The Story of Our Universe May Be Starting to Unravel

I guess the science isn't settled after all.

The Story of Our Universe May Be Starting to Unravel

Not long after the James Webb Space Telescope began beaming back from outer space its stunning images of planets and nebulae last year, astronomers, though dazzled, had to admit that something was amiss. Eight months later, based in part on what the telescope has revealed, it’s beginning to look as if we may need to rethink key features of the origin and development of the universe.

According to the standard model, which is the basis for essentially all research in the field, there is a fixed and precise sequence of events that followed the Big Bang: First, the force of gravity pulled together denser regions in the cooling cosmic gas, which grew to become stars and black holes; then, the force of gravity pulled together the stars into galaxies.

The Webb data, though, revealed that some very large galaxies formed really fast, in too short a time, at least according to the standard model. This was no minor discrepancy. The finding is akin to parents and their children appearing in a story when the grandparents are still children themselves.

 

Yes!!

I think one area being examined is the idea that the rate of expansion of the universe could have changed more than scientists have thought - or maybe at different times than has been thought.

One method of detecting distance is in measuring red shift - the change in light frequency toward the red end of the spectrum. The expansion of the universe is one significant cause for this shift. So, if the expansion has been changing, or if it is somewhat regional, or ??? that could affect distance measurement.

I've heard that this could be an explanation for the discrepancies between the multiple methods of determining the age of the universe - a major and long known issue.

Of course, detecting the expansion rate of some unimaginably distant region of the universe is pretty much impossible right now.

The problem with drawing conclusions from very recent observation is that there hasn't been time for scientists to figure out where the new information leads.

Good topic!

This could be really interesting to watch.

 

The discovery in 1999(?) that the expansion of the universe is increasing has to be one of the more startling discoveries made.

It seems to indicate that at the beginning there was a huge expansion, then less expansion, and now more expansion.

I've never heard of any model that accounts for this change of expansion rates. And, if that isn't known then we don't know how often the expansion rate changed.

I recently heard a scientist who points out that measuring the expansion that was in progress in the past (say, a billion years ago) is essentially impossible. Current methods would require incredibly accurate measurements repeatedly taken over a period of centuries - not something that gets easy funding, or attracts scientists.

He wrote a paper that explains a hack that might change that. His idea would be to use gravitational lensing to help with this. Typically, gravitational lenses give access to unbelievably distant galaxies, having that light bent by a nearer major gravitational source. BUT, the light goes around that gravitational source at different times - with light reaching Earth earlier on one side and later on the other. This is a known factor today.

In his paper he suggests that comparing the red shifts on the two (or more) sides of the gravitational lens could be used to detect the expansion rate of the segment of the universe between the gravitational lens and the incredibly distant galaxy! After all, the light from each side came from the same source, but on one side it took longer time.

Of course, it isn't as easy as a non-scientists like me makes it sound in a post. But, it might lead to a spectacular new finding.

 

A hypothesis that I attempted to mathematically demonstrate was what would be observed if "the speed of light at any moment of time is not constant over time of emission of any body in the universe" . All bodies at T1 transit light at c1. At T+t, speed is c2 The consequence is the observation of gravity (change in speed releasing energy), unifying gravity with the other three fundamental forces. Only an observer outside the frame of reference would be able to observe that light speed is not a constant. A non-constant speed of light could give rise to observations that we are now now seeing which at the moment are brushed aside with using the phrases dark matter and dark energy to explain away flaws in the current models.

The maths got too complicated for Mr to prove the hypothesis

 

I'm not sure what you mean by:
"All bodies at T1 transit light at c1. At T+t, speed is c2 "

All I can do is quote my understanding of where we are today.

Light has no rest mass. I haven't seen any support for the idea that gravity changes light speed. Mass can change its direction, though, as the direction can be seen to change by passing near a massive object. That changes momentum, but not speed.

Anyway, there certainly are big questions about gravity. As I understand it, quantum field theory has no way to explain gravity even though it is the fundamental model of the universe.

If you can fix that, you WILL get a Nobel plus a permanent place in the history of science of mankind.

 

Yes, scientists clearly state that there are a good number of questions about our universe that are not settled.

 

Saturday, August 05, 2023
Evidence for new physics? Or not?

Some physicists are claiming that there is something "wrong" with our understanding of the universe. Oftentimes, it's just to justify asking for funding for new experiments, a better detector, a new telescope, a bigger collider, but what if there's something more than that? Do we have evidence of new physics? Or not? In this video, we will look at dark matter and dark energy, quantum gravity, the mass of the Higgs-boson, neutrino masses, and the matter-antimatter asymmetry.



Transcript, links to references, and discussion on Patreon.

Posted by Sabine Hossenfelder at 8:00 AM No comments: Labels: Particle Physics, Physics, Video
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Provide a link to Sabine’s actual post.

 

It's in the post, right under the date.

 

What I meant was that at time T the speed of light emitted from every body in space was at a speed c1. That speed of emission changed to c1 + delta c at T + delta t. What this would mean is that light emitted from a body when it reaches an observing body would be at a different speed to the light currently being emitted by that observing body

Or as an example , the light we observe coming from the sun is at a different speed to light arriving on earth from any other star. The more distant the star the greater the difference in light speed.

Anyway, that was my hypothesis. Only an observer outside the frame of reference would notice this speed difference. I played around with various equations to see what would be observed if this hypothesis was validated but gave up due to becoming too complicated. This was many years ago when my maths knowledge was much greater and really enjoyed playing around with calculus. I just was never a fan of universal constants but believed more in there being a closer relationship between all variables which appear as constants. Linked to this was my attempt to unify gravity with the three other forces using similar method that Maxwell used

 

I think c stands for the speed of light through a perfect vacuum (not through all materials). That's also the cosmic speed limit, so there are other particles that have zero mass that travel at that speed, too. c is more like the cosmic speed limit - not just the speed of light. Not even information can travel faster than c. (You can read about tachyons, but remember they are hypothetical and always travel faster than c.)

There are different kinds of mass. A photon has zero rest mass - it's mass if it were stopped in one place. Thus it can travel at c. It does have momentum due to its movement, however. Thus gravity can work on that, but it doesn't affect speed.

The following site points out that light isn't slowed by gravity according to general relativity. It's direction can change due to gravity, but not speed.

https://public.nrao.edu/ask/is-the-...t answer is no,under the influence of gravity.

Note that it could take longer for light from a distant galaxy could reach Earth if it started on a course not directly aimed at Earth, and then its course was modified by passing by a massive object like a black hole. It may look like the light was slowed, but it actually just took a longer route.

 

Wow - She really hates particle physics as an entire field!!! I'd also note that she's fundamentally making a argument based on dollars.

Obviously there are serious issues that are not understood today. And, it's not easy to determine how to spend money on science.

It's surprising to me that she objects to the whole field of particle physics when it's unknown what dark matter is made of. I think she's munging arguments on this one.


If she's so wound up about money that she thinks we should stop exploring science, she should start campaigning against flying humans around space - an activity that really has little to nothing to do with science and is STUPENDOUSLY expensive.

 

Not really the best argument there. Dark matter could consist of known particles.

 

They are probably making this conclusion by observing that the red shift on the galaxies is too close to the frequency of the microwave cosmic microwave background radiation (meaning both too close in number and distance).
There are possible alternative explanations. For example, if for some reason the speed of light were a little bit faster at high frequencies. They are looking near the very edge of the observable universe.
But even most of those alternative explanations would involve a big change to the current understanding of cosmology and physics.

 

My layman's suspicion is that even if the speed of light remained constant since the beginning of the universe, it wouldn't appear to be since it would be inside a rapidly expanding universe. The "distance" between two points at the beginning of the universe and now would be widely different because the universe has expanded so much.

 

So far, known particles do NOT answer the requirements.

Plus, I'd point out that the colliders such as CERN are not the only kind of colliders. Replacing that one with one that is even stronger would probably be prohibitively expensive, but there are other kinds of colliders that explore different ideas.

Just as a general idea, our universe causes collisions that are FAR FAR more powerful than humans could possibly ever create, so suggesting that the particle collision direction has been explored enough is an unsupportable bit of nonsense.

This is an issue of where best to spend the next dollar.

We claim that our stupendous spending on spacemen is for science, but that is totally lame. If budget is the concern, we should cut the idea of spacemen.

 

Yes. The frequency of the light would change, but it's speed doesn't change is the way I think that works.

The red shift in light frequency caused by the expansion of the universe is used as one method of determining how far it is to a distant galaxy. It's possible to detect how long it would take for light frequency to make a particular change. Then, one can use the speed of light to find out how far the object must be.

 

Theoretically, but everyone really does not know.
The speed of light is very much connected to the speed of time, which means if one slows, the other slows also. It could be possible the rate of time flow has changed since the universe expanded.
But relative to time, the speed of light would not change.

It's the main way, in fact.

 

Dark matter exists to get the math right.

 

So did neutrinos, at first

 

You're doing that thing, which is a discredit to science, but which we see done on a regular basis, by people who are overly invested in our current science. The story featured in this thread, should be a reminder of how we should think of our scientific understandings as tentative. Instead, you state a tentative belief, as if it is a known certainty (that nothing travels faster than light) and in the same breath, mention something that may exist, which always travels faster than light.

The totality of all we currently know, is not even remotely close, to all there is, to be known. So it is a foolishness, to treat this puddle of information, as a basis for your statements about the ocean of things, still unknown.

We have had this argument before, I'd thought, in which you had claimed that scientists do not represent us as being certain of things, which we cannot know, for a certainty. But it is possible that it was with Centerfield, who I'd had this disagreement, so I will trust you to tell me whether or not it was you, who'd put forth that argument. Yet, you have certainly, at least, maintained similar positions; still, here you go, stating a theory, as if it were a fact. Instead of including a caveat-- "we have yet to discover, or prove, that anything can go faster than light..."-- you say, "not even information can travel faster than c." That is stating something that you cannot know to be true, as if you have total faith in this supposed "fact." If you were being accurate, you should have added, "as far as we know," but there's the rub-- we don't "know," for very far.

Now I remember, we did have one version of this argument, when I had complained about Stephen Hawking speaking about multiverse theory, as if it were fact, without his even being able to explain, how its basic mechanics work. So, he was willing to accept as truth, this inexplicable "magic" because it appealed to him, while in the same program, making fun of earlier humans believing in actual magic, which they couldn't explain. This is pure hypocrisy, and discredits anyone's bona fides, to be considered a clear, serious, rational thinker. That requires the humility to understand and accept the idea, which we always hear scientists claim, with each new discovery, to be learning: "how much we don't understand."

My argument had been that when we continually present a hypothetical as a fact, because it is too inconvenient to continually add in those caveats, of which I've just given examples, then we eventually stop thinking about it, as only a theory. And that cripples our creative capacity, to reimagine things, so gets us stuck in our erroneous scientific construct, of the moment.

Didn't Einstein speculate about faster than light travel, or was it only others, building on his theories? Of course, with wormholes, we get, in effect, faster than light travel-- I wonder if something of this nature, could be behind the quickly forming galaxies, of the OP? I have also heard theories of instantaneous reactions of the opposite half of some paired particles, even if they were separated and put galaxies away from each other. It is an interesting thought, to my mind. But it may be just a fantasy. Yet, we really can't know for sure, things don't work that way.

 

Yes, but along with the above OP the math may be fundamentally off.

 

There must be monumental justification for deciding to discard what has been tested every day for a century.

While ever scientists would love to replace or enhance the fundamentals we have today, the approach is more one of extending what we know.

Hawking didn't take that kind of casual approach to what is known.

SciFi is great. But, there is a line between sci fi and reality.

If you find something wrong with that post of mine, you need to actually specify what it is.

 

senior CIA officer retires. spends retirement copying and pasting random stuff on obscure xenforo political website.....
ffs, Jack, offer at least some minimal perspective on your take on this stuff....

 

That was your opening statement, and you are already being disingenuous. To wit: my pointing out that any ideas which we have inadequate ability to truly "test," should not be voiced as absolute truths, is by no stretch of rational thinking, calling for the "discarding" of said ideas. At this point, we cannot know for certain, the thing you had specifically said, which, to remind you, was:
WillReadmore said: ↑
...c is more like the cosmic speed limit - not just the speed of light. Not even information can travel faster than c. (You can read about tachyons, but remember they are hypothetical and always travel faster than c.)
<End Quote>


Any adult, who thinks himself the least bit competent to participate in conversations about science, should not need this to be explained to them but: just because we have not yet been able to do something, does not at all prove, that the thing cannot be done.

And yet, changing your phrasing to, for example,

We believe that nothing, not even information, can travel faster than c,

as I had suggested was the more accurate way to relate this idea, would not be a discarding of anything-- would it?


I think I have also warned you in the past, to save your utter bullshit assertions about me, for the end of your posts because, when I read a post that begins with such complete nonsense, as pretending that I have suggested anything like that we can, or should, not still employ our theories, I am often disposed to just stop reading such obvious garbage.

My post was, as plain as day, all about the way we think and speak about our theories-- not in any way, related to our use of them. If your reading acumen is insufficient to have gathered such a basic and obvious truth, about my post, then there seems little reason to continue reading this hapless reply, as you are clearly out of your conceptual depth.

Have a nice night.