I think we need a version of the New Battery Technology Checklist[1] for this type of article. (Though I understand that the research itself often just aims solve specific tensions in cosmology, and it is only the reporting that over-hypes it as a full replacement for dark matter.)
Dear alternative dark matter theory claimant,
Thank you for your submission of a proposed revolutionary theory to replace dark matter. Your new theory claims to be superior to dark matter models and will transform our understanding of the universe. Unfortunately, your theory will likely fail, because:
[ ] It cannot explain galaxy rotation curves across all galaxy types.
[ ] It fails to account for gravitational lensing observed in galaxy clusters.
[ ] It cannot explain the Bullet Cluster observations where dark matter appears separated from normal matter.
[ ] It is inconsistent with the cosmic microwave background anisotropies.
[ ] It cannot explain the large-scale structure and formation of the universe.
[ ] It introduces arbitrary parameters without physical justification.
[ ] It lacks a sound theoretical foundation or violates established physics principles.
[ ] It fails to explain the observed velocity dispersions in dwarf spheroidal galaxies.
[ ] It cannot account for empirical relations like the Tully-Fisher relation.
[ ] It cannot be tested or falsified by current or near-future experiments.
[ ] Your claims are unfounded or exaggerated.
Ironically, many of those are also levelled at dark matter theories.
Tully-Fisher - dark matter fails to explain the Tully-Fisher relation naturally, and requires a lot of tweaking and feedback effects (arbitrary parameters).
Rotation curves - recent empirical observations shows galactic rotation curves remain flat far beyond what dark matter can explain [1]
Falsified - we've been trying to find dark matter for a long time and failed. The window of possible candidates for dark matter is now surprisingly small.
I am not claiming that dark matter is wrong. I am claiming that the success of it is by no means proven , and it has many problems of its own (including those you list as problems for alternative theories).
[1] https://tritonstation.com/2024/06/18/rotation-curves-still-f...
I'm doing a sed `s/dark matter/luminiferous ether/g` replacement here and it holds up!
>[ ] It introduces arbitrary parameters without physical justification.
Every fundamental theory does this.
And they come along about once in a century.
Which doesn't make it wrong, but is it perhaps enough to call it an extraordinary claim?
Sorry, the conclusion in the paper really underlies how poorly the results fit the evidence: "The resulting almost doubling in the age of the Universe and increasing the formation times by 1 order of magnitude has been a subject of concern and requires that the new model also explain some critical cosmological and astrophysical observations" [0]
Call me skeptical of the claims made.
[0] https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/ad1bc6#...
It's a double edged sword. On the one hand the model helps to explain the "impossible early galaxy" problem (since the universe is older than we thought).
On the other hand, if the universe is older there are other things that will need more research to figure out.
You should be sceptical, but there is not as yet a reason to entirely reject it. I'm not really a fan of the tired light theories myself, but glad to see different ideas being explored.
Any article/paper claiming nonexistence of dark matter that does not mention the bullet cluster should be sent to the spam folder.
The bullet cluster is not the slam dunk proof of dark matter that is commonly supposed. For example, see this: https://tritonstation.com/2024/02/06/clusters-of-galaxies-ru...
>So the unseen mass in clusters could just be ordinary matter that does not happen to be in a form we can readily detect.
That is the same thing as dark matter...
No. Dark matter is a proposed form of matter which does not interact with light.
Normal matter we can't detect isn't dark matter - it's just currently undetected matter. As our observational ability improves we find more of it.
That's WIMPS, early candidates for dark matter included primordial black holes and dust.
A good point. I have heard of primordial black holes as a candidate for (at least some) dark matter. Not heard that dust was ever a candidate (if you have a reference it would be appreciated).
I assume you are referring to gravitational lensing estimates of total matter versus visible?
I think there are too many unknowns and we are nowhere near close to fully understanding our universe that we should be open minded to new ideas and see if they fit into our understanding. Dark matter is one explanation to the bullet cluster but perhaps there is another we just don't understand. Yes if someone has a perpetual motion machine to the spam folder but I am always open to hear new ideas to our universe.
> The new model is a hybrid model that combines the tired light (TL) theory with a variant of the ΛCDM model in which the cosmological constant is replaced with a covarying coupling constants' (CCC) parameter α.
Are the dark-matter-phobes going to pretend this is "simpler" than dark matter w.r.t Occam's razor? I bet they are. Can't wait.
"Tired light" has been debunked for decades. Unfortunately, phys.org articles are notorious for not pointing out things like this.
The whole article just accepts the paper as gospel. I've noticed this as a problem with lots of science reporting, where the latest paper or whatever completely supersedes all previous research. Sometimes even, as in this case, when the latest paper is just written by some rando with an axe to grind.
Probably not and its just our too primitive understanding and “trying to make the calculations work”
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dang 3 hours ago | next [-]
Related:
- 'Research suggests that we do have dark matter'
- 'Do we have dark matter? Probably not, according to researchers'
- 'No, we don't have dark matter, researchers say'
- 'Researchers explain why we haven't found dark matter, but it probably exists'
- 'Yes, dark matter exists, and here's why, according to researchers'
- ...
"""
/s