Quasars are the Waterloo of LCDM theory.....

[Michael]

If the slope of the segment is negative, we multiply it by −1, since we are interested only in the absolute value of the slope.

I'm having a hard time with this statement. It seems like a rather obvious way to try to circumvent the fact that the method doesn't really work well in every instance, and with only a baker's dozen worth of data points, it seems quite arbitrary. Can someone explain why this isn't an entirely arbitrary choice?

 

[SelfSim]

Hey sjastro;

From the model, the magnitude of the ratio of the slopes (in the observer's and rest frames) is empirically related to the cosmological redshift. I guess cosmological blueshift is also a possible interpretation, however this would seem to be only associated with the starting point in the curve used to interpolate the trend line?

 

[sjastro]

Hey sjastro;

From the model, the magnitude of the ratio of the slopes (in the observer's and rest frames) is empirically related to the cosmological redshift. I guess cosmological blueshift is also a possible interpretation, however this would seem to be only associated with the starting point in the curve used to interpolate the trend line?

From the equation

The definition of redshift requires that z>0 hence the quotient of the slopes (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀) >0.
The magnitude of the shift is defined by the absolute value of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).
Whether the shift is towards the red or blue part of the spectrum depends on the sign of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).

It is for this reason why only the absolute value of the slope segments are used in the calculations, as the absolute value is always positive which is consistent with expansion. Otherwise the signs of dF/dt and dF/dt₀ could differ in which case the quotient is negative which implies contraction rather than expansion.

 

[Michael]

From the equation

The definition of redshift requires that z>0 hence the quotient of the slopes (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀) >0.
The magnitude of the shift is defined by the absolute value of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).
Whether the shift is towards the red or blue part of the spectrum depends on the sign of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).

So when the technique in question erroneously suggests that the object is blueshifted, just ignore the error and flip it?

I'd sure feel a lot better about this technique if they had more than a handful of examples of it working properly.

 

[SelfSim]

From the equation

The definition of redshift requires that z>0 hence the quotient of the slopes (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀) >0.
The magnitude of the shift is defined by the absolute value of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).
Whether the shift is towards the red or blue part of the spectrum depends on the sign of (dF/dt)/(dF/dt₀).

It is for this reason why only the absolute value of the slope segments are used in the calculations, as the absolute value is always positive which is consistent with expansion. Otherwise the signs of dF/dt and dF/dt₀ could differ in which case the quotient is negative which implies contraction rather than expansion.

Ok .. thanks for that.

(Feel free to check me in any of what I say below):
I've had a another re-read of the paper. The fact that the slopes include positive values and negative values, is really neither here nor there. The authors explain these within the context of accretion disk rotation anyway (rest frame) .. which seems pretty reasonable. The point is that the +ve and -ve slopes, both occur at whatever distance the object is from us, and their overall aim is to establish a way of quantifying this distance once they've distinguished some intrinsic characteristic of quasar light curves from amongst the sample. (And then see if quasar light curves can be used as standard clocks). Your last post pointed out the theoretical framework for doing this, which demonstrates that the authors are entirely consistent within that theoretical framework.

I think your point of raising attention to this paper, is that time dilation can also be calculated once periodic events in the rest frame can be distinguished from the light curve. The logic of this statement, is embedded in the derivations from the 'first principles' of GR, (which you kindly provided). The fact that their method allows them to produce results which compare closely with currently known redshifts, also implies that similarly derived time dilations would have the same level of precision.

The overall point is that if one truly understands the deeply accurate logic (also evidenced by measurement) behind GR (Einstein's) and the implications of exact solutions to the GR equations, then the idea that 'quasars-have-no-apparent-time-dilation-is-the-Waterloo-for-LCDM-cosmology', is completely falsified as being a bogus argument by this paper!

Comments welcome.

 

[sjastro]

Ok .. thanks for that.

(Feel free to check me in any of what I say below):
I've had a another re-read of the paper. The fact that the slopes include positive values and negative values, is really neither here nor there. The authors explain these within the context of accretion disk rotation anyway (rest frame) .. which seems pretty reasonable. The point is that the +ve and -ve slopes, both occur at whatever distance the object is from us, and their overall aim is to establish a way of quantifying this distance once they've distinguished some intrinsic characteristic of quasar light curves from amongst the sample. (And then see if quasar light curves can be used as standard clocks). Your last post pointed out the theoretical framework for doing this, which demonstrates that the authors are entirely consistent within that theoretical framework.

In addition to what you stated, the rest frame is purely a theoretical construct for the obvious reason it’s not possible to measure the light curve in the Quasar’s frame of reference.
The next best thing is to take data from the observer’s frame of reference, rescale the time values by 1/(1+z), perform some coordinate transformations and multiplying the negative slopes by -1.
Note this final step has nothing to do with ignoring blueshift for the simple reason the mechanism like redshift, does not occur in a rest frame.
As you pointed out the sign and magnitude of the slopes relate to the intrinsic properties of the quasar.

In the rest frame using the absolute value of the slopes allows an increase in the number of data points available for linear regression analysis.

In the observer’s frame of reference on the other hand which is composed of real light curve data, the negative and positive slope data is included in the linear regression as redshift (and blueshift) are now mechanisms for consideration.

I think your point of raising attention to this paper, is that time dilation can also be calculated once periodic events in the rest frame can be distinguished from the light curve. The logic of this statement, is embedded in the derivations from the 'first principles' of GR, (which you kindly provided). The fact that their method allows them to produce results which compare closely with currently known redshifts, also implies that similarly derived time dilations would have the same level of precision.

The slope for the lights curves for both rest and observer frame simply indicate whether the flux values are increasing or decreasing over the time interval in question.
It is only when the quotient is calculated, cosmological redshift (or blueshift) can be determined.

For the 13 quasars the measured z value from their spectra was used when rescaling the time values to produce the rest frame light curves.
The z value for the quasar’s observer frame in question was treated as an unknown and calculated from the quotient.
This was then compared to the measured z value from its spectrum and found to be in good agreement.

What GR tells you is that the underlying mechanism for the differences in the rest and observer frames whether it is time intervals or slopes, is due to cosmological time dilation.

 

[Michael]

The slope for the lights curves for both rest and observer frame simply indicate whether the flux values are increasing or decreasing over the time interval in question.

FYI, that sounds like a more logical explanation to me than this one:

The fact that the slopes include positive values and negative values, is really neither here nor there. The authors explain these within the context of accretion disk rotation anyway (rest frame) .. which seems pretty reasonable.

I would think that movement related to the accretion disk rotation would simply skew the results but the increasing/decreasing flux aspect makes sense.

What GR tells you is that the underlying mechanism for the differences in the rest and observer frames whether it is time intervals or slopes, is due to cosmological time dilation.

That's *one possible* interpretation, and ordinary signal broadening would be the other (tired light) explanation. It would suggest that there is a consistent ratio of redshift vs. signal broadening, assuming that this technique holds up to scrutiny, but tired light authors assume that's the case with respect to SN1A events already.

I must say that I'm impressed with the paper. I've read it a couple of times now and while the test set is *very* small, it's hard to argue with the results. It would be very interesting to see if this technique works well for larger redshifts and larger sample sizes. It's a good paper.

 

[SelfSim]

That's *one possible* interpretation, and ordinary signal broadening would be the other (tired light) explanation.

Prove it!

It would suggest that there is a consistent ratio of redshift vs. signal broadening,

Huh? Demonstrate it!

 

[Michael]

Prove it!
Huh? Demonstrate it!

20th Natural Philosophy Alliance Proceedings

[astro-ph/0602500] Magnitude-Redshift Relation for SNe Ia, Time Dilation, and Plasma Redshift

 

[SelfSim]

Yet again Michael contradicts himself .. his suggestion of “signal broadening” as a substitute for time dilation implies some physical mechanism but both of the papers he cites, consider time dilation as being a result of a statistical, (or sampling), issue. :

- In the Holushko paper, time dilation is a sigma issue .. the larger the distance, the greater the uncertainty in the light curve widths;

- In the Brynjolfsson paper, time dilation is the result of a Malmquist (or selection) bias, which can be eliminated by applying a correction to the absolute magnitudes in the light curves.

So Michael; can you please explain the redshift of gravitational waves using your beloved scattering theory?

 

[lesliedellow]

The end of the world is nigh! The end of the world is nigh!

The end of LCDM is nigh! The end of LCDM is nigh!

 

[Michael]

The end of the world is nigh! The end of the world is nigh!

The end of LCDM is nigh! The end of LCDM is nigh!

Since 95 percent of it is nothing but placeholder terms for human ignorance, and the rest is mostly pseudoscience, it definitely can't last forever.

 

[Michael]

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171206131946.htm

A team of astronomers, including two from MIT, has detected the most distant supermassive black hole ever observed. The black hole sits in the center of an ultrabright quasar, the light of which was emitted just 690 million years after the Big Bang.

So how did this black hole get so big so fast?

The black hole is measured to be about 800 million times as massive as our sun -- a Goliath by modern-day standards and a relative anomaly in the early universe.

"This is the only object we have observed from this era," says Robert Simcoe, the Francis L. Friedman Professor of Physics in MIT's Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research. "It has an extremely high mass, and yet the universe is so young that this thing shouldn't exist. The universe was just not old enough to make a black hole that big. It's very puzzling."

Puzzling indeed. It's amazing how many observations simply defy LCDM theory.

 

[Michael]

I really have to wonder how LCDM survives when it fails so badly in the lab, and it fails so many other observational tests of it's 'predictions'. LCDM proponents tend to slam EU/PC models over a perceived lack of mathematical support, but when their own model fails their own mathematical tests and modeling tests, they simply ignore the problem and act as though nothing is wrong. What's the point of having mathematical models if they can't ever be used to falsify the model, and they're mostly based on metaphysical constructs in the first place?

The big bang model has been changed almost continuously since I was a kid, and it *still* fails important predictive tests like these on a regular basis.

The 'dark matter' component is one of the few parts of the LCDM model that can even be tested in the lab, and it's been a dismal failure. Billions spent. Nothing found.

The 'evolutionary' aspects of LCDM seem to be entirely incapable of predicting what we observe at the highest redshifts. High redshift galaxies are found to be more 'mature' than they're supposed to be. We observe H-alpha lines from galaxies that should be obscured from us prior to the re-ionization phase predictions. Now we're finding supermassive black holes/quasars further back in time than the LCDM model ever predicted them to exist.

 

[Michael]

This last observation really does defy all the core tenets of the big bang model. Way back when I was in college, they used to suggest that it took upwards a billion years for the first stars to form into actual galaxies. That figure has steadily been moved downwards since that time based on observations that didn't jive with those early 'predictions'. The mainstream's models really just don't allow for such massive objects to have already formed in the early universe. When you watch TV shows on the topic of early black holes, they're essentially "grasping at straws" to try to come up with an explanation of such massive objects long before they should have formed based on their computer models. The amount of mental gymnastics required to explain such massive objects is problematic to say the least.

If however the universe is infinite and eternal, such distant observations are simply 'normal' and typical. We *should* expect to see massive objects at large distances and we should see mature galaxies at large distances in a static universe.

This all comes back to the real empirical 'cause' of photon redshift. If redshift is simply caused by inelastic scattering and momentum loss over distance, then the universe isn't expanding, and it could be infinite and eternal. In such a scenario, all these high z redshift observations are entirely consistent with what we would 'predict' from a static universe. On the other hand, such observations are simply not very congruent with the LCMD computer models and they don't make a lot of sense in a big bang scenario.

I really think that the mainstream needs to go back to the drawing board and revisit Edwin Hubble's *second* proposed suggestion to explain photon redshift and revisit the "tired light' explanations that have been around since the time of Zwicky. Not only would inelastic scattering/tired light tend to explain such "mature" features in the distant universe, it would also tend to explain why we keep underestimating the mass of distant galaxies. Some of the light is simply being scattered and lost to the plasma medium, and therefore all mass estimates based on light/brightness are bound to be pretty unreliable, and bound to be influenced by the density of the spacetime medium in various directions. Not only does the concept of dark energy become irrelevant in a tired light universe, the concept of exotic matter also becomes irrelevant. All the key "mysteries" of astronomy start to make sense again, and the need for exotic forms of matter and energy fall to the wayside.

I really do think that the mainstream "jumped the gun" by assuming that "space" does metaphysical expansion tricks. There's really no evidence of that happening in actual lab experiments, whereas loss of photon momentum to the plasma medium is something that we regularly observe in the lab.

LCDM theory just doesn't seem to jive very well with large redshift observations, and it doesn't really 'explain' much in the first place since most of that theory is utlimately based upon placeholder terms for human ignorance. What is there to lose then by starting over and starting with a tired light solution to photon redshift?

 

[RealityCheck01]

https://phys.org/news/2010-04-discovery-quasars-dont-dilation-mystifies.html

It is a lie that quasrs are the "Waterloo of LCDM" because that article list explanations

This quasar conundrum doesn’t seem to have an obvious explanation, although Hawkins has a few ideas. For some background, quasars are extreme objects in many ways: they are the most luminous and energetic objects known in the universe, and also one of the most distant (and thus, oldest) known objects. Officially called “quasi-stellar radio sources,” quasars are dense regions surrounding the central supermassive black holes in the centers of massive galaxies. They feed off an accretion disc that surrounds each black hole, which powers the quasars’ extreme luminosity and makes them visible to Earth.

One of Hawkins’ possible explanations for quasars’ lack of time dilation is that light from the quasars is being bent by black holes scattered throughout the universe. These black holes, which may have formed shortly after the big bang, would have a gravitational distortion that affects the time dilation of distant quasars. However, this idea of “gravitational microlensing” is a controversial suggestion, as it requires that there be enough black holes to account for all of the universe’s dark matter. As Hawkins explains, most physicists predict that dark matter consists of undiscovered subatomic particles rather than primordial black holes.

There’s also a possibility that the explanation could be even more far-reaching, such as that the universe is not expanding and that the big bang theory is wrong. Or, quasars may not be located at the distances indicated by their redshifts, although this suggestion has previously been discredited. Although these explanations are controversial, Hawkins plans to continue investigating the quasar mystery, and maybe solve a few other problems along the way.

Hawkins is prompting his pet dark matter = primordial black holes idea.
The last is unlikely because of the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe: What is the evidence for the Big Bang?
A likely explanation is that the growth of the supermassive black hole powering a quasar hides the time dilation.

This is also a paper from 2010 and not cited much over the last 8 years so no one thinks that this is a "Waterloo" paper. Research suggests that there has been no other quasar time dilation analysis.

 

[Michael]

It is a lie that quasrs are the "Waterloo of LCDM" because that article list explanations

What "explanations"? Here's what it says about his so called "explanation"

However, this idea of “gravitational microlensing” is a controversial suggestion, as it requires that there be enough black holes to account for all of the universe’s dark matter.

Are you claiming now that *all* dark matter is found in black holes, yes or no?

He also suggests this:

There’s also a possibility that the explanation could be even more far-reaching, such as that the universe is not expanding and that the big bang theory is wrong.

That's my favorite explanation alright.

Hawkins is prompting his pet dark matter = primordial black holes idea.

So what?

The last is unlikely because of the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe: What is the evidence for the Big Bang?
A likely explanation is that the growth of the supermassive black hole powering a quasar hides the time dilation.

Agreed. It's more likely that your whole big bang claim is utter nonsense.

This is also a paper from 2010 and not cited much over the last 8 years so no one thinks that this is a "Waterloo" paper. Research suggests that there has been no other quasar time dilation analysis.

Ya, but in 8 years nobody has really published a paper that refutes it either.

 

[RealityCheck01]

What "explanations"? ....

9 March 2018 Michael: It remains a lie that there are no explanations (even if they are controversial, etc.)

The article has at the end "There’s also a possibility that the explanation could be even more far-reaching, such as that the universe is not expanding and that the big bang theory is wrong." and I wrote

The last is unlikely because of the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe: What is the evidence for the Big Bang?
A likely explanation is that the growth of the supermassive black hole powering a quasar hides the time dilation.

And you relied:

Agreed. It's more likely that your whole big bang claim is utter nonsense.

So we have:
9 March 2018 Michael: An "Agreed" fantasy since I did not write that the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe is "utter nonsense".
There is overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe: What is the evidence for the Big Bang? ! Thus the possibility of the universe not expanding is unlikely.

 

[Michael]

9 March 2018 Michael: It remains a lie that there are no explanations (even if they are controversial, etc.)

Handwaving in a *new* supernatural construct isn't an "explanation", it's an ad-hoc handwave. Admitting that your model is wrong (which he suggested could be the case) might be considered an 'explanation'. I'll buy that option as an "explanation", but making up more dark invisible friends on the fly isn't an "explanation", it's a ad-hoc handwave.

The article has at the end "There’s also a possibility that the explanation could be even more far-reaching, such as that the universe is not expanding and that the big bang theory is wrong." and I wrote

And you relied:

I replied that this was the *only* actual "explanation' offered that made any sense at all.

So we have:
9 March 2018 Michael: An "Agreed" fantasy since I did not write that the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe is "utter nonsense".

Huh? I didn't claim that you did. You're totally delusional at this point.

There is overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe: What is the evidence for the Big Bang? ! Thus the possibility of the universe not expanding is unlikely.

There is *zero* empirical evidence that "space expansion" is a real empirical cause of reshift, and there are *tons* of experiments showing a cause/effect link between inelastic scattering and photons redshift.

It's therefore highly *unlikely* that the universe is 'expanding' and highly likely that it's static.

 

[RealityCheck01]

9 March 2018 Michael: It remains a lie that there are no explanations (even if they are controversial, etc.) (emphasized the part of the assertion that is a lie).

21 March 2018: An obvious lie that there is no empirical evidence when I cited empirical evidence for the Big Bing.
What is the evidence for the Big Bang? !

He needs to read 9 March 2018 Michael: An "Agreed" fantasy since I did not write that the overwhelming evidence for an expanding universe is "utter nonsense".
Or an "Agreed" lie if he is agreeing "A likely explanation is that the growth of the supermassive black hole powering a quasar hides the time dilation" but denying the expansion of the universe causing the time dilation that is hidden.