Posted on 11/13/2007 10:29:50 AM PST by Swordmaker
Nov 13, 2007
Comets: The Loose ThreadSpacecraft have now visited four comets. What they found contradicts what was expected and falsifies accepted comet theory. But that theory is woven with every other astronomical theory into a cosmology that defines the universe as we know it. The fall of comet theory will inevitably bring us a new and different universe.
Comets are giving accepted comet theory a hard time. Close-up images of comet nuclei from spacecraft have contradicted about every expectation of theory. (“Expectation” is a euphemism for “prediction”; a disappointed expectation is practically the same thing as a failed prediction, except with the former you don’t expect you’ll have to discard the theory.) “If astronomy were a science,” as one astronomer put it, theoreticians would admit that the theory had been falsified, and they would start over with an eye to the evidence. Instead, they hang on to the theory with ever more stubbornness and hope a little tinkering and adjusting will bring the facts into line.
The facts are apt to be more stubborn than the theoreticians: Deep Impact kicked up ten times more dust than expected and stimulated the comet's activity a magnitude less than expected. The dust was not a conglomeration of sizes as expected but was consistently powder-fine. The nucleus of the comet was covered with sharply delineated features, two of which were circular enough to be called impact craters. This was not expected for a dirty snowball or a snowy dirtball or even a powdery fluffball.
The craters, of course, weren’t actually called impact craters. They must have been caused by subsurface explosions, because they had flat floors and terraced walls, despite the myriad of other craters on rocky planets and moons with flat floors and terraced walls that are called impact craters. All the other circular depressions with flat floors and terraced walls weren’t craters because they had “unusual shapes.”
The hard times began with Comet Halley. Theory expected more or less uniform sublimation of the surface as the nucleus rotated in the sun, much as you would expect of a scoop of ice cream on a rotisserie. But Halley had jets. Less than 15% of the surface was sublimating, and the ejecta was shooting away in thin beams.
The theory was adjusted to introduce hot spots, chambers below the surface in which pressure could build up and erupt through small holes to produce the jets. It went unmentioned that the holes must have been finely machined, like the nozzle of a rocket engine, in order to produce the collimation of the jets: Just any rough hole would result in a wide spray of gases.
Borrelly made the hard times harder. It was dry. And black. Theoreticians tinkered with the dirty snowball theory until they got the dirt to cover the outside and to hide the snow inside. Somehow they got the dirt, which ordinarily is an insulator, to conduct heat preferentially into the rocket chambers to keep the jets going.
Wild 2 defied them. Its jets were not just around the sub-solar point, where the Sun’s heat would be greatest. This comet sported jets on the night side. The rocket chambers now had to store heat for half a “comet day”. And something was needed to keep the jets coherent over great distances and to gather their emissions into a stream of clumps: Clusters of particles repeatedly struck the spacecraft.
Comet theorists announced that comets were mysteries and that the theorists knew nothing, that they had to “think differently”. Then they proposed adjustments to the accepted theory that would be acceptable to the accepted way of thinking.
Different theories abound—but outside the walls of astronomical acceptability. For an astronomer to recognize their existence would be to jeopardize his position and salary. But the characteristics of comets that are so difficult to explain with snowballs are fairly easy to explain with electricity.
Electrical theories date back to the 1800s, before “electricity” became taboo in astronomy. They were well-founded on observations and on the proven laws of electromagnetism. In the last few decades, they have been refined to the point where they expected the findings that were so hard on the fashionable theory:
Comets are electrical discharges in the thin plasma that permeates the solar system. Because they spend most of their time far from the Sun, their rocky nuclei are in equilibrium with the voltage at that distance. But as they accelerate in toward the Sun, their voltage is increasingly out of equilibrium with the voltage and increasing density of the solar plasma. A plasma sheath forms around them—the coma and tail. And filamentary currents—jets—between the sheath and the nucleus erode, particle by powdery particle, the circular depressions with terraced walls that are typical of electrical discharge machining. As the discharge channels move across the surface of the comet, they burn it black.
If it were only a matter of explaining with plasma discharges the jets and the blackened rocky surfaces and the powder-fine dust and the terraced depressions, there might not be so much blinkered stubbornness. But modern astronomical theories have been worked into an interlocking web of explanation. Each theory supports, and is in turn supported by, nearly every other theory. If one theory frays, if one loose thread is pulled, the entire fabric will unravel.
An electrified comet requires an electrified Sun. The Sun is the focus of the electric field that causes the comet to discharge. For the Sun to maintain its electric field, it (and all stars) must be the focus of another electric discharge within an electrified galaxy. And electrified galaxies, with their magnetic fields and x-ray emissions and ejections of quasars, must be connected in larger circuits that render meaningless such fancies of cosmology as the Big Bang theory.
If you pull one electrified comet out of the well-knit structure of accepted theories, the entire garment will become unacceptable. Either the universe is an agglomeration of isolated, gravitating, non-electrical bodies, or else it is a network of bodies connected by and interacting through electrical circuits. Either the universe is a gravity universe or it is an Electric Universe.
Romans 1:21-22,
21For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.
22Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools
If you want on or off the Electric Universe Ping List, Freepmail me.
I donned my hip-waders about halfway through this article....
Using a microscopic photo of one thing to explain something else that’s very large isn’t exactly the best science I’ve ever seen.
No problem. NASA has Bruce Willis on speed-dial.
 |
||
| · join · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post new topic · | ||
Electromagnetic phenomena are scalable... It's a little hard to create humungous lightning bolts in the laboratory, but the effects seems to scale well the larger they get, including electronic machining. These guys are postulating plasmas that span millions of miles ... sometimes light years of distance... at extremely high voltages.
Why?
So far the Fred Whipple school of "dirty snowball" or (later, after they didn't find what they expected) "snowy dirtball," cometologists have been stymied at every turn with their predictions of what they would find on comet flybys and actual comet contacts. Their predictions were simply flat out wrong.
On the other hand, the electrical theorists have predicted every finding... before the contacts. They made, and published days before the impact, specific predictions of what would happen when "Deep Impact" space probe struck Comet Tempel 1.
They were right... for example, as predicted by the electrical theorists, less than 1/100th the amount of "water" expected by the orthodox cometologists was released by the impact... and even that was in the form of a hydroxyl (OH) not water... the impact flash was a double flash, and several orders of magnitude brighter than expected... the impact crater was either non-existent of so small as to be indistinguishable from other craters... the telemetry equipment on the impacter quit working microseconds before the impact.. and many more. Nineteen specific predictions were made and 18 were found correct.
The proof of any theory is in its ability to predict future observations and events... and the orthodox theory has failed. It has been falsified, yet the cometologists cling to it, trying to squish and squeeze the facts to fit.
None of the predictions made by the orthodox cometologists was found to be true... until they squished and squoze the facts... for instance the OH was announced to be "water" at a press conference six months after the impact.
Perhaps it is time to consider another model... one that has a better track record of prediction.
Because the exasperated tone of the article is too reminiscent of the cock-sure fellows who proclaim on the "Predestination" threads over in the Religion Forum.
Whoever wrote this, has an emotional stake in the outcome. I don't trust it.
I’m not convinced this guy has the solution, but his description of the problems posed to the existing theories by the new comet data is interesting.
Yes, except it was electromagnetism.
It’s better to be absolutely certain and just belive the KJV
Very interesting ... worth thinking about ... It’s going to be telling how many mainstream astronomers begin to reconsider ramifications of these observations.
However, the exasperation may come from seeing supposed scientists who also apparently have an emotional stake in their own pet theory... and who refuse to see the writing on the wall that their theory does not meet the observed facts... and who continually marginalize a theory that DOES meet the observed facts, time and time again. That can be very frustrating.
It's the ramifications that may be the stumbling blocks. The awareness that electricity is a driving force in the Universe goes against everything the astronomers have been taught. Text books would have to be thrown away... reputations would not be so glittering.
Electromagnetism is 39 orders of magnitude stronger than the force of gravity... but modern cosmology ignores it.
Whatever. I haven’t got a dog in this fight.
Only those two choices.... only those two. And there's apparently a conspiracy to keep those Electric Universers down.
See what I mean about the breathlessness? It's that sort of thing that makes me think there's a lot of quackery behind the curtain.
Where do we stand? We stand at a time in scientific history that will be embarrassing to look back on from the vantage point of the next century. An entire subgroup of science consisting of a majority of astrophysicists and cosmologists is now – and has been – smugly ignoring the fruits of 150 or so years of electrical science. This subgroup feels perfectly confident in postulating the existence of processes and entities that cannot be verified experimentally in earthbound labs. “But that doesn’t mean those processes can’t happen in space,” they say. When there are perfectly valid electrical explanations for certain phenomena, it is irresponsible to ignore those explanations and invent ‘new science’ to avoid using them. People will ask, years from now, “How could they have ignored electricity in space when it was staring them in the face?”
Classic astronomy (and its offshoots: helioseismology, astrophysics, cosmology, etc.) have never made any real predictions that turned out to be true – although they are past-masters at inventing ‘dynamos’ and invisible entities to explain things retroactively. After-the-fact explanations are easy, especially if you can get away with saying “The hidden ‘dynamo’ did it.” Before they were forced into it, classical astronomers were wrong about how the auroras are powered, about the temperature of Venus, about the rocky nature of comets, about x-rays coming from comets and other objects, about the existence of natural radio emissions from the planets. And I claim they are wrong about many things they are now saying about the Sun.
Of course the Electric Sun model is speculative. But these speculations are reasonable extrapolations of the solid, experimentally verified properties of plasma. We are not positive that everything included in the ES hypothesis is 100% correct. We do not claim omnipotence or perfection for our early models.
The ‘standard’ astrophysical models are far more speculative. They are built up of speculation cantilevered onto speculation that is ever farther removed from any empirical basis. And a tremendous amount of doubt is piling up about them. They do not explain (without ad hoc and a posteriori adjustments) many of the observations that are being made – as the Electric Sun model does. (The fusion model doesn’t even explain why the solar corona exists in the first place, let alone its three million Kelvin temperature inversion.) Each time new data comes in from space probes, astronomers typically announce their surprise and rush ‘back to the drawing board’. They then busy themselves modifying (adding complexity to) their models – reminiscent of Ptolemaic epicycles – and emerge confidently claiming they knew this all along. In the one case where they deigned to make reference to anything electrical (the release of magnetic energy) they got it wrong and had to ‘discover’ new properties of magnetic fields that do not exist.
Call it what you will, Plasma Cosmology, the Electric Universe or the Electric Sky – the thrust of what was started by Kristian Birkeland (when he discovered the true electrical nature of the auroras), Hannes Alfvén, and Irving Langmuir (each of whom were awarded Nobel Prizes for their work) continues. And it will take more than the confrontational, parochial, pompous smoke screens of pseudoskeptics such as Tim Thompson to stop it.
Donald E. Scott – Ph.D. (Electrical Engineering)
It should be pointed out, because it is a little unclear, that only Hannes Alfvén and Irving Langmuir were awarded Nobel Prizes in Physics because of their work with Plasmas.
Kristian Birkeland never received the Nobel Prize although he was nominated a record seven times.
It was reported that Birkeland did not receive the prize because the committee thought he had "commercialized" his work by developing an electrically based method of fixing Nitrogen into fertilizer by blasting it with artificial lightning. That was not acceptable for a pure research scientist and his work was somehow tainted because he had commercialized it and made monetary gain. Therefore, the no prize.
Interestingly, Hannes Alfvén was awarded the prize for his earlier work in which he erroneously concluded that Plasmas could be "magnetized" and it was the residual magnetic force that made Plasmas act as they did... but on accepting the Nobel, he used his speech to plead with the scientific community to ignore the work for which he was nominated and won... because he was WRONG! He said that instead of residual magnetic force accounting for the phenomena, it was a continual creation of magnetism because of the flow of electrons through the Plasma.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.