Model of the Universe

I have started a new project on Kickstarter, to spread models of the Universe. You've seen globes and models of the Moon, planets and solar system. For the cost of a latte, you will have a downloadable model of the entire Universe sitting on your desktop! The model also includes the stars and constellations of the hemisphere. Any proceeds will go toward publication costs and registration at an international conference I'm invited to. Check it out and tell all your friends!

Peace Wins Over Darkness

Back in October, Darkness Can Not Drive Out Darkness, this blog pointed to the three women who shared this year's Nobel Peace Prize. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Leymah Gbowee and Tawakkol Karman bring more light to the world than "dark energy." In Sunday's New York Times they were hailed again:

"In a ceremony in Oslo that repeatedly invoked gender equality and the democratic strivings of the Arab Spring, the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize was presented to three female activists and political leaders on Saturday for 'their nonviolent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights' as peacemakers."

Sunday's Times contained no mention of the three men who divided up the Physics Prize. Perhaps claiming discovery of "dark energy" does not interest the Times writers anymore. Hint: try rewarding a woman from a challenging background. Only two women have been given the Physics Prize--Marie Curie in 1903 and Maria Goeppert Mayer in 1963. The day she wins the Physics prize will easily make the front page.

UPDATE: Nick Suntzeff, co-founder of the High-Z supernova search, quoted in Eric Berger's Houston Chronicle blog:

"This must be perhaps the only Nobel Prize ever awarded for a discovery for which we have no explanation, not even an inkling of one."

Higher Authority

Here is someone who has revolutionized science, was selfless in pursuit of the truth, overcame skepticism and outright prejudice, while maintaining a child's wonder about the universe. Rather than just learn equations from a book, this scientist thought up new equations! The statue of Albert Einstein sits in front of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington.

The sculptor, Robert Berks, gave Einstein a notebook with three of his famous equations.

E=mc^2

The most famous Einstein equation, equating energy with mass. It was published as a quick addendum to one of his 1905 papers. Einstein published 4 revolutionary papers in a short time. The world took years to realize their significance. Today E=mc^2 is ubiquitous, even to those who don't understand what it means.

eV = h $\nu$ - A

The photoelectric effect, which Einstein explained using quantum mechanics. This probably got the attention of Annalen der Physik editor Max Planck, one of the founders of quantum mechanics. There was no system of "peer review" in 1905; publication of papers was solely the decision of editors like Planck. If not for Planck, Einstein might have waited indefinitely to be published. Einstein's solution to the photoelectric effect was the official reason for his 1921 Nobel Prize, for even in 1921 Relativity was controversial.

Ruv-½guvR=-κTuv

The Einstein equation for gravitation, part of his General Theory of Relativity published in 1915. General Relativity predicted that gravity is actually a curvature of Space/Time. Einstein tried to apply this curvature to the entire universe, imagining it as a sphere of four dimensions rather than 3. We move in the 3-D surface of the sphere. Photons travel like satellites in orbit around the sphere with velocity c.

Einstein realized that the gravity which causes Space to be curved into a sphere would also cause it to collapse, unless it were expanding. Einstein could have predicted an expanding universe, which would have been one of history's great scientific predictions. Certainly the prediction would have been ridiculed at first. 15 years later Edwin Hubble's observations would show that the universe was indeed expanding.

To support his spherical Space/Time, Einstein added a repulsive "cosmological constant" to the equation. When Hubble showed that the universe was expanding, Einstein removed the constant. Later Einstein would call the CC his greatest blunder. Recently it has been fashionable to add the repulsive constant again. So far, Einstein has still not been convinced. His notebook shows that there is no cosmological constant.

We can learn a lot from Einstein. The very formulation of original equations is proof of his unusual mind. Finding equations that made testable predictions made Einstein even more special. We learn that even Nobel Prize winners make blunders. The inclusion of a cosmological constant also hides another prediction, that the speed of light c is not always constant.

NEXT: We visit another Nobel Prize Winner.

Austin

The way to Washington has a detour to Austin, Capitol of Texas. Austin is also well known for its lively music and arts scene. Near 6th Street you can see the home of author O. Henry. In late August Austin hosted the Armadillo Con science fiction convention. The weekend of September 24-25 6th Street was cordoned off for the Pecan Street Festival, full of live entertainment. That same week Austin hosted the joint annual meeting of the National Society of Hispanic Physicists (NSHP) and National Society of Black Physicists (NSBP). All things change with time, and the growing size of this meeting is a sign of positive change.

At Thursday's dinner the speaker was physicist Stephen Weinberg. As many respected scientists do today, he railed about the mystery of an "accelerating" universe. He lamented cancellation of the Superconducting Supercollider in the 1990's and in the same breath condemned the International Space Station. With all due respect to Dr. Weinberg, experiments on the Moon and ISS may end up solving his "dark" mystery. The answer to the accelerating puzzle may not be in dark, but in light.

Weinberg's textbook on Relativity, which nearly every graduate student must study, takes great liberties with Einstein theory. He completely omits the i factor for time, which is a key to considering Space/Time as one entity. Weinberg completely ignores the possibilities in c, the speed of light. In his book he repeats an absurdity: h = c =1. The Planck value and c are definitely not equal to 1, and this may have led a generation of physicists down a dark path. If c were constant, the only way to explain supernova redshifts is by conjuring "dark" energies.

On Friday night we heard from Astronaut Pier Sellers, who devoted much of his career to assembling ISS. He brought some more NASA video showing Space missions. As astronauts tend to be, Pier was upbeat about space stations and the future. The scientific output from ISS is just beginning. We would happily share a spacecraft with Pier.

The Whole Pie

The year's Nobel Prize for Physics is divided like a pie among three males who will receive 50, 25 and 25 percent of the loot. However the Chemistry Prize has rightly been awarded to one person, Dr. Daniel Schechtman. He discovered quasicrystals, a new form of crystalline matter in 1982. Dr. Schechtman, 70, has waited 29 years for his prize.

At one time scientists thought that crystals only formed in repeating patterns. The quasicrystals found by Schechtman formed mathematical patterns that never repeated. Their electrons would form in patterns of 10, a symnetry never seen before. Viewed from other directions, the crystals would exhibit fivefold symnetry. Such formations were counter to everything known to science.

Dr. Schechtman's results faced great challenges in being accepted. At first Schechtman was handed a crystallography textbook and told to reread it. Later Schechtman was asked to leave his research group. After being rejected by one journal, Schechtman's paper was published two years later by Physical Review Letters. No less a figure than Linus Pauling, who already had a Nobel Prize, denounced Schechtman. Finally 3 other scientists were convinced enough to confirm Schechtman's discovery.

Dr. Daniel Schechtman discovered a new form of crystal that had been completely overlooked by other scientists. Quasicrystals formed in patterns that were thought to be impossible. At first Schechtman was not believed, and had difficulty even being published. Few scientists believed him at first. Finally, nearly 30 years later, Schechtman has received his prize.

Eyes On the Nobel Prize

Despite evidence to the contrary, the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics will be shared by 3 scientists who claimed to have discovered an "accelerating universe." They found evidence for acceleration in redshifts of distant Type Ia supernovae. Somehow science seems to have overlooked what a child might ask: what if the universe isn't accelerating but light slows down?

Next they want a Space-based experiment, once called JDEM but now called WFIRST. Such a mission could not launch until at least 7 years after the James Webb Space Telescope, 2025 at the earliest. The cost of WFIRST would be more than 1000 Nobel Prizes. Long before WFIRST or anything like it launches, there will be evidence that light slows. With all the alternatives to an accelerating universe, this prize might be premature.

Neutrinos Pass Through LIght Barrier

Neutrinos are shadowy particles that can pass right through the Earth. For a long time they were thought to be massless, now scientists know that neutrinos have a tiny mass. Neutrinos were found in three flavors: electron, muon and tau. Recently neutrinos were found to change from one flavor to another. These discoveries were not part of the Standard model of particle Physics.

CERN is known for the giant Large Hadron Collider. Built to discover the theorized Higgs boson, LHC has so far failed to find the Higgs. Scientists are beginning to doubt that the Higgs exists at all. If the Higgs boson is not found, the Standard model will be in jeopardy. Other experiments at CERN may be just as important for Physics.

Today researchers from CERN will announce that neutrinos can travel faster than light. From Nature.com:

Particles Break Light Speed Limit

The OPERA detector is located 1400 meters underground and 730 km from CERN. OPERA is designed to detect neutrinos emanating from CERN experiments. By timing neutrino travel over this baseline, researchers can say with confidence that they have exceeded the speed of light. For a long time that speed was considered an inviolable constant. As followers of this blog know, c is slowing down. All things change with time, and someday a constant speed of light will be seen as just a stipulation.

The Peasants Are Revolting

Across the globe, from Tripoli to Texas, people are protesting their national governments. Often these regimes are composed of an elite few who have lost touch with reality. They try to stay in power by controlling what the press is allowed to publish. In this way they can set terms of debate, and marginalize dissent. Despite their attempts to stay in power, regimes are being swept away.

In the science world, there is growing resistance to the idea of "dark energy." In turn, DE has led to doubts and confusion about dark matter. A former string theorist, now exiled to China, writes in Alpha Meme:

"The public repulsion against dark matter and dark energy is really annoying. Rob Knop at scientopia compares it to 17th century catholic church mentality; Ethan picks it up and bangs the dark matter explains everything drum although dark matter does not fit very well to galaxy rotation curves – Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) fits much better:"

The "dark energy" link to Wikipedia clearly states that DE is a "hypothetical" form if energy. The link from a former member of the Supernova Cosmology Project, one group which claimed to discover DE, is equally dismissive of the public. He now blogs from Squamish, British Columbia:

"I am regularly struck, when giving public outreach talks, or when hearing the topic of Dark Matter discussed amongst the general non-Astronomer public, at the separation between acceptance of Dark Matter between astronomers and the general (informed) public. (The general public at large probably doesn't have enough of a clue about Dark Matter even to have a wrong opinion, alas!)"

Remarks like this will alienate the public which funds science. In turn this will lead to more ridicule for "dark energy" and its advocates. The idea of a repulsive energy has been very bad for science. When will the scientists admit that the Emperor has no clothes? A simple expression like GM=tc^3 shines light on these dark mysteries.

Higgs To Be Confirmed, Or Not

A headline in Christian Science Monitor confidently states:

The God Particle Existence To Be Confirmed by 2012

This refers to the elusive Higgs Boson, whose existence is predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics. The term "God Particle" was coined by physicist Leon Lederman in the 1990's while seeking funding for the Superconducting Supercollider. When that project was cancelled by the Clinton administration, it was a huge setback for US science. Physicists had to find work in other fields, like cosmology.

Since SSC was cancelled, the Large Hadron Collider has been built in Europe. Though the headline predicts a discovery, so far LHC has found no Higgs. The phase space it could inhabit has grown smaller. By 2012 LHC may have found no Higgs at all.

In big ticket projects, there is a great danger of overconfidence. Scientists must justify their funding by predicting what they will discover. Gravity Probe B was designed to find evidence of relativistic frame dragging. Though the data proved difficult to separate fr noise, Grav Probe 's operators concluded that they had confirmed relativity. There is great pressure to skew the results toward a preselected discovery.

Since the SSC was cancelled, many physicists moved into studies of the Universe. In the late 1990's they claimed discovery of a repulsive "dark energy" causing the universe to accelerate. Following the habits of Physics, they developed a "standard model" for cosmology. Results of other experiments, such as WMAP, were interpreted as confirming the model. As in the Higgs search, there is great danger of overconfidence. Future experiments may confirm that "standard models" are wrong.