Molecular hydrogene or dark matter

[Jacques]

Hi

I found that webpage

http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/hydrogen/index.html

 

It tells that molecular hydrogene (H2) is very hard to detect and that there maybe enought undected H2 to explain the rotations curves of galaxies.

I find it very attractive theory but I would like to have your opinion on that

Who is Paul Marmet ?

 

Thanks in advance for your inputs.

[calbiterol]

Even though you posted this in the Astronomy and Cosmology forum, it probably would still have been a good idea to clarify "molecular hydrogene" (and sorry if it's expecting too much of me, but it's 'sposed to be "hydrogen") and instead say, "molecular hydrogen in space.

[Ophiolite]

calbiterol, it hardly seems necessary to qualify the location of the molecular hydrogen, since it is implicit in the title "...and dark matter".

 

Jacques, I like dark matter, but only because it is different. I like different. It would be more appropriate, however, if using Occam's rasor we could cut away the invisible load of dark matter. It will be interesting to see if further observations confirm the presence of molecular hydrogen in other galaxies in appropriate quantities.

It is clear that too many researchers have invested a substantial part of their career in devloping dark matter theories to toss them aside at the first sighting of an inconvenient fact.

I am unclear as to why you ask, "who is Paul Marmet?", since the following brief biography is included in the link you gave.

"Dr. Paul Marmet recently retired from the Physics Faculty at the University of Ottawa. He was formerly a senior researcher at the Herzberg Institute of Astrophysics of the National Research Council of Canada, in Ottawa, and from 1967 to 1982, he was director of the laboratory for Atomic and Molecular Physics at Laval University in Quebec. A past president of the Canadian Association of Physicists, Marmet also served as a member of the executive committee for the Atomic Energy Commission of Canada from 1979 to 1984. "

[Jacques]

I am asking who is Paul Marmet because on the internet anybody can claim that he is a doctor or anything.

I had a quick look at the University of Ottawa site and he is an auxiliary professor. An other side of my question about Paul Marmet is how does the scientific community consider him ? How does his ideas accepted ?

Also it is said:

"The halo culture that has grown up around the dark matter problem might never have arisen if the ISO results (large quantity of H2) had been known earlier."

Maybe dark matter theory is just an accident.

[Ophiolite]

I am asking who is Paul Marmet because on the internet anybody can claim that he is a doctor or anything.

Right. I see your point. I googled him, as I'm sure you did, and found over five hundred links. He does appear to have some rather fringe ideas. You say the University of Ottawa web site lists him as an Associate Professor. One of the links describes him as Emeritus Professor there. Quite a difference.

[swansont]

Right. I see your point. I googled him, as I'm sure you did, and found over five hundred links. He does appear to have some rather fringe ideas. You say the University of Ottawa web site lists him as an Associate Professor. One of the links describes him as Emeritus Professor there. Quite a difference.

 

If he recently retired, that would make sense. It is not uncommon for retired faculty to be given the Emeritus title.

[NeonBlack]

I don't know where Jacque is from, but hydrogène is the french word for hydrogen... so I don't know, give him a break on the spelling?

[calbiterol]

calbiterol, it hardly seems necessary to qualify the location of the molecular hydrogen, since it is implicit in the title "...and dark matter".

 

Oops. Somehow I missed that part. My bad. Still, taken out of context (like on the front page, where you can't see what forum it's in), it's still a little vague, at least to me.

 

I don't know where Jacque is from, but hydrogène is the french word for hydrogen... so I don't know, give him a break on the spelling?

 

I didn't intend to sound offended or offensive, and I did base that complaint off of one assumption - that Jaques is a native English speaker, or learned chemistry in English, which can be attributed to the fact that I am an American, and all Americans are ethno- and geo-centric people that can hardly comprehend even the idea of learning multiple languages, much less that element names might be different in them. So, for that, I sincerely apologize, especially since I already knew that many languages use the Latin names for elements (like Kalium for what most Americans would call Potassium). Sorry Jacques, my bad. Again.

 

I liked the article though, it was interesting - but I have to say, I enjoy the idea of there being such a thing as dark energy and dark matter out there. But that's just my opinion.

[NeonBlack]

I also enjoyed this article. It was so simple and logical. It maded perfect sense and the theory explains so much...

 

It can't possibly be correct ;p

[Jacques]

No offence Calbiterol. NeonBlack is right my native language is french, so forgive me if I do some gramatical errors. ( you can tell me so I will improve my english)

So simple and logical! can't be correct... In french we say:

Pourquoi faire simple quand on peux faire compliqué.

Why do it simple when we can do it complicated.

 

Thanks for your answers.

 

Also the implications of the abondance of H2 are very big . If you read other articles on that site, specialy the one about the non-Doppler redshift... No more BigBang necessary.

[calbiterol]

Don't worry about it, Jacques - think of it this way: you can talk in English better than a lot of Americans can, our current president included! I should mention, your English is quite good - to the point that I thought you were a native-English speaker, because your only error on the first post was using the French form of hydrogen, which is perfectly understandable. Plus, you are multilingual, which is more than a lot of Americans can say about themselves. It really is frustrating how incredibly selfish and America-centered most Americans are - but what can one do? Viele Amerikaner sind doof! I liked your saying, I'll have to remember that one. Course, I'll totally butcher the pronounciation, but it's the thought that counts. And your ability to take corrections as everyone should take them - by using them to learn from mistakes - is something I wish I could be better at. Next time, if I notice an error, I'll be sure to be nicer about it - just like I would want someone to kindly correct me if I messed up my German, or any other language for that matter.

 

But more on the subject, it does make a lot of sense, but I don't think I could quite bring myself to give up the big bang and dark matter. It will be interesting to see what some of the telescopes under development find, because some of them are powerful enough to see so far away, and therefor so far back in time, that they can show what happened less than a millisecond after the big bang - assuming, of course, that it ocurred.

[Spyman]

A simple explanation of both dark matter and redshifts that goes against Big Bang.

 

Given the age of the article and the papers, I assume there must be some sort of catch...

(More than inconvenient fact against scientist's career concern.)

The extreme transparency of molecular hydrogen in different quantum states may also be examined (Marmet 1992). Compared with all other known gases, molecular hydrogen is the most transparent in the universe. Yet, this well-known fact, should have led to the expectation of finding molecular hydrogen, because atomic hydrogen had already been observed. [b']It is difficult to understand why it was ignored, when so many experimental observations require the presence of missing mass in the universe.[/b]

There should have been a lot of fuzz about this, but for me it's a surprise.

(Of course I could have missed it but a Google didn't come up with much old news either.)

 

There have been more news on other much, much unlikely theories.

 

So where/what is the catch ? Why didn't this theory get more support ?

 

It is really difficult to understand why it still is ignored if correct.

[Ophiolite]

If he recently retired, that would make sense. It is not uncommon for retired faculty to be given the Emeritus[/i'] title.

The impression I had, perhaps faulty, was that this was normally only bestowed on the most senior of persons, which I would not have imagined applying to a 'mere' Associate Professor. But keep in mind I am basing this perception on my undergraduate days which took place in the late Pliocene.

 

I remain an unapologetic supporter of Fred Hoyle, so I will gravitate towards anything that might favour Steady State and get rid of the Big Bang. However, attractive as Marmat's points are I suspect there are other telling points against the argument. Still, there is a small body of cosmologists who do not believe the red shift indicates an expanding Universe, or that quasars are truly distant objects, or that old galaxies have mainly population II stars and young galaxies have population I. So, who knows? Interesting.

[Spyman]

Even if Paul Marmet is wrong about the redshifts, it would remain a good explanation for Dark Matter.

(He has made assumptions on the distribution of the H2 so BB could still be correct.)

 

Edit: What if the distribution of H2 looked something like this:

http://www.mpa-garching.mpg.de/galform/millennium/

[Jacques]

Here the letter of the Astrophysical Journal Letters

First Extragalactic Direct Detection of Large-Scale Molecular Hydrogen in the Disk of NGC 891

Here the subject of that letter NGC 891

 

The ISO satellite site NGC 891

 

My first thaugth Not a lot of observations. To bad the satellite is not operational since May 1998. A lot of data available on line !

You can try to find your H2 cloud !

[Spyman]

Scientists have always taken for granted the existence of molecular hydrogen when forming theories about where all the larger and more elaborate molecules in the universe came from. But nobody could explain how so many hydrogen atoms were able to form molecules -- until now.

 

They discovered that one seemingly tiny detail -- whether the surfaces of interstellar dust grains are smooth or bumpy -- could explain why there is so much molecular hydrogen in the universe.

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/molhydro.htm