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What Is Ashmore's
Paradox About?
When we examine the spectrum (rainbow) of the light arriving from distant
galaxies we see that it is redshifted. Redshift means that characteristic
features in this spectrum (the absorption lines) are not where they should be
had they been emitted by a stationary galaxy. They have been shifted towards the
red end of the spectrum. ‘The redshift’ means that light from a distant
galaxy has been stretched (it has a longer wavelength than it should have). In
‘Big Bang’ cosmology, this ‘stretching of light’ is explained by the
Doppler effect, i.e. the galaxy is moving away from us. The faster the galaxy is
moving away from us, the more the light emitted by it is stretched and the
greater the redshift. By measuring the red shift we can determine the recession
velocity of the galaxy.
How far a galaxy is away from us is measured in different ways – usually on
the principal that the further away a star or galaxy is, the dimmer it appears
to be to us on Earth (its apparent brightness is less). The brightness of
certain stars (Cepheid variables) is not constant but pulses - they go bright,
dim, bright, dim, with a regular period. Henrietta
Leavitt and her team at Harvard found a relationship between the absolute
brightness of these Cepheid variables (how bright they really are) and the
period with which they pulse. The greater the absolute magnitude of a star (How
bright it really is) the longer the period - it takes longer to go bright, dim,
bright.
So, to sum up, find a Cepheid variable in your galaxy, measure its period. This
tells you how bright it really is (its absolute magnitude). Measure how bright
it appears to be to us on Earth (apparent magnitude) and then you can calculate
how far away it is.
Nowadays they also use supernovae Ia. A supernova is a star that explodes, but
what is special about this type of supernovae is that they all explode with the
same brightness. Find a supernova Ia in your galaxy and measure its apparent
magnitude (how bright it appears to us on Earth). We know how bright it should
be so we can calculate how far it is away.
Hubble measured the recession velocities of several galaxies by determining
their redshifts and used Cepheid variables to determine how far away they
where. From this he discovered the 'Hubble Law'.
The Hubble law tells us that the recession velocity (v) of a galaxy is
proportional to how far the galaxy is away from us (d). That is, a galaxy twice
as far away is moving away from us twice as fast. The constant of
proportionality is the Hubble constant, H.
v = Hd or (velocity of galaxy) = (Hubble constant)x(distance from
Earth to galaxy)
Cosmologists explain this as saying that the Universe was created in one ‘Big
Bang’ at a certain time and at and a certain place a long time ago. The faster
that the matter was flung out of the Big Bang, the further it will have traveled
in the same time. Hence galaxies going twice as fast will have traveled twice as
far in the same time - the Hubble law. This expansion is termed ‘the expanding
Universe’. The Hubble law gives us the rate of the expansion and the ‘Hubble
time’ is the age of the Universe - determined by assuming that the Universe
has been expanding at the same rate all the time. The Hubble time gives us
approximately the age of the Universe. It also gives a point of creation and so
the Big Bang theory and the expanding Universe are well liked by both scientists
and the Church.
This is why the Hubble constant, H is such an important constant. It gives us
‘creation’ and also ‘He who knows H, knows how old the Universe is’.
The Big Bang theory is often quoted as ‘proven’ and, it must be said, it is
accepted as correct by a very large proportion of the scientists around today.
However there are a few ‘heretics’ around. Halton
Arp is one of the best known ‘dissenter’ with several excellent books on
the subject and, as you have already guessed, I am another.
It must be said that no one is arguing against the experimental evidence of
redshift and the Hubble law, it is the interpretation of this experimental
evidence that we disagree with. We say that redshift is caused by something
else.
In my case I believe in 'New Tired Light', first proposed by Zwicky in 1929. Light is
not a continuous wave like the waves in the sea, but light comes in little
packets or quanta of energy called photons. The energy of each little packet or
quanta depends upon its frequency. The higher the frequency of the light the
more energy each photon has (blue light has a higher frequency than red light so
photons of blue light have more energy than photons of red light).
'New Tired Light' devotees like me think that as the photons of light emitted by
distant galaxies travel through space they bump into things, atoms, molecules or
particles and lose energy. As they lose energy, the frequency of each photon
reduces and their wavelength increases - they become redder. They are redshifted
because they lose energy as they travel - hence ‘'New Tired Light'’. It is
sometimes known as ‘light friction’ – but not often.
'New Tired Light' is ‘laughed at’ by Big bang cosmologists because they have built
their reputations on an expanding Universe and they believe that they have
totally disproved it on the grounds of a) no one knows how or what the photons
of light interact with, b) 'New Tired Light' has been unable to explain the Cosmic
Microwave Background (CMB), c) 'New Tired Light' has been unable to explain why
distant supernova take longer to go dimmer than they should do and d) 'New Tired Light'
does not predict the reduction in surface brightness of stars the further
away they are. However, watch this space!
The Cosmic Microwave Background radiation (CMB) is microwave radiation that is
everywhere in space. In Big Bang cosmology it is said to be the ‘echo of the
Big Bang’.
Why Ashmore’s Paradox’ is important is that ‘it draws attention to an
immediately accessible, but wholly/largely unnoticed, fact or relationship - and
then politely says 'but that isn't really compatible with our standard model, is
it?' (to quote Julian, a long and suffering friend of mine who has had to listen
to the development of this theory over many years and joined me in drinking the
copious amounts of lubrication needed to develop a new theory!)
That is, what Ashmore’s Paradox tells you is that you can take out your
calculator and pull up three very common constants, combine them and, in a
matter of seconds, find the Hubble constant. No one has noticed it before, but
now it has been seen, it can be immediately checked.
But, in the ‘Big Bang’ theory you should not be able to do this – at all.
There should be no way that the Hubble constant can be linked to the electron. A
team of international scientists have just completed an eight
year study using the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) to measure the Hubble
constant - and, what did they come up with? You guessed, a Hubble constant with
an uncertainty range including hr/m for the electron. Reiss Kirshner and Press
used Supernovae to determine the Hubble constant and what did they come up with?
You guessed hr/m for the electron in each cubic metre of space. Lots of others
have done the same and come up with the same result (they are listed
on a page within this web site). I am not decrying the work of these
scientists. They are infinitely better scientists than I. Their experimental
results are a credit to them and needed for my theory as much as anyone
else’s. It is the interpretation put on these results that the paradox puts in
doubt.
But it is worse than
that for the Big Bang theory. The constants h,r and m have been used in
measuring the Hubbble constant in the first place! The Planck constant, h, is
the constant of proportionality between the photon energy, E, and the frequency,
f (E = hf). To measure the redshift, scientists measure the shift in spectral
lines. These spectral lines represent photons of a specific frequency and hence
energy (which is where the Planck constant, h, comes in. These lines are caused
by electrons in the atoms of the cooler atmospheres of stars absorbing photons
with these specific energies. So, when experiment tells us that the Hubble
constant is actually equal to hr/m for the electron, we have to be extremely
suspicious!
'New Tired Light' has no problem with the paradox. 'New Tired Light' is all about light
interacting with electrons. So we are quite happy that the Hubble constant is
related to the electron – a particle well known for its interactions with
light. This is how I came across the paradox. Working through the 'New Tired Light'
theory I calculated the Hubble constant and showed that it is related to hr/m
for the electron.
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© Lyndon Ashmore. Nov 2003. amended Feb 2005. All rights reserved.