4 ms·

Erasing Dark Energy

20 points by hachiya 12y ago

Udo 12y ago
[...] an expanding wave with its epicenter near the Earth could produce the dimming effects the two teams had observed [...] This is not science, it's geocentrism that borders on implicit mysticism. It not only violates the Copernican principle, it also introduces a needlessly more complex model into a place where the simpler explanation was doing just fine without any appropriate justification for doing so. There is a good reason why we say "all other things being equal or held constant" until evidence suggests otherwise. As a model, this shockwave hypothesis draws its only reason for existing from the apparent willingness or need to put humans at the center of the universe, with all the consequences it implies. It's baffling that given all we know today, there are still a lot of supporters for hypotheses putting the Earth at the center of everything, but for some reason I can't find a single one that is based on, say, galaxy cluster Abell 2744 being the most important point in space.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
  - Udo 12y ago
    > reasonable response to the Fermi paradox, though I agree it's a pretty stupid one That leaves us with a very peculiar subset of certain values of "reasonable". There is nothing wrong in principle arguing that there might be something wrong with our general galactic neighborhood, without touching the Copernican principle at all. For a random example, a local population of Von Neumann drones killing all technology-using civilizations wouldn't hold any especially deep cosmological problems. There is also the small matter of us not knowing a lot about pretty much every single factor involved with Fermi's equation, so this leaves a lot of room for us simply living within a empty patch. Personally, I have to admit the Fermi paradox bothers me, as I've written before here on HN. But there is an infinite supply of imaginable reasons that don't require paranormal intervention, so I don't see the need to actually consider those other reasons at the moment.
- placebo 12y ago
  Well, it's mentioned that they are working on getting the theory to be testable and you can't get more scientific than that. The fact that the theory implies things that many scientists are uncomfortable with does not diminish anything from the quality of science being done. I don't like it either and the implications go against my gut feeling, but if they are working on enabling it to be falsifiable then let's let reality decide once the experiments can be conducted.
  - Udo 12y ago
    I'd certainly be very interested in seeing how this could be made testable. I have to admit though that "throw away everything we know about the nature of the cosmos and start again with the assumption that humans are supernaturally special" is not a great start. Also, it's from 2009 and I'm not aware of anything having come out of this.
lisper 12y ago
Originally published September 24, 2009
rnhmjoj 12y ago
There is also this theory http://arxiv.org/pdf/1212.1110v2.pdf http://arxiv.org/pdf/1212.1110v2.pdf which avoids the stratagems used in the ΛCDM model.
- acjohnson55 12y ago
  Pretty fascinating, is there much discourse out there on this?
  - rnhmjoj 12y ago
    Not much really but I have found a discussion here: http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php?140129-Dark-matter-doesn-t-exist http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php?140129-Dark-matte...

20 points by hachiya 12y ago

Udo 12y ago

[...] an expanding wave with its epicenter near the Earth could produce the dimming effects the two teams had observed [...] This is not science, it's geocentrism that borders on implicit mysticism. It not only violates the Copernican principle, it also introduces a needlessly more complex model into a place where the simpler explanation was doing just fine without any appropriate justification for doing so. There is a good reason why we say "all other things being equal or held constant" until evidence suggests otherwise. As a model, this shockwave hypothesis draws its only reason for existing from the apparent willingness or need to put humans at the center of the universe, with all the consequences it implies. It's baffling that given all we know today, there are still a lot of supporters for hypotheses putting the Earth at the center of everything, but for some reason I can't find a single one that is based on, say, galaxy cluster Abell 2744 being the most important point in space.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
- Udo 12y ago
  > reasonable response to the Fermi paradox, though I agree it's a pretty stupid one That leaves us with a very peculiar subset of certain values of "reasonable". There is nothing wrong in principle arguing that there might be something wrong with our general galactic neighborhood, without touching the Copernican principle at all. For a random example, a local population of Von Neumann drones killing all technology-using civilizations wouldn't hold any especially deep cosmological problems. There is also the small matter of us not knowing a lot about pretty much every single factor involved with Fermi's equation, so this leaves a lot of room for us simply living within a empty patch. Personally, I have to admit the Fermi paradox bothers me, as I've written before here on HN. But there is an infinite supply of imaginable reasons that don't require paranormal intervention, so I don't see the need to actually consider those other reasons at the moment.
placebo 12y ago
Well, it's mentioned that they are working on getting the theory to be testable and you can't get more scientific than that. The fact that the theory implies things that many scientists are uncomfortable with does not diminish anything from the quality of science being done. I don't like it either and the implications go against my gut feeling, but if they are working on enabling it to be falsifiable then let's let reality decide once the experiments can be conducted.
- Udo 12y ago
  I'd certainly be very interested in seeing how this could be made testable. I have to admit though that "throw away everything we know about the nature of the cosmos and start again with the assumption that humans are supernaturally special" is not a great start. Also, it's from 2009 and I'm not aware of anything having come out of this.

lisper 12y ago

Originally published September 24, 2009

rnhmjoj 12y ago

There is also this theory http://arxiv.org/pdf/1212.1110v2.pdf http://arxiv.org/pdf/1212.1110v2.pdf which avoids the stratagems used in the ΛCDM model.

acjohnson55 12y ago
Pretty fascinating, is there much discourse out there on this?
- rnhmjoj 12y ago
  Not much really but I have found a discussion here: http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php?140129-Dark-matter-doesn-t-exist http://cosmoquest.org/forum/showthread.php?140129-Dark-matte...