baric

This is where I am unsure. In a matter-antimatter annihilation, is all matter fully converted or is a percentage of it actually annihilated (i.e. no resultant energy)? What I mean is that, once the matter & antimatter have been converted to high-energy photons, then there ceases to be a distinction between them as long as they were within an EH. Although they are created traveling in opposite directions, their existence within an EH means they will be pulled back to the BH center regardless. There, they are just photons added to the overall mass of the BH. In other words, a black hole maintains no distinction between matter and anti-matter. In this regard, it is neutral. Right. In this scenario, the dark matter would be composed of black holes. I agree. I think first I need to better understand the matter-antimatter annihilation and establish an upper bound on the mass within black holes. This is not really a theory as much as a line of speculation. Right, my original assumption is that there is a full conversion to energy. That seems the most obvious. This makes the argument that the majority of mass in the universe would be bound within black holes, if this mechanism is responsible for the matter-antimatter disparity.

Upon further thought, this may not be necessary. If the photons resulting from the matter-antimatter annihilation do not fully reflect the original mass (i.e. there was actual annihilation, rather than full conversion to energy), then the sum mass of the black holes does not need to be necessarily so large. It all depends on the ratio of matter annihilated to matter converted to energy.

I was reading the latest issue of Astronomy today. There was a nice article on antimatter and a short article about a simulation with two neutron stars that merged into a black hole. Very interesting stuff, as usual! I started thinking about the ramifications of anti-matter and black holes and wondered if the matter-antimatter assymetry could be explained by it. For example, if an anti-matter particle enters an event horizon, it will produce a corresponding amount of high-energy photons when it inevitably collides with normal matter. However, these photons are trapped within the EH and ultimately increase the mass of the black hole as they are pulled back to its center. In other words, the mass loss from the matter-antimatter annihilation becomes moot if it occurs within an EH. This means that black holes would be effectively neutral with regards to matter-antimatter and could therefore explain the antimatter imbalance. Of course, it would also logically mean that the majority of mass in the universe is contained within black holes! I am not a physicist nor an astronomer. Someone please explain where my thinking is flawed on this subject.

Millions? More like billions.

Genius is, as the old saying goes, a combination of inspiration and perspiration. You must have an inclination for knowledge (inspiration) and the willingness to advance it (perspiration). If you are able to combine these two traits and advance the state of scientific knowledge, then you have met the minimum requirements for consideration as a genius. It's not enough to be smart. I am smart. Most people reading this science forum are smart. We are all human beings gifted with large brains; being smart is a default human condition so it's not really much of a bragging point. If you want to be a genius, you must be able to successfully apply yourself and do something novel with your brain. My opinion is that, if your name is prominently attached to a successfully tested theory in your chosen discipline, then you are probably a genius.

of course you are kidding! No corporation in its right mind would pass up the opportunity to resell an upgraded item to its entire customer base over a short period of time. If the conversion to tau was an actual possibility, "pi-tape" manufacturers would all be racing to be the first to sell the new tau-tapes. edit: derp... I just looked at the product on the link.. there would be no change, lol.

Are you challenging the validity of GR? If so, then instead of asking the question you should be giving your expected answer and then explaining why it deviates from the answer provided by GR. This was a good analogy because the space that your ship is traveling through is curved just as the circle in the analogy. Therefore the velocity differential from previous frames is going to change differently. And just as your distance from any other point on the circle cannot exceed 2pi no matter how far you travel along its circumference, your velocity differential with any other frame in space cannot exceed c.

I object! It did not take me long to realize that the value for pi was arbitrarily chosen from several possible values -- most likely for convenience. Some mulling on the issue made it seem obvious (to me) that 6.28... would have been a better choice, although I had no idea until yesterday that others had even entertained similar thoughts. Of course, it is silly to argue that the use of tau is superior simply because a) the use of pi is entrenched, and b) multiplication by 2 is trivial. No, the argument for tau relies solely on elegance. That's a notion that any mathematician can appreciate, with or without imbibing any beers.

Here's a link with a convincing case: http://tauday.com/

Interesting. I have thought for some time that 3.14 was not the best arbitrarily-chosen value to represent curvature and came to the conclusion that 6.28 was better. Of course, it only slightly improves the symbolism and is not even remotely worth the effort to overcome the value that has become ingrained in our sciences for millenia.

Only if you are unable to define what you mean by "God" in a sensible, non-speculative manner. This seems to be a real problem for many proponents.

I disagree. Look at the arbitrary decisions that you have made: 1) choosing to align the first Gliese 581 planet with Venus instead of Mercury (the 23.65 factor) 2) ignoring the large 14% discrepancy between Mars and its Gliese 581 analogue 3) ignoring the absence of a solar analogue to the 3.45 radius 4) ignoring the absence of a Saturn analogue in the Gliese system Summary: you arbitrarily make 4 manual fits to establish a relationship over 6 points. It's not a convincing approach, imo The orbital values are 0.186, 0.191, 0.195, and 0.196 The orbital resonance for 1:11, 1:12 and 1:13 are 0.181, 0.191 and 0.202 respectively. This means that 3 of the 4 values are actually in between resonances and do NOT fit.

If you are seeing a significant pattern in a set of data where none is expected, my advice would be to apply the same techniques to different sets of data (i.e. different intervals of integers) and see if the pattern is consistent for all intervals or is just an artifact of your initial sample.

The result needs to contain the digit 2 in multiples of 3 and end with the digit 0. Any number fitting this pattern is guaranteed to be divisible by 60. 2220 is the smallest value. 5 digits: 22200, 22020, 20220 6 digits: 222000, 220200, 220020, 202200, 202020, 200220 You see the pattern.

Seriously, those events only happen in fiction! If you see an event occur against those kinds of odds then it is far more likely that you have actually miscalculated the odds. It reminds me of my old D&D days when we had a guy who insisted that he had rolled six 18s for one of his characters. Even when I pointed out that if every one of the 4.5 billion people on the planet rolled 100 characters, there will still be just a miniscule chance that even one of them would randomly roll six 18s on just one of their characters --- yet he still claimed it to be true. For example, as a Risk player, I taught myself on a lark to roll 18s at will with dice just so I could flatten my friends in a game one night.

You cannot be 100% confident of anything. If someone flipped heads 99 times in a row, it's either an unfair coin or you are dreaming the entire episode.

No, those probabilities are independent. You should expect it 50% of the time, just like on the first flip. However, the probabilities of 99 consecutive flips being identical are so low that it's far more likely that you actually have a two-headed coin.

Sorry if you did not get the XBox 360 joke reference.

ah, but that is the crux of calculus! Simple equations are easily differentiated and integrated using the "power rule", so those would be a good illustrative example. However, proficiency of calculus involves honing your differentiating and integrating skills to handle complex equations. However, it's a quick example of the power rule. Look at the following series for [math]y=x^2[/math] 0, 1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49 .... We can easily see the rate of change by manually calculating the difference between each value: 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13 Notice how it goes up by 2 each time. Now look at the "power rule" for differentiation: [math](x^n)' = nx^{n-1}[/math] This is interpreted as "the differential of [math]x^n[/math] is n times [math]x^{n-1}[/math] So what is the differential of our original equation, [math]y=x^2[/math]? It would be 2 times [math]x^1[/math] or, more simply, [math]2x[/math]. In other words the value of y will increase by 2 with each value of x. And this is exactly what we see when we manually calculate the rate of change for [math]y=x^2[/math]. Does this make sense? Integrating with the power rule is just the exact opposite. The integral of [math]x^n[/math] is [math]x^{n+1}/(n+1)[/math]. You can see that we increased the exponent by 1 and then divided by the new exponent. This is the reverse process of differentiation. Here are some more basics on differentiation if you want to get a feel for the different techniques that can be used: http://www.math.ucda...pts/node17.html

Gravity is a force of acceleration. Acceleration is the differential of velocity over time, which itself is the differential of distance over time. For example, if you knew a rate of acceleration (from gravity), then integrating that into a velocity equation will tell you how fast something is falling after a specified amount of time. You could then integrate that velocity equation into a distance equation to tell you how far something has fallen. You can obviously imagine how incredibly useful calculus is in science. You could also differentiate the acceleration equation, which would give you an equation defining the rate of change in acceleration. This is known as "jerk" or "jolt" and is best felt as the sensation you get when you press further down on the gas pedal in your car while it is still speeding up.

The last time I did that I tripped over my XBox and broke it. No thanks!

I posted that "proof" on the whiteboard of a coworker and asked him to find the errant step.. without luck!

Begin with Euler's Identity: [math]e^{i\pi} + 1 = 0 [/math] [math]e^{i\pi} = -1 [/math] [math]e^{i 2\pi } = 1[/math] [math]e^{i 2\pi} = e^0[/math] [math]i 2\pi = 0[/math] [math]i = 0[/math] [math]1 = 0[/math] Euler says so!

Yes, but I was suggesting that perhaps we not restrict ourselves to the set of real mathematicians, but perhaps include imaginary mathematicians as well. That would make the study more complex and would at least allow us to root out the negative mathematicians.

This is a good start: http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Idiots-Guide-Calculus/dp/0028643658