absorbing   systems are due to
systems seen in Lyman are not uniformly     layering in the
alpha is not          spread through space, quasar and its
linearly, or even     and are more abundant surrounding
monotonically,        at recent (therefore  nebulosity.  No
correlated with       close) epochs.  Lack  linear or monotonic
redshift.  3C 273 at  of metal lines makes  relationship with
z = 0.16 and other    galaxy halos unlikely redshift is expected.
low-redshift quasars  candidates for most
have as many          absorbers.
absorption systems as
high-redshift quasars
(Morris 1991).

(21) So-called "iron  These still defy any  Normal for stellar
quasars" contain      consensus             objects in a certain
extremely strong      explanation.          range of mass and
emission lines from                         temperature.
ionized iron (Lipari
1991).

     [Please send E-mail for complete citations list.]

     A careful examination of the middle column reveals that almost
all of these observational features of quasars have explanations in
the standard model.  But it also reveals that most of these
explanations were contrived after the properties were discovered,
and are therefore ad hoc helper hypotheses, serving the purpose of
saving the feature of the standard model that quasar redshifts are
distance indicators.  By contrast, inspection of the last column
reveals that most quasar properties become unremarkable if quasars
are assumed to be supermassive stars with mainly gravitational
redshifts. Only a few arguments in the last column are ad hoc, and
these are only because of the lack of specificity now available for
the still unpublished the Meta Model.  -|Tom|-

-- 
Tom Van Flandern / Washington, DC / metares@well.sf.ca.us
Meta Research was founded to foster research into ideas not otherwise
supported because they conflict with mainstream theories in Astronomy.