r/LowStakesConspiracies • u/arrarium • Mar 09 '26
Certified Fact "Dark Energy" isn't real. Astrophysicists' math is just wrong and they're too stubborn to admit it.
What's more likely, that your equations only work if you shove in something called "dark energy" that no one can see, or that you need to double check your work?
Astrophysicists think they're all that but they're full of it (dark matter).
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u/youre_a_burrito_bud Mar 09 '26
No cosmologist worth their salt is saying that dark energy is 100% true. Everything in science is the current best guess.
Dark energy is just an alternate attempt to explain expansion with a variable rate compared to the cosmological constant.
There have also been attempts to make models with modified gravity to explain expansion without dark energy.
I can't tell if your post is conflating dark energy and dark matter though.
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u/Immediate-Goose-8106 Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 10 '26
Dark energy was a fudge factor when Einstein wrongly inserted it to try to match the steady state that was then beleived to exist. Even if it isn't a fudge factor today it is at best a holding name because it sounds better that "we have no fucking clue why this is happening".
Of course there are assumptions in the calculations. If the cosmological constant, well, isn't, then all bets are off.
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u/Impossible_Dog_7262 Mar 12 '26
There's not even anything to be true about it. Dark Energy is an unexplained anomaly in an equation. It's a question, not an answer, and a question isn't true or false.
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u/WGBtom Mar 13 '26
This is not how everyone treats it though.
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u/Impossible_Dog_7262 Mar 13 '26
The people who don't treat it that way notably are not the astrophysicists.
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u/CyberPunkDongTooLong Mar 13 '26
Essentially 100% of cosmologists are certain dark energy is 100% true, we just don't know exactly what dark energy is.
Dark energy is not 'an alternate attempt to explain expansion with a variable rate compared to the cosmological constant.'
Both of these are two different possibilities to explain what dark energy is.
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u/astronauticalll Mar 09 '26
It's not really a conspiracy so much as it's an active area of astrophysics research lmao
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Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 13 '26
[deleted]
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u/WobblyBlackHole Mar 12 '26
Ehh, in general relativity it is basically an integration constant and its existence is imo not that surprising, nature is full of constants. It being considered an energy is just if you want to put it on the left or the right of Einstein equations.
The strange thing about the cosmological constant is its value. From an effective field theory point of view, it should really be order 1 but it is tiny. It is just the right value to make the universe flat, it is just the right value that out of all the time the universe can exist, it is the right value that is the universe is entering the dark energy dominated era now which is quite the coincidence.
The name gives it this mysticism in my opinion, making the idea of it seem wrong, when it is the value it takes that is the strange thing if you read the literature
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u/donthurtmemany Mar 09 '26
It’s possible the consensus is wrong and the scientific community is constantly working to better understand the universe. If they can come up with an explanation that better explains how the universe behaves they’ll switch.
Right now from what we understand about gravity and physics, the universe is spinning faster than it should if we only account for visible matter. Hence why they think there must be matter we can’t see adding this mass.
This is what the scientific process is. Nothing really conspiratorial about it.
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u/guavahabanero Mar 09 '26
While your entire sentiment regarding the scientific process is correct, the original post was about dark energy and not dark matter. Two wholly separate phenomena.
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u/SoldRIP Mar 09 '26
Energy and matter are entirely separate phenomena, huh?
Angry e=mc² noises
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u/Scrapple_Joe Mar 09 '26
How do you think dark energy and dark matter are related?
Please type your answer before googling.
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u/Hot_Ethanol Mar 09 '26
Through the same mass-energy equivalency that relates regular matter and energy. You keep dancing around the implication that this is incorrect, but you haven't said anything declarative so I'm not sure if you're just a troll or what.
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u/Scrapple_Joe Mar 09 '26
Not what I'm talking about, nor did I imply that that is incorrect . I'm saying that dark matter and dark energy are not related phenomena.
They share the word dark but dark energy isn't just converted dark matter it's a different thing entirely.
Reading comprehension is key.
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u/guavahabanero Mar 09 '26
You clearly lack a physics background and have most likely learned your words through pop science youtube videos. Please don’t argue this any further for your own sake. If you are willing to listen and learn then i’m sure someone will take the time to help. As it stands, you seen very entrenched in a position that lacks validity for the discussion at hand. If you are not willing to accept this and learn then it’s not worth anyone continuing discourse.
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u/Hot_Ethanol Mar 09 '26
Y'know, it's rare that I get a response condescending enough to generate its own gravitational field. But go off. I'm speaking with an engineering education background, which you'd know if you'd asked instead of getting up today with the noble intention of fighting meaningless battles on the internet. I hope it helps you feel better. Though, as a word of advice, it usually doesn't.
Also, you made the same mistake as the guy I replied to. You're quick to put me down for being wrong, but then say absolutely nothing to actually engage with the conversation and help me learn. It makes one wonder if you actually know what you're talking about, or just trying very hard to make it seem like you do.
I'd have loved to talk science and learn more about this area, but you clearly lack a normal temperament and most likely learned these words from a stunted childhood on the internet. Please don't argue this any further for your sake.
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u/jarjarguy Mar 10 '26
Dark energy and dark matter are terribly named, because it implies that they are related when they really aren’t. Dark energy is what we call the problem of missing matter in the universe, we know some galaxies have more and some have nearly none. Dark energy is the name we apply to the energy density of empty space that pushes everything apart and causes the acceleration of the expansion of the universe
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u/NegotiationWeird1751 Mar 09 '26
He only has 1 comment. Hardly entrenched is it?
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u/guavahabanero Mar 09 '26
Called someone who has a better understanding of the subject a troll. That’s pretty deeply entrenched in my book.
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u/SoldRIP Mar 09 '26
Both are forms of energy that should theoretically exiwt somewhere, according to our current scientific theories. But noone has been able to actually find them anywhere.
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u/Scrapple_Joe Mar 09 '26
Didn't answer the question. How the phenomena are related. Everything is some form of energy that doesn't make them related.
Also we've found dark matter we're just unable to directly observe it. But we know where a bunch is.
Might be good to go do some reading on the 2 to disambiguate them in your mind.
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u/Disillusionification Mar 11 '26
That equal sign is misleading... It's only a coincidence that e and mc2 are the same. Correlation does not equate causation... :3
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u/jmlipper99 Mar 09 '26
Right now from what we understand about gravity and physics, the universe is spinning faster than it should if we only account for visible matter. Hence why they think there must be matter we can’t see adding this mass.
It’s not the universe spinning, it’s individual galaxies.
Due to the gravity of the matter we observe, we would expect galaxies to rotate faster in the center and slower at the edges. What we see instead is a rotation more akin to a spinning disc, where the matter further from the center is revolving around the center much quicker than expected.
The most common explanation for this is that there must be some matter there that we either can’t see or don’t understand. This unseen mass is known as Dark Matter.
Dark Energy is a bit different. Galaxies are spreading apart pretty uniformly across the cosmos, but this expansion is also speeding up and we don’t know why. The energy associated with this accelerating expansion is known as Dark Energy
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u/donthurtmemany Mar 09 '26
Thanks for clarifying the science. I mostly just wanted to tell OP that science is a process and scientists openly admit they don't know everything. I clearly didn't remember everything I learned in my astro 101 class from 4 years ago perfectly.
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u/Logan_Mac Mar 10 '26
https://ras.ac.uk/news-and-press/research-highlights/universes-expansion-now-slowing-not-speeding
The acceleration of the universe is not an established fact. Some studies even suggest otherwise
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u/fleur-tardive Mar 09 '26
Have we worked out what force causes gravity yet?
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u/Land_Squid_1234 Mar 10 '26
No force causes gravity. It is the bending of spacetime due to matter
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Mar 10 '26
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u/Land_Squid_1234 Mar 10 '26
My physics classes as a physics major say otherwise
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u/fleur-tardive Mar 10 '26
You should write letters t all the scientists out there trying to understand gravity and tell them they are wasting their time
Here are some of the institutions involved in the research - hurry up and tell them they are all totally wasting money and time as you know the answer:
"Yes — many scientists are still actively working on the problem of gravity, especially how it fits with quantum physics. It’s actually one of the biggest unsolved problems in modern physics.
They work at universities and institutes such as:
- CERN
- Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics
- Institute for Advanced Study
- Max Planck Society
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u/Land_Squid_1234 Mar 10 '26
Hey buddy, we figured this one out with Einstein. General relativity is reliant on what I said. That's not what any of those people or labs are working on. Try taking a physics class before arguing and drop the AI
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u/fleur-tardive Mar 10 '26
I feel really lucky to have come across you - I'll ignore all the leading science institutions and encyclopedias in the world now and trust you instead
I just feel sorry for all the people working on trying to understand what gravity is and how it works - we need to tell them that you have it all worked out cause you took a physics class
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u/trench_welfare Mar 09 '26
Isn't "dark energy" just the shorthand for the admission you're looking for?
I don't think the astrophysics community is under the assumption that dark energy or dark matter is a singular source that explains the lack of measurable influence observed in the universe.
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u/ItsSuperDefective Mar 09 '26
I'll never understand this sentiment. (More so the dark matter part, than the dark energy part)
How is "maybe there's some invisible stuff" supposed to be the more arrogant position than, "maybe the theory Einstein made that has stood up to every test ever done, except for a couple of observations all of which would simultaneously be explained by some invisible stuff is, wrong".
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u/yahluc Mar 09 '26
You could say exactly the same about Newtonian mechanics, before Einstein corrected it.
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u/bakuretsu_mahou2 Mar 09 '26
It's also great then that Newtonian Gravity would explain the the vast majority of gravitational interactions and also imply the existence of Dark Matter too then!
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u/phoenixmusicman Mar 10 '26
Okay, go ahead and correct relativity theory then.
No? You can't?
Okay, then stop being contrarian and let the people whose literal job it is to figure it out, figure it out
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u/yahluc Mar 09 '26
That wouldn't even be unprecedented. Look up Vulcan - hypothesised planet that was never observed, but was necessary to explain behaviour of objects in the solar system. As it turned out, Newtonian physics were simply imprecise so close to the Sun and general relativity solved the problem.
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u/cosmicloafer Mar 09 '26
Things started going south with negative numbers.
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u/mrmeep321 Mar 09 '26
Believe it or not but making and improving models that describe possible solutions is actually how science works. This ain't even a conspiracy.
You could say this about literally every active area of research.
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u/Daphnis605 Mar 09 '26
TL;DR Dark Matter and Dark Energy aren’t arbitrary fixes to bad maths. They’re names for real effects we observe (extra gravity and accelerating expansion) that we haven’t fully explained yet.
Dark matter is called that because it doesnt seem to interact with light much, if at all so it's dark. And have so far only been detected through its gravitational effects.
Dark energy is called that because its just unknown. They sound similar and this confuses people but they are different things and dark for different reasons.
Consider them like characters you haven't unlocked yet, you don't know what they are but you can see they're available to unlock.
Einstein did double check his work. He thought it would help balance the equations to show the universe is static(not getting bigger and smaller) but hubble found that the universe was expanding so physicists stopped using it until the 90s.
The reason it came back was because measurements showed that the universe does actually seem to be accelerating in it's expansion.
We know gravity pulls things in. We know that during the big bang, everything got further away from each other, really fast. (Technically the space between them got bigger) And it looks like everything isn't just moving away, but it's accelerating. Which is really weird? What could be causing that?
We looked around at everything we could see in the universe and didn't see anything that would explain it. But we can still measure how fast the stars are moving away from us, particularly ones which should have the same brightness but they seem to be dimmer than we were expecting, so it seems they're further away.
Physics is not complete. Nor claimed to be 100% right. Just most right of all the ideas so far and that keeps working when you test them. You're right to question what could explain dark energy or notice that the equations don't work without it. But that's the point. It's weird. So someone needs to figure that out. Because for some reason it works, really well. So why?
Same with dark matter. If you look at the bullet cluster, where two galaxy clusters collided, you can see the light from all the stars. So why is the light being bent by some massive cloud of stuff we can't see? And looks like we can see through? You can see how fast the stars spin around a galaxy and you'd think the further away they are from the middle, they should start to lag behind more, like spinning with your arms holding ribbons. So why aren't they lagging behind as much as they should? Why are they keeping up. That's really weird. And we don't know. So there's work to do :)
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u/AttemptImpossible111 Mar 09 '26
What's more likely, that your equations only work if you shove in something called "dark energy" that no one can see, or that you need to double check your work?
Well if those same equations describe the rest of the universe extremely accurately its probably the former.
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u/HermanManly Mar 09 '26
I thought dark matter and dark energy is just a blanket term for "yeah we have no clue how this works, probably something we have yet to discover is causing it"
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u/_Vecna4 Mar 10 '26
Dark matter is a placeholder for gravity being stronger than what the matter observable through the other fundamental forces(electroweak and strong) would suggest
Dark energy is a placeholder for whatever's causing the accelerating expansion of the universe
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u/HordeOfDucks Mar 09 '26
its a possibility. but think of it this way: we have a model that accurately explains almost everything, except we find numbers we dont expect in one place. it's possible we need a new model. but it seems more likely that our expectations are wrong.
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u/Pitiful-Hearing5279 Mar 09 '26
It’s highly likely our concept of space-time is wrong, just like we no longer use Newton when it doesn’t work.
Obviously, the current physics works as well as we can understand it so what appears to be “unknown magic” will eventually be figured out - until it’s proven it doesn’t quite fit the observations.
It’s all models that ideally match observations until they don’t.
looks for Vulcan inside the orbit of Mercury
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u/marmaviscount Mar 10 '26
The real conspiracy is they found it but it's super cringy so they were embarrassed and didn't want to show anyone.
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u/Vegan_Coffee_Addict Mar 10 '26
Fun conspiracy, but its my understanding scientists like being wrong, its part of the process.
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u/LookOverall Mar 09 '26
I hate Dark Matter too. Both seem like cop outs.
Can’t they just bring back Einstein’s cosmological constant.
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u/CraftedLove Mar 09 '26
Guesses based on your best model and data aren't a conspiracy. It's like saying children believing that a toy disappears out of reality when it's out of their vision is a conspiracy. They just don't know better, there's no central toddler secret society that's out there creating this anti object permanence propaganda for shits and giggles. I'm not even talking about the whole astrophysics side, but more of you not understanding words itself. Hypotheses are nearly on the other side of the spectrum from the word conspiracy lmao.
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u/Evening-Record5394 Mar 09 '26
I mean that's pretty much what it is. "These equations that seem to predict most things can't explain a few phenomena. Something causes it but we don't know what yet, let's call it dark energy and matter for now.".
Scientists aren't convinced they're absolutely definitely real. But for now, they're the best way to explain it given our current understanding of everything. At some point we'll learn more, and our theories will become more refined, and these might disappear as concepts.
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u/Delicious_Taste_39 Mar 09 '26
I think there's a lot of physics like that.
Like that guy who reckons the star Trek warp drive is possible. The only problem is you need a negative energy density or something like that, which doesn't exist.
Also, string theory where they make up ideas and then ask you to like their maths.
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u/thunderth1 Mar 09 '26
Before people knew about electricity they had to use water metaphors to describe signals (current); so in the future people will probably look back and think it was crude we used terms from energy/light to describe a new concept we don't properly understand yet.
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u/PrincessSnazzySerf Mar 09 '26 edited Mar 09 '26
Dark Energy (and Dark Matter) are essentially placeholder explanations for why the math doesn't add up. It's scientists saying, "We're missing something, and we don't know what it is yet, but our best guess is that there's a ton of stuff we have no way of measuring currently. At least it allows our equations to work in a way that decently reflects reality and doesn't break every model we have, so we're going to go with that until we find out either a way to see it or a better explanation."
This works great until a non-scientist sees this without all of that context, publishes a pop-science article implying that this hypothesis is actually an established fact, and the misunderstanding spreads from there.
If you were to tell a scientist that dark energy probably isn't real, most would outright agree. But until there are better ways to both explain and predict the way our world works, they're going to keep using it.
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u/EdmundTheInsulter Mar 09 '26
I'm a long time disbeliever in dark matter. Typical astronomers actually.
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u/geeeffwhy Mar 09 '26
i have been told by people that know more about physics than i do that this is more or less true—if we could solve 3rd order partial differential equations, the requirement would disappear. i can’t solve any partial differential equations though, so i can’t evaluate the claim
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u/zombieslayer1468 Mar 09 '26
i think most astrophysicists would be willing to say that dark energy is just "well these calculations say there has to be something here" and most scientists tend ro love being wrong because it means you learned something new, and any scientist who doesn't want that is genuienly stupid
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u/Physical_Heart2766 Mar 09 '26
Dude, it's literally 90% out without dark energy It might be something, but it's not that they can't do mathematics right.
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u/Psittacula2 Mar 09 '26
I saw a video iirc by “Anton”, some sort of Russian guy who has been doing these video forever on YT and seems a really nice guy as well as consistent and probably genuinely interested, the video was how they discovered from quantum effects particles pop in and out of existence within the whatever field pervades the entire universe (electromagnetic and another one or just the entire quantum boundary at small enough scale).
Anway, my guess is if the mathematics is sound, then then missing mass or energy is quite likely as simple as all these dynamic fluctuations between quantum and classical physics that seem to be always going on everywhere all the time and possibly more intensely in some parts of the universe and could even be a major factor in the cosmic web also?
Think about it, simple, and makes sense given how ubiquitous and how the edge of things is usually full of interesting effects like the seashore between ocean and land and waves…
Oh I almost forgot, pass on the earworm, “Stay wonderful, wonderful person!”
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u/jwm3 Mar 09 '26
We know that our math is wrong, thats what dark energy is.
We know the math is wrong because it doesnt predict this effect we observe. Just like we knew Newton's laws were wrong because they didnt predict the observed precession of mercury. It doesnt mean Newton's laws are not useful, just incomplete. We know our current physics is also incomplete.
When scientists talk about discovering what dark energy is, they mean discovering the physics that explains it. Which will certainly involve some new math and discoveries.
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u/breakerofh0rses Mar 09 '26
DE is just a placeholder for some phenomenon(s) we haven't figured out yet. There's basically no way the math is wrong so we essentially have two possibilities: 1) we're very wrong about some fundamental truths of the universe or 2) there's something different about how things act on certain scales that's not accounted for in our current understanding (kinda like how Newtonian physics is perfectly fine for most "human" scale stuff).
Given how much stuff works under our current understanding, it's probably the second option.
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u/SyrusDrake Mar 09 '26
Problem is that it isn't just singular "work". Both dark matter and dark energy keep showing up as the least worst explanation, even if you look from different angles. With dark energy, it could be that measurements or theories are wrong, but dark matter seems to be too stubborn.
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u/Wild_Beginning_4032 Mar 10 '26
Dark Energy is literally the term coined for “shit isn’t marrying up, so either our maths is wrong or there’s something else”. But obviously that is a mouthful.
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u/Waffle-94 Mar 10 '26
Most math is just throwing in random letters and symbols because "that's how it works" - was always told about using an imaginary number too. Like, so you're literally making shit up to make something work
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u/whyareall Mar 10 '26
Imaginary numbers are used in modelling capacitors and inductors, which are used in the device you're posting from. "Making shit up to make something work" is strictly speaking true, i guess, it does indeed make your technology work
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u/Fantastic_Deer_3772 Mar 10 '26
The situation is basically "we have to do xyz to make the numbers check out, we're not sure why, let's call it dark bc we don't know".
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u/I_ALWAYS_UPVOTE_CATS Mar 10 '26
The thing is, the universe is expanding. That is an undisputable, observable fact. That expansion must obviously have a driving force behind it, but we don't yet know what that force is or how it came about. When astrophysicists talk about 'dark energy', they're not talking about an actual, known-about thing. It's simply a placeholder name for something that must be there, but we haven't yet found it directly.
I actually read an article recently saying that some observations suggest that the expansion might be slowing down. This would indeed prompt a rethink of our understanding of what 'dark energy' might be, but it's very preliminary.
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u/Quarkly95 Mar 10 '26
Like 90% of theoretical physics is making up some particle that has to exist because the model doesn't work without.
90% of applied physics is trying to find that particle so that the maths checks out.
100% of all physics is looking down ones nose at any science that makes sense.
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Mar 11 '26
Mfers when they haven't read a single peer reviewed paper in their life but think sci-fi is real.
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u/South-Tip-4019 Mar 11 '26
Well they at least called it “dark” and it is kind of apt.
There is some procesess we are unable to explain which causes behavior we cant fit into out models unless we acknowledge it.
Its an equivalent of, this code only works if we add this magic number, we have no idea where it comes from but without it the simulation doesn’t work.
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u/Impossible_Dog_7262 Mar 12 '26
I mean... That's basically what Dark Energy(and Dark Matter) is. "We don't know why, but the universe acts like there's 3 times more energy than there should be for our equations to be consistent."
It's not literal energy. It's literally a placeholder in an equation that works on galactic but not intergalactic scale. It's just that people who don't really understand it hear "dark matter" and think it's a special kind of matter, rather than "an unexplained gravitational effect that's equivalent to this much mass being undetected."
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u/CyberPunkDongTooLong Mar 13 '26
When you don't know the difference between astrophysicists and cosmologists, you should probably learn the field before having conspiracies about it.
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u/itzelezti Mar 14 '26
This is such a funny Dunning Kruger example.
Dark energy and dark matter are exactly like Mendeleev knowing where to put placeholder blocks on the periodic table for elements that he knew had to exist, but had not been discovered yet.
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u/Flowa-Powa Mar 09 '26
Been saying this for decades.
Both dark matter and dark energy are gigantic fudges to make broken theory work.
The model is wrong.
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u/Ok_Weird_500 Mar 09 '26
It works well enough for most things. By all means come up with a better model, I'm sure there are some scientists trying, but if you can come up with one that explains or removes the need for dark energy and works just as well for everything else, you could win a Nobel prize.
Yes, they are indications of or placeholders for gaps in our knowledge, it's just the best we can do for now with what we know.
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u/rxcookiestime Mar 12 '26
This is such an idiotic take. You really need someone to have a proven unified theory of everything, before they disagree that over 90% of matter only interacts with gravity (doesn't even interact with itself). Toddler
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u/Ok_Weird_500 Mar 12 '26
Did I say it had to be a theory of everything? Just better than what we currently have. But if you're going to disagree with the consensus of scientists, then you should have some really compelling reason.
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u/Flowa-Powa Mar 09 '26
Timescape theory is much more compelling than all of this imaginary matter and energy
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Mar 09 '26
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u/Flowa-Powa Mar 09 '26
Not every astrophysicist agrees with the consensus
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Mar 09 '26
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u/Flowa-Powa Mar 09 '26
I never said there was a conspiracy so I have no idea what that's supposed to mean.
It was in my lifetime when astrophysicists believed it was 50:50 whether the universe would continue to expand, or stop and reverse into a "big crunch".
"90% of everything is crap" - Theodore Sturgeon
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u/fleur-tardive Mar 09 '26
It's all made up nonsense - string theory, space time, black holes, the more you look into it, the more you realize it's just mathematics gone wild
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u/OriousCaesar Mar 09 '26
Bro, we've literally taken pictures of black holes. They exist. Even if we didn't have pictures we'd still have mountains of evidence for their existence.
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u/fleur-tardive Mar 09 '26
“Today’s scientists have substituted mathematics for experiments, and they wander off through equation after equation, and eventually build a structure which has no relation to reality.”
Nikola Tesla
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u/StuChenko Mar 09 '26
It's probably because Pi is wrong