Gravity Theory So Far

Buridan held that planets turned around the sun from inertia, pulled in by what would become gravity (circa 1350 CE). No doubt studying canon balls’ trajectory helped in the following centuries. By 1600 CE Kepler knew that masses attracted each other, and exactly reciprocally so… and inversely to the distance between them (it’s actually the square of the inverse). Gravity was theorized to be described by: Mm/dd… M and m being the masses of the object, and d the distance. Boulliaut aka Bullialdus, a French priest cum physicist suggested this. 

Bulliadus had a neat little reasoning still valid nowadays, in strict analogy with light. Bullialdius hypothesized that gravity was carried by particles emitted by the mass and was proportional to the density of said particles. That’s called the “inverse square law” as the force it depicts is inversely proportional to the square of the distance. Bullialdus reasoning may look naive… But we have not progressed much since!

Bulliadus was made one of the initial members of the Royal Society, and has a crater on the Moon. Newton testified to the priority of Bullialdus during his quarrel with Hooke about who invented what). Newton more or less proved the equivalence of that law, plus the basic laws of mechanics…. with Kepler’s three laws.

Newton thought that instantaneous gravitation as he had it, made no sense whatsoever (he wrote in a letter).

The Turin born Simon de Laplace corrected this a century later, making gravity progressive, inventing in the process field theory and gravitational waves.

In June 1905 Henri Poincaré published relativistic gravitational waves. They have to propagate at c, the speed of light.

In the following decade, Einstein, with the help of his friends, including Besso and Hilbert, wrote down a relativistic version of Newton’s theory. One main ingredient is that time slows down next to masses, so star light deflection next to the sun is doubled, as light spends more time  next to the sun, giving it more time to be deflected, etc. Another is that light follows geodesics of 4 dimensional space whose (Ricci) curvature K = T. Where T is the energy-momentum tensor.

The first order approximation of Einstein’s gravity is the classical Laplacian-Poincaré version.

But what “causes” Mm/dd? We don’t know yet. QED doesn’t really help. 

Quantum ElectroDynamics (QED) reproduces the classical Coulomb potential (1/d) (giving the 1/dd force) with exchanges of virtual photons. The same is to be expected for gravity with virtual gravitons. Does that mean that virtual photons exchange “create” the 1/dd force? Not really: a critical examination of what happens says otherwise: QED starts with installing the “Proca Lagrangian” in the path integral. That Proca Lagrangian contains the Maxwell equations which contain in turn the Coulomb potential. So QED demonstrates its own hypothesis as far as (1/dd is concerned)…(That doesn’t mean QED is useless: it’s a perturbative theory which predicts some perturbations with great precision, and those are extremely technologically relevant!) 

Nevertheless it seems that we are progressing spectacularly from what is, for common high energy physicists, an unexpected direction . 

I hold that the true architecture of the world is given by Quantum Entanglement… And the progress there is spectacular: particles of different nature have been entangled.

SQPR hypothesizes that Quantum Entanglement has a finite range: if true it gives immediately Dark Matter and Dark Energy. Moreover, SQPR changes the nature of the vacuum. However the relationship with the 1/dd factor stays mysterious… So far, then, one can’t produce an explanation really deeper than Bullialdus offered…

Patrice Ayme.

Dwarf Galaxies Contradict Standard Cosmology, BUT NOT SQPR!

Standard Cosmology Threatened, SQPR Proven?

Cosmology matters, it has always mattered, ever since there are reasons, and we humans try to refine them. Cosmology is the laboratory of pure reason.

The standard cosmological model is called the Lambda Cold Dark Matter model. “Lambda” is for the Cosmological Constant, an invention of Albert Einstein (hey, you see, Albert invented a few things, on his own, contrarily to what he claimed in self-derision…). Lambda basically says that space, spacetime itself, could have an energy independent of the mass-energy tensor (the energy of all and any particles). Dark Matter, in that model, is assumed to be some, so far mysterious, thing, spread all about, right from the start. A type of particle, so far undiscovered (standard physicists would guess).

After the Big Bang, in the ΛCDM, the universe expands: light takes ever longer to go between the developing clumps of matter which will end up as galactic clusters. In these clumps, Dark Matter concentrates, like the rest. Dark Matter reacting only to gravity, it ends up forming the next generation, more concentrated clumps (it’s not held back by radiation pressure from lighting stars, ect.). These Dark Matter kernels in turn attract material which ends up more or less rotating (the bigger, the more rotation), and we call that galaxies. Dwarf galaxies stay irregular and often don’t rotate as flat disks. Giant galaxies such as the Milky Way, Andromeda and Centaurus A, rotate mightily, and find themselves with dozens of smaller galaxies as satellites.

Centaurus A (NGC 5128) is an unusual giant elliptical galaxy crossed by a dust lane. The yellow halo is made of billions of yellow stars. It is ten billion light years away (5 times further than Andromeda, and is the largest closest giant galaxy we can see, after Andromeda (others may be hidden by dust). It is accompanied by 16 Dwarf Galaxies rotating in the same plane as Centaurus A itself. Something absolutely not predicted by ΛCDM. Width of the picture is 16 arc minutes, half of the full moon (which 30 arc minutes, half a degree).

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The ΛCDM model is, at first sight, impressive. Computer simulations of the model with observations are considered to be very successful on very large scales (larger than galactic clusters, up to the observable horizon). But  it has a “small scale crisis”:  too many dwarf galaxies, too much dark matter in the innermost regions of galaxies, too much Dark Matter halos (which are not observed). These small scales are harder to resolve in computer simulations, so it is not yet clear whether the problem is the simulations, non-standard properties of dark matter, or a more radical error in the model.

However, worse is now surfacing: the distribution of dwarf galaxies in a flat disk around their mother galaxy is absolutely not predicted by the ΛCDM paradigm.

ΛCDM predicts Dwarf Galaxies around a giant galaxy, but also predicts their orbits should be left to chance, there is not enough time since the Big bang to develop a huge rotation of the supergalactic cloud. ΛCDM says galaxies formed nearly instantaneously, after being torn on the outskirts by Dark Matter clumps which then make Dwarf Galaxies.

An international team of astronomers has determined that Centaurus A, a massive elliptical galaxy 13 million light-years from Earth, is accompanied by a number of dwarf satellite galaxies orbiting the main body in a narrow disk. This is the first time such a galactic arrangement has been observed outside the Local Group, home to the Milky Way, and anchored by it, Andromeda and the much smaller Triangulum galaxy. (By the way, it turns out that Andromeda is roughly the same size as the giant Milky Way, and not larger, as previously thought. The error came from overestimation of the Dark Matter in Andromeda, from too gross an application of the Virial Theorem. All this may have consequences for life in the universe, as it is easy to find reasons for zones in giant galaxies more hospitable for life, which less organized galaxies won’t have… But I digress.)

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Dwarf galaxies move in unexpected ways in Milky Way, Andromeda and Centaurus A. This contradicts Standard Cosmology:

Giant galaxies like our Milky Way are orbited by satellite dwarf galaxies. Standard cosmological simulations of galaxy formation predict that these satellites should move randomly around their host. Müller et al. examined the satellites of the nearby elliptical galaxy Centaurus A. They found that the satellites are distributed in a planar arrangement, and 14 members of the plane (out of 16) are demonstrably orbiting in the same direction. This is inconsistent with more than 99.5% of comparable galaxies in simulations. Centaurus A, the Milky Way, and Andromeda all have highly statistically unlikely satellite systems. This observational evidence suggests that something is wrong with standard cosmological simulations.

In other words, ΛCDM predicts that there should be a halo of Dark matter and Dwarf Galaxies. There is not. (Whereas SQPR predicts planar structures, see below!)

“The significance of this finding is that it calls into question the validity of certain cosmological models and simulations as explanations for the distribution of host and satellite galaxies in the universe,” said co-author Marcel Pawlowski, “Hubble Fellow” in the Department of Physics & Astronomy at the University of California, Irvine.

He said that under the lambda cold dark matter model, smaller systems of stars should be more or less randomly scattered around their anchoring galaxies and should move in all directions. Yet Centaurus A is the third documented example, behind the Milky Way and Andromeda, of a “vast polar structure” in which satellite dwarves co-rotate around a central galactic mass in what Pawlowski calls “preferentially oriented alignment.“

The difficulty of studying the movements of dwarf satellites around their hosts varies according to the target galaxy group. It’s relatively easy for the Milky Way. “You get proper motions,” Pawlowski said. “You take a picture now, wait three years or more, and then take another picture to see how the stars have moved; that gives you the tangential velocity.”

Using this technique, scientists have measurements for 11 Milky Way satellite galaxies, eight of which are orbiting in a tight disk perpendicular (!) to the spiral galaxy’s plane. There are probably other satellites in the system that can’t be seen from Earth because they’re blocked by the Milky Way’s dusty disk.

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SQPR Versus ΛCDM:

To avoid the concept of Dark Matter, MOdified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) have been suggested. It seems to me clear that they don’t work. Moreover, MOND is an ad hoc explanation: have problem, invent specific axiomatics to solve problem. Besides solving what looks like Dark Matter, without Dark Matter, and this, only around galaxies, not during collisions, MOND has no reason for being. The more evidence piles up, the less plausible it looks.

My own theory, SQPR is quite the opposite. It is a MODIFIED Quantum Dynamics (MOQD): it predicts a Sub Quantum Reality, to make Quantum Mechanics logically complete, and causal, with a nonlocality that will not be as “spooky” (to use Einstein’s bon mot). SQPR predicts Dark Matter, and it predicts that Dark Matter is CREATED inside giant galaxies, just the same as Black Holes are created inside giant galaxies (at ten times the rate of growth inside smaller galaxies). So, with me, Dark matter becomes a Quantum effect. The exact predictions are these:

Young giant galaxies will have little Dark Matter. Dark Matter is emergent.

Dark Matter will form in disks… And Dwarf Galaxies too.

SQPRs predictions are completely different. But fit observations…

My scenario is this: giant gas clouds, galactic size, of normal matter, coalesce first from the pull of gravity. As they do, conservation of angular momentum will augment the rotation speed (there always will be some rotation to start with, it’s nearly the same phenomenon as in cyclones formation). Implosion of the galactic size cloud, in conjunction with the rise of angular speed, creates a flat disk. This disk will contain lumps in the outer zone: dwarf galaxies, similar to planet formation in a solar system. Meanwhile, the Quantum Interaction, at cosmological distance, will churn out Dark Matter.

So we will typically end up with a flat disk of Dwarf Galaxies rotating in the same plane as the growing disk of Dark Matter of the giant galaxy. (Notice that I predict Dwarf Galaxies will have less Dark Matter, in the typical case).

Objectors may brandish the fact that the Dwarf Galaxy disk of the Milky Way is perpendicular, a glaring contradiction with my model. Well, my retort to that: something happened which yanked one relative to the other. The local group contains more than 54 galaxies, and it’s not even clear the large ones have all been found out, because of Milky Way dust: so a large galaxy passing by could have disrupted the dynamics of the Milky Way with its Dwarf Galaxy disk. There are plenty of observations such vast distortions between galaxies (and in the Solar System, Uranus can be contemplated, whose rotation axis is perpendicular to that of all the other planets, and where common sense would put it, perpendicular to ecliptic: clearly something big and weird happened which rotated the rotation axis spectacularly; by the way, Mars rotation axis also wobble spectacularly, although it’s coincidentally the exact same angle on the elliptic as Earth’s, right now, another spectacular coincidence (strange occurrences are not a proof of the existence of gods; however the case of Dwarf Galaxies, considered here, is 3/3… And actually more, and it becomes very statistically significant, if we look at the set of all Dwarf Galaxies around MW, A, Centaurus A).

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Mavericks, such as yours truly argue that, like much modern physics, and related to that, the ΛCDM model is built upon an intricate foundation of conventionalist stratagems, rendering it unfalsifiable in the sense promoted by Karl Popper. Mavericks have to be taken seriously: several experts howled, for many decades, that there was Dark Matter. They were viewed as having fallen to the Dark Side (naturally enough). Then a serious mathematician called Segal pointed out that there was a Dark Energy problem: the cosmic acceleration itself accelerated, he insisted, and wrote an entire very serious book about it. In spite, or because of, these graves accusations, the entire field was ignored for more than 50 years (entire books about Dark Matter and the accelerating acceleration of the universe, were discarded as cranks): governments prefered to finance militarily useful physics (“high energy” physics) rather than potentially revolutionary physics.   

Anyway, things are quickly coming to a head. Astronomy is finally getting financed much more than it used to be. Astronomy, experimentation contemplated, on the largest scale, is shattering physics. Noble high energy physicists were studying only 5% of the universe, says astronomy…

ΛCDM says Dark Matter was always there. I suggest instead that it was created, by standard Mass-Energy and how (as Black Holes were created, albeit from a Quantum, not gravitational, mechanism). We will see. First we see, then we think.

Patrice Aymé

Perverse Logic: Saving the Multiverse with Unhinged Cosmic Inflation!

When The Unobservable Universe Is Used To Justify Various Follies, Such As The Multiverse, Civilization Is In A Bad Way:

Physics is the laboratory of reason. This where the most advanced, most subtle logics are forged (even more so than in pure mathematics, where the navel’s importance is too great). So what physicists ponder, matters to the entire civilization which nurtures them. When physics goes to the dogs, so does civilization. The follies of state of the art theoretical physics, reflect an ambient madness which pervades civilization. (If you don’t believe this, may I sell you some imaginary bitcoins for millions of dollars?)

Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel, a continual source of excellent articles in physics, wrote an interesting essay which I disagree with. His reasons are interesting, and have the merit of honesty. My answers are even more striking, and I bring the full weight of 24 centuries of history as meta-evidence for crushing the feeble, pathetic, short-sighted considerations of my fellow physicists. Ethan’s essay is entitled: “Yes, The Multiverse Is Real, But It Won’t Fix Physics
Surprisingly, the evidence points towards the existence of the unobservable multiverse. But it isn’t the answer you’re looking for. “

Ethan proposes to use cosmic inflation to provide for the proliferation of Schrödinger cats and Wigner’s friends. One folly would thus provide for the other, and they would thus stay up, like two drunks falling into each other’s arms. I will instead humbly suggest to do away with madness altogether. But first a little recap.

The universe is expanding. This experimental evidence was established around 1920, by a number of astronomers in Europe and the USA, the most famous of whom was lawyer turned astronomer, Edwin Hubble. Hubble had the biggest telescope. The expansion is presumed to be looking everywhere the same, and this is what seems to be observed. That also means that, if one looks far away, galaxies will seem to be receding from us at speed ever closer to the speed of light. As the apparent speed of these galaxies approach c, their light gets shifted to lower and lower frequencies, until they become invisible (same reason as why Black Holes are blacker than black).

Where the transition to invisibility occurs is called the “event horizon”. Beyond the event horizon is the unobservable universe (we can’t detect it gravitationally, as gravity goes at the speed of light, a theoretical prediction now experimentally verified).

The observed universe is “flat” (namely there is no detected distortion in the distribution of clouds, filaments and superclusters of galaxies). That sounds unlikely, and indicates that the observed universe is a tiny portion of a much larger whole.

This unobservable universe has nothing to do with the “Multiverse” brandished recently by many theoretical physicists who have apparently run out of imagination for something more plausible. Eighty years ago, Schrödinger pointed out that Quantum Mechanics, as formalized then (and now!) was observer dependent, and filled up the universe with waves of dead and live cats (when applied to macroscopic objects). That’s called the Schrödinger Cat Paradox. Instead of calling for a re-thinking of Quantum Mechanics (as I do!), Ethan Siegel (and many other physicists and astrophysicists) embrace the dead and alive cats, settling them in “parallel universes”. So basically they reenact Solomon Judgment: instead of cutting the baby in two, they cut the universe in two. Zillions of time per second, in zillions of smaller places than you can possibly imagine… Here is a picture of Schrödinger cat: as the branches separate in that movie, two universes are created. This is what Ethan Siegel wants to justify, thanks to cosmic inflation…

Ethan’s revealing comment: “The idea of parallel Universes, as applied to Schrödinger’s cat. As fun and compelling as this idea is, without an infinitely large region of space to hold these possibilities in, even inflation won’t create enough Universes to contain all the possibilities that 13.8 billion years of cosmic evolution have brought us. Image credit: Christian Schirm.”
To explain crazy, we will go more crazy, thus making the previous crazy sound more rational, relatively speaking…

The Multiverse”, with baby universes all over the universe, has more to do with the “Many Worlds Interpretation” of Quantum Mechanics, a theory so absurd that the great popes of physics ruling around 1960 rejected it outright. Wheeler was ashamed of himself for having had a PhD student, Everett, who suggested this folly(Everett couldn’t get an academic job, at a time when academic employment in physics was booming!)

Ethan wrote: “In the region that became our Universe, which may encompass a large region that goes far beyond what we can observe, inflation ended all-at-once. But beyond that region, there are even more regions where it didn’t end.”

This sort of statement, and I say this with all due respect to the divine, is equivalent to saying:”Me, Ethan, having checked all that exists, observable by simple humans, or not, thereby informs you that I am either God, or that She is an interlocutor of mine. We checked that cosmic inflation thing, and saw it all over all the possible universes. Don’t talk, just learn.”

There is no way for us humans to know, for sure, or not, what is going on beyond the observable universe (aside from having no gravitational field distortions when approaching the event horizon, as I said above when considering “flatness”).

Ethan notices that Many Worlds fanatics have tried to use cosmic inflation to save their (ridiculous) theory. (“Many Worlds” is ridiculous, as Schrödinger tried to show, long ago, because there would be as many ways to cut the universes into “Many Worlds” as there are observers. So, so to speak, the “Many World Interpretation”, call it MWI, is actually MWI ^ {Observers} (MWI to the power of the set of all possible Observers, the latter set being itself something of an uncountably infinite function of MWI.)

Ethan says: “But just because variants of the Multiverse are falsifiable, and just because the consequences of its existence are unobservable, doesn’t mean that the Multiverse isn’t real. If cosmic inflation, General Relativity, and quantum field theory are all correct, the Multiverse likely is real, and we’re living in it.”

What Ethan is saying is that if a number of crazy (cosmic inflation), or incomplete (Quantum Field Theory), ideas are “all correct”, then something as useful as angels on pin heads is real.Yes, indeed, if one believes that Muhammad flew to Jerusalem on a winged horse (!), one may as well believe all the rest of the Qur’an. That is a proof by crystal balls. After Ptolemy and company had established their (half correctly) predicting “epicycles” theory, one could have used it in turn to “prove” Aristotle ridiculous theory of motion.

23 centuries ago a much saner theory existed, that of Aristarchus. It was rejected at the time, precisely because it was not insane, and even though it was used to make a nearly correct prediction of the distance of the Moon. Aristarchus underestimated the distance of the Sun, but a telescope could have changed this (by showing more precisely the angle of the terminus on the Moon). If astronomers had the time had accepted heliocentrism as a possibility, it would have led them to invent the telescope. Similarly, right now, rejecting Many Worlds and Multiverse will lead to develop instruments which don’t exist yet (I have proposed at least one).

Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel suggests that: “The Multiverse is real, but provides the answer to absolutely nothing.” My opinion is that the Multiverse is worse than useless: the unhinged mood it provides prevents to develop more fruitful avenues of research, both theoretically and experimentally.

Insanity is the rule in crowds (Nietzsche). Thus follies are the truths crowds love, at first sight, before being corrected by higher minds. Why? Follies bind, because they are so special.

https://patriceayme.wordpress.com/2015/02/20/commonly-accepted-delusions-follies-that-bind/

In Aristarchus’ times, heliocentrism, the fact Earth and its Moon rotate around the Sun, should have been obvious. Indeed, people, let’s think for a moment: where was the Sun supposed to be, considering the phases of the Moon? If the Sun turned around Earth, the Moon’s illumination should have changed all day long! It didn’t require much geometrical analysis to discover that this source of light could only be where Aristarchus computed it to be, far away from the Earth-Moon system.

It took 19 centuries to correct that (obvious!) mistake. Interestingly, Jean Buridan, circa 1350 CE, did it in the most theoretical fashion.

https://patriceayme.wordpress.com/2016/03/20/momentum-force-inertia-middle-ages-buridan/

Buridan first showed that Aristotle’s ridiculous theory of motion made no sense, and had to be replaced by inertia and momentum (what Buridan called “impetus”). Having done this, the motion of the planets in a heliocentric system could be explained by “circular impetus”, Buridan pointed out (then he observed sardonically that we couldn’t observe the difference between epicycles and heliocentrism, so may as well go for “Scripture”).

Similarly, nowadays, instead of arguing with the “angels on a multiverse pinhead” authorities, we better point out to the glaring inconsistencies of Quantum Mechanics.

Civilization without reason is like a chicken without a head: it can run, but not forever.

Patrice Aymé

Discrepancy In Universe’s Expansion & Quantum Interaction

In “New Dark Matter Physics Could Solve The Expanding Universe Controversy“, Ethan Siegel points out that:

“Multiple teams of scientists can’t agree on how fast the Universe expands. Dark matter may unlock why.
There’s an enormous controversy in astrophysics today over how quickly the Universe is expanding. One camp of scientists, the same camp that won the Nobel Prize for discovering dark energy, measured the expansion rate to be 73 km/s/Mpc, with an uncertainty of only 2.4%. But a second method, based on the leftover relics from the Big Bang, reveals an answer that’s incompatibly lower at 67 km/s/Mpc, with an uncertainty of only 1%. It’s possible that one of the teams has an unidentified error that’s causing this discrepancy, but independent checks have failed to show any cracks in either analysis. Instead, new physics might be the culprit. If so, we just might have our first real clue to how dark matter might be detected.”

20 years ago it was peer-reviewed published, by a number of teams that we were in an ever faster expanding universe (right). The Physics Nobel was given for that to a Berkeley team and to an Australian team. There are now several methods to prove this accelerating expansion, and they (roughly) agree.

Notice the striking differences between different models in the past; only a Universe with dark energy matches our observations. Possible fates of the expanding Universe which used to be considered were, ironically enough, only the three on the left, which are now excluded.  Image credit: The Cosmic Perspective / Jeffrey O. Bennett, Megan O. Donahue, Nicholas Schneider and Mark Voit.

Three main classes of possibilities for why the Universe appears to accelerate have been considered:

1. Vacuum energy, like a cosmological constant, is energy inherent to space itself, and drives the Universe’s expansion. (This idea comes back to Einstein who introduced a “Cosmological Constant” in the basic gravitational equation… To make the universe static, a weird idea akin to crystal sphere of Ptolemaic astronomy; later Einstein realized that, had he not done that, he could have posed as real smart by predicting the expansion of the universe… So he called it, in a self-congratulating way, his “greatest mistake”… However, in the last 20 years, the “greatest mistake” has turned to be viewed as a master stroke…).
2. Dynamical dark energy, driven by some kind of field that changes over time, could lead to differences in the Universe’s expansion rate depending on when/how you measure it. (Also called “quintessence”; not really different from 1), from my point of view!)
3. General Relativity could be wrong, and a modification to gravity might explain what appears to us as an apparent acceleration. (However, the basic idea of the theory of gravitation is so simplest, it’s hard to see how it could be wrong, as long as one doesn’t introduce Quantum effects… Which is exactly what I do! In my own theory, said effect occur only at large cosmic distances, on the scale of large galaxies)

Ethan: “At the dawn of 2018, however, the controversy over the expanding Universe might threaten that picture. Our Universe, made up of 68% dark energy, 27% dark matter, and just 5% of all the “normal” stuff (including stars, planets, gas, dust, plasma, black holes, etc.), should be expanding at the same rate regardless of the method you use to measure it. At least, that would be the case if dark energy were truly a cosmological constant, and if dark matter were truly cold and collisionless, interacting only gravitationally. If everyone measured the same rate for the expanding Universe, there would be nothing to challenge this picture, known as standard (or “vanilla”) ΛCDM.

But everyone doesn’t measure the same rate.”

The standard, oldest, method of measuring the Hubble cosmic expansion rate is through a method known as the cosmic distance ladder. The simplest version only has three rungs. First, you measure the distances to nearby stars directly, through parallax, the variation of the angle of elevation during the year, as the Earth goes around its orbit. Most specifically you measure the distance to the long-period Cepheid stars like this. Cepheids are “standard candles”; they are stars whose luminosities vary, but their maximum power doesn’t, so we can know how far they are by looking how much they shine. Second, you then measure other properties of those same types of Cepheid stars in nearby galaxies, learning how far away those galaxies are. And lastly, in some of those galaxies, you’ll have a specific class of supernovae known as Type Ia supernovae. Those supernovae explode exactly when they accrete 1.4 solar mass, from another orbiting star (a theory of Indian Nobel Chandrasekhar, who taught at the University of Chicago). One can see these 1a supernovae all over the universe. Inside the Milky Way, as well as many of billions of light years away. With just these three steps, you can measure the expanding Universe, arriving at a result of 73.24 ± 1.74 km/s/Mpc.

The other methods makes all sorts of suppositions about the early universe. I view it as a miracle that it is as close as it is: 66.9 km/s/Megaparsec…

Ethan concludes that: “Currently, the fact that distance ladder measurements say the Universe expands 9% faster than the leftover relic method is one of the greatest puzzles in modern cosmology. Whether that’s because there’s a systematic error in one of the two methods used to measure the expansion rate or because there’s new physics afoot is still undetermined, but it’s vital to remain open-minded to both possibilities. As improvements are made to parallax data, as more Cepheids are found, and as we come to better understand the rungs of the distance ladder, it becomes harder and harder to justify blaming systematics. The resolution to this paradox may be new physics, after all. And if it is, it just might teach us something about the dark side of the Universe.”

My comment: The QUANTUM INTERACTION CHANGES EVERYTHING:

My own starting point is a revision of Quantum Mechanics: I simply assume that Newton was right (that’s supposed to be a joke, but with wisdom attached). Newton described his own theory of gravitation to be absurd (the basic equation, F = M1 M2/dd. where d was the distance was from a French astronomer, Ishmael Boulliau, as Newton himself said. Actually this “Bullaldius” then spoiled his basic correct reasoning with a number of absurdities which Newton corrected).

Newton was actually insulting against his own theory. He said no one with the slightest understanding of philosophy would assume that gravitation was instantaneous.

Newton’s condemnation was resolved by Laplace, a century later. Laplace just introduced a finite speed for the propagation of the gravitational field. That implied gravitational waves, for the same reason as a whip makes waves.

We are in a similar situation now. Present Quantum Physics assumes that the Quantum Interaction (the one which carries Quantum Entanglement) is instantaneous. This is absurd for exactly the same reason Newton presented, and Laplace took seriously, for gravitation.

Supposing that the Quantum Interaction has a finite speed (it could be bigger than 10^23c, where c is the speed of light.

Supposing this implies (after a number of logical and plausible steps) both Dark Matter and Dark Energy. It is worth looking at. But let’s remember the telescope (which could have been invented in antiquity) was invented not to prove that the Moon was not a crystal ball, but simply to make money (by distinguishing first which sort of cargo was coming back from the Indies).

We see what we want to see, because that’s we have been taught to see, we search what we want to search, because that’s what we have been taught to search. Keeping an open mind is great, but a fully open mind is a most disturbing thing… 

Patrice Aymé

DARK MATTER PROPULSION Proposed

In  Sub-Quantum Patrice’s Reality (SQPR), Matter Waves are real (in Quantum Theory Copenhagen Interpretation (QTCI) the Matter Waves are just probability waves of… knowledge… hence the insistence that “it came from bit“). There has been no direct evidence that Matter Waves were real. So far. But times they are changing as the other one, Bob Dylan, a gifted yet not too deep singer who got his Nobel today, said.

Both Dark Matter and Dark Energy are consequences of SQPR. So: Observing both Dark Matter and Dark Energy constitute proofs of SQPR.

The prediction of the deviation of light by the Sun was twice with “General Relativity” than the one predicted in Newtonian Mechanics. The effect was minute, and detected only in grazing starlight, during Solar eclipse of 29 May 1919 (by the ultra famous British astronomer and physicist Eddington). Thus, as 95% of the universe matter-energy is from Dark Matter or Dark Energy, my prediction carries more weight.

SPQR also predict “fuel-less” production, in a variant of the effect which produces Dark Matter in SQPR (also called PSQR below): 

Dark Matter Pushes, Patrice Ayme Says. Explaining NASA’s Findings?

How does Dark Matter create propulsion? Well, that it does is evident: just look at galactic clusters (more details another day). A Matter Wave will expand, until it singularizes. If it expands enough, it will become so big that it will lose a (smaller) piece of itself during re-singularization. That  piece is the Dark Matter.

Thus visualize this: take a cavity C, and bounce a Matter Wave around it (there is plenty of direct theoretical and experimental evidence that this can be arranged).

Make a hole H in the boundary of C (this is not different from the Black Body oven the consideration of which led Planck to discover the Quantum).

Some Dark Matter then escapes. By the hole. 

However, Dark Matter carries energy momentum (evidence from Galaxies, Galactic Clusters, etc.).

Hence a push. A Dark Matter push. (Notice: the Dark Matter is created inside the device, it doesn’t have to be “gathered”. DM propellant speed could be many times the speed of light, hence great efficiency…)

The (spectacular) effect has been apparently observed by NASA.

Does this violate Newton’s Third Law? (As it has been alleged.)

No. I actually just used Newton’s Third Law, the Action = Reaction law. So SQPR explains the observed effect in combination with the Action= Reaction Law, “proving” both.

How could we prove SQPR? There should be a decrease of energy-momentum after a while, and the decrease should equal the observed push exactly.

Patrice Ayme’

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Warning: The preceding considerations are at the edge of plausible physics. (Groups of dissenting physicists are always busy making theories where Dark Matter does not exist (and they should!) Should they be right, the preceding is nonsense. The consensus, though, is that Dark Matter exists, but is explained by a variant of the so-called “Standard Model”, using “Supersymmetry”, or “WIMPs”, or “Axions”. My own theory, SQPR is, by far, the most exotic, as it uses an hypothesized Sub Quantic Reality, obtained by throwing Quantum Theory Copenhagen Interpretation, QTCI, through the window, as a first order theory.)

DARK GALAXY (Explained?)

A giant galaxy made nearly entirely of Dark Matter has been discovered. Theories of Dark Matter proposed by people salaried for professing physics cannot explain (easily, if at all!) why there would be so much Dark Matter in one galaxy. I can. In my own theory, Dark Matter is not really matter, although matter gives birth to it, under some particular geometrical conditions. In my theory, in some geometrodynamic situations, a galaxy will churn inordinate amounts of Dark Matter quickly. So I was not surprised by the find.

There are many potential theories of Dark Matter. Most are fairly conventional. They typically hypothesize new particles (some of these new particles could come from new symmetries, such as supersymmetry). I do not see how they can predict why these particular particles appear in some places, and not others. However, the importance of location, of geometry, is a crucial feature of my own theory.

I predicate that the Quantum Interaction (copyright myself) does not have infinite range. Thus, quantum interactions, in some conditions of low mass-energy density, leave behind part of the Quantum Wave. Such debris have mass-energy, so they exert gravitational pull, but they have little else besides (most of the characteristics of the particles they were part of concentrate somewhere else).

I Can Explain This Dark Galaxy, By Changing The Foundations Of Physics. No Less.

[From the Hawaiian Gemini telescope.]

In my own theory, one can imagine that the geometry of a galaxy is, at some point extremely favorable to the creation of Dark Matter: it is just a question of dispersing the matter just so. The Dark Galaxy has 1% of the stars of our Milky Way, or less. In my theory, once Dark Matter has formed, it does not seem possible to make visible matter again with it (broken Quantum Wave debris float around like a cosmic fog).

All past science started as a mix of philosophy and science-fiction (Aristarchus, Lucretius, Giordano Bruno, Immanuel Kant, Lamarck are examples). One can only surmise it will be the same in the future, and this is supported by very good logic: guessing comes always before knowing. Those who claim that science will never be born again from philosophy and fantasy are saying that really new science will never happen again. They say that all the foundations of science are known already. So they are into predication, just like religious fanatics.

It was fashionable to say so, among physicists in the 1990s, the times of the fable known as TOE, the so-called Theory Of Everything. Shortly after this orgasm of self-satisfaction by self-appointed pontiffs, the evidence became clear that the universe’s mass-energy was mostly Dark Energy, and Dark Matter.

This is an interesting case of meta-mood shared: also in the 1990s, clever idiots (Fukuyama, etc.) claimed history had ended: a similar claim from the same period, permeating the same mood of stunted imagination. The advantage, while those who pontificated that way? They could claim they knew everything: they had become gods, living gods.

I had known about Dark Matter all along (the problem surfaced nearly a century ago). I considered it a huge problem: It held galaxies and galactic clusters, together. But maybe something had been overlooked. Meanwhile Main Stream Physics (MSP) dutifully, studiously, ignored it. For decades. Speaking of Dark matter made one despicable, a conspiracy theorist.

Another thing MSP ignored was the foundations of physics. Only the most prestigious physicists, such as Richard Feynman, could afford to repeat Einstein’s famous opinion that “nobody understands Quantum Mechanics”. I gave my intellectual life’s main axis of reflection in trying to understand what nobody wanted to understand, that nobody thought they could afford to understand, the real foundations of physics. (So doing I was forced to reflect on why it is that people do not want to understand the most fundamental things, even while professing they do. It is particularly blatant in, say, economics.)

I have long discovered that the real foundations of physics are entangled with those of mathematics (it is not just that physics, nature, is written with mathematics, as Galileo wrote; there is a dialogue between the mathematics that we invent, and the universe that we discover, they lead to each other). For example whether the infinity axiom is allowed in mathematics change the physics radically (the normalization problem of physics is solved if one removes the infinity axiom).

Right now, research at the foundations of (proper) physics is hindered by our lack of nonlinear mathematics: Quantum mechanics, as it is, is linear (waves add up in the simplest way). However the “collapse of the wave packet” is obviously nonlinear (this is why it’s outside of existing physics, from lack of math). From that Quantum collapse, when incomplete from great distances involved, comes Dark Matter. At least, so I propose. 

Patrice Ayme’

BURIDAN: MOMENTUM, FORCE, INERTIA, MIDDLE AGES…

Buridan was the real author of the so-called Copernican Revolution… Nearly Two Centuries Prior…

When did mechanics and calculus of the Seventeenth Century originate? Well, around 1350 CE, in Paris, thanks to the genius Buridan, and his many famous and influential students and followers throughout Europe. The first theorems of calculus (say the theorem of the mean) were demonstrated, by students of Buridan, such as bishop Oresme, in the Fourteenth Century, using geometric calculus (which Newton would expertly develop three centuries later).

WHAT’S MASS? It is not an easy question. An answer for inertial mass was given seven centuries ago. Astoundingly, it’s still the foundation of our most modern physics, the relationship between momentum and force. Let me explain. (And the thinker who suggested this, Buridan, used this new mechanics to suggest that the Earth turned around the Sun, and generally planets went into circular orbits; thanks to Catholic terror, most physicists, let alone the Plebs, have any inkling of this: religious terror works!)

Momentum, force, and inertial mass were defined from trajectory deviation, first. This, I will show below, is incredibly modern (the idea is found in Riemann ~ 1860 CE, as I explained within the text of “Quantum Trumps Spacetime”). This was all in Buridan’s work, in the Fourteenth Century (14C).  Jean Buridan postulated the notion of motive force, inventing a notion he named impetus… which is exactly momentum (= mv). Consider this, from Buridan’s Quaestiones super libros De generatione et corruptione Aristotelis:

“When a mover sets a body in motion he implants into it a certain impetus, that is, a certain force enabling a body to move in the direction in which the mover starts it, be it upwards, downwards, sidewards, or in a circle. The implanted impetus increases in the same ratio as the velocity. It is because of this impetus that a stone moves on after the thrower has ceased moving it. But because of the resistance of the air (and also because of the gravity of the stone) which strives to move it in the opposite direction to the motion caused by the impetus, the latter will weaken all the time. Therefore the motion of the stone will be gradually slower, and finally the impetus is so diminished or destroyed that the gravity of the stone prevails and moves the stone towards its natural place. In my opinion one can accept this explanation because the other explanations prove to be false whereas all phenomena agree with this one…

In 14 C, In The Late Middle Ages, Buridan Defined Momentum And Force By Considering Deviation Of Particle Trajectory

Buridan writes an explicit formula:  impetus = weight x velocity. Just a word of the modernity of it all: the idea translates directly into defining force(s) with changes of distance between geodesics (in differential manifold theory). Also Buridan launches the vector theory of force (the impetus goes in the direction of the force imparted)… and the force of gravity. (Buridan identifies implicitly gravitational and inertial mass, another correct assumption.)

Buridan states that impetus = weight x velocity (modern momentum). All the predecessors of Buridan thought one needed a force to keep on moving, but Buridan did not. Famous predecessors such as Hibat Allah Abu’l-Barakat al-Baghdaadi, who modified Avicenna’s theory, which followed John Philoponus believed in inertia NOT. They all followed Aristotle, who believed all and any motion died away, if no force was applied. (Not to say no Muslim ever invented anything scientific: the Uzbek ibn-Musa al-Khowarizmi crucially put the finishing touch on the zero, which he partly got from India, in the Ninth Century.)

Buridan’s pupil Dominicus de Clavasio in his 1357 De Caelo, pointed out that this extended to gravity:

“When something moves a stone by violence, in addition to imposing on it an actual force, it impresses in it a certain impetus. In the same way gravity not only gives motion itself to a moving body, but also gives it a motive power and an impetus, …”.

Buridan knew celestial bodies were moving from inertia: “God, when He created the world, moved each of the celestial orbs as He pleased, and in moving them he impressed in them impetuses which moved them without his having to move them any more…And those impetuses which he impressed in the celestial bodies were not decreased or corrupted afterwards, because there was no inclination of the celestial bodies for other movements. Nor was there resistance which would be corruptive or repressive of that impetus.”

By definition, inertial mass is what resists an applied force. The greater the resistance to a force, the greater the inertial mass of what it is applied to.

Buridan invented the tunnel thought experiment (and thus, the idea of thought experiments). If a tunnel were bored through the center of the Earth and a heavy body dropped into it, what would happen to it? Well, Buridan gave the correct answer, repeated as a good parrot by Galileo… nearly three centuries later:

Galileo Galilei expressed this fundamental principle of his dynamics in his 1632 Dialogo:

The heavy falling body acquires sufficient impetus [in falling from a given height] to carry it back to an equal height.

Buridan had many students: Buridan’s thought was pursued up by his pupil Albert of Saxony (1316–1390), by Poles such as John Cantius, and the Oxford Calculators.  Nicole Oresme pioneered the practice of demonstrating laws of motion in the form of graphs (equations weren’t available yet); some of these are now known as central and basic theorems of calculus (like the theorem of the mean, guessed in Oxford, proven by Oresme)

***

Buridan’s Revolution:

Buridan introduced p = mv, called it “impetus” and stated that it did not change if no force was applied. Thus Buridan buried the complete idiocy known as Aristotle’s physics. (That Aristotle could be a complete idiot at the mental retard level is philosophically, and historically capital, as Aristotle set in place the leadership system through celebrities, which we enjoy to this day).

Buridan’s Inertia Law is known as Newton’s First Law (because Buridan was from Paris, while Newton demonstrates the superiority of the English born three centuries later by attributing to him what Isaac did not discover).

More generally Newton asserted clearly his Second Law: dp/dt = F (where  F is the Force, by definition). It’s an axiom. (Weirdly the Second Law implies the First…)

***

Force = Deviation From Trajectory:

This is Buridan’s idea. It was taken over again by Bernhard Riemann, in the early 1860s (five centuries after Buridan’s death). In modern mathematical parlance, force is depicted by geodesic deviation. It’s this idea which is at the triple core of Einstein’s theory (with the idea that gravitation/spacetime is a field, and that it’s Newton’s theory, in first order).

So this is ultramodern: the idea got carried over in “Gauge Theories”, and, because there are several forces, there are many dimensions.

***

Thought Experiment Often Precedes Experiment: 

Yesterday I bought a (2015) book by a (British academic) historian of science. In it, the honorably paid professional asserted modern science started with Tycho in 1572. Tycho, a Count set his student Kepler onto the refined study of the orbit of Mars. Both Tycho and Kepler were 5 star scientists (differently from, say Copernicus or Einstein, both of whom too little inclined to quote their sources). So they were, because, differently from, say, Obama, they had strong personalities. Great ideas come from great emotions. Tycho believed the Ancients had lied. And he was right, they had lied about the orbits of the planets: observations with the same instruments gave different results from the ones the Ancients had claimed.

The preceding shows that this trite notion is profoundly false; the scientific revolution was launched by Buridan and his students (among them Oresme, Albert of Saxony), contemporaries and predecessors (including Gerard de Bruxelles and the Oxford Calculators). Some of their work on basic kinematics, the exponential and the mean theorem of calculus was erroneously attributed to Galileo or Newton, centuries later.

To believe everything got invented around the seventeenth century is not to understand how the human mind works. Experience has to be preceded by thought-experiment (even Einstein understood that). Buridan and his contemporaries did the preliminary thinking (while others were making clocks and hydraulic presses). All of this would become immensely easier after the invention of algebra and Descartes’ analytic geometry, true.

So let’s have a loving and admirative thought for Buridan, the main author of the scientific revolution, whose reputation, and WISDOM was destroyed by the (TERRORIST) CATHOLIC STATE: Buridan’s astronomical reputation was destroyed by the Catho-fascists, more than a century after his death. That’s why the heliocentric system is attributed to an abbot from a rich family (Copernicus), instead of the master physicist said abbot was forced to read as a student.

Studying the history of science, and mathematics uncovers the fundamental axioms, in the natural order given by their obviousness.

Determining which ideas came first, and why is not about determining who is the brightest child, or most impressive bully in the courtyard. In 1907, Einstein made a big deal that he, Albert, was the discoverer of Energy = Mass (“E = mcc”). A careful inspection shows that this either reflects dishonesty, or misunderstanding on his part. Or both. I will address this soon, as I keep on studying mass and momentum.

Buridan put momentum at the core of physics, and thought-measured if dynamically. Momentum is still at the core: photons have momentum, but not mass.

It’s important to realize that many of the latest ideas in physics (all of “Gauge Theories”)  rest on an idea invented in Paris seven centuries ago. Not to slight it, or to heap contempt on all the noble Nobels. But, surely, the time has come for really new ideas!

Patrice Ayme’  

Gravitational Waves Directly Detected

How Were Gravitational Waves detected?

By two detectors in the USA, one in Washington State, the other in Louisiana (detecting in one place would have been enough; in two places at the same time, the finding is overwhelming certain; the National Science Foundation of the USA had spent $1.1 billion, over 40 years, on that research). The detectors were simplicity themselves in concept: just a light interferometer to measure the distance between mirrors: light is split, sent in two perpendicular directions, and then re-united with itself. If one of the branches vary slightly in length relative to the other as a gravitational waves passes, an interference will show up. However mirrors hanging from pendulum hanging from pendulums five times, the whole thing in an anti-vibration machine had to be realized in half a dozen places in a chain of reflections and interference.

What are these Gravitational Waves?

As far as existing gravitation theory has it, distortion in space (and, thus time: time and space are related by the speed of light, c).

A Field Carries Away A Wave Just As A Whip Does

What Was Detected:

Einstein’s Gravitation Theory says that gravitation “is” the deformation of space(time) it brings. It is this deformation which was directly detected: a part of space in one direction was made shorter than in another direction. That meant a huge gravitational wave had passed.

The formidable event that caused it was the crash and collapse of two black holes into each other, each around 30 solar masses (much more details are known).

Gravitational Waves Were Certain Theoretically, & Already Detected:

We already had evidence for the existence of gravitational waves, both theoretical and experimental. Einstein’s name was rolled out, naturally enough. Because Einstein contributed to the present Theory of Gravitation (I am not anti-Einstein, far from it, but he closely worked with a number of other people, including the towering mathematician David Hilbert, who published his own approach to gravity within weeks of Einstein).

Einstein tends to appear as the cherry on many a cake. Those who celebrate the photogenic cherry, and ignore the cake, will go hungry.

WAVES ARE PREDICTED BY FINITE SPEED FIELD THEORY:

Actually, once one has hypothesized that gravitation is a field propagating at a finite speed, the apparition of waves is automatic.

The reasoning was made first by British and French Eighteenth Century physicists, in the framework of electromagnetic force; the mathematics is exactly the same with gravitation, as both fields vary with the inverse square of the distance. This is what happens in a radio antenna, with electrons going back and forth: the electric field that those electrons create is deformed in such a way that it moves other electron at a distance, back and forth.

The Gravitational Energy Loss Detection Method:

Thus, how do the waves show up? By shaking things at a distance. Using conservation of energy, it means that the field creating system, by moving just so, loses energy to its waves. An obvious case is two neutron stars (“pulsars”) rotating around each other: as they move back and forth, because of said rotation, they create gravitational waves which carry energy away from their system, As this happens, their system loses energy, the two stars should spiral into each other, thus rotate ever faster, and this should be observable, and computable exactly. This, indeed, was thoroughly observed, so we knew the waves were there.

Einstein’s Gravitation Theory is a sleight of hand:

It affects to identify space(time) deformations with gravitation. The idea actually originated with the awesome German mathematician Bernard Riemann, who invented manifold theory in part to point out that any force could be viewed as convergence, or divergence of geodesics (this is an idea that physics has been milking ever since).

This, though, does not answer Newton’s deeper query about the nature of gravitation (see below). It’s a bit as if a creature asked:’What is an arm?’ And one answered:’An arm is what pushes things, and we can detect the deformation the arm brought.’

What is the discovery good for?

Well, first, one has to make sure. Science is about making 100% sure. The present experiment improved some technology far out what anything else required (but then it does open some possibilities!) Just an importantly, now we will be able to check the details of the Gravitation Theory (the big picture was not in doubt; the details are). Ultimately it may be possible to communicate through gravitational waves, etc (although right now the deformation are only of the size of the fraction of a nucleus, and we could detect them!)

Who were the originators of that idea? First Newton himself pointed out that his own theory of gravitation was grotesque (I am paraphrasing). Newton:

“that one body may act upon another at a distance thro’ a Vacuum, without the Mediation of any thing else, by and through which their Action and Force may be conveyed from one to another, is to me so great an Absurdity that I believe no Man who has in philosophical Matters a competent Faculty of thinking can ever fall into it.”

There were actually two problems: that the action was instantaneous, and that it was at a distance without intermediaries. Newton paid attention to the second one, physics, in the last two centuries, solved the first (which was implicit in Newton’s observations).

As I mentioned in passing above, part of Newton’s worries were addressed by the invention of the concept of field. And then by the realization that fields carried energy away in waves. At that point, gravitational waves were automatic… Riemann’s introduction of manifolds, and how to conceptualize forces in them gave the manifestation of its nature to gravitation we presently have, a distortion of space metric (once again, time follows automatically).

It’s important to know who invented what, and contributed most. Because it unveils how ideas appear and evolve. Then, in turn, one can make theories of that, accelerating innovation (don’t forget there is a horse race between innovation and oblivion, on the scale of the entire biosphere!)

Curiously, this is all very useful; GPS with a precision of 30 centimeters has allowed to find out that baboon society is more democratic than ours, in fundamental ways. “General Relativistic” effects (the fact clocks run slow in a gravitational field) make crucial corrections to the GPS computations (otherwise GPS would be pretty useless). So this is not all academic. GPS will soon allow robotic agriculture… among other things.

We still don’t know what gravitation is. However, we can predict more things than Newton did… Even if he did not suspect they were there. This is just the beginning of what could be revealed, if our satanic impulses are kept in check.

Patrice Ayme’

Solstice Song

So this is the Solstice,

And what have we done,

We, the civilization of Humanity,

The only one there is,

Our Earth, her Moon, our biosphere,

Once more around the Sun: another year over, a new one just begun.

In this dark universe, we have brought our lights, our lonely lights,

Gentler than all others, peering through the night,

Dark Universe, Enlightening Humanity. Light of Moon, Enlightenment of Thinking, Throwing Light On A Fragile Future That Better Be Human

To our Moon, we may owe our life, the Enlightenment of Humanity, the snows of temperate climate, which helped.

Merry Christmas, Roman Saturnials, Celtic Yule,

Our northern ancestors celebrated that birth of the year, ever since they created edible plants, and took care of them,

Eons ago,

Well before their words could come to us.

I hope you have fun,

The far and the dear one, the old and the young,

A very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year,

Let’s hope it’s a good one, without any fear,

To use your minds as much as,

This civilization needs to keep on going,

Minimizing pain, maximixing love.

And so this is Christmas,

Verily We are the Anointed Ones.

For weak and for strong, for rich poor alike

The world is so wrong, yet so right.

No doubt a heavy, confusing, exhilarating,

Cross for us to bear,

No need to go the gym,

Exercising our minds is plenty.

And so happy Christmas,

For black and for white, for yellow and red ones,

Let’s stop all the fighting, which brought nothing good

And start those Jihads we really need,

Smartly discarding those we don’t.

A Happy New Year, let’s hope it’s a good one

Without any fear, to assume what we are,

Anointed to pursue,

Thought in the universe.

We hope you have fun

The near and the dear one, the old and the young,

A very Merry Christmas, a happy new year, let’s hope it’s a good one.

Those wars we don’t need are over, if you want it,

New wars have begun, which we really need,

Just to save our biosphere, our sanity, our civilization.

Merry Christmas:

It’s not a question of never more wars over the horizon,

It’s a question of how we fight, and why.

Humanity never rests,

Thinking is a debate,

Debate is combat,

Humanity means ever more dashing,

Incomprehensible, yet enlightening thoughts,

Where gods never threaded before,

Made obvious for all to see.

Humanity means ever more science, and fiction,

Humanity means going to Mars,

And well beyond, Plus Oultre, as Charles V put it,

Humanity means going thermonuclear,

Humanity means never aging,

Humanity means ever anew,

Thinking through everything.

Humanity means never any return of the same,

Humanity means there is no horizon,

But for the next one,

And the one after that.

Humanity means love for us shall lead us,

Ever after.

So enjoy,

Enjoy your Earth and her Moon, ever rotating around their Sun.

Life has been an ever-changing journey,

Ever since it started to evolve, more than four billion years ago,

Ever faster,

Ever more potent,

The greatest change is upon us now,

Life, thought,

Will blossom across the galaxy,

They have to, just to survive,

And we are in charge,

So happy Solstice,

We are going to need ever more happiness,

To conquer all,

Starting with ourselves.

Patrice Ayme’

Nuke That Comet

Many are not held back about being strident. Why should not intellectuals do the same? After all, what they do is most important. So Nietzsche was strident, for example against German racist, anti-Semite, mediocre nationalistic, herd like aspiring bourgeois. Apparently that was not strident enough, and, somehow, the Nazis succeeded to make many believe that their worst enemy (Nietzsche) was their prophet.

The herd approves of those who are peaceful. So, to be taken seriously by the herd, to be a bovine intellectual, so to speak, one needs to be for peace, against conflict and anything violent. In particular, nuclear power, you know, from the nuclei which are all over matter, is not kosher.

Asteroid, 500 Kilotons, 17 Meters Across, 25 Miles Away.

The wall of a zinc plant in Chelyabinsk, Russia, was damaged by a shockwave from the meteor exploding 40 kilometers away, in 2013. With a mass of around 10,000 tons, 50% more than the Eiffel Tower, its explosion at 30 kilometers altitude damaged 7,200 buildings in 6 cities, injuring 1,500 people. Just a warning. It was the fiercest impact known since the Tunguska event… That destroyed 80 million trees in a radius of around 30 kilometers… Yet left not even a fleck of dust we know of. But there may have been others over the oceans, or even… Amazonia in the 1930s, where an object brighter than the sun impacted!

A 100 meters across asteroid would explode with around 100 Megatons of TNT energy, around double the largest nuclear device ever exploded (the notorious “Czar Bomba”; see the picture inside “The Worst”)

For years would-be wise men, in scientist clothing claimed that nuclear weapons would not be efficient against asteroids. That was obviously an idiotic, and even dangerous position to have. in most plausible scenarios of a bolide impact, we would have little warning. A typical case is that of a comet on an hyperbolic trajectory, falling at enormous speed from the Oort Cloud.

Such bolides are attracted by planets like flies to honey. After all, gravitation is not called “universal attraction” for no good reason.

One such comets is going to graze Mars. It may as well have headed straight to Earth.

And then what?

Nukes. Big, fat, thermonuclear nukes.

Indeed, soft options then don’t work. Forget “gravity tractor” and “impactor.” The former involves using gravitational tug from a large spaceship to tweak an asteroid’s course. The impactor would crash at high speed into the asteroid to effect the same purpose… both may well fail, as asteroid are bizarrely constituted. Some are little more than rubble piles.

Soft methods would only work if the asteroid were small enough and seen soon enough. Many, as the one above, come from the Sun’s direction, so cannot be seen from Earth, as they catch up with her.

For large objects, short response times, or a comet, a nuclear explosion “is the only option,” (said, for asteroids, Bong Wie, a professor and director of Iowa State University’s Asteroid Deflection Research Center).

I wrote entire essays on this in the past. Now I am happy to announce that this point of view has been heard.

Some U.S. nuclear-warhead components, scheduled for disassembly, have gotten a new lease on life. Reason: possible use in defending the Earth against killer asteroids, or comets.

The National Nuclear Security Administration manages the U.S. atomic-weapons arsenal. The warhead components, containing highly enriched uranium, are being retained “pending a senior-level government evaluation of their use in planetary defense against earthbound asteroids,” an April 2014 report reveals. (A reason to keep components is that particularly powerful H bombs may have to be fabricated quickly, in the case of a looming large object, such as a comet; bombs in present arsenals can be delivered precisely, so are not very powerful, although they would be effective against very small asteroids.)

Asteroids with a diameter of about a kilometer or bigger, could “produce global devastation,” said the National Research Council in 2010. Hundreds cross Earth’s orbit, yet none are expected to impact for at least 100 years.

However at least 100,000 or more asteroids at least 50 meters in diameter cross Earth’s orbit. Probably no more than 5% of these “Near-Earth Objects” have been detected. A 50 meter asteroid exploding over a large city could kill up to 30 million people.

Those beasts tend to explode in the atmosphere, leaving no material remnants, as happened in Tunguska. So the statistics we have about how frequently they come knocking, are suspect.

It’s a world of forces, a violent world, out there. Better be ready.

When flying a civilization, we have to assume that, if it may happen, it will happen.  Especially if it’s very catastrophic. That’s the essence of Catastrophic Calculus, fundamental to flying planes, and civilizations.

Patrice Ayme’