The “Electric Universe” (EU) is an umbrella term that covers various pseudo-scientific cosmological ideas built around the claim that the formation and existence of various features of the universe can be better explained by electromagnetism than by gravity. The exact claims are diverse and vary from crank to crank author to author. A common motif is the insistence that all science should be done in a laboratory — an attempt to throw away gravity from the very beginning, because one can’t put a solar system or a galaxy in a laboratory. Most Electric Universe proponents claim some kind of relation to the “plasma cosmology” of the Nobel Prize laureate Hannes Alfvén. Too bad his model was rendered obsolete by the missing observations of the radio emission predicted by his cosmology.[2]
EU advocates can be roughly split into two groups: garden-variety physics cranks who are convinced that they have a legitimate revolutionary scientific theory, and various woo-peddlers who use EU claims to prop their main ideas (because mainstream physics would blow them apart).
Immanuel Velikovsky was an enthusiastic early adopter of electric universe ideas, seeing in them a possible mechanism to explain his scenario of planetary billiards, cosmic thunderbolts, and the notion that Earth was previously a satellite of Saturn.
Claims
Stars do not shine because of internal nuclear fusion caused by gravitational collapse. Rather, they are anodes for galactic discharge currents.
Impact craters on Venus, Mars and the Moon are not caused by impacts, but by electrical discharges.[3] The same applies to the Valles Marineris (a massive canyon on Mars) and the Grand Canyon on Earth.[4]
The Sun is negatively charged, and the solar wind is positively charged — the two systems forming a giant capacitor (this is James McCanney’s particular erroneous belief.)
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Electric_Universe
A common motif is the insistence that all science should be done in a laboratory — an attempt to throw away gravity from the very beginning, because one can’t put a solar system or a galaxy in a laboratory.
That is a total misrepresentation of what the claims of EU proponents are making. EU proponents DO NOT insist that all science should be done in the laboratory. That's a straw man fallacy. More proof your article proves nothing and is wrong, arguing points never made.
EU proponents state that many of the things that are being seen in the Universe are duplicatable in the plasma laboratory and are completely scalable to the macrocosmic simply by the addition of more power. . . and these laboratory experiments have indicated things to look for that were eventually FOUND in space in the macrocosmic scale, validating the observed linkage. This much simpler explanation can explain everything we see without invoking the "magic" fairy dust of dark matter and magical power of dark energy, adding tremendous fudge factors into their observations, which Gravity cosmology repeatedly trots out to get their theories to even work.
The EU cosmology does not require any magic fairy dust or magical power to work.
Thanks for the attempt. . . but arguing things that were never claimed is poor debating technique.
The real problem is that Gravity cosmologists have been the ones that have literally thrown away a force that is 39 orders of magnitude stronger than gravity, is demonstrably equally infinite in reach, can be seen in action right in front of their eyes every where we look, and instead of selected a the weaker force as the ultimate driver of the Universe.
They made an unsupportable declaration that "There are no charges in space!" and proceeded as if it were true, without evidence. Yet everything we've discovered since that declaration shows us that there are charges everywhere we look in space, but they refuse to revisit that declaration. It is why they are continually surprised at what they find. They cannot help but be surprised when they deny it can exist! Their declaration was and is ultimately illogical!
Try answering the questions about the objects I posted above from a gravity cosmology that WORKS. . . because the gravity cosmologists have so far failed miserably. They are constantly being surprised by what is being seen in deep space that EU cosmologists are predicting will be seen.
The test of any theory is how well does it predict future discoveries. So far Gravity Cosmology is failing miserably, while EU cosmology is doing very well in the prediction business.
Start by telling us how a strong magnetic field can exist without an equally strong flowing electric current. . . and then tell us through what medium is that electric current flowing to build that magnetic field. Yet Gravity cosmology seems to think that magnetic fields exist all, against all science, all by themselves.
They've finally started to get the idea with the sun, talking about magnetic "disconnection and reconnection" and the "explosions" associated with them. . . but they are ignoring what causes them. They've just renamed something that Hannes Alfvèn discovered over 100 years ago and named then. . . but they don't want to give any credence to the EU people who have been telling them this for years.
While you are at it, try telling us how a lower solar atmospheric temperature sun of just 8000 K (with a surface temperature even lower) can, by mere convection, give rise to an upper solar atmosphere temperature of more than 1,500,000 K? I know you can't because the solar physicists can't explain it. The EU cosmologists can. How do you explain the solar wind accelerates the farther you get from the sun? Gravity cosmology cannot explain it.
The fact that you think the militant atheist agenda driven “rationalwiki” is a trustworthy source is pretty funny!
Here’s they entry on American conservatives, just for illustration:
“American conservatives are far to the right of conservatives in other Western nations. They have little compassion for poor people, overvalue the free market and are deeply suspicious of anything that seems to them government interference. Republicans in Congress, all for example oppose the Affordable Care Act, which is seen as dangerously socialist,[2] even though it had rather conservative origins.
Broadly and recently speaking, the conservative movement was split along two paths in the 1960s, defined by Barry Goldwater’s and Nelson Rockefeller’s approaches. Rockefeller’s was a more traditional conservatism, calling for fiscal responsibility and minimal government intrusion into private affairs, both personal and commercial (except for the Rockefeller drug laws, of course). Goldwater conservatism, which found its successful avatar in Ronald Reagan, was more reactionary, longing nostalgically for a time that never existed before modern changes that bother some people. The conservatism of Goldwater and Reagan was at the time called the New Right.
The center of the modern American conservative movement has incessantly been pushed further and further to the “right”: with each success, the bar is moved farther to the right; with each failure, it is likewise moved. It now has a tendemcy to incorporate strong elements of fundamentalist Christianity,[3] creationism including YEC, homophobia & xenophobia,[4] warmongering,[5] wilful ignorance towards science, global warming denial, people who think birth control is not a critical medical issue for women, and a prideful nationalism, typically manifested as a loudly enunciated belief that “America is the greatest country in the world”[6] and God’s chosen country. Many conservatives in the United States promote religious indoctrination in schools, such as prayer in public schools, which blatantly violates the separation of church and state. They generally support less government funding for scientific research that would benefit American ingenuity, but would rather want to reduce taxes on the already privileged and create tax havens for the rich. They also advocate for increased military and police spending to moralize the world, whatever that may mean.
The Bible nowhere mentions America but prideful biblical literalists in no way let that get in the way of their certainty that their America should lead the rest of the world to their way of thinking. Only citizens (mainly men) who accept the insane sound concepts of the Religious Right are true Americans and have the right to lead the world. Filthy Democrats are in no way properly American and can only lead the rest of the world to error. All this leaves residents of other nations, large and small, understandably cheesed off, indeed more sensible people in other countries may get anxious.
While not all conservatives, obviously, embrace all these views, walking away from more than a few can easily leave a politician “outside” the “big tent.” American conservatism has moved so far in some directions[7] (invasion of personal privacy[8] and big government[9] for instance), that many traditional conservatives have been stranded in its wake, wondering what happened to the tenets of the movement they used to hold dear and why they are now branded as deceitful, nasty libtards.”