Is dark matter fact or fantasy? -- clues from the data

Abstract

We discuss arguments both in favor of and against dark matter. With the repeated failure of experiment to date to detect dark matter we discuss what could be done instead, and to this end look for clues in the data themselves. We identify various regularities in galactic rotation curve data that correlate the total gravitational potential with luminous matter rather than dark matter. We identify a contribution to galactic rotation curves coming from the rest of the visible Universe, and suggest that dark matter is just an attempt to describe this global effect in terms of standard local Newtonian gravity within galaxies. Thus the missing mass is not missing at all -- it has been hiding in plain sight all along as the rest of the visible mass in the Universe.

Essay written for the Gravity Research Foundation 2019 Awards for Essays on Gravitation. Comment added to show that conformal gravity naturally leads to a maximum mass for galaxies, one in accord with observational data

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Cited by in corpus (6)

• Galactic dynamics and long-range quantum gravity
• Gravitational orbits in the expanding universe revisited
• Probing alternative cosmologies through the inverse distance ladder
• The dynamics of three nearby E0 galaxies in refracted gravity
• Quantum Effects on Cosmic Scales as an Alternative to Dark Matter and Dark Energy
• What is the amount of baryonic dark matter in galaxies?