The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
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    WHAT IS THE SPEED OF DARK?

    By Richard Day on Thu, 10/05/2017 - 3:25pm |

    The distance from the Sun to the Earth is shown as 150 million kilometers, an approximate average. Sizes to scale.

    Decades ago, I was reading my Star & Trib.
    I hit the opinion column and this famous pundit (whose name escapes me)
    discussed some poem he had come across. A poem written by a little girl.
    The poem went something like this:
    No green
    No grass
    No leaves
    No flowers
    No warmth
    No hope
    November
    hahahahah
    So the pundit mused something like this:
    I could read and write for a hundred years and never, ever come up
    with a poem like this    . (from a little girl)
    ALAS
    hahahahaha
    So I am viewing this scientific panel put together by Lawrence Krauss, one
    of my favorite scientists entitled:
    THE STORY TELLING OF SCIENCE
     
    And this 'panel' included the likes of Richard Dawkins and Bill Nye and Neil Stevenson
    and Neil Degrasse Tyson
    and Ira Flatow and Brian Greene (along with his wife Tracy Day).
    Check this out at about 25 minutes:
     
    So Brian Greene takes the stage and begins with an acknowlegment that
    his son and daughter are present in the audience.
    Now Tracy Day and Brian Greene are intellectuals who give a damn about their children's
    education. Just like my son and his wife give a damn about their children's education.
    So Greene notes that as part of his parental tutorial duties, he attempts to educate his son
    concerning the speed of light.
    Greene notes that during this tutelage his son interrupts him with this gem:
    Okay Dad, but what is the speed of dark?
    Personally, I could spend another hundred years on this planet reading and writing and
    attempting to understand the universe but I would never come up with a question like
    that!
    I mean:
    WHAT THE HELL IS THE SPEED OF DARK?
    I get bored watching Law & Order or Gunsmoke or whatever Netflix is selling and I always
    seem to end up at Youtube, viewing some interesting lecture or debate.. ha
    I recall he first blog I ever posted was at TPM and it was the middle of the night and I basically
    discussed the idea of a true vacuum.
    There seems to be no manner in which we might view a true vacuum because in order to view the
    vacuum, we would need light to see that vacuum and if there is light, there are photons and
    maybe even gravitons and....oh and now there are phonons. (not phonoms but phonons)
    There seems to be nothing to nothing?  I mean there cannot be nothing.
    Yeah, I know about black holes but even without photons, there are gravitons and...
    (what do I know?)
    Krauss and many other 'experts' are enthralled by the concept of nothingness.
    And it turns out, according to Krauss and his cohorts, that in fact, empty space
    has 'substance'.
    And Krauss will demonstrate empty space or a void on his big computer screen demonstrating
    (artistically anyway) that empty space is not nothing. hahahahah
    And these lectures by Krauss lead me back to the question I had ten years ago:
    WHAT THE HELL IS THE DEFINITION OF NOTHINGNESS?
    I had wondered about space expansion.
    Space seems to be expanding.
    I mean, what the hell is space expanding into?
    (Sometimes one is compelled to end a sentence with a preposition, Miss Lee.)
    Maybe these atheists are just searching for a definition of GOD?
    Anyhow the issue is presented:
    WHAT THE HELL IS THE SPEED OF DARK?
     

    THE END
     
     
     

     

     

    Comments

    About 25 mph, I'd say. 

    Yup. About 25. 


    by Q (not verified) on Thu, 10/05/2017 - 7:42pm

    Well maybe in a school zone!


    by Richard Day on Thu, 10/05/2017 - 9:20pm

    That's been the speed limit in all of NYC since 2015 and I assure you that we are no school-zone-type place but the literal heart of darkness. devil


    by artappraiser on Thu, 10/05/2017 - 9:46pm

    Oh hi AA!

    I just thought of this song I should have added. I dunno, I like songs.


    by Richard Day on Fri, 10/06/2017 - 2:10pm

    Gravitational lensing helped proved Einstein's General Relativity

    ...Thus, gravitational lensing is a clean probe of the Universe and has much to tell us about its two most mysterious components - dark matter and dark energy.

    *In fact, this is one way in which gravitational lensing differs from optical lensing, as gravitational lensing is independent of the wavelength (colour) of the light. All light rays are bent the same amount by gravity. Optical lenses cause light of different colours to bend by varying amounts in a process called diffraction, resulting in the splitting of light into rainbows. There is no such analogous effect with gravitational lensing.


    by NCD on Fri, 10/06/2017 - 3:33pm

    Well NCD, I need to read this link more than once.

    But Dark Energy and Dark Matter intrigue me.

    Which brings me back to the baby boy's quiery:

    What is the speed of dark? ha

    Great link!


    by Richard Day on Fri, 10/06/2017 - 6:55pm

    Dick, I LOVE this!

    I drove 3 hours through snow to go to a talk by Brian Green at my daughter's college a few years ago.  Turned out he had a cold (I would call it a 'man cold,' meaning it is far more serious than the kinds of colds women get) and he gave a very abbreviated talk...so disappointed.  I still like him, and I love the way he explains things.   Later I went back for a lecture by Richard Dawkins.  He was very interesting, but Liberty University sent a bus load of students and they monopolized the Q&A.  

    I haven't had time to watch the whole first video, but I am looking forward to it.

    thanks for posting this.


    by CVille Dem on Fri, 10/06/2017 - 5:30pm

    See Cville, I take a nap and there you are!

    Of course men are colder than they need be. hahah

    After listening to so many of these lectures I am caught up in presentation.

    I loved Obama; but his eh eh ehs... were intially distracting but later enticing.

    Greene and Dawkins and Krauss never hesitate for thought.

    Their deliveries are almost flawless.

    Oh how I wish I were born a genius!


    by Richard Day on Fri, 10/06/2017 - 6:51pm

    Oh how I wish I were born a genius!

     There is all types of genius.  Don't sell yourself short.   ;)


    by trkingmomoe on Sat, 10/14/2017 - 1:53am

    Oh thank you Momoe!

    This comment brings to mind many things.

    I hope your babies are doing well. Very well. hahahah

    My son is a genius of sorts.

    He attempts to try other things.

    Genius is in the minds of the beholders. ha

    I aint one of them geniuses. hahaha

    I know this for sure.

    Again, I hope you are doing well and I hope your grandkids are doing well also.

    We just lost a king of truth.

    As you well know


    by Richard Day on Sat, 10/14/2017 - 7:01am