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Old January 18th 10, 07:27 PM posted to sci.physics.research,sci.astro.research
Jonathan Thornburg [remove -animal to reply][_5_]
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Default "Higgs In Space" or Where's Waldo?

On Jan 16, 5:09?pm, Igor Khavkine wrote:
|
| http://arxiv.org/find/gr-qc/1/AND+ti.../0/1/0/all/0/1
|
| Once gravitational wave detectors start producing reliable
| observations, all of these models will go through an honest weeding,
| as they should.

In sci.astro.research Robert L. Oldershaw wrote:
So are you saying that the detection of gravitational waves is a
foregone conclusion?

Is a non-detection due to non-existence of gravitational waves not
considered a permissible observational outcome?


I hereby publicly assert that if following statements are all true:
(a) Our basic theoretical models of nearby close binary stars are
correct. (These models are underpinned by a wide variety of quite
uncontroversial optical, UV, and X-ray astronomical observations.)
(b) General relativity correctly describes gravitation in nearby
close binary stars.
(c) The proposed LISA spacecraft mission flies and works properly.
[I mean "works" in the engineering sense, i.e., the launch rocket
doesn't explode, the lasers don't malfunction, the proof masses
are released properly, etc etc. This sort of "works" is normally
tested by monitoring various telemetry signals from the spacecraft,
and by injecting synthetic signals into various parts of the
interferometer optical trains and checking that the appropriate
results show up in the data stream.]
then
(d) LISA will detect gravitational waves at close to the predicted
frequency, amplitude, and waveform from at least the strongest 4
"verification binaries" discussed in
http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0605227

Therefore, if (a) and (c) hold, but the LISA data don't show (d),
i.e., LISA flies and works properly, but fails to detect the predicted
gravitational waves from the strongest of the verification binaries,
then we must conclude that (b) fails, i.e., general relativity is wrong
(at least for these systems).

--
-- "Jonathan Thornburg [remove -animal to reply]"
Dept of Astronomy, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA
"If the triangles made a god, it would have three sides." -- Voltaire