BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//ZContent.net//ZapCalLib 1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=Atlantic/Canary:20140204T160000
DTEND;TZID=Atlantic/Canary:20140204T170000
UID:iactalks-606
X-WR-CALNAME: IAC Talks: Open Astronomy Seminars
X-ORIGINAL-URL: /iactalks/Talks/view/606
CREATED:2014-02-04T16:00:00+00:00
X-WR-CALDESC: IAC Talks upcomming talks
SUMMARY:Is Dark Matter the most valid explanation for the mass which is app
 arently missing in the Universe?
DESCRIPTION:Is Dark Matter the most valid explanation for the mass which is
  apparently missing in the Universe?\nDr. Sebastien Comeron\n\nTwo main fa
 milies of models explain that, at least in appearance,  something like 90%
  of the mass of the Universe is still undetected. One  (supported by an ov
 erwhelmingly large fraction of the community) is the dark matter model, in
  which the missing mass is  postulated to be made of exotic non-baryonic p
 articles. The other one, is modifying gravity (MOND, MOG,  ...) in such a 
 way that it compensates the apparent lack of mass. Both approaches are pur
 ely ad-hoc  and so far not based in first principles of fundamental physic
 s. Since I am not a specialist, in dark matter or modified gravities, the 
  talk I am proposing is intended to be made purely from a philosophical/so
 ciological/historical point of  view. I expect the talk to be an open deba
 te. The philosophical thesis I will defend is that the order  in the disco
 very of some astronomical landmarks has led the community  to favour dark 
 matter model. In my opinion, this has caused darkmatter  to receive a larg
 er funding and become more successful at describing  reality than alternat
 ive models. I will try to expose to the audience that, from a  purely phil
 osophical point of view, the dark matter model and the modified gravity mo
 dels are equally  speculative and equally (in)valid. I will make the point
  that dark matter has to be taken only  as an extremely complex model whic
 h is useful for the description of reality and not as reality  itself.
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR