Wave hello to gravity!

[Svartalf]

aww, c'mon, keep your feet planted down and you won't fall.

[pErvinalia]

No. And if Seth was here he'd be telling you you were buying into the religion of science.

This has been a public service announcement.

I've been keen to hear what Seth's totally uninformed doomsday theory would be concerning this.

[Svartalf]

Let's see if he'll be back after his current suspension

[pErvinalia]

Oh he'll be back. He'll need to have an almighty whinge about how us evil Marxists are oppressing him.

[Rum]

I thought he might have got bored with his text wall responses that nobody reads and wandered off.

[Svartalf]

No, JimC apparently took exception to his tone and personal attacks and gave him a week to cool off... in fine form he did the same to another troll whose nick I forget right afterward.

[Rum]

On a topical note does anyone have any idea what these waves actually are? They aren't, as far as I am aware, on the electromagnetic spectrum.

[pErvinalia]

Ripples in spacetime caused by gravity.

[Rum]

Ripples in spacetime caused by gravity.

Well yes I know that. But what are the ripples? We have light rays (waves and particles), radio waves from all over the electromagnetic spectrum. And if it is the fabric of space time that infers the idea of a medium - just as waves travel through water.

[pErvinalia]

Supposedly it is the fabric of spacetime. And yeah, that does seem to suggest a medium. Not sure how they get around that. In fact a lot of astrophysics seems to suggest a medium to my unsophisticated eye.

[Brian Peacock]

On a topical note does anyone have any idea what these waves actually are? They aren't, as far as I am aware, on the electromagnetic spectrum.

The team have detected and confirmed gravity waves caused by the collision and coalescence of two black holes c.1.3bn light years ago/away. The waves were predicted by Einstein in 1916 and are the product of the massive energies released and spacetime distortions occurring in the smash. Now the equipment is up and running similar distortions are expected to be observed in other violent phenomena, like rotating neutron stars and the remnants of super novas, which along with other experiment ready to come online over the coming decade will greatly enhance our picture of what's going on in the universe.

So it says in the Guardian anyway.

Explain it to me like I'm a kid: scientists try to make sense of gravitational waves: http://gu.com/p/4gjfa

[tuco]

We do not know what gravity is, less so gravitational waves. We can only detect it/them. Its like with magnets:

Richard Feynman - Magnets (And 'Why' Questions) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjmtJpzoW0o

just in case of magnets we know.

[pErvinalia]

We don't know what gravity is?

It's distortion of spacetime. That's been known since Einstein.

[tuco]

Yes and since Newton we know its the force that makes stuff falls down. What it is? How it works? Why it works like that? We do not know.

---
edit: with regards to initial question. Was the question: How do we detect them, since they are not on el-mag? What they are .. demonstration of gravity

[pErvinalia]

Again, it's the distortion of spacetime. HOW that happens is perhaps the mystery that you are searching for?