Stephen John Crothers

Stephen John Crothers
Born	(1957-06-14) June 14, 1957
Residence	Sunshine Plaza, Queensland, Australia
Nationality	Australia
Known for	Black hole, Big Bang, General Relativity
Scientific career
Fields	Independent researcher in theoretical astrophysics

Stephen John Crothers (born 14 June 1957) is an Australian independent researcher known for his mathematical and philosophical criticisms of the theory of black holes, the big bang, and aspects of Einstein's General Relativity. He argues that black holes are neither predicted by nor consistent with general relativity, and that the expanding-universe cosmology is mistaken. He travels internationally to publish papers and deliver lectures on these views, which are rejected by mainstream physics.

Biography

Crothers holds a Master of Science degree and describes himself as an independent researcher in theoretical astrophysics. He resides in Queensland, Australia.

In about March 2003 he commenced part-time candidature for a PhD in the School of Physics at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney, under the supervision of Professor John K. Webb, with Professor Michael Ashley as support supervisor. He was initially engaged in developing a computer simulation program relating to extra-solar planets. About a year later he began working on general relativity as a sideline, and reported that he had obtained a result which he claimed showed black holes to be inconsistent with general relativity. Crothers states that he was subsequently expelled from candidature by UNSW, an account he documents on his personal website.

Crothers has cited among his intellectual influences Isaac Newton, Ludwig Boltzmann, and Michael Faraday. He is a frequent speaker at conferences associated with the Electric Universe / Thunderbolts community, and much of his written output has appeared in the journal Progress in Physics and on preprint and personal-website venues.

Scientific contributions

Crothers's work centres on the interpretation of the Schwarzschild solution of Einstein's field equations. He argues that the solution commonly attributed to Karl Schwarzschild is in fact a later form derived by David Hilbert and Johannes Droste, and he maintains that neither Schwarzschild's original solution nor Droste's solution contains a black hole. On this basis he contends that "the black hole has no foundation in theory whatsoever," asserting that neither Newton's nor Einstein's theory of gravitation predicts such objects.

He has similarly challenged the mathematical consistency of Big Bang cosmology, disputing the claim that the universe is expanding, and has criticised the theoretical basis for gravitational waves. He further reports that, in correspondence, astronomers Stefan Gillessen, Reinhard Genzel, and Frank Eisenhauer of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics acknowledged that no black hole had been directly observed at Sagittarius A*.

Crothers's claims are rejected by the mainstream physics community. His arguments have not been accepted through the standard peer-review process, and his conclusions—that black holes do not exist and that the universe is not expanding—contradict the substantial body of observational and theoretical evidence supporting general relativity, black holes, and Big Bang cosmology. Critics note that his output has appeared primarily on his own website, in preprint repositories, and in non-mainstream journals rather than in established physics literature.

Abstracts

• 2012 - "General Relativity ? A Theory in Crisis" (Read in full)
• 2012 - "Proof of no "Black Hole" Binary in Nova Scorpii" (Read in full)
• 2010 - "The Black Hole, the Big Bang: A Cosmology in Crisis" (Read in full)
• 2010 - "The Black Hole, the Big Bang: A Cosmology in Crisis" (Read in full)
• 2010 - "The Black Hole, the Big Bang: A Cosmology in Crisis" (Read in full)
• 2009 - "The Kruskal-Szekeres ?Extension?: Counter-Examples" (Read in full)
• 2009 - "The Schwarzschild Solution and its Implications for Gravitational Waves" (Read in full)
• 2008 - "On Certain Conceptual Anomalies in Einstein's Theory of Relativity" (Read in full)
• 2008 - "On Theoretical Contradictions and Physical Misconceptions in the General Theory of Relativity" (Read in full)
• 2007 - "The Big Bang in Controversy"
• 2007 - "Gravitation on a Spherically Symmetric Metric Manifold" (Read in full)
• 2007 - "On Line-Elements and Radii: A Correction" (Read in full)
• 2007 - "Relativistic Cosmology Revisited " (Read in full)
• 2007 - "On the "Size" of Einstein's Universe " (Read in full)
• 2006 - "A Brief History of Black Holes"
• 2006 - "On Isotropic Coordinates and Einstein's Gravitational Field" (Read in full)
• 2006 - "Planck Particles and Quantum Gravity " (Read in full)
• 2006 - "On the Regge-Wheeler Tortoise and the Kruskal-Szekeres Coordinates" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the General Solution to Einstein's Vacuum Field and Its Implications for Relativistic Degeneracy" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the General Solution to Einstein's Vacuum Field for the Point-Mass when lambda ???0 and Its Consequences for Relativistic Cosmology" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the Generalisation of Kepler's 3rd Law for the Vacuum Field of the Point-Mass" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the Geometry of the General Solution for the Vacuum Field of the Point-Mass" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "Introducing Distance and Measurement in General Relativity: Changes for the Standard Tests and the Cosmological Large-Scale" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the Ramifications of the Schwarzschild Space-Time Metric" (Read in full)
• 2005 - "On the Vacuum Field of a Sphere of Incompressible Fluid" (Read in full)

Media

• 2009 - The Schwarzschild Solution and its Implications for Gravitational Waves (Video Lecture)

External links

• Official homepage
• Crothers's account of his UNSW PhD candidature
• Crothers on correspondence regarding Sagittarius A*