by Psnarf » Wed May 15, 2013 3:04 pm
Thank you for the additional information, of which I was unaware, Ensign NGC3314. Just trying to help keep Dr. Nemiroff within the bounds of scientific certainty. The Sloan Survey site also avoids the deduction that the null hypothesis is false.
"These new discoveries add weight to a picture in which galaxies like the Milky Way are built up from the merging and accretion of smaller galaxies." -From the "Field of Streams" site. Yes, the evidence appears to be growing that the proposition which implies that there is no relationship between the existence of measurable trails and galactic accretion is false, yet there may yet be other explanations for the data. If the jury is still out, we cannot proclaim that galactic accretion is the only explanation for what the data implies.
Aside: the vast distances between identifiable objects in both galaxies makes it unlikely that any stars collide as they pass by, but what about the central black hole? The source of the gravitational attraction between two galaxies doesn't appear to be the stars, but their central cores. Wouldn't the distance between the cores of the Andromeda Galaxy and the Milky Way, for example, vary as a decaying sinusoidal dance until they eventually joined when they got close enough?
Thank you for the additional information, of which I was unaware, Ensign NGC3314. Just trying to help keep Dr. Nemiroff within the bounds of scientific certainty. The Sloan Survey site also avoids the deduction that the null hypothesis is false.
"These new discoveries add weight to a picture in which galaxies like the Milky Way are built up from the merging and accretion of smaller galaxies." -From the "Field of Streams" site. Yes, the evidence appears to be growing that the proposition which implies that there is no relationship between the existence of measurable trails and galactic accretion is false, yet there may yet be other explanations for the data. If the jury is still out, we cannot proclaim that galactic accretion is the only explanation for what the data implies.
Aside: the vast distances between identifiable objects in both galaxies makes it unlikely that any stars collide as they pass by, but what about the central black hole? The source of the gravitational attraction between two galaxies doesn't appear to be the stars, but their central cores. Wouldn't the distance between the cores of the Andromeda Galaxy and the Milky Way, for example, vary as a decaying sinusoidal dance until they eventually joined when they got close enough?