Astronomy

[YesNo]

I thought they found all the elements already. It looks like there is no end to the number of these provided we can build the technology necessary to fuse them. I like how the article called them "superheavies".

I've been watching the morning sky more recently along with the sunrise. Nothing unusual to report except that it is all amazing.

Beth Moon has a collection of photographs of stars and old trees: http://www.bethmoon.com/DiamondNights.html

In her artist's statement she mentioned two experimental results from the University of Edinburgh and Lawrence Edwards correlating changes in plants and changes in our solar system and galaxy.

[The Atheist]

Some astronomers in our South Island got a much longer session than they expected at Mt St John Observatory: http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/757...le-force-winds

[Dreamwoven]

The AstroCafe with glass roofs is a great idea. Can see part of the Milky Way from it.

[YesNo]

An enclosure with glass roofs is all I really need.

[Dreamwoven]

And minimal light pollution, which the sit also has. Seems to have clear skies, too.

[swathisharan]

I am also new to this forum and hope it will be useful for me.

[Dreamwoven]

Welcome to the forum and the astronomy thread. Would you like to tell its a bit about yourself and your interest in astronomy?

[YesNo]

Welcome, swathisharan! One of the things I've found useful about this thread is I started looking at the planets and the Moon. I even know some constellations now.

[Dreamwoven]

How sofia flight revealed Pluto secrets.

[Dreamwoven]

Nebulae and planets, mostly. The prettiest bits, which is all any shop-bought amateur scope is good for. The moon is really cool through a good 'scope as well.

I'm inheriting $350,000,000 from Nigeria in a couple of weeks' time and I've decided I'm going to buy the Mt John observatory! One of the darkest places on the planet which is easily accessible.

I've been checking some of the details on this Observatory. Here are some links:

Canterbury on NZ South Island seems to be a good location for a major observatory. Mt. John Observatory has its own wikipedia page, and here is more info on it (including a fine 360 degree view from it.).

[tailor STATELY]

Loopy String theory ? a possibility: https://www.quantamagazine.org/20160...antum-gravity/ ... or not.

But a number of factors may be pushing the camps closer together. New theoretical findings have revealed potential similarities between LQG and string theory. A young generation of string theorists has begun to look outside string theory for methods and tools that might be useful in the quest to understand how to create a “theory of everything.” And a still-raw paradox involving black holes and information loss has given everyone a fresh dose of humility.

Herman Verlinde, a theoretical physicist at Princeton University who frequently works on string theory, finds it plausible that methods from LQG can help illuminate the gravity side of the duality. In a recent paper, Verlinde looked at AdS/CFT in a simplified model with only two dimensions of space and one of time, or “2+1” as physicists say. He found that the AdS space can be described by a network like those used in LQG. Even though the construction presently only works in 2+1, it offers a new way to think about gravity. Verlinde hopes to generalize the model to higher dimensions. “Loop quantum gravity has been seen too narrowly. My approach is to be inclusive. It’s much more intellectually forward-looking,” he said.

I tried to watch the video which I think depicts the "2+1" model ( flatland ! ) expanding to a higher order of dimensionality, but my bandwidth cap gaks it (I'll be able to watch during a 2am - 8am pst stint later Monday morning {good grief it's only 23 seconds long !!!})

I haven't the math nor knowledge to fully grasp either theory, but I still find it fascinating that we may be able to better understand black holes and gravity, and the universe in general, better some day.

Ta ! (short for tarradiddle),
tailor STATELY

[Dreamwoven]

This is very interesting, I have looked up Quanta Magazine and the Simons Foundation, and your post combines the interest in Astronomy and parts of another thread on this forum that I also subscribe to, on Cosmology whose two main contributors are desiresjab and YesNo.

I wasn't aware of Quanta Magazine, nor of the Simons Foundation before reading your post, but will keep myself better informed on this in future: thanks!

[Dreamwoven]

Today's Dagens Nyheter has an article on black holes in association with the award of the Crafoord Prize for 2016 on Mathematics and Astronomy (this is in English). The prize is awarded to those who develop research that is not covered by the Nobel Prize).

[YesNo]

One of the things I found interesting in the reference Tailor STATELY cited was another article claiming that supersymmetry had been falsified: https://www.quantamagazine.org/20121...eek-new-ideas/ This makes me wonder if string theory itself makes any sense, but I don't know enough about it.

I don't know whether there are black holes or not or what metaphysical difference it would make but I am beginning to doubt they exist, not just because theoretically "information" can't be lost in the black hole, whatever that information happens to be, but because we did not see the black hole that supposedly exists at the center of our galaxy "eat" a cloud last year as predicted. If we can't get predictions right at such close range, how can we trust data coming from other galaxies that black holes exist?

The whole thing about information is puzzling. On the one hand it implies that reality may have no substance in the usual sense, which I think is the case. One the other it implies information is still a form of unconsciousness, a reality that can be swallowed up in a black hole, which is something I doubt.

I admit that I'm a philosophical idealist which implies that I don't believe in the existence of unconscious matter. The position is the opposite of a philosophical materialist. So I have a bias that could be falsified if some unconscious matter could be found, but is information or waves of potentiality forms of unconsciousness? These metaphors are moving in the right direction, as I understand the word "right", but they still seem faulty to me.

[Dreamwoven]

I have to admit I missed that article in Quanta Magazine. It does, as you say, raise issues concerning the whole matter.