- According to "Astronomy Picture of the Day,"
May 8, 2001, this illustration depicts GRO J1655-40 -- "a beast that
has never been seen directly: a black hole." Credit: A. Hobart, CXC
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- Cosmologists assure us that GRO J1655-40 hides a "black
hole." But critics suggest that recent discussion of the sporadic
x-ray source illustrates the growing "credibility gap" in standard
theory.
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- Recently we reviewed a well-publicized attempt to apply
modern cosmological concepts to GRO J1655-40, an enigmatic light source
seen in the constellation Scorpius. Periodically, the source emits copious
X-rays, before returning to its "normal" quiescence.
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- We found the chain of reasoning in the scientists' speculative
adventure interesting, and we were not surprised to find that it led to
a report given at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society. It can
be difficult for readers of such reports to assess their credibility, we
suggested, because the language used by scientific media continually confuses
fact and theory. We offered this perspective:
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- "The light source in Scorpius is a fact. So are
the sporadic X-ray emissions. But it may surprise you to hear that everything
else discussed in the report is speculation, unsupported by anything we
can actually study in nature: the star running out of fuel, the implosion,
the rebound, the imploded star, its 'infinite density,' the stellar black
hole, the 'event horizon,' the companion star, the siphoning of the companion's
gases, the 'accretion' disk, X-ray production by accumulating matter, the
calculated 'spin-rate,' X- ray frequencies linked to orbital motion of
gases, and X-ray frequencies linked to 'wobbling' of gases due to 'spacetime
deformation.'"
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- In reports such as the one on GRO J1655-40, how is a
reader supposed to identify the boundary between fact and conjecture? The
Space.com report states --
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- "A spinning black hole in the constellation Scorpius
has created a stable dent in the fabric of spacetime, scientists say."
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- Fact: No one has seen a black hole. All we have are electromagnetic
signals that are open to many interpretations. But "mainstream"
cosmologists interpret the signals in one way only, based on their peculiar
set of axioms about the nature of space, time and gravity. Many of the
most accomplished plasma experts dispute the entire complex of assumptions.
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- Fact: The 'fabric of spacetime' is a mathematical abstraction
of widely debated relevance to the study of natural phenomena. Critics
say that the word 'spacetime' is essentially meaningless because it combines
two incompatible concepts -- the 3-dimensional space we experience and
a non-dimensional interval of time. In physics, a dimension can only be
measured by a physical ruler. However, mathematicians use the word ambiguously
to denote any number of variables. This results in the common mathematical
"fallacy of ambiguity," where the word is used with one meaning
in the 'real' world of 3-dimensions, and with another meaning in the theoretical
world of mathematics.
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- Some cosmological theories talk of 26 dimensions and
parallel universes, which serve only to astound and confuse those living
in the physical world of 3-dimensions. As one physicist puts it, "Any
theory where time is represented as a fourth dimension does not represent
reality...If the math is correct but does not represent reality; then,
as far as factually describing reality, the math is meaningless, unreasonable
and ambiguous."
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- "The dent is the sort of thing predicted by Albert
Einstein's theory of general relativity. It affects the movement of matter
falling into the black hole."
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- Fact: The "black hole" is a theory not a fact.
In his theory of general relativity, Einstein proposed a geometrical concept
of gravity, suggesting that it was caused by the warping of 3- dimensional
space in some "extra dimension" in the presence of mass. A growing
number of scientists dispute the principle.
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- A common 3-dimensional illustration of the "geometric"
theory of gravity shows a rubber sheet stretched by steel balls resting
on it. The dents in the rubber sheet mimic the gravitational wells of the
steel balls and control their movement. However, as the astronomer Tom
Van Flandern has pointed out, this model only seems to work because our
minds imagine the Earth's gravity acting downwards on the steel balls.
Without pre-existing gravity the steel balls will not dent the rubber sheet
and they will remain stationary. Critics argue that both the rubber sheet
analogy and the extra-dimensional geometric interpretation of general relativity
violate the principle of causality: In the physical world, all effects
have causes, and it is the function of science to explore these relationships,
not to deny them.
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- "The spacetime-dent is invisible, but scientists
deduced its existence after detecting two X-ray frequencies from the black
hole that were identical to emissions noted nine years ago."
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- There is no actual observation of a black hole to verify
this deduction from a prior guess. X-rays are most easily generated by
particles accelerated in an electromagnetic field. There is no more difficult
way to generate x-rays than using the weakest force in the universe --
gravity. (Imagine your dentist trying to generate x- rays by dropping heavy
weights from space). Nature is not in the habit of doing things the hard
way.
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- "Black holes form when very massive stars runs out
of fuel. Their cores implode into a point of infinite density and their
outer layers are blown away in a powerful supernova explosion."
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- Fact: There is no experimental evidence that matter can
be compressed to "infinite density." It requires the weakest
force in the universe to overcome the strongest -- the electric force.
There is no observational evidence that stars implode. Mathematicians have
simply placed a theoretical demand on an improbable model, requiring that
a particular kind of star in a particular kind of binary system run out
of fuel suddenly and undergo spherically symmetrical gravitational collapse
to form an unreal object -- a black hole.
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- Fact: The progenitor stars for a supernova have never
been identified.
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- Fact: The explosion of a supernova is not spherically
symmetrical. It is bipolar.
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- Fact: The theoretical result -- a black hole -- is a
mathematical fiction with no verifiable connection to the natural world
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- "The X-ray frequencies detected by the team of researchers
came from outside the event horizon of GRO J1655-40, a black hole located
roughly 10,000 light-years from Earth. It is about seven times more massive
than the Sun and siphoning gas from a nearby companion star."
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- Fact: The scenario stated here is entirely theoretical.
Hence, the rest of the report can only strain credulity further by following
a series of additional guesses. (See previous summary). But how would a
general reader know this, when the author of the Space.com story cites
all of the speculations as if they are part of scientific knowledge today?
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- "GRO J1655-40 undergoes short periods of intense
X-ray emissions, followed by longer periods of comparative quiet. Scientists
think this blinking pattern of X-ray activity is related to how matter
accumulates around the black hole.
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- "Every few years, however, something -- scientists
aren't sure what -- triggers a sudden binge fest on the part of the black
hole, causing it to guzzle down most of matter in the disk within a period
of only a few months."
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- Here, at the end of an elaborate chain of speculations,
we have an admission that the sporadic X-ray outbursts remain unexplained
-- though the model was designed to explain them.
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- It therefore remains to be asked whether, from an electrical
vantage point, it is possible to account for the X-ray emissions and other
observed attributes of GRO J1655-40, without taking theoretical leaps beyond
our present scientific knowledge.
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- Part 1 of this series may be read here: http:// www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2007/arch07/070308spacetime.htm
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