If dark energy and dark matter make up most of the universe...

[tar]

wouldn't it logically have to be more or less everywhere in the universe including the Milky Way and the Sun's system and the Earth and in your living room?

 

And if it exists locally, what have we been calling it all these years of investigating the bodies and energies we have so carefully and thoughtfully catalogued and measured and modeled around here?

 

Just wondering if dark energy and dark matter make any sense, if they cannot be found to exist, in some form or another in our Earthly environment.

 

TAR

Or does the Heliopause in some way sheild us from them, or does the massive electromagnetic field of the Sun redirect them, or does the Sun somehow metabolize them and turn them into the forms of matter and energy we know?

[Bignose]

plenty in our neighborhood of the universe:

 

http://phys.org/news/2012-08-plenty-dark-sun.html

 

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=dark-matter-seasonal-variation

[tar]

And if we are trying to explain the activity of a galaxy and a supernova hundreds of millions of lys away, with the necessary existence of dark matter and dark energy in that far away area of space, are we not also talking about some activity that occured hundreds of millions of years ago? In which case things might have looked like that around here hundreds of millions of years ago...but things changed in the interim.

Bignose,

 

Oh.

 

OK. As long as we have it here, it makes sense. So its sort of a mass soup we have always been in, just never noticed since it was ubiquitous.

 

Regards, TAR2

And oh so ever mildly interacting.

[md65536]

OK. As long as we have it here, it makes sense. So its sort of a mass soup we have always been in, just never noticed since it was ubiquitous.

We never noticed it because it doesn't interact electromagnetically, so it can't be seen.

We never noticed it when looking at the solar system because matter alone could account for the known effects of gravity here, to the extent of our understanding of it and ability to measure its effects. It is only when looking at the galactic scale and larger that normal matter no longer suffices... and that's how we noticed it*. Now enough is known about it for scientists to be able to make predictions, and distinguish between noticeable effects of dark matter vs matter here in the solar system.

 

The 80% dark matter "rule" applies to galaxies and the universe as a whole, but not to the solar system. Dark matter around a galaxy is expected to be much larger and more diffuse than the galaxy itself. So within the solar system, normal matter exists in much higher concentration, and dominates the gravitational behavior of stuff within the system.

 

 

 

* That alone isn't conclusive evidence of dark matter. Other explanations have been proposed, and dark matter is only the current best explanation that best fits the multiple lines of evidence.

 

For example, it fits better than MOND:

http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2013/01/18/why-the-universe-needs-dark-matter-and-not-mond-in-one-graph/

 

This might explain the multiple lines of evidence that fit with dark matter:

http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2012/04/19/the-whole-story-on-dark-matter/

Edited January 16, 2014 by md65536

[tar]

MD65536,

 

Well thank you for those links. Have a little better understanding of why dark matter needs to be around to explain stuff...but still am not able to feel confident that we are not missing something about the nature of large scale structures, that are understandable only in a positional way, that by the very fact that the one end of the structure is happening at a different time and place than the other forces one to either be wrong about how it is currently configured (because we have not seen that yet), or falsely consider the universe is currently configured in the same way that it used to be.

 

Since one cannot actually see the entire universe in any manner other than the way we do see it, with close stuff soon after it obtains a certain configuration, and far away stuff long after it was in that configuration...evidence of the current configuration is hardly available.

 

Regards, TAR2

[Janus]

MD65536,

 

Well thank you for those links. Have a little better understanding of why dark matter needs to be around to explain stuff...but still am not able to feel confident that we are not missing something about the nature of large scale structures, that are understandable only in a positional way, that by the very fact that the one end of the structure is happening at a different time and place than the other forces one to either be wrong about how it is currently configured (because we have not seen that yet), or falsely consider the universe is currently configured in the same way that it used to be.

 

Since one cannot actually see the entire universe in any manner other than the way we do see it, with close stuff soon after it obtains a certain configuration, and far away stuff long after it was in that configuration...evidence of the current configuration is hardly available.

 

Regards, TAR2

But it is because we see the universe spread out over a long time scale that we can be confident in how the universe is configured now compared to how it was. If we look at at galaxies 5 billion light years away and and compare them to galaxies 1 billion light years away and also how they compare to galaxies a few million light years away, we can see any trends or changes that may have occurred over that time span. This gives us a picture of how the universe evolved over time rather than a static one.

[tar]

Janus,

Well I get that. But the other implication is that the actual configuration of the universe currently is that it all actually looks (if you were there at some other place currently) something close to how it looks around here, but we will not see that, or have any visual evidence of that, until later...much later. Thus we are caught in this sort of netherland of what the universe currently consists of. We have to hold an area of space in our minds in three ways. One as a way it used to be, but is no longer, another in the way it is currently affecting us and our senses and equipment, and then in a third way, the "real current universe", that we can only imagine and model since we can never "see" it, any other way than in this other "actual" way, that we see it.

I was perplexed at a simulation of a super light speed camera flying through strings and walls of clusters of galaxies. The distant strings were white and formed and as you got closer they just got bigger and more detailed. It seems to me a cheat, using facets of all three ways of looking at the universe at once, since you really can't zoom in on distant galaxies like that. You can't fly at a speed greater than C, and if you where to fly at a speed close to C, you would not make very much progress toward increasing the angular size of a distant galaxy you where moving toward, in a minute, in fact if the thing was as close as half a galaxy away, it would take you 50 thousand years to make enough progress toward a star at that distance to make it look as big as our sun. And I am thinking logic would dictate that you would not be experiencing the visible spectrum of light the object you were approaching at that speed was putting off as light in that range, but more like something in the gamma wave range. If you did survive those rays and did see any visible image of the thing you were approaching, it would be likely eminations that where eminated in the infrared range or something, which would have a different "look". Plus if you were to "fast forward" the film it took you 5 billion years to make, you would see an 8.6 billion year old object evolve into a 18.6 billion object before your eyes. So in any case, you can't "get to" any area of space, other than here, that is 13.6 billion years old, because by the time you got there, it wouldn't be 13.6 billion years old, anymore.

Regards, TAR
I imagine that the areas of space we see as cosmic background radiation, that surface of the last scattering, is currently looking like a 13.6billion year old area of space...if you were there to see it.
Just makes me think there is enough possibilty of making an inappropriate shift from one way of looking at it to another, without translating everything properly, that there is a possibilty, not that we have the laws of physics wrong, or that there is dark matter and dark energy at play, but that we just failed to carry everything required over in our transform from one way of looking at it, to the others.
After all there is only one instance of a distant galaxy, but an unlimited amount of positions in the universe, from which you can view the area of space that it inhabits. From some positions it may be microwave background radiation. From others it is every age from .1 to 13.6 billion years old, depending only on the distance from that area to the observation point.

Edited January 17, 2014 by tar

[md65536]

Thus we are caught in this sort of netherland of what the universe currently consists of.

Of course we don't have all the information possible, or all that we'd like, and the science isn't yet settled.

 

Is there any specific evidence that you think has been wrongly used, that you can show via your ideas that the conclusions of some scientists might be wrong? It is easy to assume that the scientists don't know what they're doing, but harder to pick apart what they're actually doing and to find fault with that. What specific evidence have they got wrong?

[tar]

md65536,

 

I think it is a timing thing that is not properly added back to make all three images fit together completely.

 

My clue, or what headed me in this direction is when I heard the method used to gather an image of a very far away thing involved pointing a telescope at the thing and gathering one photon at a time together, over a long period of time, and then evaluating the resulting image as if all the photons arrived at once, which they did not. Then on the other end, you are looking at at thing that is not only hundreds of millions of light years away, but is also VERY big, like perhaps 100,000 lys deep. That means that what you see happening at the closer parts of the thing, happened 100,000 years after what you see happening at the farther parts, yet the calculations seem to be done, as if the thing is moving all at once, which it is not. So unless we were to gather the images for 100,000 yrs, and key every star to its position at a particular point in time and overlay all the images in just the right way to simulate the galaxies actual configuation at one moment in time, and run the simulation from there, we would not know the actual "movement" of the thing enough to speculate upon the forces acting on it.

 

Regards, TAR

Plus, the assumptions and equations we are using to build the model of the universe we have, those of Newton and Maxwell and Einstein and Rosen, were formulated without any Dark Matter and Dark Energy as a component, it did not need to be accounted for, or present any anomolies before, so why should it now? Its not like the universe was devoid of dark matter and energy before, and now it has it. If it has it now, it had it before, and in either case it was not pertinent to our assumptions and equations then, and is equally impertinent now. Or so I would guess. So why think you are right about being wrong before, when its just as likely you are wrong about being right now?

And besides besides, it seems more appropriate to adjust your model to fit the facts, than to add facts to fit your model.

Your keys are not where you left them. Did someone else move them, or did you forget where you left them?

 

Who is more likely to be surprisingly wrong. You or the facts?

Reality already fits together seemlessly with everything exactly fitting everything else. If anything "looks" wrong, its probably because you are not looking at it right.

And besides besides besides if there is dark matter and dark energy, which were NOT built into the inflation expansion story and the detailed accounting for the timing and creation of all the subatomic particles and surface of last scattering and all, the whole script would have to be thrown out and rewritten to account for 5 times as much stuff as we already thought we had to account for.

that is like discovering there are really 180 letters in the English language and having to go back to all our words and phrases and books and stories and chronicals and put them all in, where they belong

Edited January 18, 2014 by tar

[md65536]

That means that what you see happening at the closer parts of the thing, happened 100,000 years after what you see happening at the farther parts, yet the calculations seem to be done, as if the thing is moving all at once, which it is not.

So which experiments or results fail to take this into account, and how much of an error is it (how "off" are the results?), and what different results are obtained when this is factored in?

 

 

Plus, the assumptions and equations we are using to build the model of the universe we have, those of Newton and Maxwell and Einstein and Rosen, were formulated without any Dark Matter and Dark Energy as a component, it did not need to be accounted for, or present any anomolies before, so why should it now?

It's not about changing equations, but whether they fit with newer observations. Einstein's equations fit observations of the solar system. They do not fit observations of the galaxy, and larger scale. It wasn't a case of "the equations were good enough back then", it was a case of "as soon as observations of the galaxy's behavior with respect to gravity were made, they did not fit the models (including equations like GR and Newtonian gravity, as well as up-to-date models of the amount of matter in the galaxy)."

 

 

 

As usual your thread has quickly gone from asking questions about a topic to "I'm sure everybody has it wrong." I think anyone reading this forum should expect that the scientists dealing with astronomical observations know the issues and know how to deal with them, better than the average amateur, so I don't think you'll convince anyone that all of the scientists are missing or ignoring an obvious problem. You'd be more effective by writing a paper about this, instead of proclaiming on a forum, but to do that you'd have to cite specific observations or results, and quantitatively explain the error.

 

Why not find out how scientists deal with this "problem", before being so sure that they're doing it wrong? Do they not realize that light takes time to arrive here? Do they ignore the problem and pretend it doesn't matter? Or does it not make a significant difference (quantitatively, not just "I guess")? Or does it simply not factor at all into the results? Perhaps certain assumptions are made, like about how things change over time on a large scale, that you could look deeper into. But do it quantitatively... for example you mention 100,000 years... so how much could a structure that large change over that period of time, and what conclusions could be invalidated by such a possible change?

 

 

...And before wasting too much time researching (one can always dream!) or repeating, have you considered that the results are consistent with many different observations, not just one galaxy and it's exact positions of stars in a single image, including galaxies that are viewed "from the top", so that light from different ends of it arrive roughly from the same time, and that the existence of dark matter agrees with generally all of the observations. So how would you explain that "forgotten" delays of light, missed by all of science, could change all of these observations so much that dark matter no longer "makes sense"?

Edited January 18, 2014 by md65536

[tar]

md65536,

 

I am not saying that everybody is looking at it wrong, I am just saying the current situation is not coherent. I am assuming the universe is already coherent and we just have to catch up our models, to match. Not by throwing anything we know, out, but by adding in new observations in a way that makes sense in more than one way.

 

A while back, maybe last spring, I had several bouts of double vision, where the image from my one eye was not agreeing with the image from the other. I kept trying to get the two images together, and they would not go. The eye doctor sent me to a specialist, who said my one eye focused a little higher than the other, but an MRI and chemical tests revealed no issues that could be causing double vision. Long bouts had only happened a few times, and the "problem" was down to a few minutes of the issue when I woke up, and revealed itself only when I quickly glanced to the right, and it took me a moment to bring the two images together. I thought I was having a problem with my right eye behaving correctly because I had remembered a wood chip hitting right below my right eye while I was using a chainsaw a few days before the first problem I had glancing to the right...then after a visit to the specialist, where he said everything looked OK with the MRI and the blood tests, and mentioned it was my left eye that focused a little low, I began to consider that it was not my right eye I needed to get to agree with my left, but my left I needed to let agree with my right. After work, with the dark glasses off (which I had worn after the visit since they dilated my eyes to examine them), and with the thought that my right eye was fine, and my left was being stubborn, I glanced at the lake on my right and it was instantly CLEAR and coherent. I have not had the issue, since.

 

So coherence is what I am after in this regard. Not that one image is wrong, or another image is wrong, or another image is wrong, but that we might be trying to force the wrong eye to be dominant, rather than trusting the dominant eye.

 

And in this regard, folding back in the existence of a NOW here, and a NOW there, and a NOW then, into one coherent image, is somewhat analogous to my issue. And as the coherence between two "flat" images, gives us the perception of depth, and an intuitive understanding of space, the fact that we can remember an image, gives us a third, or inner eye with which we can percieve time, or consider a thing, over time, or in a sequence...

 

But the sensations from each eye, and each ear are diverse in type and in the particulars, yet when put together into one coherent image of the world, they make "sense", and things "exist" in such a way as to make sense in all the ways, at once.

 

So perhaps if dark matter and dark energy explained more stuff, and made existence MORE coherent, and made one say "oh yeah, that makes sense" I would have a place to put it in my image. As it is, it makes no sense to me.

 

Regards, TAR

And even the galaxies we look at from the top are four dimensional still, and the middle of the image is closer, MUCH closer and more recent than the edges.

In the two shot gun scenario with the pellets from the one missing all the pellets sent from the other, if you look at the powder for a reason to impart momentum on the pellets, you will find it spent.

Edited January 18, 2014 by tar

[md65536]

And in this regard, folding back in the existence of a NOW here, and a NOW there, and a NOW then, into one coherent image, is somewhat analogous to my issue. And as the coherence between two "flat" images, gives us the perception of depth, and an intuitive understanding of space, the fact that we can remember an image, gives us a third, or inner eye with which we can percieve time, or consider a thing, over time, or in a sequence...

[...]

So perhaps if dark matter and dark energy explained more stuff, and made existence MORE coherent, and made one say "oh yeah, that makes sense" I would have a place to put it in my image. As it is, it makes no sense to me.

The evidence of dark matter does not depend on having a single coherent image of the universe. You can find evidence in fragments of images, or in looking at different things (it's not just imaged positions of things). Besides, there is a coherent model of the universe that comes from piecing all the different observations together appropriately. It's not the perfect NOW image of everything that you might want, but it does the job.

 

Science looks at evidence and draws conclusions from that, based on chosen models. It makes sense to a lot of people. Unfortunately, I don't think it's a priority that it makes sense to you, ie. that anyone would doubt the evidence in search of something that you prefer.

 

I'm sure that if you really looked deeply into what observations have been made, and how the models are put together, it will become more coherent for you.

[tar]

OK, we'll go with that.

Well wait.

 

There is not complete agreement, among all, as to what the exact nature of the stuff is, or where it came from, or how it interacts with known matter and engergy. It is not yet a coherent picture. That it "must" exist, to explain observations which have no other explanation, is what is commonly held to be the truth.

 

I agree, that should I look at a particular series of observations that all point to the existence of mass that does not seem to put off or absorb any photons, I would more than likely see the logic in it and agree that there must be this stuff. However, there have been calculations made, of the expansion rate of the universe, of the age of the universe, of cosmic constants, and the amount of particles and energy in the observeable universe, that all logically added up, and fit the calculations and each other, WITHOUT 80 percent of the stuff of the universe taken into consideration. How did THAT happen?

 

Regards, TAR2

 

Reminds me of an intiution I had, that others have had, of an ether in which matter and energy existed. My schooling drummed the thought out of me. Now it turns out there might have been something to the thought, and you are scolding me now, for not accepting what was drummed out of me, in the first place.

 

Seems, given the nature of theory and experiments, what we know, and what we are looking for, that you can give me a little latitude in proposing alternate ways of looking at a thing, without condemning me for insolence and ignorance.

Philosophically speaking, at what point does what "we" know happen? Is not a small part of that having to do with my coherence, and yours, working with a common understanding? Too complicated to get a solid handle on something so huge and out of reach as our universe, as to consider we now know what is true, that we never before knew was true, but now its obvious to anybody that looks at the facts? And that it is now coherent to everybody in the know, but me.

 

I simply don't believe the place is coherentable in an ungrounded, non human as focal point and observer, fashion. And for that, I will do, just as well as anybody else. Nobody can take an other than that perspective.

 

Regards, TAR2

[tar]

Logical problem discerned in this wiki article on cosmological constant:

 

In cosmology, the cosmological constant (usually denoted by the Greek capital letter lambda: Λ) is the value of the energy density of the vacuum of space. It was introduced by Albert Einstein as an addition to his theory of general relativity to "hold back gravity" and achieve a static universe, which was the accepted view at the time. Einstein abandoned the concept as his "greatest blunder" after Hubble's 1928 discovery that the distant galaxies are expanding away from each other, implying an overall expanding Universe (which is only detectable on the largest of scales). Surprisingly, the discovery of cosmic acceleration in 1998 has revived the need for a non-zero cosmological constant, this time to add a small acceleration to the ongoing expansion. As physicist Tony Rothman notes, "Einstein's equations do not specify the universe; rather they may be considered a general framework within which you can construct many different model universes."

 

If the distant galaxies are observed to be expanding away from each other, that should not imply an acceleration of the expansion of the universe, because that was what the universe was doing before, not now. If there is a difference between the observed rate of expansion of a distant group of galaxies, as oppossed to a more local group of galaxies, the observed rate of the local observations would be indicative of the current rate of expansion of the universe, and observations of distant galaxies indicative of a previous rate of expansion. If a known expansion rate at BB 6 billion is faster then a known expansion rate at BB 13.6 billion, then the universe's expansion is observably slowing.

 

Regards, TAR2

Such observations would be consistent with the idea that we had an inflation which slowed to an expansion, which is slowing still and we are currently in more of a statis state with some galaxies moving toward us, and some away. Mixing it up, in quite a coherent fashion.

the functions may be correct but the direction of the function is important to consider

 

looking deeper into space is not telling us what the universe will look like, its telling us what it did look like

 

if we are to extraplolate, we should start from here and carry the apparent functions foward

 

perhaps my basic complaint is that we have no way to observe the universe from an implied position, other than with our third eye, and our third eye alternately takes positions in the past, present and future, and alternately takes positions here and there and overviewing both, and although the functions might be correct, knowing which combination of here, there and overview and before, now and later is being utilized to design the function, makes a big difference in the application and direction of the function...and not always does one know from which perspective the other is speaking and not always is one convinced that the other has made all the proper transformations that should be made, while switching perspectives.

An ideal gas law for instance is hard to logically comprehend, if there is no container walls for the molecules to expend their kinetic energy on.

And once the size of the system being comprehended exceeds the local scale we have grown accostom to, the system can no longer be comprehended as happening "at once", and allowances have to be made for travel time between places in reality that are not required for getting from one place and time in the model to another.

Edited January 19, 2014 by tar