disclaimer

Over the years, cosmology, the study of the universe, has excited mankind. Who we are, where we are, where we came, and where we are going. And the nature of the all we observe. Unfortunately, there is often conflict about this subject, one whose answers we can never know for certain. Cosmology even defies the definition of science, a subject defined by three essential ingredients. First, hypothesis. Second, analysis, as in the derivation of evolutionary laws and their solution such as solving Kirchoff's equations in the electrical sciences. Lastly, experiment, the final adjudicator to the original hypothesis: does the data validate the original hypothesis?

Obviously, the universe cannot be explored or observed from wherever at our whims, but many of its elements can. So while many would claim cosmology is not ‘the Queen of Sciences’ but rather a pseudo-science, we will continue to treat it as if it were a science.

Science carries an obligation and a burden. The obligation is for science to accept all challenges in a fair and equitable way. The burden in doing so is the absence of any denigrations, belittlements, disdain or refusal. As an example, for over thirty years I have received a number of ‘cosmologies’ from authors who are usually unattached to a university or institution.

I once received a large document from a person who obviously had spent many years pondering the nature of the universe as he toiled at his occupation. While his thesis did not contain the mathematical formulation I use in my occupation, I read his document carefully ever mindful that a new idea can spring forth from the most unlikely of sources. His universe, as he saw it, was a foam of bubbles of enormous size whose force law I was uncertain (he even allowed that one of the bubbles was the plasma universe). Finishing the document, I encouraged him to continue the work. While I could not make use of it, perhaps someone else more perceptive than I, could.

The path set by Tommy Gold is what I would like to follow. Quoting George Johnson, ‘Science has no gold standard ….. but perhaps scientists have a ‘silver-plated’ heart.

Lately, there have been a number of cosmologies that have taken on names similar to plasma universe and plasma cosmology, names published in titles and contents of some hundred peer-reviewed, high index-of-citation, engineering, physics, space physics and astrophysics journals for decades. This has led to some confusion as evidenced by an exponentiation of my correspondence made possible by the Internet.

'Plasma Universe' is a term first made public on the cover of Physics Today in 1986 by Hannes Alfvén . There have been a plethora of papers published on this topic as witnessed by this website. [One should also explore the Klein-Alfvén cosmology, the 'ambiplasma' providing a source of electrical currents in the cosmos].

'Plasma Cosmology', the study of the plasma universe, likewise is a name coined for and described in many publications in several languages dating back to the early 1980’s. These are a continuation of the mathematics and experiments of Kristian Birkeland, the first to provide a general solution of Maxwell’s Equations. This was a direct result of Heinrich Hertz and Oliver Heaviside reducing Maxwell’s original 20 equations and 20 unknowns, a shorthand for Michael Faraday’s experiments, to just 4 equations and 4 unknowns, made possible by the invention of vector analysis. If there is a single strand that connects Birkeland and his predecessors, it is nonlinear mathematics as in solutions to Maxwell's Equations.

'Electric Space' is a term used as the title of a major traveling exhibit managed by the Space Science Institute (http://www.spacescience.org). This metaphor was originally coined by humanist Dr. Carolyn Brown, Director of Scholar Programs at the Library of Congress, and her husband, Dr. Timothy Eastman, creator of plasmas.org. [See also plasmas.org/space-astrophysics.htm , below Plasma Astrophysics References],

For completeness, but not exclusive, we must mention other websites with names very close to the Plasma Universe and Plasma Cosmology.

Unless you entered this site through the Los Alamos National Laboratory gateway /public.lanl.gov/alp/plasma/universe.html ; then www .plasmauniverse.info ; www .plasmacosmology.info or www .plasmauniverse.com got you to this page. If you used another suffix .xxx attached to the preceding names, and not from an institution or university, then you are reading a version with an agenda unconnected to the physics-based research of Kristian Birkeland, Hannes Alfvén, and their hundreds of collaborators.

Anthony L. Peratt, Ph.D.
Los Alamos National Laboratory

Life Fellow, IEEE