Out with the old and in with the new, as they say. While the poor old BB seems to be taking a bit of a hammering of late (let's be honest, it's in terminal decline), a new star is rising.

Plasma cosmology is clearly gaining ground. Though it has a long way to go, it has a lot going for it. Its proponents generally work backwards from observation, unlike BB supporters, who rely on abstract mathematical modelling, an increasing array of ad hoc hypotheticals, and various tenuous interpretations (especially those relating to red shifts).

I think www.plasmacosmology.net provides a powerful and straightforward introduction to the emerging paradigm.

What an auspicious beginning.

I think the work of Alfven, Langmuir, and Birkeland was certainly auspicious, although their work in cosmology -- and the implications of their work for this field -- remain largely unrecognised by the mainstream.

2 out of 3 Nobel Laureates can't be bad!

I work with this idea since last year as Rotating Universe on the base of Plasma Universe but the people do not know how to discuss. I would like to know what do you think about it.

I think the rotating universe is a natural corollary of the Plasma universe.

Trouble is, I think that ATM (Against the mainstream) is a misnomer for this thread. This BB, while interesting, frequently seems to demonstrate very conservative views, that is views IMHO more consistent with skepticism as inertia rather than skepticism as a spirit of free and critical enquiry.

How often do you hear the cry of 'Show us the evidence?', and from people who still think the universe is expanding. The spirit of the flat earther lives on, it seems.

I strongly disagree. One of the things I noticed with many ATM promoters is that they advocate throwing the baby out with the bathwater just because there are questions with current models. There's nothing wrong with "free and critical inquiry" and if you look around here you'll see that this subject has been broached in the past along with a bunch of other ATM proposals, but the skepticism shown here isn't "inertia" .. it's the demand that alternative models be shown to supplant current ones. As far as the plasma universe goes - do a search. This idea has been knocked by many here with a better understanding of cosmology than I have. I think the onus is on you to demonstrate why I should change my mind instead of misrepresenting genuine skepticism.

From the OP link...

With due respect to Max Planck, I've always found this "quote" to be a bit screwy. So, a "new scientific truth" doesn't need to be convincing??? Yeah...right. :roll:

The way this site has used that quote only reinforces my opinion...

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"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

Mr Planck neither says nor implies anything remotely approaching your very loose interpretation. He is clearly suggesting that people, for whatever reasons, struggle to make changes that challenge their world view.

Are you familiar with the work of Thomas Kuhn? Check out www.plasmacosmology.net/skep.html (Lower section of page).

Traditional cosmology speaks about gravity only. There are Birkeland currents, ionized clouds and plasma in stars with electrostatic force much stronger then gravity. The protons and electrons are not always homogeneously mixed and balanced. Why do they not search the influence of such strong, moving force ?

Yes, this is the fundamental issue. Why does the mainstream turn a blind eye?

Because, perchance, of the profound implications? Does the BBT need anymore nails in its coffin?

Do you really think that's how science "works"...that scientists are somehow scared (my word) of the "implications"...so instead they "stick" to what is safe??
A good scientist just doesn't "operate" that way.

You seem convinced that the BB is wrong, and that "plasma theory" is right...so convince us, (which was the point of my previous post) Show the mainstream how it is wrong.

Handwaving about "profound implications" "proves" nothing...and I (for one) require proof.

edited to change demand to require...

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"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

It is better perhaps to simply go after the arguments for a plasma cosmology. They stem, by appearance on the website, from a series of resemblances. Making a spiral structure is not unique to plasmas- I can do that in my drain. I can even replicate it in a separate experimental environment (my toilet) with even more violent similarity. A cup of coffee and cream stirred gently. A hurricane. The list goes on. All of these share the proof that plasma cosmology has: they resemble spiral structure. That a platypus resembles a duck is not enough to call it a duck. That a mannequin resembles a person is not enough to call it alive and intelligent.

Semblence is not proof. It is a cue for mathematical models, a possible starting point for analysis for similarity. It is not, however, itself supporting evidence.

I've detailed in my other post the other semblances posited for large scale structure - soap, sponge, spiderweb and 3-D chessboard. Plasma might be able to mimic these structures, but so can soap and water.

The "electric" fields that are described throughout the presentation haven't been found because for large part they don't exist. The appeal to electric force being so much more powerful than gravitational does not hold up either - the strength of electrical charge is its undoing. It does not propagate far before it is dampened out by opposite charges.

Simply scaling something up is not proof either. Many things do not scale in the manner proposed, applying only over short distances or brief periods of time. Imagining them bigger is not supporting evidence.

Electric and plasma cosmologies don't work mostly because any neutral particles fall through the cracks. Like light waves. The distortion of light waves is difficult to explain with electric charges acting as gravity.

It is not based on bias that plasma cosmology is not at the forefront; it is a host of difficulties in accounting for effects that are readily observable. It would appear that rather than address these difficulties and own up to them, the site preferentially assails a different theory in scattershot by attributing religious fervor to its straw-man opponent.

This, also, is not supporting evidence. Not to mention bad form.

And the final attempt at striking similarity between Halton Arp and Galileo is, to me, inappropriate. Arp can't get time at an observatory. I cannot either. Definitely not supporting evidence.

[side note] I thought Galileo had access to the most advanced telescopic equipment of his time, since he made them himself. [/side note]

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What's it like being a skeptic in the Middle East? Check out my blog.

I have questioned your interpretation of Max Planck's famous proverb, but you have avoided my question.

Max Planck implied that people, for whatever reasons, struggle to make changes that challenge their world view, regardless of whether the evidence is convincing.

Strong stuff, but wrong, nonetheless. On what basis do you make these proclamations?

Enlighten me, please. What is your understanding of genuine skepticism?

In your case it's simply a matter of not believing in a plasma universe just because you posted a link and you say so.

Are you going to get around to making a case for your beliefs or is it just going to be about what Max Planck meant, empty rhetoric about "nails in the coffin" etc, and now a side-bar on what genuine skepticism means to me? Cut to the chase and make your plasma pitch P.Asmah.

Oh no, not again... Look, we've been through this before: the electric universe model is not a valid steady-state model for this universe. It is unsupported by evidence, and contradicted by most observations.

What? #-o

My red. Well, try these. If you still can't see the wood for the trees, then I can't help you...

Plenty of technical stuff here
http://www.plasmas.org/space-astrophys.htm

Papers here
http://public.lanl.gov/alp/plasma/papers.html

I quote the following from this mainstream source
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/enc..._cosmology.htm
Edits: Deletion of superfluous text.

...and you've avoided answering PatKelley's post...so what. (No worries, I'm not going to hold "that" against you. )

Actually, I have no trouble agreeing with that statement...but...

People can struggle all they want...to change the world view requires convincing evidence...simple as that.

I agree with Archer...cut to the chase...

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"The facts gentlemen, and nothing but the facts, for careful eyes are narrowly watching." Isaac Asimov

Care to show me some convincing evidence for the alleged existence dark matter and dark energy, other than tenuous interpretations? Or do mainstream ideas require less evidence when they prop-up failing theories? Real skeptics tend to suspect as much.

www.plasmacosmology.net provides an introduction. More technical papers are provided on the links page, some of which are listed above. Go check them out, if you dare look outside your world view.

I'm not going to play games. You came here proposing an alternate model that I don't believe in and spent more time on attacking mainstream thinking than with presenting your case.How about providing some convincing evidence for the electric universe? I hope you can do better than relying on links or the tiresome misdirection of bringing up the dark matter/dark energy question. BTW, your posting style looks oddly familiar right down to the colorizing in your quotes, reliance on the dark matter issue, and antipathy toward the mainstream. Ever post here before? :-k

P.Asmah, we have seen many people in this forum promoting a plasma Universe. I strongly urge you to avail yourself of the search feature of this board to avoid making their mistakes.

I also strongly suggest you drop the attitude here. Coming in here displaying this kind of arrogance is not only bad manners, it is also a good way to be banned, since it rarely leads to polite conversation.

"Cancel each other out" is not an appropriate description. You get electric arcs in the atmosphere (lightning) because of the charge imbalances that the plasma/electric universe models propose instead drive gravity. In other words, a planet plasmatically/electrically bound to a star should ground out eventually and simply fly off into space. If the charge is to be preserved (as we don't normally experience many jumps in gravitational - excuse me, electrical pull), then the space in-between would have to be an insulator to prevent charge flow- but then, charge flow is the essence of plasma cosmology, driving the rotation. It's a no-win situation. Either the charges are separated, or they flow. One or the other. If they are separated, no electric currents exist. If they are not, then the ground state occurs as charges equalize, and there are no more electric forces.

Are you familiar with the term, Double Layers? They refer to a plasma behaviour/phenomena discovered by the Nobel Laureate, Irving Langmuir.

If you check out the pages linked to, you will find that your understanding, quoted above, is erroneous, although I will concede that it is a fairly accurate representation of the current mainstream position.

"In order to understand the phenomena in a certain plasma region, it is necessary to map not only the magnetic but also the electric field and the electric currents." Hannes Alfven, Nobel Laureate

Actually, I was going to point out that all the paper links actually just point back to the links page itself, so we can't look at them. But let's start small. How about you give us a description of how plasma cosmology handles galactic rotation curves, including at least one concrete quantitative example of matching the observed values for a typical galaxy?

Are you sure? They work fine in my browser.

Seek and ye shall find.

We KNOW that gravity exists.

If you hang two (uncharged) masses next to each other they will attract each other.
This force is measurable.
It is this experiment that established the basic gravity constant G.

The existence of tides establishes that this force works over
long distances to. (This can not be electrical because the earth
itself would block it for the counter tide (There are TWO tides per day))
All the movements in our planetary system conforms with
Newtonian physics (corrected for relativity)).
It is only when you look at the galaxy as a whole that motion and
VISIBLE mass do not complete correlate.

The simple-lest explanation for this is that we are not seeing all there is. [-(

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Incorrect. If I were to test the electrical field outside the "double layer" I would find no net charge. It is an internal organization of a plasma, and does not address plasma-low temperature matter interaction. A self-sustaining plasma is high energy enough that charges are stripped, however the separation of charges within a plasma cloud is not good grounds for extrapolation to longer distances. Besides which, the emission of photons from plasmas powerful enough are notably absent. Even if the sun were a speculative double-layer, the charge would not extend to earth, but remain contained in the sun and balanced internally.

Direct scaling does not work. It is the same reason that an ant the size of an elephant would collapse under it's own weight and be unable to move, despite claims of being able to lift 50 times its own weight. Muscular strength scales as the cross-sectional area of the muscle (the square of the rate of scaling), but mass increases with the volume (the cube of the rate of scaling).