Unidentified Object in Space, Scientists Puzzled

[Maguspk]

Holy shit Mizango, João Magueijo rules.

Static is actually 1% the echoes of light from the big bang, that blew my fucking mind. Cosmic Microwave Background (CMD) ftmfw.

[Mizango]

Holy shit Mizango, João Magueijo rules.

Static is actually 1% the echoes of light from the big bang, that blew my fucking mind. Cosmic Microwave Background (CMD) ftmfw.

:D Glad I could help! He has a really good book about the theory of VSL on amazon for less than a dollar used, it is a really good read and give you a lot of "what ifs" to think about.

I enjoyed the part where he was explaining the Horizon problem and the sweaters from his Grandmother as an analogy for Cosmic inflation. :3

[Blarg]

:D Glad I could help! He has a really good book about the theory of VSL on amazon for less than a dollar used, it is a really good read and give you a lot of "what ifs" to think about.

I enjoyed the part where he was explaining the Horizon problem and the sweaters from his Grandmother as an analogy for Cosmic inflation. :3

I haven't watched that guys movies yet but the dude who uploaded those videos seems to have like 900 science vids uploaded. Just what I needed to distract myself from doing science HW.

[Mizango]

Indeed lol, I end up doing the same thing as well.

[Maguspk]

The horizon problem seems weird to me.

They say we can observe the speed at which things are becoming more distant to estimate the time at which everything was at a single spot and figure out the age of the universe. Yet they go on to say that the horizon problem says we can't explain why things are so far apart. Isn't the solution to simply say we don't know the age of the universe instead of saying we know it and then being confused when the speed at which things are moving doesn't align with how far apart they are? Am I misunderstanding something?

[Mizango]

It is a build up to his theories on VSL. A theory that goes against conventional acceptance of what is perceived as right and wrong, which is my some call him a "rebel".

Criticized for thinking outside the box, imagine that. His book explains everything and will complete the confusing conundrum you are thinking, but no you are right on. It should get more clear when he explains VSL in the last segment.

[Max™]

The universe is undergoing accelerating expansion, it's 13.7 billion years old, but 46 billion light years across.

Just because you can't move faster than light through space doesn't mean space can't expand faster than light.

As for the lightspeed barrier, even at slower than light speeds, you can push up towards high relativistic velocities and colonize a galaxy with hundred to thousand light year trips completed in fractions of that in subjective time, thanks to the joys of time dilation.

It isn't infinite, that is ridiculous, you can tell this easily enough.

The sky is dark at night.

If it was infinite, then no matter which way you looked you would see a photon from a star.

[Kaylia]

The horizon problem seems weird to me.

They say we can observe the speed at which things are becoming more distant to estimate the time at which everything was at a single spot and figure out the age of the universe. Yet they go on to say that the horizon problem says we can't explain why things are so far apart. Isn't the solution to simply say we don't know the age of the universe instead of saying we know it and then being confused when the speed at which things are moving doesn't align with how far apart they are? Am I misunderstanding something?

I'm pretty damn tired and haven't watched the video...sorry in advance if my answer is a bit off.

I think you're confusing two different things. On one side, we can tell the age of obserable universe using Doppler Effect (same thing that make a car sound fade when it's passing by). Basically, the universe expansion is going to stretch any wavelength (redshift), and from this can calculate how long it took the light to get here. With this method, we are able to estimate the age of the universe up to ~13billions years.

However, with this alone, we wouldn't be able to say anything about the time period that come before. It could be 13.0001billions years or 100 billions years.

It's when we use quantum physics that we are able to figure out what could have happened before, and knowing those theories are fairly accurate, we are confident this period lasted 200-400millions years, for a total of 13.7 billions.

Horizon problem basically say that the universe expanded much faster than the speed of light in the first 400 years...that itself isn't really a problem if both are independant, and nothing indicate us that it's impossible.


Do we know the age of the universe? I will answer that science is right until proven wrong. There is many reason why we believe so, and the model is solid one, but there is always a chance that we all omited something.

[Kaylia]

The universe is undergoing accelerating expansion, it's 13.7 billion years old, but 46 billion light years across.

Just because you can't move faster than light through space doesn't mean space can't expand faster than light.

As for the lightspeed barrier, even at slower than light speeds, you can push up towards high relativistic velocities and colonize a galaxy with hundred to thousand light year trips completed in fractions of that in subjective time, thanks to the joys of time dilation.

It isn't infinite, that is ridiculous, you can tell this easily enough.

The sky is dark at night.

If it was infinite, then no matter which way you looked you would see a photon from a star.

Your 1st paragraph contradict the 2nd. If space can expand faster than light, the universe could be infinite AND have a dark night. Not to mention everything would be redshifted into something our eye can't detect.

[edit]
There is other reason why we think the universe is not infinite, but I don't think it's a good one, unless I misunderstood your point.

[Max™]

The first paragraph doesn't contradict the second at all.

Here's the easiest example I can think of.

Imagine an ant crawling across a balloon.

The ant has a maximum velocity at which it can travel across the balloon.

Sound can travel through the skin of the balloon faster than the ant can, and the speed of sound through the skin is in fact the maximum velocity for this hypothetical ant (he's very fast) to line the example up better.

The balloon can be blown up faster than sound can move through it's skin, and much faster than the ant can move across it.

Any sound waves moving through the balloons skin as it is blown up will be stretched out by the expansion.

Replace the balloon with space, sound with light, and the ant with matter. The stretched out sound waves are the cosmic microwave background.

[Woozie]

It isn't infinite, that is ridiculous, you can tell this easily enough.

The sky is dark at night.

If it was infinite, then no matter which way you looked you would see a photon from a star.

This line is reasoning is known as "Olber's Paradox" and it's been resolved for a long time.

[Woozie]

See, this is what I meant when I said I can never follow Max's reasoning. I fail to see how this:

Imagine an ant crawling across a balloon.

The ant has a maximum velocity at which it can travel across the balloon.

Sound can travel through the skin of the balloon faster than the ant can, and the speed of sound through the skin is in fact the maximum velocity for this hypothetical ant (he's very fast) to line the example up better.

The balloon can be blown up faster than sound can move through it's skin, and much faster than the ant can move across it.

Any sound waves moving through the balloons skin as it is blown up will be stretched out by the expansion.

Replace the balloon with space, sound with light, and the ant with matter. The stretched out sound waves are the cosmic microwave background.

Is a proper response to this:

Your 1st paragraph contradict the 2nd. If space can expand faster than light, the universe could be infinite AND have a dark night. Not to mention everything would be redshifted into something our eye can't detect.

[edit]
There is other reason why we think the universe is not infinite, but I don't think it's a good one, unless I misunderstood your point.

I can't see how your solution addresses the issue posed in Kaylia's post. You basically gave a reason that background radiation should exist. It didn't exactly explain why a universe traveling faster than light is necessarily subject to Olbers Paradox.

When I read your posts, I always get the impression that you're resolving a different problem and then acting as if you've resolved the problem at hand, or you mention some facts about the universe and act as if it addressed and resolved the issue when it actually didn't.

Would you mind explaining this again, but actually addressing the problem at hand this time? Or if you believe your post did address the problem, would you mind connecting some dots for me? Because like half of your posts you make, this one seems pretty non sequitur to me.

[Max™]

Well, I just looked that up, and apparently it has been resolved by the same reasoning I suggested, that the universe began in a big bang, and the "background" we see is the remnant of that origin.

There COULD be an infinite set or manifold of universes which this one is contained in, but this universe shows no signs of being infinite itself.

[Max™]

Light can travel through space at a set speed.

The universe is 13.7 billion years old, according to our best current models.

The observable universe is roughly 46 billion light years across.

We shouldn't be able to see 23 billion light years in any direction if light has only had 13.7 billion years to travel.

How do you resolve this, if nothing can move through space faster than light?

You realize that space expanding faster than the speed of light does not involve motion through space.

You are correct in that Olber's paradox doesn't prove that the universe is not infinite and eternal, it only proves one or the other.

If it was infinite, it could not have existed forever, otherwise we would receive light from every point in the sky.

If it was eternal, it could not be infinite for the same reason above.

The simplest conclusion is that the universe had a definite beginning some time ago.

Assuming that even though it had an origin, it is still infinite, we just can't see beyond the observable radius yet, is an unnecessary leap. There is no reason to assume this universe is infinite, yet had a starting point some finite time ago.

My reasoning may seem strange, but that is just because I take certain concepts to be self evident. I've spent 22 of my 28 years of life with General Relativity in my head, so a lot of these ideas are very natural to me. I'm sorry if I seem a little confusing with this stuff at times.

[Daydreamer]

Ok random think I've always wondered.

You guys are saying the universe is 46 billion light years across. Ok cool, fine. I'll roll with that.

But what is outside that?

[Aerin]

It's not that it's exactly that far across, it's that that's as far as we can currently see. What's beyond that, who knows. Could be everything, could be nothing.

[Woozie]

@Max:

Okay, the logical flow of that posts makes more sense to me. When I say your logic seems non sequitur, I don't mean that in any insulting way. It could easily be my own brain not making the connections between your arguments due to the way you speak (you have to admit that the way you present your flow of logic is much different than the way a professional mathematician would. It sounds to me like you're trying to present it in layman's terms, which is fine when you're talking to a lay person, but is confusing when you're talking to a fellow scientist). Also, you form your sentences much differently than most English speaking person. For example, I had trouble interpreting your last paragraph until I realized

asuming that even though it had an origin, it is still infinite, we can't see beyond the observable radius yet, is an unnecessary leap

means:

The assumption that "although the universe had an origin, it is still infinite. We just cannot see the entire universe yet" is an unnecessary leap.

That last difficulty (trying to translate your sentences in a way that I'm used to seeing) is the main reason I can't follow your posts. The sentences just sound like gibberish to me and I have to reread them a dozen times and rearrange words. I feel like I'm reading something written by someone who's first language isn't English (is it?).

I've personally always had problems interpreting the meaning of things that aren't said very directly due to a certain condition I was born with, but never before have I had so much trouble from one person.

[Max™]

The cosmic microwave background is a sphere roughly 46 billion light years in diameter.

Given the age of the stars, and several other aspects of the universe, it certainly looks like it started in a major event 13.7 billion years ago, so the 46 billion light year size is due to it inflating at an enormous rate at first, and a renewed and increasing rate of expansion as of several billion years ago.

What is outside of it? We can't say for sure, other universes maybe? A maximum entropy sea? God? That is beyond our ability to observe, and purely theoretical at this point.


@ Woozie, Sorry, I always try to speak in a way that a layman can understand.

Sometimes the concepts come across a little weird, as again, I've got some very STRANGE views of the universe.

English is my first language, math is one that I am working on. I spent a lot of time in my head pondering the implications of relativity, quantum mechanics, and our observations of the universe. When I attempt to explain them, they often come out in a weird kind of rush.

It's all locked up behind my eyes, and when I open the faucet in my fingers, it just pours out.

[Schultz]

Clearly the Battlestar Galactica.

Oh gods... they sent out cylons in advance to infiltrate us, make a series about them so that we could be easily infiltrated by the "Trojan Horse" ie Galactica, then BOOOOOOOM nukes start raining down, Basestar's jump into orbit, and in the end we all get ass raped by Number Two....

The end is extremely fucking nigh!!

[Woozie]

@ Woozie, Sorry, I always try to speak in a way that a layman can understand.

Sometimes the concepts come across a little weird, as again, I've got some very STRANGE views of the universe.

English is my first language, math is one that I am working on. I spent a lot of time in my head pondering the implications of relativity, quantum mechanics, and our observations of the universe. When I attempt to explain them, they often come out in a weird kind of rush.

It's all locked up behind my eyes, and when I open the faucet in my fingers, it just pours out.

I'm used to strange views on the universe, I'm just not used to strange sentence structures lol

Am I crazy here? Am I the only one who has trouble understanding your structure? Like I said, I've always had problems with interpreting things that aren't written as clearly as possible and in the way that my own brain is just used to, so maybe it's just my fault. I don't mean to be a grammar nazi or anything (my own grammar is far from perfect), but would you mind trying to be a little more formal with your writing style? I mean, I know it's just a forum and this is a very informal way of communication but the way your sentences come out drives me crazy sometimes (like in the example I gave above with the assumption of infinite universe).