Universe may NOT be expanding, study suggests.

a reply to: NthOther

Doppler is a measure of sound not light. They have applied it to light, I know. But the OP is suggesting there may be something wrong with the calculations in regards to light.

That I welcome too. If they could only bounce a beam of light off a distant mirror outside the Galaxy. Then we could see how much the singularity at the center of our Galaxy effects apparent light travel.

The experiment might take a while.

a reply to: intrptr

I gotta say the red shift of light seems like more of a "real" constant then the dark matter/energy problem.

Basically, IMHO the red shift seems harder for something unknown to be effecting it. Then dark matter/energy being some known phenomenon we are mistaking. We have been able to learn a lot about dark matter/energy by the gravitational lensing and the galactic " standard candels" supernovas.


I think we are pretty far into the standard model of the universe for "major" stuff to be wrong. The more likely is the "hole" people have found in theories doesn't mean the main stuff is wrong. Just that these a smaller part wrong.

originally posted by: intrptr

Doppler is a measure of sound not light. They have applied it to light, I know. But the OP is suggesting there may be something wrong with the calculations in regards to light.

Oh, I don't doubt that at all. There's all kinds of things wrong with all manner of calculations.

Just pointing out the prevailing theory is all.

a reply to: ArtemisE

I think we are pretty far into the standard model of the universe for "major" stuff to be wrong.

Like you say, standard "model".

Thats the problem I have with watching science stuff on TV anymore. They show lots and lots of standard CGI that support current theories about accepted standards. I just want them to show the pics from Hubble or other instruments.

They do, but if you blink you miss it. A whole hour of CGI and two photos.

Lots of secrets out there, we should be learning more than they let us, (imo).

I agree by the way that we are learning more, overall. In my life time they have moved the goal post more times than in the last thousand years combined.

Somehow we are stagnating with yet unanswered questions . If you ask me its because of standard models.

originally posted by: nugget1
I don't know about expanding universe, but expanding earth sure seems compelling. If you look at any map, you can see where continents would fit together. If the earth isn't expanding, then a cataclysmic event broke land masses apart and forced them into new locations....

Yes the tectonic plates the continents rest on are drifting apart, something like 3CM per year.

a reply to: pikestaff

Ever heard of the theory that the universe isn't expanding.... That all matter is shrinking at a constant rate. So to us it looks like expansion... While in reality it's us that are shrinking.. Kinda triply.

originally posted by: pikestaff

originally posted by: nugget1
I don't know about expanding universe, but expanding earth sure seems compelling. If you look at any map, you can see where continents would fit together. If the earth isn't expanding, then a cataclysmic event broke land masses apart and forced them into new locations....

Yes the tectonic plates the continents rest on are drifting apart, something like 3CM per year.

I believe it might have been possible that the original tectonic plates were originally somewhere deeper in the mantle, but as they were cooled down by water, they became more solid, filled up with gas, peeled off and floated up to the surface.

If you look at some of the simulations of tectonic plate movement on Earth, you will see that some extinct tectonic plates are now all twisted and contorted somewhere in the mantle.

en.wikipedia.org...

upload.wikimedia.org...

I have always wondered if we haven't given enough importance to the gravitational red-shift of light and have discounted it as a possible reason for the redshift cosmologically.
If one takes as a premise that we may be living in a particularly dusty region of the universe, said dust obviously affecting red-shift as a consequence of gravity, then i wonder how the maths would add up?
We would obviously not be aware of the dust as a cause simply because our reality is based in this situation and any other reality could only be speculated on.
So perhaps we live in a `coma` of material that coincidentally seems to produce a cosmological red-shift effect.
Dust as a drag effect on light. I am not a mathematician sadly...

Distant galaxies' red shift is not caused by motion away from us. Red shift is caused by "tired light". Light loses energy after traveling for 14-15 billion years, causing the wavelength to get very large (eventually infinite) and the frequency to get very small (eventually zero). This property of light (losing energy with time) is a very slow process and cannot be observed over small distances and small times. We cannot see beyond a distance of 13-14 billion light years, not because of a big bang, but because light is no longer observable after it has travelled that far. There is more stuff out there but we cannot see it.

But would that not contravene the law of conservation of energy?

In fact, unless I am mistaken, your theory of tired light is identical to cosmological red-shift.

Given that light can only `lose` energy through spacial expansion or gravitational stretch...for lose see shift to red, I wonder what premise this is based on. Personally I have tried too remain within the possible under commonly held theories. And I must admit, without doing the maths, my own idea may fall at the first hurdle...

a reply to: Adaluncatif

a reply to: Adaluncatif
I kind of approve this message.

Like a rock thrown into a pond, as the ripples move away from the center the energy gets spread out and diluted.
Even a flashlight, wall close, concentrated light, wall far, light is dimmer and diluted.

Is it also possible that some stellar objects just have different colors or brightness?
Nah

I like the tired light, or diffuse light theory.

a reply to: stirling

I buy some of the standard and I buy some of the electric theory, therefore like you I think they should stop butting heads and see how gravity and electricity work together.

I find a lot of theorists have the mindset that, 'that is his theory, has no business in my theory, we are intellectual competitive rivals'.
Therefore it's his way, or my way, but not both.

originally posted by: nugget1
I don't know about expanding universe, but expanding earth sure seems compelling. If you look at any map, you can see where continents would fit together. If the earth isn't expanding, then a cataclysmic event broke land masses apart and forced them into new locations....

Apparently you are not aware of even semi-modern geologic theory. Once upon a time all the continents were, indeed, together.
Has nothing to do with an "expanding earth".
I am sure we have been "expanding" due simply to the accumulation of space debris. However that has nothing to do with plate tectonics.

originally posted by: NthOther

originally posted by: intrptr

Time and distance skew light?

Sort of. Depends on how fast the object generating the light is moving.

The Doppler Effect

I think they are not taking into account the simple fact that the farther away we look, the further back in time we are seeing.

Ergo: If the Big Bang is even close to correct, does it not make sense that initially space was expanding at significant rates? If the universe is still expanding we should be able to measure it locally and not depend solely on observations made that occurred back at the beginning of time (the universe).

Given modern theories of physics one could safely (?) assume that the universe was much more energetic at the beginning than currently, thereby describing what we are seeing at extreme distances.

The question is this: is the universe still expanding? If so, we should be able to see said expansion locally.

The "red shift" stuff in the article interested me. If the red shift is not caused by a Doppler Effect, then the movement of light waves through the universe might be analogous to the movement of sound waves through the ocean. In that case the longer waves move the furthest through the medium, the ocean, and hence the furthest objects in space will be the most red, because the longer (red) light waves travel further than the others.

a reply to: Toadmund

You have it nearly correct.

Adjust your equation to include the parameters of it being a single drop of rain instead of a rock falling onto and into the still surface of a pool of water.These details are important to define the process.

I was asked a question lately I canot answer ,maybe someone can help me out.

If you are riding your Bicycle along a gravel road and your back tire spits out a rock with great force which hits another static rock and then ricochets in that against all odds manner and shoots forward past you and the bike and lands in front of you,has the rock time travelled?

The rock existed in my future as i approached it on my Bicycle,then my present as I drove over it with my Bicycle and then my past as I passed it completely BUT in was in my future again as I again approached it on my same Bicycle.Did the rock time travel?

originally posted by: Toadmund
a reply to: Adaluncatif
I kind of approve this message.

Like a rock thrown into a pond, as the ripples move away from the center the energy gets spread out and diluted.
Even a flashlight, wall close, concentrated light, wall far, light is dimmer and diluted.

Is it also possible that some stellar objects just have different colors or brightness?
Nah

I like the tired light, or diffuse light theory.

I have always subscribed to this, not that it is scientifically proven or anything, it just echoes as the simplest and most intuitive answer, which is normally correct.

As to why light gets 'tired':

For something to propagate, it needs a medium. In this case, it is space. We are told it contains nothing, yet is teeming with energy as virtual photons can be coaxed out and into real ones. So if there is nothing, how can something propagate in nothing? Link Goes against my logic at least...

No dark matter or energy found? If none has been found, how is the above experiment possible? I'm suggesting we are looking at dark energy and matter all the time, that is why space is black and why light can propagate in it. It also explains why it loses energy and gets 'tired'. Just like the ripples in the pond... Are these scientists daft or what? Looking but cannot see because it is staring you in the face...

So...these competing and very complex theories overlooked the very simple observable fact that the furthest Galaxies are as bright and observable as the nearby Galaxies...ok.

And these people had PhD's?

a reply to: Ketzer22

I was under the impression the universe both expands and contracts. Like our lungs do when we breathe sort of.

www.unc.edu...

It's cyclic.

a reply to: OpinionatedB

I've absolutely no proof or even evidence, but my personal pet theory is along the lines you've just said.

Expansion and contraction, but happening at the same time...weird?

Not if the Univese is shaped like a torus...imagine the magnetic field lines of a magnet..the magnet is the singularity (big bang engine) the field lines is space and matter and energy, both thrown out and attracted back into the magnetic pole.

As the matter and energy moves towards the poles of the torus, much like a magnetic field, it accelerates and is compressed, probably squeezed down to such a sub-atomic degree that quantum physics is operation, time is suspended and the singularity or big bang is initiated and happens..not once, but continually, since quantum effects are in operation, there is probably no time passing, or if there is, is passing very differently to how we percieve it.

So the big bang (attraction and expultion of matter and energy) is/could be more or less a single phenomena, happening once but continuously, much like what is going on in a magnet in terms of its fields.

So yeah..i reckon the Universe (one of many?) may be in a perpetual state of being pulled in and pushed out again to form what we think of as space, matter and energy. So is both expanding and contracting at the same time.