Blessed are they who set out to learn nothing, for they shall surely succeed.
Mike Helland has been treating us to a Gish gallop of numerical distances, even though
Ziggurat and I and others have shown that the relationship between red shift and photon energy is measured and calculated without any knowledge of distance.
Mike Helland computed most of his numerical distances using an equation based upon Helland physics instead of mainstream physics.
Mike Helland stubbornly insists his equation is based upon mainstream physics, even after I have given a proof that it isn't (and will give two more proofs below of its incompatibility with mainstream physics).
This may be a good time to remember how red shifts are actually measured and computed. Mainstream physics and chemistry tell us that certain elements and molecules have emission and absorption lines at definite fixed frequencies. When we examine the spectrum of light emitted by a distant source, we can easily measure the displacement of those lines from their original frequencies. We do that without having to know anything about our distance from the source, and without having to form any opinion about how those red or blue shifts came to be.
From those measured shifts, mainstream astrophysics defines a parameter z via the equation
1 + z = a(t1) / a(t0) = λ(t1) / λ(t0) = f(t0) / f(t1)
where t
0 is the time at which the photons were emitted, t
1 the time at which the spectrum was observed, λ(t) is the wavelength at time t, f(t) the frequency at time t, and a(t) the FLRW scale factor at time t.
Note first of all that distances are completely absent from that equation.
Note also that we can use that equation to calculate z without knowing the times t
0 and t
1. The reason we don't have to know t
0 is that λ(t
0) and f(t
0) are simply the wavelength and frequency of unshifted photons at the emission/absorption lines we are using to compute the shift, and we know those wavelengths and frequencies because they have been measured in modern laboratories and published in the research literature. The reason we don't have to know a numerical value for t
1 is that λ(t
1) and f(t
1) are simply the wavelength and frequency of the shifted emission/absorption lines we are seeing in the spectrum.
Finally, note that the scale factor a(t) is the only thing in that equation that might appear to require us to form an opinion about the cause of the shifts. In use, however, we don't use the a(t) part of that equation to measure or to compute red/blue shifts. We use the wavelength or frequency parts when measuring or computing shifts. The a(t) part of that equation is there because mainstream physics attributes much of the red shift seen in spectra from distant sources to expansion of the universe as predicted by certain FLRW models, and we use the a(t) part of the equation to relate the red shift we measure and compute (without using the a(t) part) to those FLRW models.
From the above, it should be easy to understand why
Mike Helland's obsession with numerical distances is unhelpful to anyone who truly wishes to understand the relationship between red shift and photon energy. The energy of photons corresponding to emission/absorption lines is known
- at the time the photons are emitted, because we can measure the frequency of those lines in a modern laboratory
- at the time the photons are received, because we can measure their frequency by examining the spectrum of the light we received
Distances become a concern only when we want to develop a theory that explains the correlation of red shift with distance. Expansion of space, as in the FLRW models for an expanding universe, is the mainstream theory that explains that correlation. The James Webb telescope will provide new data to help us test that mainstream theory, and also help us to calculate better estimates for the parameters of that mainstream theory.
And so the mainstream equations that relate distance to red shift are based upon expansion of space, as predicted by the FLRW models. Those FLRW models have several parameters, but for any choice of those parameters we can use the FLRW model to derive equations that relate distance to the part of the red shift that is caused by expansion of space.
Note that, in mainstream physics, the relationship between distance and red shift is model-dependent. In particular, it depends upon the parameters of an FLRW model, and those parameters show up in the mainstream equations for estimating distance from red shift.
Mike Helland's equation for calculating distance from red shift does not involve any of the FLRW parameters, which was an extremely strong clue that the Helland equation is not based upon mainstream physics. In a recent post, however,
Mike Helland has said his equation assumes a universe devoid of matter, which establishes the value
Mike Helland's equation assumes for one of the FLRW parameters. It is conceivable that
Mike Helland will eventually tell us the values of other FLRW parameters he may want us to believe he took into account when deriving the Helland equation.
With that background...
W.D.Clinger - wish you'd been my lecturer when I was doing my A level pure and applied maths! Thanks for the lessons.
Those were very good.
What do you think are the differences with this:
http://www.bo.astro.it/~cappi/cosmotools.pdf
It looks good too.
"It looks good too." For flat spacetime, a simplifying assumption I made in the notes I posted to this forum's predecessor years ago, equation (6) of Cappi's paper simplifies to
dc(z) = (H(t)/H0) a(t) r
where d
c(z) is the comoving distance corresponding to red shift z, H(t) is the Hubble parameter (as a function of time), H
0 is the value of H at the present time, a(t) (which Cappi writes as R) is the FLRW scale factor (also a function of time), and r is defined by Cappi's equation (4), which involves a rather nasty-looking integral that probably has no simple closed-form solution and would therefore have to be computed using routine numerical integration. To use that equation, you'd have to know what time t to use for the H(t) and a(t) factors; it appears to me that you'd use the lookback time given by Cappi's equation (7), which involves another nasty-looking integral.
From the comoving distance, you can compute the luminosity distance via d
L = d
c (1 + z).
Now compare (my simplification of a special case of) Cappi's equation for distance to the Helland equation, which is
d = (z/(1+z)) c/H0
(For some reason,
Mike Helland stubbornly persists in writing a more complicated equivalent of that equation, perhaps because the more complicated way of writing the equation makes it harder to compare against mainstream equations such as Cappi's.)
Now I ask you: Does the Helland physics equation for distance even resemble the mainstream physics equation?
It is therefore freaking obvious that the Helland physics equation for d is incompatible with mainstream physics. No matter how vehemently Mike Helland insists that his d values are computed using mainstream physics, they are not. Those d values come from Helland physics, which is why we should just ignore Mike Helland's "calculations" of those d values.
To close:
*edit*Not to take away from WDC. That was thorough. Christoffel symbols? That's how you know you're getting in there.
As if
Mike Helland had any idea what Christoffel symbols are about.