19 February 2010
Cosmological Heresy
Just a couple of quick links here for the heretical view, in which I persist, that some quasi-steady-state theory will be revived and will turn out to account for the evidence that is usually adduced for the Big Bang. The notion that the universe is expanding is itself a quite tentative hypothesis, drawn from the "red shift," which has other plausible explanations.
More broadly, big bang cosmology today relies on a growing number of hypothetical
entities, inflation, dark matter, dark energy, etc. Its as if the theory keeps developing holes that require a new such patch. Eventually, one ought to wonder whether the best patch of all is to junk the theory and adopt a better one.
I believe firmly in the scientific method. I also believe that professional scientists are subect to the same frailties as the rest of the human race, and that in the more abstract fields -- such as cosmology or subatomic physics -- they are subject to a sort of clubbishness that keeps regnant ideas regnant far too long and too easily.
More broadly, big bang cosmology today relies on a growing number of hypothetical
entities, inflation, dark matter, dark energy, etc. Its as if the theory keeps developing holes that require a new such patch. Eventually, one ought to wonder whether the best patch of all is to junk the theory and adopt a better one.
I believe firmly in the scientific method. I also believe that professional scientists are subect to the same frailties as the rest of the human race, and that in the more abstract fields -- such as cosmology or subatomic physics -- they are subject to a sort of clubbishness that keeps regnant ideas regnant far too long and too easily.
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Knowledge is warranted belief -- it is the body of belief that we build up because, while living in this world, we've developed good reasons for believing it. What we know, then, is what works -- and it is, necessarily, what has worked for us, each of us individually, as a first approximation. For my other blog, on the struggles for control in the corporate suites, see www.proxypartisans.blogspot.com.
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