Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

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Michael Mozina
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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Tue Apr 11, 2017 10:05 am

SelfSim:

Overall 'Gripes'
The point came to mind that MM's gripe about how the non-visually emitting cause (BHs inspiralling), whilst providing no observables other than h(t), in fact does have supporting evidence coming from theory.
So what? Other 'triggers' of similar events have supporting evidence from *empirical testing*! All you have is a curve fitting exercise that can modified to fit a *wide variety* of potential signals. LIGO even cited one "blip transient" that most closely matched a "black hole/neutron star" signal. What they didn't have is any *external verification* for celestial origin claims. Any *other* potential cause of the signal was *eliminated* based on a lack of external support, but they gave their own claim a *FREE PASS* instead!

You don't have "supporting evidence", you have a "mathematical curve fitting exercise that could match all sorts of signals. With all the variables you can "tweak", you might match almost *any* signal.
This is surely why LIGO considers eliminating all known local causes (based on lack of evidence for them),
Ya, but they *cheated* by not applying that same process of elimination to their *own claim*! There's a complete lack of visual and neutrino evidence for gravitational waves, or for even a celestial origin of the signal in question. If they had followed the same process of elimination, they should have eliminated celestial origin clams based upon a lack of evidence from any external resource, and we'd end up with a signal without an identified source. Instead they simply changed the rules with respect to their own claims, cheated, and called it a "discovery" instead.
and whatever is left, ie: the theoretical possibility of BH inspiralling GWs, is following a perfectly legitimate scientific process.
Sure, as long as they applied the *same process of elimination*! If for instance they had a *visual confirmation* of a celestial event, *then* it would make sense to talk about the source of the signal as being related to gravitational waves. Since they have *zero* confirmation either from neutrinos or from visual verification, celestial origin claims should have been *eliminated*.
This is not the same as what MM is complaining about, because there is theoretical evidence, which is of course, completely ignored by EU acolytes (and MM).
It's not theoretical evidence. It's just a curve fitting exercise that can be modified to fit a *large number* of various signals. That's not evidence of *probability*. At best case it is just evidence of a *possibility*. I accept it's *possible* that gravitational waves are a potential cause of such a signal. I don't accept the claim that it's "probable" however without any sort of external corroboration. Lots of potential things might fit that save curve, and in fact I sited a paper that shows the same signal is related to ordinary background noise from the US power grid *in both cases* no less.
There are so many reasons as to why the lack of a visual event doesn’t impact on the validity of the discovery:
The only reason is "confirmation bias". They didn't apply the same standards of "evidence" to their own claim as they applied to every other potential cause of the signal. Every *other* potential cause was *rejected* based upon a lack of external corroboration. Only in the *single case* of celestial origin claims did they *ignore/skip* that same process of elimination. That is pure confirmation bias on a stick!
i) An associated electromagnetic (visual) event isn’t compulsory if the BH merger occurs in the absence an accretion disk.
Sure, you could make any type of excuse that you want for your lack of *evidence* of celestial origin of that signal. You can rationalize it a million different ways if you like. Now you need not only two *hypothetical* entities, you need two *special* hypothetical entities. They can't be charged, and they have to both be "naked". It's damn unlikely that an event would release the energy equivalent of three solar masses in gravity waves alone in just 1/4 second and not light up the sky like a Christmas tree. A charged black hole merger might release *more* energy in the EM spectrum than in gravitational waves. You're just making excuses from where I sit.
Also BH mergers don’t produce bright gamma ray bursts, as this would require that one or both objects, would have to be neutron star(s);
The overall brightness probably would depend on their charge, and the amount of plasma in the accretion disks around each object. So what? Nobody claimed this job would be easy. It's not my fault that you can't produce any evidence that supports a celestial origin of this signal or *any* subsequent claim either. Why is that? Two "lucky" instances where only uncharged naked black holes did it?
ii) As MM himself admits, to accurately pinpoint the source requires more than two GW detectors;
True. I even support more LIGO detectors, but I absolutely won't support sloppy science. With three or more detectors you should be able to triangulate the signal to a "point" rather than a "swath". In that case you have *no excuse under the sun* to *not* get some type of confirmation.
iii) If the visual event is faint then it falls within the range of large observatory telescopes. Observatory telescopes only cover a limited region of the sky and the probability of a visual GW event falling within the field of view of a CCD detector must be very small;
They've had more than year to look through every visual and neutrino data set, and they have found exactly *zero* evidence that the signal is celestial in origin. It's not my fault that the job is "difficult" and cheating the system isn't really an acceptable alternative. If they couldn't provide any evidence of it being celestial in origin they should have eliminated their own claim too and categorized the signal as "unknown in origin". They didn't. They cheated.
iv) The gravitational wave strain amplitude falls off as an inverse distance function and visual brightness, as inverse distance squared. Hence for large distances, the visual brightness can fall below detection limits, no(?)
Wouldn't gravitation wave strength diminish with distance too?
Reason for Veto Removal:
Oh, and for the record, LIGO has already disclosed the reasons for the Veto removal, (in spite of MM's denials/misunderstandings of what is clearly stated in the quote below):

From page 10 LIGO Magazine Issue 8 ..

Originally Posted by Urban, Essick
At 11:23:20 UTC, an analyst follow-up determined which auxiliary channels were associated with iDQ’s decision. It became clear that these were uncalibrated versions of h(t) which had not been flagged as “unsafe” and were only added to the set of available low latency channels after the start of ER8. Based on the safety of the channels, the Data Quality Veto label was removed within 2.5 hours and analyses proceeded after re-starting by hand.
How "safe"? Was it 80 percent safe, 90 percent safe, or 5.1 sigma "safe"? The fact they *misrepresented* the veto at all is a serious problem. They should have acknowledged that the signal in question originally failed the data quality veto test. They should have explained *why* this exact signal was rejected with high confidence and which auxiliary hardware caused the veto so anyone and everyone had the ability to check their *human safety choice*. How can anyone do that now? LIGO won't even answer my questions. How do they know it was "safe". What triggered the veto? What hardware was involved in the veto? Why did it achieve a "high confidence" rejection? Why didn't they *explain all of this* in the paper?

The simply *lied* when they claimed in February of 2016 that no vetoes took place within an hour of the event. Why? Why not give a *complete and honest* account of events for the peer reviewers to decide for themselves what is "safe" and what's not safe? Why misrepresent the facts at all? It's pretty damn obvious why. If they had told the truth, and admitted that they signal failed the VETO test they would have had to justify that claim of "safety" to a 5.1 sigma level of confidence, and we all know full well that would be *impossible* given the fact it was *vetoed* with high confidence. They added that h(t) veto for a reason, and they didn't explain anything about it in the published paper. They gave the false impression (and testimony) that *no vetoes* took place so they could avoid any scrutiny about that veto.

I'm pretty sure this is the first astronomy paper I've ever read that contained *false information*. That's simply bizarre and it's unethical.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Tue Apr 11, 2017 3:03 pm

Jeantate:

I forgot to comment on this part.

MM certainly knew of this second detection (or should have known); that this is not covered in his document is ... strange. After all, it goes to the heart of this sections 5 ("Confidence from black hole calculations") and 6 ("Confirmation Bias"), does it not? Besides, it's the sort of thing a reviewer would likely pick up on, so why ignore it?
I didn't ignore it. In fact, earlier in this thread I cited a paper that looked at *both* events and which was able to link *both* events back to basic electrical grid background noise.

http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInfor ... erID=71246

Did you miss that link? Is it just pure coincidence in your opinion that *both* signals can be linked back to background noise cycles from the US power grid? Why would that be the case Jean? Why would the signal align itself in sync with the background noise from the power grid? Pure dumb luck in *both* instances? What are the odds?
The glitches displayed in Gravity Spy are sonograms, with time on the x-axis, and frequency on the y, with a logarithmic scale. The max frequency is ~2k Hz, and Whistles are typically between ~400 and 1800 Hz. These are the beat frequencies between MHz radio signals and the VCO's ones
I'm not personally attached to any particular explanation for the signal you know. You'll note that "blip transients" occur in the same frequency range of this event, they have a similar duration, and they created signals that 'fit" your mass merger models. Figure 12 even shows the graph of one of them which fit a black hole/neutron star merger pattern. It's far more likely that whatever the "cause" of blip transients, it's also the "cause" of those two signals. After reading that cited paper, I'm inclined to believe it's a power grid related phenomenon.
I think Brian says, in one of the 444 comments, that his policy is to never edit ... posted comments appear as written (including typos etc), or they do not appear.
So what? He just *banned* every single individual that pointed out his *bonehead* error. I didn't accuse Koberlein of editing my posts, I accused him of lying his ass off and banning everyone that noticed and commented on his unethical error. Are you really so professionally incompetent as to believe that Thrornhill's (Jeurgen''s) solar model predicts "no neutrinos"? Really? Why the hell are you citing a blatant liar Jean?

I tried several times to get Koberlein to quote a reference that used the term "no neutrinos". I suppose that I'll see that quote about the same time as I see Clinger's non-zero *rate* of reconnection formula in a vacuum eh? Never!
He also seems to have an admirable approach, not dissimilar to that of Phil Plait in the original Bad Astronomy forum: if your commenting history shows you continue to ignore what Brian posts in response, you will likely be quickly banned.
Nobody ignored Koberlein's posts, we just pointed out the obvious error and got banned for our efforts. Phil banned me at "Bad Astronomy" (aptly named) after *months* of answering as many questions as I could honestly answer about Birkeland's solar model. You guys cannot even explain that slow solar convection problem in your *own solar model*! Give me a break. You guys silence by force those who you cannot silence by BS.
And yes, leaving the pro-EU posts in the 444 does serve as a wonderful educational resource ... as many who have dropped by (and read!) have said.
You really believe that a blog page with a blatant *bush league* error in the *very first* argument is a "wonderful educational resource"? Where's your reference that any EU/PC solar theory predicts "no neutrinos"? You have no scientific integrity whatsoever. You *should* be busting Koberlein's chops over his ignorant error, not advertising his pure stupidity as well as your own! Do any of you *really* believe that Thornhill predicted that the sun emits no neutrinos? Really? Be honest Jean. Where's your quote to support that nonsense?
This is particular appropriate, considering that indirect detection of GWR is well-attested (and got Hulse and Taylor their Nobels). Further, the GWR waveform of an inspiral is relatively easy to calculate (from theory), and is very distinctive.
It's not that distinctive since blip transients make the same basic pattern. There are all sorts of "variables" to play with in those models, so much so that you can fit a *variety* of different wave forms, including those made by very ordinary "blip transients".
AFAIK, no other source of GWR has been indirectly detected, and other proposed sources do not have such easily derived GWR waveforms (well, I guess a 'neutron star mountain' might). This makes detecting them more difficult; I guess the best chance - within the frequency range LIGO is sensitive to - would be a nearby asymmetric supernova, which would have the added benefit of being easily observable.
So why cry wolf over "invisible" events?
You can also add that rather a lot of interesting things, astrophysics-wise, are not easily visible due to dust, either in our own galaxy or the host one. On top of that, there's source confusion ... parts of the sky where there are vast numbers of sources (e.g. stars in the plane of the Milky Way).
Excuses, excuses, excuses as to why they gave celestial origin claims a free pass and offered us *no way at all* to eliminate them as a source of a signal as they did with *every* other potential source. The very fact that there is no category for "unknown origin" is direct evidence of confirmation bias. The very fact they didn't allow for or offer any way to eliminate celestial origin claims from consideration is another example of confirmation bias in action. Every *other* possible source of the signal was *eliminated* from consideration when no external confirmation existed. Only celestial origin claims are exempt from any type of elimination process. That's pure confirmation bias on a stick.

I think it's very telling Jean that you keep defending and citing Koberlein as a reference. His error is undeniable as evidenced by the fact that *none of you* are able to quote anyone that claimed that EU/PC solar models predict "no neutrinos". Koberlein flat out lied about that issue, and you keep patting him on the back for lying through his teeth. You have *no* scientific credibility or you'd be busting his chops, not citing his blog and claiming that it is' a "wonderful educational resource". It's only wonderful resource to someone who doesn't give a damn about truth. It's only a wonderful resource of *disinformation* about EU/PC theory. I suspect that 's why you like it in fact. It's dishonest as hell, and that makes you happy.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Wed Apr 12, 2017 10:51 am

Seflsim:

Yes .. its an obvious question which is completely unanswered in his paper.
Subsequent foot-shuffling and pointing at other questionable papers, is yet another diversionary tactic aimed at covering up the oversight in his original paper, (IMO).

(MM frequently practises such tactics ... he seems to assume others can't see through it for some strange reason ..)
What a bunch of hogwash. My paper and my list of criticisms applies to *all* LIGO claims of the "discovery/observation" of gravitational waves which are *devoid* of visual or neutrino confirmation. It's not a "coincidence" IMO that *both* of their claims are devoid of empirical support. Until they stop playing the confirmation bias game, the same criticisms apply to *every* gravitational wave claim that they might come up with. I left open the possibility for a *real* discovery that enjoys some external visual or neutrino support of the claim, but my very same criticisms apply to *both* gravitational claims, not just the first one.

About the only criticism in my paper that doesn't necessarily apply to the second gravitational wave paper (I assume) is the conflicting accounts of data quality veto events. All the rest of my points apply to the second paper too. Both papers and both claims suffer from a serious case of confirmation bias.
Yes the purpose of characterising (and classifying) the attributes of these sonograms from known sources, is surely to provide a high statistical probability that they aren't involved when declaring detections of signals from GW sources. For example, IIRC, blip transients were already characterised when the first signal was detected (and was included in the LIGO report as being similar, but quite distinct from the first GW150914 event, and the subsequent GW151226 event too, I think?)
How exactly did they classify all possible blip transients *before* they even finished the "engineering" run"? How do they know that the signal in question wasn't a "blip transient" if they were just testing out the upgraded equipment? Figure 12 demonstrates that blip transients have the same wave form pattern and the same duration as "merging objects". They even cite an example of one such blip transient event that matches a "black hole/neutron star" merger signal. Without even completing the engineering run for all this upgraded equipment, how could they possibly know that they've even seen everything they might see related to blip transients?

I'd be more impressed with that particular argument if they had six months of real data collection and classification under their belt after the major upgrades. As it stands however, they weren't even out of the *engineering* run yet, so their "classifications" are based on *extremely limited* data.
Yes .. the argument by repetition, when used as an 'assault weapon', (as it often is by certain EU zealots), requires the 'stronger measures' you mention.
The only reason you ban EU/PC proponents is because you simply cannot handle an open and honest scientific debate. Koberlein *definitely* can't handle an *honest* debate. You're peddling four supernatural constructs, while claiming that empirical physics is "woo". You're so unethical in debate that you all focus on *people*, not ideas. RC is the poster child of unethical debate and he's the attack dog for EU/PC haters. You refuse to put him on a leash at ISF, although it looks like CF finally got tired of his personal attack crap.

That's why you're bashing EU theory and going all personal in the GW thread too rather than just addressing the points that I made. It's so much easier to go the ad-hom route in debate. You're not fooling anyone. You're all forced to avoid me in public debate, because you can't handle me in a public debate, and we all know it. Otherwise you'd just go over to CF and blow up my paper with actual "science". Since you can't do that, you hide behind boards that don't allow me to directly respond. EU/PC haters are a bunch of scientifically illiterate wimps as evidenced by their constant citations to "blogs" with *glaring scientific errors*!
Yes .. and overall, it seems completely ridiculuous to downplay, (or completely ignore), the entire backdrop which underpins the design of the LIGO observatories when, lo and behold, it detects exactly what it was tuned to detect!
But gravitational waves are not the only thing that LIGO "detects" however. If all it ever detected or was influenced by were gravitational waves, you might have a point. Those "blip transients" however demonstrate that LIGO "detects" all sorts of things that have *nothing* to do with gravitational waves.

You'll note that unlike the authors from the other paper that I cited, I gave the LIGO team a completely free pass with respect to the legitimacy of GR theory *and* with respect to all the hardware. All I focused on were the *biased methods*, and the conflicting accounts of veto events, not the technology or the theory.
A reasonable onlooker who has not been intimately involved in all of the various design decisions, who then reads news of a detection, would surely not typically assume a position of being an authority on the process used in detecting it(?)
I wasn't involved in that BICEP2 fiasco either, but I easily (first read through) picked out the specific section of their published paper that was destined to blow up in their face. Since nobody had public access to any of the Planck data that was necessary to refute their claim, the folks involved in Planck had to do it. Even still, any amateur could see the huge problems with respect to claiming to have eliminated all dust and syncrotron radiation contamination based on a *single* Planck image.

I gave LIGO the benefit of the doubt at first, until I read that LIGO magazine account of events and realized that the peer reviewers (and I) had been *duped* by the LIGO team with respect to VETO events. Then I became a lot less impressed with their "authority". They haven't even responded to my questions about those conflicting accounts either.

I did give LIGO the benefit of the doubt everywhere that I could do so. Unfortunately however, they simply cheated in terms of their method. The confirmation bias problem is undeniable, and it applies to *all* future claims which have no empirical visual or neutrino support.
The reports issued by the LIGO team were intended for a peer-review audience .. and not an audience seeking to justify their own conspiracy theories and beliefs (such as the veto over-ride conspiracy theory).
How is that a "conspiracy"? How exactly is it my fault that LIGO flat out lied about there being no vetoes within an hour of the event in the published and supposedly "peer reviewed" account? I didn't write either the published version of events, or the LIGO magazine account of events surrounding the veto of this specific signal. They don't match. How on Earth is that my fault?
The latter folks should be trying to quantify and justify from theory, the generation of neutrinos in their own pet solar models (for eg).
Why bother when you folks simply flat out lie about the neutrino predictions we've already put out there? Who *within* the EU/PC community ever claimed that any EU/PC solar model predicts "no neutrinos"? You folks don't care about facts.
I'm pretty sure Brian (and the rest of us) would be interested in actually seeing such a formally articulated (and agreed) EU solar model in the first place!
I'm pretty sure that Koberlein would simply lie about it if we did. I've yet to see any of you formally articulate the reason that you missed the solar convection speeds by two whole orders of magnitude. I'd love to see that explanation too, but alas you folks avoid that topic like the plague.
Tom Bridgman attempted to address all the models he was aware of, and still awaits answers to his challenges AFAIK. (Apologies .. I'm pretty sure you're already aware of this anyway).
Oh, I'm quite aware of Bridgman's *false* claims about Birkeland's solar model, and I've busted his chops in public over his misrepresentations of his work too:

http://thunderbolts.info/wp/forum/phpBB3/v ... =3&t=15939

I even handed your hero a quote from Birkeland himself that directly refuted Bridgman's claim that Birkeland predicted that only electrons come from the sun. Bridgman ignored that paper and he and ignored his error. Birkeland *never* promoted "three" solar models. Bridgman made up that erroneous crap too. What a putz.

It's really quite telling (and rather sad) that you folks keep citing individuals who have no clue what their talking about with respect to EU/PC theory. Birkeland only supported *one* solar model, specifically a *cathode* solar model. Birkeland predicted from experimentation that *both* types of charged particles came from the sun and flowed into the Earth. He even wrote a whole paper about the solar wind content which I have cited for Bridgman. Bridgman's particle flow diagram is totally FUBAR, and he flat out lied about Birkeland having "three" solar models. Bridgman doesn't acknowledge or correct his errors anymore than Koberlein fixes his blunders. Throw in Sara Scoles and you've got the perfect trifecta of clueless EU/PC haters that apparently know *absolutely nothing* about EU/PC theory, and who evidently prefer to *misrepresent* the ideas rather than to present them ethically and fairly.
(I have also seen such challenges put to the TBolts forum in the past, and the poor poster was summarily banned for pointing out that the lack of such an objectified model left the EU exposed to accusations of pseudoscience. So much for being open to constructive criticism!)
Pots and Kettles. How many times have you folks banned me from various websites over the past decade? You can't handle any criticisms of your beliefs at all without going for the ban button. I didn't even pick on your supernatural LCDM nonsense at "Bad Astronomy", but Phil banned me anyway just for discussing Birkeland's solar model there. You folks have *zero* right to complain about being banned here, particularly when you keep citing individuals who have willfully misrepresented our models and you refer to them as "wonderful references". Oy Vey. Are you folks really that clueless about EU solar models, or are you all just that unethical? Which is it?

The fact that you even refer to empirical physics as "pseudoscience" just shows how out of touch with reality that you've become. Right or wrong, all EU/PC theories can be tested in the lab. That's far better than can be said for LCDM theory. None of your crap shows up in the lab, and none of it is falsifiable in the lab or exotic dark matter claims would be long dead by now.
Somewhat amusingly, the Ulianov etal paper referenced by MM in support of his revised feelings on what LIGO detected, (ie: speculation that a power grid issue affected the GW signal detection), actually contains virtually opposing views to those articulated by MM in his own paper!

For example:

i) Ulianov etal have stated, in no uncertain terms, that LIGO's mainstream GR and numerical relativity interpretations are wrong. However MM has stated he accepts GR theory.

ii) Ulianov etal seem to think the power grid issue is the result of a technical oversight. MM, on the other hand, claims it’s due to LIGO's incompetence/dishonesty.

It is easy to conclude from the above contradictions that the Ulianov etal paper, seems to be yet another afterthought by MM, (ie: akin to his previous 'whistler waves' one), rather than his rather dishonest portrayal of the paper somehow being central to his own ideas(?)
Huh? Their paper is *not* central to any of my criticisms or my paper in general. Unlike those authors, I gave the LIGO folks every possible benefit of the doubt with respect to GR theory itself, and with respect to the LIGO hardware and technology. My confirmation bias criticisms apply to *both* gravitational wave papers because you don't have any visual confirmation of either claim.

I didn't even really try to offer a specific explanation for the signal because I really don't know for sure what caused it. I only cited their work because I originally "guessed" that the signal in question was probably related to whistler waves in the upper atmosphere of the Earth, but their paper offers a "better" explanation for both signals IMO. They were able to show a correlation to the background noise of the US power grid that I never caught, and LIGO never caught either. I just think they're probably right on that one specific point. They could be right about other things related to GR theory and the LIGO equipment for all I know too, but it doesn't matter one iota with respect to the methodology problems that I cited in my paper. My criticisms still apply either way.

I suspect that if you actually had a valid argument about any of the points that I raised, I'd have heard them by now. Instead I'm seeing a pattern of personal attacks and citations to EU hater blogs where EU theory is being *blatantly misrepresented* by those clueless individuals.

Do you have any valid criticisms of my paper from a *scientific* perspective, yes or no? If so, I haven't seen any. All I've seen so far is ad-homs, insults and nonsense.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Wed Apr 12, 2017 11:28 am

JeanTate:

Yeah. I think an awful lot of people would be delighted to see an even half-way decent, coherent, internally consistent EU model of anything (not a regurgitation of old stuff, like Peratt's galaxy evolution ideas)!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m58-CfVrsN4

Unlike your pseudoscientific nonsense, Birkeland's solar model actually works in the lab. It's not a "regurgitation" to note the fact that something *works*. It's also pointless to reinvent the wheel when good examples already exist. Obviously you don't know squat about the EU solar models as they've been described by their original authors or you would not be citing Bridgman and Koberlein and erroneously claiming that they are "wonderful educational resources".

Do you even have an internally consistent solar model that explains *slow* solar convection as observed by SDO yet? Yes? No? Maybe next year?

I'd *love* to see public funds spent on redoing Birkeland's full body of experiments with upgraded gear, but alas you keep blowing all our public lunch money hunting for invisible snipes that never show up in any lab experiments in *spite of* your "predictions" which turned out to be worthless.
Especially, for this thread, an EU model of what everyone else calls an inspiral caused by GWR, whether binary pulsars or stellar mass black hole mergers.
Everyone in the EU community and every ethical scientist calls a data quality veto a data quality veto. Pots and kettles.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by comingfrom » Wed Apr 12, 2017 4:48 pm

We get accused of using popsci for primary source of info on EU.
Koberlain's anti-EU popsci blog is their proof of that.

When we do reference a paper,
then they say we're pointing to questionable papers.

They prefer popsci, and are as selective on science papers as we are,
and accuse us of what they themselves are guilty of.
Confirmation bias.

The beautiful thing about believing in an EU, which they shall never comprehend,
is that we get a lot more confirmation for our bias than they ever will :P
~Paul

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Wed Apr 12, 2017 6:30 pm

comingfrom wrote:We get accused of using popsci for primary source of info on EU.
Koberlain's anti-EU popsci blog is their proof of that.

When we do reference a paper,
then they say we're pointing to questionable papers.

They prefer popsci, and are as selective on science papers as we are,
and accuse us of what they themselves are guilty of.
Confirmation bias.

The beautiful thing about believing in an EU, which they shall never comprehend,
is that we get a lot more confirmation for our bias than they ever will :P
~Paul
The fact that the EU/PC haters keep referring to a "popsci" blog entry which contains *bonehead* errors as a "wonderful educational resource " just goes to demonstrate that EU/PC haters are either professionally and scientifically incompetent, or they have no ethics whatsoever.

In Koberlein's specific case, his problem is clearly related to his complete lack of ethics. I specifically asked Koberlein several times for an actual citation that stated that any EU/PC solar model predicted "no neutrinos" and I never got one. He blamed Findlay for his ridiculous error but Findlay's PDF doesn't even mention the term "neutrino". Scott and Thornhill which are also cited as references for Koberlein's popsci article *do* mention the term neutrino and they both made it perfectly clear that Koberlein flat out lied about EU/PC predicting "no neutrinos" from the sun. Both Thornhill and Scott predicted the emission of neutrinos from near the surface of the photosphere that varied with sunspot activity.

How can the EU/PC haters even be that professionally incompetent? I think they all just have a complete lack of moral integrity or they'd be busting Koberlein's chops to fix his error. Bridgman simply "made up" his erroneous claims about the solar wind content and directional flow of Birkeland's solar model and Bridgman refuses to fix or retract his errors too. It's definitely an ethics problem IMO.

That false claim by LIGO that "no data quality vetoes were active within an hour of the event" also demonstrates a complete lack of professional and scientific ethics. The LIGO group refuses explain their conflicting statements. The Physics Forum wouldn't even let me ask any public questions about the two conflicting account of events. I'm definitely seeing a very ugly pattern in their behaviors.

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I got a response from LIGO

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Thu Apr 13, 2017 2:29 pm

FYI, LIGO was kind enough to respond to my email today. They sent me a slightly more verbose, but not much more informative explanation of the veto event surrounding GW150914 which pretty much mirrors the account of events as described in LIGO magazine. If you're interested in their actual response, PM me and I'll send you a copy of their email.

In retrospect, and in fairness to LIGO, my original email to LIGO and my list of questions was a little too vague. LIGO's email was certainly responsive to my original list of questions, and I appreciate the fact that they took the time to answer my email.

I sent a second email to them today asking how I might go about getting a copy of the actual software that caused the original veto and a list of the specific auxiliary hardware channels that were associated with the original veto. I'll keep you posted......

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by comingfrom » Thu Apr 13, 2017 5:16 pm

Thank you, Michael.
FYI, LIGO was kind enough to respond to my email today. They sent me a slightly more verbose, but not much more informative explanation of the veto event surrounding GW150914 which pretty much mirrors the account of events as described in LIGO magazine.
So they are going on with the story that contradicts the account in their official paper. Interesting.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Mon Apr 17, 2017 2:31 pm

I found it interesting too, particularly after they made this comment about the veto and the signal:
We still have no evidence that GW150914 came from any terrestrial source.
They also have no evidence that it came from any extraterrestrial/celestial source either.

That's the whole problem here in a nutshell IMO. Ultimately they have no evidence to support any specific conclusion as to the cause of the signal. The signal should have been labelled 'unknown" in terms of the cause, but instead they simply "assumed' that they could and/or should exclude the need for external corroboration as it relates to celestial origin claims. They are employing a blatant double standard with respect to "evidence".

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There's just no getting around the confirmatoin bias problem

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Tue Apr 18, 2017 1:23 pm

Well........

Based on the responses that I gotten from LIGO thus far, it does seem as though there was in fact a data quality veto that took place within a few seconds of the signal being sent to the GraceDB database. The veto was eventually overridden after it was deemed 'safe'/'unsafe', although no mathematical quantification of the term "safe" has been offered. How safe? 80 percent sate? 95 percent safe? 5.1 sigma safe?

Even if I give everyone the benefit of the doubt with respect to the veto in question, there's still no quantified likelihood of the signal being related to gravitational waves that is actually offered in the LIGO paper. The fuzzy sigma argument still applies.

While LIGO continues to maintain that there is no external evidence that the signal is related to environmental influences, there's also no external evidence that the signal in question is celestial in origin. We're right back to square one.

Because they changed the process of elimination method with respect to celestial origin claims, the confirmation bias problem still exists in their method, no matter how much 'benefit of the doubt' that I choose to give them with respect to the data quality veto of this signal. I'm not sure where to go from here with respect to the main argument of my paper. I've yet to hear a valid or quantified mathematical argument to suggest that the signal in question must necessarily be related to a celestial event.

If they had followed their own process of elimination method consistently, this signal should have ended up in the 'unknown origin' category, not the "gravitational waves did it" category. The fact that they changed the process of elimination rules with respect to their own claims still shoots their whole argument in the foot regardless of the outcome of the veto debate.

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Too big to fail?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Mon Apr 24, 2017 10:46 am

After dumping over a billion dollars into the LIGO program over the past four decades, it seems highly doubtful that this gravitational wave 'discovery' is going to be overturned or reexamined anytime soon. I'm pretty sure that they'll just reward their dishonest portrayal of data quality veto events of GW150914, and award the LIGO team the Nobel Prize this year while simply turn a blind eye to the *numerous* problems in their paper.

My 'doubt" and my "question" is more about the long term implications of not having any visual/external corroboration for gravitational waves. How many times can they get away with trying to claim that "naked black holes did it"? Isn't it going to look rather "suspicious" after awhile if they can't visually confirm their claims?

If the signals in question are in fact associated with power grid related activity in the US, or other localized EM influences, will they even be able to pick up such an event from three or more detectors?

Are they counting on naked black hole mergers being "standard operating procedure" * for the next four decades? How are they going to explain these types of events if they only show up in two out of three detectors? Will such potential events undermine their own confidence in their previous claims? It seems to me that LIGO is painting themselves into a corner by "doubling down" on their original claim without visual support by making another claim without any visual support.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Zyxzevn » Mon Apr 24, 2017 2:22 pm

This is the raw data coming from the LIGO:
Image
click for large version


The signal that we see everywhere in the raw signal, is clearly an amplitude modulated signal.
The wave goes up and down with slowly varying amplitudes.

The modulation frequency seems to be caused by the circular system that they built.
The light from the laser returns after many bounces back to the origin, the laser,
where it is used again. This is a power-amplification trick.
This light follows a path of around 1120 km, which corresponds with a frequency of c/1120= 268 Hz.
And this is exactly what we see. A persistent resonating signal that is
around 268 Hz or half of that.
The full signal can be caused by the laser power being enhanced by the returning light,
and the half-signal can be caused by the laser-power being reduced by the returning light.
This depends on how stable the laser and its components really are.
Both frequencies seem to be present at different times. Maybe this is temperature dependent.

Looking through the papers, as far I could tell, the researchers seem to model all disturbances as white-noise.
So they simply ignored this resonating signal.

In AM modulation, the modulation frequency spreads out over wide area.
This means that the signal frequency range in which they they were looking,
overlaps with the signal that is already persistent in the system.
Worse: the claimed GW-signal is very close to the modulation signal (half-signal).

If you want to remove the AM modulation signal,
you can not simply use a Fourier transformation filter.

Yet this is what they used.
It only works with real white noise, and even then it introduces a big uncertainty.

As far I can tell, the scientists did not correct the probability factors (sigma) for uncertainties
added due to the fourier-transformation, and the filtering.

Additionally, the AM modulation causes an extra problem. The frequency signature is very similar
to that of a chirp. A chirp is also an AM (and FM) modulated signal in its bare essence.

What if the lasers changed their modulation frequencies at about the same time?
Due to temperature-change or power-change or whatever.
Wouldn't that create two chirps?
Yes. Indeed.

Does anyone else know anything about signal processing or AM-radio waves?
It might be interesting to filter out the AM wave properly, and see what is underneath.
More ** from zyxzevn at: Paradigm change and C@

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by comingfrom » Mon Apr 24, 2017 5:05 pm

there is theoretical evidence
supporting evidence coming from theory
and whatever is left, ie: the theoretical possibility of BH inspiralling GWs, is following a perfectly legitimate scientific process.
SelfSim helps us to see how they justify themselves
(and how lame their justification is).

In theory they have evidence for their claim and, in their theory, theoretical evidence is as good as actual evidence.
And they are claiming that a discovery using only theoretical evidence is perfect legitimate science.

I think this is where we (EU) beg to differ with them (mainstream).
I think we here feel that a legitimate scientific discovery should have more than just theoretical evidence.

~Paul

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Tue Apr 25, 2017 8:20 am

comingfrom wrote:
there is theoretical evidence
supporting evidence coming from theory
and whatever is left, ie: the theoretical possibility of BH inspiralling GWs, is following a perfectly legitimate scientific process.
SelfSim helps us to see how they justify themselves
(and how lame their justification is).

In theory they have evidence for their claim and, in their theory, theoretical evidence is as good as actual evidence.
And they are claiming that a discovery using only theoretical evidence is perfect legitimate science.

I think this is where we (EU) beg to differ with them (mainstream).
I think we here feel that a legitimate scientific discovery should have more than just theoretical evidence.

~Paul
Obviously you're right about their reliance upon theoretical forms of evidence, but that's pretty much par for the course with astronomy today. They don't have any *direct empirical* cause/effect evidence to support *any* of the absurd claims of the LCDM model.

In "theory", something like "expanding space" might cause photon redshift, so in their mind any form of observed redshift from space must be interpreted as evidence to support their space expansion "hypothesis" and all other options have to be ridiculed and rejected. Likewise, "theoretically" speaking, exotic forms of matter might be "invisible" to the EM spectrum. They might bend light too just like ordinary matter. Exotic forms of matter might exist that emit gamma rays or x-rays when they decay. Therefore any missing mass which they can't account for has to be "evidence" of exotic forms of matter and various gamma rays from space must be related to exotic matter. "Theoretically" something called "dark energy" might cause space to accelerate over time. Same dance, different tune. Black holes might 'theoretically" merge and generate gravitational waves too, so any signal that fits with that "theory" has to be evidence to support gravitational waves. It's all one gigantic circular feedback loop, and it's all one big affirming the consequent fallacy on a stick.

There are *multiple* possible forms of inelastic scattering that are *known causes* of photon redshift. There are many ordinary forms of matter that can cause gravitational lensing too. There are multiple ways to explain this signal too, but they aren't interested in any *empirical* explanation for any of those observations.

I think however that this is the first time that I've even seen flat out deception used with respect to the core of the claim that is being made. Until this LIGO paper, I've never seen the mainstream simply misrepresent the data and/or the historical facts *intentionally* with the express intent of supporting their claim. That is a new ethical low AFAIK.

I have to admit that I'm simply blown away at the anemic response that I've seen toward my criticisms of LIGO thus far at ISF, and CF. The mainstream really doesn't have any defense of the numerous errors in the LIGO paper. Starting with the fuzzy sigma problem, and ending with the blatant confirmation bias problem, they've simply have no logical defense or they would have offered it by now.

I thought the original "dark energy" claim was bad enough because it was based upon so little data and pure "theoretical evidence", but this claim of the discovery of gravitational waves is the cheesiest and least scientifically ethical claim that I've seen them make yet. Even worse, I'm almost certain they'll reward this "junk science" with yet another Nobel Prize this year.

I don't think the mainstream even understands the difference between "theoretical evidence" and real empirical evidence. They are one and the same concept in their mind, so their entire argument ends up being a circular affirming the consequent fallacy every single time. That's why they can award a Nobel Prize based on nothing but affirming the consequent fallacies, and pure confirmation bias.

I frankly think that there is so much pressure to come up with a 'win', they're willing to stoop to just about anything to get it.

I'm open to the possibility of actually discovering gravitational waves, but this kind of junk science is just pitiful IMO. I thought the BICEP2 claim was bad, but at least they didn't misrepresent the data.

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Re: Evidence of Gravitational Waves, or Confirmation Bias?

Unread post by Michael Mozina » Tue Apr 25, 2017 10:26 am

Selfsim:

There appears to be a case of: 'the blind leading the even blinder' recently over at the holy house of electric horrors.
Ya know.....

It's quite telling IMO that you're reduced to personal attacks when trying to deal with this issue. Nobody here is promoting *multiple* invisible supernatural constructs, or even promoting any hypothetical constructs to make any claims about the universe.

The only "horror" going on is the constant misinformation and constant misrepresentations that you folks make with respect to EU/PC models, like Koberlein's ignorant rants about EU/PC models predicting "no neutrinos", or Bridgman's FUBAR misrepresentations of Birkeland's *one* cathode solar model. You guys are either too unethical to bust their chops on your own, or you're completely professionally incompetent, one or the other. Which is it?

Whatever the cause of the public misinformation, it totally and completely undermines your credibility.
In particular, the comment:
I think we here feel that a legitimate scientific discovery should have more than just theoretical evidence.
There is thus, a clear and present need to elaborate on just how theory and painstaking astronomical measurement intersect in adding vast 'weight in the discovery of the first GW by LIGO.
It's rather ironic that you're trying to counter that particular criticism by relying upon previous examples where you actually did have some visual celestial evidence to work with, not just pure theory. :) Notice a problem with that comparison?
So, as mentioned by JT in this thread, Hulse and Taylor were awarded the 1993 Nobel in Physics for the discovery and analysis of inspiralling binary pulsars (generating gravitational energy dissipation in the form of GWs):
We're supposed to be "impressed" by a study of a visible process in 1993 and give you a free pass with respect to this one which has *zero* visual support? Really? How about those "minor" differences between the two claims like that minor difference of one process being visible and the other one not being visible at all?

Even if we give you the benefit of the doubt with respect to that particular study from 1993, that study was based upon *visual evidence* and real celestial observations, something that the LIGO claim *lacks entirely*! Had you provided *similar visual evidence* of a real celestial event that could have also been shown to release the amount of gravitational waves in question, you might have a valid point.

As it stands however, you just shot yourself in the foot by demonstrating the key weakness of the LIGO claim, specifically it's complete *lack* of any observational support!
Clearly, this demonstrates the accuracy of GR's theoretical predictions relating to GW energy loss leading to orbital decay, (underpinned by Weisberg etal's subsequent 2010 paper outlining the empirical timing measurements accumulated over a 30 year period).
And yet you have no such observational evidence as it relates to *this* celestial origin claim. You kinda lowered the bar there in case you didn't notice. One Nobel prize came from *direct observation* of a real celestial event, and a (GR) theory based upon that celestial observation, whereas your LIGO claim is based on *invisible objects* and nothing but pure theory!
As usual, TBolters have misunderstood how H&T/Weisberg etal add a vast amount of empirically-backed theoretical 'weight' to the claim of GW discovery (as mentioned by JT in post#36 of this thread).
Horse pucky. I personally gave LIGO *every* possible benefit of the doubt with respect to the legitimacy of GR theory, the existence of gravitational waves, and all of the LIGO hardware. I gave LIGO every opportunity to duplicate a similar *visual* study of *this* celestial event if they could in fact produce one, but they couldn't and they didn't. Instead they simply cheated by changing the process of elimination method *entirely* as it relates to supporting their claim of a celestial origin of *this specific signal*.
MM's confusion of blip transients with the measured h(t), his confused 'fuzzy sigma', and his assertion of:
Quote:
'You don't have "supporting evidence", you have a "mathematical curve fitting exercise that could match all sorts of signals. With all the variables you can "tweak", you might match almost *any* signal'
... substantially fails in recognizing just how empirically well-constrained the theoretical predictions were.
Boloney. They even mentioned and cited a "blip transient" event that did fit their mathematical merger models just fine. They have many degrees of freedom as it relates to the speed of the merger, the angles of the merger, the distances involved, the masses involved, etc. Those models fit *lots* of different signals, not just one. All you can demonstrate from such models is the *possibility* that gravitational waves might produce a similar signal. You can't demonstrate *probability* that way however!

That brings us right back to your fuzzy sigma claim which not only does *not* link the signal to gravitational waves or to a given celestial observation, it doesn't even rule out environmental factors as the potential cause of the signal!

That also brings us right back to the fact that LIGO has no visual confirmation to support their claims. If they had followed the same process of elimination methods the applied to every other potential cause of the signal, they should have eliminated celestial origin claims, and the signal *should have* been described as "unknown in origin". Instead they came up with a cockamamie and "made up" 5.1 sigma confidence claim that the signal came from gravitational waves from a couple of special (naked and uncharged) black holes. Worse still, they blatantly misrepresented the facts surrounding the veto of this *exact signal* in their published account of events!

Let's get real. Youl folks have no external corroboration that there even was any celestial event that could have or might have caused this signal. LIGO has nothing but an affirming the consequent fallacy to use as "evidence" to support their claim, and they blatantly mirspresented the facts surrounding the veto of this exact signal. That's not anywhere near the same as your neutron star study from 1993. Give me a break.

Holy cow. You're trying to use neutron stars to support black holes and your trying to ignore the fact that you have zero visual evidence that the signal is celestial in origin. How can you simply ignore that difference and pretend they're the same thing? They are *not* the same thing. Oy Vey.

I'd feel a lot better about mainstream claims if they weren't so busy *misrepresenting* both EU/PC models *and* misrepresenting their own claims too. Like hell the were no data quality vetoes within an hour of the event as LIGO falsely claimed in the published account of events. There was a data quality veto of this exact signal within 18 seconds of the signal being uploaded to the GraceDB database and it stayed that way for the first two and a half hours. Nobody from LIGO has yet offered a quantified "safety" figure/estimate for that human change either. The whole LIGO study *reeks* of both confirmation bias and a rush to publication. It also has the smell of disinformation about that veto.

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