Black Holes Do Not Exist, claims Mersini-Houghton

I just have to believe you when you say that you are overwhelmed with all of the data published about astrophysical phenomena. However, the same is true for any discipline in science and it is essential not to be blinded by the entropy of ideas inherent in the cacophony that we call science.

I did not say quasar variability does not change in time. In fact, that statement is oxymoronic. I said that my naïve expectation was that quasars would vary in time by any number of accretion mechanisms.

Everything that I read indicates that the steady-state or recycling universe is just inconsistent with observation. Strangely enough, though, the evidence for an expanding universe is still consistent with a collapsing cosmology. A collapsing cosmology simply means that c, alpha, and h evolve over time and it is c/alpha and mdot that are constant instead.

Steve,

I seem to live in a universe where only time stands still, ie. always now and it is light moving through space/the vacuum alone that creates change.

I guess this is one of those levels of the multiverse.

Regards,

John M

John C,

Euclid defined points as having no parts, i.e. no size. I see this the only way to escape Zeno's nonsensical paradoxes.

John M,

You asked John C: "Is zero just a point on the line between 1 and -1, or does it represent the void?"

Why should an Euclidean point not represent the void? Of course, a pebble is not void.

Tom,

Fortunately logics is not based on your questionable belief in Relativity. What about Einstein's so called first postulate, I see it formally seemingly correct but its interpretation blundering: Well, the laws of physics are certainly the same for every chosen point of reference. However, once a point of reference has been chosen, one must not expect that things look simultaneously equal from a different point of view.

Eckard

Eckard,

The problem is that the point still has location, but the void is an absence of location and/or all location.

While I have no problem with it representing a reference to positive and negative, this conflation of the point for the void seems to be the basis of the view that all space arises from one dimensionless point, which is an absence of space. So the view then becomes that space is only a product of the geometry of points of reference. Yet as I keep pointing out to Tom, multiples of zero always equal zero, so no matter how many dimensionless points you have, they still don't add up to extension and volume.

Regards,

John M

"Possibly because you have a static view of reality, rather than a dynamic one."

You haven't the faintest idea of what I'm saying, do you?

"Naivete would be the element of consciousness prior to the acquisition of knowledge."

No, I think that would be called ignorance. And what guarantees that knowledge is acquired?

" ... one must not expect that things look simultaneously equal from a different point of view."

Because they don't.

" ... I keep pointing out to Tom, multiples of zero always equal zero ..."

And I thank you for it. Now, what does that have to do with your claim that infinity times zero equals zero?

" ... if you ask me a 'philosophical' question or reply in that 'vein,' then I can deal with it."

I think you did, E.P. The question of uniformity -- whether the laws of physics apply equally throughout the universe -- is certainly a philosophical one. We can't measure the whole universe.

There may be a physical answer, though, to your question of " ... a very bumpy and abstract structure that did not really contribute any information toward the understanding ..." of black hole collapse. I recently completed a web-based seminar course in cosmology taught by Pankaj Joshi of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research.* Professor Joshi touched on a model of "chaotic collapse" which ties in to what Jason is saying above. Classical chaos is deterministic.

*The web based program is sponsored by Scientific American in conjunction with the New York University Polytechnic School of Engineering. Very worthwhile.

John, if you can get over your addiction to unreasonably oppressive concrete thinking, consider the case of Thomson's lamp :

Since zero is an even number, would you say that the lamp is on or off after one minute? Would you say that the lamp was never on or off? Would you say that the lamp was always both on and off? Would you say that lamp exists in an eternal superposition of on and off states?

Eckard,

I quite agree about the indefinite quality of a point in relation to a continuum. Really the concept is as imaginary as is the square root of a negative value. We can say that an address might be determined for it through the convergence of two or more continuous functions, but that can't tell us what room number it lives in.

More importantly, mathematics is what we make of it to give form to our conceptualization of reality. So if I want to create a measurement scheme to quantify my own preferred hypothesis, I can choose from a variety of axiomatic properties just as if each axiom were like a chess piece having it's prescribed move capabilities. I note that Tom specifically stated that the gameboard of topology chooses that the 3 sphere compacts R^3 to a simple 'pole', not point. This doesn't disallow a Euclidean point in the midst of oo, it means that 'i' is an axis rotated 90 degree counterclowkwise enabling a complex plane to evolve from what would be our point of origin having no parts. If 'I' choose to do so, I could incorporate that third partless point in the oo scheme as representing that o and o are infinitely close, and with that third element construct an orthogonal axial schema. :-) jrc

Right, John R. The irrelevant and naive arguments over dimensionless points assume that Cartesian plane arithmetic applies to the complex plane, which of course isn't true -- the double zero of the complex plane does indeed lend itself to a geometric interpretation, as Euler showed with his iconic equation: e^ipi 1 = 0

(Gauss is reputed to have said that no one to whom this relation is not immediately obvious could ever be a first rate mathematician.)

John M,

"no matter how many dimensionless points you have, they still don't add up to extension and volume".

Yes, but a dimensionless point is something unimaginable to morons. Humorist Wilhelm Busch mocked: Who cannot imagine a point is just too lazy for that.

Dedekind cut effectively reinvented the non-dimensionless pebble-like rather than measure-based notion of numbers. This relapse paved the way to Cantor's abstruse while nonetheless populist set theory up to the belief in singularities of physical reality, including the singularity of a black hole. Substitute in topology "set of points" by "continuum of real numbers", and some nonsense disappears.

By the way, position is not included in Euclid's decisive definition. When the ancient mathematicians considered two the first number, they may have felt that absolute void and its logical complement absolute endlessness are logical necessities. The many infinities and zeros mentioned by John C and the variety of arbitrarily fabricated modern axioms illustrate the lacking self-consistence of set theories.

Tom,

"Because they don't." Congratulation. You made the first step to understand not just relativity but also Relativity - the latter as an illusion.

Eckard

"Congratulation. You made the first step to understand not just relativity but also Relativity ..."

Thanks, Eckard. Now you take the first step toward understanding Lorentz Transformations.

Yes, John, I agree with you. I think it is more important for fundamental science did not even a problem a "black hole exists or does not exist", but an adequate model of the Universum as a holistic process of generating structures in eternity and time. This requires a "crazy" new ontology, which will give a new heuristic for the fundamental knowledge.

Regards,

Vladimir

Tom,

Why would zero be even or odd?

Eckard,

It was when I did try imagining a point that that I couldn't get around the contradictions. No matter how small, if it didn't have some dimensionality, then how are we to "see" it having existence?

I am sorry for my ignorance, but numbers are an organizational tool, reflective of an infinitely complex reality. They can be either units of measure, or individual entities, ie, pebbles, because there is no platonic form.

No, I'm not an expert and haven't made any claims otherwise. Does this mean that interested observers such as myself should be excluded from discussions about the nature of physics, when such devices as blocktime, multiworlds, dark energy, inflation, etc, are invoked to solve the many problems? People like Tom might think I need to learn enough to understand why these many fixes are valid, but my suspicion is there is more jury-rigging than anyone cares to consider. People such as myself are only the vanguard of skepticism.

Regards,

John M

Vladimir,

First it will take the realization that when observations don't match theories, simply adding a patch is not good science in the first place.

Regards,

John M

Proof that zero is even is as easily looked up as everything else I've been telling you.

Tom,

I appreciate that this year the Nobel Prizes in physics and in chemistry honored ingenious work. Nobel himself decided against a prize in mathematics, and the Committee did also prove prudent in 1912 and 1921.

Nonetheless I confirm from my engineering perspective the importance of Euler's equation, and without overestimating myself, I maintain that Dedekind's relapse into pebble-like numbers deserves a scrutiny. What about Lorentz transformation, I know this message, and I will try and look for mistakes.

While Vladimir is correct when he mentions that pre-mathematical intuition often led to progress, I am skeptical concerning guesswork that is based on any kind of teleology including theology. I am sure, you will share this view of mine.

John C,

Sometimes I fear I got you wrong. What do you mean with "a Euclidean point in the midst of oo"?

Eckard

Tom,

So in what amounts to a base two system, not flipping the switch at all is equivalent to switching it on and off however many times.

What does this have to do with anything multiplied by zero is still zero?

I certainly am not making any claims to mathematical proficiency, but I still see space as the basis of geometry and topology, not a product of it. I really am not above being convinced otherwise, but you haven't yet managed to do it.

Regards,

John M