13 Things That Make No Sense: My Take
Sixsix has a long article about thirteen things in Science that make no sense, some of which are very interesting open problem. I have some opinion on all of them, so I’ll share it here!
1) The placebo effect: You give a saline or sugar solution to patients to trick them into thinking they receive treatment when they are actually not. The treatment works as planned.
My theory on this is that the human will or belief can affect physicality. If I want it to rain, the chance of rain increases correspondingly to my desire or belief that it will rain. A better way to describe it might be that if I truly believe in an outcome, that outcome has little choice but to actualize itself in the form you’ve set for it.
2) The horizon problem: The universe is 28 billion light years across, but has only been around for 14 billion years. Also, background radiation is uniform throughout the universe. Contradiction.
This is not a problem if you either assume that we do not have the capability to meaure the universe well, and that maybe the thing we think of as the universe is just some localized subspace of something we can’t yet comprehend. This is highly likely. The other explanation is that things are permitted to travel faster than c, the speed of light, which is probably true. There’s no such thing as an absolute limit.
3) Ultra-energetic cosmic rays: There’s a theoretical upper bound to the energy that cosmic rays can have, yet we’ve detected rays above this limit with no apparent source.
To me, this isn’t such a big deal. It’s just a case where the models we’ve built don’t match reality. Happens all the time.
4) Belfast homeopathy results: ultra-dilute solutions of histamine have a measurable effect on human white blood cells, even when there may not actually be any histamine left in the solution!
I should ask my dad about this. He’d be interested. *asks dad* So, my father who is a medical professional says that the community has a high distaste for the subject, much like science thinks UFO watchers and ID proponents are mostly psycho. Personally, from my study of chemistry, I’d have to take that opinion as well. For this to become even semi-legitimate, I’d need to see multiple studies all pointing the same way.
5) Dark Matter: The spin of the universe needs more matter than we have. So much more matter to produce the gravitational effects, that 90% of the universe might be dark matter.
This is unsatisfying. As the article mentions, it might make more sense to modify Newton’s laws over large distances and masses than to speculate that some mysterious dark matter exists.
6) Methane on Mars: The Viking lander detected methane being produced, but future missions could not detect any “organic” molecules needed for life.
Who says life needs organic molecules?
7) Tetraneutrons: It seems neutrons can bind in ways that in the classical model produce absolute chaos.
But then where do Neutron stars come from if Neutrons can’t bind to each other?
Planet X: The Pioneer starcraft have been pulled off-trajectory by a large planet.
Scientists have wondered if there’s another body in our solar system far, far out, some Planet X beyond Pluto, but they have never been able to find it. I suggest they keep looking.
9) Dark Energy: The universe is increasing its rate of expansion, still.
Why does the universe have to slow down? Maybe it’s alive, and just starting a big race or something. The universe isn’t tired yet.
10) The Kuiper Cliff: There’s a belt of icy rock, then nothing at all in the vicinity.
The speculation is that a large planet swept the area clean of debris–this is easy if you assume a Planet X.
11) A mysterious signal, received on 1420MHz, a frequency banned on earth.
“It was either a powerful astronomical event - or an advanced alien civilisation beaming out a signal.” Or EM pollution…
12) Constants not so-constant: John Webb analysed some light and found that a fundamental constant alpha had changed over time.
To me, this makes the most sense. It’s counter intuitive in a universe where everything is in a state of change for there to be such a thing as the “constant.” I believe Scientists will eventually find that not only do constants vary over time, but that any particular point they can only be represented by certain probability distributions.
13) Cold fusion: palladium + heavy water = instant energy.
There’s a good reason I will leave a comment here. Cold fusion is probably ridiculous.
This entry was posted on Saturday, November 5th, 2005 at 5:32 am and is tagged with energetic cosmic rays, white blood cells, horizon problem, placebo effect, background radiation, apparent source, absolute limit, measurable effect, sugar solution, subspace, speed of light, upper bound, medical professional, light years, homeopathy, chance of rain, saline, contradiction, belfast, match. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback.
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