Sorry, I guess I didn't finish the thought - nice recovery.

Better try not to think of those 10 dimensions too much, or you might wind up like these folks:

ABBA DABBA KABALLA


www.crystalinks.com/superstrings.html+CRYSTALINKS+STRING+THEORY+10+DIM ENSIONS&hl=en&ie=UTF-8]WOO WOO[/url]


www.ransom.co.uk/universe/press_12.htm+magic+string+theory+ten+dimensions&am p;hl=en&ie=UTF-8]MAGIC SCIENCE AT PRINCETON[/url]

Comparing M theory with Kaballistic string theory is like comparing astronomy to astrology, only moreso. M theory (and BTW, the M doesn't really stand for "magic;" it doesn't really stand for anything) is an attempt to merge five differnt types of superstring theory into one completely self-consistant theory. Nothing more odd than "standard" superstring theory. When people start trying to use string theory to justify the Genesis account of creation, however...let's just say they make you look like a main-stream thinker.

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"Nobody understands quantum physics." -- Richard Feynman

"So, does quantum physics predict circular orbits for electrons?" -- Student in my Intro to Quantum class

Showing that Feynman was especially correct about some individuals.

Oh? Why don’t we just ask a ghost to answer all our questions before we ask them? Or maybe we could go to a palm reader and she could tell us the answers before we even think up the questions. I think she would cost only about $5 per question.

Yes, I can definitely see a future for magic in physics.

Hey Sam5--

You asked earlier in the thread for "commonsense explanations." THen you go on to say that there are no scientific papers discussing the expansion (observed) of the universe. Let's get into a couple of things here.

First, space "expands" but it isn't like blowing up a balloon where you add something. It isn't just a mystery of nature either. The best analogy I can come up with is a rubber band -- you don't add anything to the band when you stretch it, but it is longer. Space, not being made of anything material, behaves in a similar fashion. But this is an analogy, NOT the thing itself.

Originally, Einstein and his colleagues thought the universe was static. But the implications of relativity were for a finite univese. This is quite aside frmo the Olbers' paradox observation, which says that the universe can't be infinite becuase if it was the sky would not be dark. (You would eventually see a star in every direction, and since an infinite universe immplies an infinite age, the light from infinitely far away stars has time to reach you, unless you posit an infinite universe of finite age, but then you run into problems explaining that).

The expansion of space is a function, in part, of all those virtual particles that pop in and out of existence. In one sense, the quantum foam that makes up space is coming from there. But again, that is a very rough way of putting it.

Yes, quantum physics says things that don't jibe with common sense, as does relativity. But they WORK. You are using a computer that would not function AT ALL if quantum tuneling did not happen (there would be no semiconductors, which are essential to any computer smaller than a room). Digital displays work. Redshifts in distant galaxies are observed, and the predicted observations from explanations that do NOT include universal expansion of some kind or other did not work. That is, the prediction (a mark of a real theory) did not test out. Now, it is possible that somethign is going on that we can't observe for whatever reason, but that puts it riht out of the realm of science unless you can come up with an experiment to falsify the theory involved.

So, if the universe was not expanding, one would expect redshifts and blue shifts to be randomly distributed. They aren't.

If the expansion was thought up to save relativity, and just a methematical convenience, one would have to come up with a more compelling explanation. There have been a few, but they too failed to produce confirming observations. (Like theories that require an ether).

If there were no space curvature, then Newton's mechanics would have been perfectly accurate, given the better instruments we have now to test that theory at more extreme conditions than he could. Again, no dice.

It is almost like you have thins thing that all scientists must be fools because the theories they propose and test don't confirm to a world view that is "common sense." Electricity didn't fit that bill either for some people, who philosophically objected to the idea of atoms. Well, Maxwell and atomic theory work. Oh well.

-J

Well, when you stretch the rubber band, you are expanding or “thinning out” its “fields”, whatever fields there are that hold the molecules of the rubber band together. “Space” is just the place where you stretch the rubber band.

I suspect this happens in deep space when the galaxies spread apart, i.e. the “thinning out” of the galaxies’ gravitational fields as they spread apart. “Space” is just the place where this “thinning out” occurs. So it is not “space” that “expands”, the fields become “thinner” or “weaker” in the area of space in-between the galaxies as they separate. So, the real expression should not be an “expansion of space”, but a “weakening of the gravitational fields in-between the galaxies” or an “expansion of the gravitational fields” or a “thinning out of the gravitational fields”.

This would match observation, it would make sense, and it would NOT be “counter-intuitive”.

No, the expansion was not “thought up to save relativity”. That’s not what I’m saying. The switch-over in terms occurred mainly in the 1990s, from “big bang” and “moving galaxies” to “expanding space” and “non-moving galaxies being carried along by expanding space”, and I say the switch-over in terms was designed to salvage and save the “c speed limit” of SR theory, AFTER the superluminal (faster than “c”) galaxies were discovered.

Look, if you run away from me at 5 mph, I can say you are “moving away from me at 5 mph”. Also, if you get in a car and the car drives you away from me at 5 mph, I can still say you are “moving away from me at 5 mph”. So, it doesn’t matter HOW the galaxies are “moving,” away from us at faster than “c”, they are still “moving away from us at faster than c”, whether “space is expanding” or not. But some cosmologists think this violates Einstein’s “speed limit of c”, so they don’t like it. They are afraid to “violate” anything Einstein said, even if what he said turned out to be wrong.

But, this might NOT violate the “speed limit of c” if the galaxies are not moving through any fields. The “speed limit” is actually based on Lorentz theory of the motion of atoms “through fields”, not the motion of atoms “through empty space”. So, “c” might still be a “speed limit” for atoms moving through fields, such as gravitational fields, but the distant galaxies might not be moving through fields.

Ummm... you do realise that *EVERYTHING* is always moving through a gravitational field, right? Any galaxy, however distant, creates a gravitational field by virtue of its mass so at very least it's smack in the middle of its own gravitational field. Moreover, *every other piece of matter in the universe* is creating a gravitational field that is, in some way, affecting every other piece of matter in the universe. It's impossible *not* to be travelling through a gravitational field.

OMFG sam you are so annoying

Classic Sam5-ism, join a debate, make an incorrect supposition, and then argue about definitions of words to try and make yourself seem right.

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<3

This can't be right because it is actually the opposite of what is observed. Judging from the way the galaxies are moving, there is more gravity in between galaxies than we can account for by summing the known mass.

No, I think the reason is more fundamental than that, and I think it derives from the observed fact that the the farther away an object is, the higher its redshift and therefore the larger its apparent recessional velocity. Why should this be so if all objects in the universe are just streaming "outward" through space? Why should more distant objects be moving away from us faster? Is there any explanation for this?

But if it's space that is expanding, this easily explains why more distant objects appear to be moving away at proportionately greater rates.

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Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.

Well that doesn’t matter. Whatever the gravity strength is of the masses and in-between the masses, if the masses move apart the gravity strength between the masses becomes weaker.


Yes, a very simple one.

If you look at any video or old film of an explosion, you’ll see the outer most particles moving faster than the innermost particles. If you put one pound of explosives in a hole 3 feet deep, and set of the explosive, you will see a semi-circle of debris particles move upward from the point of the explosion, and the outermost particles will move faster than the innermost. Some of the particles nearest to the explosion will move only an inch or two. You can see this phenomenon in a simple spherical star-burst fireworks explosion, like this one. The outermost dots are where they are because they moved faster than the innermost dots. This is why the “big bang” was described as a kind of “explosion” for 65 years. This is why Eddington called Lemaitre’s 1927 big bang theory a “fireworks” model.

OK, but if that's the case, then the earth would be positioned right at the center of the big bang, since this Hubble law phenomenon is happening no matter which way we look. Why should our dinky little planet be at the center of everything? Considering the number of other stars and galaxies, the theory folds under the weight of its own coincidence.

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Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.

No, not necessarily. This is apparently what the astronomers first thought when the BB theory was first accepted and this is why Eddington invented the “expanding balloon” model. The astronomers literally didn’t want the religious folks to get hold of the “apparent center” information, since a visually apparent “central position” would be too “Biblical” for the astronomers to accept.

But, if you do some diagrams on graph paper or if you do some vector analysis equations, you’ll find that we would see the same thing if we were way out in the middle areas of the “expansion”.

We don’t have to be in the center in order to see all the galaxies expanding away from us, just as we don't have to be in the center of our own galaxy in order to see stars on all sides of us or the Milky Way encircling us. In fact, Herschel thought we were in the “center” of a “circular” universe. He thought the Milky Way was the whole universe, and since it circles the earth, he thought we were in the center of the universe. But that turned out to be wrong. We turned out to be way out near the edge of our galaxy, not anywhere near the center at all.

If you look at some of the inner dots in the fireworks picture, they see exactly what we see, i.e. “redshifts” of the other dots in all directions.

Now, there would be a “sideways” motion of some of the galaxies, if we were way out away from the center, but we can’t measure the sideways motion since it is so slight from our point of view. We could go hundreds of years and compare photos from now and from hundreds of years from now and notice no “sideways” motion of the distant galaxies. All we can see is their redshifts which reveals their radial motion.

The universe could have a center, but we don’t necessarily have to be in it.

But even if you take the “expanding space” point of view, that doesn’t get us out of the “center”. We’ve looked like we were in the “center” from the very beginning of the Big Bang theory.

Astronomers who say that they have “seen out to the very edge of the universe and back to within 5% of the beginning of the bb,” they are placing us in the “center”, since they claim they can see this “5%” in all directions of the sky. That puts us within 95% of the center.

However, I think the universe is much larger than they think it is. I think their “age of the universe” estimates are not correct, and I think the “inflation model” is wrong. The inflation model has the galaxies suddenly speeding up to almost an infinite speed, early on, and then suddenly slowing down again. I think that’s silly.

Look at it this way: We are in the “center” of our “sphere of visibility”, but that doesn’t mean we are in the “center” of the entire universe. It only means that our “radius of visibility” only goes so far, and the “radius of the universe” is much larger than our “radius of visibility”.

Well exactly. Space might even be infinite and we are always in the center of the visible universe, since the speed of light is constant. But we couldn't see a recession speed that is a function of merely the distance of a galaxe unless space is uniformly expanding. If there was a center, recession speed would depend also on the angle between the direction of the object and the direction of the center.

How do you figure that? What assumptions are you making?

I assumed Sam5's three dimensional explosion model which he so often illustrates. I also assumed that it would progress in a fashion that everything doubles its distance to the center in the same amount of time. And there I was wrong: As far as I can see this is just the big bang expanding space model with an arbitrarily chosen "center" (more of a viewpoint transformation, the center can be put anywhere).

Putting a real center into this model of course necessitates rapid acceleration. Every time an object doubles its distance from the center, it also has to double its speed. This doesn't work so good.

However, it does work with constant speeds that were set at the time of the big bang as far as I can figure. Problem with that is that in order for the universe to look uniform in every direction, the higher the speed the more likely any given particle would have to have it in order to fill the volumes that are expanding by the cube of the distance from the center. That, or I'm just confused now. 8-[

No.

Let’s say you have 3 guys in a line. Then they start moving forward. The guy out front runs at 5 mph. The next guy runs at 2.5 mph. The third guy walks at 1 mph.

So they are “expanding apart” with no increase in speed. 1 year from now, they will be very far apart, but with no increase in their original speed. Their starting point is the “center”. You can do this with several lines of guys, all radiating out from that same starting point in all directions.