Dark Stuff?
- Thread starter Arowx
- Start date
My guess, FWIW? Dark Matter probably is, very indirectly, by virtue of how the galaxy's gravitational simulation works (possibly via a very course gridded Newtonian method rather than anything "fancy" like General Relativity). Dark Energy probably less so because universal expansion wouldn't really need to be modelled at all.
But considering neither are detectable (at least in our time), who's to know?
But considering neither are detectable (at least in our time), who's to know?
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I think it would be safe to assume not. The presence of dark energy is inferred on cosmological scales - the Galaxy is tiny by comparison. Dark matter does affect the stellar rotation curve of the Galaxy, but given the timescales we are talking about I would be surprised if Galactic rotation is modelled. The Galactic Year is over 200 million years (with a 10 per cent error) so things will have barely moved at all in 1000 years time. The only reason to model rotation would be if you could speed up time in game, but one would assume the multiplayer nature of the game would make this impossible.
The Galaxy in 1000 years time will look virtually identical to the way it does now, and even if you play the game for the rest of your life any change in stellar positions will be too small to bother about, especially considering the uncertainties in contemporary measurements. I would be surprised if Frontier are bothering to implement proper motions for example, and this is an effect which dwarfs the influence of DM on the timescales we're talking about.
The Galaxy in 1000 years time will look virtually identical to the way it does now, and even if you play the game for the rest of your life any change in stellar positions will be too small to bother about, especially considering the uncertainties in contemporary measurements. I would be surprised if Frontier are bothering to implement proper motions for example, and this is an effect which dwarfs the influence of DM on the timescales we're talking about.
But doesn't dark matter create gravitational lensing, in effect a system or cluster of systems behind a dark matter ring or cloud could be invisible to sensors from some directions.
Then there is energetic dark matter and matter reaction a potentially extremely powerful weapon/energy source?
Then there is energetic dark matter and matter reaction a potentially extremely powerful weapon/energy source?
It certainly helps you "weigh" galaxies that way, but since there will only be our galaxy in ED it's not really relevant.
The fact that the galaxy we'll get in game looks something like an approximation of the Milky Way (or I guess any spiral galaxy), and the Milky Way looks the way it does because of DM means that DM is taken into account at some level, but "indirectly" barely begins to cover it.
1. Yes, dark matter does cause lensing but on cosmological scales, so it distorts the position and brightness of distant sources (other galaxies). Measurement of Lensing phenomena within the galaxy tends to involve a star as the lens and causes a short increase in the brightness of the lensed object ('microlensing') - this is one mechanism used to detect exoplanets.
2. For your second comment I think you are confusing dark matter with antimatter.
Sorry, thought this was a thread about Guinness? Move along, move along!
Better still .... DON'T BE THE FATHER.
what, If only I could unsee what I have seen. I now long for Dementia and the loss of my short-term memory!Better still .... DON'T BE THE FATHER.
Of course some cosmologists say the whole dark matter thing is rubbish Proponents of MoND theory suggest that by modifying Newton's theory of gravity you can do away with the need for the dark matter entirely. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modified_Newtonian_dynamics
You'd have to modify Newtonian gravity pretty drastically to get it to match observations though. It's based on the attraction between two objects with mass, but gravitational lensing demonstrates how gravity also acts on massless particles (photons, in this case) - it's why General Relativity is considered to be a more successful theory.
I can't see how modifying an old approximation theory can really get you anywhere (but then I'm not an expert).
I can't see how modifying an old approximation theory can really get you anywhere (but then I'm not an expert).
Dark matter is not literally a type of material, it is a phenomenon of the universe that is not well understood. As I recall, Neil deGrasse Tyson once mentioned that "Dark Matter" was only a placeholder name for something we have yet to understand. It could just as easily have been named 'foo'. The confusion is that people assume it is a physical object just because it has the word "matter" in it. The reason they used the word matter is just because our closest explanation of what it could be involves some physical mass that we just can't see or prove exists.
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But dark matter theory is even less helpful, essentially we have very little proof that dark matter exists and it's really just used as a fudge factor to make conventional theories fit with the observations. Unless we have actual proof of the existence of dark matter, it's just as likely that our theories need some adjustment.
"a fudge factor to make conventional theories fit with the observations"
and your plan is to fudge conventional theories to fit with observations?
It's like saying Brownian motion isn't proof of atoms, but rather we need to adjust Newtons laws of motion.
There is much excellent evidence that dark matter exists. The aforementioned gravitational lensing for example, and the DM interpretation of the structure of the Bullet Cluster (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullet_Cluster) is difficult to argue with.
These are 'indirect detections', but in the absence of alternative explanations they are convincing. This is similar to the phenomenon of gravitational radiation. For a direct detection we are waiting for the next generation of detectors to come online, but in the meantime the indirect detection from binary pulsar timing is sufficiently convincing that to disbelieve in the existence of GR would mark you as something of a scientific maverick
Bleh, well assuming it isn't a manifestation of a fundamental misunderstanding then it has to be something. Or numerous somethings. Something which might make a small contribution is vast numbers of undetected brown dwarfs. Perhaps Frontier are planning on including enough brown dwarfs in their Galaxy to match this theoretically predicted population?
When you calculate the amount of mass in a galaxy based on how many stars we see, we find that there isn't enough mass to account for the spin that we see in that galaxy. Dark Matter is whatever it is that we cannot see that accounts for it.
Dark Energy is the force that is accelerating galaxies away from each other against the force of gravity.
The universe, it turns out, is made of 4.9% ordinary matter, 26.8% dark matter and 68.3% dark energy.
