Latest news with #GeneralTheoryofRelativity
Express Tribune
30-07-2025
- Politics
- Express Tribune
Living in the shadow of shadow principles
Listen to article Ron Wyden, the Oregon Democratic Senator, when asked by investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill about his view on the lethal operations of the US government against American citizens, said, "It is almost as if there are two laws in America and the American people would be extraordinarily surprised if they could see the difference between what they believe a law says and how it has actually been interpreted in secret". I want to give a little perspective here. For centuries, the world of science and physics was dominated by Newton's gravitational principles. Yet, nobody could make sense of Mercury's movement around the sun, which moves in an elliptical path. Then came Einstein with his theory of gravity called the General Theory of Relativity, which predicted, explained and made sense of Mercury's movement. It was through the elliptical path of Mercury that Einstein confirmed his theory's accuracy. Once one understood Einstein's theory, Mercury's anomalous movement made all sense. That is true for politics and power globally as well. Politicians and those in power repeat the nice sounding causes and goals, but their actions make absolutely no sense when compared to their rhetoric. It all, however, starts making perfect sense when we understand the shadow principle with which they operate. Just like gravity works in the shadows without meeting the eye, these shadow principles and motivations of politicians and power systems drive their actions and policies. So, for example, politicians make claims to live and die for Pakistan but when they have the means and ability, all they do is to steal money and park it in Swiss banks or in the form of luxury properties overseas. But if we actually understand that these politicians are not driven by benevolence or patriotism but one simple shadow principle, greed and selfishness, then all their criminal activities and dark enterprises become quite easy to understand. American politicians get elected to Congress and publicly claim to work for Israel's safety. Notice that Israel is a foreign country, just like any country other than America. Anyone new to the study of American politics would find it ridiculous to hear such claims and assertions from American politicians. Anyone not fully comprehending the nuances of American politics and the shenanigans of the Israel Lobby inside America would be completely baffled to see how this one superpower country is always ready, willing and almost bowing to be at the service of this tiny country in the Middle East. It would be a mystery for anyone not knowing about the shadow rulebook to watch America always rescue Israel from the United Nations resolutions by using its veto power, by providing arms to Israel despite knowing that innocent children would be killed, by providing money to this tiny little terrorist state knowing that countless American citizens are homeless, without running water, without food, buried under massive credit card debt, killed due to terrorism that resulted from supporting this very extremist state and lack universal healthcare, while Israel does have one. However, it would all make unmistakable sense when we observe all these American actions from the lens where the Israel Lobby controls, coerces, scares, blackmails and dictates American politicians. Through a combination of mind control of the electorate, campaign donations using American money given as aid to Israel and, as conspiratorial as it may sound, through blackmail of powerful politicians, Israel manipulates and redirects American foreign policy where it only favours Israel even if it is at the cost of American national interests. Once these shadow realities are understood then it makes perfect sense to watch Ted Cruz say, "I came into Congress 13 years ago with the stated intention of being the leading defender of Israel in the United States — I've worked every day to do that". Make sense of it if you can without deciphering the shadow rulebook first.
Indian Express
17-07-2025
- Science
- Indian Express
Why merger of two black holes, 100 times bigger than the Sun, holds significance
Scientists have just reported the discovery of gravitational waves from the merger of two black holes that are the biggest to have been observed in such an event. Black hole mergers are rare but some of the most spectacular events in the universe, releasing massive amounts of energy that are propagated to a very large distance through gravitational waves. Gravitational waves are ripples in spacetime created by movements of massive objects, just like the movement of a boat in a lake produces ripples in water. But these are extremely weak, and only gravitational waves produced in very big events, like the merger of two black holes, can be detected by instruments on Earth. The existence of gravitational waves was proposed in Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity in 1915. However, it was only in 2015, exactly 100 years later, that scientists were able to detect these for the first time, using extremely sensitive equipment at the two detectors built in the United States for this purpose, called the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory, or LIGO. Since then, scientists have discovered gravitational waves from hundreds of similar events. So, what's new this time? In general, a black hole is a region in Space where the pulling force of gravity is so strong that neither matter nor light can ever escape. The latest discovery involves black holes that are more massive than any seen in previous such detections, and something that current theories find hard to explain. One of the black holes was 140 times the mass of the Sun in our solar system, the other 100 times bigger. Their merger resulted in a black hole that was about 225 times larger than the Sun. The previous record for such mergers detected through gravitational waves in 2021 involved black holes about 80 and 65 times larger than the Sun. Much bigger black holes do exist in the universe. Supermassive black holes are millions of times more massive than the Sun. However, what was surprising in the latest discovery was the fact that black holes in this specific size range, roughly between 100 and 150 times bigger than the Sun, are not expected to exist according to the prevailing knowledge. The stars that can produce black holes in this particular size range are currently understood to meet a different kind of end, and not end up collapsing into a black hole. Additionally, at least one of the black holes involved in the event was spinning at very high speeds, almost at the limit of what is possible under the General Theory of Relativity. For these reasons, the detection of gravitational waves from this event has generated a lot of scientific interest. It has the potential to refine the current understanding of black hole formation, the evolution of stars, and, possibly, the current models of the universe itself. Importance of a new tool Gravitational waves offer scientists a new way to glean information about the universe. Until it was first detected in 2015, scientists had to depend largely on the electromagnetic waves, like light, X-rays or radio waves, to study the universe. But most of the universe comprises of dark matter and dark energy, which do not interact with electromagnetic waves. These areas, and the events that happen therein, are therefore 'invisible' to traditional measuring devices like telescopes. Black holes were a classical example. Scientists knew they existed, but could not 'see' them. Detection of gravitational waves has provided a new tool to detect and study them. Gravitational waves are generated by all moving objects in the universe, though only those that are produced by sufficiently large events are strong enough to travel very large distances and get detected by gravitational wave detectors on Earth. But they still offer information that was hitherto unavailable to the scientists. Gravitational waves, thus, provide a new 'vision' to scientists to view and study the happenings in the universe. The first detection of gravitational waves, in 2015, was made by the two observatories in the United States. After that, a few more observatories have come up, notably the Virgo detector in Italy and the KAGRA (Kamioka Gravitational Wave Detector) in Japan. Together, these are known as the LVK collaboration. The latest discovery has come from this collaboration. Incidentally, the LIGO is proposed to have a third observatory, this one in India, to be called the LIGO-India observatory, but its construction is running way behind schedule. It was originally supposed to begin operations in 2024, but a final government approval earmarking Rs 2,600 crore for the project came only in 2023. The Department of Atomic Energy, which is handling the project, has selected a site in the Hingoli district of Maharashtra to set up this observatory. As per the latest information, the construction of the project is expected to start later this year and be completed by April 2030.
Indian Express
15-07-2025
- Science
- Indian Express
Scientists detect signals of biggest black hole merger
An international network of gravitational wave observatories has reported the detection of the merger of two black holes that are the biggest that have ever been observed in this kind of an event. Two black holes, one of them 140 times more massive than the Sun, and the other 100 times bigger, merged to result a black hole estimated to be about 225 times the size of the Sun. The detection of the gravitational waves from this event, which actually occurred billions of years ago, was made by the LVK network of observatories, involving the LIGO detector in the United States, Virgo in Italy and KAGRA in Japan. LIGO, which stands for Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory, is a set of two detectors in the United States that was the first one to detect gravitational waves in 2015. That discovery gave the first experimental validation of the existence of gravitational waves, which had theoretically been proposed in Einstein's General Theory of Relativity 100 years ago. It had resulted in a Nobel Prize two years later. The global gravitation wave detection network has since then expanded to Virgo observatory in Italy and KAGRA (Kamioka Gravitational Wave Detector) in Japan. India is in the process of building the third detector of LIGO, which will be known as LIGO-India. Indian scientists from 17 different institutions are already part of network. The study of gravitational waves provide scientists a new tool to understand the workings of the universe, which was unavailable ten years ago. The LVK network has so far detected hundreds of events in the past that produced gravitational waves, most of them involving mergers of two black holes. The latest discovery, given the name GW231123, is exceptional because it involves the biggest black holes to have been observed in any such event. 'Typical black holes from stellar collapse are under 60 solar masses and hence intermediate-mass black holes like those detected in GW231123 (100-120 solar masses) are hard to explain,' Prof Archana Pai from the Department of Physics, IIT Bombay and principal investigator of the LIGO-India Scientific Collaboration, told The Indian Express. She said scientists believe that more massive black holes are formed via a hierarchy of mergers of smaller black holes. 'Such a hierarchy might be responsible for the formation of a supermassive black hole, the engine of any spiral galaxy,' she added. According to an official statement issued on Monday, the two black holes that merged were a colossal 100 and 140 times the mass of the Sun. In addition to being extremely massive, they were also spinning incredibly fast, making this a uniquely challenging signal to interpret and suggesting the possibility of a complex formation history. 'One of the detection algorithms used for the detection was developed by the IIT Bombay group in collaboration with the LVK. IIT Bombay alumnus Koustav Chandra (now in the United States) significantly contributed to the analysis and interpretation of the event,' Pai said. Mark Hannam, a professor at Cardiff University and a member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration said, in a statement that the detection of GW231123 event presented a challenge to the current understanding of black hole formation. 'Black holes this massive are forbidden within our current understanding of the formation of these objects from the evolution of massive stars. One possibility is that the two black holes in this binary formed through earlier mergers of smaller black holes,' he said. Scientists said the discovery has important implications for understanding the astrophysical environment that black holes are found in, whether black holes are more likely to collide, or whether the orbits of black holes are more elongated than spherical. Alternative scenarios could also arise, opening up new directions in theories of gravity, astrophysics, cosmology, particle physics, or cosmic strings. Researchers are continuing to refine their analysis and improve the models used to interpret such extreme events. GW231123 will be presented at the 24th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation (GR24) and the 16th Edoardo Amaldi Conference on Gravitational Waves, held jointly as the GR-Amaldi meeting in Glasgow, UK, from July 14-18, 2025. According to Koustav Chandra who wrote the main part of the paper about the searches and also helped write the summary of the science results, 'This signal, just a tenth of a second long, was a real puzzle at first. Yet it matched the waveform of merging black holes, just as Einstein's general relativity predicts. We realised that we may have, for the first time, witnessed the collision of two intermediate-mass black holes. But uncovering its true origin and extracting all the science out of it will take years and will help us advance our theoretical tools in the process,' he said. Anuradha Mascarenhas is a journalist with The Indian Express and is based in Pune. A senior editor, Anuradha writes on health, research developments in the field of science and environment and takes keen interest in covering women's issues. With a career spanning over 25 years, Anuradha has also led teams and often coordinated the edition. ... Read More
Indian Express
20-05-2025
- Science
- Indian Express
Astrophysicist Jayant Narlikar passes away: What is the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity?
Eminent Indian astrophysicist, science communicator, and Padma Vibhushan awardee Jayant Narlikar passed away in Pune on Tuesday (May 20) at the age of 87. He was best known for propounding the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity (also known as conformal gravity), which he developed with English astronomer and professor Fred Hoyle in 1964. The theory sought to improve on Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, published in 1915. Here is a look at the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity. Link to Mach's principle At the heart of the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity is the Mach's principle, which says that the mass of every object in the universe is affected by its interaction with every other object. Einstein was greatly inspired by the principle, but could not incorporate it into his theory. Hoyle and Narlikar took Mach's principle more literally and claimed to have successfully included it in their theory. They said that the inertia of an object, that is the tendency to resist change in its state of motion, arises from its interaction with all other matter in the universe. 'As Hoyle and Narlikar see it, a universe with nothing in it is impossible. There must be at least two particles, each to give mass to the other. The masses, and therefore the gravity, of the sun and the earth are partly due to each other, partly to more distant objects such as the stars and galaxies,' according to a report in Time Magazine. Concept of C-field The Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity also proposed a 'creation field' (C-field), a hypothetical negative-energy field responsible for the continuous creation of matter. This helped explain the steady-state cosmology, which said that the universe had no beginning and will endure forever. The steady-state concept of the universe is essentially an alternative to 'Big-Bang' cosmology, which proposed that the universe originated 13 billion years ago with an expansion and has been expanding ever since. Hoyle and Narlikar said that if the universe were this old and always expanding, we would not see anything in the sky. 'Hence, Dr Hoyle and other proponents of a steady‐state situation have proposed that hydrogen atoms are continually being created in space to fill the void resulting from such expansion. It is to account for this that Dr Hoyle has proposed the existence of an unseen force, or C-field. When this field becomes strong enough, at any point in space, a new hydrogen atom appears,' according to a report in The New York Times. The Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravity was not widely accepted, especially after the discovery of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation in 1965. CMB — considered as an echo or shockwave of the Big Bang — is the cooled remnant of the first light that could travel freely throughout the universe. However, the theory continues to draw attention for its attempt to integrate Mach's principle in cosmology.
