[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by C1ay

No winner this time, please try again.

You make a statement as a fact even though no one can observe the universe from the outside an never will. Any curvature of spacetime within would not require it to have a particular shape anyhow.

Based on the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) many theorize the shape as a soccer ball. What makes your theory any more certain than theirs?

Good points C1ay,

There is no outside the universe. If you are referring to outside the visible universe that is something else. Indeed we would have to extrapolate to predict what an observer there would see. So here is the extrapolation. Observers outside our visible universe too, geometrically, would see a hyperbolic universe if redshift z were to be used as a guide: not for velocity, but for the metric structure of spacetime. If they were well versed in general relativity, they could deduce that what they saw was only a relative effect on light as it would be seen at great distances. They too would know that any observer, no matter the restframe, would see redshift increasing with distance.

The curvature of the universe is apparent from the point of view of any observer. That observer could be located in the Milky Way, at the visible horizon, or anywhere in between.

It's funny, the Doppler interpretation is usually taken as a fact and few complain. Also, I am writing about an theory, so I use affirmative style. It's less complicated than writing "there is a possibility that..." or "consider the likely scenario that..." in the beginning of each sentence. It is very common practice to simply write what the theory states. Plus, it is clear enough when I write that the curvature interpretation needs to be explored further.

The big bang, supposedly located beyond the horizon is an extrapolation as well. A huge extrapolation. Not only does it extrapolated back in time to a point (at the beginning), but it extrapolates physics as well. Starting from know physics, all the way back to no physics (or new physics).

The redshift observation is not theory-based in this sense. Whether it's a Doppler interpretation or a spacetime curvature interpretation, observers always see the same thing regardless of their location.

Certainly what is theory-based is the history and future development of a universe that is either expanding or not.

The curvature approach has no break-down of natural laws.

Riemannian spaces are distinguished by a ‘positive’ definite quadratic differential form that describes the square of the distance between two adjacent points: each of these little neighborhoods has the metric of Euclidean space, however, these segments may be ‘sutured’ together in an infinite variety of ways. In passing from hill to hill, from galaxy to galaxy, we draw a picture of the geometrical structure of the visible universe (as seen from our relative rest-frame), in the same way that the hills and valleys on the surface of the Earth reveal the continuous curvature of a the global sphere. The difference being that the curvature of the universe is not spherical in the way described by Riemannian geometry or Einstein’s globally finite spherical space.

Bear in mind, the Riemannian multi-dimension spaces of constant positive curvature are precisely what led to the globally homogenous spherically symmetrical finite universe with an attitude: the infamous boundary condition.

This is where the illustrious framework of Lobachevsky’s non-Euclidean space, and to a certain extent de Sitters hypersphere, may be considered very closely as more realistic representatives of the global properties of the universe. A metrically homogenous world is obtained by the equivalence of all points, in all directions, since the change is a continuous transformation, there is no reason why the hyperbolic curvature should not be everywhere continuous in a homogenous playing field. Further note that we have not yet discussed the evolutionary processes and the potential consequences on the global curvature of the universe. We have previously seen that there is evidence of change in the look-back time, from the topological point of view, that will furnish us with very important information about the development of the cosmos. Today these observations have been interpreted as acceleration in the velocity of expansion.

Consider, now, the simplest example of an isotropic two-dimensional curved space, namely the surface of a hyperbolic manifold. This two-space is isotropic because the degree of curvature is the same at all points in the two-space (shaped like the surface of a saddle, or a Pringles potato-chip). If we extend our model to three spatial dimensions we are no longer looking at a saddle shape; we have the curved volume of a hypersphere. The fourth associated dimension, the temporal coordinate, varies proportionally with the curvature of the three-dimensional volume. We are in possession of a four-dimensional singularity-free non-expanding, non-contracting general relativistic continuum, the physical attributes of which are observed in nature: by the redshift z.

Finally, I realize that this in one of the pillars of support for big bang cosmology. Without the Doppler effect it falls. And so, without a doubt, all will be done to defend the Doppler shift interpretation. When the 1998 SN Type Ia data came in, it looked as if inflation was ruled out observationally, because the universe in the past 5 billion years no longer appeared flat, as inflation predicted. So, the complex interweaving of the inflation portrayal into a psudo-standard model and its offshoots (eternal inflation, chaotic inflation etc.) so prominently in control at the stages of pre-1998 theoretical physics, even though impossible to test either in practice or in principle, have at some level taken a serious beating.

Not only the WMAP project, but the Boomerang (see Boomerang/NA) project too, were designed to measured fluctuations in the angular power spectrum of another pillar, the cosmic microwave background. The hope was that inflation could be salvaged. And in so doing, the big bang too. The best fit was found for a marginally closed universe. However, considerable theoretical prejudices were involved in the variable set of parameters that were chosen (Melchiorri et al, astro-ph, 1999). With a little tweaking, the flat geometry of the universe has been confirmed. Though this result is in blatant contrast and even contradiction to the supernovae results, that clearly show an open, infinite universe, i.e. Shaped like a saddle in reduced dimensions. That C1ay is a hyperbolic signature. The SN observations are observations. There is no tweaking of the SN images. Only the subsequent interpretations in order to fit a dying theory had to be dramatically tweaked, with at least three parameters: Omega was insufficient, so was dark matter. That is exactly why Einstein’s “greatest blunder” had to be reintroduced, but with a ugly facelift. Now it looks like dark energy.

In addition, there is absolutely no guarantee that thermal fluctuations of CMB are at all useful for testing spacetime curvature (geometry), an enormous assumption has to be made first about the origin and evolution the blackbody radiation, the geometry then depends on the model, not on the differences in temperature from one region to the next. In this particular case, the theory determined the outcome of the experiment, just as the theory determined its own laws. If the curvature interpretation for redshift z is correct, and today that possibility exists, (at least until more research is done), then there is not expansion, no relic radiation from hot creation event. The CMBR has another explanation (see Burbidge, G., Hoyle, F. 1998, ApJ, 509 L1-L3 for the best alternative. Also Hoyle, F. 1994, 1997, Home is Where the Wind Blows 399-423). Another pillar bites the dust.

That leaves one pillar standing: the origin of the light element, the so-called primordial creation of the canonical hot big bang cold dark matter model. For that, Cold Creation has a reply, but see too the paper co-authored by Geoffrey Burbidge and Fred Hoyle published in the Astrophysical Journal (1998) entitled The Origin of Helium and the Other Light Elements, 509 L1-L3. That will not only be the subject of another thread, but an area of active research in physics for years to come.

Coldcreation

[C1ay]

Or perhaps the universe is infinite with no shape at all. We can never no because we can only examine that which lies in an approximate 13.5 billion light-year sphere of space, expanding since the time of an event that led to the evolution of the local universe as we know it. There are NO facts on the shape of the universe.

[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by C1ay

Or perhaps the universe is infinite with no shape at all. We can never no because we can only examine that which lies in an approximate 13.5 billion light-year sphere of space, expanding since the time of an event that led to the evolution of the local universe as we know it. There are NO facts on the shape of the universe.

No C1ay you are not correct. We cannot examine that which lies approximately 13.5 billion light years ago. If we could we would be able to see your big bang. The furthest image of the deep universe to date is the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image. Check it out. There is no big bang in it. Just 10,000 galaxies. Many of those distant galaxies are well formed and have high metalicity: Two facts that violates your belief.

You might be assuming that the CMB is a 13.5 billion year old relic, but that is far from being a fact. That is one of the most farfetched massive extrapolations in the history of modern science. The CMB is simply a thermal blackbody radiation, the temperature of the local (visible) universe at this time t, in the millimeter wavelength. Nothing more, nothing less. Every alternative theory predicts a thermal radiation. This is no pillar of proof.

I agree with you though that the universe is infinite and that it therefore has no shape. Einstein's general postulate of relativity defines a relative shape from the perspective of any observer. Redshift z is thus, I repeat, a relative effect in a nonzero mass-enegy density enriched vacuum continuum. It is because of the nonzero mass-energy density that the universe appear non-Euclidean from any relative restframe. So the shape of the visible universe is derived from z. Thus, observationally we see hyperbolicity. Call is a fact, evidence, proof, anything you like. I call it empirical evidence that suggests the Doppler interpretation may be wrong, and consequently too the entire framework that modern cosmology has erected around itself.

We are centered in the observable universe. Redshift indicates spacetime dilation with distance. The greater the distance, the larger the relative deviation from linearity, and the greater the redshift z.


Coldcreation

[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by Little Bang

Coldc, I thought that a de Sitter universe was one that had spread out to infinity and entropy had taken everthing to zero energy?

Our conception of the structure of the universe bears all the marks of a transitory structure. Our theories are decidedly in a state of continuous, and just now very rapid, evolution. It is not possible to predict how long our present views and interpretations will remain unaltered and how soon they will have to be replaced by perhaps very different ones, based on new observational data and new critical insight in their connection with other data.

Willem de Sitter, 1932



Here, too, the observed fact is undoubtedly the supreme arbiter; but it cannot pronounce sentence until the wide chasm separating the axioms from their veritable consequences has been bridged by much intense, hard thinking. The theorist has to set about this Herculean task fully aware that his efforts may be destined to prepare the death blow to his theory

Albert Einstein, 1934


De Sitter had designed at least two well known world models. One of them was empty, the other was not. They were both static and they were both based in a non-Euclidean continua.

At this time Einstein’s static universe had a constant positive curvature and was spatially closed, temporally infinite (or “finite yet unbounded,” a phrase Hawking would later pilfer), the scale factor or radius remaining constant with time. ‘Infinite,’ here refers to the continuous curvature of spherical space. Note that had time not been considered infinite the universe would posses a central symmetry. Both Einstein and de Sitter realized a four-dimensional sphere had the bizarre feature of allowing the coiling of time around itself, leading to the hypothetical prospect of an observer experiencing his own past. The physical meaning of the spherical model prompted de Sitter’s hyperboloid solution, avoiding the time paradox by leaving open the time direction.

Willem de Sitter was able to demonstrate that the geometrical attribute of pure space (a completely empty universe, where both density and pressure are equal to zero) is a hypersphere, time is no longer independent of space, but depends on distance. The time and space that separates two points is curved, corresponding to a hyperbolic spacetime description. In other words, from the point of view of a hypothetical observer, the time that elapses between two events is proportional to the distance of the events. This is the reason for the redshifts in spectral lines of distant sources, called the de Sitter effect (in a static universe). (see de Sitter, Kosmos, 1932)

Coldcreation

[C1ay]

Originally Posted by coldcreation

No C1ay you are not correct. We cannot examine that which lies approximately 13.5 billion light years ago. If we could we would be able to see your big bang. The furthest image of the deep universe to date is the Hubble Ultra Deep Field image. Check it out. There is no big bang in it. Just 10,000 galaxies. Many of those distant galaxies are well formed and have high metalicity: Two facts that violates your belief.

You might be assuming that the CMB is a 13.5 billion year old relic, but that is far from being a fact. That is one of the most farfetched massive extrapolations in the history of modern science.

Well, let's see. From Wiki for the Hubble Ultra Deep Field we have, "It is the deepest image of the universe ever taken in visible light, looking back in time more than 13 billion years." Now if you want to be so ****** retentive to claim that "more than 13 billion years" is not approximately 13.5 billion years I think you need to return to math class. I never said we could see back exactly 13.5 or 13.4 or 13.6 billion years nor did I imply that we could see the big bang. I've never even claimed there was a big bang. What I will make clear is the departure of some crass member that wants to continue in some vein as to claim they are right and everyone else is wrong with out backing up their claim.

[Little Bang]

So far everthing I can find including the recent supernova still says the universe is flat. Do you have some independent verification other than your own that it is not flat?

[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by C1ay

Well, let's see. From Wiki for the Hubble Ultra Deep Field we have, "It is the deepest image of the universe ever taken in visible light, looking back in time more than 13 billion years." ... to claim they are right and everyone else is wrong with out backing up their claim.

Hmm, I checked out the Hubble Space Telescope website and found less than that. No problem. No quibling. You are correct according to your reference.

The claim is only that there are two possible interpretations for redshift z that are in agreament with most observations throughout the 19 octave spectrum, not one. In both cases there are deviations from the redshift - distance (or apparent magnitude) relation.

Richard S. Ellis (Caltech) has studied the ultra deep images in detail. One of the outstanding features of the ‘early’ universe is that galaxies out to redshift 7 appear to have normal stellar populations. These are not the big, bright, ultra-heavy 500 solar-mass 1st generation stars thought to have reigned at the time. Moreover, galaxies are fairly evolved.

This means that those distant galaxies formed, according to Ellis, when the universe was a meager 600 million years old—at an epoch once assumed to be in the Dark Age. Observations suggest these distant objects are not representative of the first population of galaxies (Ellis, R.S., 2004).

Others too have found that distant red galaxies in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (Toft et al 2005) present morphological properties that suggest “complex stellar populations, consisting of both evolved populations that dominate the mass and the restframe optical light, and younger populations, which show up as patches of star formation in the restframe UV light; in many ways resembling the properties of normal local galaxies.

Peace.

[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by Little Bang

So far everthing I can find including the recent supernova still says the universe is flat. Do you have some independent verification other than your own that it is not flat?

The favored Friedmann model describing the universe in which omega is precisely equal to one, the critical density model, is ruled out by the SN Type Ia observations. There is no one-to-one relation between the density of the cosmos and its spatial curvature, i.e., this model with a flat, Euclidean geometry (zero curvature) is incompatible with the interpretation of universal acceleration, and so too incompatible with inflation. The velocity of the supposed expansion does not tend to zero as its radius approaches infinity. It appears to be accelerating, requiring an ad hoc dark energy to justify.

See Reiss, A.G., Filippenko, et al, 1998, AsJ, 116: 1009-1038, 1998 September "Observational Evidence from Supernova for an Accelerating Universe and Cosmological Constant."

Toft, S., et al, 2005, Distant Red Galaxies In The Hubble Ultra Deep Field, Draft version March 23, arXiv:astro-ph/0503454 v1 21 Mar 2005

Livio, M. 2000, The Accelerating Universe, Infinite Expansion, the Cosmological Constant,
and the Beauty of the Cosmos.

Goldhaber, G., Perlmutter, S. 1998, Physics Reports-Review Section Letters 307 (1-4):
325-331, Dec. 1998

Goldsmith, D. 2000, The Runaway Universe, The Race to Find the Future of the Cosmos.


This is not my view little bang. By the way, it was Einstein's view based on his general postulate of relativity that a Euclidean universe was untenable. Space-time had to be non-Euclidean, or quasi-Euclidean to use Einstein's term. Either way flatness does not fit in the GR.

The universe is either flat or it is not. I personally choose the latter. But do not take my
word for it. Do some research (the above references should make that easier for you) look at the evidence, then decide for yourself.

Question Little bang: Why would the universe be flat anyway? Do you really think the all the humps, bumps, ripples, nooks and crannies of spacetime curvature (gravity) due to the nonnegative, nonzero mass-energy density of the universe all cancel out to zero?

[C1ay]

Originally Posted by coldcreation

This means that those distant galaxies formed, according to Ellis, when the universe was a meager 600 million years old—at an epoch once assumed to be in the Dark Age. Observations suggest these distant objects are not representative of the first population of galaxies (Ellis, R.S., 2004).

Others too have found that distant red galaxies in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (Toft et al 2005) present morphological properties that suggest “complex stellar populations, consisting of both evolved populations that dominate the mass and the restframe optical light, and younger populations, which show up as patches of star formation in the restframe UV light; in many ways resembling the properties of normal local galaxies.

I've posted news here myself about old galaxies in the early universe and Tormod posted here as well. There also seems to be some evidence for globular clusters that are older than the supposed 13.5 billion year age of the universe, i.e. 15 - 18 billion years. As a result, I personally believe there was some event (a big bang?) around 13.5 billion years ago in a universe that already existed. We can never know though because, as a result of that event, we can never see beyond that event horizon. I think the closest we could come to proof would be to positively date objects within the bounds of that horizon, our local universe, as being older than that event.

[coldcreation]

Originally Posted by C1ay

There are NO facts on the shape of the universe...
Well, let's see. ... I've never even claimed there was a big bang. What I will make clear is the departure of some crass member that wants to continue in some vein as to claim they are right and everyone else is wrong with out backing up their claim.

... I personally believe there was some event (a big bang?) around 13.5 billion years ago in a universe that already existed. We can never know though because, as a result of that event, we can never see beyond that event horizon. I think the closest we could come to proof would be to positively date objects within the bounds of that horizon, our local universe, as being older than that event.

OK, back to redshift z. The topic under review.

I will attempt to back some claims I've made above. I would hope that nobody takes this as a personal attack. It is not meant to be. Though it is certainly an alternative view to the standard model. My opinion will be mixed into what follows, but most is based on the Hubble Space Telescope supernovae data from the late 1990s. I would hope that an open forum exists in order to voice opinions, especially those that do not concord with modern cosmology, and even more so when those opinions are founded on observational evidence. Why? If that were not the case everyone would agree on everything, give or take a little inter-stance nitpicking and naïve questions from the curious. Note, I have all the references, if anyone would like one.

Fact 1. Distant supernovae and their host galaxies appear to be receding slower than permitted by Hubble’s Law (the proportionality between redshift and apparent magnitude). Remarkably, the observations are consistent with an accelerating expansion of the cosmos: a model that had never before been predicted. What had been predicted was a deceleration or a constant 1 to 1 Hubble flow.

Fact 2. The large shells of radiation and material emitted by distant supernovae appear to have a greater area than they would in a topologically flat space, making the source look very faint.

Fact 3. The visible universe appears larger, deeper and emptier than previously suspected.

Fact 4. Unexpected dimness of early supernovae gives the impression they are further away than their redshifts indicate, altering the predicted structure of the cosmos.

Fact 5. These SN Type Ia observations indicate that at least 80 percent of the matter necessary to make the universe flat (in accordance with inflation theory) is missing, i.e., undetectable.

Fact 6. If the Doppler interpretation is real, the universe could be as young as 12.5 billion years old, a figure at odds with the age of a flat matter dominated universe, and at odds with the age of some of the objects in it, i.e., some stars in the Milky Way appear much older (around 18 billion years old. The conservative figure is 15 billion years old, and the upper limit is 20 billion years): Even when the age problem is revised upwards at around 14 Gyrs, the age crisis looms.

Cold Conclusions:

The favored Friedmann model describing the universe in which omega is precisely equal to one, the critical density model, is ruled out by observation. There is no one-to-one relation between the density of the cosmos and its spatial curvature, i.e., this model with a flat, Euclidean geometry (zero curvature) in incompatible with the interpretation of universal acceleration. The velocity of the supposed expansion does not tend to zero as its radius approaches infinity. It appears to be accelerating, requiring an ad hoc dark energy to justify.

The Friedmann model with a closed spherical geometry that expands and collapses to infinite density in a finite time is ruled out observationally. There is not enough gravitating mass to halt the expansion and reverse it. There will be no big crunch.

The Friedmann model with a hyperbolic geometry that expands for ever, tending to infinity with a finite velocity is ruled out on empirical grounds. Distant galaxies are not undecelerated.

So what to do? If the big bang is to be salvaged, the Friedmann model should obviously be dropped. Another different model is required. Inflation should be dropped as well as it was designed with the critical model in mind. But the universe is not flat. By the way, flatness contradicts not only the SN observations, but it also violates general relativity. The GR continuum cannot be regarded as Euclidean. Anyone that reads the general postulate once knows that. The continuum can only be non-Euclidean.

A major fact follows: the flat universe predicted by inflation is untenable. Redshift z shows the universe is not flat. And if inflation falls, so too does the big bang. Unless of course one is willing to accept again all the intrinsic problems with that scenario (horizon, monopole, singularity, spacetime boundary, isotropy of the CMB, etc.). These problems are well known. Inflation was supposed to have solved them, albeit by introducing a false vacuum: a state that has never been observed nor can it. All vacuum experiment show that the state described as a false vacuum would require an infinite amount of negative energy to produce, obviously something that does not exist. So now we have two reasons to abandon inflation: the non-physical nature of the false vacuum and SN observations that show the universe is not flat. What a pity...

Eternal inflation, chaotic inflation, superstrings, M-threory (branes) are al useless is the patch-up process because not one of theses alternatives shows any observational or experimental evidence for support. The search continues...for a fourth Friedmann model. One that accelerates to infinity. It leads to a Big Rip...to a cosmological constant 120 orders of magnitude overweight.

Riess et al recently grouped under the name Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS). The word Origins had to be added, otherwise they would have been left with GODS program. The latter is possibly most fitting, as Riess admits, referring to dark energy “we still have almost no clue what it is.” (Britt 2004)

"In some ways it sounds more like science fiction than fact," alleged Dr. Robert Caldwell, a Dartmouth physicist who described this apocalyptic prospect in a 2003 paper with Dr. Marc Kamionkowski and Dr. Nevin Weinberg, California Institute of Technology.

Riess is trying to determine whether the universe will end in a “Big Rip, Big Collapse or just a Big Fizzle.” Snap crackle or pop?

A cosmological constant dominated universe is “the bleakest of all outcomes, offering no chance to do cosmology, no chance for rebirth—just a long, cold death,” observes a cold footed Brian Schmidt as if he just got coldcocked by a cold-hearted southpaw in cold-blood. The natural laws have been cold-shouldered cold turkey once again.

Cold Creation predicts they all will eventually win, i.e., the observations will rip apart the theory causing it to collapse then fizzle-out. Catastrophysics will ultimately fail. In my opinion it already has.

Frankly, it’s hard to believe that something so ridiculously dubious is so doggedly pursued. One need not be a visionary to see that there are no viable solutions to fix big bang cosmology and that it needs to be replaced with something known-physics compatible. Just when everyone began thinking that modern cosmology was safe, and that physics would soon find solutions to the unification problem (well, within the next hundred years or so), Einstein’s cosmological constant began seeping back into the Astrophysical Journal. Though, Einstein would no longer have recognized it.

Ironically it would be observations coming from the Hubble Space Telescope that would brake Hubble’s law.

Solutions? (1) A model is needed that explains all observations without the introduction of ad hoc dark forces or bogus vacuum energy. (2) A worldview is needed that explains observations without the break-down of natural laws. (3) The mechanism responsible for the gravitational interaction should be identified, and its relationship to the cosmological constant should be made clear, too without artificial flavor added as a preservative for a theory that should not be preserved. (4) Once the gravitation mechanism is identified, the new standard model that will inevitably surface should be applied to all the other areas of physics that were hitherto lacking, or incompatible with general relativity, vis, quantum mechanics...

A cold wave is on its way.

Coldcreation