Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger · HackerPapers discussions

Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger — mentioned by godelski

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 22:52:10 GMT

> physics tends to be much more reproducible than biology, and CS doubly-so. With physics I think there is a better culture of reproduction, but that is, I believe, due more to culture. That it is acceptable to "be slow". There's a high stress on being methodical and extremely precise. The prestige is built on making your work bulletproof, and so you're really encouraged to help others reproduce your work as it strengthens it. You're also encouraged to analyze in detail and to faithfully reproduce, because finding cracks also yields prestige. I don't know if it's the money, but no one is in…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.

Observation of Gravitational Waves from a Binary Black Hole Merger — mentioned by raattgift

Tue, 08 Nov 2016 20:05:01 GMT

Gravitons appear in several different families of theory. We have not observed any of them; the interaction cross-section is so small (because gravity is so weak) that we have no hope of observing a single graviton, or failing to observe an expected one, any time soon. Gravitational waves have spin 2 symmetry and are massless. A straightforward quantization of a gravitational wave leads to gravitons as a spin 2 massless gauge boson. Conversely, in almost any gauge theory that admits a massless spin 2 particle, that particle mediates a force almost exactly like gravitation, and is amenable to…

Paper and discussion history. A mention is not an endorsement.