Brent Clay

Introduction There seems to be an inevitability to the notion of anti-gravity. Given how effectively other systems of nature can be exercised, such as electromagnetics, chemical interactions, thermodynamics, sound, and so on; gravitation can seem an odd holdout. Why can’t we control gravity like we can electricity? Looking into gravitation and understanding its nature in terms of General Relativity brings quick clarity to the question, and reveals the difficulty of the problem. If we start with the simple goal of either directly manipulating gravity or finding a way of directly overcoming it, then the first and most obvious step is to understand how it occurs naturally. General Relativity tells us that gravity is a consequence of the curvature of spacetime. Ignoring questions of Dark Matter for the moment, this curvature is caused by the presence of mass and/or energy, which distorts spacetime into Gravity Wells and then becomes enveloped within them. This rather straightforward ...

All prior posts in this Dark Matter series are summarized as follows: Spacetime Cavitation Summary Galaxies begin as regions of  Spacetime Cavitation  resulting from Universal Expansion, often taking on whirlpool-like shapes, which reflect the underlying curvature and motions of Spacetime itself, upon and within which they are formed (see image below). Matter has a counterpart within the realm of non-material Spacetime. When subjected to extreme cavitation, an applicable unit of Spacetime is converted into its material counterpart (mass and/or energy). Said another way:  Matter is a byproduct of Spacetime Cavitation . This counterpart is almost always hydrogen and/or radiation. With respect to galaxy formation, hydrogen produced as a byproduct of Spacetime Cavitation, which generally lacks sufficient mass to coalesce into stars by reason of its own gravitation when sparsely distributed, instead reacts to the Gravity Well within which it was produced, spiraling and c...

Now for the next big question, which has to do with the origin of matter. All along, the assumption has been that all matter present within the Universe originated from the Singularity that preceded the Big Bang. As I have pointed out, I believe this theory is wrong (Big Bang theory, that is) for many reasons. I will touch upon a couple of them now, and a few more in a following post. If all the matter within the Universe is nothing more than the debris field of the Big Bang, then what caused the galaxies to form in the first place? I discussed what I believe to be part of the answer to this question in the previous post, finally concluding that Galaxies form at points where Universal Expansion causes spacetime to break down, cavitating into regions of non-flat spacetime. I call this process,  Spacetime Cavitation . I submit that most galaxies form as regions of Spacetime Cavitation like this, and quite possibly, all of them. To fully grasp this concept requires that we no long...

There are two gravitational conditions. First is the common notion of Relativistic gravitation, which tells us that gravity is a result of the curvature of spacetime caused by the presence of mass. This form of gravity is most familiar to us. When we look up at the night sky, we are peering at the stars from deep within the earth’s Gravity Well, which also happens to be fairly deep within the Sun’s Gravity Well. Kepler’s Laws of planetary motion, Einstein’s General Relativity, and even Newtonian Gravitation all provide good frameworks for understanding what we see in the skies, especially when it comes to the behavior of nearby celestial objects like the planets in our Solar System. However, applying what we have learned about gravitation to our observations of other galaxies, especially spiral galaxies, we find that they  do not  seem to behave as we expect. As we have discussed at length, there simply isn’t enough visible matter within them to account for their abil...

We should remember that in every scenario where a substance or object succumbs to stress in a way that changes its nature (as discussed in the previous post), the principles of mass/energy equivalence remain in play, as do those of mass/energy conservation. For instance, the sun’s nuclear furnace works by compressing hydrogen atoms into helium (although, not quite so directly), resulting in a loss of mass in the form of energy. But, using the handy equation,  E = mc 2 , we can account for the mass of the original hydrogen atoms even after this fusion takes place. It is important to understand something else about mass/energy equivalence too, which is that it does not imply that mass and energy can be converted between states in some trivial way; it says that the  mass of a body is a measure of its energy content . One way of thinking about this is to consider unit of measure conversions: one gallon of liquid is equal to 3.785 liters. Although this analogy is far from perfect...

In the previous post, I discussed some of the oddities revealed in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field Image. Specifically, the strange occurrence of what appear to be galaxies of vastly different ages occupying the same regions of space, within what is believed to be a snapshot of the early Universe itself (or, at least part of it). At the end of that post, I concluded that the most straightforward solution to this mystery lies in the likelihood that these galaxies formed in place (at their relative positions) as a result of something other than the Big Bang. The next question is, if the matter from which these galaxies were formed did not originate from the Big Bang, then where did it come from? And, what triggered their formation? Let us think about the rigidity of space and Universal expansion again. As we discussed in a prior post, spacetime is incredibly rigid, but it expands nonetheless. And, despite this unrelenting and ever-accelerating expansion, the matter within it condenses into...

If there isn't enough observable matter within a given galaxy to account for the fact that it does not simply fall apart, then what explanation (other than Dark Matter) is there for its formation? Is it possible that the galaxies formed in place, at their relative positions within the Universe, rather than being part of the debris field of some enormous explosion (the Big Bang)? It seems worth considering. Of course, if we do consider it, we must then ask where all the matter  did  come from. Indeed we do. For some, this question is enough in itself to dismiss any argument against the Big Bang altogether. Yet, I must hold out that to the open-minded, considering this question is no less sensible than believing that all the matter in the Universe originated from a singularity. Speculation like this leads to many valid questions, not the least of which being, "What about all the other supporting evidence for the Big Bang?" A fair question to be sure, but that's wh...

In actuality, speculation about the origins of the Universe is very often speculation about the origins of matter. The Big Bang tracks everything back to a  singularity  – a single theoretical point where everything that  is  today, at one time existed in a condensed, ethereal state, which eventually exploded and evolved into the Universe as it is now. Given our observations and reflections on the Universe, this theory seems almost, but not quite reasonable. First, the Big Bang is essentially targeted at two fundamental and hereto unexplained features of the Universe; 1) that it is expanding and 2) that there seems to be no other reasonable explanation of its origins. Beyond these two conditions, which the Big Bang seems particularly well suited to explain, are other observations that it doesn’t address quite so elegantly. One of the biggest problems with the Big Bang is the distribution of matter. Deep space astronomy has revealed that there is a remarkably even...

So we see that space (the actual spacetime fabric itself) is enormously stiff (or enormously fluid, but that discussion will come later), but that's not all that's strange about it. It is also expanding. This seems a rather odd coupling of characteristics. Anything that is rigid resists bending or flexing in any way, yet the Universe is clearly expanding at an enormous rate. This forces us to wonder about the nature of that expansion. When we look to the heavens and see that all of the visible galaxies appear to be moving away from us (regardless of where in the sky we look), it begs the question of  how  they are moving. This may seem to be yet another odd question. If something is moving away from us, does it really matter  how  it is moving? In fact, it does. The question boils down to this: Are galaxies moving through space like cars on an interstate, or are they being carried away like suitcases on an enormous, invisible conveyor belt? This difference is a...

Note that this post makes reference to a scale-model Solar System, which was introduced in a prior post. What does this have to do with the rigidity of space? Think of a location that is about 40 miles from where you are at this moment. Even if there is interstate highway between you and this location, it would still take quite a drive to get there - 40 miles is a fair distance. Now, imagine that the entire region around you is covered with a layer of insulating foam, which is 50 feet thick (think of something you might find in the cushions of a sofa). If you were to set a golf ball on the foam in front of you, it would have no reason to roll in any particular direction (for this example, assume that you are somehow hovering above the foam, and that there is nothing else nearby to disrupt its smooth, flat surface). Now, let's say that 40 miles away there is an enormous floating crane, which is holding a scale model of the sun (a spheroid, 36 feet in diameter) suspended in the...

Let us now perform another level-set. So far, we recognize and accept the obvious existence of matter within the Universe. Furthermore, as  E=mc 2  tells us, whether any unit of matter happens to take the form of energy or mass does not subtract from its overall qualification (or quantification) as matter. In other words, mass and energy are interchangeable; they are only different  forms  of matter. Of course, this is not to suggest that switching between these two states is a trivial thing - far from it, but that is a topic for another day. Next, we know that empty space isn't exactly empty. Meaning, in a very real sense, there is a spacetime fabric that can be coerced into forming gravity wells, or producing other observable effects such as gravitational lensing. Gravity wells then, are constructed of spacetime itself; they do not fall within the realms of matter, but have identifiable characteristics nonetheless. General Relativity actually predicts  Emb...

Once we begin considering the possibility that galactic gravity wells could somehow be independent of the matter within them, a few more questions immediately surface. Could gravity wells predate the matter within them? Why does matter seem to always  live  in these gravity wells rather than more evenly cover the emptiness of intergalactic space? Why do they rotate? And of course, what causes them? Surprisingly, none of these questions are difficult to answer within the context of our current line of reasoning. There are in fact, agreeable, and what seem to be quite plausible answers to all of them.  Note that I will not get to all of these questions within this particular post, but will eventually address each of them within this Dark Matter series . In terms of the Big Bang, all the matter in the Universe is nothing more than a debris field. On first glance, this debris appears to be remarkably evenly distributed. But on closer inspection we find that although ...

To this point we have not discussed anything new; only clarified the importance of thinking of gravity in the correct context. Rather than visualizing gravity as the attraction of two bodies, we are now thinking of bodies such as stars and planets traveling along the inside of Gravity Wells - a well-known concept. This means, we have only restated the problem in less abstract, less obscure terms. It turns out that this analogy holds up remarkably well; like rolling a marble along the inner surface of a physical bowl, it will travel around the bowl until it eventually loses momentum and settles to the bottom, or if it is tossed too hard, roll over the edge of the bowl and escape it altogether. If the marble could somehow be rolled with just the right force (momentarily overlooking friction), it could settle into a point of equilibrium, having just the right amount of angular velocity to maintain a constant distance from the bottom of the bowl and its outer edge. This perfect velocit...

These depressions in space (gravity wells) express the classical understanding of gravitation (Relativistic, not Newtonian), which suggests that gravity is not a measure of the force of attraction between two bodies, it is instead a measure of the force with which two bodies fall into the larger gravity well produced by the overlapping of their two individual gravity wells. This means that we could essentially describe the riddle of Dark Matter in another way, by simply saying that we cannot explain how the gravity depressions in which galaxies exist can be deep enough to prevent the spinning matter within them from over-spilling their boundaries. So, before tackling the question of how these depressions can exist at all, we should first ask an even more basic question. If we concede that such depressions  do  exist, then perhaps we can first attempt to understand whether the matter within galaxies behaves according to our understanding of gravitation. In other words, start ...

The paradox of Dark Matter leads unavoidably to a few questions. The first and most obvious has to do with galaxy structure. How can galaxies behave as though they contain 70% more mass than they appear to have? What keeps them from simply flying apart? But these questions quickly lead to the even more intriguing question of how they ever formed at all. Understanding the riddle of Dark Matter requires rewinding the clock all the way back to the Big Bang. Like so many other questions in physics, it can seem odd that two seemingly disconnected topics can end up having such direct bearing on one another. But in the end, unexpected connections like this often end up being a good thing; they are signals, hints that we may have tapped into a fundamental aspect of the Universe that once understood, could help resolve other mysteries as well. First, what of galaxy structure and rotation? Here the problem is that we cannot detect enough matter to account for the gravity that we know  mu...