Stop the universe, it's leaving us behind (faster-than-light expansion)

Sydney Morning Herald ^ | 3/21/02 | Richard Macey

[powderhorn]

so - if we have some method of knowing that the universe is expanding then I would guess that we have some notion as to the general shape of the universe and it's center?

This is where it gets interesting. It has no center..for the same reason that the surface of a balloon has no center. There's nothing on the inside or the outside of the balloon, so you could say that the universe looks like the surface of a balloon, but not the whole balloon.

[PBRSTREETGANG]

Any clue yet as to what to do about the 20 Billion year old stars?

Bob Hope? Milton Berle?

[RadioAstronomer]

It would take many years for an earth bound observer to "see" your craft move from star to star. However, if you were traveling very close to the speed of light, the Lorenz Transformation (time dialation) for you inside the moving craft, would shorten the journey for you. Thus you could reach many stars in your lifetime, however, the time passage back on earth would be in "real time" i.e. how far you traveled at near the speed of light. So time for you might be in years while time passed on earth in the thousands of years.

[NormsRevenge]

Cap'n,, She's gonna blow if I push her any harder .. :-\

[RadioAstronomer]

I have to bow out for the moment. Been up all night. :) Will check back this evening.

[NormsRevenge]

The Universe is expanding faster then expected

Larsen B glacier shelf collapses

OwLGore shaves beard

Coincidence? Are they linked?

I dont stay upnights pondering Gore's relevance in the Grand Scheme of things, do you?

Sounds like a risky scheme to me... :-|

[VadeRetro]

The total energy in the universe is the same. Stars turn nucleon mass into photons, yes. Here's the funny part. A photon has energy and thus mass-equivalence. (E = mc² and all that.) Energy is mass, mass energy. Light not only curves in space, it causes space to curve.

The curvature of the universe is unchanged by the energy transformations.

BTW, I've been bit by that one myself on a different question. Physicist had to slap me awake.

[NormsRevenge]

Yup, Astronomers are notorious for pulling All Nighters... Sleep Well ,Star gazer :-)

[jpl]

Unlike most star trek movies you would still see the stars appear to be relitively stationary.

But don't forget: in the Star Trek universe, they are not travelling at or around the speed of light. They are travelling at speeds considerably greater than the speed of light. This is why they're able to get to Alpha Centauri in a couple of days instead of five years.

[blam]

The Great Attractor

[Mike Darancette]

There are so many questions about this, if you think about it in terms of Relativity.

Wouldn't objects receding at greater than light speed be perceived as black holes with infinite mass?

[Aric2000]

They are traveling in a WARP bubble as well, in other words OUT of the physical universe, therefore the laws of this universe do not apply. IE the limit of the speed of light.

This is why in MOST science fiction you will find terms such as hyper space, warp speed etc. It gets around that pesky speed of light limitation in the real physical universe.

[HeadOn]

[It is] he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof [are] as grasshoppers; that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in:Isaiah 40:22

There are no less than 10 references to God, the Creator, "stretching out the heavens" in the Bible. Not calling the universe a baloon, but a curtain. Try that on for size.

Here's another way to look at it: Who says it started with a big bang? If you believe in creation, scripture will send you toward the very young earth and universe, created by the hand of God in 6 days. I know, I know - everything is billions of years old...

Maybe not. What was the last movie you saw? Movies are a little universe all their own, aren't they? So are books. Did the main character start at birth? Probably not. Even if he/she did, what about the character's parents?

What about a painting? You have a picture by the artist, frozen in time. What happened before?

There is nothing before the movie or book starts, and there is nothing before the painting was painted. The characters and objects leap into existence, fully formed by the hand of the author/screenwriter/artist.

I respect those who understand all the relativity stuff, but, as a Christian, I have to weigh these things with what I believe.

[RightWhale]

what is it expanding into?

Why should there be a what into which to expand? You will probably get a kick out of some new lab experiments involving measuring the 5th dimension, now being designed and performed at Princeton [and many other research centers are scrambling their own projects.] Accepting the 5th dimension shouldn't be difficult for those who have accepted dimensions 1, 2, and 3, not to mention accepting time as the 4th dimension.

[RightWhale]

I don't believe there are any naked eye objects outside our galactic cluster.

If by galactic cluster you mean the Milky Way and several other galaxies not too far away, such as M31, Andromeda Galaxy, visible near the Great Square of Pegasus for those regions of earth not yet terminally light-polluted, then that is probably true.

[RightWhale]

No it didn't.

Did so.

[EBUCK]

Thanks for the ping. (why did you ping me? I'm not a scientist or anyhting like that)

Very interesting nonetheless. What is the energy source that is fueling the acceleration? Cosmic winds? And if we are to beleive Einstein wouldn't that energy source fail before light speed velocity is reached?

EBUCK

[Salgak]

Why would it implode ?

[RightWhale]

black holes have a gravity well that is not that wide, but exceptionally steep once entered

Sort of. Black holes act gravitationally-speaking just like an ordinary body of the same mass if you are outside the critical radius. If there were a black hole in place of the sun, and if that black hole had the same mass as the sun, earth and the other planets would continue orbiting just as they do now. In the dark.