Posted on 06/26/2007 5:59:25 AM PDT by BGHater
The 'Pioneer anomaly' – the mystifying observation that NASA's two Pioneer spacecraft have drifted far off their expected paths – cannot be explained by tinkering with the law of gravity, a new study concludes.
The study's author suggests an unknown, but conventional, force is instead acting on the spacecraft. But others say even more radical changes to the laws of physics could explain the phenomenon.
Launched in the early 1970s, NASA's Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft are drifting out of the solar system in opposite directions, gradually slowing down as the Sun's gravity pulls back on them.
But they are slowing down slightly more than expected and no one knows why. Some physicists say the law of gravity itself needs revising, so that gravity retains more strength in the outer solar system. But there has been disagreement about whether such modifications would accurately predict the orbits of the outer planets.
Now, Kjell Tangen, a physicist at the firm DNV in Hovik, Norway, says tweaking the law of gravity in a variety of ways cannot explain the anomaly – while also getting the orbits of the outer planets right. After modifying gravity in ways that would match the Pioneer anomaly, he inevitably got wrong answers for the motion of Uranus and Pluto.
Conventional explanation
(Excerpt) Read more at space.newscientist.com ...
Right up your alley for the Space Ping.
I think these eggheads are way over-thinking this.
Maybe, just maybe, some humans made errors over the past 30+ years? Perhaps?
They just misplaced a decimal point.
Kewl.
Maybe they calculated in miles instead of kilometers, as with the Mars lander.
Maybe there is more friction in ‘empty space’ than they think? (not so empty)
Dumb question...tenth planet?
You betcha!
Bet you its hyperspace!
If Pioneer 10 and 11 are traveling in different directions, a tenth planet can’t be the cause
What kind of human error could cause drifting spacecraft outside the solar system to slow down? I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just not seeing a mechanism.
V’ger is learning.
Ort Cloud or W.I.M.P.s?
The one groundbreaking technology needed for future extra-solar system unmanned probes is a J.S. Bell communications device. This technology, based on an oddity of quantum physics, would provide instantaneous communications across vast distances of space. And huge amounts of money are currently being spent to develop it.
It is based on the discovery of a phenomenon (roughly) that twin pairs of particles always spin in a direction with respect to each other, no matter how far they are physically apart. And when you change the spin of one, the spin of the other changes no matter where it is. And no one knows why.
And even if they were communicating with each other somehow, they are doing it faster than the speed of light.
This means that when we send a probe outside of our solar system, commands to it, and the information received back, would be instantaneous, not reliant on the huge delay of communication from the speed of light, or even worse, the signal strength of normal communications.
So we could then build probes that would just look like a steel ball, covered with armor, powered by an ion drive engine for high speed, that would not even open their armor to perform their mission until they were outside the harsh environment of our solar system.
The situation at the Bullet Nebula indicates that simply adjusting the law of gravity will not explain dark matter. Something else is going on.
No, it doesn’t. The physics will have to be adjusted.
It’s a start, but entanglement doesn’t work that way.
Modification of the gravitational potential field equation will not cure this one.
Maybe empty space isn’t all that empty.
Dark matter has gravity but otherwise does not interact with anything. What could it be? It is localized and is near ordinary matter, mixed in with it, but the Bullet Nebula shows that it can be extracted from the vicinity of ordinary matter, so it is something and does not fill empty space.
Well, which is it? If it has gravity, it must interact.
Couldn't these spacecraft just be running into 'dust' and that's what's slowing them down. Sort of like drag in the air, but at much less magnitude.
I mean for every micro-meteor or particle of dust that strikes the spacecraft, there must be a resulting loss of velocity. Right?
I presume Newtons Laws still apply out there, of course.
L
No, they are not running into dust. They are instrumented and data does not indicate dust particles. Note the presence of the word ‘otherwise’ in the suspect statement.
It’s Galactus approaching.
” radical changes to the laws of physics”
I waiting for changes to the distributive laws of mathematics. That should be fun.
Clearly those spacecraft are not ‘hooked-up’ the way they could be. Time to pit for new rubber and a round of wedge.
“Myles Standish, who calculates solar system motions...”
...had parents with a sense of humor.
Maybe their factoring in of the friction offered by space dust was wrong? Maybe the accumulating dust on the spacecraft is slowing it down...
Maybe high velocity microscopic dust is colliding with the craft from ahead? Maybe, just maybe...
I was wondering about an orbit 90º off of the orbits of the other planets, so that it would affect planets on both sides of the ecliptic...
Your explanations are totally possible, in fact they may be probable — but they’re not human error.
Well, those influences have to be factored in, to derive the expected velocity of the craft, and compare it to the actual velocity. Why can’t human error factor in that “coefficient” wrongly?
"Speak for yourself, John."
And the Pioneer's probably don't have the instrumentation and or power to investigate, so such knowledge will still be lacking until we send out more extra-solar spacecraft to specifically study the phenomena.
Well, if that is the case, then the very premise of predicting the theoretical velocity of the craft, to compare with the actual velocity, should be an erroneous proposition, shouldn't it?
No offense to the mathematicians out there, ok, well maybe a little bit of offense, but, math is just made up. You make up some numbers and some rules, and you deduce stuff from that. You can prove some of the propositions. Physics isn’t like that at all, it isn’t made up. Physical laws describe nature, and it’s up to us to discover them - you can’t do it just by thinking about it, like you can with math. You can postulate alternative explanations for physically observable processes, but ultimately, these hypotheses either withstand scrutiny, or they do not. With math, you can simply postulate other systems, and see what you get from there.
Here’s an example: There is exactly one line parallel to a given line, that passes through a point not on the given line. Euclidian geometry. You don’t like it? Ok, simply postulate that there are no lines that pass through a point parallel to a given line (spherical geometry) or, if you’d prefer, there are an infinity of distinct lines, all parallel to a given line, that pass through a point not on the given line (hyperbolic geometry).
related:
Mystery force tugs distant probes
Source: BBC News
Published: Tuesday, 15 May, 2001, 15:46 GMT 16:46 UK Author: Dr David Whitehouse
Posted on 05/17/2001 01:31:37 PDT by AndrewC
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3b038c692f17.htm
Gravitational anomalies: An invisible hand?
From The Economist print edition | Aug 19th 2004
Posted on 08/21/2004 4:31:57 AM EDT by ScuzzyTerminator
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1196132/posts
Pioneer [gravitational] anomaly put to the test
Physics World | September 2004 | Slava Turyshev and John Anderson
Posted on 09/27/2004 2:38:32 PM EDT by PatrickHenry
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1228396/posts
Scientists ponder the problem with gravity
Space COM | October 18, 2004 | Robert Roy Britt
Posted on 10/18/2004 3:27:05 PM EDT by roaddog727
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1248992/posts
Gravity May Lose its Pull
The LA Times | Dec. 21, 2004 | John Johnson
Posted on 12/21/2004 2:05:13 PM EST by bruin66
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1305997/posts
The Unfinished Quest to Solve the Pioneer Anomaly (unknown gravitational effect)
The Planetary Society | 11 May 05 | John D. Anderson, Philip A. Laing, Eunice L. Lau, Michael Martin Nieto, and Slava G. Turyshev
Posted on 05/11/2005 9:33:22 AM EDT by Arkie2
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1400907/posts
Computer Sleuths Try To Crack Pioneer Anomaly
New Scientist | 3-2-2007 | Stuart Clark
Posted on 03/02/2007 7:30:53 PM EST by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1794297/posts
Newfound Data Could Solve NASA’s Great Gravity Mystery
space.com | 03/27/07 | Tariq Malik
Posted on 03/28/2007 9:18:54 PM EDT by KevinDavis
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1808454/posts
10 posted on 04/01/2007 1:07:28 AM EDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1808454/posts?page=10#10
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Newfound Data Could Solve NASA's Great Gravity Mystery (#10)I sent the ping message without the ping. Still, you're glad to know I'm on the job...
Has the spacetime curvature of the entire solar system as a unit been factored in? ... Where’s Dick Feynman when they need him. [Mumble, mumble ... CalTech Physics Lecture series, etc.]
The ether really does exist!
Ugh...spherical geometery I get and understand, hyperbolic, not so much.
What you need to understand is that physics and mathematics and all of the natural sciences are intertwined. I consider pure math as much of a science as physics or chemistry. Without math there would be no physics and without physics, well we’d still probably have math. But you can’t solve a physics problem without math, end of story.
What the other sciences DO is create a set of constraints with which to develop a mathematical model. The mathematical model usually mimics a “perfect” world, because there are so many variables in the real world that for engineering “close enough” is actually all that matters.
A mathematician, a physicist, and an engineer were asked to review this mathematical problem. In a high school gym, all the girls in the class were lined up against one wall, and all the boys against the opposite wall. Then, every ten seconds, they walked toward each other until they were half the previous distance apart. The mathematician, physicist, and engineer were asked, “ When will the girls and boys meet?”
The mathematician said, “ Never.”
The physicist said, “ In an infinite amount of time.”
The engineer said, “ Well... in about two minutes, they’ll be close enough for all practical purposes.”
Naturally-occurring wormhole. Got to be.
Heh, thanks for that one! I am committing it to memory now.
Yes, it has. Something else is going on, and it might not be dark matter but something even more unknown.
All of science, even physics, is heuristic but being refined constantly as measurements get more significant digits. One thing physicists might do to improve their position in the philosophy of science is to cease grabbing terms that are laying about and pasting them onto their theories. They could make up new words instead of calling one variable time and another mass, etc. They don’t know what time and mass are and shouldn’t use the terms as names for their Bridgman measurement procedures since they can’t know what they are measuring.
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