pantheory

Once the laundry is properly cleaned, softened, nicely folded, and neatly put away -- I think we will know almost certainty that black holes exist, but not of the vacuous singularity type, more like a more condensed form of matter than neutron stars. My fave is compressed field material from the Zero Point Field, other proposals have been quark stars, etc., but in the end I believe they will by made of a presently unknown form of matter. Like others have pointed out, there may be no reason to suspect that the math for such new matter should give the exact same results as general relativity. So there probably would be a difference in the math based upon certain circumstances. And if a difference were found how could underlying theory be affirmed without direct observation? I do not like vacuous points as a model for black holes for philosophical reasons. It would seem to complicate reality. IMO there will be no resolution to this question in the foreseeable future. But as to my laundry analogy, clean close must be worn to have value, and so black-hole theory will be continuously revisited until somebody figures out how to test by the mathematics, the underlying concept(s) involved IMO. If theory changes then the cloths will be worn out and we can buy new more stylish ones to first try on, and then to "wear."

Here's my hypothesis. Deletia

Is Dark Matter necessary? Hypothetical entities like dark matter and dark energy have been proposed to explain observations that otherwise seem difficult to explain. Three of the main reasons dark matter was proposed in the first place was 1) to explain the stellar orbital velocities of stars in the disks of spiral galaxies 2) to explain orbital rates of galaxies in a cluster 3) to explain the extent of galactic lensing whereby it would take a lot more matter than what we can see to bend light as mush as we observe. There were also other theoretical advantages to this proposal. There have been few alternative proposals to dark matter. One approach was to change the formulation of gravity concerning the effect of gravity per distance in a spiral galaxy, concerning 1 and 2 above. This was the approach of MOND gravity (Modified Newtonian Dynamics). This proposal, although somewhat successful in explaining problem #1, was less successful in explaining #2, and says nothing about #3. Another big problem with the MOND formulation is that it does not address why the force of gravity should change under different circumstances. A different approach from MOND might be to explain how by using the Newtonian formulation one can explain what is being observed. Newton’s gravity formulation can derive Kepler’s gravity mechanics, and rate of orbital motions. The equation for orbital velocities in a circular orbit would be: v = (GM/r).5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_mechanics If the application of this formula were different, the results would be different. Instead of the mass of the galaxy being considered constant, and the only variable would be a star's distance from the center of the galaxy, both the mass and distance could be variables based upon Newton's shell theorem, where only the mass of the galaxy on the inside of a star's orbit would be considered. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_theorem So as the radius away from the center of the galaxy would increase, so would the mass that would affect the stellar orbital velocity. This could produce a constant orbital speed of stars within the galaxy, or faster stellar speeds toward the outside diameter of the galaxy, if stellar densities outward were close to being equal to inner densities. To test such a hypothesis galactic stellar orbital motion data from a number of different galaxies would be needed and then tested. This could also seemingly explain motions of galaxies in a cluster when they tend to orbit each other on somewhat the same orbital plain. As to #3, either the mechanics of galaxy lensing would need to be explained differently concerning its application, such as an additional refraction characteristic, or explanations would be needed to explain why an adjustment to the bending of light formulation would be needed at galactic scales. Dark Matter is not that easily explained away.

Really cool. Something very different. They look like floppy mushrooms to me. Maybe they might have a place in the mosaic of man's terraforming aspirations some day. I don't see any chlorophyll, and if not they would be dependent on pre-existing life or its byproducts for food.

Yeah, you are probably right. She may have no desire to collaborate more with Iranians than any other nationality or group now that she's here. Maybe only because she is still an Iranian citizen.

Wow, Lots of unique perspectives and lines of research. Hope she and here Iranian research team can broaden their cloistered horizons (if not already doing so) to exchange ideas with other fundamental research teams from all over the world. Hope we hear of more successes from her and her Iranian team in the future concerning her mathematical research and its possible applications.

3. They didn't do it in a vacuum, so how do we know the result is valid in space? While the original abstract says that tests were run "within a stainless steel vacuum chamber with the door closed but at ambient atmospheric pressure", the full report describes tests in which turbo vacuum pumps were used to evacuate the test chamber to a pressure of five millionths of a Torr, or about a hundred-millionth of normal atmospheric pressure. (bold added) http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-08/07/10-qs-about-nasa-impossible-drive

In aether models, aether is a background field like dark matter. "Is there infinite amount of aether, so it can flow outside of device forever?" Not infinite but the answer is yes. "Then why not simplify it and say that some microwave photons escape system, while other one are absorbed by engine?" That's a good explanation and answer but I cannot think of any mechanism in particular to explain how this could work since microwaves are readily absorbed if not reflected. Also such microwaves would need to be linearly directed. I also expect that both covers on each end of the device are needed for reflective purposes.

If this effect turns out to be correct, I don't think their conclusions will be like mine since it would be radical for present-day physics. However, I expect they will come up with an ad hoc hypothesis to explain it that will leave the conservation of momentum intact while the new hypothesis may become an addendum to GR or another part of modern physics.

I understand your concern. NASA's explanation of it is that the microwaves are pushing on the ZPF. The ZPF could be considered a kind of aether. For example: My hypothesis/ explanation of this phenomena is similar IMO to NASA's, concerning the gist of it. My preliminary hypothesis is that the microwaves would accordingly be pushing on the aether which would cause aether continuously flowing through the small end of the tapered device and exhausting through the big end. The result would be a lower aether pressure outside the small end of the device and a higher aether pressure outside of the big end of the device, hence propulsion. It would not matter that both ends of the device are closed since matter is mostly space and the aether accordingly could readily flow through them. In a pushing gravity model this would mean less gravity pushing in one direction than the other, hence acceleration. Any explanation like mine involving the alteration of external forces, would not necessarily interfere with Newton's conservation of momentum but instead would change our understandings of gravity. My long term expectations, if this phenomena is proven to be valid, would be that our understandings of gravity (GR) and other aspects of modern physics (such as QM) will need to be changed (not necessarily the equations of them); But classical physics, for the most part, would remain intact.

There is enough information out there now from different sources whereby I think there is really something to this technology. IMO probably new physics is also involved. Yes, Shawyer's explanation of it does not really make sense to me either. Maybe he doesn't truly understand the mechanism(s) involved himself. I have some speculative ideas of how it might work which are similar to NASA's ideas that the ZPF is involved. I believe there will be an ongoing non-stop development of this technology which I expect will reach many of the expectations and hopes of its inventors and developers. Down the road I expect to see one or more Nobel Prizes come from this discovery and technology. The scientific American issue "No wings, No wheels" future technology based upon Em-drive and related proto-types, was also an indication that "positive results" are coming from numerous sources, governments, researchers, etc. concerning this technology. According to sources, it seems that Shawyer may no longer be part of the loop concerning his advisory capacity and government research. He may no longer be informed of what they are doing, privy to the types of equipment or experiments being built or tested, their successes or failures, etc. But if this is not the case then it might be expected that he has signed security agreements and now can only discuss the "technologies" and results of research being developed by his own company.

My understanding of it is that microwaves are directionally generated through reflective focusing in primarily one direction, leaving the containment cavity, while the reaction force causing acceleration would accordingly react in the opposite direction. That's the explanation of it in my link above (different form your posting of it) as I understand it.

The paper below was written by Roger Shawyer, the British Engineer and developer of Em-drive (electro-magnetic drive), based upon information available to him in 2013. There is ongoing classified research by NASA, England, China, and probably others where even Shawyer seems to be out of the loop concerning details of such research. Shawyer's company and probably the other researching companies and countries mentioned would probably keep much of details of their present research secret for competitive advantage if the technology proves successful. The promise of such technology seems huge. http://www.emdrive.com/2Gupdate.pdf

There seems to be enough evidence behind this proposed technology that many including NASA are seriously checking it out, as the OP explained. http://guardianlv.com/2014/08/nasa-looking-to-emdrive-to-revolutionize-space-travel/ This is not a something-from-nothing technology. The Input is electricity, which in this case is a kind of fuel, and the output is microwaves. The problem is that this design, according to theory, should not produce propulsion. This reminds me of an old joke which goes something like this: The government was considering investing a considerable sum of money into a new technology that initially seemed to be promising. If valid the technology in the long run would be more efficient and save a lot of money compared to the present technology. The main problem was that the technology seemed to violate principles of physics. The government decided to fund research by giving the project to two different groups to study the concept and proposed technology. The first group consisted of 100 prominent scientists educated in the related disciplines involved. In the second group were 100 renowned engineers, known for their achievements concerning the development of possibly related technologies. Each group was given 15 million dollars and 3 years to come to a conclusion and recommendations. After 3 years the group of scientists presented a 900+ page consensus thesis explaining why the proposed technology was impossible, showing the details of the related physics and past experiments that could explain the failure of the related theory and concept. At the same time the group of Engineers presented a 250 page report, complete engineering drawings, and a 1/10 scale highly functional working model. In today's science IMO even scientists take the engineer's approach. If it seems to work then all-speed-ahead with its continued evaluation and possible development; and why not? Most would suggest that we can come up with operating hypothesis now, and change theories later to explain it, if needed

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22329782.700-strange-dark-stuff-is-making-the-universe-too-bright.html#.U9QHYzd6MQ4 The quote above from the subject link could be the simple answer to their "problem." Neutral hydrogen comes in a number of different forms. Only a single hydrogen atom is relatively easy to observe in the intergalactic medium (IGM) because of its numerous spectral emissions. The other forms of hydrogen are very difficult or impossible to observe in the IGM and afterwords give a very accurate estimate of their overall quantities. Thinking that "that loophole has been shut" (much more neutral hydrogen) may be their problem. Other common forms of hydrogen are neutral H2 and H3 along with their ionized forms. From what I have read, an estimate today of the quantities of molecular hydrogen in intergalactic space is speculative, more a matter of theory (probably Big Bang) than of observation. Relying on theory when accurate estimates of quantities of molecular hydrogen based upon observation could be off by many factors, may be the source of their accounting problem. The two links below explain these other forms of hydrogen. http://iso.esac.esa.int/science/SSR/Habart.pdf http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trihydrogen_cation Fourteen years ago, right or wrong, Marmet speculated on the possibilities, link below. . http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/hydrogen/

No such line should exist if the source of the x-rays "bumps" have their basis in atomic transitions. As stated, it is just speculation as to what the cause might be. Galactic Black holes, stellar black holes, and neutron stars can be sources of gamma rays and x-rays. Most of this type of radiation is thought to be related to interactions of these entities or their jets, with matter. Such forceful entities as black holes and their jets, when interacting with matter, produce gamma rays for reasons that are still only speculative. My guess is that this OP x-ray radiation energy absorption lines are related to black holes or their jet interactions of some kind. Since these radiation "bumps" are observed within only a small range of energy levels, the source may be only one particular type of interaction the absorbs the x-ray radiation creating the observed absorption edges.

Thanks for your time and interesting comments. I want to stay on topic so I'll try to explain what I can from that perspective. One of the two themes of the subject OP paper is the the universe appears to be "too bright" for known light sources. As to Olber's Paradox, I think it can be readily explained for most any cosmology. The first reason is that galaxies are so far away that we can only see a few of the very closest galaxies with the naked eye, and then they are very dim and barely visible in the night sky. The second and most important reason IMO is that galaxies become redshifted with distance. After a certain distance all of a galaxy's light will be redshifted to the infra-red, microwave and radio frequencies so they would not be visible using normal telescopes. As to the subject news article, I think they are over-estimating present brightnesses based upon the Hubble formula, if the Hubble distance formula is wrong. There could be one or more reasons for what they are observing but as they say in the article, the difference between what is calculated and what is being observed is off by a factor of four. "After recalculating and plotting these cosmological distances from redshifts ................................................." This quote from the paper I posted relates to the supernova data calculations of the paper only and nothing else. There are no Doppler shifts or expansion of space in this model so redshifts accordingly would be caused by the diminution of matter. "type 1a SNe is one type of standard candle a standard candle is any system whose properties are well understood enough to to be used. It is not restricted to type Sn1a supernova." Your quote above: Yes, this is true, but there would seem to be less possible variables with type 1a supernova. I cannot weave your other comments into the topic but if you are interested in specific replies/answers to any questions please PM me, thanks.

Alternative cosmology gets published by peer-reviewed journals once-in-awhile if one is careful about the wording (include wordings of possibility rather than of probability, wordings such as "according to this model" etc. Also such papers must include what appears to be evidence for what is being proposed or stated. Most journals do summarily dismiss papers with proposals outside the mainstream, after a quick perusal, but without reading them. Here is an example of a fairly recent paper by someone else that did get published. http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2013/08/the-universe-is-shrinking-a-radical-new-theory-challenges-accepted-view-of-an-expanding-cosmos.html Presently I have 6 to 7 offers from new publishers (to me) who wish me to publish a new paper in their journal, some at little or no cost to me. These offers are based upon their review of my last paper which I posted on this thread. My new paper discusses the many long-considered problems in today's cosmology, and proposes "simple" solutions to these asserted problems based upon an alternative cosmology. The subject OP article may be explaining a new problem. When the time comes, granted, I might get a number of refusals first before I get one of my past or new publishers to publish this new paper. I am presently considering an offer to peer-review someone else paper that seems to have some kinship to the paper I posted here, at least as far as I can tell by the title. That's probably why they made me the offer. Some of these studies are Herculean, and take many researchers to accomplish them over many years. Most make every effort to be error free before they publish.

(deleted double posting)

The quantitative data that I could find in this article is that by their analysis there appears to be "five times too much ionized gas for the estimated number of UV sources in the modern, nearby universe." The other related theme of this article is that the universe appears to be 400% too bright based upon observable sources of EM radiation. This quote: " Hubble Space Telescope observations of the large-scale structure show a brightly lit Universe. But supercomputer simulations using only the known sources of ultraviolet light produces a dimly lit Universe. The difference is a stunning 400 percent." http://www.universetoday.com/113092/missing-light-crisis-the-universe-seems-a-little-too-dark/#ixzz38RlI3Cg7 Then this quote: “The great thing about a 400 percent discrepancy is that you know something is really wrong,” said coauthor David Weinberg from Ohio State University. “We still don’t know for sure what it is, but at least one thing we thought we knew about the present day universe isn’t true.” and this link: http://www.universetoday.com/113092/missing-light-crisis-the-universe-seems-a-little-too-dark/#ixzz38Qw3MOep Since the calculations of the alternative model, which I discussed above, assert that the mainstream calculated distances are wrong, even if valid this would not change the real amount of light or UV radiation in the universe, only the calculated brightness because of underestimated distances. For the "too much ionized hydrogen problem," I believe they might have overlooked the ionizing potential of quasars to strip electrons from matter within quasar jets, and also the possible ionizing effects of the jets on pre-existing matter, besides the quasar UV radiation that they discussed.

That is explained in posting #14, and figure 2 in the paper. The mainstream model over estimates brightnesses to a redshift of about 1.1 then under estimates them progressively thereafter. This is the blue line in figure 2. The red "nearly straight line are brightnesses according to the alternative model which match observations very well. The quantitative extent is shown in that figure.

The answer is Yes. There are exact quantitative predictions made within the paper as to what the exact extent the universe will appear brighter. Looking at table 2. You will see the alternative distance predicted/ calculated at a redshift of about .6 (#8 in the table) is about 1.44 times greater than the Hubble formula. Square this concerning the inverse square law of light and you would get an apparent brightness of more than twice as bright. At a redshift of about 1.4, the alternative model predicts a distance of about 1.89 the Hubble distance. This when squared would relate to an apparent brightness enhancement of more than 3.5 times brighter. At the farthest distance indicated on the chart, at a redshift of 10., the alternative model's distance would be more than 10.39 times greater than the Hubble calculations. This would equate to a brightness increase of about 108 times brighter than would be expected when using the Hubble formula for distances and brightnesses.

Concerning supernova, predictions would be the red straight-line graphing on figure #2 of the paper. The Hubble formula is the blue-line parabolic graph that would require variable degrees of dark energy to explain the overly dim and over-brightness data. If type 1a supernova are standard candles as expected, then the same graph would apply to all cosmic entities, not just supernovas. Notice on the graph, based upon the Hubble distance formula, that all cosmic entities with redshifts greater than about 1.1 progressively appear brighter than what they are expected based upon their Hubble calculated distances. For the alternative model calculated distances and related brightnesses appear as they should. On the left margin of figure #2 you will see brightness are on the bottom and dimmer is on the top.

This is a peer-reviewed journal. It is the Journal of Applied Physics Research published by the Canadian Center of Science and Education. The unique equations and calculations concerning type 1a supernova and how they quantitatively match the data, is the theme of the paper. The predictions and claims about the brightnesses of all cosmic entities are also within the paper, see sections 7.1 and 7.2 in particular. Here is another link to the paper.

Few would want to consider outside the box explanations (outside the Big Bang model) to solve this "over-brightness" problem. After all, the problem doesn’t seem that awesome that a standard explanation of some kind could not be found. Still the appearance of over-brightness in the universe was a prediction of another cosmological model long ago so I thought I would mention it here. Here is the recent paper on it. It was a supernova paper proposing that Dark Energy is not real, whereby I was the lead author (see 7.2 and 7.3 within the paper.) The paper predicts that the universe will appear brighter than what would be expected using the Hubble formula to calculate distances. Instead, this model proposes that distances are greater at redshifts greater than about .5, therefore all cosmic entities at greater distances would appear brighter than they really are/were. It also proposes that an additional brightness factor would be needed. The paper proposes new distance and brightness equations based upon the alternative cosmology, seemingly corroborated by type 1a supernova data. The other aspect of the OP paper was their assertion of the over-abundance of ionized hydrogen. One possibility that might explain this is that galactic jets, stellar black holes, and some neutron star jets conceivably could ionize great volumes of in-falling matter. Such jets are all over the universe. The outside-the-box explanation concerning the alternative cosmology would be that new protons would be created surrounding black holes, and conceivably within these jets, from a background field material (not unlike dark matter). This would be an alternative to the creation of matter by the Big Bang process that in time would result in mostly neutral hydrogen, and seemingly not enough observed UV sources to ionize it, according to the OP paper.