12.28.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:20 pm by nemo
When the Black Hole Was Born: Astronomers Identify the Epoch of the First Fast Growth of Black Holes
ScienceDaily (Dec. 28, 2010) — Most galaxies in the universe, including our own Milky Way, harbor super-massive black holes varying in mass from about one million to about 10 billion times the size of our sun. To find them, astronomers look for the enormous amount of radiation emitted by gas which falls into such objects during the times that the black holes are “active,” i.e., accreting matter. This gas “infall” into massive black holes is believed to be the means by which black holes grow.
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11.13.10
Posted in cosmology, Evolution, physics at 3:50 pm by nemo
Comment on Goldilocks Enigma
Some interesting material from P. Kinnon, and a reference to his book:
Peter Kinnon said,
November 13, 2010 at 1:01 am ·
Your observation is right on the mark. The absence of the slightest hint of teleology is a deeply entrenched dogma for almost all those in the current scientific establishment.
Supposedly rational individuals wriggle and squirm, inventing the most extravagant hypotheses to avoid the strong patterns which are staring them in the face.
In actuality the most convincing evidence for directionality is not in the values of the universal constant but is to be found way “downstream” within the chemistry which their “fine-tuning” uniquely enables.
The wider aspects of evolutionary processes and their directionality are the subject of my newly published work “The Goldilocks Effect”.
(This title, by the was not derived from Paul Davies’s book, which I discovered only after publication. As I suspected from other books of his that I have read it is a fairly pedestrian recapitulation of the extensive general literature based around the four constants and in no way overlaps my own.)
Please go to my website:
http://www.unusual-perspectives.net
There you will find more info on “The Goldilocks Effect” My email address will be found there as a graphic and if you contact me I will send you a free copy as a celebration of having found intelligent life among the blogs.
Meanwhile, my first book, “Unusual Perspectives” is available for free download. You will find Chapters 10 and 11 the most directly relevant to this topic.
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10.25.10
Posted in cosmology at 1:50 pm by nemo
A New Way to Weigh Planets
ScienceDaily (Oct. 23, 2010) — An international CSIRO-led team of astronomers has developed a new way to weigh the planets in our Solar System — using radio signals from the small spinning stars called pulsars.
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09.11.10
Posted in cosmology at 11:12 am by nemo
A Nearby Galactic Exemplar
ScienceDaily (Sep. 11, 2010) — The European Southern Observatory has released a spectacular new image of NGC 300, a spiral galaxy similar to the Milky Way, and located in the nearby Sculptor Group of galaxies. Taken with the Wide Field Imager (WFI) at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile, this 50-hour exposure reveals the structure of the galaxy in exquisite detail. NGC 300 lies about six million light-years away and appears to be about two thirds the size of the full Moon on the sky.
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09.08.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:24 pm by nemo
Big Bang Was Followed by Chaos, Mathematical Analysis Shows
ScienceDaily (Sep. 8, 2010) — Seven years ago Northwestern University physicist Adilson E. Motter conjectured that the expansion of the universe at the time of the big bang was highly chaotic. Now he and a colleague have proven it using rigorous mathematical arguments.
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09.07.10
Posted in cosmology, The Axial Age at 2:30 pm by nemo
The reason I look askance at multiverse theories, or one of them, is that history gives us an example of ‘spectrum’ multicultures in parallel during the Axial Age, and the issue there is not the physical replication of physical universe variants, but the exploration of religious and cultural potentials in different modes, in related but varying systems of value.
It is ironic commentary on the physics flounderings of string theorists to consider that the Axial Age produces a multiverse (so to speak) of differing art forms, religions (theist/atheist), political constructs and civilizational frameworks. It is a long way from the real multiverse concept, but the analogy is exact. But the issue if the evolution of parallel worlds from the perspective of values, not just of facts.
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09.02.10
Posted in cosmology, physics at 12:07 pm by nemo
Leading theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking has argued that the idea of God creating the universe is false.
In a new book hitting shelves next week, Hawking argues that there is a new series of theories has convinced him that the idea of a sentient deliberate creator of the universe was redundant. He says in the book :” Because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist”.
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08.17.10
Posted in cosmology at 1:02 pm by nemo
Tantalizing Clues as to Why Matter Prevails in the Universe: Surprisingly Large Matter/antimatter Asymmetry Discovered
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08.01.10
Posted in cosmology at 11:01 am by nemo
Blowing in the Wind: Cassini Helps With Dune Whodunit on Saturn’s Moon Titan
ScienceDaily (July 31, 2010) — The answer to the mystery of dune patterns on Saturn’s moon Titan did turn out to be blowing in the wind. It just wasn’t from the direction many scientists expected.
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07.08.10
Posted in cosmology, Evolution at 12:35 pm by nemo
Carl Sagan: A Universe Not Made For Us
By CARL SAGAN – YOUTUBE – CALLUMCGLP
http://richarddawkins.net/videos/487121-carl-sagan-a-universe-not-made-for-us
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06.14.10
Posted in cosmology at 11:16 am by nemo
Zooming in on an Infant Solar System: For the First Time, Astronomers Have Observed Solar Systems in the Making in Great Detail
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05.20.10
Posted in cosmology, physics at 11:35 am by nemo
A New Clue to Explain Existence
By DENNIS OVERBYE
Physicists at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory are reporting that they have discovered a new clue that could help unravel one of the biggest mysteries of cosmology: why the universe is composed of matter and not its evil-twin opposite, antimatter. If confirmed, the finding portends fundamental discoveries at the new Large Hadron Collider outside Geneva, as well as a possible explanation for our own existence.
In a mathematically perfect universe, we would be less than dead; we would never have existed. According to the basic precepts of Einsteinian relativity and quantum mechanics, equal amounts of matter and antimatter should have been created in the Big Bang and then immediately annihilated each other in a blaze of lethal energy, leaving a big fat goose egg with which to make stars, galaxies and us. And yet we exist, and physicists (among others) would dearly like to know why.
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05.17.10
Posted in cosmology at 2:40 pm by nemo
Death of a Star in 3D: New Computer Models Show in Detail How Supernovae Obtain Their Shape
ScienceDaily (May 17, 2010) — Massive stars end their lives in gigantic explosions, so called supernovae, and can become — for a short time — brighter than a whole galaxy, which is made up of billions of stars.
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05.11.10
Posted in cosmology at 5:02 pm by nemo
Ancient City of ‘Modern’ Galaxies: May Be Most Distant Galaxy Cluster Ever Detected
ScienceDaily (May 10, 2010) — Using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, a Texas A&M University-led team of astronomers has uncovered what may be the earliest, most distant cluster of galaxies ever detected.
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04.09.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:20 pm by nemo
Our Universe at Home Within a Larger Universe? So Suggests Physicist’s Wormhole Research
by ScienceDaily
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/5404
Could our universe be located within the interior of a wormhole which itself is part of a black hole that lies within a much larger universe?
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03.29.10
Posted in cosmology, physics at 3:15 pm by nemo
Scientists seek dark matter in “Big Bang” project
GENEVA, Mar. 29, 2010 (Reuters) — Scientists at the CERN research center will begin trying on Tuesday to make particles collide at ultra-high power and close to the speed of light to create mini-versions of the “Big Bang” that gave birth to the universe.
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03.27.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:25 pm by nemo
Universe Has Billions More Stars Than Thought
by Discovery News
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/5333
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03.11.10
Posted in cosmology at 1:05 pm by nemo
Galaxy Study Validates General Relativity on Cosmic Scale, Existence of Dark Matter
ScienceDaily (Mar. 10, 2010) — An analysis of more than 70,000 galaxies by University of California, Berkeley, University of Zurich and Princeton University physicists demonstrates that the universe — at least up to a distance of 3.5 billion light years from Earth — plays by the rules set out 95 years ago by Albert Einstein in his General Theory of Relativity.
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03.02.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:36 pm by nemo
Astronomically Large Lenses Measure the Age and Size of the Universe
ScienceDaily (Mar. 1, 2010) — Using entire galaxies as lenses to look at other galaxies, researchers have a newly precise way to measure the size and age of the universe and how rapidly it is expanding,
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02.25.10
Posted in cosmology, Kant, Science & Religion at 4:30 pm by nemo
Coyne blog on Ruse
It seems that Ruse can’t quite get his argument tuned to what he is feeling about the New Atheists. This kind of ‘something is wrong with Dawkins’ atheism pitch’ feeling has hit a lot of people. But Ruse can’t quite figure out how to proceed. I can’t really help since, while I understand his feeling, I don’t agree with his approach.
But OK, Ruse’s point is good: monotheists (naively?) were sensitive to first cause argument, and at the fountain source of theism that argument is extremely powerful.
Or is it? The problem is the failure to graps a kind of Kantian antinomy involved in first cause arguments. As Kants so eloquently dissolves the logic here, on both sides, we cannot do with, or do without the first cause logic.
So the problem with Dawkins is that he proposes a simple reversal of the antinomy, in all seriously, oblivious to the double aspect to the Kantian antinomy.
Ruse on the First Cause argument:
“You know, and I know, that Christians (St. Augustine, certainly St. Thomas) spent a hell of a lot of time—I mean, they knew this—what they were trying to do, was articulate a notion of God who would be First Cause: you know, the whole notion of a Satiety Aseity, God as a Necessary Being. You know, God’s essence is His existence.”
. . . Christians have got some grown-up responses to these sorts of things, and I think that Dawkins does a serious disservice to the cause of nonbelief by not being prepared to take seriously the kinds of things that believers believe in.”
Well, as many have pointed out, I’m neither a philosopher nor a theologian, but these highly sophisticated defenses of the First Cause Argument seem to me merely intellectualized versions of the assertion, “My kind of God did too exist forever!” Perhaps real philosopher/theologians like Eric MacDonald can weigh in here.
Anyway, here, according to a new survey by the Pew Forum, are some of the things that Americans do believe (proportion of respondents who accept the notions):
Bible as the word of God: 63%
Bible as the literal word of God: 33%
Life after death: 74%
Heaven: 74%
Hell: 59%
Miracles: 79%
Angels and demons: 68%
Own religion is the one truth path that can lead to eternal life: 24%
Many religions can lead to eternal life: 74%
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02.21.10
Posted in cosmology, Evolution at 3:33 pm by nemo
Jurassic Space: Ancient Galaxies Come Together After Billions of Years
ScienceDaily (Feb. 20, 2010) — Imagine finding a living dinosaur in your backyard. Astronomers have found the astronomical equivalent of prehistoric life in our intergalactic backyard: a group of small, ancient galaxies that has waited 10 billion years to come together. These “late bloomers” are on their way to building a large elliptical galaxy.
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02.16.10
Posted in cosmology, physics at 3:01 pm by nemo
In Brookhaven Collider, Scientists Briefly Break a Law of Nature
by Dennis Overbye – NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/16/science/16quark.html?ref=science
from dawkins site
Physicists said Monday that they had whacked a tiny region of space with enough energy to briefly distort the laws of physics, providing the first laboratory demonstration of the kind of process that scientists suspect has shaped cosmic history.
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02.11.10
Posted in cosmology at 12:28 pm by nemo
Our world may be a giant hologram
by Marcus Chown – NewScientist
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126911.300-our-world-may-be-a-giant-hologram.html?full=true
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02.09.10
Posted in cosmology, Evolution at 8:43 pm by nemo
Is Victor Stenger Right about Fine-Tuning?
The issue of fine-tuning has been falsely theologized, and the result is the failure to see that the question of the emergence, given such fine-tuning and assuming it is real, of life is part of the cosmological emergence of the universe itself. The obsession over the design argument threatens to make the obvious insight into a quagmire of metaphysics, and that is unnecessary.
Let’s face it, the design argument has been wrecked by the theological ID groups now current, with the result that noone can use it anymore.
Stenger is equally obsessed in reverse for this reason.
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