Site BLOG PAGE🔎 SEARCH  Ξ INDEX  MAIN MENU  UP ONE LEVEL
 OJB's Web Site. Version 2.1. Blog Page.You are here: entry382 blog owen2 
Blog

Add a Comment   Up to OJB's Blog List

Strange

Entry 382, on 2006-08-18 at 13:54:01 (Rating 1, Science)

In my last blog entry I listed 13 things that, according to New Scientist, don't make sense. The second thing which doesn't make sense is the horizon problem. This states that the observable Universe (28 billion light years in diameter) is so uniform (it is similar density, temperature, etc on a large scale in all directions) that we cannot explain it. No force or phenomenon could travel faster than light to result in this uniformity over that distance because the Universe is only 14 billion years old.

The theory of inflation solves this problem (along with a few others) but we don't really know why inflation would have happened. Essentially inflation theory states that the Universe expanded really quickly just after the big bang. When I say really quickly I mean *really* quickly: by a factor of 100 quadrillion quadrillion in one billion quadrillionth of a second!

In many ways this whole idea is unprecedented elsewhere in science, but until we have a theory of quantum gravity we probably can't really understand what's happening. My intuition says we will find this theory is a good model, but what really happened will be better explained in different terms - sort of like Newtonian gravity is a good model but not strictly correct.

Recent space probes have found anisotropy in the microwave background which is consistent with inflation, so I think cosmologists are on the right track. Maybe the reality of this is like Haldane said: The Universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine.


There are no comments for this entry.


You can leave comments about this entry using this form.

Enter your name (optional):
Enter your email address (optional):
Enter the number shown here:number
Enter the comment:

To add a comment: enter a name and email (optional), type the number shown, enter a comment, click Add.
Note that you can leave the name blank if you want to remain anonymous.
Enter your email address to receive notifications of replies and updates to this entry.
The comment should appear immediately because the authorisation system is currently inactive.

I do podcasts too!. You can listen to my latest podcast, here: OJB's Podcast 2024-08-22 Stirring Up Trouble: Let's just get every view out there and fairly debate them..
 Site ©2024 by OJBOJB's BlogMicrosoft Free ZoneMade & Served on Mac 
Site Features: Blog RSS Feeds Podcasts Feedback Log04 Nov 2024. Hits: 49,585,490
Description: Blog PageKeywords: BlogLoad Timer: 11ms