A Heavenly Wind - Ether theory challenges "Invisible Mass"

[Dover]

Dark Matter's Rival: Ether Theory Challenges "Invisible Mass"

National Geographic News

Late last month scientists working at NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory announced that they had found proof of dark matter, the theoretical substance believed to make up more than a quarter of the universe.

But Glenn Starkman, a cosmologist at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, is hitting back with a blast from the past. He argues that dark matter might not exist and that the long-discredited substance known as ether is actually what influences gravity in the cosmos.

Dark matter is the prevailing scientific explanation for a puzzling phenomenon: Galaxies behave as if they contain much more mass than is visible to astronomers (see a computer simulation of dark matter).

According to theory, dark matter is the invisible mass that accounts for this behavior, and the undetectable substance makes up five times more of the universe than the matter we can see.
Starkman's controversial counterproposal is that the presence of ether in the universe better explains the galaxies' behavior.

His theories were recently reported in the August 26 issue of New Scientist magazine.

"Galaxies spin faster than they should, given the amount of matter we see in them. The possibility we've gone with for a long time is that there's some unaccounted-for mass generating that extra gravity," Starkman said.

"But the other possibility is that the amount of mass we see generates more gravity than we thought. That's where ether comes in."...cont'd

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/09/060908-dark-matter.html

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We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half-full of cocaine and a whole galaxy of multicolored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers.... also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether, and two dozen amyls.... But the only thing that worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible than a man in the depths of an ether binge...."
--Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

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Ether


Having postulated the existence of the ether as the medium in which light travels it becomes interesting to determine the properties of this material. First and foremost, since the light from distant stars does reach us, we must assume that the ether permeates the whole universe up to its farthest reaches. We must then imagine that the Earth plunges through this ether as it circles the Sun. The ether must then be very tenuous, for otherwise the friction would have stopped the Earth long ago. Let us now derive some other predictions derived from the ether hypothesis

As the Earth moves through this ether a kind of ``ether wind'' must be present on Earth's surface. To see why this should happen consider the following analogy. Imagine a windless day in which you take a ride in your red convertible which, unfortunately, has no windshield. As you speed up you will feel the air blowing, the faster you go, the stronger this wind is. In the same way, replacing air -> ether and red convertible -> earth , a very sensitive apparatus on the surface of the earth should detect and ether wind.

So, can the ether wind be detected? Apparently yes! The idea for the first experiments is based on the following argument. Imagine yourself back in your convertible (with no windshield) taking your nagging grandmother to the store; she sits in the back seat...it's safer. She talks all the time, but, fortunately, her words get blown back by the wind. In contrast she hears everything you say, for your words get blown back by the wind, right into her ears (good grief!). In the same way, as we stand on Earth, the ether wind should blow back the light coming from the stars. At different times of the year, the ether wind blows in different directions since the earth is moving in different directions, hence the observed positions of the stars should change (see Fig. 5.6)... and they do!


cont'd -- http://physics.ucr.edu/~wudka/Physics7/Notes_www/node67.html

[Dover]

1. Quantum Aether Dynamics Institute

http://www.16pi2.com/

[Dover]

2. Aether: The Ancient Greeks

Aether: The Greek God

AITHER (or Aether) was the Protogenos (first-born elemental god) of the bright, glowing upper air of heaven - the substance of light. Above him lay the solid dome of the sky-god, Ouranos, and below, the transparent mists of earth-bound air.

In the evening his mother Nyx drew her veil of darkness between the aither and the aer to bring night to man. In the morn his sister-wife Hemera dispersed these mists, revealing the shining blue aither of day. Night and day were regarded as quite independent of the sun in the ancient cosmogonies...cont'd

http://www.theoi.com/Protogenos/Aither.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aether_(mythology)


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The Ancient Greeks and Nature
It should be recalled that the foundations of the classical physical sciences, mathematics and geometries can be traced back to the ancient Greek philsophers and sages whose recorded wisdoms and writings were rediscovered after the Dark Ages, and upon whose philosophies and sciences the emerging western civilisation sought to rebuild knowledge "anew".

This article examines the translated historical literature concerning the earliest of the ancient Greeks, by way of very brief summarisation of the extensive researched work of the classicist WKC Guthrie.

http://www.mountainman.com.au/ancients.html

excerpts:

The Fifth Element of Nature
Notes from Guthrie: The truth is that the emergence of a fifth element in Greek thought was a gradual process. In bare outline, a common conception of the universe seems to have been shared by most religious and philosophical thinkers in the centuries before Plato. The cosmos, a sphere bounded by the sky, contains the conflicting "opposites" (ie: primarily the hot/the cold, the wet/the dry) which became (via Empedocles) the four root substances earth, water, air and fire.

The mutually destructive nature of these elements ensures that the creatures compounded of them shall be mortal. But this cosmic sphere is not the whole of existence. It floats in a circumambient substance of indefinite extent. This "surrounding" was of a pure and higher nature, everlasting, alive, and intelligent - in fact - divine.

Xenocrates, a student of Plato - himself educated in accordance to the Pythagorean thought, comments upon writings from Aristotle ...
"Why then does he call it a fifth substance? Surely because Plato too declares the substance of the heaven to be distinct from the sublunary elements, since he assigned it to the dodecahedron and delineated each of the four elements by a different shape. He too therefore says that the substance of the heaven is a fifth one."

On the life of Plato, Xenocrates writes:
"Thus he then classified living creatures into genera and species, and divided them in every way until he came to their elements, which he called the five shapes and bodies, aither, fire, water, earth and air.


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Reference to the "Counter-Earth"
Referenced from writings by Aristotle on the Pythagoreans ... Aetius III,II,3 (DK,44a,17)

Pythagoreans held that the cosmos "Breathed in" from the Infinite Breath outside it: the "aither"
Pythagoras derived the world from the fire and the fifth element"

Philolaus the Pythagorean says that FIRE is at the center, calling it the hearth of the universe; second comes the COUNTER-EARTH, and third the inhabited earth which in its revolution remains opposite the counter-earth, wherefore the inhabitants of this earth do not see those of the other" -

"They call the earth a star as being itself an instrument of time, for it is the cause of day and night. Day it creates by being lit up on the side which turned toward the sun, and night through the cone of its shadow. COUNTER EARTH was the name given by the Pythagoreans to the MOON (as also "heavenly earth"), both because it blocks the sun's light, which is a peculiarity of the earth, and because it marks the limit of the heavenly regions as does the earth of the sublunary." -

Empedocles ... "Come now, hear how fire, as it was separated, raised up the darkling shoots of miserable men and women. Not erring nor ignorant is this tale. Whole natured forms first arose from the earth, having portion both of water and of heat. These the fire sent up, wishing to come to its like."


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The Harmony of the Spheres
From the writings of Aristotle ...
"It seems to some that bodies so great must inevitably produce a sound by their movement: even bodies on earth do so, although they are neither so great in bulk nor moving at so high a speed, and as for the sun and moon, and the stars, it is incredible that they should fail to produce a noise of surpassing loudness. Taking this as their hypothesis, and also that the speeds of the stars, judged by their distances, are in the ratio of the musical consonances, they affirm that the sound of the stars as they revolve is concordant.
To meet this difficulty that none of us is aware of this sound, they account for it by saying that the sound is with us right from birth and has thus no contrasting silence to show it up; for voice and silence are perceived by contrast to each other, and so all mankind is undergoing an experience like that of a coppersmith, who becomes by long habit indifferent to the din around him."



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Pythagoras and the Nature of the Soul
From the writings of Plato ...
"The virtue of temperance (sophrosyne) is said to be the virtue of the soul as a whole, the result of the smooth working of its parts together ... the man who possesses it is "well tuned" (nb: the Greek translation has nothing to do with the state of his health), and is achieved by bringing three parts into accord, just like the fixed three intervals in the scale - highest, lowest and middle - that is, a musical harmony is achieved.
In the case of the soul, the three parts that have to be brought into accord
are of course reason, passion and desire."

Guthrie: These "parts" are psychical and not physical.


The soul is both an attunement or "harmonia" and also immortal.

The soul was of the natue of air, or breathed in with air - pneuma - the "breath-soul".

'The soul is a kind of harmony, for harmony is a blend of contraries, and the body is compounded out of contraries" - Aristotle on the recorded beliefs of Pythagoras.

"The ancient theological writers and prophets also bear witness that the soul is yoked to the body as a punishment, and buried in it as in a tomb". -

Pythagoras taught of the transmigration of the soul - man/plant/animal - and post-humous rewards for the good. It is recorded that he remembered his past lives as Aethalides (son of Hermes, whence the gift of memory), Euphobus (from the Homer epics), Hermotimus and Pyrrus (a Delian fisherman) before his birth as Pythagoras.


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Apollonius of Tyana
In conclusion of this account concerning the manner in which the ancients contemplated nature it would be an idea also to reference what is known of the life of one of the last of the Greek philosophers - and one who is rarely known and referenced in the classical disciplines. A better description of Apollonius of Tyana (approx 20BC - 90AD) would be philosopher/sage and what we know of him is recorded in a publication entitled The Life of Apollonius of Tyana by Philostratus in about 220AD. The web reference supplied here will access much of this work.
Briefly, Apollonius of Tyana travelled overland to India, in or around the time of Christ in order to "converse with the Brahmins". The following extract is of particular relevance to a further series of articles entitled Theories of Aether, and is sourced from chapter XXXIV of Book II of the above publication:


"They sat down together as they would want to do, and they allowed Apollonius to ask questions; and he asked them of what they thought the cosmos was composed; but they answered: 'Of elements'.
'Are there then four?' Apollonius asked.

'Not four,' said Iarchus, 'but five'.

'How can there be fifth', said Apollonius, 'alongside of water and air and earth and fire'?

'There is the ether', replied the other, 'which we must regard as the stuff of which the gods are made; for just as all mortal creatures inhale the air, so do immortal and divine creatures inhale the ether.'

Apollonius again asked which was the first of the elements, and Iarchus answered:

'All are simultaneous, for a living creature is not born bit by bit.'

'Am I', said Apollonius, 'to regard the universe as a living creature?'

'Yes', said the other, 'if you have sound knowledge of it, for it engenders all living things'."

In conclusion of this account concerning the ancients, it would be fitting to thus also reference the ancient civilisations of the east, as they have a greater extended history that those of the western world. To this end I have prepared a number of further documents which might be browsed by interested parties:


The Rig Veda - An account of the earliest recorded views (3700BC) on nature and man.

The Katha Upanishad - An account of more recent - yet still earlier than 1000BC - views and outlooks.

[Dover]

3. Aether Theories

Aether Theories:

http://www.mountainman.com.au/aetherqr.htm

[nealmhughes]

4. Does anyone else see higher astrophysics merging with metaphysics,

or is it merely me?

I am still trying to figure out the strong nuclear force....

[Beelzebud]

5. Only for those that wish to see a connection.

[Dover]

6. I think they've always been connected. Check out this 18th C. book

1741 Le Gendre, MATHEMATICS PHYSICS ASTRONOMY, Leather
Incl. OCCULT SCIENCES, ASTROLOGY & ALCHEMY, 14 PLATES

http://cgi.ebay.com/1741-Le-Gendre-MATHEMATICS-PHYSICS-ASTRONOMY-Leather_W0QQitemZ330068418812QQihZ014QQcategoryZ29223QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

....