Challenge : Post better proof of Big Bang than this ! (Polaroid glasses)

NYT, University of Chicago ^

[Truth666]

More support for Big Bang by looking through Polaroid glasses

Although the theory of the Big Bang is on pretty solid ground, there are other competing cosmological theories out there. So any observations that have the capacity to test the Big Bang theory are very welcome - but also hard to do! We are well past the point where existing instruments can get the data we need. As new observational tools become available, we can test our physical theories at increasing detail.

Now new data is available from the Degree Angle Scale Interferometer (DASI), a big telescope near the South Pole, and it reveals just what the Big Bang model predicted.

The new data reveals that the cosmic microwave background radiation (CMBR) is polarised - that is, the light waves coming from space are not wiggling equally in every direction but are preferentially aligned. Polaroid sunglasses work to reduce reflections on the principle that light reflected from a surface is usually polarised. The sunglasses cut out the light with polarisation expected from reflections but let other light through. Essentially, the DASI telescope looks at the sky to see what gets cut out when it looks through the equivalent of a pair of Polaroid sunglasses.

The polarisation of the CMBR is not uniform across the sky but patches are polarised in particular directions. (See the first picture at this page for the polarisation map). The levels of polarisation are exactly those predicted by Big Bang models.

"If you had any doubts that this radiation is from the Big Bang, this should quash them," Dr Michael Turner of the University of Chicago told the New York Times.

Referenced pages : http://www-news.uchicago.edu/releases/photos/polarization/index.html

http://astro.uchicago.edu/dasi/

[Truth666]

If you have a better proof of the Big Bang, I'll be glad to see it.

[Dr Warmoose]

This is called a "red herring", because the God haters want you to ignore the retrograde planets, the galaxies that do not appear their alleged age, the massive amounts of matter that BB predicts but no one can find... the list goes on.

These dolts confuse "interpretations of evidence" as "proof".

[franky]

Although the theory of the Big Bang is on pretty solid ground.....HA!

[LiteKeeper]

YEC INTREP

[LiteKeeper]

Was there a Big Bang?

Cosmologists Can't Agree and Are Still in Doubt

[dangus]

The Big Bang theory does not predict massive amounts of dark matter. That is the theory of one person who is a god-hater, Steven Hawkins, who has discarded the Big Bang precisely because it does point towards a singular First Thing (i.e.. God).

[dangus]

The alternate view is not whether there was a big bang, but whether definitions of time and space collapse as one traces towards the infinitessimal moments of time at the start of the universe. The traditoinal "Big Bang" is the god-friendly position.

[Dr Warmoose]

The Big Bang theory does not predict massive amounts of dark matter.

Then what was Vera Ruban's problem? And I think that Fritz Zwicky in the 1930's brought up the issue before Stephen Hawking...

[dangus]

OK, you got me there. I don't know too much history about the subject. I do know Hawkins was far from the first person to speculate about dark matter; it's long been thought that galaxies don't seem to behave right given what we know of gravity. Plus, it's always been thought of as tidy to speculate that the universe would be in balance as far as matter goes.

I take up Hawkins because he has created a wild vision of infinite universes which seem to violate occam's razor, just as a belief in God seems safer under occam's razor; and because he acknowledges in "A Brief History of Time" (a nonethless excellent introduction to physics through most of it) that he began working on this wild theory of his after discovering that religious people were too comfortable with the Big Bang... He is, unlike Einstein, a God-hater. It was he who began using dark matter to explicitly use science to refute God.

[dangus]

>>God haters want you to ignore the retrograde planets,>>

Retrograde planets? What do you mean? To me, "retrograde planets" has meant the unique backwards motion that planets make across the sky which enabled Copernicus to deduce that the Sun was the center of the solar system.

[dangus]

>> These dolts confuse "interpretations of evidence" as "proof". >>

No, it is physical evidence which is consistent with predictions made by theory. Absolute proof? No, but it is strong empirical support. Suppose someone claims to have seen a crime. He tells the police where to find the body. The police go there and find a body. Does that prove he witnessed the crime? No. But it sure helps make the case/

[dangus]

Then what was Vera Ruban's problem?

A bad attitude?

Oh, Vera Ruban... Never knew who first posed the problem... In my first response I alluded to "her" problem... Hawkins prosposed many, many times more dark matter than would be needed to solve her problem. Hawkins saw the entire universe filled with dark matter. Vera's observations would be explained if dark matter existed only within galaxies. A later observation (sorry, I don't remember names) proposed rings of dark matter around the galaxies.

IF it is just in rings around galaxies, it solves Vera's problem, but refutes Hawkins severely. But the whole issue of dark matter has little to do with the big bang; Hawkins used dark matter to support a theory which *refuted* the traditional big bang theory.

[Ichneumon]

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