[fargolime]

> Since 1 million light years in 14 years is way faster than the speed of light, and relativity doesn't allow you to exceed the speed of light by acceleration, clearly this is something other than regular old F=ma "acceleration".

As the blog notes, the speed of light limit in relativity theory applies only to observers in free fall or observers measuring things passing right by them. The rocket's crew isn't in free fall and the thing they're measuring is distant.

> Additionally, the fact that we don't see things 14 light years away accelerating to a million light years away very quickly, despite being under a constant 1 gee acceleration, would seem to indicate that this is not what actually happens.

That's because our 1g field drops off quickly with distance. The rocket's crew has a uniform 1g field all the way to the beacon.

> I can use the standard d = 1/2at^2 equation to "demonstrate" that combining one apple and three tangerines produces 4.5 dandelions, and you would get the same result putting those numbers into the equation, but it doesn't mean the exercise makes any sense.

That's because you're using the equation illogically, by mixing labels. The blog uses the equations properly.

> But I understand enough to realize that it is very wrong, and point out some obvious flaws.

OK, I've been a student of the blog for years and can likely always show the flaw in your arguments.

> I can see no indication of this, even though it should be an easy exercise.

It wouldn't be easy. As the blog notes, it's not just the Earth's gravitational field, it's also the Milky Way's and more. When observing supernovae in distant galaxies we're talking about a much larger g-field than the Earth's.

> This is another major indication that this is all nonsense, if it is in fact the case that this analysis has not been done.

That's unscientific as hell, like saying Newton's Principia is crap because he didn't include a calculation that used his equations to weigh the Earth (which Cavendish "easily" did much later).

[mikeash]

"It wouldn't be easy."

Nonsense. The mass of galaxies is reasonably well known. Put the numbers in and see how well they match reality. The numbers are uncertain? Then put on appropriate error bars and see if reality falls within them.

[fargolime]

We know the mass of each of millions of galaxies? I doubt the galaxies involved have even been counted. But never mind, because ideas aren't proven invalid when they aren't applied in some way you desired.

[mikeash]

No, but when a quantitative theory isn't compared with reality then there is absolutely no reason to pay attention to it until it is.

[fargolime]

Special relativity should've been tossed in the bin, then.

[mikeash]

No, because special relativity had plenty of quantitative corroborating evidence for it, gathered both before and after the theory was actually proposed.

Seriously, this is insane. You have a theory that makes quantitative predictions but when I ask whether those predictions line up with reality you protest that it's just too hard to actually come up with any numbers. You loved equations and graphs before, but now, perish the thought of actually looking at quantities, let's just wave hands and pretend that this theory is definitely right even though we can't be bothered to check.

You have a few blog posts with no quantitative reasoning whatsoever even though all of the math is present and straightforward, no actual papers, no evidence, no nothing, and you're sure that this is proof that academia is suppressing new ideas, not, say, proof that the author is a complete crackpot.

Sure.

[fargolime]

Special relativity as published included no experimental confirmation. None of its quantitative predictions in the original publication were "lined up with reality" by Einstein. What came after the theory was published, experiments done by others, is obviously irrelevant to the point you're making.

The blog proves that general relativity predicts that sufficiently high-redshift supernovae accelerate away from us, the 1998 observation of which is currently a mystery. The blog offers the same level of corroborating evidence as special relativity did when it was published, both offering solutions to observational mysteries. Neither Einstein nor the blog author lined up anything with reality numerically in their original publications.

Yet you insist (at a minimum) the blog author add up the masses of all the millions (trillions?) of galaxies within a sphere centered on the Earth and whose radius extends to those supernovae, billions of light years from the Earth, to make a numerical prediction of the rate those supernovae are accelerating away from us. You suggest that not doing such a calculation means the blog is hand-waving. Well I say again that's unscientific as hell. Yes by your standard, special relativity as published would be junk and Einstein would be a crackpot.

(I probably won't say anything more because I get tired of this type of discussion. You seem to be done with scientific attempts to discredit the blog.)