Gravity was first observed, quantified and mathematically explained by Newton, not Einstein! Einstein only hypothesized the speed of the gravity wave, at the speed of light, but there were never any question that 2 huge masses spinning and gravitating towards each other, will have an observable effect on earth. Nevertheless, its impressive that such a far away mass can be detected by man!
2
'Einstein’s “ripples” should matter to everyone — not just physicists'.
Of course, but one can also be content and live presumably happy life if one believes that the Earth is flat, the Sun circles around it, and life was created in six terrestrial days.
Congratulations to all those who were able to convince the holders of the money-bags' strings to fund the project and then to see it to completion.
Of course, but one can also be content and live presumably happy life if one believes that the Earth is flat, the Sun circles around it, and life was created in six terrestrial days.
Congratulations to all those who were able to convince the holders of the money-bags' strings to fund the project and then to see it to completion.
2
@ Gary from Austin, TX:
The link to the scientific paper is given in the Feb.11 NYTimes article: https://dcc.ligo.org/public/0122/P150914/014/LIGO-P150914%3ADetection_of...
I am no physicist, but from the paper I gathered that a pair of black holes orbit and spin at rates and that depend on their masses, separation, energy, etc. Using numerical simulations based on theoretical models of black holes, the scientists produced time-series templates reflecting various combinations of these parameters. The templates were continuously compared to the received LIGO signals, using statistical techniques to distinguish potential matches from the background noise
The thing that left me slack-jawed was the "sound" of the black holes whirling down to coalescence. Each cycle of the waveform corresponds to a single orbit, so just before they fused these enormous objects were orbiting each other over 200 times a second at around 60% of the speed of light! In case you missed it you can listen to it here: http://podcasts.nytimes.com/podcasts/2016/02/11/science/space/ligo-chirp...
The link to the scientific paper is given in the Feb.11 NYTimes article: https://dcc.ligo.org/public/0122/P150914/014/LIGO-P150914%3ADetection_of...
I am no physicist, but from the paper I gathered that a pair of black holes orbit and spin at rates and that depend on their masses, separation, energy, etc. Using numerical simulations based on theoretical models of black holes, the scientists produced time-series templates reflecting various combinations of these parameters. The templates were continuously compared to the received LIGO signals, using statistical techniques to distinguish potential matches from the background noise
The thing that left me slack-jawed was the "sound" of the black holes whirling down to coalescence. Each cycle of the waveform corresponds to a single orbit, so just before they fused these enormous objects were orbiting each other over 200 times a second at around 60% of the speed of light! In case you missed it you can listen to it here: http://podcasts.nytimes.com/podcasts/2016/02/11/science/space/ligo-chirp...
2
I used this article to tell my daughter that if she waved her hand she would set off gravitational waves that would travel at the speed of light affecting all the universe.
"Cool," she said.
"Cool," she said.
2
In the great scheme of things, it is somewhat comforting to realize that the primary debates of 2016 will never register a "chirp" on scientific instruments a billion light years away.
I wish we could turn our efforts to something really important and of lasting significance.
I wish we could turn our efforts to something really important and of lasting significance.
2
Good use of my tax money. You're welcome any time, sci guys and gals.
2
"...vibrations of the atoms in the mirror could have overwhelmed the signal. But scientists were able to resort to the most modern techniques in quantum optics to overcome this"
Wrong. No modern quantum optics were used. The detector was limited by standard photon shot noise (read the paper). The thermal vibrations of the mirror are focused at higher frequencies, merely as a consequence of the mirror geometry.
Wrong. No modern quantum optics were used. The detector was limited by standard photon shot noise (read the paper). The thermal vibrations of the mirror are focused at higher frequencies, merely as a consequence of the mirror geometry.
Truly this is a big discovery only if the scientists are telling the truth. We should be grateful to the LIGO team for this achievement in the history of mankind. Now I realize why Einstein was so famous. He was really a brainy brain. I am sure that with time his other predictions will also come true. Scientists say that now we will be able to listen to the Universe.
2
The LIGO interferometer shares geometry and technique (recombine the light beams and observe the interference) with the Michelson Interferometer. Michelson's and Morley's observations provided Einstein with something to explain (No luninferrous either) and he gave us Special Relativity. LIGO detects gravity waves (General Relativity - Einstein again).
Let us appreciate the experimentalists who make the measurements.
E=mc2 came out of Special Relativity - does that result somehow 'justify' the expense of building an L shaped interferometer in 1886 (or so) and floating it on a moat of mercury in the basement of an academic building in Ohio and spending a year staring at negative results?
Does it 'change' anything to know the physics needed to explain our universe? Should funders have asked Michelson and Morely to predict the impact of their experiment before allowing it to continue? We do not know how the LIGO results will change the practical lives of humans. The fallout will certainly escape our predictive capabilities. What they have done is beyond beautiful. Maybe measuring the collisions of black holes will improve our understanding of humanity's place in the universe as well as of black holes. We are the beings that study nature's rules.
Ironically understanding nature's rules is critical to keeping the Earth experiment going. Now there are "leaders" who would discontinue our efforts to understand Nature's rules because they think all the answers are known.
Let us appreciate the experimentalists who make the measurements.
E=mc2 came out of Special Relativity - does that result somehow 'justify' the expense of building an L shaped interferometer in 1886 (or so) and floating it on a moat of mercury in the basement of an academic building in Ohio and spending a year staring at negative results?
Does it 'change' anything to know the physics needed to explain our universe? Should funders have asked Michelson and Morely to predict the impact of their experiment before allowing it to continue? We do not know how the LIGO results will change the practical lives of humans. The fallout will certainly escape our predictive capabilities. What they have done is beyond beautiful. Maybe measuring the collisions of black holes will improve our understanding of humanity's place in the universe as well as of black holes. We are the beings that study nature's rules.
Ironically understanding nature's rules is critical to keeping the Earth experiment going. Now there are "leaders" who would discontinue our efforts to understand Nature's rules because they think all the answers are known.
5
I wish I could say that I fully understand the science of article. However, I do have some questions. Can the waves of energy be predictable ? If predicable, can we use the energy ?
Simply remarkable!!
But is the finding reproducible?
But is the finding reproducible?
3
Every great scientific discovery in history has resulted in practical advances, most of which couldn't have been predicted. Why should this one be any different?
3
Is there any way to measure how fast the warp may be? Could it exceed the speed of light?
1
This report from LIGO concerning the validation of Einstein’s’ theory by the detection of gravitational waves is not only tremendously interesting but also historic. Historic at least to those that have open and inquiring minds.
For religious fanatics, shills marketing fundamentalism for any sect, spiritualistic believer’s dependent upon the supernatural to reinforce their faith it must either be a non-event quickly passed over or disturbing.
For religious fanatics, shills marketing fundamentalism for any sect, spiritualistic believer’s dependent upon the supernatural to reinforce their faith it must either be a non-event quickly passed over or disturbing.
2
America is Donald Trump. America is also much of the most amazing science being done on the planet.
2
I am a Finance person. I was always interested in development of our knowledge about the universe. It is a great news indeed. I used to listen to my cousin who studied a lot about it. Never understood why we don't teach our kids about science more and let them explore. We live in a world where massive discovery is happening about earth and universe. But the same world treats a women like a slave. We are trying to elect most powerful man in the world who just removed an ad where an adult film actress participated. Interesting how biased a society can be towards the person who has all the power to elect a president. Comparing the same exact discovery to the same political act we know where we stand as a nation and as a citizen of the world. Time to think. I guess its not late.
2
Another little idea worth pondering is that if this event happened a billion light-years away, it took the light from there a billion years to get here. In other words we just witnessed an event from a pretty distant past. I wonder what's been going on there in the intervening time? This whole thing should be teaching us a bit of humility.
11
More than a bit. The good news is that this information forces us out of our daily orbit of the NFL as the meaning of life.
3
I want to split a hair with the author and our culture. Dr. Krauss begins with concerns of "...the economy, immigration and terrorism" Dr. Krauss and our culture, myself included, daily ignore our most important concern. There is a giant meteor fast approaching; the sky is falling. But it is not in our thoughts, our screens, our politics. It's like we intellectually know that we are animals, but we really don't think so. Even scientists tell their kids not to act like an animal. Intellectually we know anthropogenic climate change is real but we don't really want to think about it-- because then we will have to think about the probabilities-- our major cities and farmlands under salt water, severe human migrations, violent protests over food and water........"And here we were, escaping into a gravitational wave and this hair-splitting chicken-little wants us to think about the unthinkable." .......Our numbers are also fueling mass extinctions and resource depletions but just as Einstein did early on, Malthus and Ehrlich should have consulted some mathematicians as well.
4
Brilliant paper Mr. Krauss.
I tried to talk about it with people around me today, I was bewildered as how much it didn't affect them. It was very frustrating, especially when I try hard to encompass all it represent as an achievement and everything it means for the future, the future of science but also the future of culture, of civilization. When it, as you say (I quote loosely), "reflects the best about what it means to be human". When I see such an adventure succeed I am proud to be human, and I am flabbergasted by my luck to be alive at a time that not only so powerful a step forward is taken, but also by my luck to live in a time when it is shared instantly across the world, no matter distance, beliefs, or social status.
I felt good today.
Thank you
I tried to talk about it with people around me today, I was bewildered as how much it didn't affect them. It was very frustrating, especially when I try hard to encompass all it represent as an achievement and everything it means for the future, the future of science but also the future of culture, of civilization. When it, as you say (I quote loosely), "reflects the best about what it means to be human". When I see such an adventure succeed I am proud to be human, and I am flabbergasted by my luck to be alive at a time that not only so powerful a step forward is taken, but also by my luck to live in a time when it is shared instantly across the world, no matter distance, beliefs, or social status.
I felt good today.
Thank you
2
Whether "space" physically interacts in a gravitational field or not does not address the problem that the non-Euclidean geometry of the general theory of relativity is self-contradicting. Even if Einstein is correct that "space" does interact in a gravitational field or near massive bodies, his statement that "in the presence of a gravitational field the geometry is not Euclidean" cannot be correct if that non-Euclidean geometry is self-contradicting.
It would be better to have 3 light beams all at 90 degrees. Now there must many gigantic cosmic events happening in the Universe at the same time. How do they know this is the right one or the most pronounced? The universe must be awash with gravity waves, both in phase and out of phase. The cmbr is left over from the big bang, any gravitational echoes or left overs?
The discovery truly brings on happiness and excitement. I remember first learning about Theory of Relativity in high school and simply admired the ingenuity of the formula and space-time curvatures. Now, this adds on another level of appreciation for science and learning. Although, like many of us have stated, its practical uses may be difficult to imagine, but just being able to be here to learn, to know, and to enjoy the richness of science and knowledge is a honor of its own. Just think, wouldn't it be pretty magnificent if we were to witness the Theory of Relativity to become the Law of Relativity?
1
OK. Now that the existence of gravitational waves has been confirmed can the invention of the warp drive be far behind? :-) :-)
I have nothing profound to add. Just my thanks and appreciation to the author for a beautifully written, thoughtful article. To be able to explain so clearly such a complex, mysterious achievement is itself remarkable. Bravo!
1
As an art historian deeply moved by this discovery and the author's discussion of it, I was both shocked and gratified to read Krauss's justification of his discipline's work in the name of art. Support for STEM sometimes seems to steamroll the humanities these days, but Krauss reminds us that both the study of art and the study of theoretical physics are humanistic inquiries. To attempt to comprehend this discovery, as to stand before a great work of art, is to confront the sublime.
3
I LOVE this article - very well written! Although so much of the science behind it is way above the majority of our mere mortals' heads, (no pun intended,) I consider this astonishing event one of the most exciting I can remember. Thank you NYT!
1
Was this "merger of two massive black holes over a billion light-years away" also observed or verified in some other way? How do we know that the wave observed actually came from such an event, and not from somewhere else? That part has me puzzled.
1
Gary asked
"How were the numbers presented determined? I suppose I will have to search the literature to find that answer. If any reader knows, please post it."
The paper from the LIGO consortium is published in Physical Review Letters :
http://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.061102
"How were the numbers presented determined? I suppose I will have to search the literature to find that answer. If any reader knows, please post it."
The paper from the LIGO consortium is published in Physical Review Letters :
http://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.061102
1
This is so far over my head, but in the way that the ebullient laughter of others can you to start laughing, even without knowing why they are laughing, I am ecstatic for those who understand what just happened.
5
"While the political displays we have been treated to over the past weeks may reflect some of the worst about what it means to be human, this jiggle, discovered in an exotic physics experiment, reflects the best."
I had the same thought…
RIPPLES
Ripples from afar
Einstein's brain in a jar.
Ripples from here
No-brain hemisphere.
I had the same thought…
RIPPLES
Ripples from afar
Einstein's brain in a jar.
Ripples from here
No-brain hemisphere.
3
Wow. Amazing. Just think what Einstein might have done if he had comouters to help with his calculations and modeling.
Maybe during the next republican debate they could ask the opinion of the republican candidates of this great discovery and advancement in science.
3
Theoretical physicists and artists alike ponder our place in the universe, asking, "Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?" - Paul Gauguin
4
It's disappointing to me that nobody has commented on the basic, elegantly simple instrumentration that was utilized in the discovery of this phenomenon, i.e, interferometry, or more precisely, Fourier transform technology.
From its inception in the mid-19th century, optical interferometry as a measurement tool of almost unimaginable power and precision was largely ignored by the scientific community until In 1922 the Michaelson-Morley experiment (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_A._Michelson) conducted the most precise speed of light measurement to date by using an optical interferometer at the Mount Palomar Observatory in California.
It was not until the late 1950s that optical interferometry began to be utilized in such new and varied technologies as infrared spectroscopy, astronomy and holography. Today, an optical interferometer is the essential element in many surveyer's pillars.
From its inception in the mid-19th century, optical interferometry as a measurement tool of almost unimaginable power and precision was largely ignored by the scientific community until In 1922 the Michaelson-Morley experiment (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_A._Michelson) conducted the most precise speed of light measurement to date by using an optical interferometer at the Mount Palomar Observatory in California.
It was not until the late 1950s that optical interferometry began to be utilized in such new and varied technologies as infrared spectroscopy, astronomy and holography. Today, an optical interferometer is the essential element in many surveyer's pillars.
2
Given that the LIGO observation constrains the source of the gravitational waves to lie within a restricted area of the sky, is anyone looking for an electromagnetic correlate to the black hole collapse? If even a tiny fraction of the gravitational energy were somehow converted into electromagnetic radiation, that should be one brilliant flash; and the shock wave of the unimaginably strong gravitational waves close to the coalesced black holes (close meaning within some tens of light years, I imagine) should heat matter to give off strong EM radiation.
1
I don't pretend to understand everything that Mr. Krauss wrote....but, I am struck by the amazing minds that made this happen. This type of science in fact produces magnificent art.
It is humbling to think all this is happening while we sit in lines for our burgers and fries at take out windows or are choosing the right gift for Valentine's Day.
Will it put bread on the table tomorrow...no....but, this could benefit mankind in extraordinary ways. Whereas, who wins the World Series is of little value to our future...yet, millions of fans hang on the very outcomes.
It is humbling to think all this is happening while we sit in lines for our burgers and fries at take out windows or are choosing the right gift for Valentine's Day.
Will it put bread on the table tomorrow...no....but, this could benefit mankind in extraordinary ways. Whereas, who wins the World Series is of little value to our future...yet, millions of fans hang on the very outcomes.
8
We wouldn't have things like how if it weren't for einsteins relativity...so there' no way of knowing where grav waves will take us. Maybe back in time!
I like this; We need more bringing together our "whole" human experience, so we can actually Use our wisdom instead of just admiring it. Great comment because it was "helpful." Thank you.
1
Thanks for that mindboggling discovery. Now, can we turn our attention to the cold virus? I've got a terrible cold this week!
There are many dozens of videos on youtube of Dr. Krauss elegantly describing the universe and our place in it. He is the rightful heir to Carl Sagan in his ability to humanize science.
5
I am looking for your tongue, hoping to find it in your cheek. The last thing that should occur to one in reading of this discovery is the Hebrew god.
And to think that the God of the Hebrews created and rules this vastness. Well, that's one heckuva god. Must have had an Einstein as an assistant.
4
The sound of space, the chirp and the spiral of gravitational waves is boring. Maybe space is just a black lifeless boring sounding, not exactly musical.
1
From http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr162/lect/blackhole/blackhole.html
"but the essential point is that the black hole curves spacetime back on itself, so that all paths in the interior of the black hole lead back to the singularity at the center, no matter which direction you go"
In several locations, I have seen the curving of space used as the reason light can not leave a black hole similar to the above quote. If "all paths in the interior of the black hole lead back to the singularity at the center, no matter which direction you go", then how come gravitational fields find a way out?
Said another way, if there is no path out of a black hole, then how can gravity find one?
"but the essential point is that the black hole curves spacetime back on itself, so that all paths in the interior of the black hole lead back to the singularity at the center, no matter which direction you go"
In several locations, I have seen the curving of space used as the reason light can not leave a black hole similar to the above quote. If "all paths in the interior of the black hole lead back to the singularity at the center, no matter which direction you go", then how come gravitational fields find a way out?
Said another way, if there is no path out of a black hole, then how can gravity find one?
1
Light is a form of energy that travels along geodesics in space-time. Inside the Schwarzschild radius of a black hole, those geodesics all loop back toward the singularity at the center, without exiting beyond that radius. Gravity, on the other hand, is the shape of space-time created by mass, so it does not "escape" a black hole; it is simply a manifestation of the black hole's existence.
3
Gravity is not a field: it is a warping of space-time. It does not "travel" in the way light and particles travel.
Amateur here.
Isn't gravity the effect of mass distorting space? They didn't say that something left the black hole. All space around the now less-massive neighborhood that once housed two black holes progressively distorted. This distortion reached us. Can someone confirm that I'm getting this vaguely correct?
Isn't gravity the effect of mass distorting space? They didn't say that something left the black hole. All space around the now less-massive neighborhood that once housed two black holes progressively distorted. This distortion reached us. Can someone confirm that I'm getting this vaguely correct?
Are there any other signals from the same collision event, arriving to us at about the same time as these gravitational waves? Electromagnetic waves, traveling at the same speed as the gravitational waves, and neutrinos perhaps a little slower (but maybe still far behind after a billion years)?
5
And there was no hullabaloo when it was reported that the Earth's gravity dips from ice loss.
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/GOCE/GOCE_reveals_...
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/GOCE/GOCE_reveals_...
To those comenters too ready to attribute this scientific achievement to the work of God, I offer these (edited) words I sent this morning to an individual commenter: Nice try. This astounding achievement has nothing to do with human-contrived myths such as the concept of one or more Gods responsible for creating the universe and watching over you. Those myths may be comforting to some (while often used to damaging ends by others) but they have been long since disproved by science- as evidenced by the self-righteously religious now needing to explain away scientific knowledge with the patently disingenuous concept of "intelligent design."
2
"This astounding achievement has nothing to do with human-contrived myths..."
On the contrary this dog and pony show is nothing but a compendium of mathematical myths and unfounded assumptions. The so-called chirp was analytically massaged out of the data by software that was designed to find a sub-quantum level "event" - something inherently unobservable by any direct means. From this dubious shred of evidence a whole gossamer mathematical fiction is spun backwards up the mathematical logic chain that the measuring equipment was designed around in the first place. Confirmation bias is written all over this arrangement.
Central to the claims being made here is the vindication of General Relativity, which was constructed by Einstein not discovered as Mr. Krauss would have it. But GR can't be vindicated by such a contrivance. It has already been found scientifically wanting in as much as it requires a belief that 95% of the cosmos is composed of invisible 'stuff' (dark matter and energy). The only salient characteristic of this 'stuff' is that it reconciles GR predictions with actual observations.
Further, it is a myth-like assumption of GR and by extension this experiment that there exists a space and time with physical characteristics. There is however no observational evidence supporting such a belief. The only scientifically coherent view of space and time is that they are like temperature, human concepts abstracted from the observed behavior of physical systems.
On the contrary this dog and pony show is nothing but a compendium of mathematical myths and unfounded assumptions. The so-called chirp was analytically massaged out of the data by software that was designed to find a sub-quantum level "event" - something inherently unobservable by any direct means. From this dubious shred of evidence a whole gossamer mathematical fiction is spun backwards up the mathematical logic chain that the measuring equipment was designed around in the first place. Confirmation bias is written all over this arrangement.
Central to the claims being made here is the vindication of General Relativity, which was constructed by Einstein not discovered as Mr. Krauss would have it. But GR can't be vindicated by such a contrivance. It has already been found scientifically wanting in as much as it requires a belief that 95% of the cosmos is composed of invisible 'stuff' (dark matter and energy). The only salient characteristic of this 'stuff' is that it reconciles GR predictions with actual observations.
Further, it is a myth-like assumption of GR and by extension this experiment that there exists a space and time with physical characteristics. There is however no observational evidence supporting such a belief. The only scientifically coherent view of space and time is that they are like temperature, human concepts abstracted from the observed behavior of physical systems.
2
THis is exciting science, but if it is true that: 20% of our children go to bed hungry, police abuse abounds,the middle class ( I hate the term class) and almost everyone else is loosing ground to the 1%ers, the real cost of pollution is being ignored and arrogance, bluster and posturing paves a road to the white-house then we as a country have lost tough with empathy and compassion.
1
I doubt every child has at some time wondered about cosmology when all the answers are found in the only book more popular than the Art of the Deal. You don't need to be amazed, excited, dazzled or especially bewildered when you have cosmology neatly explained by god. There is no need to look for answers that don't make your car go faster. The pinnacle of human creativity was writing the Bible. Gravity wave experiments pale in comparison.
This space time dilation thing is very real and most people have experienced it in their lives. I spent a week in Indiana one day and I am sure that has happened to many people. What goes unremarked by these fancy scientists is how many people fall between the cracks in time/space. I know plenty of people who still live in a nether region somewhere between the present and 1952. Personally, I am convinced cold fusion exists. That is the only possible explanation for the enormous amounts of energy needed to sustain that sort of chronosynclastic infundibulation.
This space time dilation thing is very real and most people have experienced it in their lives. I spent a week in Indiana one day and I am sure that has happened to many people. What goes unremarked by these fancy scientists is how many people fall between the cracks in time/space. I know plenty of people who still live in a nether region somewhere between the present and 1952. Personally, I am convinced cold fusion exists. That is the only possible explanation for the enormous amounts of energy needed to sustain that sort of chronosynclastic infundibulation.
1
What makes humans a unique and often confounding species is, unlike a cow, we can raise our head from the grass we're eating and contemplate something like a star. It's a privilege that far too many choose to forfeit, apparently content to abandon this joyful experience, and the only thing that makes us truly special. When anyone discovers this fact, their lives are forever enriched and expanded to a size worthy of this miracle we call life.
5
Well, the comparison to high art is nice, but one has yet to invest a billion dollars in an art project. (I like what was said here, even though I can't recognize it as a strong argument.) But I think there is another point that the author must know but has skipped over here. The best expression of it I have heard was by a physicist at the Large Hadron Collider who said that when they discovered radio waves at Bell Labs, no one knew they would be useful. The fact is that we need knowledge about nature. As much of it as we can get from everywhere, because, even for the utilitarian, the one with the most knowledge about everything will be the one that is ahead.
2
Thank you for explaining so clearly this magnificent achievement! So many questions come to mind, not the least of which is whether additional waves are being detected and if so, at what frequency? How do the LIGO scientists know the specific origin of the wave(s)? Now that they've proved their methods (an astonishing feat on its own), are there plans to build other facilities that can detect waves generated from smaller scale events? I guess I'll have to try reading the paper describing this amazing thing!
4
As much as scientists proclaim this discovery adds one more clue to the mystery
of the universe and our humanity, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the cosmic collision of two black holes one billion light years away. I visit the employment office once in awhile to remind someone like me, who lives submersed in the greenery of maple trees and well-manicured lawns, that yes, there is an economic crisis and people are struggling to survive it. Then I ask myself which of these two worlds (the cosmic and the employment office) are more consequential: I would say the employment office is.
of the universe and our humanity, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the cosmic collision of two black holes one billion light years away. I visit the employment office once in awhile to remind someone like me, who lives submersed in the greenery of maple trees and well-manicured lawns, that yes, there is an economic crisis and people are struggling to survive it. Then I ask myself which of these two worlds (the cosmic and the employment office) are more consequential: I would say the employment office is.
6
It is a grand shame that everything must be so over-sold. There is no way at all to determine the conditions that produced this signal should it prove to be real - not even the direction in which is might have arrived. There is no information whatsoever about the initial conditions and final ones beyond the grossest level - the possible masses of the participants. Any number of scenarios might be responsible. In fact one should wonder why this device has not seen anything previously. It is perhaps a consequence of the new and improved data analysis techniques used, but equally it could be some unknown systematic. A few years ago it was announced that superluminal neutrinos had been detected - this turned out to be due to a bad cable. Until physicists regain their composure and stop hyping science-fiction style scenarios, and drop support for dead idioms like string theory, it will be very hard to trust them.
1
You entirely miss the point. The comparison is specious and irrelevant. You could say the same about anything: what's more important, a toaster or a Beethoven symphony? One gives you toast, the other beauty. Eating toast doesn't negate the need for beauty.
9
The human dilemma that we struggle with daily is that both mysteries exist and we humans are not able to make the one work to illuminate the other. So much for human arrogance.
They conducted a very expensive experiment to find something, and, by golly, they found it. Imagine that. Who knows what they will find with the next multi-billion dollar experiment. Schroedinger's Cat?
1
Too late, Schroedinger's Cat has already been discovered. But at the very moment they discovered the beast, he vanished forever. That is the way it is not only with cats, but with the whole universe. Our sense of time ("I am 45 years old!") is a trick that nature plays on us, for its own arcane reasons. So the best philosophy is to search for answers, but in the meantime, answer your email and eat lots of fiber food.
As Josh Radnor wrote: "Cynicism is kind of like folding your arms and stepping back and commenting on things, like the old guys in 'The Muppets,' just throwing out comments all the time, whereas there are other people on the ground really trying to affect things and improve their lives and the lives of other people. I think it's noble and I think it's cool."
4
What a great piece of writing. I am floored by Prof. Krauss's ability to explain to the lay reader the complexity and significance of this experiment. I am now as capable of experiencing the wonder scientists must feel as much as I do at the conclusion of a great novel, a Bruce Springsteen concert or a remarkable stage play. Thanks!
5
Pinnacles of Universe Creativity
Powerful tool of the human ingenuity
Also fed by imagination, it is creativity
Artists and scientists flowing processes
Insight, curiosity, synthesis, observation
Curiosity, observation, insight, synthesis
Un-obvious things together proposing putting
New sights on mesmerising things defying
Putting together things that has to be together
Even if obvious they might be, I mean
The only way mesmerising things can be seen
The most valuable, extraordinary lesson maybe
We should get from this marvellous discovery
The ultimate mesmerising wonderful things
Are of the universe, himself, creativity
Horácio Tomé-Marques
Friday, the 12th February 2016
Powerful tool of the human ingenuity
Also fed by imagination, it is creativity
Artists and scientists flowing processes
Insight, curiosity, synthesis, observation
Curiosity, observation, insight, synthesis
Un-obvious things together proposing putting
New sights on mesmerising things defying
Putting together things that has to be together
Even if obvious they might be, I mean
The only way mesmerising things can be seen
The most valuable, extraordinary lesson maybe
We should get from this marvellous discovery
The ultimate mesmerising wonderful things
Are of the universe, himself, creativity
Horácio Tomé-Marques
Friday, the 12th February 2016
Re: "Into pure energy in the form of gravitational waves."
"Pure energy" annoys me. Energy is not a "thing"; it is a computable attribute of things. Part of the black holes was converted into gravity waves, not "pure enegry". I gather that means part of the black holes was converted into distortions in space. It seems distorting space takes a lot of work.
"Pure energy" annoys me. Energy is not a "thing"; it is a computable attribute of things. Part of the black holes was converted into gravity waves, not "pure enegry". I gather that means part of the black holes was converted into distortions in space. It seems distorting space takes a lot of work.
1
In paragraph 5, you might have used substances other than alcohol for a more compelling figure of speech.
1
It makes you wonder...
in these faint echoes from events so far away and so long ago, is all the information that has ever been in the universe available to us if we can just build the instruments sensitive enough to capture it?
Not just the death throes of massive individual black holes as they embrace each other and fuse into one, but the whisperings of two beings as they quietly communicate with one another.
in these faint echoes from events so far away and so long ago, is all the information that has ever been in the universe available to us if we can just build the instruments sensitive enough to capture it?
Not just the death throes of massive individual black holes as they embrace each other and fuse into one, but the whisperings of two beings as they quietly communicate with one another.
1
...each time we wave our hands around or move any matter, disturbances in the fabric of space propagate out at the speed of light... Watch out for Chaos Butterfly.
1
Also, during every second of your existence, and that of all other life, a spherical emanation of your body's electrical activity spreads at the speed of light throughout the universe. Perhaps, that's the soul, and can be reconstructed some day by advanced technology.
It's like a Picasso, or something by Mozart! Give me a break. These things come from the imagination of the human mind. The "observation" of gravity waves is a confirmation of an already existing assumption from Einstein's theory. And, although the technical aspects are impressive, I'm not seeing how this adds anything new to our understanding of the cosmos.
1
You obvious suffer from a deficit of imagination.
11
Theories come and go. Most go. Verification of theory is essential to the advancement of knowledge, whether it be the theory of how cells replicate or the nature of gravity.
4
Einstein's theory sprang from the imagination of his mind -- prompted by a small amount of empirical data, true, but largely the product of his creative insight and a lot of mathematical skill (some of it provided by others). The experiment confirms that Einstein's imagination, yet again, describes physical reality. More importantly, it validates a new instrument (or class of instruments) with which to learn a great deal more about the structure and dynamics of the universe.
One could, I suppose, argue that Picasso's art also sprang from an empirical reality, his perception of the world, and that it gives us a new means to view and interpret that world. Mozart's music has empirical origins in the sounds produced by vibrating strings, surfaces and air columns, and in human means of organizing those vibrations to convey... what, exactly? (For me, instrumental music remains the highest of all human endeavors precisely because it expresses what cannot be expressed otherwise. Ludwig Wittgenstein famously said, "Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must remain silent." He might more accurately have said, "Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must make music.")
One could, I suppose, argue that Picasso's art also sprang from an empirical reality, his perception of the world, and that it gives us a new means to view and interpret that world. Mozart's music has empirical origins in the sounds produced by vibrating strings, surfaces and air columns, and in human means of organizing those vibrations to convey... what, exactly? (For me, instrumental music remains the highest of all human endeavors precisely because it expresses what cannot be expressed otherwise. Ludwig Wittgenstein famously said, "Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must remain silent." He might more accurately have said, "Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must make music.")
4
Wow, wow. Now if reading and trying to understand this doesn't stimulate some new neurons in my cranium, nothing will! I'm amazed that the Republicans haven't shut down such "foolish", un-understandable projects (LIGO). If they don't believe in Global Warming, which we can measure at a scale of daily, yearly, there's absolutely NO CHANCE this will mean anything but waste of money and liberal propaganda to them. Very cool stuff. Wouldn't it be cool to send them through a black hole to another galaxy! :-)
5
..., Top quark, accelerating expansion, Higgs boson, Pluto, gravitational waves, ...
Amazing!
Amazing!
3
EINSTEIN Proven right again! He predicted that time would slow down greatly near the event horizon of a black hole. Recently, scientists saw two black holes moving around each other, eventually at half the speed of light. Then there was a jolt of energy equivalent to 3 of our Suns. And the two black holes became one. It's remarkably prescient that Einstein could predict such an event over 100 years ago. That humans continue to develop technologies that can predict the occurrences of events that Einstein predicted is remarkable in and of itself.. It is an extension of his theoretical work.
4
From the conception of the theory to the construction and operation of the LIGO to prove the theory just an awesome achievement!
3
The LIGO instrument and others that will follow are much more similar to seismographs (seismometers) than to telescopes. It is better to say that LIGO listens than to say that it sees. LIGO tells us a lot, just as a seismograph tells us a lot. Like a seismograph, having more than two will allow triangulation to find the location of the source object and achieve a more precise measurement statistically. While gravity waves are very different from the pressure and shear waves of an Earthquake, it would be useful to call the events that LIGO detects Spacequakes.
I had the fortune of worldly parents and a wonderfully rich liberal arts education (1960s CUNY-Hunter College, tuition $300/yr). No one I knew ever asked 'What's the use'. It was understood that the abilities to wonder, discover and learn are the greatest gifts of Life. Fast forward to 2000s where I teach college science to students who are products of our technologically enriched educational system. Wonder has become "What's my grade?", discovery is "I think you marked my answer wrong by mistake.", learning is rejected with statements like "I don't want to read all this bio stuff, I'll just take a D."
5
This discovery is amazing, although I barely comprehend it. What I can comprehend is that, once again, science has shown the majesty of God as creator and sustainer of the universe. I see no contradiction between this wonderful science, and knowing that, in part, we are looking at and listening to God's music of the spheres.
1
As the incomparable Robbie Burns wrote:
O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion:
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
An' ev'n devotion!
O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion:
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
An' ev'n devotion!
"It is equivalent to measuring the distance between the earth and the nearest star with an accuracy of the width of a human hair."
The nearest star is the sun. Is that what you meant, or Proxima Centauri? Big difference. Either measure is mind boggling, the latter almost incomprehensible.
The nearest star is the sun. Is that what you meant, or Proxima Centauri? Big difference. Either measure is mind boggling, the latter almost incomprehensible.
1
If cosmology does not take your breath away and illuminate your soul with the endless potential of the human spirit then you must live in the Bible belt!
3
In the attempt to create a perfect human.....even if you were able to clone humans.....you would unfortunately also clone all of man's mental and physical imperfections. Be that in a virtual computer type, or in the vivo human flesh.
I often wonder how man's ingenuity can be so intricate with exacting mathematical computations to explain distant entities millions of light years away. Man has traveled to the moon and back and is planning to inhabit Mars. And finally man has created a wealth of nuclear weapons capable of initiating a global nuclear holocaust. Yet man somehow fails to eradicate human diseases such as Alzheimer's, Ebola, Polio, Lupus Erythematosus, Influenza, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, Diabetes, HIV/AIDS, Asthma, Cancer, and the common cold.
I often wonder how man's ingenuity can be so intricate with exacting mathematical computations to explain distant entities millions of light years away. Man has traveled to the moon and back and is planning to inhabit Mars. And finally man has created a wealth of nuclear weapons capable of initiating a global nuclear holocaust. Yet man somehow fails to eradicate human diseases such as Alzheimer's, Ebola, Polio, Lupus Erythematosus, Influenza, Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease, Diabetes, HIV/AIDS, Asthma, Cancer, and the common cold.
"While the political displays we have been treated to over the past weeks may reflect some of the worst about what it means to be human, this jiggle, discovered in an exotic physics experiment, reflects the best."
So true, and depressingly so. This kind of news does briefly restore my hope in humanity that has been so decimated by this political season.
Your essay, Professor Krause, was a pleasurable relief from the drivel of the politicians and political pundits that dominate our national conversation.
So true, and depressingly so. This kind of news does briefly restore my hope in humanity that has been so decimated by this political season.
Your essay, Professor Krause, was a pleasurable relief from the drivel of the politicians and political pundits that dominate our national conversation.
3
Totally mind blowing! I am happy to at least get a qualitative understanding of this experiment and what it proves, even though the math involved is utterly impossible to grasp!!
3
"In the absence of alcohol, your living room doesn’t appear to shrink and grow repeatedly."
___________________
Luv a scientist w/a sense of humour. (Very Big Grin) I trust people like that to tell us the "truth."
___________________
Luv a scientist w/a sense of humour. (Very Big Grin) I trust people like that to tell us the "truth."
3
Both in the case of Einstein and Newton, the nature of Gravity was depicted in a mathematical equation telling us nothing about the how and why of gravity. The confirmation of Einstein's predictions tells us that space has a physical reality that can be distorted by mass. I would suggest it has something to do with the passage of information through space. And conceiving of a system in which space is a component of an information system that resolves curvature and the information encoded in it. And like the physical systems that were observed in this observation, curvature that is in constant motion.
Gravitational waves...meh...where's my flying car?
Beyond the darkness uncovered by this gravitational wave data is the mystery of the "substance" known as dark matter which makes up 25% of physical reality and the "force" known as dark energy which is 70% of physical reality. We know a little more about the limited 5% of reality that we know best. The real beauty is how much each scientific insight expands the limits of our knowledge while exposing our vast ignorance. As one scientist noted the universe is not only strange, it is stranger than we can sometimes possibly imagine. We are limited by our biology, chemistry, physics, place and time.
6
I wonder what Rep. Louis Gohmert has to say about this.
1
A beautifully written article. As a (once) physicist, what particularly fascinated me is the explanation of the missing 3 sun masses -- that they were all converted to energy, for that second greater than all the energy being radiated by all the stars in the cosmos. That is mind-blowing.
How were the numbers presented determined? I suppose I will have to search the literature to find that answer. If any reader knows, please post it.
How were the numbers presented determined? I suppose I will have to search the literature to find that answer. If any reader knows, please post it.
18
Have you ever gone on-line to find a way to fix some broken bit of property you own? The more complex the broken thing is the more varied the methods of repair will be when crowd sourced. Here you have the ultimate level of complexity being supported by the most highly specialized set of explainers. Does it really matter how they arrived at their masses. When they can make a statement that one object weighed X amount and the other Y with the new mass being Z I am credulous. While I believe they saw the evidence of gravity waves I find the conclusions to be more hand waving than certain. These calculations would be more believable if one of the gravity detectors were located in China. Everybody knows the Chinese are better at math. That's why the factory jobs got sent to China.
Gary, here's where you can find the paper -- which is actually pretty readable, with some patience. It describes how the signal was determined to be real and not an artifact, and how they fit a theoretical model to the data to determine the black hole masses, spin, and distance from Earth.
Sorry, I forgot to provide the link to the Phys Rev Letter. Here it is: https://journals.aps.org/prl/pdf/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.061102
2
Science is my escape into reality from the unreality of the current election cycle. I love being lifted from my mundane life. Thanks to whatever power-that-be for people who are so much brighter than I am and are actually able to do such creative, exploratory work in their day jobs. Thanks that, for now, we are able to fund such research as a nation. I hope that this continues.
Thanks for putting a spark in my day!
Thanks for putting a spark in my day!
3
"Too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters." OMG. It's science that produces toasters! That type of thinking does seriously bother me as its Ted Cruz and his like that try to defund science programs. Hillary and Bernie can bring up this astounding work in their next debate.
2
art and science, left to their tasks, exploration, inquiries of various sorts, offer examples of endeavors that nurture and elevate the human spirit...politics should be one of these, the one that guarantees, as trusted to guarantee, the best environments for the practice of the others, but, alas, it has settled for material gain, the glittery bits, so to speak, rather an exploitation of than a share in the advancement of human affairs.
Well, as the song says, "It's clear as mud but it covers the ground." All I can say is I'm glad some folks out there studied a little more math and physics than I did and can experience the beauty of this ripple and chirp.
3
I celebrate this discovery and have even more admiration for Dr. Einstein than ever. We mortal beings cannot really begin to understand what this all means but it does provide a rational scientific explanation of our existence as humans. There are those among us who can settle for religious myth and fantasy for explanations but I am not one of them. This is wonderful.
How wonderful it would be if every child were given the chance to learn what this discovery really means. Who knows where the next Einstein,Picasso or Mozart will come from if we do not believe in the power of science, art and equality in the schools and in the home. It is so sad that so many children know about guns and do not look to the stars.
2
Discoveries like these only increase one's awe of great thinkers like Einstein. What amazing brains they had!
1
To any young person who is moved and inspired by this: first LEARN MATH!... and get really, really good with it!
Mathematics is the key to unlocking the universe, mainly because it is the fundamental tool of physics.
Mathematics is the key to unlocking the universe, mainly because it is the fundamental tool of physics.
Both the conception and the discovery of gravity waves transcend physics. It's not surprising that they exist, but rather that human beings, whose nearest ancestor is a wild animal in the jungle, evolved a brain that could theoretically predict them, mathematically define them, and experimentally measure them. That is the unexpected, incredible power of natural selection.
4
A shining moment for physicists and another confirmation of Einstein's genius. Makes me proud to be a human, and for a brief space, I can ignore the damage that humanity's progress has so often wrought. Thank you, Dr. Krauss.
3
It's a good paper (the PRL one), very readable and not too technical. It goes to great lengths to explain the details of data collection, noise filtering and apparatus validation. But you won't find there the math (GR) that correlates binary collision parameters with observed waveform characteristics.
And maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen claims correlating black holes with the given masses to known astronomical sources. I'm wondering how one would go about it; can the apparatus pinpoint where in the Universe the signal came from (or even the ballpark)?
Somebody once said "cosmology is the poor man's particle accelerator". Not so poor anymore, hey? Also, don't miss xkcd.com/1642/
And maybe I missed it, but I haven't seen claims correlating black holes with the given masses to known astronomical sources. I'm wondering how one would go about it; can the apparatus pinpoint where in the Universe the signal came from (or even the ballpark)?
Somebody once said "cosmology is the poor man's particle accelerator". Not so poor anymore, hey? Also, don't miss xkcd.com/1642/
2
If the waves propagate over the observatories at the speed of light, then the difference between the times they received the chirp should provide a rough estimate of the direction as long as that signal wasn't coming in too perpendicular to the baseline between the observatories.
2
Speaking of event horizons, modern civilization has passed its own event horizon as it screams towards an oblivion of its own making...
1
I can't wrap my non-scientific brain around any of this, but I'm still thrilled that there are people that have worked together over the centuries to make these discoveries. I wish there was a book out there that could explain it all in a way that a five-year-old could understand. (Maybe there is? If not, could a physicist out there do all of the scientifically challenged among us a favor and hop to it?) As it is, if someone asked me to explain to them precisely how a T.V. works, I couldn't really tell them, much less explain what was discovered by LIGO, even though I just read this article. In any case, bravo to the scientists. Tonight, as is my habit, I will look through the trees and houses trying to get a glimpse of the night sky, see a planet or two blinking in a distance I can't comprehend, and be thankful for the improbable fact that I am even here.
24
You can't explain a Kardashian by reading a breathless infotainment story about one of them either. You can choose to believe this gravity experiment result is just a nice story made up by all the scientists who make a great living off the experiment. Who could dispute their results? It's just like disputing the Kardashians.
Why not do it yourself?
"I'm not a scientist"......therefore I refuse to believe this finding. Sound familiar? It's the Republican talking point used to cast doubt on climate change. It's heartening to know that this great country can still fund science projects like this.
2
This stuff is so cool and so complicated and so confusing and so interesting, I wish I'd became an astrophysicist, or astronomist, or astro-whatever. Even the titles are confusing. But it’s really cool stuff, huh?
3
To say that Einstein "discovered" his theories diminishes his genius. Rather he created them from whole cloth using his method of "thought experiments". That is what should truly inspire us the most because his precise method is available to you and me.
2
My only quibble with this piece is the use of the word immense to describe the colliding holes. Compared to the giants residing at the center of most galaxies, these holes were quite modest in size, as is the merged hole.
Since all of the black holes we have actually detected live in the center of galaxies, the fact that two colliding holes were detected so soon after the machines started operating is extremely interesting, in that it implies that holes are more common outside galaxy centers. A second detection within a reasonable timeframe would confirm this.
Since all of the black holes we have actually detected live in the center of galaxies, the fact that two colliding holes were detected so soon after the machines started operating is extremely interesting, in that it implies that holes are more common outside galaxy centers. A second detection within a reasonable timeframe would confirm this.
1
There are well over a dozen black holes in stellar-size systems known in our own Milky Way galaxy and its closest neighbors. (For example, see Cygnus X-1.) So, it is not true to say none are known outside the centers of galaxies. Indeed, they are common end points of stellar evolution. If you read Dennis Overbye's article in yesterday's NYT, you'll also see that the LIGO team already has several more events that they are working on verifying.
1
All of this is taking place in the consciousness of human beings. We cannot truly explain anything fundamental about the cosmos until we can explain what this consciousness or awareness is and from what it arose. This and not some physical event will give us the real understanding of our universe.
1
The collisons of black holes far, far away is taking place only in human consciousness?
Good grief. What's great about this event and its measurement is that they're not.
Good grief. What's great about this event and its measurement is that they're not.
How do you know that-Einstein wondered if all he was doing was studying his nervous system. Read Descartes.
Many in my acquaintance will sadly fail to understand the sheer beauty of what LIGO has observed. Many outside my acquaintance will question the utility of the billions spent to observe an event that lasted .3 seconds. A few in my acquaintance may be persuaded to read Mr. Krauss' beautiful essay on the results of the LIGO project's first observation. Still fewer will be amazed as I am about the possible reach of the confirmation of another one of Einstein's predictions. Surely this, along with CERN's confirmation of the existence of Professor Higgs' boson are what Richard Feynman referred to as "the pleasure of finding things out." Let us hope that the current political season yields some measure of that pleasure.
2
The data of this experiment look absolutely convincing. It is hard to imagine that something went wrong in these measurements. The fact that two different apparatus detect the same interference pattern exactly the amount of time separated it takes for the gravitational wave to travel is stupefying. Ever the pessimist though, I was thinking what may have gone wrong. What if both apparatus use the same software and a rogue programmer had coded this event? Lol!
With a third LIGO going live this year in Europe I am sure this result will be confirmed shortly.
With a third LIGO going live this year in Europe I am sure this result will be confirmed shortly.
2
Re "This, of course, is far from the realm of human experience. In the absence of alcohol, your living room doesn’t appear to shrink and grow repeatedly. But, in fact, it does." Not true. Nothing shrinks or grows. Mr. Krauss, the measuring scale is what changes. There is no absolute size of anything, so it is not correct to claim that the living room grows or shrinks. What really happens is that a certain method of detection concludes that something grows or shrinks. But the issue is that the scale we create to perceive this is what changes. The scale is inextricably linked to the high mass event, so nothing shrinks or grows. They are all related.
Thanks, Parmenides.
That's a breakthrough. Great things can be achieved with collaborative work! Thanks Einstein!!
1
Unlike so much that goes on in this world this sort of work makes me proud to be human. As a species we have a lot of drawbacks but I have to say the sheer glory of pure science and the capacity to understand just a little bit about this glorious universe that surrounds us is not one of them.
3
Wow - how awesome was Einstein!
2
I stopped believing the Bible's creation story decades ago;so I'm totally thrilled by this.Next time I'm Seattle and confronted by a bible thumper,or Jehova Witless comes to my door can mention that 1.3 BILLION light years and send them and their 6,000 years young universe scooting on down the road.
I can hear in my mind,somewhere in that "chirp " ,the late John Lennon's great song " Imagine ." Because if I was one scientists in on this discovery,that's how beatiful a sound that chirp would to my ears.
I can hear in my mind,somewhere in that "chirp " ,the late John Lennon's great song " Imagine ." Because if I was one scientists in on this discovery,that's how beatiful a sound that chirp would to my ears.
4
In these days very few Christians believe that the universe is only 6000 years old. The Bible is not a science book. The book of Genesis was written in a primitive time to a primitive people in a way that they could understand. The universe, without a doubt, is many million years old. However, civilization , as we know it, is apparently only about 10,000 years old, according to my world history books.
"Too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters."
In a world where nothing much seems to matter any more but money and personal aggrandizement, I hope we have enough people left in each generation to be interested in the mysteries. There are days when I read the news that I think we teeter on the cusp of abandoning our thirst for knowledge to howl at moon for the failure of our crops and hurricane that destroyed our settlement. As you mentioned Interstellar, I can't imagine anything more tragic than being the person who remembers what it was like before we slipped back into the dark ages of ignorance and lethargy. More and more that looks like a daily battle we are losing.
In a world where nothing much seems to matter any more but money and personal aggrandizement, I hope we have enough people left in each generation to be interested in the mysteries. There are days when I read the news that I think we teeter on the cusp of abandoning our thirst for knowledge to howl at moon for the failure of our crops and hurricane that destroyed our settlement. As you mentioned Interstellar, I can't imagine anything more tragic than being the person who remembers what it was like before we slipped back into the dark ages of ignorance and lethargy. More and more that looks like a daily battle we are losing.
1
The Sanskrit word NAAD means Sound and BRHMA means that which expands itself infinitely( read Universe ). The " Sound of Expansion " or " Naad Brhma" as told by ancient mystics is AUM or OM. There is great relavance emerging in science that after all, it may have been just a sound that is responsible for this bewildering creation. Truly beyond amazing.
1
Republicans don't believe in evolution or golobal warming so I doubt any of them will be reading much less understanding the importance of this.
2
What amazing beings we are. We can identify and comprehend an event whose defining properties range from a difference in length of 'one ten-thousandth the size of a single proton' to a mass '62 times our sun’s mass'. Mostly through thought experiments enabled by a brain that's optimized for hunting mammoths.
3
I'm a physicist major and the only thing that i can learn from this is that the limits are the ones that the mind put to itself, we are in astonishing times where almost everything we imagine is becoming true, and not because we have more resources, but because now a days we have an open mind to new things, and we are willing to make everything that is in our hands to discorver, to create, and to make ideas come true.
2
So cool.
2
the methodology behind this discovery is the real story here. We are still capable of great things.
30
Can we envision gravitational wave surfing sometime in the future?
1
Political and social problems have existed since the beginning of early civilizations, a perfect world does not exist.
Once in a while is good to ponder upon great scientific discoveries such as this one, I mean who knows? Science can be the way to solve many of our society's issues.
Once in a while is good to ponder upon great scientific discoveries such as this one, I mean who knows? Science can be the way to solve many of our society's issues.
1
I would defund this research immediately. It's obviously a ploy, similar to the climate warming crazies, to get more funds for their research. When climate models are wrong, why should I believe that these measurements are correct? By the way, I'm being completely satirical.
1
Unfortunately it does nothing to fix the real problem with GR, the lack of a real energy law. This caused Einstein to change his mind - twice.
-drl
-drl
The most intriguing statement in this editorial suggests “other universes.” If the conventional use of the term "universe" connotes a one and only "universe" then other "universes," it would seem, would have to declaim the conventional definition of the term. Or, keeping the convention, what do we call anything that may lie beyond the realm of what we generally have come to accept as the "universe"? More to the point, it is the sort of discussion that this discovery invites, just as a Picasso painting or a Mozart symphony elicits more from the human mind than what it sees or hears. Rather than merely confirming a century-old Einstein hypothesis, such discoveries as this should also rattle the stale orthodoxy and hubris which presume to know that an age for time and space can be established at all, let alone pinpointed at, what is it, oh yeah, right, 14 billion years? That arrogant assertion is based on what we know about the observable universe. But since we cannot be certain about what we cannot observe, we cannot know what lies beyond our finite powers of observation. Let’s keep exploring and above all, let’s keep our minds open.
2
Yes, I wouldn't be surprised if Krauss used "multiverses" in his original version and then an editor changed it to "other universes" (since the term 'multiverse' would require additional explanation). As for what's "beyond the realm of what we… accept as the 'universe'," which stretches the meaning of the word 'beyond', Einstein said it as well as anyone ever has: "Once you can accept the universe as matter expanding into nothing that is something, [then] wearing stripes with plaid comes easy."
7
Could someone explain to me a few questions: How did the scientists know the black hole collision occurred before they detected the waves? The waves must travel slower than the speed of light. How did they know the source? Would the deflection caused by the waves be greater if we were closer to the source?
1
1) They didn't; this detection was the first evidence. 2) No, they travel at the speed of light. 3) As far as I understand it, the location of the source is basically by "triangulation", which therefore was very crude (the location was "somewhere in the southern sky") and will continue to be crude until the scale of the experiment is vastly increased (with instruments in space). 4) Undoubtedly the amplitude of the waves would be greater if we were closer to the source; the energy in the waves would fall as the reciprocal of the distance squared.
It's wonderful to be able to get our noses out of the dirt and see the greater universe that we live in. A valentine for Einstein and all of the astronomers and physicists! This is truly thrilling stuff.
We seem to stop listening to our scientists once they put fuel in our tanks. Anything above that seems to be greeted with jeers. Here's to hope for change in that arena.
We seem to stop listening to our scientists once they put fuel in our tanks. Anything above that seems to be greeted with jeers. Here's to hope for change in that arena.
1
"Gravitational-wave observatories of the future will be able to explore the exotic features of black holes. "
I long heard that "nothing escapes a black hole". While watching the movie Interstellar, I realized that arguably a massive exception to this statement that ought to be painfully obvious. Gravity escapes a black hole although light does not.
However, we can know where things are by their gravity even if we can not see them. We would know how big the sun and the moon were even if they were invisible because of the earths path through space and the tides. The Earth takes wobbly elliptical path because the Earth orbits the Sun and the Moon orbits the Earth.
So if we can see mass through its gravity, and gravity escapes a black hole, why can't we know where mass is within a black hole by the gravity pattern that leaves it.
A physicist may be able to show huge flaws in what I just said, but it does seem to make some sense on the surface.
I long heard that "nothing escapes a black hole". While watching the movie Interstellar, I realized that arguably a massive exception to this statement that ought to be painfully obvious. Gravity escapes a black hole although light does not.
However, we can know where things are by their gravity even if we can not see them. We would know how big the sun and the moon were even if they were invisible because of the earths path through space and the tides. The Earth takes wobbly elliptical path because the Earth orbits the Sun and the Moon orbits the Earth.
So if we can see mass through its gravity, and gravity escapes a black hole, why can't we know where mass is within a black hole by the gravity pattern that leaves it.
A physicist may be able to show huge flaws in what I just said, but it does seem to make some sense on the surface.
1
No, gravity doesn't "escape a black hole". The essence of Einstein's theory is that gravity doesn't exist; instead, what Newton called a gravitational force is the warping of space-time by the presence of mass. Thus, it's not gravity "escaping" any mass (such as a black hole) but space-time is significantly warped in the vicinity of a black hole.
7
Thank you very much for writing this beautiful and informative essay. Indeed, the results of LIGO are a triumph of human civilization!
3
What a beautifully written article. Great read.
4
People who paint, sculpt and write music are called creative types. And the world needs the beauty and enrichment they create.
Clearly there are other creative types, from the world of science. We need them too.
The laws of nature themselves are a work of art. If we can somehow keep the anti-science crowd out of power, we might be able to keep funding their discovery at deeper and deeper levels. The unity of nature is truly beautiful and awe inspiring. Go science! And thank you, Einstein.
Clearly there are other creative types, from the world of science. We need them too.
The laws of nature themselves are a work of art. If we can somehow keep the anti-science crowd out of power, we might be able to keep funding their discovery at deeper and deeper levels. The unity of nature is truly beautiful and awe inspiring. Go science! And thank you, Einstein.
3
For most of living in our four dimensional world, the very idea that space and time are a physical reality that can bend and skew and change is astonishing. Even if we understood the theory. Even if we knew that Einstein predicted it a century ago.
It is hard to wrap your mind around a force that is wrapping around your mind, that you cannot see or hear for feel. But with agile and brilliant minds, someone just did "feel" the bend in spacetime.
How can that not be astonishing and beautiful?
It is hard to wrap your mind around a force that is wrapping around your mind, that you cannot see or hear for feel. But with agile and brilliant minds, someone just did "feel" the bend in spacetime.
How can that not be astonishing and beautiful?
1
On the basis that "there are no dumb questions, only dumb answers," I'd like to ask the following. This experiment is all very good and sublimely interesting and doubtless influential on the progress of knowledge, but why and how is the discovery called a "sound?" I thought that sounds could not propagate in space. I mean, would a giant with 10,000 km spaced-apart ears launched into orbit be able to hear this "chirp," or whatever it was? Lawrence, dumb and intelligent people want to know.
2
It's just a phrase that's used, like "sound of silence"; it "sounds" better, I suppose, than "a wiggle in space-time".
So Einstein is once again proven right. On the one hand, ho-hum. On the other hand, Zowie! What a mind. Great explanation, Prof. Krauss. Let's alert the Republican Party: science yields information, and it's fun!
4
Two black holes
Sitting in a tree
K-I-S-S-I-N-G
Sitting in a tree
K-I-S-S-I-N-G
18
Appears intriguing. Please elaborate.
Astrophysics exciting? You bet! My progeny will someday actually have the ability to know the answers to "the ultimate questions" about the origins of the world... of life... of matter...of time...of space ... which I don't want to even put into words... and the biggest one... as to "who"... : I don't know if I could handle the answers. I don't know if we could handle them. Not now. Maybe not ever. For now, I think the most I can personally handle is trying to understand how my TV remotes work.
3
This is another verification of the fact that Einstein's Mathematical Physics hunch or instinct is probably the most developed.Advanced research Mathematics level endeavors usually got launched via a conjecture.Someone who has an instinct developed enough to boldly assert that a certain statement holds introduces the statement as a conjecture then the other hardest part of proving the validity of the statement via a rigorous proof that will stand the test of time follows.This is the case even at the Ph.D. or post-Ph.D- level research drive.What makes one stick with research, using a combination of existing technics and coming up with fresh ones, even when there is no absolute guarantee that it is provable is that it is suggested by someone whose instinct is reliable.What makes this discovery most special is that its scope is not limited to a subject of narrower dimension but is universe, galactic or intergalactic implication or influencing, or illuminating them.That it, a century later became observationaly verifiable demonstrates that Axioms, theorems and other statements stated by the Science's giants around The Theory of relativity, uncertainty principles,etc, r worth learning and laboring over ,even though some of them are not yet proved or experimentally verified.The Scientists who didn't lose faith and toiled over to get this result need to, at least, be commended at the highest level. TMD,wrote my Ph.D.Thesis (in the US) in an aspect of Mathematics of Quantum Physics.
2
Clearly one of the most important discoveries in physics in our lifetimes. A tragic sidenote not mentioned is that one of the physicists who came up with the idea for LIGO is suffering Alzheimer's disease and is now unable to appreciate his extraordinary contribution. I hope a Nobel awaits all the leaders in this effort.
Another point, worth mentioning, is the vital role that government funding played in this research. The hundreds of millions of dollars invested were taxpayer funded. This was such a worthwhile effort. Hopefully we can learn from this accomplishment and continue to pursue science "for the sake of science".
Another point, worth mentioning, is the vital role that government funding played in this research. The hundreds of millions of dollars invested were taxpayer funded. This was such a worthwhile effort. Hopefully we can learn from this accomplishment and continue to pursue science "for the sake of science".
6
"Too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters".
I was going to write please don't be so disparaging of the populace but then my mind turned to seemingly endless procession of troglodytes I encounter on a daily basis, and I have to admit, you are probably correct.
I was going to write please don't be so disparaging of the populace but then my mind turned to seemingly endless procession of troglodytes I encounter on a daily basis, and I have to admit, you are probably correct.
3
How beautiful it is that human beings can work together in such harmony of purpose to answer complex questions. It is the working together with purpose that gives me hope - not just what they found.
What appears to lie outside the mind is in the Mind we share. All of the universe is in Mind we share. Nothing is "out there." All of it is "in here." I am that. You are that. We are together All of That. We will travel far outside ourselves, perhaps to the ends of the universe, to discover it is all here within.
What appears to lie outside the mind is in the Mind we share. All of the universe is in Mind we share. Nothing is "out there." All of it is "in here." I am that. You are that. We are together All of That. We will travel far outside ourselves, perhaps to the ends of the universe, to discover it is all here within.
4
We truly are stardust. Just spectacular.
2
If space contracts and expands what is the definition of a vacuum now ?
I am listening to a biography about Tesla, who was criticized for being too much of a fantastical experimenter and not giving us enough gadgets. We are like crows fascinated by the silvery flashes of our iPhones, too short sighted to be in awe of the ocean of space vibrating with all of the information at our disposal through our tuning devices. Alas, Einstein's famous equation is simply a disguised form of the Pythagorean rule for a right angle triangle. A squared plus B squared equals B squared. See the appendix in Frank Close's "Antimatter" if you are interested in paring down the most famous equation in the world to something you can actually get, as Dirac did. It's mindblowingly simple. It takes a brilliant mind to grasp the simple elegance of our universe, though I'm sure Tesla would love seeing the iPhone store in Grand Central Terminal, his old haunt where he mused the wonders of our energized universe.
3
I feel so minuscule.
2
That's A squared plus B squared equals C squared, solved by 3:4:5 or for electrons with simple 0,1 matrices.
For a really good explanation of the mechanics of how and WHY space changes due to mass, do a search on Thad Roberts and start by watching his u-tube programs. His approach to physics and cosmology is uplifting and very human, as discussed in this article. His will be the physics of the 22nd century. 9+2=11.
1
Can you imagine the groundskeeper bumping into this device while vacuuming? Oops!
1
And thank you, Albert Einstein.
Every time we put your theories to the test, they ace it.
Every time we put your theories to the test, they ace it.
5
May the awesomeness of this discovery attract the attention of some young boys and girls leading them to become the new wave of scientists that will unfold more knowledge about the universe.
4
Finally an article that allows me to faintly understand gravitational waves and their importance. Poetically said, I feel the enormity of the discovery and the universe. If only I had the capacity to comprehend the vast numbers and scales described. This essay took me far far away, something needed in a world filled with human suffering and political buffoonery.
3
Yes Joel, I feel the same way.
Even though I can't understand it, I do know this is a whisper of what's to come and how glorious it is that some of us have the intelligence and capacity to seek it and prove it......to look up and to wonder what we are part of is verification, to me, that our place here has a reason - to seek the creation of this universe which brings us closer to the Creator.
4
When I read about the discovery of gravitational waves, I visualize the earth as a tiny bubble in a wide sea, connected to and interacting with everything around it as far as the mind can imagine. It makes me feel wonder and humility. Will science and religion someday come together in a beautiful understanding of our existence? We can only hope.
31
A very big thank you Dr. Krauss for writing about this great scientific breakthrough in such a lucid and simple way , almost to replicate the action of a little boy chucking a ball up in the sky, so common place and yet so profound. I would not have been able to understand this if it were not for you.
I wish so many of our powerful and mighty leaders in this world could fully comprehend the relevance of this seemingly distant cosmic phenomena so that they think really deeply,sensitively and wisely about the policies and actions they make whose ripples and waves influence human existence for so much longer than their own lifetimes. I see a very troubled world around me. Let us hope that we can now all appreciate how the an event that occurs over a billion light years away impacts us all.
I wish so many of our powerful and mighty leaders in this world could fully comprehend the relevance of this seemingly distant cosmic phenomena so that they think really deeply,sensitively and wisely about the policies and actions they make whose ripples and waves influence human existence for so much longer than their own lifetimes. I see a very troubled world around me. Let us hope that we can now all appreciate how the an event that occurs over a billion light years away impacts us all.
3
Is it not possible that we have gone beyond the limits of our ability to understand this amazing universe that we occupy. When the numbers required to describe such phenomenon become so large it would seem that the reliability of their correctness would come into question. Just as it was believed that the largest prime number was certain, but later disproved by simple calculations repeated over and over until the correct result proved that it was not a prime number, so to these extreme calculations will in all probability be proven wrong at some point. Numbers are useful to a finite limit. I wonder how much information is useful to humans if they cannot keep from ruining the environment that supports them.
1
In an advanced civilization, physicist are the stars.
4
Thank you, Lawrence, for explaining to people why we as scientists find this result so incredibly exhilarating and significant for humanity.
4
This is a truly amazing discovery the magnitude of which is hard to wrap one's head around. It does clearly demonstrate some of the best qualities in human beings.
3
I can't get enough of Lawrence Krauss. I miss the scientists' speaker lectures he used to organize in NEO. For free. They were great.
Dr. Krauss, I will see you at the reason rally June 4th.
Dr. Krauss, I will see you at the reason rally June 4th.
2
The time the scientists measured was not how long it took the laser beam to be reflected off a mirror at the far end of a tunnel, but what was measured, was the time it took the laser beam to leave its source, travel to the end of the tunnel, be reflected off the mirror and return to the source-- the round trip time for the laser beam.
Those with some physics background know what Professor Krauss was trying to communicate, but it did not come across as intended.
Those with some physics background know what Professor Krauss was trying to communicate, but it did not come across as intended.
1
But wait a minute. Wasn't our world created ca. 5,000 years ago according to the Bible? This would sound a bit fishy to our current breed of politicians seeking the Evangelican votes.
Lucky for me that I had a great Catholic education first and foremost with the nuns of the IHM and the best one, Sister Maria Virginia, was our science teacher and she got us onto the right track re God and our world. In any conflict between "Faith" and Science, the former looses out to the latter as this experiment proves, i.e. our Universe was formed billions of years ago. This in no way disproves the existence of our Creator, just the time frame in the creation process.
It takes a power beyond humans to create something from nothing!
Faith depends on events that cannot be disproved such as the Virgin birth and Our Lord rising after his crucifiction, but to claim that it all started just some thousands of years ago is disproved by the science of this discovery.
Lucky for me that I had a great Catholic education first and foremost with the nuns of the IHM and the best one, Sister Maria Virginia, was our science teacher and she got us onto the right track re God and our world. In any conflict between "Faith" and Science, the former looses out to the latter as this experiment proves, i.e. our Universe was formed billions of years ago. This in no way disproves the existence of our Creator, just the time frame in the creation process.
It takes a power beyond humans to create something from nothing!
Faith depends on events that cannot be disproved such as the Virgin birth and Our Lord rising after his crucifiction, but to claim that it all started just some thousands of years ago is disproved by the science of this discovery.
1
It was just the other day, at a political prayer breakfast, I was pondering if gravitational waves could be detected with very tall, orthogonal stacks of pancakes, and, if so, could I spawn a General Unifying Theory of Everything Ever. In a "Eureka", and partially "senior", moment, it occurred to me that I could link the gravity thing with the this-is-what a trillion-light-years-feels-like sensation of watching back-to-back viewings of "Interstellar" and "Gravity". Suddenly it seemed all so obvious as did the cash value of such a theory rented to the producers of election attack ads. Move over Mr. Einstein, I'm waiting for Mr. Nobel.
Odd humour aside, I hope the world, and some American political hopefuls, recognize in this discovery, the greatness of America is not lost.
Odd humour aside, I hope the world, and some American political hopefuls, recognize in this discovery, the greatness of America is not lost.
12
Excellent summary, Dr. Krauss. Einstein was developing his General Theory of Relativity about 100 years. In my humble opinion, this effort by Einstein was the greatest intellectual tour de force of all time. All developed in a single human brain with hardly any equipment beside pad and pencil. It gave rise to the idea that the universe had a beginning, despite Einstein's belief in a steady state universe (described by Einstein as his single biggest mistake).
How marvelous it is to have verification a century later. It also verifies that human existence can be a virtue, which is not always obvious given the current state of world affairs.
How marvelous it is to have verification a century later. It also verifies that human existence can be a virtue, which is not always obvious given the current state of world affairs.
2
For anybody who really enjoyed this article, the author is featured in many YouTube videos. They are typically an hour long, in college auditoriums, either alone or on a panel. The typical lecture/presentation is 40min lecture, 20 Q&A.
I personally find some of them really good, and some of them not as much.
I personally find some of them really good, and some of them not as much.
1
When I heard the reproduction of the gravity wave reproduced in sound, the familiar sound of one heartbeat stood out.
1
The fact that we do nothing with our growing knowledge to achieve productive measures in space, such as just using our Sun for warmth, growth, and illumination, is frustrating. For instance, how about ending our trash problems, where usable land is now turned into nauseous dump sites, and send all this trash to our Sun. Build huge cheap space rockets filled with trash for a one way trip to our Sun. By the time this stuff gets within a million miles of our Sun all that stuff will be incinerated and we will never have to bother with it again. To take this a bit further, why not send all our nuclear waste to our Sun. By the time this toxic waste got to a million miles from our Sun the cheap space rockets would be destroyed in massive nuclear explosions, explosions that would feel like pin pricks to our giant Sun. Just a thought.
1
Upon noticing this and becoming aware of our presence, the inhabitants of the sun may begin firing back.
“God” (usually meaning the Christian concept of “God”) is not the only alternative to chance as an explanation of the beauty and order we find in the Universe. Intelligence and order may be inherent properties of matter.
Cosmologist Brian Swimme, in his book “The Universe is a Green Dragon”, says that "particles boil into existence out of sheer emptiness” . In other words, their self-nature is uncreated.
Whatever questions you may ask about the origins of the Universe (or matter or Consciousness) can just as well be asked about the origins of “God”. If it’s ok for “God” to be uncreated, then why is it not similarly ok for the Universe and Consciousness to be uncreated? It is OK!
There is simply no need for an anthropomorphized “God” to explain the wonders of Nature—which may, indeed, be beyond verbal explanation.
Cosmologist Brian Swimme, in his book “The Universe is a Green Dragon”, says that "particles boil into existence out of sheer emptiness” . In other words, their self-nature is uncreated.
Whatever questions you may ask about the origins of the Universe (or matter or Consciousness) can just as well be asked about the origins of “God”. If it’s ok for “God” to be uncreated, then why is it not similarly ok for the Universe and Consciousness to be uncreated? It is OK!
There is simply no need for an anthropomorphized “God” to explain the wonders of Nature—which may, indeed, be beyond verbal explanation.
2
That's the way I think too!
I'm an agnostic.
2,400 years ago, Lao Tze said:
"Existence is beyond the power of words to describe."
Alternatively, there may be several levels of "created beings" which is the premise of the film Prometheus, directed by Ridley Scott. Advanced aliens visited Eartb eons ago and introduced their DNA here - which eventually resulted in humans.
Those aliens themselves may have been "created" by other aliens from elsewhere. And so on. This does not preclude the possibility that there was some First Alien species that was, indeed, embodied as the Creationists say. Except that it didn't take place on Earth!
I'm an agnostic.
2,400 years ago, Lao Tze said:
"Existence is beyond the power of words to describe."
Alternatively, there may be several levels of "created beings" which is the premise of the film Prometheus, directed by Ridley Scott. Advanced aliens visited Eartb eons ago and introduced their DNA here - which eventually resulted in humans.
Those aliens themselves may have been "created" by other aliens from elsewhere. And so on. This does not preclude the possibility that there was some First Alien species that was, indeed, embodied as the Creationists say. Except that it didn't take place on Earth!
Over a trillion dollars for the F 35?
Just over a billion for the LIGO experiment? - a thousandth of the F 35 costs?
I guess in the future some mad scientist will discover to extrapolate LIGO's results into some Gravity-wave death wave or something.
For the moment, I am lost in a goofy, open-eyed wonderment of this dazzling achievement and the sense that human beings are unique and pretty special.
Which is probably exactly what each of the 10 billion other alien species in this vast Universe think about themselves -"unique & pretty special"
Its a marvelous achievement. Congratulations!
Just over a billion for the LIGO experiment? - a thousandth of the F 35 costs?
I guess in the future some mad scientist will discover to extrapolate LIGO's results into some Gravity-wave death wave or something.
For the moment, I am lost in a goofy, open-eyed wonderment of this dazzling achievement and the sense that human beings are unique and pretty special.
Which is probably exactly what each of the 10 billion other alien species in this vast Universe think about themselves -"unique & pretty special"
Its a marvelous achievement. Congratulations!
2
6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles certainly is a bit of distance. Ken Ham will have to update his theories yet again: God must have made the universe with the gravity waves already on their way to Earth. (I wonder if He bothered to actually make the black holes, given that there'd be no need to do so.)
The creationists' "universe as a practical joke" theory gets more and more elaborate as time goes on. Too bad they can't see that the reality of the universe is far more inspiring.
The creationists' "universe as a practical joke" theory gets more and more elaborate as time goes on. Too bad they can't see that the reality of the universe is far more inspiring.
3
While Penzias and Wilson of Bell Labs may have provided demonstrable evidence of the Big Bang, I find it a bit awkward, to say the least, that this article does not mention the theorist who set forth the theory of the Big Bang to begin with, the Belgian Catholic priest George Lemaitre. I trust this wasn't a deliberate oversight.
2
As one who was lucky enough from the age of 21 to be directly involved making new observations that help us understand how things happen in the world, it is one of the greatest satisfactions of human life to know what is going on and to be able to describe it with some accuracy. It beats living in the dark.
39
Congratulation to Einstein and everyone in these endeavors, truly amazing. Someday perhaps we can use these waves to escape the bounds of humanity with all its trash.
Only God could create a universe as magnificent as this and minds as brilliant as Einstein's! Thank you NYT for your articles today on LIGO.
Please tell me you're kidding. This astounding achievement has nothing to do with human-contrived myths such as the concept of one or more Gods responsible for creating the universe and watching over you as you brush your teeth. Those myths may be comforting to some (while often used to damaging ends by others) but they have been long since disproved by science- as evidenced by the self-righteously religious now needing to explain away scientific knowledge with the patently disingenuous concept of "intelligent design."
3
While doesn't the bible talk about black holes, as they are so numerous in "His" creation?
1
IN WESTERN NATIONS SANS THE U. S. AS RELIGION BECOMES RITUAL . . .
...we are finding out through the scientific method ... how as we have become closer to the truth of creation ... and, how much more mysterious and beautiful it actually is .... when compared to the Abrahamic faiths.
Compare "finding beauty in darkness" to that the Earth was created in six days ... and this inexplicable God rested on the seventh day 6,000 years ago ... and instead of each the species being created separately ... Darwin's theory of evolution was far more explicable and elegant.
...we are finding out through the scientific method ... how as we have become closer to the truth of creation ... and, how much more mysterious and beautiful it actually is .... when compared to the Abrahamic faiths.
Compare "finding beauty in darkness" to that the Earth was created in six days ... and this inexplicable God rested on the seventh day 6,000 years ago ... and instead of each the species being created separately ... Darwin's theory of evolution was far more explicable and elegant.
6
Beautiful article, to cap many of the articles I read on this subject today.
Thank you for bringing clarity to this phenomenon. Fascinating!
Thank you for bringing clarity to this phenomenon. Fascinating!
3
Great article, great sentence: "If the fact that this is possible doesn’t astonish, then read these statements again."
6
It was difficult to discern that faint ripple over the din of the 2016 campaigns; but if you really listen...
30
Yes, one has to wonder at the extremes of human existence, the floundering grasp of democracy at the same time that new discoveries outpace our ability to create intelligent life around us.
The feeble sound of the gravitational waves produced by the black holes collision and ripples caused in the time-space fabric observed by a team of physicists, exactly on the predictive lines of Einstein in his general relativity theory a century ago, is really an exciting development in the basic science research, which is bound to provide new perspectives on the understanding of the universe and its evolution since the big bang.
13
Good writing to help "lay" people envision a realm with close to unimaginable boundaries . . .
The reference to Bell Labs was a nostalgia trigger that sent me off to locate the name of one of the specials they did in the early 1960's: "About Time" - with an animated demonstration of the relativity of time - coupled with an explanation by Richard Feynman... Bell did remarkable work, and made efforts to make science meaningful - - and exciting for the public -- especially the young public.
The reference to Bell Labs was a nostalgia trigger that sent me off to locate the name of one of the specials they did in the early 1960's: "About Time" - with an animated demonstration of the relativity of time - coupled with an explanation by Richard Feynman... Bell did remarkable work, and made efforts to make science meaningful - - and exciting for the public -- especially the young public.
6
This collision of black holes over one billion light years away jiggled the structure of our entire universe and perhaps that of every universe we can not see. That we as tiny specks on a tiny planet should know this is astonishing.
the mystery of our existence should humble us enough to make it possible to work in harmony here on this world to solve our problems. But will we? Probably not for the arrogance of the human race seems to be boundless and resistant to finding compassion for our neighbor next door.
the mystery of our existence should humble us enough to make it possible to work in harmony here on this world to solve our problems. But will we? Probably not for the arrogance of the human race seems to be boundless and resistant to finding compassion for our neighbor next door.
12
One small wave of gravitational force;
One giant leap for the human imagination.
Bravo!
One giant leap for the human imagination.
Bravo!
12
thank you for this explanatory article, it makes me appreciate the difficulty and accomplishment. to be able to overcome the quantum vibrations in the matter of the measuring device is deeply extraordinary, congratulations for your efforts and success. ripples in space time.
9
How do we know this chirp that was detected came from the two black holes colliding and not from something else in the universe? It's not like these detectors are pointed in one direction (like a telescope) right? Will we continue to hear this chirping from the same black hole/event? How does one distinguish between two different events taking place in the depths of the universe? Absolutely fantastic stuff. Hats off to everyone involved. This is the type of news I enjoy reading!
9
The paper is quite readable, even to this layman. You can read how they detected it and how they ruled everything else out. One time event from the merger of these two black holes. However, since this universe is apparently "fine tuned" to creating black holes, there are likely many such mergers yet to detect.
1
This is a relatively simple experiment, it is the structure that needs to be designed to isolate the optical equipment from any other possible vibration and the precise tolerances needed to guarantee an accurate measurement that is phenomenal.
3
"...what’s the use of science like this?"
More than just aesthetics, and there certainly is an elegant beauty in this observation, the value in receiving a unique result in agreement with what the physics predicts is tremendous. The theory of general relativity is buttressed by one more brick.
Ad astra per ardua was my High School's motto. May our labors to reach the stars never end.
More than just aesthetics, and there certainly is an elegant beauty in this observation, the value in receiving a unique result in agreement with what the physics predicts is tremendous. The theory of general relativity is buttressed by one more brick.
Ad astra per ardua was my High School's motto. May our labors to reach the stars never end.
8
I'm not even an engineer or a astrophysicist (now I know that I should have been one), but the universe has always amazed me. And every time scientists discover something new or reach a new planet (or dwarf planet) to know it better I just renew my faith in humanity. Like species we can achieve awesome things. Last year was great for science, I hope 2016 is greater.
8
Ever have the tiniest tinge of wishing these researchers weren't so dang brilliant? That's quite a laser-guided gizmo they came up with!
Bit this is all so far out of my comfort zone when I haven't even come remotely close to catching up with Newton, or even Archimedes, let alone Einstein.
Leaves one longing for the olden days of illustrations in Diderot's encyclopedia, with all it's wooden gears & fascinating things I can actually pretend to bend my brain around...
For me the geniuses working on Life on Earth are far more fascinating than black holes. Matter converting to energy with velocity & mass thrown in for good measure is truly off my charts,
Because to be honest, the very existence of the idea of Black Holes, let alone colliding ones, is utterly, viscerally terrifying & unknowable. At least to me.
But back to our own solar system, and our classical, if trite, world of politics & policy:
"Our sun will burn for 10 billion years, with the intensity of over 10 billion thermonuclear weapons going off every second"
Kinda puts 'Drill Baby Drill' in permanent perspective.
Bit this is all so far out of my comfort zone when I haven't even come remotely close to catching up with Newton, or even Archimedes, let alone Einstein.
Leaves one longing for the olden days of illustrations in Diderot's encyclopedia, with all it's wooden gears & fascinating things I can actually pretend to bend my brain around...
For me the geniuses working on Life on Earth are far more fascinating than black holes. Matter converting to energy with velocity & mass thrown in for good measure is truly off my charts,
Because to be honest, the very existence of the idea of Black Holes, let alone colliding ones, is utterly, viscerally terrifying & unknowable. At least to me.
But back to our own solar system, and our classical, if trite, world of politics & policy:
"Our sun will burn for 10 billion years, with the intensity of over 10 billion thermonuclear weapons going off every second"
Kinda puts 'Drill Baby Drill' in permanent perspective.
5
"we may learn more about the beginning of the universe"
But, alas, how does a "chirp" from the outer darkness compare with "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" that remains embedded in the very DNA of the masses. If God created Adam with a belly button is He a deceiver, or the first trees with rings? The man in the street would be as surprised at a none-wave universe as he would to find the first tree without rings. Imagine telling someone that researchers discovered a secret code in a Picasso and hear, "Oh, he's a good friend of mine." Not to deny the beauty of a space "chirp", but the masses cannot look into the beauty of the night and not say "the heavens declare the glory of God." Not one person in ten million is capable of believing that all this came from a self-creating atom. And they cannot make themselves believe that Krauss is capable of believing such a thing. And until Krauss is able to convert his "may" into something less terrifying, 99% of the world's population will cling to what they cannot deny.
On a darker note: this will undoubtedly yield many benefits, and greater bombs. But will it make men better, kinder, humbler?
But, alas, how does a "chirp" from the outer darkness compare with "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth" that remains embedded in the very DNA of the masses. If God created Adam with a belly button is He a deceiver, or the first trees with rings? The man in the street would be as surprised at a none-wave universe as he would to find the first tree without rings. Imagine telling someone that researchers discovered a secret code in a Picasso and hear, "Oh, he's a good friend of mine." Not to deny the beauty of a space "chirp", but the masses cannot look into the beauty of the night and not say "the heavens declare the glory of God." Not one person in ten million is capable of believing that all this came from a self-creating atom. And they cannot make themselves believe that Krauss is capable of believing such a thing. And until Krauss is able to convert his "may" into something less terrifying, 99% of the world's population will cling to what they cannot deny.
On a darker note: this will undoubtedly yield many benefits, and greater bombs. But will it make men better, kinder, humbler?
2
The Universe is far more interesting and far more real than the god image you make. The Universe, is beyond....always was, always will be. The human created notions of god and religion pale in the face of the Universe.
3
"But will it make men better, kinder, humbler?" Because religion has done such a good job at that??
I'm a believer BTW but I think mankind has to take responsibility for their own actions and in-actions, science can't do that for them.
Science seeks knowledge, if people pay attention then the astounding complexity of the universe should make them better (awed at least) and therefore humbler. Alas, how many pay attention?
I'm a believer BTW but I think mankind has to take responsibility for their own actions and in-actions, science can't do that for them.
Science seeks knowledge, if people pay attention then the astounding complexity of the universe should make them better (awed at least) and therefore humbler. Alas, how many pay attention?
4
Understandable. My point is merely that the 99% are incapable of moving beyond agnosticism, and the minute these doubting Thomases hear "chirp," their mind immediately conjures up the "Chirrupper." A revival would sweep these into the fold by the millions. It would be helpful if people like Dawkins would address that, otherwise we all know what lies on the near horizen.
1
The wavelength of light is about 5 e-7 meter. Google size of proton and it is as much as 1 e-14 meter. So how do you see vibration amplitude of 1 e-18 meter by interference of laser light? Quantum optics? Oh I see.
2
Today it is Beautiful Science, but who knows where all this leads? Einstein's Theory of General Relativity (1915) is the basis for GPS systems in use today.
Research must be a dicey enterprise. NSF, especially Dr. Cordova, made the right call to fund this work. If some projects fail or produce results different from the hypotheses in the grant proposal, that is how knowledge discovery works. If there is no failure, then the funders are far too timid and conservative in their choices. Congratulations to NSF as well for taking the chance.
Research must be a dicey enterprise. NSF, especially Dr. Cordova, made the right call to fund this work. If some projects fail or produce results different from the hypotheses in the grant proposal, that is how knowledge discovery works. If there is no failure, then the funders are far too timid and conservative in their choices. Congratulations to NSF as well for taking the chance.
78
A profound victory for everyone who believes in science.
1/10,000 the diameter of a proton!
If that doesn't send shivers down your spine, you need to read more.
Aristotle, one of the, if not "the", smartest men to ever live, held many views which later turned out to be false or incomplete.
But, there is one observation of his that I feel certain will endure as truth forever: "Political science is the most important science, because it determines what other sciences will be studied."
I learned that lesson in college, and I'll never forgive Aristotle for it.
It's like a forcing a Vulcan to watch how laws are made - Or Supreme Court decisions.
Unfortunately, the logical truth of his statement is inescapable.
Oh, this mortal coil!
1/10,000 the diameter of a proton!
If that doesn't send shivers down your spine, you need to read more.
Aristotle, one of the, if not "the", smartest men to ever live, held many views which later turned out to be false or incomplete.
But, there is one observation of his that I feel certain will endure as truth forever: "Political science is the most important science, because it determines what other sciences will be studied."
I learned that lesson in college, and I'll never forgive Aristotle for it.
It's like a forcing a Vulcan to watch how laws are made - Or Supreme Court decisions.
Unfortunately, the logical truth of his statement is inescapable.
Oh, this mortal coil!
10
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. - Hamlet (1.5.167-8), Hamlet to Horatio.
6
We are privileged to live near the LIGO facility in Washington state, and to have been able to tour the facility, both in its early years and more recently. It has been fascinating to see the patience of the staff, explaining the theory of the device to their visitors, and the new enhancements that were underway, but having no results to tell them about. It is exciting to read about -- and listen to -- this first event observation!
9
But a tiny chirp, it speaks volumes to the accomplishments of humanity in a moment crowded with hate, anxiety, and sadness. Whoever ends up as president, please fund the sciences more.
9
We come from stardust and will become stardust again. But, amazingly, in our ludicrously short existence on this planet, our sentience allows us to explore the deepest secrets of the universe. From the mind of one man came a theory that explains what happens when two black holes collide 1.2 billion light years away. The detection of gravitational waves is also a mind boggling feat. This gives me hope and a sense of optimism that I never felt before. We do not need the puny gods of our tribal ancestors to guide us in our quest for truth and meaning. The music of the universe will guide us wherever our ultimate destiny may lie.
121
You want to crash into the current reality? Just listen to the boobs running for office.
3
Sing on brother, sing on!
3
Almost as amazing as this discovery is how American corporations, like Bell, had laboratories doing basic research such as discovered evidence of the Big Bang in 1964. Even our universities are now doing less basic research that may have no immediate practical or financial value. More and more the measure of success is in terms of financial gain.
I recall a scientist being interviewed maybe 20 years ago about a discovery or invention of his that did have practical and likely financial value. He was asked if he planned to take part in having it produced and marketed, probably making him a rich man. He said no, he was a physicist not a businessman. He had spent many years in study and training and research, following his interests and honing his talents. And now he should leave his calling, his lab, and go into business? Not for him. Not for Einstein.
I recall a scientist being interviewed maybe 20 years ago about a discovery or invention of his that did have practical and likely financial value. He was asked if he planned to take part in having it produced and marketed, probably making him a rich man. He said no, he was a physicist not a businessman. He had spent many years in study and training and research, following his interests and honing his talents. And now he should leave his calling, his lab, and go into business? Not for him. Not for Einstein.
5
I have a distinct leaning toward the sciences and scientific thought. I find this discovery fascinating, and the writing is beautiful and appreciated. As a teen I wanted to be an astronaut (and a writer and a singer, and I was a physics major in college for a short time)
But the world's most brilliant minds and the exorbitant cost of this machinery surely could be put to more pragmatic use. We have enough and know enough to solve human problems-, but we don't. It's just not as "sexy" to help children everywhere to be safe, fed, and educated than to be part of an announcement that evidence of the big bang has been witnessed, and to distract the curious and sated among us for days trying to grasp the enormity of 5.88 trillion multiplied a billion times.
How might we as a society, as a civilization, turn more brilliant minds to securing basic human requirements^--toward agriculture, urban planning, climate change, and economics before we worry about the bang. I don't know how anyone's life would be different today if Newton had seen evidence of the big bang^ I can say that my life has been enriched by thousands good meals, thousands of days in public education, and thousands of the works of Art--the costs of which to create, in combination, might be best compared to the price tag on this apparatus with the illustration used on this page--the width of a hair to the distance from a star.
But the world's most brilliant minds and the exorbitant cost of this machinery surely could be put to more pragmatic use. We have enough and know enough to solve human problems-, but we don't. It's just not as "sexy" to help children everywhere to be safe, fed, and educated than to be part of an announcement that evidence of the big bang has been witnessed, and to distract the curious and sated among us for days trying to grasp the enormity of 5.88 trillion multiplied a billion times.
How might we as a society, as a civilization, turn more brilliant minds to securing basic human requirements^--toward agriculture, urban planning, climate change, and economics before we worry about the bang. I don't know how anyone's life would be different today if Newton had seen evidence of the big bang^ I can say that my life has been enriched by thousands good meals, thousands of days in public education, and thousands of the works of Art--the costs of which to create, in combination, might be best compared to the price tag on this apparatus with the illustration used on this page--the width of a hair to the distance from a star.
10
Go easy! Look at where our tax dollars are now spent: 18% on defense etc., 24% on Medicare etc., 11% on "safety net programs", and so on, down to 2% on "science and medical research". Or is your premise that other than "brilliant minds" are involved in the other programs?!
3
The problems you'd like to solve may indeed need money. But isn't for the lack of money that solutions go unrealized, it's the lack of money allocated. Just because money that is allocated for this kind of research doesn't go to help solve these problems doesn't mean that money would have allocated for that purpose otherwise,
2
Greed, religious fundamentalism, politics, racism, and so on are the problems keeping the future from being great. No "brilliant minds" can change these things, but they can advance science, the arts , and education. The cost of this machinery pales compared to our spending on the military.
3
Mr. Krauss, please not Picasso—there are much greater artists.
And Mr. Krauss, be careful about jumping on the Einstein cottage industry.
Mr. Einstein missed the boat (despite the waves) on Quantum Theory—the backbone and fundament of 20th century physics. And he absolutely could not abide the probabilistic view of nature.
And Mr. Krauss, be careful about jumping on the Einstein cottage industry.
Mr. Einstein missed the boat (despite the waves) on Quantum Theory—the backbone and fundament of 20th century physics. And he absolutely could not abide the probabilistic view of nature.
Don't even try to undermine Einstein's extraordinary accomplishments. And while Picasso may not be to your personal taste he, like Einstein, is almost universally considered a creative, innovative genius of the highest magnitude.
Einstein couldn't possibly conceive of everything! While he couldn't reconcile the quantum world with his own work (100 years ago!), he still produced staggering innovation in his two main theories which are the foundation of many of our greatest scientific insights today.
Einstein couldn't possibly conceive of everything! While he couldn't reconcile the quantum world with his own work (100 years ago!), he still produced staggering innovation in his two main theories which are the foundation of many of our greatest scientific insights today.
2
Quite true. He didn't like "spooky action at a distance" and personally preferred deterministic physical explanations, such as GR. Nonetheless, he will be rightly be hailed as one of the greatest physicists ever.
1
Just like light can act as a wave and a particle (photon), I wonder if gravity, which has now been shown to act as a wave can also act as a particle ? And if gravity particles exists could they somehow be related to dark matter ? Just asking.
2
This experiment does indicate (at least for now ) RIP Gravitons ! The Wave hypothesis on which this experiment rests can be argued dogmatic by many. But hey, it's Caltech and MIT that operate these LIGO program. Who would possibly bell the cat here ?
2
Nice article. Appreciate the part about our eyes now being open to a new way of exploring the universe. What speed do gravitational waves travel? Speed of light?
Oh my gosh Dr. Krause, your line -
'In the absence of alcohol, your living room doesn’t appear to shrink and grow repeatedly.'
had me laughing out loud. I don't think too many articles about astrophysics can claim that.
Thank you for your good explanation that lay people can follow. It is truly astonishing that smart people were able to fashion a machine to measure such infinitesimal differences. It is truly astonishing that Dr. Einstein thought of this in the first place. And now we know so much more.
The truly astonishing thing is, of course, the universe itself.
'In the absence of alcohol, your living room doesn’t appear to shrink and grow repeatedly.'
had me laughing out loud. I don't think too many articles about astrophysics can claim that.
Thank you for your good explanation that lay people can follow. It is truly astonishing that smart people were able to fashion a machine to measure such infinitesimal differences. It is truly astonishing that Dr. Einstein thought of this in the first place. And now we know so much more.
The truly astonishing thing is, of course, the universe itself.
8
If people are scratching their heads saying 'why is this discovery important?' Then let me say this- in sci fi films Gravity is played with in many ways, the most obvious being hover cars. If we want hover cars I am fairly certain we need to know a lot more about how gravity works and reacts and even exists- how is there a force that causes things to go towards its center which touching you? In short- we are living in an exciting era where these kinds of pure advancements are being made- although I would like to see some level of reproducibility in this experiment to rule out errors or even data fixing. The layman figures that the golden age of science was during the Cold War- the scientist knows he/she is living in a time where we can learn more about our selves and the universe now than in the entirety of human history so far.
The times should follow up with this story later once more experiments are done to really conclude the teams findings.
The times should follow up with this story later once more experiments are done to really conclude the teams findings.
19
"In this short treatise I propose great things for inspection and contemplation
by every explorer of Nature. Great, I say, because of the excellence of the
things themselves, because of their newness, unheard of through the ages,
and also because of the instrument with the benefit of which they make
themselves manifest to our sight."
-Galileo Galilei : Sidereus Nuncius
by every explorer of Nature. Great, I say, because of the excellence of the
things themselves, because of their newness, unheard of through the ages,
and also because of the instrument with the benefit of which they make
themselves manifest to our sight."
-Galileo Galilei : Sidereus Nuncius
4
...well the Republicans will of course deny this; and it's likely to be Obama's fault if it turns out to be a bad thing in any way.
7
How long before the new age cranks start selling crystals, new diets, etc to protect you from the harmful, no doubt cancer-causing, effects of gravitational waves.
37
great idea! I've got the cure available now. MC, Discover and Visa accepted.
1
I hope not long. I can feel something coming on. I now realize I've been detecting, and have been influenced by, gravitational waves that have simultaneously, but alternately stretched, scrunched, and distorted my space time waveform configuration from well before the birth of the universe, which is impossible because there was no there there because there was no before before either.
1
OK, but how do these waves differ from the gravity changes ("waves"?) that occur daily because of the moon orbiting the earth (which cause high and low tides)??
1
Space-time is "permanently" warped in the Earth-Moon system (stated differently, a gravitational force exists); the daily changes in the tides are caused by the Earth spinning in this "permanently- warped" space-time, not by any gravitational waves. In contrast, for the results described, the gravity waves were caused by a massive transient in space-time, caused by the merging of two Black Holes; similar (but vastly smaller) waves would arise if the Moon were to suddenly disappear.
But, it’s not "’permanently’ warped”. Any moving object anywhere would cause a corresponding change in the gravitational field. Is it then just a question of magnitude or of rate-of-change?
Yes: it's "then just a question of magnitude or [and] of rate-of-change"; that's why I put the word 'permanently' in quotes. For example, the tides, themselves, send out gravitational waves (of obviously very low frequency / slow rate of change). As another example, at a higher frequency, consider Krauss's great comment about waving one's arms, which has gotta be one the greatest "hand-waving argument" ever presented!
The power of mathematics allowed this prediction. It's now been proven.
Another more recent theory is the theory of rapid inflation at the start of the universe. The mathematics to describe that allow multiple solutions which can be interpreted as multiple universes. The new proof is pending.
The reality is far more exciting than any SF movie.
Another more recent theory is the theory of rapid inflation at the start of the universe. The mathematics to describe that allow multiple solutions which can be interpreted as multiple universes. The new proof is pending.
The reality is far more exciting than any SF movie.
1
These tunnels are updated Cavendish Machines; no?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavendish_experiment
I built one for high school science fair.
Way too many subliminal vibrations for it to work--from cars and what not--or so it seemed.
Maybe they were gravity waves. ;)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavendish_experiment
I built one for high school science fair.
Way too many subliminal vibrations for it to work--from cars and what not--or so it seemed.
Maybe they were gravity waves. ;)
Though Professor Krauss waxes eloquent on this possible new discovery
he might note the following:
a) Galileo observed what he claimed were moons moving around Jupiter.
If those moons, along with Jupiter revolved around the Earth, ala
Neo-Aristotelian theories, the "Earth Centered" theory was not yet
demolished. It would take until 1838, when the Stellar Parallax was
detected by Bessel, via far more powerful telescopes than Galileo
had access to, in order to 'dethrone' the Neo-Aristotelian theory.
b) My Uncle Jack lives near Hartford, Washington, his twin, Uncle Joe
lives near Louisiana. When they blow their noses they make noises
at about the 135 db level. Sometimes they blow their noses at the same
time - even though they live 1,500 miles apart - "Human version of
"Bell's Theorem ? "
The delicacy of the "Gravitational Ripple" detectors should make us
very cautious about claiming that it is certain that "Gravity Waves"
have been discovered and are considered to have been proven to exist.
c) Not clear at all that the interaction of the "Black Holes" actually
released more energy than the rest of the observable Universe...there
is much about the "observable Universe" we are unsure about.
he might note the following:
a) Galileo observed what he claimed were moons moving around Jupiter.
If those moons, along with Jupiter revolved around the Earth, ala
Neo-Aristotelian theories, the "Earth Centered" theory was not yet
demolished. It would take until 1838, when the Stellar Parallax was
detected by Bessel, via far more powerful telescopes than Galileo
had access to, in order to 'dethrone' the Neo-Aristotelian theory.
b) My Uncle Jack lives near Hartford, Washington, his twin, Uncle Joe
lives near Louisiana. When they blow their noses they make noises
at about the 135 db level. Sometimes they blow their noses at the same
time - even though they live 1,500 miles apart - "Human version of
"Bell's Theorem ? "
The delicacy of the "Gravitational Ripple" detectors should make us
very cautious about claiming that it is certain that "Gravity Waves"
have been discovered and are considered to have been proven to exist.
c) Not clear at all that the interaction of the "Black Holes" actually
released more energy than the rest of the observable Universe...there
is much about the "observable Universe" we are unsure about.
2
I am an artist not a scientist, but science inspires me. Always has.
Years ago, as a very young girl I had recurring dreams of myself as a dust mote in a dance of the stars - by turns shooting out into space, and falling back to nothingness condensed. Like breathing. Like being alone, and then together, alone and together over and over again until that one brilliant moment when everything changes and I am thrown beyond the event horizon, falling not back but away, drifting through the vastness of space to land here on this beautiful planet.
I was born with six toes on my right foot, a gift to remind me of who I was. It was cut off right after birth so my shoe would fit, but I knew where it was by the scar it left. It dawned on me that I had been a twin. The two of us had circled the drain together, had left together in that last great explosion, and then became separated. She left me her toe to remember her by. Where she is, I do not know.
I grew up with a father and brothers who were scientifically minded and often discussed space travel and Einsteins theories. I listened but then wandered away to the private place inside me where I could freely play in the images they inspired.
The beautiful video is so much like my dreams, I am struck dumb to find the right words to describe it. I am reminded of how I felt as a child, an alien, a mutant, a traveler, alone, and finally finding my calling in life.
From dust we come and to dust we go and in between we dream.
Years ago, as a very young girl I had recurring dreams of myself as a dust mote in a dance of the stars - by turns shooting out into space, and falling back to nothingness condensed. Like breathing. Like being alone, and then together, alone and together over and over again until that one brilliant moment when everything changes and I am thrown beyond the event horizon, falling not back but away, drifting through the vastness of space to land here on this beautiful planet.
I was born with six toes on my right foot, a gift to remind me of who I was. It was cut off right after birth so my shoe would fit, but I knew where it was by the scar it left. It dawned on me that I had been a twin. The two of us had circled the drain together, had left together in that last great explosion, and then became separated. She left me her toe to remember her by. Where she is, I do not know.
I grew up with a father and brothers who were scientifically minded and often discussed space travel and Einsteins theories. I listened but then wandered away to the private place inside me where I could freely play in the images they inspired.
The beautiful video is so much like my dreams, I am struck dumb to find the right words to describe it. I am reminded of how I felt as a child, an alien, a mutant, a traveler, alone, and finally finding my calling in life.
From dust we come and to dust we go and in between we dream.
4
that was great
Wait, this event happened a billion light-years away and the waves just passed by us last Thursday?
There have been three related science articles/video in The Times over the past few days. Each makes reference to music. They include Natalie Angier's February 8, article, "New Ways Into the Brain's 'Music Room;'" a February 11 video "LIGO Hears Gravitational Waves Einstein Predicated" by Dennis Overbye, Jonathon Corum and Jason Drakeford, which references the "invisible music of the cosmos;" and Lawrence Krauss' February 11 article, "Finding Beauty in the Darkness," which suggests that science has a sublime nature similar to that contained in art, music and literature.
Going to the extreme, I ask whether music, itself, has a place in answering the big question--why is there something rather than nothing? With my imagination unrestrained by science (except for being enticed by string theory) and moved by whimsy, I speculate that it might. In the first stage, I suggest a framework of two forces: creation, a non-physical, conceptual force, and chaos, initially, the unstable void in nothing, a physical force. In the second stage, creation, meeting its purpose and using its power, built an evolving harmony from this unstable void. Harmony, as it then existed, was a single, super-note. In the final stage, the note, seeking a symphonic base necessitating silence between parts, fractured into ever accelerating pieces culminating in the Big Bang.
Going to the extreme, I ask whether music, itself, has a place in answering the big question--why is there something rather than nothing? With my imagination unrestrained by science (except for being enticed by string theory) and moved by whimsy, I speculate that it might. In the first stage, I suggest a framework of two forces: creation, a non-physical, conceptual force, and chaos, initially, the unstable void in nothing, a physical force. In the second stage, creation, meeting its purpose and using its power, built an evolving harmony from this unstable void. Harmony, as it then existed, was a single, super-note. In the final stage, the note, seeking a symphonic base necessitating silence between parts, fractured into ever accelerating pieces culminating in the Big Bang.
Almost anyone when young has looked up at the stars and asked what wonders might exist out there. Anybody old enough to have been aware on 21 July 1969, when Neil Armstrong placed the first human foot on a celestial body other than Earth, wondered how long it would be before we had outposts on the Moon, Mars and in open space; and was dreadfully disappointed that more than 45 years have passed with none.
The detection of gravity waves occurring as a result of the brushing and merger of two massive black holes could have great practical importance to humanity beyond the art of Mozart or Picasso. An engineering-level understanding of gravity waves could render obsolete current modes of transportation on Earth and in space. A far better understanding of black holes and their effect on the structure of space around them could someday facilitate what even Einstein believed impossible – faster than light travel, and the practical ability for humans to explore and populate the stars. Just two impressive possibilities among the thousands or millions of serendipitous and valuable discoveries that could occur with intense review of these phenomena.
But most valuable of all is the inspiration that finding beauty in the darkness sparks in human beings to take our knowledge to the next level. Congratulations to the LIGO team that recorded this observation: they along with many others who seek to plumb reality in the distant darkness do immensely important work for all humanity.
The detection of gravity waves occurring as a result of the brushing and merger of two massive black holes could have great practical importance to humanity beyond the art of Mozart or Picasso. An engineering-level understanding of gravity waves could render obsolete current modes of transportation on Earth and in space. A far better understanding of black holes and their effect on the structure of space around them could someday facilitate what even Einstein believed impossible – faster than light travel, and the practical ability for humans to explore and populate the stars. Just two impressive possibilities among the thousands or millions of serendipitous and valuable discoveries that could occur with intense review of these phenomena.
But most valuable of all is the inspiration that finding beauty in the darkness sparks in human beings to take our knowledge to the next level. Congratulations to the LIGO team that recorded this observation: they along with many others who seek to plumb reality in the distant darkness do immensely important work for all humanity.
15
"Anybody old enough to have been aware on 21 July 1969..."
It was 20 July 1969.
It was 20 July 1969.
2
I agree. This could easily be a bigger deal than we can imagine. Also, I was aware on that July evening in 1969, which came about a year after I saw 2001;A Space Odyssey, and I know he disappointment you speak of. I'm still waiting to ride that Pan Am shuttle up to the Howard Jonson space hotel!
Ortrud:
Look it up again. The actual Moon walk didn't occur until 21 July. They were in orbit and on the Moon in the lander on 20 July.
Look it up again. The actual Moon walk didn't occur until 21 July. They were in orbit and on the Moon in the lander on 20 July.
Anyone who has stood by a clear stream, watching the silver flashing of fish moving through but obscured by ripples, and reached in to pull out small oddly shaped, smooth stone to turn over and over again in their fingers, and not wondered about our own silvery flashing in the constantly shifting, shape changing moments of a day, and the coming into our time and space, and leaving, of friends and strangers and family, that person, those people, are asleep to the mystery of being, of existing, the incredible big bang of coming into life, and equally mysterious collapse out of it into the blackness of death and all of the carving out of the landscape that we are by time and the days flowing.
54
Well put!
1
Beautifully put. Thanks for writing this, and thanks NY Times for running it.
36
I'll read this again, at least five times to get it. The photo is stunning.
Bravo bravo bravo. Never stop. It's "such stuff as dreams are made on," except it's real. WOW!!!
2-11-16@9:06 pm
Bravo bravo bravo. Never stop. It's "such stuff as dreams are made on," except it's real. WOW!!!
2-11-16@9:06 pm
41
How could anyone think that this marvelously complex universe just happened by chance? I say that we have an awesome God.
13
an odd comment. it proves nothing about whether or not there is a god.....
3
If God exists, maybe He's the author of the Laws of Physics which came into being in the first tiny nano second after the Big Bang. These laws pretty much put everything on automatic pilot and allowed HIm to go on a long vacation. Not sure He'll ever check back in.
5
Well, by the same god that presumably gave us everything from farts to Ebola.
8
I'm an engineer and physics endlessly fascinates me. Trying to understand the numbers in this article may help wrap my mind around the national debt.
10
And how picayune it is, eh?
1
How ironic that our understanding of the universe is greater than ever before at the same time that we are inundated with pettiness and ignorance.
66
Yet I see generosity and knowledge abounding all around us. I guess it depends upon where you look.
1
ahhh the great dichotomy of the human mind!!!
The ultimate questions about who we are and where we came from and how it all works would have been wonderful to know if we had the time. But it is no secret to scientists that along with the beautiful questions comes the depressing truth: money has become an incurable disease that blinds us to the fact that we are destroying the planet. It blinds us to everything else, and makes it unlikely we will be allowed to use the money in our quest to discover what we truly are.
15
Well said, and thank you Dr. Krauss for giving us a moment of broader perspective on the universe. I'm glad to think about something other than the 2016 presidential race, if only for a few minutes.
34
Between the Time's article "Chirps From Black Hole Colliding Vindicate Einstein" and this present article "Finding Beauty In The Darkness" solidifies my thought that the Cosmos is my Bible and if there is life after death, i can look forward to actually understanding all of this instead of playing a harp on some cloud.
37
Or surf gravitational waves while listening to the Beach Boys.
4
The older I get the more I realize that science is man's greatest gift to himself.
87
@Turgid:
As opposed to religion.
As opposed to religion.
2
Have you ever been to the Metropolitan Opera? I'm an atheist but there are times when I think that proof of god's existence lies at the Met.
Oh to fathom the mind of God and understand what God has in mind, and what role we play. Slowly we learn more of the beauty of Creation.
8
As long as you don't find yourself some grizzly bear's meal, die a horrible painful prolonged torturous death or endure the tragedy of seeing an innocent newborn hopelessly disfigured and crippled by a bad set of genetic cards. Then you can afford to marvel as the "beauty of Creation."
4
The role we play is to destroy our home, without air, water, food, confronted with war, the investigations will cease. Quite depressing.
3
Einstein did not believe in a personal God.
2
I'm very happy for the international collection of scientists and engineers who contributed to this discovery. Listening to a sound representation of the gravity waveform that has travelled over a billion years to reach us is thrilling.... a communication, information, from an unimaginably far distant past and far distant place. And another piece of the universal puzzle drops into place.
15
Great as this discovery is, it does not help us not understand ourselves, because we are not objects. Just as we do not use methods of literary criticism to study physics, discoveries or methods of natural sciences cannot be applied to human phenomena. Different objects require different methods.
6
We are all made of stuff from stars. (Sagan)
1
We are objects. We are part of the universe and we operate by the same laws, and are made up of the same building blocks, as the rest of it. There is no human phenomenon that is immune to scientific inquiry.
2
I like your point, and I agree with the last part. But I don't agree that it doesn't help us understand ourselves. I think it's harder to understand anything with less context, rather than more. Perhaps if we learned something really important, and that thing was also true, we would realize that earlier we had been mistaken. The scientific method. I think much of what we do otherwise just obfuscates - the problems to be studied. There's no such thing as bad information.
1
Some investments of time and money made in scientific endeavors completely fail, while others succeed brilliantly. The astounding insight that research provides humanity pays us back in infinite ways. We all benefit from every last dime and minute spent. The minuscule fraction of our GDP used for scientific, medical, space and engineering research and development should be doubled over the next ten years. Our very soul is nourished by it and our collective future depends on it.
46
We learn from failure as much as from success. (But succeeding does feel better.)
1
" With presidential primaries in full steam"
Do you think the presidential candidates especially the republicans are going to be impressed with any scientific discovery? They all seem to be frozen in biblical times. A large number of major party contenders for political office this year took anti science positions against evolution, human-induced climate change, vaccines, stem cell research, and more. Ben Carson, the Republican candidate said " Religion is needed to interpret science because ‘maybe it’s just propaganda’". Significantly fewer Republicans believe in evolution than did so four years ago, setting them apart from Democrats and independents, according to a recent Pew Research Center study.
Do you think the presidential candidates especially the republicans are going to be impressed with any scientific discovery? They all seem to be frozen in biblical times. A large number of major party contenders for political office this year took anti science positions against evolution, human-induced climate change, vaccines, stem cell research, and more. Ben Carson, the Republican candidate said " Religion is needed to interpret science because ‘maybe it’s just propaganda’". Significantly fewer Republicans believe in evolution than did so four years ago, setting them apart from Democrats and independents, according to a recent Pew Research Center study.
47
["Do you think the presidential candidates especially the republicans are going to be impressed with any scientific discovery? "]
They will, if that person is a billionaire campaign contributor, and if their 'discovery' doesn't upset the applecart of one of their interest-groups (ie evangelicals, nra, neoCONs, & etc)
They will, if that person is a billionaire campaign contributor, and if their 'discovery' doesn't upset the applecart of one of their interest-groups (ie evangelicals, nra, neoCONs, & etc)
1
I'd be more impressed if they figured out how to stop destroying this planet. A better use of resources in general.
7
They're not destroying the planet. Why don't you ask those who are to do so?
8
We are not destroying our planet, we're destroying our habitat, nothing else. Planet Earth has been around way before us and have seen and survived quite worse than humankind. I'd suggest to leave the scientists do their job. The real problem is politicians and their lack of ambitions.
2
We already know how to stop destroying the planet. The answer is stricter regulations on agriculture and air quality an immediate transition to nuclear energy increased research funding for energy storage in the short term and photovoltaics in the long term to facilitate an eventual transition to renewables. The real issue is the political will -- and incidentally these are policies that most scientists, physicists and otherwise, support.
2
Few who admire Mozart and/or Picasso ask what the "use" of this kind of science is. And let it be known that, despite Thorne's advisory role, Krauss thought "Interstellar" was, in his words, "one of the worst movies ever made." But "Interstellar" was lovely, and I don't believe Thorne thought "Hollywood" (Nolan) ruined it.
Isn't it stupefying that here this fellow is talking about quantum optics and whatnot, and yet ISIS is concurrently lopping lads' heads off for failure to adhere to an outlandish doctrine? How unscientific!
But why are physicists always so certain that children wonder about the world more than 80-year-olds? Frankly, I don't see science as the best of humanity. No, that's when we help an elderly lady with her groceries, admire a sunset in Polynesia, hold a lover's hand during a stroll through the park on a blustery September afternoon, spend time at the orphanage, or embrace the recently-widowed.
Or maybe when we drop acid at Zabriskie Point.
When JD Salinger (what of those "new books"?) writes in "The Last and Best of the Peter Pans" of Mary Moriarity's eyes, describing them as eyes that can make the world "seem as spiritually fey as the sight of a child running across a gasoline-streaked road on a rainy day," that's the best of us.
Science will make us humble, but I doubt it'll make us better people. And as much as I want to see the scientific worldview dominate, as much as the monotheisms annoy me, today the humanities are more missed.
Isn't it stupefying that here this fellow is talking about quantum optics and whatnot, and yet ISIS is concurrently lopping lads' heads off for failure to adhere to an outlandish doctrine? How unscientific!
But why are physicists always so certain that children wonder about the world more than 80-year-olds? Frankly, I don't see science as the best of humanity. No, that's when we help an elderly lady with her groceries, admire a sunset in Polynesia, hold a lover's hand during a stroll through the park on a blustery September afternoon, spend time at the orphanage, or embrace the recently-widowed.
Or maybe when we drop acid at Zabriskie Point.
When JD Salinger (what of those "new books"?) writes in "The Last and Best of the Peter Pans" of Mary Moriarity's eyes, describing them as eyes that can make the world "seem as spiritually fey as the sight of a child running across a gasoline-streaked road on a rainy day," that's the best of us.
Science will make us humble, but I doubt it'll make us better people. And as much as I want to see the scientific worldview dominate, as much as the monotheisms annoy me, today the humanities are more missed.
15
Fortunately, it doesn't have to be one or the other. The fact is that some of the best scientists are also deeply well read and literary, are musicians, or are artists: these are the great scientists who are also able to communicate science to the rest of us, like Dr. Krauss. Likewise, some of the great authors are (or were) themselves great scientists or have had a life long interest in science.
Finally, some of the greatest scientists also give generously, and sometimes anonymously, to efforts beyond their vocation that serve humanity in one way or another.
Finally, some of the greatest scientists also give generously, and sometimes anonymously, to efforts beyond their vocation that serve humanity in one way or another.
1
But the "queen of the humanities" is philosophy -- and the king of philosophy is science!
Yes, the link between scientific discovery -- the origins of the universe -- to all of creativity, be it painting, poetry, music, literature, sculpture -- begins with humankind's "persistent curiosity and ingenuity." My most thrilling academic experience came after a full legal career that segued into a study of theology in an Episcopal Seminary. The Systematics course was amply peppered with second career people like me, but who were physicists. Breathtaking discussions about the immutable laws of the universe, and the meaning of the ordered universe for humankind set me upon higher planes that made pedestrian any questions of religious doctrine. This latest discovery sets me longing for another term with my theological physicist colleagues.
9
It's great, it's amazing, I don't really understand it. But....
How can it be assumed that the triangulation on earth (between Louisiana & Washington devices) remained absolutely constant? Aren't there earthquakes & tectonic activity all the time?
How can it be assumed that the triangulation on earth (between Louisiana & Washington devices) remained absolutely constant? Aren't there earthquakes & tectonic activity all the time?
3
As I understand it the two facilities are independent and intended to provide confirmation of an event by separate detection. They are not parts of a single apparatus that need to remain in perfect spatial alignment.
9
If you read the article, they explain how they compensate for or take into account such things.
3
I believe these are two separate devices; one in WA and one in MA.
3
I'd rather see money spent on this rather than on instruments of war.
73
"I'd rather see money spent on this rather than on instruments of war."
Give the guys in the Pentagon some time. They'll come up with a military application for this. Maybe something called GWZ, the Gravity Wave Zapper. Useful for exterminating alien life.
Give the guys in the Pentagon some time. They'll come up with a military application for this. Maybe something called GWZ, the Gravity Wave Zapper. Useful for exterminating alien life.
8
Not going to happen. A human mental shortcoming paired with greed.
Or wiping out Klingons from Uranus.
Does the photo have anything to do with the article or the discovery and, if so, what does it tell us?
2
I love this column. In college, my senior year I wrote an article for the school paper. I was an art major, and a musician, but had considered a science major and have a deep abiding love and fascination with science since childhood. I feel that science at the highest levels is all about creativity, and is very aligned with the arts in that respect. A physics professor at the school who I had never met or had a class with told me he was moved by this small article I wrote. Which made my day more than words can express.
By which I mean to say, knowledge, beauty and truth, for their own sake, are beyond valuable. It is perhaps these things that are the core of what makes us human. There isn't a need for this knowledge perse, not at first. At first, it is an end unto itself. Later, the application becomes real, the improved toaster or faster car. That comes later. First the pure creative inspiration of high science, high art, you name it. This spirit has driven all human growth.
By which I mean to say, knowledge, beauty and truth, for their own sake, are beyond valuable. It is perhaps these things that are the core of what makes us human. There isn't a need for this knowledge perse, not at first. At first, it is an end unto itself. Later, the application becomes real, the improved toaster or faster car. That comes later. First the pure creative inspiration of high science, high art, you name it. This spirit has driven all human growth.
30
The capacity to know, the ability to behold beauty and the innate ability to be receptive to Truth ! Your comment made me feel awesome. For a change, being human and conscious of the fact is something we can and should all be exceedingly thankful for.
Much respect.
Much respect.
1
My heart was lifted up by Leonard Krauss' paean to the accomplishments of the human mind.
Then, as I got to the end of his piece, I say, down on the left, a link to a story about how SCOTUS, by a 5-4 vote, looks to be on the verge of trying to squash even the modest efforts which the Obama Administration is trying to put in place to slow down man's contribution to climate change.
Climate change: just another piece of science, just like evolution!
I wonder if Senator James Inhofe, and other Republicans, will read this Op-ed and move to cut off funds for LIGO because it's just based on science, and in a budget proposed by President Obama?
None of this is Leonard Krauss's fault, of course.
Then, as I got to the end of his piece, I say, down on the left, a link to a story about how SCOTUS, by a 5-4 vote, looks to be on the verge of trying to squash even the modest efforts which the Obama Administration is trying to put in place to slow down man's contribution to climate change.
Climate change: just another piece of science, just like evolution!
I wonder if Senator James Inhofe, and other Republicans, will read this Op-ed and move to cut off funds for LIGO because it's just based on science, and in a budget proposed by President Obama?
None of this is Leonard Krauss's fault, of course.
59
@arbritrot,
Staggering isn't it? The height of enlightenment on one side and the abyss of willful ignorance on the other.
2-11-16@11:33 pm
Staggering isn't it? The height of enlightenment on one side and the abyss of willful ignorance on the other.
2-11-16@11:33 pm
4
Oh, please don't misunderstand my comment!!! I love science; in fact, it has saved my life, and the lives of my wife and our oldest son. And with anti-vaxxers endangering us all and the climate science deniers America has in Congress, good science and good science education matter. Science is a magnificent and beautiful expression of the best parts of what it is to be human, and it helps drive away the darkness. But I do sometimes wonder about "big science". About half the planet doesn't have enough to eat, people on First Nations reserves in Canada live in third world conditions, and there never seems to be enough money for health care and education. Perhaps is some of this money and brilliance and passion were redirected...?
2
"If some of this money ...were redirected" it would be a classic case of throwing good money after bad. It wouldn't change for the better the deep-rooted conditioning of the perennial down-and-outers, nor would it plant in their psyches the motivation to bootstrap themselves out of their predicament. They'd grab the money and run to the nearest liquor store or phone their dealer to load up on crystal met or smack or whatnot. Natural selection has set apart the good bets from the bad ones and smart money would be stupid [it'd cease to be smart money] if it were to go against the grain and blow scarce resources on losing propositions 'a priori et a fortiori'.
1
@James West: GPS also has its roots in experimental tests of general relativity. The system was actually created as a--gasp!--US military project. Yet today aid groups use it to deliver food and medical supplies to needy people in remote regions, and scientists use it to monitor areas threatened climate change. Don't assume that just because something is "pure" or "basic" science that it will never benefit all of humanity.
1
Redirected? There isn't enough money going to the sciences now as it is. You're talking about a comparatively miniscule amount. Take 10 or 20% of the U.S. military budget instead and redirect that, including a sizable chunk to NASA, then tell NASA "Go crazy, folks."
1
Your article states clearly the massive complexities that make up the universe and the complex process to unravel and understand more of its way of being in existence, more cause and effect. There is a philosopher that writes there are two ways to look at the formation of our universe. The first is ""oops" suggesting it is a random process, the universe just appears, there is nothing behind it, it is all accidental, it just is, it just happens." "The other broad answer that has been tendered is that something else is going on here: behind the happenstance drama is a deeper or higher or wider pattern, or order, or intelligence. " Ken Wilber. Take your pick.
2
Many of new frontiers of science seem to deal with very subtle, difficult to replicate phenomena, that require decades to detect even one time, and very expensive manpower and equipment. There must be tremendous pressure to justify these (often public) investments. Additionally, the voracious 24 hour media adds pressure by hyping any sign of discovery as a proven groundbreaking front-page worthy headline. I think we have created a situation where we are pushing scientists to frame things too quickly as conclusive groundbreaking discoveries before the long, tedious, boring replication and peer review process - and therefore risking fraud, hyperbole, and error.
2
This discovery has been peer reviewed (appeared in the Physical Review Letters this morning) and replicated (the exact same signal was detected concurrently in Hanford and Livingston).
1
Both instances (Hanford and Livingston) were detecting the same instance/phenomena (they were a few milliseconds apart. That's a weak example of replication. Is it possible that there was an alternative radiating phenomenon causing the signal? Both detectors were on the same base (earth). Is it possible that there was a geological/or other vibration at a perfect frequency (one time in countless opportunities) that overcame the defenses? A strong statement about a very subtle phenomenon should have very strong replication in more than one instance to be verified as a discovery. According to the article we are measuring something the equivalent of a hairsbreadth from here to a star. Of course the safeguard is the fact that there are zero odds of the other station having the exact same error at the same time, but that still leaves the possibility of an alternative phenomenon causing the measurement discrepancy.
1
Einstein had only pencil and paper - no computers, super colliders or VLA. What insight !!
48
That's why he achieved the monumental gift to us all: He soared with thought experiments rather than with number crunching computers. Of course his genius is ineffable.
1
Pellucid explanation of one of the most complicated aspect of physics. Your correlation with why these experiments will encourage others to conduct further research.
4
Incidentally, while I endorse - entirely - the notion Mr. Krauss espouses about the human / cultural benefits to humanity of such knowledge (I do!)...
...The naysayers should be told that such a deep understanding of physics will result in better single-shooter video games (ugh!)...
But also in safer cars, and probably more energy with less damage to civilization, etc.
I appreciate Mr. Krauss' probity in no holding out such pie-in-the-sky notions, but so many of us know that major scientific breakthroughs lead to day-to-day technological advances, too.
Indeed, the science that revealed this will find its way to us all... Of this I have no doubt.
Great article!
Great advance ("One small step... One huge step...?")
...The naysayers should be told that such a deep understanding of physics will result in better single-shooter video games (ugh!)...
But also in safer cars, and probably more energy with less damage to civilization, etc.
I appreciate Mr. Krauss' probity in no holding out such pie-in-the-sky notions, but so many of us know that major scientific breakthroughs lead to day-to-day technological advances, too.
Indeed, the science that revealed this will find its way to us all... Of this I have no doubt.
Great article!
Great advance ("One small step... One huge step...?")
5
This is a fantastic result of bold, extraordinary science. Today, we have evidence in support of a prediction arising from Einstein's general theory of relativity. What wonderful news. It took a century to develop the technological means to test the prediction but we got there. Despite the epidemic of madness raging in the world today, humans may yet deserve the species epithet of "sapiens."
106
The money spent on the Hubble telescope was some of the best money spent by our government in the last 40 years. The technology used to develop sensors and machinery like this is absolutely amazing and trickles down to other markets. The development of the original integrated circuits were done for the NASA moon programs and many other things you use every day, like velcro?
And they do it on a shoestring budget, with the military consuming 600 billion per year and thats just the budget much more is owed on prior military expenses carried forward in treasury bonds. There isn't much left for actual science.
I am glad the science community has the backbone to push hard enough to get funding for projects like LIGO.
Just so we can wonder what else we don't know.
And they do it on a shoestring budget, with the military consuming 600 billion per year and thats just the budget much more is owed on prior military expenses carried forward in treasury bonds. There isn't much left for actual science.
I am glad the science community has the backbone to push hard enough to get funding for projects like LIGO.
Just so we can wonder what else we don't know.
12
Of course, any tax payer can ask question where the money spent?
But at the same time I am a taxpayer too, I want this to be happen, I want this to be spent on this scientific feat.
Still the cost of building LIGO which is 1.1 billion USD is a dwarf when it comes to one single aircraft carrier which is more than 5 billion USD
Secondly, This is a scientific progress, you cannot stop and wait till rest of the technology and civilization catch up with you.
Today , we are way ahead in terms of theoretical scientific level than applied science. This gap is naturally in some areas are almost impossible to close.
This story rekindled with renaissance and will not stop for anybody.
Scientific curiosity is the only way to enjoy this life and be aware of the reality at least for who respects and understands it.
But at the same time I am a taxpayer too, I want this to be happen, I want this to be spent on this scientific feat.
Still the cost of building LIGO which is 1.1 billion USD is a dwarf when it comes to one single aircraft carrier which is more than 5 billion USD
Secondly, This is a scientific progress, you cannot stop and wait till rest of the technology and civilization catch up with you.
Today , we are way ahead in terms of theoretical scientific level than applied science. This gap is naturally in some areas are almost impossible to close.
This story rekindled with renaissance and will not stop for anybody.
Scientific curiosity is the only way to enjoy this life and be aware of the reality at least for who respects and understands it.
9
America is really in trouble when you need a NYT editorial to justify scientific discovery. Our government spends over a trillion dollars on a single high-tech whizz-bang defense program like the F-35, and the public barely noticed. But it seems every time NYT covers some scientific discovery, there are a bunch of people asking "why do we need to learn about THAT? Why did we spend money to learn THAT?"
Besides that many technological marvels came from scientific discoveries that seemingly had no practical applications at the time, let us consider who in America will be left to build the high-tech whizz-bang of the future if we continue with this culture of anti-intellectualism? Let us recall many of the scientists on the Manhatten Project were precisely the sort of physicists who studied things that made people ask, "why do we need to know about THAT?"
Besides that many technological marvels came from scientific discoveries that seemingly had no practical applications at the time, let us consider who in America will be left to build the high-tech whizz-bang of the future if we continue with this culture of anti-intellectualism? Let us recall many of the scientists on the Manhatten Project were precisely the sort of physicists who studied things that made people ask, "why do we need to know about THAT?"
230
Science has driven man not only to build exquisitely sensitive measuring instruments and to mentally explore the furthest reaches of the mathematical realm, it has also challenged us to develop testable theories which unite the two. And I love that about science along with the "faster cars and better toasters" which it makes possible.
What I worry about nowadays in science, though, is when the math becomes unhinged from the measurement. As this news breaks, I am currently reading Max Tegmark's "The Mathematical Universe" where he argues that math doesn't just help explain reality, math, or more precisely "mathematical structures," ARE reality.
Other than being a voracious reader of science, especially the science at the outer limits of our understanding, I make no claim of expertise. But as even many physicists now complain about string theory, Tegmark's theory seems over-the-top speculative beholden only to the beauty of the equations and mathematical logic rather than to any relationship to testable predictions. Now, I'd have no problem with rampant speculation if certain physicists (like Tegmark AND Krauss) weren't so ready to use their science creds to expound on what are necessarily META-physical questions or if so many non-specialists weren't so ready to defer to scientists as if they were the new priests. But that's not the case.
Other than that note of caution, I celebrate with all others human ingenuity at its finest.
What I worry about nowadays in science, though, is when the math becomes unhinged from the measurement. As this news breaks, I am currently reading Max Tegmark's "The Mathematical Universe" where he argues that math doesn't just help explain reality, math, or more precisely "mathematical structures," ARE reality.
Other than being a voracious reader of science, especially the science at the outer limits of our understanding, I make no claim of expertise. But as even many physicists now complain about string theory, Tegmark's theory seems over-the-top speculative beholden only to the beauty of the equations and mathematical logic rather than to any relationship to testable predictions. Now, I'd have no problem with rampant speculation if certain physicists (like Tegmark AND Krauss) weren't so ready to use their science creds to expound on what are necessarily META-physical questions or if so many non-specialists weren't so ready to defer to scientists as if they were the new priests. But that's not the case.
Other than that note of caution, I celebrate with all others human ingenuity at its finest.
2
Good heavens! Given that 'metaphysics' is essentially 'speculation', do only 'priests' have "authority" to speculate?! When Krauss (or Einstein!) speculates, he does so with full understanding that his speculation will be rejected if it doesn't pass experimental tests.
3
This famous Zen haiku was composed by Matsuo Basho over four hundred years ago in Japan. Some consider it the best haiku of all time.
The old pond,
A frog jumps in:
Plop!
(translation by Alan Watts)
Here's another translation, using the haiku's traditional 5-7-5 syllabic construction:
ancient is the pond--
suddenly a frog leaps--now!
the water echoes
(translation by Tim Chilcott)
What would Basho write today about the LIGO observation? Here's my attempt. (Others' haikus welcomed...)
Two black holes collide
a billion light years away--
Gravity waves peal.
The old pond,
A frog jumps in:
Plop!
(translation by Alan Watts)
Here's another translation, using the haiku's traditional 5-7-5 syllabic construction:
ancient is the pond--
suddenly a frog leaps--now!
the water echoes
(translation by Tim Chilcott)
What would Basho write today about the LIGO observation? Here's my attempt. (Others' haikus welcomed...)
Two black holes collide
a billion light years away--
Gravity waves peal.
7
still empty eon,
suddenly something - big bang:
empty awareness.
suddenly something - big bang:
empty awareness.
1
Greatest collisions
Unfathomable distance
Tiniest ripples
Unfathomable distance
Tiniest ripples
3
". . . if history is any guide, every time we have built new eyes to observe the universe, our understanding of ourselves and our place in it has been forever altered. "
ah. So,
is that why the world is continually becoming a better place to live
for all of us down here on earth?
Is this understanding ourselves
a way of accounting for the lucid political examination of issues that's going on in the present moment?
well, does understanding ourselves contribute a lot to making our local world a better place for ALL of us?
hmmm.
just sayin'
(i ain't blaming the rationalists or the scientists, either!)
ah. So,
is that why the world is continually becoming a better place to live
for all of us down here on earth?
Is this understanding ourselves
a way of accounting for the lucid political examination of issues that's going on in the present moment?
well, does understanding ourselves contribute a lot to making our local world a better place for ALL of us?
hmmm.
just sayin'
(i ain't blaming the rationalists or the scientists, either!)
Wait for the GOP either to deny or to ban gravity waves... They clearly trample all over people's right to believe the earth is 4,000 years old. Somewhere out there is a florist or a baker who is going to be forced to sell flowers or bake a cake for these scientists...
2
When asked if ripples in the space-time continuum exist, Sen. Marco Rubio reportedly replied, "I don't know. I'm not a theoretical astrophysicist."
I also heard that Florida Governor Rick Scott is rehearsing the same response should the question come up, and learning how to pronounce the big words.
I also heard that Florida Governor Rick Scott is rehearsing the same response should the question come up, and learning how to pronounce the big words.
3
Folks, We are puny. We are totally fragile.
"Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity."
We need to live realistically by insuring that no one on earth suffers.
My god, if our planet stops spinning, we and everything on it will just "fly" off it into oblivion.
"Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities! All is vanity."
We need to live realistically by insuring that no one on earth suffers.
My god, if our planet stops spinning, we and everything on it will just "fly" off it into oblivion.
Could this newly discovered understanding of gravity lead us one step closer to interstellar travel? What befuddles and enrages me is that far too many people could care less about scientific achievements such as this. Science gives me some hope for our continued survival as a species, even if we don't deserve it.
2
It's amazing that something so far away and so long ago can produce an effect here. It's also fascinating the difference in time scales involved. Billions of years, then a fraction of a second. Such an exquisite instrument.
2
Lawrence is inspiring, as always. Great article.
Today I feel proud of being human.
Today I feel proud of being human.
2
"One was about 36 times the mass of our sun, the other, 29 times that mass."
I think these values are way too small. Otherwise a great article!
I think these values are way too small. Otherwise a great article!
A beautiful article, so filled with an obvious pride in accomplishment (although I see and appreciate Ralph's comment).
But things like this, like Mozart, Picasso; Shakespeare, Dante, Gauss.
Quantum Mechanics, Dark Matter, Antimatter. Things that belong so strongly to the intellect are simply not meat for everyone. Perhaps not for most.
Good and educated men and women, Harvard grad to skilled mechanic, have jobs to tend to, families to care and worry about. This year: serious political issues to ponder and act upon.
There is little question in my aged (86) mind that the advances of the kind reported here absolutely make a difference for Humankind. I just assert, in my opinion, that much of Humankind really doesn't know and really doesn't care.
Naf NavyVet; retrd Math type
But things like this, like Mozart, Picasso; Shakespeare, Dante, Gauss.
Quantum Mechanics, Dark Matter, Antimatter. Things that belong so strongly to the intellect are simply not meat for everyone. Perhaps not for most.
Good and educated men and women, Harvard grad to skilled mechanic, have jobs to tend to, families to care and worry about. This year: serious political issues to ponder and act upon.
There is little question in my aged (86) mind that the advances of the kind reported here absolutely make a difference for Humankind. I just assert, in my opinion, that much of Humankind really doesn't know and really doesn't care.
Naf NavyVet; retrd Math type
2
Beautiful article about enormous discovery. Being myself a scientist I couldn't have put it more beautifully why science is so important to us humans. We want to know what is unknown and marvel on things that we discover.
2
I had to read this article a few times. It will still take some time for all this to actually 'sink in.' It's amazing. Let the haters hate. They have always been there. They are the bulk of humanity--sitting in Plato's cave, refusing to see their own shadows, much less the outside world. I'm so grateful that in this age of distraction, we still have human beings who are curious, brilliant, and disciplined enough to take on such a project. This article, and the information it contains, gives me hope.
2
If we could one day produce artificial gravitational waves, then we would have the ability to alter space and time and accomplish truly unimaginable and endless feats. We would become gods (God forbid!)
For now, I do accept Einstein's theory that gravitational waves exist. However, I highly doubt experiments on earth can be sensitive enough to detect them, notwithstanding today's publication.
For now, I do accept Einstein's theory that gravitational waves exist. However, I highly doubt experiments on earth can be sensitive enough to detect them, notwithstanding today's publication.
1
We no longer need to "detect" them with earth-based experiments. We build earth-based (and space-based) detectors to detect phenomena created by natural events that we do not have the ability to create.
1
Indeed. It is appropriate to balance the immensity of this discovery with the utter banality of the current Presidential primary campaign, which is so full of sound and fury. Einstein's theory, and today's announcement does indeed signify "something," while the politics of the day fall into the "nothing" category.
1
Thank you, Mr. Krauss for this wonderful article
"Science, like art, music and literature, has the capacity to amaze and excite, dazzle and bewilder".
What a wonderful observation. On only has to listen to fugues and other works by J.S. Bach to understand the math that is involved in these works.
Pythagoras was actually the first mathematician who pointed out the strong relationship between math and music.
"Science, like art, music and literature, has the capacity to amaze and excite, dazzle and bewilder".
What a wonderful observation. On only has to listen to fugues and other works by J.S. Bach to understand the math that is involved in these works.
Pythagoras was actually the first mathematician who pointed out the strong relationship between math and music.
3
What a magnificent accomplishment ! I am as excited about this as I am the flyby of Pluto with its stunning images and the scenes of joy from the scientists and engineers who worked for decades to make this happen.
Unfortunately much of our nation will not care or notice these things, transfixed as they are by trying to elect a hate-filled, xenophobic bully/coward to the highest office in our country. What has happened to the America of boundless enthusiasm that was crowned by the Civil Rights Act and landing a man on the moon?
Unfortunately much of our nation will not care or notice these things, transfixed as they are by trying to elect a hate-filled, xenophobic bully/coward to the highest office in our country. What has happened to the America of boundless enthusiasm that was crowned by the Civil Rights Act and landing a man on the moon?
2
I share the sense of pride and wonder in this scientific accomplishment. But when it comes to the question of "what use is this?", there is one very large difference between astronomy and art or music. The National Science Foundation invested $1.1 billion in the LIGO experiment, whereas the U.S. Government spends virtually no money for the creation of paintings or musical compositions. This is not a reason to defund science but to give equal recognition to the arts and humanities.
3
I appreciate your sentiment, but consider some details. For one, "the U.S. Government" has no money: all money belongs to the people. Then, think of details of funding different enterprises. For example, I and many others would be able and more than willing to pay triple the usual admission price to hear a new violin concerto by Tchaikovsky, but which of us would be able to pay a thousand scientists to work for a decade to "hear" two Black Holes colliding? Yet, we can do fund such scientific enterprises if we pool our resources (provided that our money is competently distributed by an agency such as the NSF).
Some might argue it is a way, if not the best way, to fing God. If one needs such a construction; I don't, unashamedly reveling in the pure beauty and chaos and coincidence that is our cosmos.
Wonderful story, lucidly explained for laypeople. I'd like to know how the LIGO people know (or why they think) that the gravitational waves they have detected originate from the particular black hole collision they have designated.
Thank you Dr. Krauss for this very informative article. Of course, like all great discoveries, this one generates more questions. For example: does it prove existence of graviton? are we closer to detect a graviton? does it change our understanding of current physical model of particles?
It shocks me how little we know of the "known" universe, and how little so many of us want to know. We live our lives surrounded by myth and religion speculation and extrapolation; fear. Is there another race of intelligent life out there? Is there any anywhere in this universe?
1
Quite a triumph of the human intellect!
And BTW - I believe that the radio waves observed by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson of Bell Laboratories were not emitted by celestial objects. The scientists concluded quickly that their origin was beyond our galaxy. Eventually this cosmic background radiation was understood to be a remnant of the big bang. They did not discover the big bang. They discovered evidence to support that the big bang model was the correct cosmological model - not the steady state model.
And BTW - I believe that the radio waves observed by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson of Bell Laboratories were not emitted by celestial objects. The scientists concluded quickly that their origin was beyond our galaxy. Eventually this cosmic background radiation was understood to be a remnant of the big bang. They did not discover the big bang. They discovered evidence to support that the big bang model was the correct cosmological model - not the steady state model.
1
Paul, you apparently misunderstand the word 'celestial': it doesn't refer just to our galaxy. As for "they did not discover the big bang", you should cut Krauss some slack: he's simplifying for a general audience. In addition, you might want to congratulate him for his great essay: I certainly do!
1
God has given humans wonderful brains so that they can learn such astonishing aspects of the universe and be constantly amazed by creation. We should be all the more respectful of creation and want to learn more about our place in it.
1
I agree that some people have "wonderful brains" and I do hope that you "learn more about [your] place" and be "more respectful of creation".
And yet throughout the universe we've yet to find a single thing that actually requires a god to explain it.
1
Science and religion are incompatible. I say that there is no God and no Santa Claus. You say there is no Santa Claus. What is the difference?
1
Totally amazing, and beautiful. The discoveries of the past few decades, from Einstein to Hubble to Higgs and beyond, are thrilling. As Dr. Krauss correctly observes, there is enormous beauty in all of this.
That said, trying to comprehend the astonishing scale of space and time is like inviting a mental hernia...
I remember a lecture by John Dobson years ago, an amateur astronomer, who left me with a thought about the Big Bang which I still cannot put out of my mind. The man was more of a philosopher than a scientist, although he had a degree in chemistry. He rebelled against the current theories around the Big Bang, saying that the Big Bang presupposes change (from nothing to something), and therefore time had to already exist for it to be triggered.
I know even less physics than Mr. Dobson, but I suspect that there are countless people out there with similarly interesting questions. Perhaps we could encourage Dr. Krauss, Dr. Kaku, Dr. Thorpe, and many other brilliant minds out there on the Science Channel to solicit questions from their audience, and then select the best ones to answer in a Q & A segment.
Very few people realize how much this type of basic scientific investigation has already contributed to society, from medical equipment to computers, even GPS. Science at this level is totally thrilling, inspiring, and constructive. It needs to be more supported and encouraged.
That said, trying to comprehend the astonishing scale of space and time is like inviting a mental hernia...
I remember a lecture by John Dobson years ago, an amateur astronomer, who left me with a thought about the Big Bang which I still cannot put out of my mind. The man was more of a philosopher than a scientist, although he had a degree in chemistry. He rebelled against the current theories around the Big Bang, saying that the Big Bang presupposes change (from nothing to something), and therefore time had to already exist for it to be triggered.
I know even less physics than Mr. Dobson, but I suspect that there are countless people out there with similarly interesting questions. Perhaps we could encourage Dr. Krauss, Dr. Kaku, Dr. Thorpe, and many other brilliant minds out there on the Science Channel to solicit questions from their audience, and then select the best ones to answer in a Q & A segment.
Very few people realize how much this type of basic scientific investigation has already contributed to society, from medical equipment to computers, even GPS. Science at this level is totally thrilling, inspiring, and constructive. It needs to be more supported and encouraged.
I'm sorry, but your Mr. Dobson had it wrong: the currently accepted model is that time started with inflation (aka "the Big Bang"). For an excellent description, see Dr. Krauss's book "A Universe from Nothing" (referenced in the footnote to his essay).
1
This makes me feel good being human. With science and open minds we can do anything.
2
If one's living room expands, so does the ruler with which one measures it.
Why isn't that the case with this experiment? The speed of light isn't effected by the gravity waves?
Why isn't that the case with this experiment? The speed of light isn't effected by the gravity waves?
Indeed, speed of light and the distance it travels in a second is a constant in all reference frames and is unaffected by space-time contortions.
3
This is all great entertainment for those who have food on their table. But it is appropriate to note that a Picasso or Mozart symphony cost the public nothing. Science costs the public a lot! So a fair question is not whether science is fascinating (even if in this case it is 'merely' confirmatory of a theory already very well established), but what is its worth in human terms, in the real terms of how resources are distributed.
If, besides the excitement and news media flourish, and the inevitable lobbying for more funding, this is to be evaluated in overall human terms, it should be related to those who have little not just the interests of those (like me and most readers of the Times) who are otherwise comfortable. That is where the politics of science and its support should be discussed, not in the Gee-Whiz! of the media.
These sentiments do not in any way diminish the mind-stretching ideas that General Relativity requires and inspires us to struggle to grasp.
If, besides the excitement and news media flourish, and the inevitable lobbying for more funding, this is to be evaluated in overall human terms, it should be related to those who have little not just the interests of those (like me and most readers of the Times) who are otherwise comfortable. That is where the politics of science and its support should be discussed, not in the Gee-Whiz! of the media.
These sentiments do not in any way diminish the mind-stretching ideas that General Relativity requires and inspires us to struggle to grasp.
1
I am not smart enough to understand this stuff but the fact, among others, that a light year 5.8 trillion miles x a billion light years is beyond comprehension.
5
At the end of one of my college physics classes, the professor read Whitman's "Learn'd Astronomer" poem, in which the supposed dullness of scientific astronomy is contrasted with the quiet beauty of stars. He put down the poem, and said: "Let me tell you what I see, when I look up at the stars," and proceeded to describe stellar nurseries, dancing black holes, and the mysteries of the cosmos in terms that could make a poet weep.
Indeed, there is beauty in the darkness.
And to Prof. Devlin, wherever you are, thank you. I haven't forgotten.
Indeed, there is beauty in the darkness.
And to Prof. Devlin, wherever you are, thank you. I haven't forgotten.
6
This is very exciting stuff. I'm hoping that further experiments will confirm the existence of gravitational waves generated from the birth of our Universe and thus help confirm the Inflationary Theory that accompanied the Big Bang..
1
Great article...and it's true... ANY findings in the world of physics is beautiful and can help us understand the universe, and where we stand in the big picture.
It's unfortunate that, as the author states, "too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters."
Probably even the world's greatest physicist wouldn't know how to respond to them. He did after all say: " Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former!"
It's unfortunate that, as the author states, "too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters."
Probably even the world's greatest physicist wouldn't know how to respond to them. He did after all say: " Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former!"
4
Thank you for the intelligible and fascinating explanation of the discovery! Truly wonderful indeed, and I'm hugely impressed at the ingenuity of the experimental design. I would also like to know, however, whether this discovery does anything to change the way scientists will calculate other observable phenomena; I understand that the impact of the waves is so minuscule that it won't affect the way we calculate, for instance, the trajectory of a thrown baseball, but are there any other sorts of contexts apart from the cosmically massive where these waves will need to be taken into account in order to get the math right?
Thank you for this extraordinary explanation! I knew this was a big deal but I could not grasp it until this beautifully clear prose illuminated it. Congratulations to all involved. WOW.
3
Great to witness these hystorical discoveries...really exciting!
2
Perhaps the scientists should have waited for others to reproduce the finding before making the announcement. The vanishingly small measurements that were necessary suggest errors are highly likely.
1
Saying that they "never" would be seen is a large stretch. Never is a very long time. Now if we find a way to control gravity that would be a very big deal. Nobody has ever proven Einstein incorrect and it would be a very surprising thing to see that. Confirmation was expected. As we see real science backed by objective evidence as opposed to Climate Guessing which has little objective evidence to support the idea that CO2 is very dangerous and needs to be controlled at massive costs.
1
A number of decades ago Kip Thorne wrote an article for Scientific American where he explained that space wasn't expanding out into a void, but space ITSELF was expanding. It was a revelation to me and the first time I and laymen like me may have been in awe of the implications of Einstein's discoveries. I hope Dr. Thorne shares in the Nobel prize for this verification of Einstein's theory.
2
I will not believe this until Sheldon verifies it.
4
I gave up trying to write symphonies, painting, and understanding quantum physics a long time ago. Yet as the author suggests, just hearing, seeing and wondering about those things makes life worth living. And that is not the end of it.
156
No visible end to it. Wish I could be alive 50 or a hundred years from now.
What is not clear is how they attributed this blip to a specific black-hole event.
Similar to detecting a sound wave: How do you know its source?
Similar to detecting a sound wave: How do you know its source?
This is proof that America is great today , these scientific discoveries and your great universities ,your great hospitals ,your businesses and your democratic form of government . So Mister Trump , you will not make America great again because she is already great .You will only diminish her with your ignorance and your hate .
7
@Bernardo Izaguirre MD,
What you've said cannot be emphasized enough and I can't thank you enough.
2-11-16@9:01 pm
What you've said cannot be emphasized enough and I can't thank you enough.
2-11-16@9:01 pm
1
Q: Did the detection of the gravitational waves indicate the two black holes and their merger or were the scientists aware of those particular black holes before the experiment?
Scientists were not aware of those particular black holes before the experiment. The particular gravitational wave signature, frequency and duration observed in the detectors is exactly what numerical simulations of the equations of general relativity predict for two black holes falling into each other. Hence, the confidence in the result. The event was strong enough to be registered by the detectors for a mere 0.2 sec after the waves made a journey of 1.4 billion years! We only know a rough spot in the sky where the gravitational waves originated from. It is even possible the merged black hole no longer exists, possibly having merged with another black hole since then.
3
I cannot claim to be a great appreciator of high art like classical music, opera, poetry, painting, and sculpture. But I have occasionally felt quite thrilled and moved by some encounter with art. I can certainly appreciate why art is so meaningful to many people and so enriches their lives. For many of us, science is similar. It is absolutely thrilling to learn about today's news of gravity waves. I've been reading everything I can about it. I marvel at the virtuosity of the scientists the way one might marvel at the virtuosity of a great musician. A visit to a great observatory for me would be like a visit to the Louvre for an art fan. Some may look askance at me the way the uninitiated might regard an opera fan. But there are many of us for whom science can be a thrilling and even transcendent experience.
192
"But there are many of us for whom science can be a thrilling and even transcendent experience. ".....A thousand times yes. But being thrilled by science does not exclude being thrilled by music, art, a beautiful bird, or forest. The real joy is being able to know them all.
1
I'm a painter. And science is one of the greatest things since sliced bread topped with butter and cherry jam.
2
"...political displays we have been treated to over the past weeks may reflect some of the worst about what it means to be human…" Since you've begun your fine opinion piece with this dismal reflection on today's politics, let me remind you that Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio "aren't scientists," and therefore they cannot relate to this stuff. They never reflect on "the qualities that we should most celebrate about being human." They instead robo-recite their talking points gathered not from science chambers but from Fox News echo chambers. So they leave science to others…as they hurtle on to the next primary victory in hopes that they may govern us, in all their ignorant wisdom.
15
Wow! Let's take a step back and see what the wonders of science
are offering us instead of the latest politician's gaff. This is the truly important stuff.
are offering us instead of the latest politician's gaff. This is the truly important stuff.
143
@Rocky yard,
Well said.
2-11-16@8:52 pm
Well said.
2-11-16@8:52 pm
There is enough politics to brain wash peoples' minds. Wonders of science is much more important than watching conservative people ad liberal people participate in a name calling contest and try their best to insult each other. Yawn.
The way I interpret this is that there really is a butterfly effect and this just reiterates my feeling that everything and everyone is connected is some way.
5
@babywatson,
Absolutely. We really are all in this together, literally.
2-11-16@8:50 pm
Absolutely. We really are all in this together, literally.
2-11-16@8:50 pm
A very nice essay about an amazing accomplishment in experimental physics. Why care in a world where we still have very mundane issues and serious unsolved problems of humanity? Because great accomplishments in humanity can't wait until all of those mundane issues and unsolved problems are resolved. That's why.
2
True religion.
Science and religion are incompatible. Science relies on falsifiability; religion on faith. Given your nom de plumbe, I'm hardly surprised by your response.
2
"Too often people ask, what’s the use of science like this, if it doesn’t produce faster cars or better toasters" why? Your answer is good, but I would have said that most often useful practical tools are discovered by serendipity. The world wide web was invented at CERN; Google, Amazon, and Facebook are just exploiting the invention of scientists who possibly still find photo sharing waste of time. The Genera Theory of Relativity is now used in GPS communication, and some of the technology used in hand held devices today was discovered during research on Black Holes.
5
Overwhelming news!
1
I was tempted to read another column about the recent Primary or some other political junkie script, but shifted to realize the enormity of this profound discovery & clicked here instead. This work is simply AMAZING. Will have to read this lay version three more times to even half a partial grasp on what this all means. And, then dream tonight the astounding genius of Einstein to simply think this up a hundred years ago. Pause for a moment. Think about just one piece of this ... two black holes colliding a billion light years away. My respect to the scientists who can even imagine this concept, let alone design and implement an experiment to test it out. Bravo!
4
@Rocketman,
You've read my mind, verbatim. This is mind-blowing.
2-11-16@8:58 pm
You've read my mind, verbatim. This is mind-blowing.
2-11-16@8:58 pm
One cannot overestimate how amazing Einstein was as an old school natural philosopher, as well as a mathematical physicist. First came the empirically-driven intuitive insights about fundamental principles, and only then did he bring in the tools of mathematical physics (with lots of help from others in the case of General Relativity) to give rigor, details and predictive capacity to his conceptual discoveries.
Maybe it is time to reassess the conventional scoring of the Einstein-Bohr debates and to reconsider the reservations Einstein had about the incompleteness and opaque quality of Quantum Mechanics. His intuition was legendary, and well deserved.
Maybe it is time to reassess the conventional scoring of the Einstein-Bohr debates and to reconsider the reservations Einstein had about the incompleteness and opaque quality of Quantum Mechanics. His intuition was legendary, and well deserved.
1
Well, yes and no: Einstein's visualization capacity was possibly unrivaled in human experience; however, it seemed not to extend (or he didn't want it to extend) to the quantum-mechanical regime. Quantum entanglement and its implications have been so well demonstrated experimentally that Einstein himself would have to admit, probably grudgingly, that he was wrong and the "spooky action at a distance" -- which, incidentally, does not violate relativity -- is real.
1
Thank you for the simplicity of your explanation (waving your hands around the living room) which helped me comprehend this exciting news more fully than an earlier article I had read.
As a musician and artist I fully agree with you about the beauty and cultural importance of scientific discoveries. My father was a physics professor at Syracuse University. One of my fondest childhood memories was the night he called my mother from work and told her to wake us up and bring us into the back yard so we could witness a spectacular aurora borealis. Beauty and science are deeply intertwined with our humanity
As a musician and artist I fully agree with you about the beauty and cultural importance of scientific discoveries. My father was a physics professor at Syracuse University. One of my fondest childhood memories was the night he called my mother from work and told her to wake us up and bring us into the back yard so we could witness a spectacular aurora borealis. Beauty and science are deeply intertwined with our humanity
3
@aurora,
Thank you for sharing an exquisite memory.
2-11-16@8:54 pm
Thank you for sharing an exquisite memory.
2-11-16@8:54 pm
My mother, bless her, one winter night - also in upstate NY, a couple of hours east of Syracuse - pulled my brother and me out of bed, threw on our winter stuff over pajamas, to get outside in subzero night for the same thing - to see the aurora borealis (my parents were farmers ). I hadn't thought about it in years until I read this - it was magical.
2
Totally brilliant stuff. My scientist father who passed away 5 years ago, would have been thrilled and delighted to hear about this. Then again, he probably does know this...he himself must be somewhere as star dust, his sparkling essence, a part of the Huge underlying essence that is at once self aware and Conscious.
6
This type of big discovery astonishing me always; it's the testament of human mind and it's capacity to find the unseen, to know the unknown. More so, when I think of some human beings with extraordinary advanced neural capacity that not only conceive or predict but also discovered such highly 'esoteric' but real earth-shattering discoveries that will permanently 'change our perspective of our place in the universe'. I feel ecstatic but I still can't comprehend!
96
It is kind of ecstatic to read about and contemplate this, incomprehensible and unimaginable as the numbers distances and concepts are. How wonderful that at least a small part of humankind can co-operate and work together to achieve these results. Wow Wow and Wow!!!! Thank you so much, scientists for following up on human curiosity and broadening our view with such thrills. I'm wondering where that 'lost' energy goes. As an artist and poet I have always been convinced that scientists are just as creative as artists. Regarding Picasso, Mr. Krauss, at least no one has ever, whether they understand it or not, said of scientific activity,"My kid could do that!" Don't underestimate your public. We are aware that technologies and such are applied science—so yes better toasters, faster cars, MRI's, and "God " knows what else of practical benefit pure science will in the future generate. Where in the world, so to speak, would we be without it? Carry on, we love it!
1
General Relativity is probably the most beautiful subject I've ever had the privilege to study, the most sublime poetry I've ever read. Humans, just a provincial species in a very large place, have come to understand truths that hold over the greatest distances we can observe; truths that transcend our brief existence and myriad contrived narratives of nature's ways. With this understanding we connect, if only intellectually, to something much much bigger than ourselves.
5
Now if only we could learn to live together and not destroy our planet, life would be good.
1
@Gary; Easy does it! Let's tackle the easy questions first, like understanding the fundamental fabric of the universe. Learning to live together is way too advanced for us right now.
3
beautiful statement. to add to your reflection on what's the use of this scientific knowledge, like others on what's the use of art, one might say, what's the use of life. maybe the useful of toasters and computers lies in getting us to the point of finding usefulness in thinking, and the beauties and pleasures that can arise from reflection, observation, and communicating this to others. that this made your column possible, in fact, is what validates your claim.
2
Using the example of the ripples on a pond caused by an object dropped: When the pond is the Universe, how do we differentiate where these ripples originated?
2
A day to celebrate.
For Science and Scientists.
And all of Humanity.
And the Universe.
For Science and Scientists.
And all of Humanity.
And the Universe.
4
A prodigious feat! Congratulations to the scientists and the designers of LIGO.
1
What I would really like to understand about this experiment is how the laser beans themselves escape being compressed and stretched along with the tunnels. How do they remain unaffected by the passing wave so that they can measure the differences in the length?
5
My (physicist) spouse says it's because the laser beams are not space; they are waves propagating through space. It is space itself that is distorted by the gravity wave.
7
Speed of light is a constant in all reference frames, an axiom of the theory of relativity. Hence, the distance light travels in a second is a standard yardstick that is unaffected by space-time compression or expansion.
4
Yes, indeed, Dr. Krauss. Yes, indeed.
2
"Science...has the capacity to amaze and excite, dazzle and bewilder"...well, I'm sure it's wonderful and all, but I don't really understand it enough (even though you tried) to be amazed, etc...also, I can see a Picasso painting and hear a Mozart symphony...
When I was ten years old I learned that my neighbor did not wear socks, I also learned that he ate oatmeal in the morning and baked potato fpr lunch. These were exciting discoveries. However, my neighbor did not attempt to explain what constitutes the content of your article. The name of my neighbor: Albert Einstein!
3
In this era of science deniers in Congress and of theocracies rearing their ugly heads around the world, it's good to hear that there are still people who value knowledge and truth, and who are willing to go to the edge of the universe to find it.
This news gave me a feeling that I couldn't quite put my finger on, until I realized it was pride. It had been a while since reading the news produced anything but shame and embarrassment. Thank you, Dr. Krauss.
This news gave me a feeling that I couldn't quite put my finger on, until I realized it was pride. It had been a while since reading the news produced anything but shame and embarrassment. Thank you, Dr. Krauss.
268
This is what real science looks like, unlike certain other "sciences" where hypotheses go to undisputed fact with nothing substantial in-between. Some I guess believe science is like a democracy, if more than 50% vote that a hypothesis is true then it becomes fact...
2
Well said, thank you. The news is beyond thrilling and yet there are those who embrace very rigid belief systems that exclude so much of human endeavor.....of which I too feel pride as a human....it's sad to see their "God" is so limited...limited by their own ignorance and lack of God given curiosity.
2
It's amazing to me that these people really believe that they have found what they say they have found. The description of their detection devices makes them seem so sensitive that it could be that what they witnessed was caused by seismic activity under the labs. However, assuming that it is real, it is still hard to understand or believe that they can detect and describe an event that occurred billions of years ago and trillions of miles away. I realize that there were over a thousand very intelligent people involved, but a "belief state" can encompass a lot of people. One very interesting aspect of all this is that we can all say "whoopee," "fantastic," "great job," and "what are you going to do with the information?" Clearly, I am skeptical, but I know some of the dedicated, intelligent people involved and congratulate them on their accomplishment.
7
That's why they have 2 sensor labs and decided to put them 2,000 miles apart. The sensors do detect local human and earthly activity such as logging, trucks, and seismic tremors but not in both locations simultaneously. They also used the nanoseconds of difference between the black hole gravity waves to triangulate the location of the blackhole. It took years before ANYTHING showed up on both sensors simultaneously. How remarkable it is that something could vibrate something 2000 miles apart the exact same way.
15
The beauty of science is that they explain how they arrived at their conclusion. Or, as my old math and science teachers used to say, "show your work."
15
I'd imagine that they can differentiate between a seismic event and a gravitational event. The L shapes and separation of the two observatories should tell them whether the even is terrestrial or cosmic. Seismic pressure waves propagating through the planet must be travelling at a minute fraction of the speed of light
And the degree of sensitivity involved mean that they likely have to filter out footsteps, let alone earthquakes if that sort of filtering is necessary.
And the degree of sensitivity involved mean that they likely have to filter out footsteps, let alone earthquakes if that sort of filtering is necessary.
3
The beauty is that the universe - the Cosmos - can be defined with objective language. There is no need for some magical deity whose anger and benevolence make things happen. Someday we may even figure out how it all began and how it all fits together. By learning how to begin quantifying gravity we are a step closer.
84
really ? you don't see the magic ? or are you refusing to see it ?
1
Pushing beyond Natalie Angier's February 8 science article, "New Ways Into the Brain's 'Music Room;'" Times' February 11 video "LIGO Hears Gravitational Waves Einstein Predicated" by Dennis Overbye, Jonathon Corum and Jason Drakeford, which references the "invisible music of the cosmos;" and Lawrence Krauss' February 11 article, "Finding Beauty in the Darkness," suggesting the sublime nature of science, similar to art, music and literature, I ask whether music, itself, has a place in answering the ultimate question--why is there something rather than nothing? With my imagination unrestrained by science (except for being enticed by string theory) and moved by whimsy, I speculate that it might. In the first stage, I suggest a framework of two forces: creation, a non-physical, conceptual force, and chaos, initially, the unstable void in nothing, a physical force. In the second stage, creation, meeting its purpose and using its power, built an evolving harmony from this unstable void. Harmony, as it then existed, was a single, super-note. In the final stage, the note, seeking a symphonic base necessitating silence between parts, fractured into ever accelerating pieces culminating in the Big Bang.
This is such an exciting time to be alive. We just discovered the Higgs Boson and now gravity waves. Science is beginning to unlock the deepest mysteries that nature has. The atom smasher at CERN has just been upgraded to achieve much higher collision energies. May more discoveries will soon come.
We are witnessing the melding of astrophysics and quantum mechanics. The gravity wave detector peers deep into the far reaches of space and the CERN machine probes the tiniest elements of matter. It's all beginning to fit together. These are not mutually exclusive discoveries, but complementary ones. They reinforce each other. Of all of the forces of nature, gravity has been the most elusive to give up it's secrets. We are getting closer.
I don't believe in spirits, but I wish we could find Einstein's and give him the news of these discoveries. That's a movie I'd like to see.
We are witnessing the melding of astrophysics and quantum mechanics. The gravity wave detector peers deep into the far reaches of space and the CERN machine probes the tiniest elements of matter. It's all beginning to fit together. These are not mutually exclusive discoveries, but complementary ones. They reinforce each other. Of all of the forces of nature, gravity has been the most elusive to give up it's secrets. We are getting closer.
I don't believe in spirits, but I wish we could find Einstein's and give him the news of these discoveries. That's a movie I'd like to see.
174
Well stated.
1
If there are such things as spirits he does know. And of course we have thought that we saw the smallest particle of matter before and yet there are more things to be seen. Try some string theory on for size, for example.
From what I've read about Higgs Boson, physicists don't treat the discovery of the Higgs boson as an absolute certainty. The best they have been able to do is assign the label of a statistically significant finding.
2