Reason for Cosmological Redshift

By machian cosmologist Date 2014-01-27 11:22 Edited 2014-01-27 11:25

I just read an Article in the German Journal "Sterne und Weltraum" (in english: "Stars and Space").

There it is written that Edwin Hubble proofed the relationship between cosmological redshift and velocity.
Is this really true? In my opinion he just proofed the relationship between redshift and DISTANCE!
Maybe this is a real tragedy: All young scientists are told that there is a proof for expansion, but there is actually NO proof for expansion at all.

Does anyone know about proofs or hints for the cosmological redshift-velocity relationship paradigma?

Thank you in advance!

Sincerely yours,
S.

P.S.: Please consider that I'm talking only about cosmological redshift. I'm aware of the fact that there is a doppler-redshift/blueshift for example in the light from rotating galaxies.

By hartmut Date 2014-01-27 13:13

During the time before Lemaître (1927) and Hubble (1929) noticed that the redshift of galaxies increases with their luminosity distance, these redshifts were interpreted as due to a Doppler effect, thus due to velocity, as in the light from stars. Hubble continued to express the redshift in terms of this apparent velocity, but he actually considered it more likely (until his death) that the cosmological redshift was caused by some kind of tired light effect.

The cosmological redshift has never been shown to be due to relative velocity. It is not even considered to reflect an actual velocity in contemporary orthodox cosmology, in which the Universe is, nevertheless, presupposed to expand.

Actually, the Universe does not appear to expand. Distant galaxies do not show the increased angular sizes that would be expected if the Universe had been smaller in the past, so that the galaxies would have been closer to us when the light we see was emitted. It may be possible to explain the discrepancy away by an ad hoc hypothesis of compensatory size evolution, but this would make no difference to the actual appearances. The observed angular sizes are, instead, immediately compatible with tired light models, in which light waves expand in the absence of an expansion of the Universe. However, these models do not predict the time dilation that has been observed in the light curves of distant supernovae. The Universe does not appear to expand, but it does appear to be time dilated as a function of distance, which is reflected in the cosmological redshift as well as in these light curves.

If you are interested in a more viable interpretation of the redshift, you may read my paper
http://www2.ling.su.se/staff/hartmut/contraction_cosmology.pdf

By machian cosmologist Date 2014-01-29 13:37

Thank you very much for your detailed answer, Hartmut!

I read your article with great interest. I think your contraction theory is a good idea for explaining the cosmological redshift.
I have knowledge of a similar theory in which such a contraction (there a contraction of atoms, molecules,...) is explained by a time dependent mass of elementary particles.

Here is the link to the abstract of an article published in "Astronomical Notes" (Volume 333, Issue 2, pages 182–185, February 2012):

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/asna.201111641/abstract

In this article the Pioneer Anomaly is explained with the above mentioned variable mass theory.

Kind regards,
S.

By hartmut Date 2014-01-29 23:08

Thanks for this reference.

I have the impression that the Pioneer anomaly simply reflects an error introduced into the tracking algorithm at a certain date. I shall open this as a new topic.

Kind regards,
Hartmut

By Jade Annand Date 2014-01-31 07:03

I wish I had more papers of Edwin's in the post 1929 era. I transcribed a copy Vincent Sauvé sent me once upon a time here, and you can get a pretty good sense of what his thoughts were at the time.

Anyone know where we could dig up more cosmology papers (especially from Edwin Hubble) from that era?

By hartmut Date 2014-01-31 23:42

There are several papers by Domingos Soares, in which Hubble's doubts about expansion are mentioned with references:

http://arxiv.org/pdf/physics/0605098.pdf?origin=publication_detail
http://arxiv.org/pdf/0908.1864.pdf
http://www.fisica.ufmg.br/~dsoares/ensino/hubef.pdf

By bangstrom Date 2014-02-01 11:05

Hartmut,

Many thanks for the references to papers by Domingos Soares. I have often seen it stated as fact that Hubble discovered universal expansion but Hubble himself was never convinced about expansion. Contraction cosmology is the most plausible explanation I know of for 'dark energy' and 'accelerated expansion.' Acceleration over time is observed with nearly any form of contraction because contraction works with the forces involved- usually gravity. Accelerated expansion may be nothing more than an illusion resulting from accelerated contraction and acceleration with time is what we should expect if our material world is contracting. Contraction does not require an external energy source so there is no need for a 'dark energy' explanation. I am glad to see that your paper has been accepted for publication.

By Ari Jokimäki Date 2014-02-01 12:48

Anyone know where we could dig up more cosmology papers (especially from Edwin Hubble) from that era?

Here you go: All Hubble papers in ADS between 1900 and 1950. I think we discussed this Hubble thing with links to papers in the Arp forum long ago.

By Jade Annand Date 2014-02-04 01:56

Thank you, Ari! :)

By Jade Annand Date 2014-02-05 06:58

Now, this might have still been 'obvious' in his day, but it still seems oddly prescient that this dogs us to this very day:

From this paper (emphases mine):

Edwin said:

If no recession is assumed, the observed nebular counts are satisfactorily described by supposing that we are observing a finite portion of a much larger universe of nebulae, but a universe in which the frequency of light varies uniformly with the distance.

If, on the other hand, recession is assumed, the observed nebular counts are not satisfactorily described by any of the homogeneous expanding models of general relativity, but if forced to fit require that the universe be closed, that we have already explored it to its outmost bounds with the 100-in. telescope, and that it is a universe dominantly filled with non-luminous matter distributed in such a way as to absorb or scatter negligibly small amounts of light.

(I think the outmost bounds based on the Hubble constant of the day was considerably less than it is now, hence the "explored it to its outmost bounds" comment, I would guess.)