My bold

Thank you for the links. While they detail some interesting ideas for heat absorption, they all fail to mention one small detail. The total lack of ice! An abundance of ice was predicted, and yet has been found wanting!

This 'surprise' was also predicted by the EU crowd, and notably one Mr Wallace Thornhill. But this surprise, according to some, fails to support the EU hypothesis! It's just a surprise, and we all expect a few little surprises now and again. Yeah, right.

My bold:You, and several other EU proponents, have been asked - several times - to provide at least a link or reference to these 'EU theories', specifically the EDM one and the one that Thornhill used to produce his 'predictions'.

No proponent has answered these direct, pertinent questions concerning the ATM claim.

You are now on notice, P.Asmah; please provide answers to these questions. Please do not post anything else to this thread until you have done so.

For starters*, here is one such direct question:Oh, and BTW, did I misread at least one EU website, where it presented the work of Birkeland as being important for the EU idea? The same Kristian Birkeland who died in 1917? How can these ideas be called 'young' then?

*Later, I will check to see which other direct, pertinent questions about the relevant EU 'theories' on EDM and electric comets (specificallly, those which Thornhill used to make his 'predictions') have yet to be answered, by at least the EU proponent who made the claims.

This thread is buzzing again like a live wire. I can't even keep up reading (busy times at work).

Dear Nereid
It is not my intention to claim anything. And I was unaware of "empirical" being a dirty word. (disclaimer: the following is not science, just my opinion)
Thornhill's work is IMHO more like a research project. Based on observations in many different fields he came up whith an idea: "what if it is all electric?". This required a complete paradigm shift. Since then he is collecting pieces of the puzzle, hoping to find an electric universe. The physics of Alfvén is one of those pieces. So is plasma physics. Anything remotely supporting the EU idea is worth adding to this puzzle. Of course there is not yet a complete working theory. Some of the puzzle pieces will prove wrong, others may contradict each other. At this stage of development the point is to keep things open instead of nailing everything down with math.
Does it matter how long this takes? 30 years is not much when working with a handfull of people.

Funny thing is that the improved instruments and higher resolution pictures seem to more often confirm EU ideas than contradict them. For an empirical, observations based idea that is not a bad sign.

My intuition may be very wrong, I'm prepared to accept that. I am even collecting a list of observations severely contradicting EU, but my bet is still on an a largely electric cosmology. This might include a complete overhaul of how electromagnetism and gravity work, but if that is not necessary, I won't be disappointed.

gerards kind regards

__________________
Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Is that the best you can come up with?

Exposed Water Ice Deposits on the Surface of Comet 9P/Tempel 1
J.M. Sunshine, et al., Science 311(5766): 1453-1455, March 2006

Abstract: We report the direct detection of solid water ice deposits exposed on the surface of comet 9P/Tempel 1, as observed by the Deep Impact mission. Three anomalously colored areas are shown to include water ice on the basis of their near-infrared spectra, which include diagnostic water ice absorptions at wavelengths of 1.5 and 2.0 micrometers. These absorptions are well modeled as a mixture of nearby non-ice regions and 3 to 6% water ice particles 10 to 50 micrometers in diameter. These particle sizes are larger than those ejected during the impact experiment, which suggests that the surface deposits are loose aggregates. The total area of exposed water ice is substantially less than that required to support the observed ambient outgassing from the comet, which likely has additional source regions below the surface.

Detection of water ice grains after the DEEP IMPACT onto Comet 9P/Tempel 1
R. Schulz, et al., Astronomy and Astrophysics 448(3): L53-L56, March IV 2006

Abstract:
Context Icy grains in the inner coma of a comet may play an important role in the energy balance and in the production of certain gas coma species. Their existence has therefore been assumed repeatedly to explain a variety of observed phenomena. However, owing to their extremely short life time no evidence for the presence of icy grains had been found in any active comet close to the Sun.
Aims We observed Comet 9P/Tempel 1 during the Deep Impact mission to look for phenomena induced by the impact
Methods The comet was observed with the XMM-Newton Observatory. We used the EPIC camera for X-ray imaging and the Optical Monitor for monitoring in the ultraviolet and visible spectral range.
Results An outburst of the comet nucleus was observed as a result of the impact and the evolution of the coma was monitored in gas and dust. Our observations led to the first detection of icy grains in a comet at 1.5 AU from the Sun.
Conclusions We showed for the first time that the material ejected from the nucleus of a comet contains icy grains, even at small heliocentric distance.

So, we now know that the bold prediction of Thornhill, that there would be no water ice exposed by Deep Impact, has been falsified. It is a failed prediction. But this is no big surprise, the observational evidence for water ice in comets has been around for many years, had any of you ever bothered to look for it.

3 micron spectrophotometry of Comet Halley - Evidence for water ice
Jesse D. Bregman, et al., Astrophysical Journal 334: 1044-1048, 15 Nov 1988

Abstract: Structure has been observed in the 3-3.6 micron preperihelion spectrum of Comet Halley consistent with either an absorption band near 3.1 microns or emission near 3.3 microns. The results suggest that a large fraction of the water molecules lost by the comet are initially ejected in the form of small ice particles rather than in the gas phase.

The Detection of Water Ice in Comet Hale-Bopp
John K. Davies, et al., Icarus 127(1): 238-245, May 1997

Abstract: We present spectra of Comet Hale-Bopp (C/1995 O1) covering the range 1.4-2.5 microns that were recorded when the comet was 7 AU from the Sun. These spectra show broad absorption features at 1.5 and 2.05 microns. While we recognize that much of the light from the comet is scattered from the coma, we show that some, but not all, of the absorption features can be matched by an intimate mixture of water ice and a low-albedo material such as carbon on the nucleus. Furthermore, the absence of the 1.65-micron absorption feature of crystalline ice suggests that the cometary ice was probably in an amorphous state at the time of these observations. An unidentified additional component may be required to account for the downward slope at the long-wavelength end of the spectrum.

Evidence for water ice and estimate of dust production rate in comet Hale-Bopp at 2.9 AU from the Sun
E. Lellouch, et al., Astronomy and Astrophysics 339: L9-L12, November 1998

Abstract: We report observational evidence for water ice in comet C/1995 O1 (Hale-Bopp) when it was at 2.9 AU from the Sun, from emission features at 44 and 65 microns, and possibly an absorption feature at 3.1 microns, observed with ISO/LWS and PHT. We find that icy grains have mean radii of 15 microns within a factor of 2, lifetimes of ~ 2 days, a temperature of ~ 153 K, and a total mass of ~ 2x10⁹ kg. From investigation of the continuum spectrum at 43-195 microns, we also infer a production rate of large particles ( ~ 100 microns) dust of about 4x10⁴ kg s^-1 . Based on observations with ISO, an ESA project with instruments funded by ESA Member States (especially the PI countries: France, Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom) and with participation of ISAS and NASA.

So, you were saying something about a "total lack of ice"? I believe that EU myth has been laid to rest.

__________________
The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it. -- Bertrand Russell

biknewb, I have no idea what you're saying.Thanks for the clarification (though what you say later seems to contradict this).It isn't, and never has been.

HOWEVER, AFAIK, no EUer has ever, ever, ever said their ideas are purely empirical!

In fact, it seems almost exactly the opposite - the EUers' websites are full of sweeping claims about the fundamental nature of 'plasmas' and 'electricity' (and so on), and how this theoretical, a priori set of assumptions is essential to understand the universe.

IOW, EUers begin with a clear set of assumptions, and then look for evidence to support their beliefs.

Further, the rest of your post seems to bear this out.Do you see my confusion?

What on earth (or in the universe) can "what if it is all electric?" mean except "The physics of Alfvén [and] plasma physics"??? Are you saying that there's more to "electric" than "The physics of Alfvén [and] plasma physics"?Please clarify this ... how can you "keep things open instead of nailing everything down with math"?Well, yes, it does.

If you - or any EUer - can point to something that is "electric" that is NOT "The physics of Alfvén [and] plasma physics", then we may be able to discuss further.

If not, then please explain why it takes 30 years to work on something qualitatively that's already been developed in considerable detail quantitatively. (this is a direct, pertinent question).We've seen this claim here in this thread several times these last few pages. So far, no EU proponent who has made such claims has been able to answer direct, pertinent questions about those claims*

Would you like to take a shot at answering them, biknewb?

*for example, simply making some qualitative statements - without explaining how those predictions were made - isn't acceptable, here on BAUT (I'm sure all readers know why).

Maybe. Perhaps you are at long last coming to grips with the fact that you really have no idea what mainstream science has to say about comets or cosmology. It seems to me, that if you are going to maintain that the mainstream is wrong, and/or that some ATM idea is a better one, you should at least make a serious attempt to see what mainstream science really says, as opposed to what Thornhill & others want you to think it says.

I think that plasma physics, and the mechanics of EM become less important at larger scales, because of the tendency of opposite charges to "cancel" each other. I think that large scale structure in the universe is dominated by gravitation, as a confining & attractive "force", and thermodynamics as a liberating & repulsive "force". In this case the role of plasma physics is in the thermodynamic end, where the nature of the plasma state will affect cooling rates, and therefore the time it takes to form large scale structure. It is not dominate, but it is one of the elements of physics that needs to be considered.

Plasma physics & EM become more important, and in many cases dominant, in smaller scale structures. Plasma physics & magnetic fields are crucial to star formation, and stellar evolution. Galaxies evolve because the stars in them evolve, so the time scale of galactic evolution is fixed to a large extent by the time scale for stellar evolution. So you might say that Plasma physics & EM "bootstrap" galactic evolution. But I see no reason to believe that plasma physics or EM are important ingredients in forming large scale structures in a galaxy, like spiral arms, which are much easier to explain via stellar evolution & rotational dynamics.

And, of course, in small scale affairs like our solar system, everything falls into the mix; plasma physics, EM, gravitation, thermodynamics, geology, it's all there. Each element plays a role. Obviously, plasma physics & EM are necessary when considering the solar wind and magnetic fields, whereas thermodynamics is much more important in the dense neutral atmospheres.

That's the short version. In reality, each case has to be examined in detail, and the relative importance of the various branches of physics has to be determined uniquely for the given situation.

I doubt that a comet could carry any significant net charge, and it certainly makes no sense to assign flash brightness to an electric discharge, simply because the flash is way too bright. The charge transfer would have to be enormous, and it would have to happen in a confined area. That implies a large surface charge density, and a phenomenal net charge on the comet as a whole, well beyond anything that could be readily explained.

Remember the bright plumes revealed when Shoemaker-Levy 9 slammed into Jupiter? In almost all the images, except perhaps the immediate flash recorded by Galileo, the light we see has nothing to do with the direct impact, and is only sunlight reflected off of huge, expanding plumes. We have to be aware of the same effect with Deep Impact. The energy of the impact itself is dissipated rapidly, and will show up, if at all, only in the immediate flash at impact. After that, much of what we see, probably all of what we see, is reflected sunlight on the fast expanding plume after impact. The difference between emission & reflection has to be understood.

__________________
The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it. -- Bertrand Russell

What I tried to say with "keeping things open" is using existing theories like Alféns and Plasma physics, but at the same time not be limited to these.
There may be nothing else but you never know.
Math is a representation of the real world. It is only safe to make a mathematical representation of something when you know it thoroughly. Once your real world object is inside the mathematical realm it can be treated with mathematical methods, totally unrelated to the real world situation. The outcome may be mathematically right, but only after translating this back to a real world situation the real meaning will become evident, if there is any.
(The neutron star comes to my mind.)

gerards regards

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Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

It didn't take 30 years to just elaborate on existing physics. I think developing a completely new picture of the universe and incorporating plasma physics into this, is better served with a qualitative approach. Not that I wouldn't like "them" to go to the OOM phase!
Me, I am not a real scientist I just like following the development.

gerards regards

__________________
Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Thank you for your confidence
When I know an answer I'll certainly provide it... Don't expect too much

gerards kind regards

__________________
Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Firstly, I am not an EU proponent.

Secondly, numerous links have been provided to EU predictions and hypotheses earlier in this thread, a few of them by me after browsing thunderbolts.info. I have no intention of searching back through this thread to find them. I suggest you get another research assistant.

More importantly, I am interested in balance. It is for this reason that I am shocked by the casual dismissal of many EU ideas. Of course, you may claim that you simply want more OOM etc, but I think this is a bit of a smoke screen, hence recent tangental discussions on the role of math in science.

Personally I am satisifed that a strong case has been made for a number of EU related ideas, by confessed EU proponents, and hence some support from me. But I don't begrudge you your differing opinions.

I have just donned my Dunce's cap!

I would make a number of points here.
1. 100 years isn't necessarily a long time in science, even if a day can be a long time in politics. Not that I am suggesting that there is any politices here, of course!
2. It took a long time for many of Birkeland's ideas to achieve recognition, notably in respect of his aurora models, which were laughed down at the time. Sydney Chapman, for example, refused to even discuss them, and he died in the late 70s I believe!
3. While KB was a respected scientist, I think it is a slightly different matter when it somes to recognising the potential cosmological implications of his ideas, as I have also stated in respect of Alfven. A point which you seemed to accept in the latter case.

I think you would be better off addressing your questions to those who originally advocated the EDM idea. I hope this does not preclude me offering my tuppence worth if I see fit to do so, or is this thread now by invite only?

My bold. How likely?

Thank you for clarifying your position. I asked thee qustions some time ago, not that I was in any rush for an answer, but perhaps we all now live in fear of the wrath of Nereid? All pertinent questions must now be answered. I can almost imagine her putting on a dalek voice!

Why did no one in the mainstream predict these plumes (emissions), and the potential for them to reflect sunlight? Had they done so, there might have been far fewer expressions of shock and surprsie at the flashes witnessed, as predicted by no other than that old rascal, Thornhill!

I've closed this thread for a short time while something is being resolved.
edit: the issue isn't resolved yet, but I'm reopening the thread.

__________________
Forming opinions as we speak

I truly am at a loss to understand what you're saying, biknewb.

AFAIK, no EUer (and remember that this is a thread about the EU ideas) has ever claimed that there is any new physics (beyond plasma physics, and especially that there is any beyond Alfvén), involving things electric(al).

Can you point to any EU work that is inconsistent with this?

Second, I'm at even more of a loss to understand how any EUer can go about developing the EU ideas (based on plasma physics) without working with the math, equations, numbers and stuff that the well-established plasma physics (of Alfvén, and others) is built on.

Of course, several BAUT members have asked for sources (papers etc) by the leading EUers (such as Thornhill), which (presumably) describe - qualitatively, quantitatively, or in any other way - how these leading EUers went about deriving, guessing, working out, {insert synonyms here} the 'predictions' that some BAUT members have put on the table here.

None have been forthcoming.

OTOH, with no exceptions at all, all the EUers' work on 'electric comets' seems to me to be just word salad, and the methods used to make these science-free dishes not much different from the methods used by writers of fiction (they sit down at their typewriters/word processors/with their pens and paper, and they pour forth their imaginations, untrammelled by the need to even read a paper by Alfvén, much less attempt to understand it).

Of course, it may not be like this at all ... but so far no one has given us anything on what Thornhill et al. actually did to come up with those 'predictions'.

Would you please try again?
-> Where, in all the writings of EUers, does it say that they're actively investigating 'new physics' (beyond plasma physics, beyond Alfvén, beyond 'electic')?
-> How do they make 'predictions' (without understanding the plasma physics of Alfvén)?

I did that, before I wrote my earlier post.

I could find no such 'theory'.

I will ask you one more time: where are the steps that Thornhill et al. used to make the 'predictions' detailed? Please be sure to provide such information in terms of theory, which word is understood to mean 'scientific theory'.

For avoidance of doubt, the claim that it is a theory (wrt EDM, a key part of the Thornhill claims, this is your own claim, P.Asmah).Then why are you posting here, in BAUT's ATM section?Are you concerned that we are not attacking the EU ideas fiercely enough?There's nothing 'casual' about it, at least not on my part.

Remember, this thread is an opportunity for EU proponents to put their best case on the table, and for other BAUT members to "attack your arguments with glee and fervor". To do that, I need to understand what this EU case is, before I can attack. That's why I've spend hundreds and hundreds of hours reading the material with EU proponents have provided here, in support of their claims. (I expect several other BAUT members have spent even more time than I have on this).

If I may record some 'shock', I am shocked by the appallingly weak case that has been presented here, by the lack of internal consistency; by the secrecy concerning methods, approaches, techniques, analyses etc used to come up with the so-called 'results'; by the disgraceful reluctance to (apparently) actually read the papers of EUers' all time hero (Alfvén); by ... ; and above all, by the apparent inability of any EU proponent to address even the most basic questions about the EU ideas that they put on the table.I do not claim that I 'simply want more OOM etc'; if you have difficulty understanding my questions, then please ask for clarification.I guess I should be happy that you seem to have claimed the EU ideas can be evaluated on the same basis as those in mainstream astrophysics - scientifically.

If that's so, then perhaps you could explain why you find the (apparent) complete lack of anything remotely resembling a link between Alfvén's papers and Thornhill's 'predictions'? I mean, given that Alfvén, and others who worked in plasma physics (and who still work today) as applied to astronomy have no difficulty coming up with OOM calculations*, numbers, math, equations and so on, what unique barrier does an EU proponent face (other than a lack of familiarity with the appropriate, basic, maths)?The one thing that you are required to do, if you post to this (or any other ATM thread) is answer - in a timely fashion - direct, pertinent questions concerning any ATM statement/claim/proposal/etc that you make in posts in this thread.

Among the simplest questions to answer are those concerning sources.

*Much earlier in this thread I did an OOM calculation, based on EU ideas about electric comets. It took me very little time (and showed an extraordinary inconsistency in the EU idea). Yet Thornhill claims to have worked on this for 30 years ... with nary anything quantitative to show for his labours.

Steps? This is a new request, I think? Before you requested a link to the predictions, which have been provided by others. These predictions are based on the broad sweep of EU thought. When you say steps, are you alluding to mathematical models?

Link removed as this kept corrupting my post, doubtless through my own html incompetency.

However, I wish to stress that I did not originate this claim within this thread.

I agree, and I have been impressed by many of the arguments forwarded by both sides?

Well, Alfven stressed, time after time, the importance of measuring causative electric currents, and not just magnetic fields. Funnily enough, Thornhill does likewise.

"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

• Here is a list of links to the Thunderbolts site that mention EDM
• Here are a couple of links to the Holoscience site that mentions EDM

Note: these are not theories.

Regards,
Ian Tresman

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Ian Tresman
plasma-universe.com

If I may repeat an earlier question already on pages past ...
Do you have examples of EDM generated by terrestrial lightning? How do they compare to alleged EDM features on comets & moons?

__________________
The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it. -- Bertrand Russell

Like Quantum Mechanics?
It took about twenty years from the first ideas underlying Quantum Mechanics, such as the quantization of the interaction between electromagnetic fields and matter (Planck), the explanation of the photoelectric effect (Einstein) or the quantized orbits of electrons in atoms (Bohr), until a full formulation of the theory (Schroedinger's wave mechanics and Heisenberg's matrix mechanics).
Even before the full formulation of QM, classical theories incorporating some QM assumptions (first and foremost, the assumption that identical particles are indistinguishable), also known as semi-classical theories, allowed finally to make sense of condensed matter systems on microscopic level.
And Quantum Mechanics was definitely more revolutionary than the application of Plasma Physics in astrophysical systems.


But Plasma Physics is already developed at a quantitative level (Kulsrud's Plasma Physics for Astrophysics has its first OOM estimate on page three of the introduction, and then each chapter has 50-100 equations).

__________________
papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

"...because the logic of the lines traced from reality is as poor of aesthetic value as it is strict in consistency. " - Paolo Bozzi (Naive Physics - free translation)

No, iantresman, show us that cometary jets are the result of EDM-like effects. You made the claim, and you have the burden of proof.
Stop giving us links to pages containing a few keywords: gives us the reference to the real theory, or retract the claim.

__________________
papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

"...because the logic of the lines traced from reality is as poor of aesthetic value as it is strict in consistency. " - Paolo Bozzi (Naive Physics - free translation)

Well, that is what I call a compliment! Comparing the efforts of Thornhill, Scott and a few others to that of the Planck-Einstein-Bohr-Schroedinger-Heisenberg team.
Thanks

__________________
Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Much of the confusion arises from our different views and language. I seem to have more of a philosophical approach, here in BAUT it is about pure science. (I wasn't posting for some time because of this)

You must have wondered often about the stubbornness of EU proponents. Attack after serious attack does not seem to influence their conviction. I think this is because the scientific side is just part of the total picture. There is a lot of circumstantial evidence from outside the physical sciences.

Warning: the following might be unnerving for scientific minds.
I will not defend the next list here, for that is beyond the scope of this forum.

EU-ideas explain (for me)
why the pyramids were built
the origin of the incomprehensibly cruel human sacrifice rituals in middle-america
the existence of religious wars
many enigmatic prehistoric findings
and the ubiquity of phantasy creatures like dragons.

This list is incomplete and just meant to illustrate that the scientific side of the EU-idea (at least in my case) is just part of the picture.
It follows from basic EU ideas that a comet must be an electric phenomenon. The science to explain this will have to be elaborated. So the result comes first and the hypothesis follows afterwards.
This way of thinking is rather opposite to normal scientific procedure. And one of the reasons this thread is this long.

Here are two links to the more exotic parts of the Electric Universe concerning 'new physics'.
some basics
another TOE
I hardly dare mention the name of Ralph Sansbury even in the ATM section, but he has proposed a completely different physics of light and gravity.
Rupert Sheldrake has some very interesting ideas and has performed experiments on it with positive outcome.
These are some of those pieces of the puzzle I mentioned earlier. Maybe right, maybe completely wrong, but nevertheless usefull in completing the world-view.

When I read back this post I'm afraid it won't be of much help. Maybe I should write a book

gerards kind regards

__________________
Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Ok, let me try to answer this. Terrestrial lightning is distinct from EDM on moons and comets because Earth has an atmosphere. I think this means that on Earth you would need much more energy to create effects similar to those on atmosphere-less moons and comets. I've seen a photograph of lightning creating a trench in someones backyard and a Lichtenberg pattern on a golfcourse, but as common lightning goes that's about it. But because in a vacuum you would need less current to create damage (I read about a 1 V/m electric field could start a discharge in space).

Here is an example of laboratory discharge effects on a claylike surface, showing some features of discharge damage. This not quite the EDM that is active on comets, because on comets the jet activity is prolonged and much weaker. Comet activity is better compared to the "volcanoes" of Io and Enceladus here is a paper describing how Io's volcanoes resemble plasma gun activity, close-ups of Io's surface should show features comparable in shape (only many times larger) compared to comets. A weaker version of this activity is active on Enceladus and the reason those moons have this "volcanic" activity and not others with higher eccentricities (like Mimas) and more tidal heating capacity is the fact that they are orbiting at the electrically most intense areas around their planets.

Note: while tidal heating is calculated to create enough energy to get volcanic activity on Io, it all depends on unknown factors about the composition of the moon's interior that are always guesses at best. The calculations for Enceladus are problematic, hence my questions on what is a safe lower limit for excluding tidal heating as a mechanism, is 10 km across a safe guess? For comets the mechanism to produce the same material (very fine grained accelerated dust and ice and ions) should be similar and the charging/discharging cycle also explains why some asteroids show signs of comet-activity (their orbits are eccentric) and why comets can be active beyond the orbit of Saturn, where solar heating is insignificant.

Cheers.

It is not a compliment.
It shows that "The EU theory is too young!" is just a lame excuse.

__________________
papageno


"Why waste time learning, when ignorance is instantaneous?" - Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)

"It's all about context!" - Vince Noir (The Mighty Boosh)

"I've never heard of such a brutal and shocking injustice that I cared so little about!" - Zapp Brannigan (Futurama)

"...because the logic of the lines traced from reality is as poor of aesthetic value as it is strict in consistency. " - Paolo Bozzi (Naive Physics - free translation)

Thanks biknewb, this helps a great deal. You're quite right about this - at least wrt this ATM section of BAUT.

The rules for this section are avowedly pro-science, and the default assumption is that those presenting ATM ideas are prepared to defend those ideas using the tools and techniques used in (modern) science (if their intent is primarily to call for a radically different approach, then this ATM section (and maybe even BAUT) is not the place to start a thread).Yes, that certainly clarifies a few things!

And my first impression is that none of those topics are suitable for this ATM section, if only because none of them seem to have anything to do with astronomy or space science.Of all the things you've mentioned, this gave me the best insight - from this material, it seems that there is a huge disconnect ... assuming the first page does, indeed, outline the core physics underlying (most?) EU ideas, then the word 'electric(al)' (and related - 'electrostatic force', 'atom', 'electron', and so on) is an enormous barrier to mutual comprehension. When EUers use the term, they are not referring to the physics of Alfvén, of Maxwell, of Einstein, of Kelvin, of Faraday, even of Newton, but rather some new physics that would require a complete re-write of just about all the physics developed since Newton's time.

In this sense, as iantresman noted, there are no EU theories at all, let alone "EDM theories", or "electric comet theories".

In fact, it may not be too much of stretch to say that the EU ideas don't count as science, neither do proponents seek to develop the ideas scientifically. However, that would probably take us beyond the scope of this ATM section.Thanks again, very helpful.

I'm left wondering though - where can this thread go from here?

I guess there's one place - a request to all those who are still prepared to present and defend EU ideas that they clearly distinguish which of those ideas are based on (modern) plasma physics, and which on the radical new physics in the links biknewb gave. For the former, it is reasonable to expect a defence full of math, numbers, equations and stuff; for the latter, it may be more appropriate to attack the core ideas, by asking questions about inconsistencies with good experimental results (such as many of those in standard textbooks, the ones which 'put QM and Relativity on the map' for example).

This has been the foundation of EU from the beginning. Thornhill & friends believe that Earth previously orbited Saturn, and are essentially Velikovskian in their view of solar system history, including planetary lightning, and plasma glow phenomena making light bridges & other visible phenomena. It has always been their fundamental principle that EU must be true, because the evidence from mythology proves it. So they see their task as finding bits & pieces of evidence to "scientifically" prove something they already know. As biknewb points out, this is contrary to the normal process of science.

It has always been, and continues to be, my position that all of the mythology used by Thornhill & friends, and everything in biknewb's list, is 100% irrelevant, totally meaningless & useless speculation. The ultimate arbiter of the validity of EU must be, and absolutely is, the fundamental & operational physics that allows or requires EU phenomena to take place in the physical universe. Everything (everything) we know about that physics weighs heavily against the EU, which I already consider falsified out of scientific existence.

So, yes, this makes the argument very frustrating, because in essence there is no use in even trying to have a "scientific" discussion about something that is in essence not scientific.

__________________
The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it. -- Bertrand Russell

Thanks Nereid for allowing these "unscientific" posts.
BTW my views may not be shared by all EU proponents.
This thread is still great as a testing ground for the science side of EU related things. An idea without a valid mainstream scientific basis is shot down here with glee. So when eventually I have found something substantial I will present it here and try to defend it. If it holds out it will certainly be bullet proof.
The new BAUT rules leave little room for discussions like we had previously on things like interpreting pictures of Titan's "rivers".
Well, with all those probes zooming through the Solar system there may be some surprises to discuss in the near future.

gerards kind regards

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Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Ouch. The Saturn "theory" and mythology-believers, both work well with your apt "mythbusters" tag line.

It's easy to mock. Heck, I can hardly get my socks into my sock drawer, let alone understand how the entire universe might once have fitted into the eye of a needle.

And The Emporer's New Physics: (a) expansion (b) Black Holes (c) Dark matter (d) Neutron stars (e) Creation without a cause (thank god I'm an atheist)? I forget, what might actually falsifiy any of these?

I think we tend to forget that there is a lot of faith in science, faith that our theories and knowledge are correct.

We "knew" dirty snowballs, then icy dirtballs, and now we have oddballs. There's the Big Bang, I'm sure I've heard of Little Bangs, and Alfvén promoted a Bigger Bang.

Of course I know that you're right, I just can't prove it.

Regards,
Ian Tresman

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Ian Tresman
plasma-universe.com

Thanks biknewb, thanks Tim Thompson.

For those EUers who do subscribe to the kind of "'root and branch' new physics is required", per the links in biknewb's post, the challenge is far, far greater ... there is the requirement to show that all the data from every space probe is as it is represented to be, by the folk who release that data*.

After all, if EUer's reject mainstream physics, then they have no reason to believe that space probes work as advertised!

*not counting statements about time of receipt of data, details of communications protocol and frequency band, etc.

Every research from the EU vantage point is indeed an enormous challenge. I did start out an investigation into how space probes measure electrons. It was hard to get to the essential data. From an EU view one cannot take anything for granted with regard to the basic ideas behind the instruments. I found one probe (I should dig up the name) measuring the flow of electrons in the solar wind perpendicular to the solar equator. Never found out why.

Measurements stand. Interpretation of them is unavoidably biased. Interpreting data in an EU way can only be done knowing the complete chain of data acquisition. That's a lot of extra work.

When I drop something, I know the way it will fall down. I accept everyday 3D physics even though I have no idea what mass, gravity and inertia really are. They seem to work consistently. There have been developments in mainstream physics that have gone far beyond reality with the aid of mathematics. I have the same attitude towards those aspects of physics as I have towards the EU-ideas: they may be right, they may be totally wrong and I sure hope to find out in this life-time.

Years ago I was naive enough to think that scientists might be persuaded to have an unbiased look at their data to see if it corresponded with EU ideas. All just in the course of their daily tasks. It wouldn't have taken much extra work. Just an open mind. Now I understand this is all but impossible. And I don't know yet why exactly.

gerards regards

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Es gibt keine Tatsachen, es gibt nur Interpretationen. (There are no facts, only interpretations.) Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche