William G. Tifft
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William G. Tifft is Emeritus Professor/Astronomer at the University of Arizona. His main interests are in galaxies, superclusters and what Tifft calls redshift problems (see redshift quantization).[1] He was influential in the development of the first redshift surveys [1] and was an early proponent of manned space astronomy, conducted at a proposed moon base for example.
He has an A.B. in Astronomy from Harvard University (1954), and Ph.D. in Astronomy from the California Institute of Technology (1958) where he wrote his dissertation on photoelectric photometry, a copy of which is available online.
[edit] Redshift quantization
Based on observations of nearby galaxies, Tifft has put forward a theory that the redshifts of galaxies are quantized, or that they occur preferentially as multiples of a set number. These theories on redshift quantization were originally published in 1976 and 1977 in the Astrophysical Journal.[2][3][4] The ideas were controversial when originally proposed; the editors of the Astrophysical Journal included a note in one of the papers stating that they could neither find errors within the analysis nor endorse the analysis.[3] Since the initial publication of these results, Tifft’s theory has been used by other individuals, such as Halton Arp, as an alternative explanation to the Big Bang Theory, which states that galaxies are redshifted because the universe is expanding.[5][6] However, Tifft himself, when interviewed for the popular science magazine Discover in 1993, stated that he was not necessarily claiming that the universe was not expanding [7].
Today, Tifft’s redshift quantization, as well as other intrinsic redshift theories, are rarely cited, and a large majority of the observational evidence reviewed in a 1993 cosmology textbook by Peebles[8] suggests that redshifts are indeed related to the expansion of the universe and are not intrinsic to the galaxies themselves. Tifft’s research and other astronomers’ research into redshift quantization have also been criticized for their inconsistent results. A review of the subject shows that the claimed periodicity of redshifts has ranged from 5.76 km/s to 72.5 km/s.[9] Some of the smaller periodicities that Tifft claimed to find are difficult to measure accurately.[9] Moreover, the description of the quantization and the techniques for measuring it vary depending on the extragalactic objects (i.e. dwarf galaxies, spiral galaxies, superclusters) being observed.[9]
[edit] External links
- Clicking on this link does a search for all articles by Tifft at the Smithsonian/NASA Astrophysics Data System. The full text of the articles is available in some cases.
[edit] References
- ^ William G. Tifft's Personal Web page at the U. Arizona
- ^ W. G. Tifft (1976). "Discrete states of redshift and galaxy dynamics. I - Internal motions in single galaxies". Astrophysical Journal 206: 38-56.
- ^ a b W. G. Tifft (1977). "Discrete states of redshift and galaxy dynamics. II - Systems of galaxies". Astrophysical Journal 211: 31-46.
- ^ W. G. Tifft (1977). "Discrete states of redshift and Galaxy dynamics. III - Abnormal galaxies and stars". Astrophysical Journal 211: 377-391.
- ^ H. Arp (1986). "A corrected velocity for the local standard of rest by fitting to the mean redshift of local group galaxies". Astronomy and Astrophysics 156: 207-212.
- ^ H. Arp (1987). "Additional members of the Local Group of galaxies and quantized redshifts within the two nearest groups". Journal of Astrophysics and Astronomy 8: 241-255.
- ^ Dava Sobel, "Man stops universe, maybe - William Tifft believes the universe may not be expanding", Discover, April, 1993)
- ^ Peebles, P. J. E. (1993). Principles of Physical Cosmology. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-01933-9.
- ^ a b c E. E. Salpeter (2005). "Fallacies in astronomy and medicine". Reports on Progress in Physics 68: 2747-2772.
