Dwarf galaxies suggest dark matter theory may be wrong

[Bosonic]

Scientists' predictions about the mysterious dark matter purported to make up most of the mass of the Universe may have to be revised.

Research on dwarf galaxies suggests they cannot form in the way they do if dark matter exists in the form that the most common model requires it to.

That may mean that the Large Hadron Collider will not be able to spot it.

Leading cosmologist Carlos Frenk spoke of the "disturbing" developments at the British Science Festival in Bradford.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14948730

[laconicsax]

1. Interesting how the article chooses to focus on one two "equal" possibilities given.

The other, having to do with galaxy-formation models and supernovae, is very exciting, but is only given a tiny part of the article.

[tama]

2. Goodbuy

standard model and SUSY, wellcome Something Else! As we know, standard model has never been a (unificatory) theory, just a working model, but why is that "disturbing"? Real theoretical physicists do not find this situation and new empirical data disturbing, but exciting!

[laconicsax]

3. Science journalism tends to prefer sensation over substance. n/t

[tama]

6. It's not just dwarf galaxies

if you've been following, and I believe you have been at least to some extent, so far empirical data from LHC has been disastrous for SUSY and standard model predictions of Higgs boson. Not to mention the cumulating amount of other anomalies.

[laconicsax]

7. "but why is that "disturbing"?"

Because science journalism prefers sensation to substance.

[tama]

10. I thought

that was direct quote from the scientist interviewed in the article. Who has invested lot of time (and emotion) in the study of the standard model... ;)

[intaglio]

11. My partner thinks that SUSY has more patches than a quilt ...

[TheMadMonk]

15. Because it IS disturbing. It takes a certain kind of mind to be excited...

...by having one's mental feet kicked out from beneath.

AND scientists with a lot invested in the old ways of thinking can be the worst offenders when it comes to defending the increasingly indefensible. Worst case, the world has to wait for a "Great Man" to die before matters advance. Recall the old "Who's chemistry is right?" controversy that is a staple of early high school/middle school science teaching.

[The Doctor.]

4. When they finally figure out that 'dark matter' is really just a nifty by-product

of the Cosmological (Hubble) Constant, that should put things in place.

That's why the best place to look for cosmic strings is between super-massive objects like galactic clusters and such.

They'll catch up one day. ;)

[laconicsax]

8. How nice that you know better!

:P

[The Doctor.]

12. I sense a note of sarcasm.

:)

[tama]

9. Very complex puzzle

Myself, I would try to avoid the hubris of saying that theoretical physicists are unaware of the relation between "Einsteins biggest mistake" and red shift evidence of inflating universe. :)

What is really exciting and interesting is that Cosmological constant gets huge values in quantum field theory. It's dependent from the Gravitational constant, which according to wikipedia is "dimensionally and numerically equal to the cube of the Planck length divided by the Planck mass and by the square of Planck time." According to a certain TOE, the reduced planck constant (hbar) does not have a single value but its values scale number theoretically. I'm not expert but generally puzzled by the puzzle of unificatory theory, but AFAIK that would bring together cosmological constant and QFT and explain "dark" matter and energy as other values of hbar in a very elegant way.

[The Doctor.]

16. Oh, I agree.

And what I said was 'TiC'.

Now, if we're trying to look at symmetry as a sort of 'absolute', the puzzle there can be solved at exactly the same point (h bar)- , by considering that the divergence of probabilities is actually its own driving factor. I couldn't even begin to think of how to formulate that though.

[saras]

5. It's always good to remind people that science is provisional, and not an alternative religion.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

13. This is a very dark matter indeed.

http://www.holoscience.com/news.php?article=n6yue95j&keywords=dark%20matter#dest

The Death of Physics

“Those who regard philosophy as a ‘soft’ and unscientific discipline, in contrast to the ‘hard’ and scientific fields of mathematics and physics, have accepted a Big Lie. The ideas of mathematicians and physicists can be no more objective or certain than the philosophic ideas on which they depend. Philosophy is the discipline that tells us how to be objective and how to achieve certainty. Without a theory of knowledge, how would mathematicians or physicists know the relationship of their concepts and generalizations to reality? It is the inductive science of philosophy that teaches the ‘hard’ scientist how to be scientific.”
—Leonard Peikoff in The Logical Leap by David Harriman

[laconicsax]

14. Uh huh.

[Confusious]

17. ^ What he said nt