The demise of Dark Matter? (At last) - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: TerraHertz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 05:37:25 am
content: Dark Matter? No. Birkeland Currents? Yes! | Space NewsQuoteI find this very conceptually and emotionally satisfying. The whole 'galaxy rotation profiles are not Newtonian, so let's make up invisible fairies' rubbish has been annoying for a long time. Hope this interpretation goes somewhere.But I'm not counting on it. Cosmologists seem to be almost completely blind to electromagnetics, electrostatics and plasma physics. "Gravity, gravity, gravity, and nothing but gravity!" Bah.

author: igendel
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 05:54:22 am
content: I won't pretend to actually understand any of these theories, but rumor has it that a new evidence for dark matter just surfaced...https://www.nature.com/articles/nature25791

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 02:22:21 pm
content: Okay so he draws a graph that says f(x), another graph that says g(x), says f(x) ~= g(x), and therefore it must be true?Crap science at best.Basic, embarrassingly fundamental questions that immediately arise:- Space is pretty goddamn neutral. Where is this current? Why have we not measured it?- How is the current acting upon very large masses (stars, clusters)? Even if such a current exists, it's only acting upon the interstellar plasma. There must be a new mechanism to link that motion to the very dense objects floating within it.- Where is the outward-flowing reaction mass? Even if all of the above happens, there must be a truly astronomical amount of plasma being farted out, radially, in order to keep pushing all those stars towards the center. Calculate the reaction mass required. Assume outflow velocity 0.2c just for optimism. How long will a 10^12 solar mass galaxy live for, until its mass is completely evaporated away?If you don't have the decency -- or basic understanding of science and physics -- to supply these answers, you're going to be labeled a crackpot. Simple as that, put up or shut up.Tim

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 04:03:31 pm
content: Please no! Not more woowoo.....

author: Beamin
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 06:52:15 pm
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 04, 2018, 02:22:21 pmWell in one minute you convinced me that Einstein's greatest blunder still isn't his greatest blunder. Dark matter seems too well studied to not be real. I try not to get close minded in my thinking but didn't they once think neutron stars could be explained by plasma or something like that. I would love to see what a 20 mile wide atomic nucleus looks like.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 06:58:34 pm
content: Well, this doesn't have much to do with Einstein. We're not talking black holes, and galaxies are rather small compared to the visible universe.Though, speaking of, black holes (large and small) will necessarily be among the objects that need to be influenced, and as the most compact astronomical objects, it will be very difficult indeed to push them with anything but gravity.Tim

author: Beamin
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 07:01:05 pm
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 04, 2018, 06:58:34 pmI thought the cosmological constant was dark matter; Einstein greatest blunder. No? black holes was just a reference to things we would never think of unless we saw their math.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 04, 2018, 07:12:35 pm
content: Quote from: Beamin on March 04, 2018, 07:01:05 pmYou're thinking of dark energy, the property of universal expansion. Or more precisely, its change over time, I think?AFAIK, Einstein put a hack in the original field equations, to allow for a static universe, or one expanding or contracting as the case may be (depending on value). This turned out not to be needed, when theFLRW metricwas found and fitted to the universe as we know it. But then further fitting discovered such a hack to be necessary (and poorly justified).Einstein's other notable contributions to astronomy include the precession of Mercury (time dilation due to gravity well), gravitational lensing (both of which were early confirmations of Relativity, thanks to some precise astronomical observations) and relativistic jets (the observation of which can imply superluminal velocity, unless Relativity is taken into account).Tim

author: Beamin
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2018, 10:05:11 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 04, 2018, 07:12:35 pmSo the jets appear to be going faster then light but when you take into account the spacetime is curved that it passes through, the speeds are sub luminal. I can't believe I mixed up dark energy and matter. Duh! I find the fact that we didn't detect any light dark matter troubling. I want to think it's actual stuff that we can find a use for. Too bad it doesn't clump I like the idea of a dark matter world filled with aliens walking through us wondering what the missing 5% of the universe is. The weak force is the most fascinating of the four.

author: ogden
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2018, 10:39:21 am
content: I just love scientists. First they measure and confirmacceleration of universe expansionusing method that is full of assumptions so they can continue their existence by researching cause of acceleration. Could you imagine that all those billions of research are spent believing that "type 1a supernovae all have almost the same intrinsic brightness"? I find it truly amazing.

author: Vtile
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 10, 2018, 11:39:55 am
content: Science is amazing, the humans are even more amazing animals and social norms are the most amazing.

author: Beamin
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2018, 11:01:02 am
content: Quote from: ogden on March 10, 2018, 10:39:21 amIt's the best worst theory we have. Like democracy. Democracy: Three wolves and a sheep sitting at the dinner table taking a vote on what to have for dinner. Grass is not on the menu.

author: Red Squirrel
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2018, 09:34:54 pm
content: Dark matter is the future and contains all energy, we just need to figure out a way to harness it. Combined with solar roadways and the batteriser we will solve the world energy problem and put the oil companies out of business!

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 11, 2018, 10:04:21 pm
content: Quote from: ogden on March 10, 2018, 10:39:21 amAre you asserting that 1a supernovae don't have almost the same intrinsic brightness? You have data to refute the data used to come to the accepted conclusion?I just live ignorant naysayers who think they can negate anything just by ridiculing it without any basis except for false founded sup[superiority complex.

author: Mechatrommer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 12:56:57 am
content: the problem with this world is too many bright intelligent scientists that can make theories out of nothing, instead of doing real work in physics lab.. presenting their findings in eevblog forum..

author: Brumby
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 01:12:20 am
content: Quote from: Lightages on March 11, 2018, 10:04:21 pmI have to agree.Astronomers and cosmologists will have come to that determination from a disciplined approach and subsequent evidence that I am sure will be detailed somewhere if anyone cares to look.Ridicule without the demonstration of any sort of discipline or evidence is simply an embarrassment.

author: GerryBags
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 02:19:31 am
content: I'll just leave this here....

author: SMB784
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 04:55:23 am
content: Quote from: GerryBags on March 12, 2018, 02:19:31 amGuys, come on. Let's try not to publicly embarrass ourselves here in front of the entire internet.Thousands of independent astronomers, physicists, engineers, and technicians have worked their entire lives on this problem; to ignore their conclusions and dismiss them out of hand because somebody with one functioning brain cell and a YouTube channel has been "compiling evidence" to the contrary for 5 years is crazy.If you really want to understand dark matter and actually contribute to the debate in an intelligent and well informed manner, why not get a proper education, actually study the subject, read all the papers (yes, they number in the thousands), and undertake the painstaking process of actually doing the research? Then you can make your own YouTube channel and fill it with actual facts instead of arguing about things that you haven't taken the time to study in detail.

author: GerryBags
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 06:15:09 am
content: Anthony Perrat of Los Alamos Labs, Hannes Alfven (discoverer of Alfven waves, check out this article from 1978:http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1978Ap%26SS..54..279A- ), Kristian Birkeland (discoverer of the currents that bear his name) are just a few of the names of very eminent scientists who have spent decades, lifetimes even, against the stream of accepted scientific wisdom with regards the electrical nature of many astronomical phenomena - only to be ultimately vindicated. All of them were experimental scientists, not theoreticians or mathematicians, and plasma cosmology is making concrete predictions (see Wal Thornhill's predictions on what any of the Mavern, Juno, Rosetta or cassini missions would find as a prime example), while the theorizing is being left up to electrical engineers like Don Scott. (http://www.ptep-online.com/2015/PP-41-13.PDF) Here's his model for Birkeland currents that, in my opinion, goes a long way toward addressing one of the main issues mainstream science has with the idea of an 'electric universe': charge separation in space. Voyager encountering 'magnetic foam' instead of the interstellar vacuum wasn't enough to make most wonder, but here a few recent articles from the mainstream literature that show that not just disembodied magnetic fields exist in space (and here's me thinking that folks here would be ready to listen to the idea of magnetic fields and electric currents being as inseparable in space as they are on Earth. Huh.) but also electric currents..... although quite often terms like "charge-carrying filamentary structure..." get used to describe them:https://www.universetoday.com/29770/new-image-of-jet-driven-galactic-shock-wave-is-a-shocker/https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/360/4/1545/1747527https://phys.org/news/2017-04-cassini-voyager-missions-picture-sun.htmlhttp://www.springer.com/cda/content/document/cda_downloaddocument/9781461478188-c1.pdf?SGWID=0-0-45-1488334-p175232497http://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1988Ap%26SS.144...73Chttps://www.newscientist.com/article/2131889-weird-energy-beam-seems-to-travel-five-times-the-speed-of-light/http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel1/27/1720/00045503.pdf(Synchrotron radiation spectrum for galactic-sized plasma filaments )That was from the pick from the first three pages of Google results.

author: ogden
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 12, 2018, 12:03:42 pm
content: Quote from: Brumby on March 12, 2018, 01:12:20 amEmbarrassment is when data from real probe does not meet theoreticalmodelevidenceIt even sounds weird: "theoretical evidence", but this is how theoretical scientists work. And this is why I am not scientist.

author: TerraHertz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 12:32:32 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 04, 2018, 02:22:21 pmNo it isn't. Space is full of really massive ion flows. What do you think the 'solar wind' is? CMEs? Auroras, visible on Earth, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, etc. Google 'electric Universe comets' for some more interesting stuff. Take a look at detail surface pics of the dumbell comet, and notice the obvious signs of electro-machining.The common idea that charge distributes evenly in space is very ignorant. There are far more complicated effects, including Birkeland currents, pinch efects, double-wall charge layers, etc. Even commonly heard phrases such as 'magnetic field lines breaking and reconnecting' are ridiculous ignorant twaddle. Most astrophysicists seem to have no understanding of basic electromagnetics and plasma physics at all.The way they describe things, simple neon bulbs would be a complete mystery. Does the electrostatic field from the electrodes distribute evenly across the space between them? No, it doesn't. It virtually all concentrates in a thin layer around one of the electrodes, hence that's where the glow appears.QuoteYou do realise that stars are highly electrostatically charged bodies? They self-develop net charge imbalance with the net charge on surrounding interstellar plasma. Charged stars move through the plasma, which has magnetic field embedded in it and anchored by the mobile ions of the plasma. Net ultra-large scale electric currents have a lot of energy, and the magnetic fields are of course part of that. Like any other charged particle moving in a magnetic field, stars will feel a net force.The 'no dark matter' suggestion is that THIS is the cause of stellar trajectories not complying with predictions considering gravity alone. But the details of the physics involved are going to be *very* complicated, due to complex behavior of heliospheres, charge hiding behind double-wall layers, relativistic effects, etc. Hence the lack of a complete model, just a suggestion that this is a hopeful path of investigation. That doesn't involve making shit up, about unknown, invisible, mysteriously acting 'dark matter'.Oh and btw, electrostatic forces are 10^39 stronger than gravitational forces, proton to electron. Same at macro scales. This is not intuitive to us, because we live in an environment in which charges mostly DO equalise, so we very rarely directly experience electrostatic/EM forces of any significant magnitude. But this is not true in macro-plasma environments such as deep space.QuoteAnd yet you happily accept the idea of dark matter?Where is the 'reaction mass' that deflects electron beams in a CRT?Note that compared to the distances between galaxies, the actual galaxies are very small. And we know next to nothing about the plasma, charge and magnetic structures between galaxies. You've seen illustrations of what we know about large scale structure of space, and the way galaxy clusters seem to be strung like strings through the largely empty volumes? Why is that?Those saying 'dark matter must be real, because hundreds of scientists have built their careers on its study' are pretty amusing.An example: hundreds of scientists have built their careers on the principle that CO2 concentration in the Earth's atmosphere is the primary regulator of Earth's surface temperature.Here's a relevant chart.It happens to be one I came across around 2007. Before which I was a firm believer in the CO2/Warming story. The chart prompted me to start checking out some things... Because either it's incorrect, or the CO2 story is false. Let's not divert into that. But do think about it, and maybe start doing your own checking. My point here is that Science is NOT a concensus voting game. And those who pretend it is, are generally pretty mixed up on other things too.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 04:47:26 am
content: Quote from: TerraHertz on March 13, 2018, 12:32:32 amWhich one? 67P? Just looks like a pile of ice and rocks. Apparently it very likely formed as the low velocity collision of two cometoids, but there's absolutely no reason to suspect something quite that specific.Also, there would be NASA studies of "electromachining" on a scale far more massive than is seen.They study it, sure;https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/NP-2015-03-015-JSC_Space_Environment-ISS-Mini-Book-2015-508.pdfcomes up on top of a search. But it's minuscule.If solar wind were strong enough to atomize whole km's of cometary surfaces, there would be no dust, or smaller (<1km) asteroids left.Space is rough, but it's not that rough!QuoteThat's exactly what I'm saying. Thank you! Plasma is conductive, thus shorting out the electric field basically everywhere.The most charge separation that is possible, is the maximum particle energy emitted by a given body. A few million volts, say. For something that contains ~10^50 particles, like a star, that's, well -- astronomical balance!(A boundary layer is characteristic of cool plasmas, where the gas recombines and only low energy ions and electrons interact with the conductor. With much higher energies, lower densities, and no way for the plasma to recombine near a surface, I wouldn't think this is relevant here. Maybe a similar effect could be produced in a contrived setup, like a magnetic funnel, and some way to pump energy out of the plasma near it?)QuoteGosh, you must really have a lot at stake here, to have such a strong opinion about it.What's wrong with making things up? I do it all the time. Then I fit theory to it and see if it matches the data or hypothesis. Seems to work well for me, and the century or three of other scientists out there.That seems to be the critical step, forming a cohesive data-hypothesis-theory system. Wouldn't you say?Throwing out uselessly complicated, contrived, and poorly justified theories is also an important step. There are infinite ways to tackle any given problem -- the best is the one that is easiest to work with.Example: planetary motion.You can describe the motion, to arbitrary accuracy, with finite series of epicycles. That's a valid description, sure -- or really, more merely an encoding of the data. It doesn't provide any insight into their behavior, why the planets move the way they do. (Aside from the motion generally being circular, though that too is far from a necessity, asmany examplesshow.)Someone invented a siderocentric system, relatively recently (mid 2000s was it?). And it was horrendously complicated (I don't remember if it's just epicycles anyway, or what, or if there's a trivial transformation to Kepler's laws that makes working in such a domain purely Sisyphean), so that even if it's nontrivial, it's the last thing you would ever want to actually work in.Whereas Kepler's laws are simple, concise and very practical. A few astronomical observations, a few pushes on the slide rule, and you've got reasonable predictions for the paths of celestial objects. A few tweaks on statistical methods (like Gauss predicting the orbit of Ceres) and you've got almost everything. If you need extremely precise predictions (down to the second, or out to millenia), a little relativity can be brought in -- accounting for the precession of Mercury, or the timing of GPS satellites, say.QuoteThis is a meaningless statement.Nothing is stronger than gravity. I've never heard of an electron and proton clacking together so hard they ripped a hole in space time.The 10^39 figure bandied about in the popular press is a special case, for a certain scale factor (I forget what, probably particle-scale interactions). It's as meaningless as the supposed 10^120 discrepancy in vacuum energy, which is similarly easily debunked (if not to complete equality, mind -- a difference perhaps hinting at further science that may explain dark matter, or a GUT).QuoteI like how you, ahem, "deflect" from answering my easily calculated problem; in the process, implying that I am the one with an irrational affinity for an incomplete theory...I have an estimate for the answer to this problem, by the way; I'd be interested to see others' SWAGs on it. Anyone?QuoteThe magnetic yoke or deflection plates, of course. The electromagnetic field of the beam causes a small but nonetheless present deformation of the ambient fields, pushing back. Or if you prefer a quantum view, the virtual photons from the spinning charge carriers in the magnet deliver momentum.Note that no such force occurs if the beam is neutral, e.g., an equal mixture of electrons and protons travelling at ~1MeV average velocity. The components will separate in opposite directions, giving no net force on the yoke*.*For small angles. I can think of situations where this is not true; can you?QuoteI'm glad you asked! Because none of that mess was ever taken into account* in whole-universe simulations, yet they produce exactly the structure observed!https://youtu.be/NjSFR40SY58*http://www.illustris-project.org/about/doesn't mention anything about plasma or currents.Mind, I'm not saying those currents don't exist. I'm saying, even if they do, they are insignificant compared to the dominant gravitational force at work, which itself, does not produce the correct results alone -- but when a model of dark matter is included, the result is striking. (It seems unlikely that we'll ever have much need of considering such high-order effects. If humanity is around for long enough to see their sun complete even a single orbit in its galaxy -- whichever sun and galaxy that might happen to be -- I won't be mad, I'll be very well impressed, indeed!)Dark matter isn't explained with an underlying theory, no. Perhaps that will come in time. One is not given the data-hypothesis-theory trifecta from heaven. It is built up over time!Anyway, ultimate understanding is not needed to obtain something that is nonetheless practical to use! I don't see you referring to quantum electrodynamics every time you want to measure the voltage (whatever that is) on a transistor (whatever that is).QuoteIndeed, science is not built on consensus (and that which is, ain't science).Science is built on numbers, on measurement, on reason.So, hey -- where's that reaction mass going, anyway?Also, you're making the implication, for the second time, that I somehow have my reputation or livelihood staked on the truth of dark matter, or something like that. I don't much appreciate having words put in my mouth, thank you.Tim

author: Elasia
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 05:42:33 am
content: Personally Im keen on dark matter or rather unexplained gravity wells being deeply linked with the expansion of the universe and the fact we live in an asymmetrical one. If membrane or multi dimensional/universe physics pan out it could be something as simple as areas where multi verses are interacting with each other like two people on opposite sides of a balloon.

author: TerraHertz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 06:25:19 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on March 13, 2018, 04:47:26 amNo I didn't mean at a large scale with 67P/dumbell. Small surface features. Not sure if I have any images saved. But they do look exactly like lab experiments in surface erosion via high electric field and ion flux. I'll see if I can find them.Quote"Plasma is conductive" - true."shorting out electric field basically everywhere" - not true. Please read up some more on this. I know you are a very knowledgeable expert in many things, but you're apparently not so hot in plasma effects. Not saying I am either, but I do read widely on the topic.To 'short the field' ions have to move. In moving they create magnetic fields. This has countering effects on the ion movement, and the ion's own space charge affects the imposed field. It gets very complicated. Please look up 'double layers' in plasma. If this stuff was simple, NASA's 'space tether' experiment would have worked as expected.QuoteThe charge difference between the Earth's surface, and surrounding plasma, is on that order. The atmosphere is the insulator. I can't wait till someone actually tries hanging a space elevator cable through the atmosphere.Also there's evidence that charge difference has quite a lot of effect on weather. As for the Sun, yes, astronomical imbalance.Btw, for relatively tiny objects like comets, have you noticed that the old myth about them being 'icy bodies' just isn't holding up? All the ones we've actually looked at are very rocky, little or no ice. The 'ice' was assumed because of spectral OH lines from the coma, and the need to explain the tail. The electric universe version is that comets take on the charge of deep space in the outer parts of their orbit. Then are undergoing glow discharge and ion surface blasting while in the denser regions of solar wind. The OH seen is due to H ions striking rocks, releasing O ions from the rock, which then combines with more H solar wind.QuoteYou're neglecting the concept of mean free path. Plasma effects all scale.QuoteHa ha, no, I just don't mind expressing myself in strong words. So far no one has come up with a single shred of actual experimental evidence for dark matter/dark energy. Such a huge amount of theorizing, with no basis other than the one unexplained thing (galactic rotational anomaly) that they're struggling to explain, is something I find inherently deserving of cynicism and ridicule. I was willing to go with it for a while, years ago when the idea was first raised. Since then it's just become farcical.QuoteOf course! It's good to believe several impossible things before breakfast. It's the 'it's invisible, that's why we can't find any evidence of it, because it's so very invisible' part that makes this one special.QuoteAnd dark matter is due to be thrown out, due to continued lack of evidence. Bit like 'muh Russian collusion.'QuoteHeh. More relevant than you think. A religious belief-based 'explanation' (Epicycles/Dark Matter) with no functional basis and poor predictive power, was thankfully displaced by a sensible experimentally verifiable theory based on a general physical theory. Near perfect predictive power, improved to perfect by Relativity. I did say "I hope this develops" about the electric universe approach to galactic star velocities. It strikes me as something with a lot more potential for investigation.Oh and btw, electrostatic forces are 10^39 stronger than gravitational forces, proton to electron. Same at macro scales. This is not intuitive to us, because we live in an environment in which charges mostly DO equalise, so we very rarely directly experience electrostatic/EM forces of any significant magnitude. But this is not true in macro-plasma environments such as deep space.QuoteThere isn't any, at least not near the stars. I gave the CRT example, because it's a case of an external structure applying a known simple force (E or M fields) to deflect charged, moving mass. And that's exactly what the EU theory is proposing is happening with galactic rotation velocities. Areally largecurrent and associated M field, all externally sourced, is deflecting star trajectories.Something I would like to see, is star velocity study of globular galaxies. Since, the unaligned star trajectories there wouldn't be susceptible to uniform deflection by an external current & field.QuoteNot 'deflecting' (heh) from it. Just saying that there is no 'thrust by mass ejection' occurring, and trying to get you to see why it's not needed. Because 'larger external systems' that can impose EM forces.QuoteOf course. Net kinetic vector of the particle beam is altered. Yoke has corresponding net counter force.QuoteAhem. You did notice that simulation critically includes Dark Matter? Which, since no one knows what it is or how it behaves, means they have a tweek knob on their simulation that they can twist until it produces results that roughly match the seen distribution of matter.Not saying this disproves dark matter, just that it's somewhat circular.QuoteWhen to be realistic, itshould.QuoteThe match is not surprising, since when making up a model to match the visible system, you can fiddle the model till it does match very closely. Somewhat like epicycles. But you do at some point have to come up with an explanation of what the little arms actually are.QuoteSure. I've just lost patience with it.QuoteWhat? This time? Where? And what other time?No such implication was ever intended. I have nothing but the greatest respect for your expertise, always.I was just responding to your pretty strong rubbishing of my original post, in which I say I don't like the Dark Matter theory (didn't specify reasons) and this version seems more interesting to pursue.

author: John Heath
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 02:50:09 pm
content: Dark matter and dark energy have one thing in common. They are both dark , Hmmm . Dark as in can not be seen. Science does better when it follows empirical evidence that can be seen and measured not dark mysterious demons hiding in the grass . I realize I am making cheap shot sweeping generalizations but that word dark brings to mind lazy star trek solutions. Real physics requires a little elbow grease. If one wants to know what is under a rock you have to get out there and lift the rock. Arm chair intellectual speculation of what is under the rock is just a lazy ego trip with 10 dollar college words better suited for tea parties with a baby finger in the air. It is boring work to the wee hours setting up test equipment that finds the answer.

author: nctnico
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 05:46:12 pm
content: Quote from: John Heath on March 13, 2018, 02:50:09 pmPerhaps but when you build something you often need some temporary supports to keep the structure from collapsing.

author: Mr. Scram
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 05:51:14 pm
content: Is this that electric universe that keeps rearing its head regularly?https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Electric_Universe

author: Lightages
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 06:26:48 pm
content: Some of you respondents here amaze me. Anyone who claims that scientists don't believe in the possibility of something existing merely because they can't explain, you are wrong. Anyone who says that science doesn't work, WTF are you doing using it to be online? Is this magic to you?Nobody has said that dark matter is 100% proven, nor dark energy. If they did, they misspoke. There is strong evidence to say that there seems to be more gravity than should be there based on the matter we can observe and that it appears that the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate. Both of these things are unknown somethings so place holders have been used to name them.We only know of one thing that can cause gravity and that is matter. It could be something else but until we find it we have used the place holder "dark matter". It could be a new particle, field, or undiscovered amount of matter. It could also be that the theory of gravity needs to be adjusted to meet the evidence.It could also be that this electrical universe theory might have some validity or point to something. The point is we have observations. These observations show us that something in our knowledge is missing.The only thing we know of that make things go faster is energy. Therefore we have used a place holder "dark energy". Again our observations could be wrong, or our theory of gravity is wrong, or, or, or. These observations show us that something in our knowledge is missing.So we are missing some knowledge, some understanding. Does that mean everything that we know that produces results should be abandoned? If so, throw everything out and start wearing animal skins and start praying to the volcano gods again. Everything else shouldn't be trusted, even though it works.WTF are you people doing on an electronics engineering forum if it is all woowoo and magic to you? What possible thing can you learn or discuss here if it is all unreliable guessing?

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 07:19:50 pm
content: The conspicuous thing about dark matter is, it looks like mass, that responds to gravity, does not otherwise interact (with electric fields or baryonic matter), and, on just these facts alone, is fully able to explain the observations. If MHD is actually at work here, then at best, it can only be an overly complicated approach (as far as I know, analytical results in MHD and plasma physics are few and far between; why is fusion still 10 years away?..), and still has to be merely equivalent to the same observations.Oh, so, hey, TerraHertz. Given the above (and given some error bars allowing for inaccurate observations, and higher order details we haven't yet discovered), surely it should be a very useful insight, to work backwards from this point? I mean, if MHD is the mechanism, then it must contain solutions which exhibit such simple and smooth behavior as this. We should be able to work backwards and solve for the fields, and discover a new (analytical?) truth about MHD. No? Or -- in the process, by contradiction, thoroughly disprove that MHD can explain this at all. Whether the result is positive or negative, it's still a step towards narrowing down the possible explanations!Tim

author: technogeeky
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 13, 2018, 08:19:19 pm
content: This thread is incredibly embarrassing.QuoteTheorists are absolutely essential. A cursory glance at alist of theoretical physicistswill reveal many dozens of pure theory physicists who never set foot in a lab but made invaluable contributions to physics. A few of those dozens won Nobel prizes for their efforts. People who make "theories out of nothing" are charlatans. Theorists look at the published physical experiments and results, and craft a framework for understanding them and hopefully viewing them in a broader context. And if they are physicists, they will make at least one prediction. Such people aren't a lower grade of physicist or thinker. They are especially useful in times when data is scant, ambiguous, or only slowly forthcoming.Quote1. All physicists, theorist or not, are mathematicians.2. When it comes to cosmology,Anthony Perattis a theorist. He has worked in labs, but on other subjects. He doesn't appear to have spent any time building or operating telescopes, surveying the sky, or running astrophysical or other representative experiments.3.Hannes Alfven (ofAlfven wavefame) was acting as a theorist making a mathematical prediction about the properties and existence of these waves in other areas. This prediction was quickly shown to be correct, his theory is used in all kinds of fields of physics, and he won a Nobel Prize for it. I think this safely excludes him as an outsider. He hardly spent any time against the scientific mainstream. His original paper essentially argued that nobody noticed the effect he was proposing; not that there was some contrary theory or interpretation.4.Kristian Birkelandisa scientist who working against the mainstream for most of his life (which was cut short due to drug overdose). He was both a theoretical and laboratory scientist. Some of his ideas have come to be accepted as correct.So when you try to drum up support with the rule of three, it's probably better that all three meet your criteria than only one of three.In any case, there are tremendously easy to understand arguments againstplasma cosmologyincluding the fact that we can nearly all the way back to thesurface of last scattering(and with gravitational waves, which none of the people you mention had anything to say about, we can probably see farther back). We have observed galaxies now withALMAwhen the universe was 800Myr old using gravitational lensing. We have mapped the fluctuations of the CMB down to afew parts in 10^-6and they indeed match prediction exactly. If we can observe out to these distances, there is no intervening plasma. The explanation that matter/antimatter asymmetry is resolved by a dynamical process in our observable universe is now totally impossible: the CMB perfectly matches itself in regions of our universe which are separated by many, many times the speed of light times the age of the universe. The only relativity-respecting explanation for this is that these regions were once casually connected. This is the opposite of the idea that we are accidentally in a a baryonic bubble in which a previous process converted out all of the antimatter (as in plasma cosmology). Such a process could never be as smooth as the CMB is observed to be (on first principles) because it would propagate from an initial condition (of plasma, which has reason, in the theory given, to be homogenous and isotropic). And because it would have taken thousands of lightyears for all of the waves of reactions and back-reactions to have settled out, we would still be able to detect such a thing easily on the CMB and we do not.There are a lot of other bad arguments in this thread, but I have spent too much time already.I will say, adding something of my own:1. Dark matter is the best explanation of all considered and tested explanations evaluated so far. And there have been hundreds of core ideas with thousands of variants that have been considered. Many hundreds of good experiments done. Cold dark matter has been the best fit, every time, so far. And if your pet theory is going to compete, remember that it has to account for 5 to 6 times as much mass as the visible mass. And we're not talking about just electrons.2. Dark energy is thesimplestmathematical location to introduce the effects (accelerating expansion) that we observe. We only know a few things about this effect (except for the acceleration increasing), and one of them is that the energy density (of the dark energy) is approximately constant at all times. This is anextremelyhard thing to reconcile in any other way. We are only at the very beginning of understanding dark energy. If you want to propose pseudoscientific theories on what is going on or laugh derisively at a theory, this is the place to do it. Dark matter is so incredibly more well founded on observation than dark energy.

author: John Heath
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 14, 2018, 12:55:45 am
content: These posts are putting a smile on my face . Nicely done guys and pleased to be in the same company.Can not let this go without putting my own 2 cents in. A positive charge will effect other charges with a Coulomb force. As a Coulomb force diminishes with radius ^2 we have to have to attract negative charges more than repel positive charges with Q1 Q2 / R^2. Oh dear we are stuck with Einstein who said many years ago that matter changes the shape of space. However in this case we are only armed with Coulomb's law not the nightmare of a metric tensor and time as a fourth dimension. All leptons have to be written off as the way a vacuum reacts to positive matter but other than that it has legs in principles of physics. The test for this is in another thread called measurement of 10 MHz down to 50 uHz.

author: Brumby
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 14, 2018, 02:12:15 am
content: Quote from: Lightages on March 13, 2018, 06:26:48 pmIt's as simple as that.Giving something a name allows it to be referred to - in shorthand. It's no different than using terms like "charge", "mass" or "general relativity" that encompass a subject that has far more detail behind it. Wrapping up the concepts of Dark Energy and Dark Matter into their own little bundle, with an easy to manage label means that discussion can continue and characteristics can be explored, even though precise knowledge of the contents is lacking.Ridicule of a concept because its name has a simplistic structure is as intelligent as writing off the beef industry because a four-year-old called the animal a "Moo cow". It is also arrogance of the greatest level - and is to be mourned as the death of scientific thinking. Fortunate, then, that there are more open minded people involved.