Cosmology

When how I choose to observe a photon at a particular time and place can (1) instantaneously affect a photon a billion light years away and (2) retroactively changes the history of that photon (delayed choice quantum eraser), and when we have searched far, wide and deep and have not found any “matter,” we have comprehensive, conclusive evidence that we do not live in an objective, external, material world. At some point, if your views are guided by reason and evidence, you will have to accept that whatever “experience” is, it is not caused by an objective, external, material world.

Thought it all started with a big bang? Well, not so fast. If a new theory turns out to be true, the universe may not have started with a bang. In the new formulation, the universe has never been a singularity, nor an infinitely small and infinitely dense point of matter. In fact, the universe may not have a beginning at all. The model may also account for dark matter and dark energy, resolving multiple problems at once. “The Big Bang singularity is the most serious problem of general relativity because the laws of physics appear to break down there,” Ahmed Farag Ali at Benha University and the Zewail City of Science and Technology, both in Egypt, told Phys.org. “Our Read More ›

Because we just haven’t found the dark matter that the theory seems to require. Further to Human languages must be irreducibly complex (Can someone help us understand what this translation from German means?)—maybe it was something about how cosmology needs to change, which Neil Turok of the Perimeter Institute in Canada said plainly earlier this year. Something like: Hi, Nonsense, meet Budget: From PBS: Do We Need to Rewrite General Relativity? Astronomical observations show that there isn’t enough ordinary matter to account for the behavior of galaxies and other objects. The fix is dark matter, particles invisible to light but endowed with gravity. However, none of our detectors or experiments have ever seen a dark matter particle directly, leading some Read More ›

The largest large quasar group LQG ever has been discovered, stretching an enormous 4 billion light years from end to end. That is 40,000 times larger than our Milky Way galaxy which is only 100,000 light years across. This LQG contains 73 quasars! See: Largest Structure in the universe discovered “The quasar group appears to violate a widely accepted assumption known as the cosmological principle, which holds that the universe is essentially homogeneous when viewed at a sufficiently large scale.” Original publication: Astronomers discover the largest structure in the universe Royal Astronomic Society, Monthly Notices, January 11, 2013. If stochastic homogeneity is disproved, is there an intelligent design based argument for the existence of such an enormous Large Quasar Group?

Woes of God particle researchers worse than woes of Job, in the Bible, apparently:

Here’s a fun piece on the large Hadron Collider’s woes, when a passing bird dropped a piece of bread on it (yes!) , via Commentary Magazine – “Big Bang Machine Felled by Frenchman from the Future” by Anthony Sacramone (11/16/09):

So efforts by scientists to re-create the big bang — that moment, if one can speak of a moment, as in time, before there was time, or at least a decent wristwatch, when energy, or some hot gooey primordial stuff, spewed out a burgeoning universe, eventuating in the birth of galaxies, the advent of life, and the eventual cancellation of Charles in Charge — have failed once again.

It seems that the quixotic quest to find Higgs Boson, once thought to be the front man for an Air Supply tribute band, but which turns out to be the “God” particle,” has come to a crumbling halt.

First, about a year ago, the Large Hadron Collider (not to be confused with the Medium Hadron Collider and Omnidirectional Shower Head) went phffffff when, shortly upon whiz-banging, hydrogen began to leak from its cooling thingee, ruining a good pair of chinos and an autographed picture of Carol Channing.

Go here for more. The funny part is the explanation offered:

As the narrator of this CNN piece relates:

According to two physicists, the culprit could be the Higgs-Boson Particle traveling back in time to destroy itself.

Hey, I do that all the time, but generally only to defuse embarrassing social situations and get rid of problem documents. I do not  drop bread on anyone, unless they really, really bug me and only in situations where I can retreat indoors from the balcony before they figure out who dun it. Succeed or fail, I have an advantage over the Higgs Boson particle. I definitely exist.

Golly, I can remember the days when science was not ridiculous. Here’s another interesting comment.

Note added: Re the bread from heaven files: The secret of a successful aerial bread bomb – and I do not expect the bird to know this – is to make sure that the thickly buttered side lands in the victim’s hair.  I cannot give advice on the Large Hadron Collider. I only know how to ensure that snotty persons must go home and shampoo and shower before going to whatever upscale event they were bound for.

Other stories at Colliding Universes: Read More ›