Interesting Article on the History of the Search for Gravity Waves

rbpeake
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This article provides an interesting perspective on the history and potential near-term discovery of gravity waves.
http://phys.org/news/2014-02-sight-gravity.html

Mike Hewson
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Interesting Article on the History of the Search for Gravity Wav

Good article overall. But, as usual it propagates the myth that measurement is either labelled a success or a failure. It is the theories under disambiguation that suffer the cut. Hence if we do not find any gravitational waves - when we know we should have - then GR requires correction and/or one of it's competitors ascend. The act of reliable measurement itself is still a success because we are then informed of how the universe works. See Michelson & Morley. What would then fail is the use of interferometers as astronomical instruments, the expectation of which is being misunderstood here.

Alas the comments below it have the ongoing disturbing trend of online conversations - people seem to think that Wikipaedia ( one can easily detect implicit references to it ) is either authoritative and/or useful. I now remember why I stopped contributing there ..... generally the issue is 'reification' : a fallacy of believing something is real just because it can be imagined or seem explicable or be written down. Or posted on a forum. Roughly : 'I thought of it, therefore it must be true'. The crux of science is to discard reifications that do not correlate with measurement. All else is conversation, or if you like : online sociology gamesmanship. The stupidity isn't so much in the doing of that, but the evident belief by some that others will swallow it. Do not people reflect upon how others may receive ??? :-(

As for the core topic at hand : well, are we not very ambitious in this enterprise! The level of effect sought is really minute. I was thinking the other nite about the use of 'squeezed light' at the interferometers to increase sensitivity, which effectively takes advantage of the fact ( see eg. Casimir effect ) that otherwise unseen or virtual photons in 'empty' space can indirectly affect noise levels at the dark port. That is by injecting EM quantum fields into the interferometer one can tone down the rowdy vacuum stuff in one 'quadrature' by parking it in another. Thus you can enhance the examination of the differential arm signal. I feel there is something rather deeper about the universe that this phenomenon is telling us, I just can't finger it though .... something relevant to both GR and QM.

Naturally as an Aussie I'm pleased that our DownUnda scientists are still in the mix. :-)

Cheers, Mike.

I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...

... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal

Holmis
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Hey Mike, did you see the

Hey Mike, did you see the comment from Protoplasmix? If not here it is:

Quote:
The comment you're now reading was composed and submitted using a computer that actually had some of the LIGO data flowing through it, as part of the distributed computing project known as Einstein@Home. It was a most rewarding experience, from learning about GR and QM in the forum, to reading the daily logs of the scientists during commissioning and scientific operation of the interferometers. People from all over the world were participating—from the UK and Germany where they were also doing pioneering work with their GEO interferometer, from Italy who was doing likewise with their VIRGO, and of course from Australia. I recall with much admiration a doctor from down under, one of the volunteer moderators in the forum, who worked tirelessly to translate into lay terms the scientist's comments from their logs and explain and answer questions on the various figures of merit and screenshots of control systems and sensors. It was an awesome learning experience.


I totally agree with the praise of our good doctor! Keep up the good work!

Mike Hewson
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RE: Hey Mike, did you see

Quote:

Hey Mike, did you see the comment from Protoplasmix? If not here it is:

Quote:
The comment you're now reading was composed and submitted using a computer that actually had some of the LIGO data flowing through it, as part of the distributed computing project known as Einstein@Home. It was a most rewarding experience, from learning about GR and QM in the forum, to reading the daily logs of the scientists during commissioning and scientific operation of the interferometers. People from all over the world were participating—from the UK and Germany where they were also doing pioneering work with their GEO interferometer, from Italy who was doing likewise with their VIRGO, and of course from Australia. I recall with much admiration a doctor from down under, one of the volunteer moderators in the forum, who worked tirelessly to translate into lay terms the scientist's comments from their logs and explain and answer questions on the various figures of merit and screenshots of control systems and sensors. It was an awesome learning experience.

I totally agree with the praise of our good doctor! Keep up the good work!


Yes I did see that and I blushed. I thank you both for such praise. :-) :-)

Now as it turns out ( ie. funny thing it was mentioned ) : I have been sneaking a look or two at the LIGO detector logs recently, given that they are by degrees approaching operational status with their new configurations and equipment. So I may yet line up a duck or five and fire up a new Detector Watch thread for commentary ( assuming I can make any sense of it ). They appear to be doing some serious commissioning and testing - alot of 'clean room' type activity. For that matter I'll see if I can dig out any detailed timelines. Stay tuned ! :-)

Cheers, Mike.

I have made this letter longer than usual because I lack the time to make it shorter ...

... and my other CPU is a Ryzen 5950X :-) Blaise Pascal

Holmis
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RE: ... So I may yet line

Quote:

... So I may yet line up a duck or five and fire up a new Detector Watch thread for commentary ( assuming I can make any sense of it ). They appear to be doing some serious commissioning and testing - alot of 'clean room' type activity. For that matter I'll see if I can dig out any detailed timelines. Stay tuned ! :-)

Cheers, Mike.


I bet ya you can make much more sense of it than I ever could! =)
It sounds like there's exciting times ahead! Though the pulsar searches has added more value to the project and helping in recruiting new participants it's the gravity waves we're here for!

MAGIC Quantum Mechanic
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Gravity attracts mad

Gravity attracts mad scientists

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