Brilliant, But Distant: Most Far-Flung Known Quasar Offers Glimpse Into Early Universe

Scientific American ^ | 7-29-2011 | John Matson

[blam]

At a recent neighborhood card game, in a discussion about the budget and how much is a trillion, a friend pointed out that a trillion seconds is 32,000 years, as a comparison, a billion is only 32 years.

I was awe struck with the size of a trillion explained this way.

Then, a while later, I read this article about this quasar being 63 trillion times brighter than the sun (63 trillion!!).......it is just incomprehensible.

In God's plan, we are so insignificant.

[P.O.E.]

By Motorola

[redroller]

Try doing a few google searches on “Halton Arp”. This stuff has all been debunked, that is, blackholes, the “big bang”, and the entire idea of interpreting redshift as distance and velocity which is the only basis there ever was for believing in an expanding universe. Quasars in particular turn out to be not remotely as distant as a redshift=distance cosmology demands.

[blueunicorn6]

“Assuming that the universe makes sense” - oh, it makes sense alright. It’s the scientists who keep messing up.

[cripplecreek]

Alpha Centauri is about 26 trillion miles away.

Our sun compared to VY Canis Majoris, the largest known star.

[P.O.E.]

All kidding aside - cool post, thanks.

[Right Brother]

In God's plan, we are so insignificant.

Actually, we are very significant. We seem to think that our physical size, in relationship to the universe, makes us somehow unimportant. Even a galaxy becomes a mere speck in relation to an INFINITE universe. So how big must we become to be significant? God's love has no size restrictions.

[wardaddy]

In God's plan, we are so insignificant.

LOL..not to some who post on this forum...but I don't have to tell you that.

[hattend]

The Dept Of Defense briefed the president this morning.

They told President Obama that 2 Brazilian soldiers were killed in Iraq.

To everyone’s surprise, all the color drained from Obama’s face. Then he collapsed onto his desk, head in his hands, visibly shaken, almost in tears.

Finally, he composed himself and asked, ‘Just how many is a brazilian?’

[cripplecreek]

Halton Arp theories hardly “debunk” anything. They’re just different theories.

When his theories become accepted by the greater astrophysics community, other theories can be considered debunked. Even then they’ll still just accepted theories.

[seowulf]

In other words, when you watch a play, do you focus your attention on the actors or the set?

[JPG]

Since it would take 108 side by side Earth's to fit across the diameter of the Sun, that comparison with VY Canis Majoris is a true mind-blower.

[cripplecreek]

The biggest stars in the universe (Video)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bcz4vGvoxQA&feature=player_embedded#at=34

[Red Badger]

14.6 TRILLION DOLLARS in debt doesnt sound so big now................/s

[Red Badger]

Depends on how bad the play is.........

[Moonman62]

Actually, we are very significant. We seem to think that our physical size, in relationship to the universe, makes us somehow unimportant.

I think our extreme rarity makes us significant.

[Oratam]

Brilliant, But Distant:

For a second, I thought this was another NYT's article defending Obama.

[Moonman62]

Try doing a few google searches on “Halton Arp”. This stuff has all been debunked,

A few anomalies does not equate to debunked. Most quasars fit the model such as the one in this article.

[EternalVigilance]

"The quasar itself is a remarkable object in that no one really knows how to form a black hole that massive, two billion solar masses, in what in cosmological terms is a relatively short time,"

Uhmmm...well...obviously SOMEONE knows how.

[4FreeSpeach]

Hmmm! The following statement appears to be problematic:

“Try doing a few google searches on “Halton Arp”. This stuff has all been debunked, that is, blackholes, the “big bang”, and the entire idea of interpreting redshift as distance and velocity which is the only basis there ever was for believing in an expanding universe. Quasars in particular turn out to be not remotely as distant as a redshift=distance cosmology demands.”

Well here’s an interesting comment about that in the Wikipedia listing about Halton Arp at:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halton_Arp

“As more recent experiments have expanded the amount of collected data by orders of magnitude, it has become increasingly simple to test Arp’s postulates directly. A recent study stated that:

“... the publicly available data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and 2dF QSO redshift survey to test the hypothesis that QSOs are ejected from active galaxies with periodic noncosmological redshifts. For two different intrinsic redshift models, [...] and find there is no evidence for a periodicity at the predicted frequency in log(1+z), or at any other frequency.”[10]

Nonetheless, Arp has not wavered from his stand against the Big Bang and still publishes articles[11] stating his contrary view in both popular and scientific literature”