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Scientists find first evidence that many universes exist
PhysOrg ^ | 12/17/10 | Lisa Zyga

Posted on 12/18/2010 4:14:00 PM PST by LibWhacker

The signatures of a bubble collision: A collision (top left) induces a temperature modulation in the CMB temperature map (top right). The “blob” associated with the collision is identified by a large needlet response (bottom left), and the presence of an edge is determined by a large response from the edge detection algorithm (bottom right). Image credit: Feeney, et al.

(PhysOrg.com) -- By looking far out into space and observing what’s going on there, scientists have been led to theorize that it all started with a Big Bang, immediately followed by a brief period of super-accelerated expansion called inflation. Perhaps this was the beginning of everything, but lately a few scientists have been wondering if something could have come before that, setting up the initial conditions for the birth of our universe.

In the most recent study on pre-Big Bang science posted at arXiv.org, a team of researchers from the UK, Canada, and the US, Stephen M. Feeney, et al, have revealed that they have discovered four statistically unlikely circular patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). The researchers think that these marks could be “bruises” that our universe has incurred from being bumped four times by other universes. If they turn out to be correct, it would be the first evidence that universes other than ours do exist.

The idea that there are many other universes out there is not new, as scientists have previously suggested that we live in a “multiverse” consisting of an infinite number of universes. The multiverse concept stems from the idea of eternal inflation, in which the inflationary period that our universe went through right after the Big Bang was just one of many inflationary periods that different parts of space were and are still undergoing. When one part of space undergoes one of these dramatic growth spurts, it balloons into its own universe with its own physical properties. As its name suggests, eternal inflation occurs an infinite number of times, creating an infinite number of universes, resulting in the multiverse.

These infinite universes are sometimes called bubble universes even though they are irregular-shaped, not round. The bubble universes can move around and occasionally collide with other bubble universes. As Feeney, et al., explain in their paper, these collisions produce inhomogeneities in the inner-bubble cosmology, which could appear in the CMB. The scientists developed an algorithm to search for bubble collisions in the CMB with specific properties, which led them to find the four circular patterns.

Still, the scientists acknowledge that it is rather easy to find a variety of statistically unlikely properties in a large dataset like the CMB. The researchers emphasize that more work is needed to confirm this claim, which could come in short time from the Planck satellite, which has a resolution three times better than that of WMAP (where the current data comes from), as well as an order of magnitude greater sensitivity. Nevertheless, they hope that the search for bubble collisions could provide some insight into the history of our universe, whether or not the collisions turn out to be real.

“The conclusive non-detection of a bubble collision can be used to place stringent limits on theories giving rise to eternal inflation; however, if a bubble collision is verified by future data, then we will gain an insight not only into our own universe but a multiverse beyond,” the researchers write in their study.

This is the second study in the past month that has used CMB data to search for what could have occurred before the Big Bang. In the first study, Roger Penrose and Vahe Gurzadyan found concentric circles with lower-than-average temperature variation in the CMB, which could be evidence for a cyclic cosmology in which Big Bangs occur over and over.


TOPICS: Astronomy; Science
KEYWORDS: anotherstudy; creationstory; evidence; exist; gottagettagrant; multiverse; provemewrong; psychobabble; scifi; stringtheory; universes
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To: goat granny

>>Don’t worry Free, your probably good looking to lots of female freepers also..smile, your on candid camera...<<

Lordy!! ;)


41 posted on 12/18/2010 5:43:16 PM PST by freedumb2003 (Nothing sharpens the mind like not being able to get a job. /Nonstatist)
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To: Blood of Tyrants

>>I find it strange that someone can believe in infinite universes but not heaven.<<

There is nothing in the OP that suggests the latter.


42 posted on 12/18/2010 5:44:31 PM PST by freedumb2003 (Nothing sharpens the mind like not being able to get a job. /Nonstatist)
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To: ReverendJames

One only has to look at the Democrat party to know there is an alternate Universe!


43 posted on 12/18/2010 5:49:16 PM PST by JaguarXKE (Life - It's 10 percent circumstances and 90 percent how you react to circumstances - Sarah Palin)
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To: ReverendJames
(PhysOrg.com) -- By looking far out into space and observing what’s going on there, scientists have been led to theorize that it all started with a Big Bang

The big bang idea was never based on anything more than a misinterpretation of cosmic redshift. Halton Arp destroyed that and intelligent people are starting to reject it.

Like the theory of evolution, the big bang idea is a bunch of bullshit which is mainly being defended by academic dead wood. The idea of multiple universes is mainly motivated by a clear understanding of the laws of probability and what the odds are against evolution and evoloserism in the one universe we actually have in real life.

44 posted on 12/18/2010 5:52:53 PM PST by wendy1946
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To: Williams
The scientists don’t seem to realize they are delving more and more into the mystical.

Maybe that's because using observational evidence isn't "delving more and more into the mystical."

45 posted on 12/18/2010 6:03:54 PM PST by Moonman62 (Half of all Americans are above average. Politicians come from the other half.)
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To: LibWhacker; SunkenCiv; neverdem
Scientists find first evidence that many universes exist

And that's just on FR.

Ping

46 posted on 12/18/2010 6:16:14 PM PST by decimon
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To: wendy1946

I’ve watched for years and years as these folks come up with one theory to explain the failures of another theory. I watched these folks pass theory as fact when pushing another theory. I watched the same folks keep trying to push a universe with boundaries, multiple universes, other dimensions, etc...., and of course discuss it as though it is fact - AND get funded for it handsomely - while real scientists doing actual experiments “in situ” get the crumbs. (Most of the funding is from government - just another form of welfare and dependency that undermines those doing real work.) And these same real scientists don’t get defensive when in many cases - they too are still stuck with theories in some cases.

In my opinion, these “theoretical” folks who can’t get past theory but talk like they have are simply insecure people.

I for one have no insecurities over the possibility that our universe IS the only one and has literally no beginning, end or border. I am not surprised when a new telescope shows more stars behind known stars - nor will I be surprised when the generation telescope shows more behind those ad nauseum - n++;

Down to earth people like real scientists are very secure in their being.

=8-)


47 posted on 12/18/2010 6:18:01 PM PST by =8 mrrabbit 8=
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To: TomasUSMC
What was in between them before they bumped?

Imagine a 2-D universe. It's a sheet of paper. It's infinitely large. Cartoon characters can crawl on that sheet; but they don't know the meaning of "up" or "down." That's your Flatland.

Now imagine that there is a stack of such sheets. Sometimes they hang one over the other, sometimes they "bump" into each other. (They are all parallel to each other.)

Can you explain "what is between them" sheets, using only the terminology of Flatlanders? You and me would say "air" or whatever else represents the 3rd dimension. But those poor Flatlanders have no such concept.

If we bump the whole model up a notch, the 4th dimension can be visualized as a gradual change of things that may already exist in our 3-D world. For example, what will happen when a 4-D sphere crosses through our 3-D plane of existence? First, there is nothing. Then a tiny sphere appears from nowhere. Then it grows. Then it shrinks, down to a tiny point, and then vanishes. What we see are 3-D sections of a larger, 4-D object.

So if there are multiple Universes that are separated by one or more other dimensions then when those Universes intersect they become visible to each other - just like when two paper sheets cross, the drawings on them (points, actually) become visible to both sets of Flatlanders. Also a Flatlander then can cross from his plane of existence onto the other one because the fact that the surface is sharply bent in 3rd dimension is lost on him.

48 posted on 12/18/2010 6:20:26 PM PST by Greysard
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To: wendy1946

Good point.


49 posted on 12/18/2010 6:37:30 PM PST by ReverendJames (Only A Lawyer And A Painter Can Change Black Into White)
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To: LibWhacker

"Fascinating."

50 posted on 12/18/2010 6:40:20 PM PST by GreenLanternCorps ("Barack Obama" is Swahili for "Jimmy Carter".)
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To: UCANSEE2

Only if there’s a pro/coni-verse


51 posted on 12/18/2010 6:41:37 PM PST by ReverendJames (Only A Lawyer And A Painter Can Change Black Into White)
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To: yefragetuwrabrumuy

Johnny Quest!! The best animated “kid” show ever.


52 posted on 12/18/2010 6:48:39 PM PST by corkoman
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To: LibWhacker

53 posted on 12/18/2010 6:57:14 PM PST by BushCountry (I spoken many wise words in jest, but no comparison to the number of stupid words spoken in earnest)
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To: ReverendJames
Well then there is no such thing as a uni-verse.

You are right unless we define 'universe' as everything that is. Then what we have until now thought of as the universe is just a sub-component of the actual universe and it needs a different name.

Of course the more the definition of 'universe' is stretched the less it means. If we add 'everything that was' and 'everything that will be' to 'everything that is' to the definition of 'universe' it becomes less and less quantifiable. Add 'everything that never was and never will be' (why not? isn't the universe 'everything?') and 'universe' becomes something that is impossible to ever measure, mentally picture or understand.

I simultaneously love and hate these mental conundrums. ;^)

54 posted on 12/18/2010 7:17:19 PM PST by TigersEye (Who crashed the markets on 9/28/08 and why?)
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To: Moonman62

Infinite universes and many other modern theories are so out of the understanding of man and so beyond the realm of human understanding, that it is as good as mystical.

The scientists can’t understand it, or explain it. The state of the “cosmic egg” pre big bang is not within the realm of human understanding. Nor is where it came from. Nor is the concept of infinite universes beyond our cosmic egg/ big bang universe (which was supposed to contain everything), nor is a cat that is both dead AND alive but not until you observe it (quantum theory), nor is the timeless ingularity of a black hole, or the other dimensions it may lead to. All these take the scientists into realms they cannot understand, observe, or see beyond. In that sense, the limits of science mesh quite well with the mysticism of religion.

You don’t think it’s as mystical as God? What is God, except the infinite, that which preceded everything, he is indeterminate and mysterious, he is beyond time and space, all knowing, all powerful.

How are the modern mysteries of science any different than the spiritualist’s yearning for God?


55 posted on 12/18/2010 7:18:12 PM PST by Williams (It's the policies, stupid.)
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To: LibWhacker

What did they expect a picket fence at the edge of the universe.


56 posted on 12/18/2010 7:19:29 PM PST by steveab (When was the last time someone tried to sell you a CO2 induced climate control system for your home?)
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To: LibWhacker

POP!


57 posted on 12/18/2010 7:21:56 PM PST by NormsRevenge (Semper Fi ... Godspeed .. Monthly Donor Onboard .. Obama: Epic Fail or Bust!!!)
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To: Moonman62

You realize of course the scientists have not observed any other universes, and certainly not infinite universes? Almost by definition, they cannot see anything beyond this universe.

What they have done is, using Earth bound observations, decided there are a few areas of the sky in which they see variations in the cosmic background radiation.

Now, a non-religious person might say that’s interesting, maybe our ability to detect the radiation is inaccurate, etc.

But the “religious mystical scientist” makes a splash by theorizing that we are observing the “bruising” of our universe from 4 of the “infinite universes” which they theorize exist and actually “bump into” our universe.

I hope you don’t think this is anything other than an enormous and unknowable, unprovable leap of faith by the scientists? Because they sure as hell did not observe any of the things they are theorizing based on scant data.

I’m not commenting as a religious, or as a scientist, and neither are they.


58 posted on 12/18/2010 7:26:59 PM PST by Williams (It's the policies, stupid.)
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To: LibWhacker

“If they turn out to be correct, it would be the first evidence that universes other than ours do exist.”

Have to love this quote. Now I’d like to hear how they can ever “turn out to be correct” within the realm of human knowledge? It is absolutely impossible to verify the existence of these other universes.


59 posted on 12/18/2010 7:33:43 PM PST by Williams (It's the policies, stupid.)
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To: yefragetuwrabrumuy

My all-time favorite episode of Johnny Quest. That energy monster scared the beejezus out of me when I was a kid.


60 posted on 12/18/2010 7:36:23 PM PST by reagan_fanatic (Save the whales. Collect the whole set.)
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