Some quasars are *not* at cosmological distances

In Prof Wright's well explained cosmology FAQ he has the following
question and answer:

Are quasars really at the large distances indicated by their redshifts?
The short answer is Yes.
Stockton (1978, ApJ, 223, 747) observed associated galaxies and quasars
and quite correctly conclude that at least some quasars are at the
distance indicated by their redshift. They argue against others being
at some other distance but not convincingly. Long URL ...
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/np...325b47acc08258

In a later paper, by Burbidge, G.; Hewitt, A.; Narlikar, J. V.; Gupta,
P. Das; 1990ApJS...74..675B; "Associations between quasi-stellar objects
and galaxies" a much larger sample is studied and it is found that for
both Stockton's sample and this one, that the angular separation of
galaxy and quasars that are associated is strictly inverse of distance,
whether or not they have the same redshift. Another long URL ...
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/np...p;db_key=A ST

This evidence is extremely compelling because the redshifts range over 4
orders of magnitude and the separations follow along perfectly inversely.

It is difficult to imagine that the difference in redshift is due to
gravitation unless quasars are doing some sort of amazing gravitational
glug-glug that varies between 0 and a very high mass. Therefore it seems
extremely likely that there is an additional component to redshift that
is beyond known physics. Are there any other reasonable explanations?

Why do cosmologists continue to interpret redshift as purely
cosmological? Why does Prof Wright not put this more substantial
counter-evidence in his FAQ and answer "NOT all of them" in even bigger
letters?

--
Ray Tomes
http://ray.tomes.biz/
http://www.cyclesresearchinstitute.org/

Ray Tomes wrote:
It is difficult to imagine that the difference in redshift is due to
gravitation unless quasars are doing some sort of amazing
gravitational
glug-glug that varies between 0 and a very high mass. Therefore it
seems
extremely likely that there is an additional component to redshift
that
is beyond known physics. Are there any other reasonable explanations?

It is in my opinion not only likely but a logical necessity that there
is a different redshift mechanism unrelated to recessional velocities.
This could well be related to propagation effects of the light in
electric fields due to charged particles in a plasma (see my page
http://www.physicsmyths.org.uk/redshift.htm ).

Thomas

"RT" == Ray Tomes writes:

RT In Prof Wright's well explained cosmology FAQ he has the following
RT question and answer:

RT Are quasars really at the large distances indicated by their
RT redshifts? The short answer is Yes. [...]

RT Why do cosmologists continue to interpret redshift as purely
RT cosmological? Why does Prof Wright not put this more substantial
RT counter-evidence in his FAQ and answer "NOT all of them" in even
RT bigger letters?

I'd point out that astronomers do not interpret redshifts as purely
cosmological. If you read any of the literature on the local
Universe, you'll find plenty of discussion on peculiar velocities.
Perhaps this question is better stated as, consider objects at "large"
redshifts, Is there any reason to think that they are not at their
cosmological distances? (Here "large" might mean z 0.5 or something
like that.)


I think that this is one of those issues that has moved into the
"extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" category. There
are various reasons for thinking that redshifts are largely
cosmological. For instance, gravitational lenses are always at lower
redshifts than the objects they are lensing, for cases in which the
redshifts of both are known. More importantly, various
redshift-independent distance estimates have been developed. These
redshift-independent distance estimates agree with the
redshift-derived distance.

I know this is going to sound pejorative, but I think that more than a
simple plot of angular separation and redshift is needed to rise to
the "extraordinary evidence" level. One needs a gravitational lens
with a larger redshift than the object being lensed or a blueshifted
object in a distant cluster or ....

--
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No means no, stop rape. | http://patriot.net/%7Ejlazio/
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Joseph Lazio wrote:
I'd point out that astronomers do not interpret redshifts as purely
cosmological. If you read any of the literature on the local
Universe, you'll find plenty of discussion on peculiar velocities.

Yes of course. I am happy to accept peculiar velocities.
I am referring to the bulk of the resdshift for high z.

I think that this is one of those issues that has moved into the
"extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" category. ...

I know this is going to sound pejorative, but I think that more than a
simple plot of angular separation and redshift is needed to rise to
the "extraordinary evidence" level.

It being a "simple plot" does not make it any less extraordinary.
Such a good fit over 4 orders of magnitude is rather difficult to
explain with big bang cosmology. Can you explain it?

One needs a gravitational lens
with a larger redshift than the object being lensed or a blueshifted
object in a distant cluster or ....

But if, as Arp claims, quasars always have correct through to
excessively high redshifts then you will never get a quasar with a lower
redshift behind a galaxy to be gravitationally lensed. Likewise, if they
are nearby low mass objects then they will not likely be lenses. Are
there any cases of quasars being a gravitational lens?

The situations that you describe are possibly carefully chosen to not
fail even if the other side in the argument is correct. :-)

regards
Ray Tomes
http://ray.tomes.biz/
http://www.cyclesresearchinstitute.org/

[Once upon a time ...]
"RT" == Ray Tomes writes:

RT Joseph Lazio wrote:

[What is required to convince the majority of astronomers that many or
even some quasars do not lie at the cosmological distances suggested
by their redshifts?]

One needs a gravitational lens with a larger redshift than the
object being lensed or a blueshifted object in a distant cluster or
....

RT But if, as Arp claims, quasars always have correct through to
RT excessively high redshifts then you will never get a quasar with a
RT lower redshift behind a galaxy to be gravitationally
RT lensed.

I'm not sure I follow this. My recollection of Arp's idea was that
the redshift had something to do with age. It's not obvious why that
should influence the possibility of gravitational lensing.

RT Likewise, if they are nearby low mass objects then they will not
RT likely be lenses. Are there any cases of quasars being a
RT gravitational lens?

That I don't know. However, astro-ph/0606084 (Hennawi & Prochaska)
appeared today. They discuss quasars close to the line of sight of
other quasars. They find incidences of absorption in the spectra of
quasars with the larger redshifts---the redshifts of the absorption are
close to those of the quasars with the smaller redshifts.

Of course, one could argue that there is no connection between the
absorping gas and the smaller-redshift quasar. However, it is quite
clear that the absorping gas must lie in front of the quasar with the
larger redshift.

One obvious missing item is whether they inspected the quasars with
the smaller redshifts for absorption close to the redshifts of the
larger redshift quasars. I suspect not, but I cannot quite tell from
this paper or from Hennawi et al. (2006, AJ, 131, 1), on which this
paper is based. However, one might want to look through the few
spectra provided in Hennawi et al. (2006) to see if there are any
incidences of "anomalous absorption."


In summary, this paper presents results that are consistent with the
notion that redshift is an accurate measure at least of relative
distance.

--
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Joseph, thanks for the email alerting me to this.

Joseph Lazio wrote:

RT But if, as Arp claims, quasars always have correct through to
RT excessively high redshifts then you will never get a quasar with a
RT lower redshift behind a galaxy to be gravitationally
RT lensed.

I'm not sure I follow this.

Well I have to admit that I didn't express it very well. :-)
I will have another shot after the next paragraph.

My recollection of Arp's idea was that
the redshift had something to do with age. It's not obvious why that
should influence the possibility of gravitational lensing.

Yes, he has two main components to redshift for quasars.
One is cosmological as for galaxies, the other (which also applies
to galaxies) is age defendant. Any galaxy starts life with a high
internal redshift (i.e low frequencies) and gradually comes into
line with other matter as light speed "communication" is established.
This communication may be taken to be exchange of energy through
standing waves relating to matter, i.e de Broglie waves.

Therefore all quasars are at lower distances than their redshift
implies (compared to galaxies). Therefore even quasars with high
redshift are not as likely as galaxies with the same redshift to
be found behind galaxies of any given redshift (because they are
really closer).

RT Likewise, if they are nearby low mass objects then they will not
RT likely be lenses. Are there any cases of quasars being a
RT gravitational lens?

That I don't know. However, astro-ph/0606084 (Hennawi & Prochaska)
appeared today. They discuss quasars close to the line of sight of
other quasars. They find incidences of absorption in the spectra of
quasars with the larger redshifts---the redshifts of the absorption are
close to those of the quasars with the smaller redshifts.

Any matter associated with a quasar should be expected to have a very
similar redshift and so this does not distinguish between the two
rival theories.

Of course, one could argue that there is no connection between the
absorping gas and the smaller-redshift quasar. However, it is quite
clear that the absorping gas must lie in front of the quasar with the
larger redshift.

Yes. Again, this is likely with either theory.

One obvious missing item is whether they inspected the quasars with
the smaller redshifts for absorption close to the redshifts of the
larger redshift quasars. I suspect not, but I cannot quite tell from
this paper or from Hennawi et al. (2006, AJ, 131, 1), on which this
paper is based. However, one might want to look through the few
spectra provided in Hennawi et al. (2006) to see if there are any
incidences of "anomalous absorption."

Yes this is a test that does distinguish. Under Arp & Narlikar theory,
it is possible for this situation to arise, but not under big bang
theory. However it is still much less likely, so it would need a
decent sized sample to be tested to expect any positives.

In summary, this paper presents results that are consistent with the
notion that redshift is an accurate measure at least of relative
distance.

Well, the low scatter of galaxy redshift versus distance estimates
shows that the distances are reliable. The very high scatter of
quasar redshifts show that either:

a. Quasar distance estimates are terrible inaccurate. OR

b. Quasars have a very high range of true brightnesses.

Of course the big bang requires the second alternative, whereas Arp's
ideas would allow the first to be true.

For some time I have thought about a test for this. There are some
real possibilities. For example, in the line of sight quasars near
galaxies with much lower redshift, if Arp is right then the quasars
should have a lower scatter when plotted versus the galaxy distance
(which is their true distance), whereas in big bang theory the
whole thing was a random co-incidence and so the scatter would be
worse. Do you agree that such a test is possible with existing data
on line of sight galaxy-quasar pairs from Arp or Burbidge papers?

--
Ray Tomes
http://ray.tomes.biz/
http://www.cyclesresearchinstitute.org/