<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif">On Sun, May 28, 2017 at 10:55 PM, spike </span><span dir="ltr" style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"><<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net" target="_blank">spike66@att.net</a>></span><span style="font-family:arial,sans-serif"> wrote:</span><br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote"><br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US"><div class="gmail-m_4906482402381821445WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u></p><div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u></p></div><div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">></div>…In contrast the September 14 2015 LIGO signal was so strong that in just hours nearly all the scientists involved were convinced they'd found colliding Black Holes, although they didn't say so publicly for about 6 months. There has been some criticism. justified I think, that they kept it secret too long. I'll bet they've already found some cool stuff in the second observing run that they won't talk about until they've finished writing the journal paper…John K Clark</span></blockquote><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">> </div>I cut them plenty of slack on this. The thing hadn’t even been on but for a very short time. Had I seen that signal, I would have said noooo way Jose, just no way. It’s too much like buying exactly one lottery ticket, not even knowing how to play, never bought one before, just bought it as an afterthought, and it wins the big jackpot, and you are the only one to pick that number. You would just say no, this just can’t be. I have plenty of dreams that go like this, but reality never does, no way. This signal must be a mistake.<br>Then consider they would be betting it all: their careers would be Pons/Fleishmanned down the toilet forever if they were wrong.</div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"></div><font size="4">Yeah you're right.<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>I just finished reading a book "Gravity's Kiss" by Harry Collins that gives a day by day account of the discovery and the time leading up to the official announcement. They were all terrified of becoming the next Joseph Weber, he was a respected physicist and back in the 1970s he claimed to have found gravitational<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>waves but<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>was soon universally recognized as being wrong and Weber became a joke. So before they<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>even<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>started looking the LIGO<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>people<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>set up a long protocol they would go through that checked and recheck the statistics nineteen dozen different ways before they went public with<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>a discovery claim.<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>The protocol was<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>designed for a subtle signal deeply buried in the noise that had to be carefully teased out,<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>but<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>the October 12 2015<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>event was HUGE,<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>it was<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> far</div> larger than anybody expected<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>and and there was nothing subtle about it<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline">; </div>everybody knew immediately it was the real deal but the<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>bureaucracy said you had to go through the entire protocol<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>regardless<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>so they did. </font></div><div><br><font size="4">And<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>I think there was another factor, they knew they wouldn't be scooped. If there was a rival team with their own gravitational<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> </div>wave detector somewhere I'll bet they would have run through that protocol one hell of a lot faster. <div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"></div></font></div><div><font size="4"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"><br></div></font></div><div><font size="4"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;display:inline"> John K Clark</div></font></div><div><font size="4"><br></font></div><div><font size="4"><br></font></div>
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