Majority of Spiral Galaxies Spin Counterclockwise

Here's an odd tidbit of information that I found. One would think that looking out into the Universe we would find clockwise and anti-clockwise galaxies in a fairly evenly distributed ratio. Apparently that may not be the case

Galaxy Zoo is a project that has classified over 10,000,000 images of galaxies. Nearly 100,000 members have classified these images, with each image being classified by at least 20 different members. The initial results show that a large majority of galaxies are anti-clockwise.

It is early days still, but our preliminary results are indicating that there are more anti-clockwise galaxies than clockwise!

If the excess of anti-clockwise galaxies really is there in the sky, then we need to figure out how significant it is - because obviously we do not expect *exactly* the same number of anti-clock and clockwise galaxies. Some deviation from the expected number is allowed... and we need to work out how big the excess needs to be for the result to be unusual and interesting.
galaxy zoo forum

What does this mean exactly? I don't know but it sounds interesting. Perhaps things aren't as random as we thought. Or maybe people are biased when viewing these galaxies. Just to be sure they're going to introduce mirrored images at random to avoid any counter non-counter bias.

Hat tip to toomanytribbles for this information.

I guess it depends how you look at it. If you look at a galaxy that is in your perspective (say the bottom portion) to be going anti-clockwise, wouldnt it be also going clockwise if your perspective changed (to a above view)?

To me it sounds like those figures could be reversed and there would be more clockwise galaxies than anti-clockwise galaxies. No?

Xia

Ok, maybe a stupid question, but doesn't the direction they spin depend on your angle of perception? It looks counterclockwise from one side, yet if you could travel through it and turn around to look at the other side, wouldn't it be going clockwise?

Maybe this has to do with where we are in the universe on why most appear to be going counterclockwise from our vantage point.

To be honest, i don't possess the technical knowledge to confirm anything at all about that.

Using my rather special knowledge gained through constant, focused meditative insight however, i can share some basic ideas on what this may ultimately mean.


A: All galaxies are spiralling outwards from the universal core - which backs up the theory of the big bang.

B: All things inside each individual galaxy causes individual galaxies to spin in different.

C: All galaxies are required to maintain an individual spin which controls some sort of ultimate balance that controls some supernatural force that lies within the universe.

Of course, it's possible all three of these insights are correct, perhaps only one or two are correct.

I wait upon scientific knowledge.

What's to say that they're not all spinning one way, and it's just our perception that makes them look like they're going in different directions?
If you were to look at on from below, and it's spinning clockwise, when you looked at it from above it would be spinning counter-clockwise. Maybe we're just looking at some galaxies from above and some from below?

I wonder if there is a difference between galaxies with super-massive black holes at their centers and galaxies without.

It would be spinning the same direction as its black hole, with the black hole spinning in the same direction as its original star.

Is there a greater number of counter-clockwise spinning stars? From solar North, Sol is spinning counter-clockwise, yes? As is Earth.

Perhaps the entire universe is rotating.

Even thinking about the perspective issue, galaxies are still spinning in one distinct direction. Can be represented by a binary variable, because two galaxies spinning in different directions will still be spinning in different directions no matter which way you approach them. Calling them clockwise or counterclockwise is just an easy shortcut.


My biggest question aroused by this is that basically, we are in the accretion disk of a massive black hole. While we cannot directly experience any of it's forces working, what effects on time does this have as opposed to being in a galaxy with no super massive hole. Does time flow differently in the vast void expanse between galaxies?