MigL

Assuming you don't mean 'effective' mass, but actual inertial mass, which, by the equivalence principle, is identical to the mass which 'generates' the gravitational field, and to the mass which responds to an external gravitational field ( by momentum conservation ), then H Bondi, W B Bonnor an R L Forward ( one of my favorite sci-fi authors ) proposed the phenomenon of 'Runaway Motion' An excerpt from the Wiki article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_mass follows, and you might want to give the whole Wiki article a good read... "Although no particles are known to have negative mass, physicists (primarily Hermann Bondi in 1957,[6] William B. Bonnor in 1964 and 1989,[12][13] then Robert L. Forward[14]) have been able to describe some of the anticipated properties such particles may have. Assuming that all three concepts of mass are equivalent according to the equivalence principle, the gravitational interactions between masses of arbitrary sign can be explored, based on the Newtonian approximation of the Einstein field equations. The interaction laws are then: In yellow, the "preposterous" runaway motion of positive and negative masses described by Bondi and Bonnor. Positive mass attracts both other positive masses and negative masses. Negative mass repels both other negative masses and positive masses. For two positive masses, nothing changes and there is a gravitational pull on each other causing an attraction. Two negative masses would repel because of their negative inertial masses. For different signs however, there is a push that repels the positive mass from the negative mass, and a pull that attracts the negative mass towards the positive one at the same time. Hence Bondi pointed out that two objects of equal and opposite mass would produce a constant acceleration of the system towards the positive-mass object,[6] an effect called "runaway motion" by Bonnor who disregarded its physical existence." The article goes on to state that R L Forward showed that no conservation laws are violated by this effect, however, quite a few unphysical situations ( mentioned in the article ) result.

Your efforts are appreciated, Cameherein2020. Stick around, there's plenty of misinformation on the internet, that needs correcting.

I do remember reading that a superluminal particle ( tachyonic, derived from the root of -1 in the denominator of SR's Lorentz transforms ) travelling backwards in time, is equivalent to creating one at the destination and travelling forward in time, to the source. This would go some way to preserving causality. The 'idea' of these imaginary ( from i , root of -1 ) particles has been largely set aside, but the imaginary fields ( 'sourcing' these particles ? ) can often be a useful tool.

Strange has given you the accepted thinking of the scientific community. A photon hitting a photographic plate will show an image whether a human ( or other ) consciousness looks at it or not. Hint- Getting into a metaphysical argument with Dimreepr is best done when you are stoned. Sometimes you wanna hug him, sometimes you wanna strangle him .

Isn't LIGO just a giant sized Michelson-Morley interferometer, where the 'arms' are 4 km long, and the beam is cycled 400 times ? Further, two detectors are located 3000 km apart, signals compared to remove any spurious signals, and triple checked against the VIRGO detector in Italy. You'd think, with such accuracy, they would have detected an aether shift. Yet people still complain that Michelson-Morley wasn't accurate enough to detect it.

Yeah, sometimes 'life happens' and you gotta take a break. Good to have you back.

Found the comments after the article much more interesting.

I thought he was implying that Mods are corrupted by their power...

Not right. In your example the finite Universe is 'bounded'. What happens at the boundary ? Is there a physical barrier there ? What keeps the contents of our Universe from escaping into whatever lies beyond ? If you stick your arm past the boundary, does it go to another Universe ? Or does it 'extend' our Universe, since Universe means "all there is" ? A finite, UNBOUNDED Universe, on the other hand, has the properties of a finite size, but no 'edge'. Somewhat like the Earth's surface ( a 2Dimensional analogy ) is finite, yet you can travel as far as you like without reaching an edge. Our 3dimensional Universe would be the 'surface' of a 4Dimensional hypersphere ( just one possible model ), where the 'surface' has a 'thickness' which also curves around to meet itself ( yes, 4D is very hard to describe verbally using 3D language ). The Earth's SURFACE ( not the Earth's volume ) has no center, why would the 'surface' of the hypersphere ?

It's like trying to teach integral calculus to an 8 year old, Strange. I'm starting to get the impression he's 'playing' us.

Frozen stars as opposed to black holes ? Would two 30 solar mass frozen stars, where the 'edge' of space-time is the event horizon as per your 'realistic' preferred frame, that spiral toward each other, but 'freeze' at the EH, release 5-6 solar masses as gravitational wave radiation, if they never actually merge ? Or am I mis-understanding your 'realistic', preferred frame interpretation ? Could one of the mods post a message that this has been split off the other thread. I wanted to post an answer to Smelzer's reply, but had trouble finding it. Thank you.

You tell us, you posted it... http://www.physics.org/article-questions.asp?id=103 How about now, are you feeling silly yet ?

No it hasn't changed. Our measurement methods have changed, yielding slightly differing results. Again I must stress reading comprehension. I really have no idea why you would link an article regarding 5 Sigma ( solution confidence ) to back up your assertion. Now do you feel a bit silly ?

From Schmelzer's paper... I. Schmelzer, A Generalization of the Lorentz Ether to Gravity with General-Relativistic Limit, Advances in Applied Clifford Algebras 22, 1 (2012), p. 203-242, resp. arxiv:gr-qc/0205035. "Does relativistic gravity provide arguments against the existence of a preferred frame? Our answer is negative. We define a viable theory of gravity with preferred frame. In this theory, the EEP holds exactly, and the Einstein equations of GR limit are obtained in a natural limit. Despite some remarkable differences (stable “frozen stars” instead of black holes, a “big bounce” instead of the big bang, exclusion of nontrivial topologies and closed causal loops, and a preference for a flat universe) the theory is viable." Might be mathematically consistent, but doesn't model reality, as it does not fit observational evidence.

From your link... "Subsequently, using the data gathered by WMAP over 3 years, the statistical significance of such a large, cool region was estimated. The probability of finding a deviation at least as high in Gaussian simulations was found to be 1.85%.[5] Thus it appears unlikely, but not impossible, that the cold spot was generated by the standard mechanism of quantum fluctuations during cosmological inflation, which in most inflationary models gives rise to Gaussian statistics. The cold spot may also, as suggested in the references above, be a signal of non-Gaussian primordial fluctuations." Other possible causes for the 0.00007 deg K deviation ( out of 2.7 deg K ) stated in the link, include... Sachs-Wolfe ( integrated ) effect due to the large void between us and the CMB. Cosmic Texture remnant of the last phase transition, i.e. primordial origin. Parallel universe 'imprint which would necessitate an equivalent spot in the opposing hemisphere. And sensitivity to finding method is also mentioned. I did NOT find any mention of vacuum decay ( and the end of the universe ) as a possible cause for the cold spot. So, I have to wonder, are you pulling this out of your a*s, Chicken Little ?