Starship Asterisk*

rstevenson wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:Excellent points Ann. Hubble's discovery of the expansion of the universe, and then the discovery of the acceleration of that expansion that you mention where two of the biggest, most mind blowing discoveries of the last century. Both have forced changes in mainstream astronomical thinking.
Bruce

No force was required, Bruce. Hard work was done by highly-qualified professionals; an interesting and unexpected result was obtained; other professionals sat up and took notice (and no doubt got out their calculators to check the work); and fairly soon a new consensus was reached and accepted. Scientists like new results; they don't need to be forced into accepting them, just convinced through the peer review process.

Science is not (usually) a contest of wills, not in this day and age. I think we may sometimes over-emphasize the struggles of scientists in days of yore, when the church ruled. It's not like that today, but today's way of working is not (usually) very exciting, so the old stories remain current.

Rob

BDanielMayfield wrote:

Ann wrote:When Riess at al. and Perlmutter et al. searched for distant supernovas to find clues about the evolution of the universe, they were really trying to find out how much the universe was decelerating. When the two teams announced that based on their research the universe apparently wasn't decelerating at all, but instead accelerating, the astronomical community was gobsmacked. That was in 1998, fairly recently.

But of course, the teams that carried out the supernova research were made up of scientists, and and the soundness of their hypothesis, methods and conclusions was peer-reviewed.

Ann

Excellent points Ann. Hubble's discovery of the expansion of the universe, and then the discovery of the acceleration of that expansion that you mention where two of the biggest, most mind blowing discoveries of the last century. Both have forced changes in mainstream astronomical thinking.

BDanielMayfield wrote:Excellent points Ann. Hubble's discovery of the expansion of the universe, and then the discovery of the acceleration of that expansion that you mention where two of the biggest, most mind blowing discoveries of the last century. Both have forced changes in mainstream astronomical thinking.
Bruce

Ann wrote:When Riess at al. and Perlmutter et al. searched for distant supernovas to find clues about the evolution of the universe, they were really trying to find out how much the universe was decelerating. When the two teams announced that based on their research the universe apparently wasn't decelerating at all, but instead accelerating, the astronomical community was gobsmacked. That was in 1998, fairly recently.

But of course, the teams that carried out the supernova research were made up of scientists, and and the soundness of their hypothesis, methods and conclusions was peer-reviewed.

Ann

MarkBour wrote:

Chris Peterson wrote:No. Appeal to authority is only a fallacy when the authority has no authority. A person qualified to have a non-mainstream view about some aspect of science where there actually is a consensus will almost certainly be an active researcher with a peer-reviewed publication history in that subject.

Unless your name is Albert and it is 1904. :D

tomatoherd wrote:So...there's a doppler shift on the side of the galaxy moving away from us and a blue shift on side towards us? And a big enough difference to measure? why have there been no APODs showing that? Is it so tiny it's not a visually demonstrable thing for a photo-based site? Is is just mathematical figures???

• I learned a few things from this one: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap161024.html
• One perhaps has to go a ways back to find other specific treatment of the topic. A classic would be: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap010510.html
• There is also: https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap970430.html

Chris Peterson wrote:No. Appeal to authority is only a fallacy when the authority has no authority. A person qualified to have a non-mainstream view about some aspect of science where there actually is a consensus will almost certainly be an active researcher with a peer-reviewed publication history in that subject.

Chris Peterson wrote:I get the sense you think I'm attacking you. I'm not.

I can not think of any example in modern science where a consensus view was overturned by somebody who was not a specialist in the subject. Can you? (It's also very rare for consensus views to get overturned at all... a separate issue.)

BDanielMayfield wrote:

Chris Peterson wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:
Classic deflection. Ignore the argument (especially if it's true), just assail the qualifications of the one making the argument.

No. Appeal to authority is only a fallacy when the authority has no authority. A person qualified to have a non-mainstream view about some aspect of science where there actually is a consensus will almost certainly be an active researcher with a peer-reviewed publication history in that subject.

Note that in this exchange I haven't even brought up any particular non-mainstream view, I've merely dared to point out that mainstream views are subject to change as new data comes in. The mainstream view once was that everything revolved around the Earth; the invention of the telescope proved that wasn't the case. New tools could alter understandings in the future as well. One doesn't need to be a rocket (or any other type of) scientist to hold this valid opinion.

BDanielMayfield wrote:

neufer wrote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence wrote:
<<The spiral of silence theory stipulates that individuals have a fear of isolation, which results from the idea that a social group or the society in general might isolate, neglect, or exclude members due to the members' opinions. This fear of isolation consequently leads to remaining silent instead of voicing opinions. The spiral of silence theory suggests that "people who have believed that they hold a minority viewpoint on a public issue will remain in the background where their communication will be restrained; those who believe that they hold a majority viewpoint will be more encouraged to speak.">>

I'm glad I didn't fall into that spiral. If no one ever dares to raise minority opinions discussion wanes and interest fades. Also, advancement can be stalled. Remember, haven't all current majority views started out as minority ideas?

Alexander von Humboldt wrote:

• “There are three stages of scientific discovery:
  • first people deny it is true;
    then they deny it is important;
    finally they credit the wrong person.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Croll wrote:

---

<<James Croll (2 January 1821 – 15 December 1890) was born in 1821 on the farm of Little Whitefield in Perthshire, Scotland. He was largely self-educated. In 1859, he became a janitor at the museum of the Andersonian University in Glasgow. He was able to use the university library to get access to books, and taught himself physics and astronomy to develop his ideas.

From 1864, Croll corresponded with Sir Charles Lyell, on links between ice ages and variations in the Earth's orbit. This led to a position in the Edinburgh office of the Geological Survey of Scotland, as keeper of maps and correspondence, where the director, Sir Archibald Geikie, encouraged his research. He published a number of books and papers which "were at the forefront of contemporary science", including Climate and Time, in Their Geological Relations in 1875. He corresponded with Charles Darwin on erosion by rivers.

Croll was the leading proponent of an astronomical theory of climate change in the nineteenth century. Using formulae for orbital variations developed by Urbain Le Verrier (which had led to the discovery of Neptune), Croll developed a theory of the effects of variations of the Earth's orbit on climate cycles. His idea was that decreases in winter sunlight would favour snow accumulation, and for the first time coupled this to the idea of a positive ice-albedo feedback to amplify the solar variations. Croll further argued that the accumulation of snow would change the pattern of trade winds, leading to the deflection of warming currents like the Gulf Stream, and finally a self-sustaining ice age. He suggested that when orbital eccentricity is high, then winters will tend to be colder when the Earth is farther from the sun in that season and hence, that during periods of high orbital eccentricity, ice ages occur on 22,000-year cycles in each hemisphere, and alternate between southern and northern hemispheres, lasting approximately 10,000 years each.

Croll's theory predicted multiple ice ages, asynchronous in northern and southern hemispheres, and that the last ice ages should have ended about 80,000 years ago. Evidence was just then emerging of multiple ice ages, and geologists were interested in a theory to explain this. Geologists were not then able to date sediments accurately enough to determine if glaciation was synchronous between the hemispheres, though the limited evidence more pointed towards synchronicity than not. More crucially, estimates of the recession rate of the Niagara Falls indicated that the last ice age ended 6,000 to 35,000 years ago – a large range, but enough to rule out Croll's theory, to those who accepted the measurements.

Croll's work was widely discussed, but by the end of the 19th century, his theory was generally disbelieved. However, the basic idea of orbitally-forced insolation variations influencing terrestrial temperatures – now known generally as Milankovitch cycles – was further developed by the Serbian civil engineer Milutin Milankovitch (28 May 1879 – 12 December 1958) and eventually, in modified form, triumphed in 1976.>>

Chris Peterson wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:

Chris Peterson wrote: The distinction in science is that we reasonably expect those with minority views to actually be qualified to have those views.

Classic deflection. Ignore the argument (especially if it's true), just assail the qualifications of the one making the argument.

No. Appeal to authority is only a fallacy when the authority has no authority. A person qualified to have a non-mainstream view about some aspect of science where there actually is a consensus will almost certainly be an active researcher with a peer-reviewed publication history in that subject.

Guest wrote:

Chris Peterson wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:If no one ever dares to raise minority opinions discussion wanes and interest fades. Also, advancement can be stalled. Remember, haven't all current majority views started out as minority ideas?

The distinction in science is that we reasonably expect those with minority views to actually be qualified to have those views.

Classic deflection. Ignore the argument (especially if it's true), just assail the qualifications of the one making the argument.

Chris Peterson wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:If no one ever dares to raise minority opinions discussion wanes and interest fades. Also, advancement can be stalled. Remember, haven't all current majority views started out as minority ideas?

The distinction in science is that we reasonably expect those with minority views to actually be qualified to have those views.

BDanielMayfield wrote:

neufer wrote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence wrote: <<The spiral of silence theory stipulates that individuals have a fear of isolation, which results from the idea that a social group or the society in general might isolate, neglect, or exclude members due to the members' opinions. This fear of isolation consequently leads to remaining silent instead of voicing opinions. The spiral of silence theory suggests that "people who have believed that they hold a minority viewpoint on a public issue will remain in the background where their communication will be restrained; those who believe that they hold a majority viewpoint will be more encouraged to speak.">>

I'm glad I didn't fall into that spiral. If no one ever dares to raise minority opinions discussion wanes and interest fades. Also, advancement can be stalled. Remember, haven't all current majority views started out as minority ideas?

neufer wrote:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence wrote: <<The spiral of silence theory stipulates that individuals have a fear of isolation, which results from the idea that a social group or the society in general might isolate, neglect, or exclude members due to the members' opinions. This fear of isolation consequently leads to remaining silent instead of voicing opinions. The spiral of silence theory suggests that "people who have believed that they hold a minority viewpoint on a public issue will remain in the background where their communication will be restrained; those who believe that they hold a majority viewpoint will be more encouraged to speak.">>

tomatoherd wrote:

Chris Peterson wrote:

tomatoherd wrote:Chris:
and by "constant" you mean radially constant, with the periphery moving almost as fast as the inner matter, unlike our solar system???

Yes.

So in other words, moving in a non-Keplerian, non-Newtonian way for the observed visible, calculated mass, hence the "necessity" for unseen mass, aka dark matter. correct?

(covering old ground, i'm sure)

Chris Peterson wrote:

tomatoherd wrote:Chris:
and by "constant" you mean radially constant, with the periphery moving almost as fast as the inner matter, unlike our solar system???

Yes.

sillyworm wrote:If we calculated the positions of these 3 Galaxies if we could view them as they would appear today(in their location)...how close would they be now? Would they be in the process of merging?

tomatoherd wrote:Chris:
and by "constant" you mean radially constant, with the periphery moving almost as fast as the inner matter, unlike our solar system???