Fortunately I hopped off the train last, well behind everyone else. However the train had just come to a stop so that the dwindling Eddy currents sparked into a micro wormhole catapulting me several tens of minutes into the future where I could safely step out ahead of everyone else ;^)
I'll have to peek more at your paper...
Steve
And this is both absurd and mysterious (the combination is highly valued by Einsteinians):
"In SR only one case was assumed for observing 'speed' with constant c. We describe a second case, where c is unaffected but where an 'apparent' speed c+/-v is also allowed."
Pentcho Valev
Dear Peter,
While I think you do make some useful observations regarding the importance of plasma in the universe, I am compelled to point out a crucial misrepresentation of the right image in 'Figure 1'. The superimposed image caption states: "Visible 'Dark Matter'. Galaxy Cluster CL 0024+17."
The Figure 1 caption states:
"Space. Different constituents of the Inter-Galactic Medium (IGM) are visible at each waveband. X-ray (left) and visible (right) 'dark matter' around clusters, galaxies and stars. The 'clouds' represent a diffuse plasma medium of ions, CO and molecular gas..."
It's not entirely clear what 'clouds' you're referring to, but I'm certain that the so-called "visible" dark matter is not visible in any waveband. As briefly explained in both the NASA announcement and Wikipedia - CL0024+17, the image shown in your essay attributed to "visible" 'dark matter' is actually a composite telescopic image overlayed with a 'gravity map' illustrating dark matter as it seems to be inferred from identified gravitational effects. Those gravitational effects are very tenuously identified from minute optical distortions of likely many thousands of background galaxies, statistically evaluated to derive the location of the weak lensing medium. The total mass required to produce the identified weak gravitational lensing effects is compared to the estimated mass of the clusters' galaxies and the intracluster medium (thought to represent most of the cluster's mass) - the difference is thought to be the mass represented by the inferred dark matter. This exceedingly complex process is subject to significant error.
The illustrated CL 0024+17 dark matter is not visible, and cannot consist of any ordinary detectable matter and does not emit any EM radiation including X-rays. Since this identified peripheral dark matter ring circumscribing the galaxy cluster, conveniently aligned to the Earth's line of sight, is thought to have been dispersed by some collision, it is not collocated with the hot, X-ray emitting intracluster medium. Hubblesite contains a newsy discussion and interviews, concluding with the statement: "Cl 0024+17 is the first cluster to show a dark matter distribution that differs from the distribution of both the galaxies and the hot gas."
Most tellingly, both the NASA announcement and Wikipedia entries referenced above includes both the unaltered telescopic image of CL 0024+17 and the illustration overlay you described as "visible" 'dark matter', for ease of comparison.
Of course, if you read my essay entry Inappropriate Application of Kepler's Empirical Laws of Planetary Motion to Spiral Galaxies Created the Perceived Galaxy Rotation Problem - Thereby Establishing a Galactic Presence for the Elusive, Inferred Dark Matter (you did post a comment) you should have found that I argue that imposing the specific laws of planetary motion on vast spiral galaxies is invalid, and artificially produces the falsely perceived galaxy rotation problem that seems to require the compensatory mass thought to be provided by imaginary dark matter. As shown in the "Supplemental Information" section of my essay, there are a number of physicists that have produced models of spiral galaxies that accurately describe their observed rotational characteristics without requiring any dark matter or modified gravity.
Best wishes,
Jim
Dear Pentcho,
We haven't been taught to think about, let alone understand the actual physical processes involved where fluctuating EM fields interact with charged particles in the general sense that Peter's essay explores. So it is no surprise that you might think an exploration of its effects "absurd". I could point out a number of papers here which propose highly extravagant new types of physics (which conflict with rather than compliment known physics). But of course none of that is necessary. It has been shown that the Maxwell equations and the Lorentz force law are perfectly able to say exactly what the physics are.
Steve
Steve,
The absurdity is in Peter's claim that the speed of light is variable (c'=c+v) prior to the light meeting the observer but then on arrival miraculously becomes constant c'=c (so that Einsteinians can safely sing "Divine Einstein" and "Yes we all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity").
http://www.haverford.edu/physics/songs/divine.htm
DIVINE EINSTEIN: No-one's as dee-vine as Albert Einstein not Maxwell, Curie, or Bo-o-ohr!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PkLLXhONvQ
We all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity. Yes we all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity. Everything is relative, even simultaneity, and soon Einstein's become a de facto physics deity. 'cos we all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity. We all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity. Yes we all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity.
Pentcho Valev
Pentcho
You have misunderstood the model. It would indeed be absurd if speed varied "prior to the light meeting the observer." You have not absorbed the body of the essay, which says the contrary; Nothing happens to speed of propagation until the change of medium. This is as optical science, just poorly interpreted until now.
Consider a light wave in a diffuse medium, 99% of which passes by a co-moving lens, but 1% of which interacts. The 99% caries on at c wrt the background medium. The 1% changes speed in accordance with the refractive index of the lens, and passes through the lens at new speed c/n WITH RESPECT TO THE LENS MEDIUM.
It is simply that last sentence that most human brains have not yet evolved to comprehend and visualise kinetically. The 'n' is due to the different dispersion delay, but the SECOND factor, delta v is due to relative media v.
The 1% meeting the lens is absorbed by the free electron particles at the lens surface. They then re-emit at c, but Doppler shifted because THEIR c is NOT the same as the BACKGROUND MEDIUM c.
The confusion is due to our forgetting to adjust for observer frame. If a single observer at rest in the background watches the whole process, he will see the apparent combined speed change as the light enters the moving medium.
If the observer ALSO accelerates into the lens frame WITH the 1% of the light signal, he will then of course find local c/n.
We have merely been, until now, incapable of dealing with that number of variables all in one go. This result removes all the paradox and anomalies from our observations. It does NOT quite support SR as interpreted up to now. The assumption of length contraction of rigid bodies is not required, as there is both real and apparent light speed (the latter from real c in another 'passing' frame). It does however make logical sense of the postulates themselves.
If you didn't absorb all that you really do need to read it about three times and assimilate it or it will evaporate, because it is quite different to the old paradoxical assumptions we're used to when applied.
Peter
Sreenath
I come to bury Caesar not to praise him. Not quite true as Einstein was clearly a true genius, getting so close even without knowing space isn't empty! But I show how with just a bit of tidying up to remove the paradoxes SR can be logical, and a similar tweak to QM then fits SR properly.
Gravity (GR) emerges as a combined energy effect, that is, Visible Matter plus 'Dark Matter', plus dark energy, as a simple energy density distribution; where there is more energy focussed into matter there is less dark energy, so (gravitational) pressure asymmetry. But there was no space to elaborate on that. Even the explanation I just gave to Pentcho had to be curtailed in the essay so many missed it.
I look forward to reading yours this year, if it's as good as last year it'll get a good score, and I hoped you liked mine enough to give it the top mark Petcho's vision of the future (above) foresaw.
Very best wishes and good luck.
Peter
Dear Pentcho,
It's the beauty of having identified a homomorphism between relativistic 4 vector equations and Newtonian-Galilean 3 vector equations that for most common problems you may choose which framework you wish to work within and the numerical results will be equivalent to what you get in the other framework. That homomorphism is:
[math]\Delta E = f(t, x, y, z, q, m) \qquad \rightarrow \qquad \Delta E = f(-ct, x, y, z)[/math]
Where the left hand side is what could be called the Maxwell-Thomson-de Broglie relations and the right hand side the Poincare-Einstein-Minkowski relations. A similar homomorphism may be written for momentum also.
Pentcho,
The Mystery may now be resolved, and the apparent "absurdity". (I post this here as you had multiple points above and I've already responded to the main one there). My 'mysterious' sentence was;
"In SR only one case was assumed for observing 'speed' with constant c. We describe a second case, where c is unaffected but where an 'apparent' speed c+/-v is also allowed."
What this means is; When Einstein considered SR he assumed that anything that even 'appeared' to move faster than c HAD to be denied, i.e. a pulse of light in a Fibre Optic cable, or better still, gas filled waveguide tube, pinned to a passing Concord doing Mach2 could not be seen at c
James
Dark matter must be denied as well as supported, that's science, and I think you make as good a fist of it as possible. I also agree your comments and that interpretations (as they must) vary. I set out to falsify it myself some years ago and followed exploration as well as the two competing teams and eventual 'task force'. I tended to read some 30 papers a week (the MNRAS alone had 56 in just one of 3 Sept volumes so far). I was initially astonished by the data, much of which, with respect, you ignore or are not aware of, but eventually a clear picture dawned on me, not matching most interpretation, but more consistent with the actual findings, of all sorts. I know I won't change your mind, but must explain anyway.
I now do not agree with your comment that dark matter; "cannot consist of any ordinary detectable matter and does not emit any EM radiation." It can indeed consist of baryonic matter despite assumptions. Plasma considered as 'stem cell' type pairs is not detectable except kinetically and gravitationally. There is a plethora of both gravitational and kinetic evidence. A whole pile of other anomalies are then resolved by such a model, from Interstellar Faraday Rotation, through ellipticity to the Voyager anomaly, lensing and light delays.
We now estimate the rotational velocities of galaxies via the red and blue shift of the dark matter haloes. The related kinetic Sunyaey-Zeldovich effect has been known for decades, and a recently derived kinetic term from Atlas 3D work is referred in my essay. Related light delays can be over 3 years!!!
i.e. The dark matter couples with all em waves, re-emits them at c within the halo as it rotates (so slows it down one side and speeds it up the other) then when it leaves' it's out of phase, but does c across the intervening spce.
Please refractive index n=
James
Anon was me, not only a logout but half the post gone! I think I referred to plasma n=
Peter,
Thanks very much for your courteous response. While I am a lay person, I have spent >30 years identifying and solving critical operational issues in some of the world's very largest computer systems. I'm quite used to encountering many conflicting interpretation of observational data. As the primary goal of this contest is to "Encourage and support rigorous, innovative, and influential thinking about foundational questions in physics and cosmology", I don't think it would be appropriate to bow to any interpretation of 'dark matter evidence' based solely on the credentials of the interpreter. Nothing personal.
If I understand correctly, the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect has been used to detect galaxy clusters since, unlike dark matter, the vast, hot plasma comprising the intracluster medium physically interacts with the photons of the CMB, producing large scale optical distortions in the microwave background signal. The independence of supposed galaxy cluster dark matter, inferred by identified weak gravitational lensing, and the gaseous intracluster medium has been established by their spatial separation due to galaxy cluster collisions. Interestingly, the weak lensing effects are not separated from the clusters' galaxies by those collisions...
I am not aware of any peer reviewed published reports using the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect to identify galactic dark matter halos. In the interest of rigorous investigation, can you provide some references for visible dark matter?
Sincerely, Jim
James
Just to give you a flavour, a Sept AGN paper abstract is here, discussing the high density jets of re-ionized matter. And one thing I forgot the Milky Way certainly DOES 'still have' and AGN. (iro Sagattarius A) Not (back) up to any great speed yet, so the 14 hypervelocity stars it has spat out recently are still in one piece, but there's also plenty of ions and gas.
Some are certainly worth paying for. The 'bipolar structures' referred in this one is a bit complex but can include 'kinetically decoupled' haloes and cores (rotating the other axis) which the recycling model explains.:
Claude-Andr茅 Faucher-Gigu猫re, Eliot Quataert The physics of galactic winds driven by active galactic nuclei MNRAS Volume 425 Issue 1, pages 605-622, 1 September 2012 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2966.2012.21512.x/abstract
Active galactic nuclei (AGN) drive fast winds in the interstellar medium of their host galaxies. It is commonly assumed that the high ambient densities and intense radiation fields in galactic nuclei imply short cooling times, thus making the outflows momentum conserving. We show that cooling of high-velocity shocked winds in AGN is in fact inefficient in a wide range of circumstances, including conditions relevant to ultraluminous infrared galaxies (ULIRGs), resulting in energy-conserving outflows. We further show that fast energy-conserving outflows can tolerate a large amount of mixing with cooler gas before radiative losses become important. For winds with initial velocity聽vin聽≳ 10 000 km s−1, as observed in ultraviolet and X-ray absorption, the shocked wind develops a two-temperature structure. While most of the thermal pressure support is provided by the protons, the cooling processes operate directly only on the electrons. This significantly slows down inverse Compton cooling, while free-free cooling is negligible. Slower winds with聽vin聽∼ 1000 km s−1, such as may be driven by radiation pressure on dust, can also experience energy-conserving phases but under more restrictive conditions. During the energy-conserving phase, the momentum flux of an outflow is boosted by a factor ∼vin/2vs聽by work done by the hot post-shock gas, where聽vs聽is the velocity of the swept-up material. Energy-conserving outflows driven by fast AGN winds (vin聽∼ 0.1c) may therefore explain the momentum fluxes聽聽of galaxy-scale outflows recently measured in luminous quasars and ULIRGs. Shocked wind bubbles expanding normal to galactic discs may also explain the large-scale bipolar structures observed in some systems, including around the Galactic Centre, and can produce significant radio, X-ray and γ-ray emission. The analytic solutions presented here will inform implementations of AGN feedback in numerical simulations, which typically do not include all the important physics.
There are scores of recent ones more relevant to halo density and morphology.
Peter
Gurcharn
Thanks for your kind words. I'm no conspiracy theorist but you may have a point. There is room for 'old pals act' back scratching. Yet I also see some downsides, in limiting fair evaluation of many essays.
The big problem I think is finding time to read and absorb them. Mine for instance will not expose it's riches to a cursory skim over. But as I said on your blog I'm also very impressed with yours and it will certainly get a good rating from me. I think you may also like Regazas and Kingley Nixey's if you've not read it yet.
Best of luck.
Peter,
Thanks again for your reply, which was to some extent helpful in identifying the source of confusion. However, I must point out that you've not addressed the specific reference to the image caption referring to "Visible 'Dark Matter'. Galaxy Cluster CL 0024+17." As demonstrated by the NASA & Wikipedia references, this is definitely a misinterpretation.
Your last response stated:
"Just to give you a flavour, a Sept AGN paper abstract is here, discussing the high density jets of re-ionized matter. And one thing I forgot the Milky Way certainly DOES 'still have' and AGN. (iro Sagattarius A) Not (back) up to any great speed yet, so the 14 hypervelocity stars it has spat out recently are still in one piece, but there's also plenty of ions and gas."
The Milky Way certainly does NOT exhibit the relativistic jets characteristic of an AGN. As I understand, the enormous gamma-ray emitting polar bubbles of plasma are thought to be the remnants of past galaxy nucleus activity. Please see the NASA press release, NASA'S Fermi Telescope Discovers Giant Structure In Our Galaxy.
Your Claude-André Faucher-Giguère, Eliot Quataert reference abstract makes no mention of dark matter. I could not find a free version of that paper, however, I think much more to the point, an FQXi essay entry attributes the observed rotational velocity of spiral galaxies to those very same AGN outflows producing spiral arms moving to the galaxy periphery. This proposal also does not require dark matter to explain the observed rotational characteristics of spiral galaxies. Please see A New Model Without Dark Matter for the Rotation of Spiral Galaxies: The Connections Among Shape, Kinematics and Evolution by Mario Everaldo de Souza.
Still trying to understand the source of confusion regarding visible dark matter, I could not find any accessable Claude-André Faucher-Giguère papers in arXiv, but I did find some with contributor Eliot Quataert. Specifically, I found a very curious report, On the Structure of Hot Gas in Halos: Implications for the Lx-Tx Relation & Missing Baryons. As the title implies this model evaluation of, as I understand, hot gases in the intraclustr medium of galaxy clusters is also applied to the composition of galaxy dark matter halos. It also suggests that galaxies were formed from primordial dark matter.
What I think may be occurring is that researchers studying the characteristics of hot gaseous intracluster media (ICM) (perhaps produced by AGN outflows) are applying their results to supposedly galactic dark matter halos thought to have been accreted from the hot gas/presumptive dark matter ICM, depleted of baryonic gases.
I can understand how confusing this is from the varying perspective of those studying hot gases in the ICM and the presumedly colocated galaxy cluster dark matter, and those that specified the presence of dark matter to explain the non-Keplerian rotational characteristics of spiral galaxies.
Keep in mind that the visible ICM matter is thought to be twice as massive as the visible galactic matter of all galaxies within a galaxy cluster. It's difficult to understand how the more massive visible ICM could have been ejected from the relativistic jets of less massive AGN.
Moreover, galactic dark matter halos are thought to be about 10x the visible mass of spiral galaxies - this mass seeming to be necessary. It's also very difficult to believe that AGNs produce much more massive dark matter galactic halos.
At any rate, I have yet to see any reference to "visible 'dark matter'" in galactic halos. I don't think there's any support for this interpretation in any of the literature.
I hope this helps, Jim
Jim
Our 'dark matter' Halo is 10^12 solar masses, far more than visible baryonic matter. In my caption I put 'dark matter' in inverted commas as I'm clearly saying I'm not proposing the common interpretation. That density is consistent with kinetic effects and CMB data as well as gravity, but I also accept your own proposal as worthy of consideration.
Mine is simply one of the alternative valid views; That we live in a 'dark energy/ matter universe' where visibly baryonic matter in only
Dear Peter,
Thanks for your valuable support.
In my opinion, at this stage of the contest we should not get bogged down in minor points of differences in our viewpoints. We should pickup about 40 to 50 essays that are broadly to our liking, generally represent our viewpoints in different styles and are novel contributions in our opinion. We should rate them 'high' to see them in the list of finalists.
I definitely want to see your essay in the list of finalists!
Best of Luck
G S Sandhu
Peter,
Thanks very much for your consideration. I must say, though that the image caption "Visible 'dark matter'" certainly does not even clearly convey your assertion that it represents (as stated in the Figure 1 caption) "... a diffuse plasma medium of ions, CO and molecular gas." Neither interpretation is correct, as the 'visible' 'clouds' actually illustrates a gravity map inferred by the researchers. No plasma medium has been detected within any inferred galactic dark matter halo - no 'clouds' or anything else is visible there.
Sorry to be so obstinate - I do see value in your emphasis on the importance of plasma media in the universe. I'm just compelled to clarify points of confusion.
Best wishes - you're doing very well in the competition!
James
Thanks. The 'map' is overlaid on the image on the left, also showing REAL X ray results. The caption is, correctly, on the visible band HST image. That was precisely my point; That 'dark matter' need NOT be some mysterious unknown substance. The Ostriker quote gives the 'Concordance' view which I vary from. That fact, or that it's a different modification to yours, cannot make it 'incorrect.'
Your following comment "No plasma medium has been detected within any inferred galactic dark matter halo - no 'clouds' or anything else is visible there." is indeed incorrect.
Firstly you have two propositions; 1. "No plasma medium has been detected", which is quite wrong. 'detection' covers all forms of detection not just the limited visible wavelengths. It is detected everywhere, and generally at increasing densities nearer matter. Its normally considered as 'electron density'. Gravitation is only one indicator of a number used. In fact I disagree with gravitational mass estimation level from lensing as it ignores the kinetic diffraction well known from optics etc. (and kSZ).
2.; "no 'clouds' or anything else is visible there." Agreed, plasma scattering is not detectable in the optical range, but is otherwise. CO and molecular gas can only come from bound ions (from pair production). Wherever we find gas being formed we find the ions that form it (less in long established undisturbed gas clouds). Also check the sums; the gravitational effects can and do include the gas itself (or the plasma density is even greater!)
I'm sorry if my thesis appears to disagrees with yours, but that does not make mine wrong. I make mine very clear in the text, there are no ghost-like dark characters, just Eddie and the electrons, and Penny and the protons, who might just couple one day!
I've now read Evaraldo's essay as you suggested, and commented. It's original and I can see why you like it, as it offers your idea support. But beware of being unscientific. I suggest the best science is about 'falsifying' a model, so zeroing in and honestly analysing the conflicting, not supporting evidence. Evaraldo's does seem to conflict with much evidence, i.e. he has ring galaxies expanding not accreting! (just look at the 'spokes of the Cartwheel galaxy) so it should be an interesting process.
You'll have seen from my papers (I hope) that I do however agree with his note ref formation from Quasars. Do comment on those.
Best wishes.
Peter,
"The 'map' is overlaid on the image on the left..."
This is incorrect - the gravity map overlay I've repeated referred to is included only in the image on the right. The process using weak gravitational lensing to generate the gravity map used to produce the artificial dark matter 'cloud' overlay image is clearly and undeniably explained in the NASA announcement: Hubble Finds Ghostly Ring of Dark Matter. Both the overlaid and unmodified images are included in that document.
If you will refer to the above NASA document I'll be happy to discuss any issues you might have.
