World's most sensitive dark matter detector finds nothing (again). :(

[Michael]

http://phys.org/news/2016-07-world-sensitive-dark-detector.html

LUX's sensitivity far exceeded the goals for the project, collaboration scientists said, but yielded no trace of a dark matter particle. LUX's extreme sensitivity makes the team confident that if dark matter particles had interacted with the LUX's xenon target, the detector would almost certainly have seen it. That enables scientists to confidently eliminate many potential models for dark matter particles, offering critical guidance for the next generation of dark matter experiments.

This is like watching a bunch of folks engaging themselves in a never ending snipe hunt. Negative results are never used as a basis for the falsification of the dark matter snipe claim. Instead the negative results simply 'offer them critical guidance' as to where the dark matter snipes cannot be found.

Lambda-CDM proponents have the worst case of confirmation bias in the history of physics.

Oy Vey.

 

[lesliedellow]

Creationist: If Evolution is not true, then YEC must be true.

Michael: If Dark Matter does not exist, then EU nonsense must be true.

Both completely fallacious of course. It may be that dark matter is a sticking plaster on General Relativity, and that what is really needed is a new theory of gravity, but it is no secret that a new theory of quantum gravity is one of the things at the top of cosmology's agenda, for the twenty first century, in any case.

 

[Michael]

Creationist: If Evolution is not true, then YEC must be true.

Michael: If Dark Matter does not exist, then EU nonsense must be true.

Both completely fallacious of course. It may be that dark matter is a sticking plaster on General Relativity, and that what is really needed is a new theory of gravity, but it is no secret that a new theory of quantum gravity is one of the things at the top of cosmology's agenda, for the twenty first century, in any case.

EU theory stands on it's own scientific merits, and unlike LCDM theory, it's not dependent upon new forms of matter and energy.

If dark matter doesn't exist, then LCDM theory is false. Period. The problem with LCDM proponents is that there is no *logical way on Earth* to actually *falsify* their claims! It has already been demonstrated that they botched the stellar mass estimates in that 2006 "proof of dark matter" paper by a whopping factor of between 3 and 20 times, and they've struck out in the lab so many times now I've simply lost count. Every single bit of "evidence" we've found since 2006 would suggest that "dark matter" simply does not exist, nor is it *required* in the first place! The only theory in (about) the universe that *requires* "dark matter" to exist is LCDM theory. The bottom line is that if dark matter doesn't exist, then LCDM is false.

EU theory is irrelevant to the main issue.

LCDM proponents simply have a horrific case of confirmation bias. No "test" can ever actually falsify their claim, so it's an "unfalsifiable creation mythology", not an actual form of "science".

 

[Michael]

It's simply sad IMO that rather than investing in known technologies that have *already* produced tangible results in terms of solar physics and plasma physics, we instead waste *countless millions* of dollars looking for the mythical dark matter snipe.

 

[lesliedellow]

EU theory stands on it's own scientific merits, and unlike LCDM theory, it's not dependent upon new forms of matter and energy.

Whether you like it or not, there would seem to be pretty general agreement amongst astrophysicists that EU is bunkum. We are probably in a position similar to that at the end of the nineteenth century, when attempts were being made to patch up Newtonian physics. An imperfect theory will always be regarded as preferable to no theory, until a better theory comes along.

 

[Michael]

Whether you like it or not, there would seem to be pretty general agreement amongst astrophysicists that EU is bunkum.

Considering how poorly they understand EU theory in the first place, that's hardly surprising. Since when was any form of pure empirical physics "bunkum"?

We are probably in a position similar to that at the end of the nineteenth century, when attempts were being made to patch up Newtonian physics. An imperfect theory will always be regarded as preferable to no theory, until a better theory comes along.

The obvious problem with your invalid comparison is that Newtonian physics wasn't based upon 95 percent "dark magic", it produced tangible results that got us to the moon and back, and Newtonian physics has allowed us to explore our solar system.

The cost of various dark matter snipe hunts has now run into the *billions* of dollars and it's produced nothing but falsified claims/tests galore.

You're comparing empirical oranges to poisonous metaphysical apples.

 

[Michael]

An imperfect theory will always be regarded as preferable to no theory, until a better theory comes along.

IMO an honest "I don't know" is better than utterly ignoring every "failed test" of one's claims.

 

[lesliedellow]

Considering how poorly they understand EU theory in the first place, that's hardly surprising. Since when was any form of pure empirical physics "bunkum"?

Sure. They may be PhD physicists, but they couldn't even scrape an undergraduate course in electromagnetism or fluid mechanics, could they?

The obvious problem with your invalid comparison is that Newtonian physics wasn't based upon 95 percent "dark magic", it produced tangible results that got us to the moon and back, and Newtonian physics has allowed us to explore our solar system.

General Relativity isn't based upon "dark magic" either.

 

[Michael]

Sure. They may be PhD physicists, but they couldn't even scrape an undergraduate course in electromagnetism or fluid mechanics, could they?

Based upon Alfven's own statements, what they 'got' from those classes was a healthy dose of "pseudoscience", and no understanding of circuit theory as it's applied to plasma.

General Relativity isn't based upon "dark magic" either.

True, but then again the theory of General Relativity isn't dependent upon the validity of LCDM theory for it's legitimacy. Adding 95 percent "dark magic" to GR doesn't allow "dark magic theory" to ride the empirical coattails of GR theory. While LCDM *requires* GR to be valid, the reverse isn't true and you know it.

 

[lesliedellow]

Based upon Alfven's own statements, what they 'got' from those classes was a healthy dose of "pseudoscience", and no understanding of circuit theory as it's applied to plasma.

Oh, St Alfven says it, so it must be true.

True, but then again the theory of General Relativity isn't dependent upon the validity of LCDM theory for it's legitimacy. Adding 95 percent "dark magic" to GR doesn't allow "dark magic theory" to ride the empirical coattails of GR theory. While LCDM *requires* GR to be valid, the reverse isn't true and you know it.

Like Newtonian Gravity, General Relativity is only valid as an approximation - albeit a very good approximation. Physicists are not wedded to dark matter, but they regard it as the best available hypothesis which is currently available.

 

[Michael]

Oh, St Alfven says it, so it must be true.

No, because circuit theory applied to plasma works in the lab, it must be true. Funny how you folks almost *always* begin with an E field to generate "magnetic reconnection" in the lab.

Like Newtonian Gravity, General Relativity is only valid as an approximation - albeit a very good approximation. Physicists are not wedded to dark matter, but they regard it as the best available hypothesis which is currently available.

Based on the various and numerous stellar mass estimate errors that they made in 2006, the term "dark matter" was indeed a valid approximation of all the stellar mass and other plasma mass they didn't account for in 2006. So what? In no way does that "approximation" relate to anything "metaphysical" in nature!

 

[Michael]

Oh, St Alfven says it, so it must be true.

You must of course realize the irony of the fact that your own argument goes something to the effect that because: "Einstein says it, therefore it must be true, except of course for Einstein's claim that adding a non zero constant to GR was his greatest blunder, in which case St. Einstein was clearly wrong."

 

[lesliedellow]

You must of course realize the irony of the fact that your own argument goes something to the effect that because: "Einstein says it, therefore it must be true, except of course for Einstein's claim that adding a non zero constant to GR was his greatest blunder, in which case St. Einstein was clearly wrong."

Einstein added a non zero constant because he thought the universe was static, which it wasn't. The cosmological constant was reintroduced because observation made it clear that the universe was expanding at an accelerating rate.

The idea that the universe was static was not based on observation; it was simply a philosophical presupposition of scientists at the beginning of the twentieth century. A mistaken one, as it happens.

 

[Michael]

Einstein added a non zero constant because he thought the universe was static, which it wasn't. The cosmological constant was reintroduced because observation made it clear that the universe was expanding at an accelerating rate.

The idea that the universe was static was not based on observation; it was simply a philosophical presupposition of scientists at the beginning of the twentieth century. A mistaken one, as it happens.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/781/2/96/meta

Actually Hubble preferred a "static universe" solution to redshift, and indeed a static universe/tired light model passes the same sorts of difficult "tests" that an expansion model passes. The only thing that Einstein ever tried to do with that nonzero constant is keep objects 'stable', not cause that non zero constant to accelerate "space". Einstein's non zero constant could have been something as simple and as empirical as any ordinary E field. You're abusing that non zero constant in ways that Einstein never did.

 

[lesliedellow]

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/781/2/96/meta

Actually Hubble preferred a "static universe" solution to redshift, and indeed a static universe/tired light model passes the same sorts of difficult "tests" that an expansion model passes. The only thing that Einstein ever tried to do with that nonzero constant is keep objects 'stable', not cause that non zero constant to accelerate "space". Einstein's non zero constant could have been something as simple and as empirical as any ordinary E field. You're abusing that non zero constant in ways that Einstein never did.

The universe has to be expanding, contracting or static. To keep it static would have required an incredible amount of fine tuning, and that alone should have sounded a warning siren for Einstein. A few years later a putative Unified Field Theory would be rejected for that very reason.

 

[Michael]

The universe has to be expanding, contracting or static. To keep it static would have required an incredible amount of fine tuning, and that alone should have sounded a warning siren for Einstein. A few years later a putative Unified Field Theory would be rejected for that very reason.

Fine tuning? How does adding ordinary E fields to the process equate to "fine tuning"? Based on Birkeland's *empirical lab tests*, there is an E field component that *has* to be added to get solar plasma to physically do the things it does.

You're required to "fine tune" your claims with 95 percent "fine tuning" (invisible) gap filler for goodness sake! How can you *possibly* try to use that "fine tuning" argument to validate your claims?

 

[lesliedellow]

Fine tuning? How does adding ordinary E fields to the process equate to "fine tuning"? Based on Birkeland's *empirical lab tests*, there is an E field component that *has* to be added to get solar plasma to physically do the things it does.

You're required to "fine tune" your claims with 95 percent "fine tuning" (invisible) gap filler for goodness sake! How can you *possibly* try to use that "fine tuning" argument to validate your claims?

To keep the universe stable would require the cosmological constant to have an effect that was exactly equal and opposite to that of gravity. The slightest bit weaker, and the universe would contract. The slightest bit stronger, and it would expand at an accelerating rate.

Only an EUer could see the relevance of an electric field.

 

[Michael]

To keep the universe stable would require the cosmological constant to have an effect that was exactly equal and opposite to that of gravity.

Well, that's your first obvious false assumption. Gravity does a fine job explaining the basic behaviors, and stable movement patterns of our own solar system even *without* much input from any other source. All we'd need to keep it "stable" over a very long time is maybe a "tiny" bit of extra force to keep the orbits of planet stable indefinitely. The constant would in no way need to be exactly equal and/or opposite to gravity. That's *assuming* no object movement relative to each other, and such an assumption is falsified by the movements of our own planets, and the movement of our sun around a center of gravity, and the fact our galaxy itself is moving around another center of gravity related to it's local galaxy cluster.

You're making *wild* assumptions there that simply aren't valid.

Only an EUer could see the relevance of an electric field.

Ya, and anyone else really interested in solar physics and solar wind in general. Birkeland *predicted* these behaviors in a real lab, but indeed it required an E field.

 

[lesliedellow]

Well, that's your first obvious false assumption. Gravity does a fine job explaining the basic behaviors, and stable movement patterns of our own solar system even *without* much input from any other source.

The planets are accelerating towards the Sun, and it is only their lateral velocity which prevents them from ploughing into it. So whereabouts in the universe is your "sun", and where are your "planets".

 

[lesliedellow]

Ya, and anyone else really interested in solar physics and solar wind in general. Birkeland *predicted* these behaviors in a real lab, but indeed it required an E field.

Do you mean he made the astounding discovery that charged particles are accelerated in an electric field? Well, I would have thought that fact was pretty generally known. The only problem is that galaxies are not charged particles.