Archive for the ‘Cosmology’ Category

Quantum Mechanics: Did Newton Have it All Wrong?

Friday, January 15th, 2010

Guest author, Thomas Kennedy, features a twice-monthly series, Quantum Leap, wherein he guides readers through the fascinating world of quantum mechanics. This is issue 006.

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You know, I am probably wrong in blaming Sir Isaac Newton for ideas like black holes, dark matter, and dark energy, but there is no doubt that the bulk of the scientific community have continued to attempt to use his approach based on Force, Mass, and Acceleration to model cosmology.  At least, at some point, after The Big Bang.

The $9 billion dollar science project, aka the Large Hadron Collider and the search for the elusive (and most likely) nonexistent Higgs Boson particle, represents the end point in this attempt.  Black holes and dark matter, the assumed core and make up of galaxies in an attempt to balance angular momentum, is akin to attempting, like the Little Dutch Boy, to plug as many holes as possible where observed reality fails to line up with the various hypotheses that exist in cosmology.  Dark energy is also a balancing variable in the equation because, if both black holes and dark matter have such a hold on the universe, why does it appear that all visible matter in space at the super scalar level appear to be growing more distant from one another?

The one thing that I have learned over the years building statistical models is that adding more variables in an attempt to improve ones forecasting accuracy isn’t necessarily the way to go, but this is the approach taken right now within the scientific community and their reliance on Sir Isaac.

Now this leads to the question of “If not Newtonian physics, what else is there?”  My and other minority scientists’ reply is Quantum Mechanics.  So what does that mean?

More to come…

<em>Watch for Issue #7 of Thomas’ “Quantum Leap”, here on A Sky Full of Stars, on February 05, 2010.</em>

You can access all previous issues of “Quantum Leap”, here.

Quantum Leap: The $9-billion particle

Friday, January 1st, 2010

Guest author, Thomas Kennedy, features a twice-monthly series, Quantum Leap, wherein he guides readers through the fascinating world of quantum mechanics.  This is issue 005.

The significance of the $9 billion dollar particle …

In an earlier article, I talked about the Other Worldly difference between the near certainty, relatively speaking, of Newtonian physics and the chaotic, probability realm of quantum mechanics – how you can predict the path of a normal baseball being thrown against a wall bouncing back to you while a quantum baseball would just as likely go through the wall and come out the other side as it would return to you.

The fact that the Newtonian world we live in each day, looking so relatively stable, is actually resting on a world teeming with chaos and uncertainty – well, that makes this place we live in as much like Alice going down the rabbit hole as anything else.

Artist rendering of the Higgs Boson particle

It also leads us to the quest for the $9-billion particle, otherwise known as Higgs Boson.  The $9-billion cost is the budget used to create the Large Hadron Collider that will be used to attempt to find this little beastie.

Finding the Higgs Boson particle would, once and for all, unite the four forces that seemingly make up our world and usher in a New World Order with all sorts of possibilities for our understanding of the Universe, unifying the worlds of Newtonian physics and quantum mechanics.  The failure to find the particle wouldn’t make the Large Hadron Collider inert, but it would prove, once again, that speculation built on a hypothesis can easily lead the scientific community astray.

More to come on this one…

Watch for Issue #6 of Thomas’ “Quantum Leap”, here on A Sky Full of Stars, on January 15, 2010.

You can access all previous issues of “Quantum Leap”, here.

Webcast Archive: “MoonWalking with Rob Self-Pierson”

Friday, December 18th, 2009

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12/23/2009 Update: Video archive of this webcast can be found here.

Throughout billions of years, the Moon has held an intrinsic practical and emotional bond with our planet.  Sadly, we are losing the human connection as we keep our eyes fixed on the material and social noise of today’s world.

Every once in a while, something special comes along to remind us to pause and look up at Luna, to consider that constant, though oft-forgot, guidepost for all living things on Earth.

We are proud to announce our next AFM*Radio special event, an audio/visual presentation, Moon-Walking with Rob Self-PiersonJoin us next Tuesday night, Dec. 23 0100 UTC (Dec. 22 8pm ET), when Rob Self-Pierson stops by to discuss his “MoonWalking” experiences and his upcoming Blue Moon Walk.  We’ll feature images, video, an interactive chatroom, and details about how you can participate in commemorating the last Blue Moon of this decade!

Quantum Leap: Quantum Mechanics Gets Depressed

Friday, December 18th, 2009

Tom_at_Elu_Event_2008_Cropped_for_Twitter_biggerGuest author, Thomas Kennedy, features a twice-monthly series, Quantum Leap, wherein he guides readers through the fascinating world of quantum mechanics.  This is issue 004.

From The Sunday Times, Oct 4, 2009:“BRITAIN could be forced to pull out of the world’s highest-profile physics project, Cern’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC), because of financial failures by a government research council.

The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) has already had to slash university grants, prompting warnings that physics departments may face closure.

Now managers are warning that Britain’s membership of Cern, based in Geneva, is also threatened, along with its involvement in global astronomy projects.”

When a society is immersed in an economic downturn so severe that it rivals the Great Depression of the 1930s, all matters of negative effects come into play.  Government funding of basic research will continue to be slashed over the next 10 years as the world’s economies find themselves having to re-balance what they want versus what they can afford.

It’s a new day, baby.

NOTE: The Large Hadron Collider is a grand quantum and astrophysics science experiment that is attempting to answer a number of questions, from what were the initial conditions when the universe was born, is there a unique particle, the Higgs Boson, that unites the world of particle and Newtonian physics, to what happened to antimatter after the Big Bang.  BBC News provides an excellent description of the LHC in their Guide to the Large Hadron Collider, here.

Watch for Issue #5 of Thomas’ “Quantum Leap”, here on A Sky Full of Stars, on January 1, 2010.

You can access all previous issues of “Quantum Leap”, here.

Dream a Little Dream – Under the Blue Moon

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

Blue Moon / You saw me standing alone / Without a dream in my heart …

Actually, I do have a dream …  Blue Moon / I’ll be standing with you / Without a cloud in the sky

For many people, December 31st will mark the last day of another year, just as it ends every year of the Julian Calendar.  But, for sky enthusiasts, this December 31st has poignant meaning, marking the end of a very exciting year of astronomy outreach – the International Year of Astronomy 2009. So, it seems most appropriate that this wonderful year of sharing the night sky should end with a Blue Moon!

But, what is a Blue Moon?  We often use the term to reference a rare event – “once in a blue moon” – but is the Moon ever really blue?

Actually, on rare occasions, the Moon does “appear” blue due to specific atmospheric conditions, thus that reference for rare events.  But, more often, the term “Blue Moon” defines an “extra” Full Moon within a given calendar, an event that can be credited to the Julian/Christian calendar, farming cycles, and the tradition of naming Full Moons, rather than any cosmic phenomenon.

Of course, there never really is any “extra” moon.  The Moon orbits our planet, phasing through New to Full with such consistency that it occasionally clashes with our less-precise, seasonal timekeeping.  This leaves us with an “extra” moon about every 2.7 years – and we account for it with the name “Blue Moon”.  For yearly timekeeping, this Blue Moon occurs as the thirteenth of a twelve-moon calendar; for seasonal timekeeping, it is the fourth of a three-moon season; and more recently, due to an interpretation error in the mid-twentieth century, a Blue Moon is the second Full Moon in a one-month period.

This year’s Blue Moon just happens to fall on December 31 – the last day of the month, the last day of this year, and the final day of a decade.  On that day, I’ll be there to watch it, rising on the east horizon at sunset – big, bright, and full of promise – as I reflect on the successes of a year of star-filled outreach.  And then I’ll return at sunrise, to watch as that same Moon – the last Moon of this century’s first decade – sinks into the west horizon, bringing forth a New Year under the Milky Way and another decade of new discoveries.

*For a real treat, pop over to Rob Self-Pierson’s Moonwalking site and check out his beautiful #BlueMoonWalk video!

A Sky Full of (Shooting) Stars!

Monday, December 7th, 2009

GeminidMeteorWatch2009Okay, so they aren’t really stars, and they certainly aren’t shooting, but they are just as exciting and they’ll be here next weekend, December 12 – 14!

Of course, “they” are the slow, bright trails of the Geminid meteors, one of the year’s best showers.  Named for the constellation from where they appear, the Geminids is a comparatively new shower that has steadily intensified through the decades.  First reported with less than 20 streaks per hour in 1862, that original peak rate has now grown to a predicted 120-160 per hour this year!

Join A Sky Full of Stars on AFM*Radio, December 13 at 9pm ET (Dec.14, 0200 UTC), for a special audio/visual presentation, When Planets and Particles Collide! We’ll talk about meteors and the mystery of the Geminids; take live call-in updates from the Geminid #MeteorWatch; and explore Astronomy.FM’s #MeteorWatch Central, where observers can watch all-sky cams, experience live telescope imaging, and even listen for meteor pings.

We encourage everyone to participate in next weekend’s meteor shower.  You can follow Twitter for the latest reports and images from around the world; pick up some great backyard meteor-watching tips from Sean Welton’s Universe Today article, here; and keep your eyes on Astronomy.FM for their MeteorWatch Central, to be unveiled next Saturday night.