Nobel Prize awarded to Big Bang proponents as evidence vanishesOur regular members and readers will recall that the simplest explanation of the microwave radiation is the "temperature of space", as correctly calculated by Eddington in 1926 and verified with greater accuracy by later authors: 2.8°K. This is the minimum temperature that anything bathed in the radiation of distant starlight can reach. No Big Bang proponent ever came close to predicting the correct temperature of this radiation, its dipolar asymmetry, or the tiny size of its fluctuations... The blackbody character of the microwave radiation was an important observational finding, and its discoverers deserve credit for that (despite trying to attach religious significance to it themselves)... [T]he following new results about the microwave radiation were just released in September... "In a finding sure to cause controversy, scientists at the University of Alabama in Huntsville found a lack of evidence of shadows from 'nearby' clusters of galaxies using new, highly accurate measurements of the cosmic microwave background... Taken together, the data shows a shadow effect about one-fourth of what was predicted - an amount roughly equal in strength to natural variations previously seen in the microwave background across the entire sky... [B]ased on all that we know about radiation sources and halos around clusters, this kind of emission is not expected, and it would be implausible to suggest that several clusters could all emit microwaves at just the right frequency and intensity to match the cosmic background radiation." ...Just over a year ago, published results of another study using WMAP data looked for evidence of "lensing" effects which should have been seen (but weren't) if the microwave background was a Big Bang remnant.
by Tom Van Flandern
Meta Research
>>Nobel Prize awarded to Big Bang proponents as evidence vanishes
by Tom Van Flandern
Meta Research<<
Its worth remembering as you read Dr. Van Flandern's article that he is working on what he believes is proof that the Universe is much older than the 20 billion years predicted by big bang theory and that like the other 500 articles that week he only had the the Alabama press release to work with.
Van Flandern is also the guy who claims Einstein faked the theory of relativity and lied to cover it up. He also says he has proof of an alien civilization on Mars.
If you look at at articles that came out over the next few weeks and months it turned out that the WMAP sensors would likely not have detected the shadow if there is a shadow. And that if the shadow is not there it may tell us more about the galaxy clusters than the big bang because they were measuring inside a cluster.
But the Alabama research raised some interesting questions that will be looked at in further studies. But in less than a week Dr. Lieu backed off saying ""I myself am not at this point prepared to accept that the CMB is non-cosmological and that there was no Big Bang"
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2006-09-11-big-bang-doubts_x.htm
But that's a fascinating article I'm glad you found it.