Questioning the Big Bang Theory

by Rod P 95 Replies latest watchtower bible

VM44

Just found out about this book published by lulu.com press, "The Big Bang, or the Big Blunder", by Ernest Osborn.
Haven't read it, but it looks interesting. --VM44
http://books.lulu.com/content/72878
Rod P

O.K. People!
So sorry for being so delinquent. There's so much to cover on this topic.
I am an accountant who still has to make a living. When a client demands your attention, "Thou shalt drop what you are doing and deal with it!"
Tomorrow A.M. I will deal with this thread, and start responding in the areas that need attention, but, as well, add a few initiatives.
I can't help but feel very excited about this subject, because there is so much to explore, and we have all but just begun.
Our focus, at the moment, is about Red-Shift= Distance (and Velocity). Boy, have we discovered there are some real issues about this question. For if that is not exactly true, then we must suddenly consider alternatives, which includes "Steady State Theorem", which has all but been dismissed in the corridors of modern science today.
I am giving you a clue as to where I may be headed, but at the same time, challenging you to not be so hasty to dismiss things, at least so readily. There are a few surprises in store for you, and No! I am not trying to be melodramatic here.
At the same time, I must curb my enthusiasm, because I must, in the name of science, try to conduct myself with a reasonable level of "objectivity", which is more easily spoken than accomplished. Boy, do I hate leaving God out of the equation, just because there are a lot of skeptics running around on this forum.
But that's O.K. I have said all along, if what I have to say is worthless or meaningless, then what I have to say "Ain't worth keeping!!!"
Like Custer, this IS symbolic of my Last Stand. I am either going to remain a "believer" in all this, or else I am going to have to join the side of the Atheists. Damn!!! I don't want to be put in such a position, but it looks like I have to take a stand somehow, someway, someday! It might as well be now!
Just joking. . I know better than to take the position of the "last stand"! There's no such justifiable position, certainly not in Astronomy, Astro-Physic and nobody questions anyone!
There's still too many questions, and we have yet to explore them all. So do I want to continue the exploration? You bet!!
But just remember, if the Big Bang Theory is actually wrong, then be prepared for some serious ramifications, and also how your own future may be defined.
Rod P.
Rod P.
zagor

<just a suggestion>
erhaps you guys should look a bit further and deeper than what is "obvious" or apparent in the sky. Universe is way stranger than most people here (except Tera i guess
I was thinking of starting a thread about String theory - super strings - multiverse and end with M-theory, but I sense that most people wouldn't have a clue what a hell I'm talking about, so I'm afraid that entire effort of writing such a thread would be almost complete waste of my time.
So yes, have a bit of a research. Here is also a page with good videos to watch. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/elegant/program.html
</just a suggestion>
DannyBloem

erhaps you guys should look a bit further and deeper than what is "obvious" or apparent in the sky. Universe is way stranger than most people here (except Tera i guess
makes we wonder who Tera is.....
I was thinking of starting a thread about String theory - super strings - multiverse and end with M-theory, but I sense that most people wouldn't have a clue what a hell I'm talking about, so I'm afraid that entire effort of writing such a thread would be almost complete waste of my time.
Yep, there are only limited people who would answer in such a thread.
So yes, have a bit of a research. Here is also a page with good videos to watch. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/elegant/program.html

Thanks for the link to the video's. That is a great site. I enjoyed them (finished half of them now) Anyway I was thinking about posting a thread about quantum physics, but it is quite hard to understand.
For now, I think we better handle those big subjects one by one. Rod P wanted to start a thread about relativity here after. We'll see. Anyway to much of the mixing makes it even more harder to keep it to the subject (even though things are related of course). Danny
tetrapod.sapien

zagor,
that Tera is a crazy bastard!
and you know? by all means, don't waste your time posting stuff that most people would not have a clue in hell regarding. of course you can say this with confidence, because why again?
ironically, i know more about hypothetical 11 dimension hyper space than i do about the big bang. big fan of Kaku.
Rod,
sorry i have not posted here yet. by the time i read all the stuff in your first post, the discussion had spiraled out of my knowledge zone. and so i just watched it unfold. i will try to read a bit on the subject before the next discussion.
but i do have to say that i agree with peacefulpete regarding how these researchers word their material. it seems to speak of a hidden motive, and lack some objectivity.
TS
zagor

LMAO,
Crykee, I was so tired I didn't even see I've missed somehow whole chunks of a sentence. This is what I was trying to say:
Perhaps you guys should look a bit further and deeper than what is "obvious" or apparent in the sky. Universe is way stranger than most people here (except Tera i guess) would be able comprehend.
Sorry Tetrapod

zagor

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/bigbangredux.shtml

I Was a Big Bang Skeptic (2002)

For years I argued that there might not have been a Big Bang, since the evidence for it was rather poor. I encountered as a result a sea of snobbery and condescension from physicists. I encountered bias and closed-mindedness, and this was all the more reason to go on record against it. I found my experience was not unique: even some professional astronomers had been pressured to advocate the Big Bang in order to get telescope time, which makes or breaks every astronomer's career.[1]. This kind of arrogance was appalling.

As for myself, I asked for every piece of evidence available. But all I was ever given was a paltry handful of sometimes dubious facts that did not entail the conclusion drawn from them. Even if there was some other evidence, something "I could not possibly understand," it still violated all propriety and sense to expect me to believe in what was beyond my comprehension, or to attack me for this. Just as the mystic is not authorized to expect me to believe what only he has experienced, just as the Christian is not authorized to expect me to believe in the Resurrection without the evidence afforded to Thomas, so the cosmologist is not authorized to expect me to believe a theory that he cannot demonstrate to me as true, even if (indeed, even because) the evidence is such that "I cannot possibly understand."

Despite the rude madness I received from the physics community, I always kept an open mind and continued my investigations. And over the past two years enough evidence has arisen, and two physicists (Victor Stenger and Bjoern Feuerbacher) took enough trouble to patiently persuade me with genuine facts and argument, that I have "seen the light" so to speak, and changed my mind. Equally important was my careful reading of the apologetic works of Barry Parker and Joseph Silk.[2] I now conclude that the Big Bang Theory, in some formulation, is probably true. The odds are well in its favor. Why and how this is so I explain in this essay.

My Position Now

The current Big Bang Theory should be thought of as having two distinct elements. The first part is a theory about the origin (or at least the early evolution) of the observed universe. The second part is a theory about how that came about. By confusing these two aspects of the theory I and others were easily led astray in our assessments of the evidence. The first element of the Big Bang theory now has about as firm an evidential foundation as anyone could reasonably expect of it. There is no good reason to doubt that the observable universe had its origin in a small, superheated state about 14 billion years ago, from which it expanded and cooled, condensing into the cosmos we now see.

The second element of the Big Bang Theory is another story. Hardly anyone can agree on the details, and evidence for or against any particular position is scarce and indecisive. But even if we had no clue at all as to why the universe began in a small, superheated state, this would not detract from the evidence that it did. And as it happens, we have more than a clue about the why. The basic outlines of Singularity and Inflation theory account for the Big Bang and other observations fairly well. They do not have enough specifics to fit or explain all the facts that we observe, and both are largely undetailed and untested as far as theories go. So this element remains highly contentious and speculative, and much in need of more fact-finding. But it is the best game in town, and it makes a lot of sense.

The Evidence

(1) General Relativity and Vacuum Energy Imply a Big Bang Inflation Event

When Einstein applied the equations of General Relativity to the entire universe, rather than just the solar system, he found they predicted either that the universe must expand from or collapse to a singularity. Einstein eliminated this result by arbitrarily adding a "cosmological constant" that balanced everything out. As Parker notes, "Einstein was reluctant to add the term. It destroyed the simplicity and beauty of his equations" (p. 51). As Einstein himself said, "If Hubble's expansion had been discovered at the time of the creation of the general theory of relativity, the cosmological member would never have been introduced. It seems now so much less justified to introduce such a member into the field equations" (Letter of 1932, quoted by Parker, p. 59).

When later scientists worked out all the possible solutions to this problem, it was found that the entire universe would inevitably have one of several particular shapes. Some of those shapes included a singularity at the beginning of time followed by an expansion: a Big Bang. As it happens, the known properties of the universe as presently observed entail that only one of those descriptions can be correct. So the universe had to have begun as a singularity. The only way this could not be correct is if General Relativity is false (and that is unlikely: it is very well corroborated) or if some as-yet unknown force or factor prevented it. Some theorists, like Stephen Hawking, argue that quantum theory is such a factor, that quantum uncertainty makes a singularity impossible, but this has not yet been proven. And even if that is correct, the Big Bang theory only changes in one minor detail--the observable universe still begins very, very small.

Much later it was noticed that such a Big Bang event would experience a very brief period of "supercooling" which would cause a rapid but brief period of "inflation," at least if we are right about currently-accepted physics. This in turn predicts many peculiar observations, like the near-perfect density, smootheness and flatness of the universe. Though Inflation Theory does not explain everything or fit all the facts, it has two things going for it: it appears to be independently predicted by other physical laws, and it explains a lot that otherwise would remain a mystery. Still, many physicists remain skeptical of Inflation Theory, even as they agree that the Big Bang theory is probably true.

(2) Expansion is Confirmed by Multiple Lines of Evidence.

There are five independent lines of evidence that all converge on a common conclusion: the universe began between 14 and 15 billion years ago in a superheated state where even atoms could not form, and has rapidly expanded and cooled ever since.[5]

The first and most important piece of evidence is the observation of redshifts, which can only be explained by assuming that every galaxy cluster in the universe is moving away from every other: the more distant, the greater the speed. Though many scientists have shown or argued that some redshift has other causes, these explanations do not account for even a significant fraction of the observed objects, or of the observed redshift overall, which is simply too enormous to be accounted for by any other known means. The most obvious contrary explanation is that something to do with the space the light passes through causes the frequency to decay, but this has been soundly refuted by two observations. First, the expansion rate is accelerating, which only a change in velocity can explain (since the rate of a space-caused decay could not change but would have to be constant).[6] Second, many observations of redshifted objects have been made whose light is split by a gravitational lens. These studies show that even when light coming from the same object traverses different distances, the redshift remains the same.[7] So light is not decaying as it passes through space. The redshift must originate with the object, and only velocity can explain that.

The five independent lines of evidence for the universe's age are as follows:

First, taking into account all known factors, including the recently-confirmed acceleration of the cosmic expansion rate, scientists have shown that if you rewind the observed behavior of the known universe, it all comes together in a tiny, superheated state about 14.5 billion years ago.

Second, we have confirmed that the oldest stars in our own galaxy are between 12 and 13 billion years old. Though Pickrell (cf. n. 5) notes that these "were probably not among the universe's very first stars," they would have formed no more than a billion years after the cosmos itself began to form. Though this only proves an age for our galaxy, not necessarily the universe, the result of 14 billion years perfectly matches the most recent calculation of the projected start-point for the universe's observed expansion.

Third, the most distant galaxy yet observed, based on the most precise and accurate observations to date, lies between 12 and 13 billion lightyears away, and thus is just as old as ours.

Fourth, the observed interstellar abundance of certain radioactive elements, calculating backwards from their known rate of decay, entails that they must have been produced at least 12 to 13 billion years ago, about the time we would expect them to have formed if the universe began about 15 billion years ago.

Fifth, the current calculated age of various globular clusters beyond our galaxy is no more than 15 billion years. This corroborates an age of the universe of about 15 billion years.

These five facts, especially in combination with all the other "evidences" ennumerated in this essay, would be a remarkable coincidence if the universe didn't in fact originate between 14 and 15 billion years ago. So it probably did.

It must be noted that Lerner discusses experimental evidence that the pressure-action of light itself, upon galactic or stellar magnetic fields, would inevitably accelerate all objects away from each other: in other words, there is a possible explanation of expansion other than a Big Bang, indeed, an explanation of accelerating expansion. And despite critics who originally attacked this suggestion, intergalactic magnetic fields have recently been demonstrated to exist on a vast scale.[8] Many other theories could perhaps account for it, too. However, all the other evidence concurs with a Big Bang event, not any of these other theories.

Likewise, M-Theory has recently provided an alternative that is just as successful as Inflation Theory without any Big Bang as ordinarily conceived. Called the ekpyriotic or "brane" theory, developed by Dr. Paul Steinhardt and others, this theorizes a "Big Collision" instead of a Big Bang.[9] Or, as Boslough puts it, "Maybe the big bang was just a big bang, an explosion in our little neighborhood of the universe that was neither the beginning of time nor the creation of the cosmos. Nobody knows."[10] This fact should be kept in mind throughout this paper: Big Bang theory is consistent with many different interpretations of the originating event. It is not solely tied to Singularity or Inflation Theory, nor does it entail that nothing else exists apart from what we observe: there may be other universes, and even this universe is probably much larger than we will ever see.

(3) The Microwave Background Radiation is Consistent with a Big Bang Event

Not only did Big Bang Theory predict a microwave background glow, it exactly predicted its temperature. Though there are problems with the exact pattern of that radiation, and though there may yet be other causes for it,[11] no one has demonstrated any better explanation to be correct. In contrast, analysis of the microwave background as observed by numerous independent instruments confirms certain features that suggest the universe was indeed in a superheated state (indeed, the very state that "Inflation" would have ended with) about 14 billion years ago. The evidence is of sound waves that passed through the early superheated universe, in such a way that predicts the current existence of roughly 4.5% "baryonic matter," based on experimentally proven ratios in particle accelerators, which is almost exactly what we observe.[12] This is not a slam dunk proof, but it is very strong evidence that the universe was once in a superheated state 14 billion years ago, again corroborating the basic elements of the Big Bang Theory. No other theory can explain this acoustic peak, except theories already resembling the Big Bang, like Brane Theory.

(4) There are Too Many Light Elements to be Explained Any Other Way

I originally saw this as a failed evidence because we know too little to get anything like a precise ratio of light to heavy elements and thus could not base any argument on what that ratio was. However, on closer examination I found that this ambiguity does not matter so much. Even though a lot of matter remains unobserved, and the time and rate of star formation is not securely known so the actual ratio today is not securely known,[ 13] the vast quantity of key light elements that we do observe is far too great to be accounted for in any other way than by something like a Big Bang. Alternative theories are at present entirely speculative,[14] while Big Bang theory has experimental basis in particle physics.

This is most clear in the case of the verified presence of natural deuterium. Its quantity is not even important: its mere existence is inexplicable--except, so far, by the Big Bang theory. There is no other natural process known that can create stable deuterium. In fact, stars destroy this element. But the evidence doesn't end there: beginning at a superheated state entails a vast abundance of light elements over heavy, with more light elements in older epochs. Both observations are confirmed. The exact ratios are unknown, but everywhere (even in our own galaxy) older stars are comprised of more light elements than newer stars, and the vast scale of light elements is undeniable. There is simply way too much helium, for example, to explain by any other means. And no other theory can account for the precise kinds of light elements we observe in superabundance: not just any helium, for example, but only helium-3 and helium-4; not just any lithium, but lithium-7; and so on. Other light elements exist in only trace amounts. This is exactly what would be predicted if the universe began as a superheated mass of superhot protons and neutrons which then cooled, according to the experimental results of atomic physics.

Evidence Against

Those are the four lines of evidence for the Big Bang that carry convincing weight. Other evidence might be uncertain (such as that for epochal change on a galactic scale, cf. n. 13), or equally predicted by other theories (such as that the universe is very nearly flat, a finding now well confirmed [15]). But when we examine the evidence above, there really is no better theory than the Big Bang: all lines of evidence point there. Inflation Theory could be false, even Singularity Theory could be false--yet even then some form of the original Big Bang theory might still be true (i.e. Lamaître's theory that the cosmos began as a spherical superheated mass a few lightyears across). However, Singularity and Inflation explain, even predict, so much of the evidence we do have, and are predicted by well-tested theories like the Standard Model of Particle Physics, Quantum Mechanics, and General Relativity, that they are probably approximately true, at least in some fashion. But even if false, the Big Bang theory, at least in some fashion, is still probably true.

This remains so even despite problems. Indeed, some problems have been removed: for instance, more accurate measurements with higher resolution have resolved any doubts about the existence of observable objects more distant than 13 or 14 billion lightyears. None have been observed. Though some still might, current observation remains consistent with the Big Bang. Note that it is only the observable objects that matter--the universe may easily be larger than 14 billion lightyears on any Big Bang theory, we just shouldn't yet be able to see farther than that if the theory is true, and so far it seems we can't. Likewise, though a value for the Hubble Constant had been confirmed that caused problems with earlier theories, the discovery of accelerating expansion has resolved that issue.[16] Likewise, while there has been trepidation over inconsistencies in observed vs. required mass, gravity observations have confirmed the existence of 30% of this missing mass (in some form as yet unobservable to current instruments),[17] and much has been accounted for by the expected volume of neutrinos in the universe, according to the recently-confirmed neutrino mass.[18] The number of observed kinds of neutrinos is also partly predicted by the Big Bang theory, so neutrinos are starting to provide an additional line of evidence for the Big Bang. Though this proof is less secure than the others, it is impressive that it happens to match and corroborate the same result as the stronger proofs (cf. Parker, pp. 105-111).

But some problems remain. Primarily, no version of the Big Bang theory yet explains supercosmic structure. As Peter Coles puts it, some scientists "argue, controversially, that the Universe is not uniform at all, but has a never-ending hierarchical structure in which galaxies group together in clusters which, in turn, group together in superclusters, and so on. These claims are completely at odds with the Cosmological Principle and therefore with the Friedmann models and the entire Big Bang theory."[19] Certainly, the observation of very large-scale structure going very far back in time is as yet not entirely explained. Yet Wane Hu notes that evidence of supercosmic structure in the most accurate microwave background data so far (retrieved by BOOMERANG) shows such structure "on the largest scales at the earliest times."[20] But the incorporation of heavy neutrinos into cosmological models may be changing that.[21]

Conclusion

Still, this is simply a mystery that remains to be solved. The evidence for the Big Bang theory is simply too strong to dismiss on this account. All we can be sure of is that we don't know exactly how or why the universe existed in a superheated state about 14 billion years ago, though it seems to have had something to do with singularities and inflation. But the basic fact, that the universe existed in a superheated state about 14 billion years ago, now seems hard to dispute. I, for one, believe it.

Copyright 2002 by Richard Carrier. Copying of this material is permitted provided credit is given to the author and no material herein is sold for profit.

[1] "Heaven's Gatekeepers: the Galactic Battle for Telescope Time,"Lingua Franca, September, 1999, pp. 56-61.

[2] Barry Parker, The Vindication of the Big Bang: Breakthroughs and Barriers, 1993. This is out of print, but I found it an excellent lay summary of the evidence by a bona fide expert and well worth acquiring. Though some of his facts (particularly concerning chronology) are out of date, recent advancements have made his case stronger, not weaker. He also summarizes quite fairly many problems with the Big Bang theory (pp. 159-208, 231-2, 281-300; but compare pp. 233-57 and 305-12), and several alternatives to it that were proposed before 1993 (pp. 302-04, 313-36). All the same is true of the very up-to-date work of Joseph Silk, The Big Bang, 3rd ed., 2000. Far less useful but still in the same genre lies the relevant chapter in Robert Ehrlich's Nine Crazy Ideas in Science (2001) and of course Fox, op. cit. n. 9.

[5] The first three "proofs" are reported by J. Pickrell, "Faded Stars Get New Role: Hubble Takes a Long Look" and R. Cowen, "Sharper Images: New Hubble Camera Goes the Distance," Science News 161 (May 4, 2002), pp. 277-78. The other facts are described by Parker, op. cit., n. 2, pp. 96-101.

[6] e.g. J. Glanz, in Science, vol. 282, 1998, pp. 2156-7; Idit Zehavi and Avishai Dekel, in Nature, no. 6750, 1999, pp. 252-4.

[7] e.g. G. Goldhaber, et al. Timescale Stretch Parameterization of Type Ia Supernova B-band Light Curves (2001).

[8] cf. Science News, May 6, 2000, p. 294.

[9] See Karen Fox, The Big Bang Theory: What It Is, Where It Came From, and Why it Works, 2002, pp. 152-7. Brane theory fits superstring theory better than Inflation, and makes all the same predictions but one: different features in the gravity wave background, which we will probably not be able to measure for decades. See: J.R. Minkel & George Musser, "A Recycled Universe: Crashing branes and cosmic acceleration may power an infinite cycle in which our universe is but a phase," Scientific American (March 2002), pp. 25-26. See also: "When Branes Collide: Stringing together a new theory for the origin of the universe," Science News 160:12 (Sept. 22, 2001), pp. 184-5.

[10] John Boslough, Masters of Time, 1992, p. 223.

[11] e.g. Hoyle and Burbidge, "A Different Approach to Cosmology," Physics Today, April 1999, pp. 38, 41. Their theory predicts a blackbody metallic dust as the source of the microwave background, and unexpected metallic dust has indeed been found in intergalactic voids (J. Michael Shull, "Intergalactic Pollution," Nature, 2 July, 1998, p.17-19; Lennox Cowie and Antoinette Songaila, "Heavy-element enrichment in low-density regions of the intergalactic medium," ibid., pp. 44-6). Another theory is Hannes Alfvén's "plasma theory," which is given at least a nod of respect by the science community: cf. Boslough, op. cit., n. 10, and Anthony Peratt, "Not with a Bang," The Sciences, January/February, 1990. Fox also agrees that this makes all the same predictions as Big Bang theory with fewer difficulties, and has yet to be falsified by experiment or observation (op. cit., n. 9, pp. 133-4). Her one objection ("we must be at the very center of a matter...region of the universe") operates on the mistaken assumption that such a region would be exactly as small as the visible universe: if these regions are trillions of lightyears across, we need be nowhere near the center of ours. It is also a known fact that such a glow would be created by, as Boslough puts it, "the continuous emission and absorption of electrons by the strong magnetic fields" of galaxies and their intergalactic filaments--fields and filaments recently proved to exist. However, as intriguing as these theories are, all the evidence taken together still more strongly supports the Big Bang interpretation.

[12] cf. Fox, op. cit., n. 9, pp. 150-2.

[13] Science News, July 25, 1998, p. 55 (cf. also January 10, 1998, p. 20): "maps of the far-infrared background glow had already demonstrated that visible-light images drastically underestimate the amount of star formation," and based on submillimeter photography, "at early times in the universe, stars were born at a rate five times higher than visible-light studies have indicated," etc. Also: J.K Webb, et al., "A High Deuterium Abundance at Redshift z=0.7," Nature, 17 July, 1997, pp. 250-2: finds far more hydrogen isotopes than there should be; and J. Michael Shull, Lennox Cowie and Antoinette Songaila show there are far more heavy elements strewn throughout the intergalactic voids than anyone thought (Shull, op. cit. n. 11); and Ron Cowen, "All Aglow in the Early Universe," Science News, May 27, 2000, pp. 348-50: "most of the light emitted by the very first galaxies in the cosmos is much too dim to be seen today. Objects that were bright long ago appear faint now, and less brilliant objects are entirely invisible," p. 349.

[15] P. de Bernardis, et al., "A Flat Universe from High-Resolution Maps of the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation," Nature, 27 April, 2000, pp. 955-9. These results (from BOOMERANG) have been confirmed by a second balloon probe (MAXIMA), cf. Science News, June 3, 2000, p. 363.

[16] Riccardo Giovanelli, "Less Expansion, More Agreement," Nature, 8 July, 1999, pp. 111-2. The "constant" lies in the range of 66-70 km/sMpc, which was not good news, for "values...above 60 have the embarrassing feature of yielding an age for the Universe since the Big Bang that is exceeded by the oldest stars in our Galaxy" unless the expansion is accelerating, and as it happens, it is. Further research has made both observations indisputable: cf. "Age of the Universe: A New Determination" Science News 160:17 (October 27, 2001), p. 261. It is 95% certain that the universe cannot be more than 14.5 billion years old (and that is the uppermost limit--its probable age is only 14 billion). This research also demonstrated that the hubble constant cannot be less than 55 and is probably around 72. See L. Knox, N. Christensen, & C. Skordis, "The Age of the Universe and the Cosmological Constant Determined from Cosmic Microwave Background Anisotropy Measurements," updated Feb. 2002.

[17] This is the firm result of the Two Degree Field Galaxy Redshift Survey, cf. Science News, June 10, 2000, p. 374.

[18] "Physics Bedrock Cracks, Sun Shines In," Science News 159:25 (23 June 2001). See also n. 21 and: "Laboratory measurements and limits for neutrino properties"; Super-Kamiokande at UC Irvine and New Results from Neutrino Oscillations Experiment.

[19] Peter Coles, "Cosmology--An unprincipled Universe?" Nature 391: 120-121 (8 Jan. 1998).

[20] Wane Hu, Nature, 17 April, 2000, pp. 939-40. Cf. also, Ron Cowen, "A Cosmic Crisis? Dark Doings in the Universe," Science News 160:15 (Oct. 13, 2001), pp. 234-6). Cf. also Science News, June 7, 1997, pp. 354-5.

[21] Peter Weiss, "Double or Nothing: Physicists bet the neutrino's its own eerie twin," Science News 162:1 (6 July 2002), pp. 10-12.

DannyBloem

Nice article Zagor.
I wonder what Rod P has to say about it....
Try also this link about Lerner's book the big bang never happened:
http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/lerner_errors.html
Danny
Rod P

Hey Guys,
Very sorry, but have been distracted by some heavy "accounting demands" in my line of work. Thanks for keeping the thread alive in the meantime.
Danny,
I promised to get back to you, and I expect to do so before this day (Saturday) is over. Thank you for being patient.
Tetra,
Nice to see you surfacing once again. I assumed that you were most probably reading quietly in the background, but that you were going to jump right in at some point along the way.
Zagor,
I have made a cursory read of your very interesting essay, and need to assimilate it more thoroughly. Much food for thought, and I think it is a pretty good summation of the different evidentiary strands that seem to point to "big bang" as the most probable explanation.
I am still bothered, however, by the kind of apparent intellectual snobbery that you seem to have encountered along the way. I also find it very disconcerting how those who dare to dissent from prevailing opinion seem to get branded with labels of "quack" and "irresponsible" and so on, and how they often get shunted off to the side, black-balled by their own colleagues, denied telescope time, and having their entire reputations destroyed in the process. It looks to me like "Tow the party line here, or else! You engage in dissenting theories at your own peril." This does not look like good science to me. Rather, it has all the appearances of their own little social club, and you must follow all of their rules or face severe punishment and retribution.
For these reasons, I want to take a very hard look at what a number of these dissenters have to say, and why it is that they are simply not convinced of the Big Bang theory. I want their observations and viewpoints thrown into the mix along with everyone else's, and be given the chance to be heard, and to be considered right alongside what the protagonists of the Big Bang have to say.
After that, I would like to lay out the various viewpoints/theories, placing them in some kind of "possiblity matrix", and try to sort them out in different relational aspects, such as pro and con, or prioritization order. This can also lead to the exposure and elimination of some due to logical inconsistencies, as well as raise serious doubts about others, notwithstanding the enormous political support they may currently be enjoying. In some respects though, this exercise is a bit like trying to separate the flysh#t from the pepper. I feel very much like David in his encounter with Goliath. Yet, undauntingly I shall trudge on, without fear or favour.
And so, Zagor, you may be much further along than I am on this subject, since you now seem more than convinced as to the overall veracity of the big bang. I, on the other hand, have many questions that cause me to........shall I say "wonder how true Big Bang really is in the final scheme of things". In that sense, I am quite prepared to sit in this "classroom" and let the rest of you be the "professors" here. But just don't expect me to sit there quietly while you do all the "spoon-feeding".
Like in the days of the Roman gladiator colosseum, "To those who are about to die, we salute you!" (In this case referring, of course, to the duelling theories.)
Rod P.
Rod P

Danny,
Okay, finally I am getting back to you.
You did present a pretty good summation for the methods used to calculate the distances of stars that are not too far away (i.e. within our own Milky Way galaxy). However, I am not too sure how useful or applicable these methodologies are for galaxies and quasars that are very far away.
Similarly, for the Closer Galaxies, scientists may have produced some goo observational data using the techniques you outlined (say, for instance, up to 200 million light years away- and that is only my arbitrary assumption here).
However, when the distances start to get very far, such as galaxies 300 million miles away, and quasars in the billions of light years away, I find the probability (indeed, certainty) for error, increasing exponentially. (Yes, I realize, they have to start somewhere, and I applaud that.)
However, I note a lot of "tinkering around" with mathematical models and so-called "constants", manipulating space-time diagrams, producing a wide array of +/- uncertainty ranges and variances of orders of magnitude that I find quite disconcerting, given how vociferous they are about expecting us to "hang our hats" on the big bang theory and none else. It reminds me of Cinderella's wicked step-sisters who were trying on the glass slipper, and one of them said "Well, I'll just MAKE it fit!"
That, to my mind, is not dissimilar to the situation where the scientists utilize a number of methods and multi-disciplinarian approaches to verifiying the big bang. But when one set of variables does not quite fit with other sets of variables, then they jigger the results of the different sets (of course, within the uncertainty ranges and tolerances) in order to make things "fit better". And I don't mind the exercise in playing with "educated guesses" and "what if" scenarios- in fact, I see that as a necessary exercise in the final analysis. What disturbs me is, that in the face of this, they still present the "big bang" as a kind of Holy Grail", and nothing else is possible. It is more about "attitude" than anything else, that bothers me.
Now, on the other hand, proponents of teh bib bang theory do acknowledge:
1) Observational data from many serouces support, or are consistent with, BOTH the big bang and the "steady state" theories of the universe.
2) None of these prove the big bang (or the "steady state" or other models).
It is just that they are convinced that, taken together, the observations show that, in their opinion, Big Bang is the best current model for the universe, or that more observations support Big Bang than Steady State. And therein lies the basis for continued debate, wich, of course, will inevitably carry on.
Now, respecting your comments on the connections between some quasars and normal galaxies:
So this quasar is not in front or closer by then the galaxy, it is near the galaxy, and has about the same distance. So probably at least a few others.

Anyway, we have to ask if the red shift of the quasar is so high, and it is closer than expected, then what other process gives the quasar the red shift.

A possibilty is that it is moving away from us. Red shift is speed, this can be speed due to expansion of the universe or actual speed of the object. So if this object is moving for some reason at half the speed of light away from us, it would give this result in observation.

However I can not see any reason why this object whould travel so fast. So I don't think this is a good explanation, but it is a possible one however.

The second thing is that red shift can also be caused by gravitational pull. If this quasar is a very compact heavy object, its radiation would have a redshift even if it is not moving. So this could explain it.

There can maybe also be another process at atomic scale, causing a red shift.
When you state "and has the same distance, I take it you mean "distance from us".
I note that you have some doubts as to the RedShift = Speed being a good explanation. I don't think this is a viable explanation either. If the quasar has a recessional velocity of at least 8X or 10X (or more) than that of the galaxy, heading out into deep space, how can it be interacting at all with the galaxy? It is, instead, rapidly receding from the galaxy (as well as us), and long ago would have left it in the "cosmic dust" so to speak. Is it simply a mere coincidence that some twenty or so similar cases of quasars interacting with nearby galaxies have been discovered and observed?
As for gravitational pull and possible nuclear processes, would you care to elaborate how either one of these would account for such a high red-shift (2.11)? These do not seem very plausible to me.
I would harken back to the article by Halton Arp, with his rationale on red-shift, and then someone please show me where he is necessarily in ERROR:
If the cause of these redshifts is misunderstood, then distances can be wrong by factors of 10 to 100, and luminosities and masses will be wrong by factors up to 10,000. We would have a totally erroneous picture of extragalactic space, and be faced with one of the most embarrassing boondoggles of our intellectual history.
Because objects in motion in the laboratory, or orbiting double stars, or rotating galaxies all show Doppler redshifts to longer wavelengths when they are receding, it has been assumed throughout astronomy that redshifts always and only mean recession velocity. No direct verification of this assumption is possible, and through the years many contradictions have arisen and been ignored. The evidence presented here is, I hope, convincing because it offers many different proofs of intrinsic (non-velocity) redshifts in every category of celestial object.
This really is the entirety of the theory on which our whole concept of cosmology has been rested for the last 75 years. It is interesting to note, however, that Hubble, the observer, even up to his final lecture before the Royal Society, always held open the possibility that the redshift did not mean velocity of recession but might be caused by something else.
But of course, the stunning aspect of the ROSAT observations was that two quasars of redshift .63 and .45 are actually physically linked by a luminous connection to a low redshift object of z= .007. When I showed this to the local experts, there were alarmed states followed by annoyance.
This result made it clear that the compact and interacting groups were just a more concentrated ensemble of young, non-equilibrium companion galaxies which had been ejected more recently from the parent galaxy, and were composed of material of higher redshift. Aside from being empirically true, this interpretation solves all the conventional paradoxes of the failure of the galaxies to merge into a single galaxy on a cosmic time scale, and also explains the unbearable presence of "discordant" redshifts.

In later chapters we will show that galaxies and quasars tend to occur at certain preferred redshifts. This quantization implies that galaxies do not evolve with smoothly decreasing redshifts, but change in steps.

One major point of the present book is to try to make it impossible to ignore the enormous amount of mutually supporting significant evidence which all points to the same conclusion.

In the face of 28 years of accumulated evidence, to go on proclaiming that quasars are out at the edge of the universe seems unpardonable.
Summary - Alignments, Quasars, BL Lac's and Galaxy Clusters
1) Objects which appear young are aligned on either side of eruptive objects. This implies ejection of protogalaxies.

2) The youngest objects appear to have the highest redshifts. This implies that intrinsic redshift decreases as the object ages.

3) As distance from the ejecting central object increases, the quasars increase in brightness and decrease in redshift. This implies that the ejected objects evolve as they travel outward.

4) At about z= .3 and about 400 kpc from that parent galaxy the quasars appear to become very bright in optical and X-ray luminosity. This implies there is a transition to BL Lac Objects.

5) Few BL Lac objects are observed implying this phase is short-lived.

6) Clusters of galaxies, many of which are strong X-ray sources, end to appear at comparable distances to the BL Lac's from the parent galaxy. This suggests the clusters may be a result of the breaking up of a BL Lac.

7) Clusters of galaxies in the range z= .4 to .2 contain blue, active galaxies. It is implied that they continue to evolve to higher luminosity and lower redshift.

8) Abell clusters from z= .01 to .2 lie along ejection lines from galaxies like CenA. Presumably they are evolved products of the ejections.

9) The strings of galaxies which are aligned through the brightest nearby spirals have redshifts z= .01 to .02. Presumably they are the last evolutionary stage of the ejected protogalaxies before they become slightly higher redshift companions of the original ejecting galaxies. (p166-7)
Rod P.

The Backstory
My Position Now
(1) General Relativity and Vacuum Energy Imply a Big Bang Inflation Event
(2) Expansion is Confirmed by Multiple Lines of Evidence
(3) The Microwave Background Radiation is Consistent with a Big Bang Event
(4) There are Too Many Light Elements to be Explained Any Other Way
Evidence Against
Conclusion

Questioning the Big Bang Theory

I Was a Big Bang Skeptic (2002)

Copyright 2002 by Richard Carrier. Copying of this material is permitted provided credit is given to the author and no material herein is sold for profit.

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