Starship Asterisk*

Really? When the blue galaxy is near enough for individual stars to be discriminated, and the red one isn't. Surely the red one is ?twice? as far away, meaning that iteraction is unlikely. There are no stars resolved in either galaxy. The "stars" you see in the blue galaxy are vast clumps...

I'm not saying "light corkscrews", that would be a statement of fact. I am saying "I believe" light corkscrews. I know that's what you're saying. But I don't understand the statement. Are you talking about the E and B vectors? Are you talking about some property of the wavefront...

Chris, I have been looking but I am unable to locate info on the M-Theory as it relates to DM & DE. Does Quantum Mechanics support these theories too? String theories might address dark matter, because they address the fundamental nature of particles, and dark matter is most likely composed of ...

I believe light corkscrews through space .. accounting for its speed through dark matter dark energy - accounting for more light going through a small hole than the diameter can account for. Is this "belief" like believing in unicorns? I would hope, on what is a scientific discussion foru...

I think I have a pretty good idea what "science" is. I'm a little less clear on "pseudo-science" and "non-science" - without seeing what authorities think, "pseudo-science" sounds to me like "non-science" pretending to be "science", or som...

Chris, Variable Gravity. What are your thoughts on this? Since Newton's laws had to be modified for the extremely small ...isn't it likely that it may need to be modified for the extremely large? Wasn't DM & DE born from the failure of computers to accurately simulate the formation and motion o...

I just skimmed what I could in the internet about string theory… this is what I gleaned so far… String theory does provide a nice example in the context of this conversation. It is bad theory. In fact, it may not be theory in the scientific sense at all, given that nobody has really come up with mu...

How to go about working out if NGC 7331 is (truly) distorted/"warped" (and if so, how) vs whether it's some kind of optical illusion?... Sounds very complex, and therefore likely to be prone to error. A simpler approach, which does not depend on examining other galaxies, is just to measur...

I'm pretty sure they don't ... nor were they intended to! Okay, I guess I misunderstood your point. Some of these posts have gotten long and complex! But how do you decide - ahead of time - what constitutes a "reasonable conclusion"? And how do you measure "strength" (of evidenc...

Applying (Newton's) theory of gravity to observations of Uranus produced inconsistencies; not one but hundreds of observations 'contradicted' the Newtonian theory, ergo it was 'proven wrong'. You, dear reader, know the rest, don't you? Applying (Newton's) theory of gravity to observations of Mercur...

Philosophy of Science Karl Popper contended that the central question in the philosophy of science was distinguishing science from non-science. Early attempts by the logical positivists grounded science in observation while non-science (e.g. metaphysics) was non-observational and hence nonsense. Po...

I don't get how a simple life form can evolve into a complex life form where all of the systems that make up the complex life form have to be in place at the same time in order for the life form to function successfully. As I understand the current theory, features were added to living organisms on...

I don’t see faith as logical and I don’t see science as faith. I agree with both observations. Nevertheless, there is some core of faith deep in a scientist, because the decision to believe that science is the best approach to explaining the Universe, or that rationality is the best approach, is ax...

Noting that I was referring to the idea and not endorsing it... Yes, I realize you were just passing on the statement. Hard to indicate that in a phpBB quote, though. How about "If you use technology, you believe in science whether you know it or not."? I don't buy it, unless you have som...

"If you use technology, you believe in science." Clearly untrue, of course. Plenty of people are unable to separate technology from magic. A three-year old can watch TV, and have no concept of technology, let alone science. "If you use technology, you have faith in science, so scienc...

The relationship between "reality" and (scientific) theory is an interesting one. As it's come up in this thread, let me ask all readers some simple questions, if I may. I'll consider those questions in a moment, but first, a comment on the above. In my view, "reality" is what w...

I wonder if there could be some invisible force accounting for the distortion. The theory of dark energy causing the universe to expand kind of falls under this category... The effects of dark energy are neglible over the small distance across galaxies or over gravitationally bound galaxy clusters....

Why not post an APOD now and then of an “imitation” of what the human eye would see if it were capable of zooming in on space objects? Mainly because they're not very interesting to most people. If you want to know what objects look like to the eye, a good source is the sketches many amateur astron...

There is merit in imaging objects only as they appear to the normal human eye. Not really. To begin with, by imaging at all you are going beyond what the human eye can see. For example, we cannot really see color in galaxies or nebulas. That is true regardless of the size of telescope we use, or ho...

Do spiral galaxies revolve (apparently) in a clockwise direction, as does a 4th of July pinwheel or, COUNTER clockwise, as I've read somewhere, which wd seem unlikely - unwinding as it goes? Normal spiral galaxies revolve like pinwheels (cw and ccw don't apply, as we see galaxies from both sides). ...

Neutrinos play a critical part and research in this field has just started. The question is what dark matter are you refering to... You're doing it again- spewing lists of papers that have little or no relevance to the point you're trying to make (if I even understand that point). There's hardly an...

G'day Chris you maybe interested in this paper... Not particularly. It is 14 years old (a long time in this field), and if you check the citation history it's rarely referenced, and only by a few researchers (including the author himself in other papers). But thanks for the reference, which does he...

...but seriously, Chris, your mother would not like the way you call people Crackpots. To be clear, I carefully avoided calling anyone in particular a crackpot. I left it to others to make whatever associations seemed reasonable to them. In fact, some people may have even made that association to t...

I don't get how a simple life form can evolve into a complex life form where all of the systems that make up the complex life form have to be in place at the same time in order for the life form to function successfully. It is easier to rationalize a designer. Now we're in serious Cafe territory! A...

When I wrote this I didn't realize it would cause such a furor! I used Big Bang because it's the accepted thought of the way the universe started. I used dust in reference to the building blocks of everything. I know we use the phrase 'Big Bang' as accepted fact a bit loosely; but that is what most...