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  4 months ago

  Matt Johns tagged Me and Dani - Carla and Jay Routine.

  Dance, Lindy Hop and Swing
• 
  7 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on All the cool kids are doing it

  Oh man, that was hilarious
• 
  8 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on songs you already know: scared

  So cute.
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  8 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on God doesn't care if we believe

  "Being in that 6% does make feel slightly more special, but that comes off of today's science, where we try to measure and quantify and qualify things that we have no clue about, so I personally can't put stock in that figure."
  
  As has been noted, we are and must be skeptics, and so we shouldn't put absolute faith in any scientific theory. However, these theories wouldn't exist without good reason, and throwing them out simply because of the inescapable presence of uncertainty is nonconstructive .
  
  
  The dark matter theory does address a phenomena that occurs at scales way outside of our normal experience, and so it is tempting to say "come on, we don't really know what the hell we're talking about, it's all just positioning to make math work." It is possible that general relativity works really well on a solar system level, but breaks down on an inter-galactic level. This would be unusual, as most field theories that work in a specific range continue to work at lower energies / longer distances and have problems at higher energies / shorter distances, if they have problems at all. However, it is possible that GR is an insufficient model, and that at these uber-large distances we need a modified theory of gravity. Some scientists have worked on just such a model, which is commonly referred to as Modified Newtonian Mechanics, or MOND. There has been mixed success in this approach, and it seems to work more or less for individual clusters, but breaks down for clusters.
  
  More importantly, MOND or any modified theory of gravity must still maintain one key characteristic: gravity has to point in the direction of matter. There has recently been an increasing amount of evidence (such as photographs of gravitational lensing around two colliding galaxies) that gravity does occasionally point towards seemingly "empty" areas of space. Unless we decide to completely redefine gravity such that it points away from matter, the existence of dark matter is the most logical explanation.
  
  I don't necessarily want this to degenerate into a debate on dark matter theory, as none of us are qualified for that. Instead, I hoped to show that ideas don't become theories haphazardly or out of convenience. Alternate gravitational theories exist and are being researched, but given the data that we have right now, dark matter is the most likely solution. In the grand scheme of things, it's not such a strange theory; a large percentage of quantum mechanics makes absolutely no intuitive sense and in fact directly contradicts our classical understanding of the world. And yet, QM is the most precise and accurate predictive tool in science.
  
  P.S. Actually, the current model predicts that 20% of the universe is dark matter, and 75% is dark energy, which permeates the universe and, among other things, is supposedly the cause for the acceleration of the expansion of the universe.
  
  Edit /P.P.S. My school actually has a large group of particle / astrophysics theorists and experimentalist s, and in fact my department chair is part of the CDMS (Cryogenic Dark Matter Search) research group. Check out cdms.berkeley.edu/ and phys.cwru.edu/faculty/index.php?akerib if you happen to be interested.
• 
  9 months ago

  Matt Johns likes ALHC Strictly Lindy - Joanna & Carl
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  9 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on ALHC Strictly Lindy - Joanna & Carl

  Joanna, I love you.
  
  Don't tell Caroline.
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  9 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on vlog 7 - autumn again

  Awesome :o)
  
  (Also: will there ever come a time when I can look at you and not be struck by the depth of your eyes? Experts say "no, probably not." )
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  9 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on Never forget that the world is beautiful.

  I won't forget so long as you keep showing me.
  
  Nice video. I'm glad things are on the upswing.
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  10 months ago

  Matt Johns commented on Lip Dub - Harder Better Faster Stronger (robot!)

  Damnit! You took down the original version, and I lost my first post. Missed it by 4 minutes. 4 minutes!
  
  (Still awesome, though)
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  10 months ago

  Matt Johns tagged Salt Peanuts!.

  Colorado's In Cleveland

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