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What Is The Most Astounding Fact About The Universe?
Forbes/Science ^ | 8 Apr, 2016 | Ethan Siegel

Posted on 04/11/2016 6:26:44 PM PDT by MtnClimber

Back in 2008, Time Magazine interviewed Neil de Grasse Tyson, and asked him, “What is the most astounding fact you can share with us about the Universe?” His answer was indeed a very good, true, and astounding fact about the Universe: that all the complex atoms that make up everything we know owe their origins to ancient, exploded stars, dating back billions of years. It’s a great fact, and it’s definitely on the short list of the most remarkable things we’ve learned about the Universe. But if I were to choose the single most astounding fact about the Universe, I’d want you to consider something else: something far more fundamental and profound. Consider that the Universe — with everything in it the way it is — didn’t have to be this way. It didn’t have to even be close. We could have had a Universe without trees, without mountains, without our skies and without oceans. We could have had a Universe without planets like Earth, or planets at all. We could have even had a Universe where nothing that we know of — no particles, forces or interactions — exists as it does right now.

(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...


TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: science; stars; universe
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To: MtnClimber
What Is The Most Astounding Fact About The Universe?

That the abstract endeavor of mathematics can explain/model the universe.

41 posted on 04/11/2016 7:16:10 PM PDT by bkopto
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To: JSDude1

Psalm 8:3 - “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet...”


42 posted on 04/11/2016 7:20:15 PM PDT by 21twelve (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2185147/posts It is happening again.)
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To: ghosthost

On the back of a giant turtle.


43 posted on 04/11/2016 7:21:41 PM PDT by Larry Lucido
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To: MtnClimber

That one could look upon it’s majesty and not recognize the hand of God.


44 posted on 04/11/2016 7:30:02 PM PDT by Cyman
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To: MtnClimber

Ping


45 posted on 04/11/2016 7:37:42 PM PDT by ChinaGotTheGoodsOnClinton (Go Egypt on 0bama)
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To: 1FreeAmerican

That’s hot...


46 posted on 04/11/2016 7:45:36 PM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously-you won't live through it anyway - "Enjoy Yourself" ala Louis Prima)
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To: MtnClimber

The Universal Constants; if you know them, you know there is a God.


47 posted on 04/11/2016 7:51:34 PM PDT by heights
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To: MtnClimber

The most astounding thing about the universe is that it is just a petri dish to GOD


48 posted on 04/11/2016 7:51:55 PM PDT by 5th MEB (Progressives in the open; --- FIRE FOR EFFECT!!)
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To: minnesota_bound

Monty Python Universe Song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yq4uCWtQE24

Song lyrics
http://www.montypython.net/scripts/galaxy.php


49 posted on 04/11/2016 7:53:13 PM PDT by minnesota_bound
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I don’t understand the question.


50 posted on 04/11/2016 7:55:07 PM PDT by Rockpile (GOP legislators-----caviar eating surrender monkeys.)
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To: MtnClimber

That some humans believe they control earth’s climate


51 posted on 04/11/2016 8:22:46 PM PDT by Dr.Deth
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To: MtnClimber

It was created by GOD!!!!


52 posted on 04/11/2016 8:35:08 PM PDT by Busko (The only thing that is certain is that nothing is certain.)
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To: MtnClimber

That it suddenly came into existence from nowhere and nothing - or that it’s existed forever without beginning.....


53 posted on 04/11/2016 9:04:21 PM PDT by Intolerant in NJ
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To: infool7
137

The reciprocal of the fine structure constant!

54 posted on 04/11/2016 9:20:16 PM PDT by Steely Tom (Vote GOP: A Slower Handbasket)
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To: MtnClimber

This guy is a world renowned physicist and he’s geeking out about that?

How about electrons that disappear and reappear in higher energy states when photons hit them?

How about quantum entanglement?

How about the fact that most of the mass of the Universe is unaccounted for.

How about the fact you can get a 118 atom molecule to behave like its a wave, and not a particle?

How did he get his job?


55 posted on 04/11/2016 9:27:05 PM PDT by RinaseaofDs
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To: MtnClimber
I would vote for the Hubble Space Telescope's Ultra Deep Field (UDF), which is is one of the strongest empirical 'tells' that the Universe is in fact created.

Why? Because it shouldn't be visible, not like that. That image should be a fog or completely black, nothing in between. To see that amount of detail, that amount of fine structure, those beautiful delicate rotating pinwheels, to see galaxies billions of light years away across almost an entire universe is absurd. It is more mathematically improbable than hitting the Power Ball Jackpot lottery five times in a row. That mind-blowing image is impossible without a super-finely tuned matter density gradient and alpha opacity function that is absolutely perfect.

The UDF is one of the many wildly improbable aspects of the physical Universe. It is unique in that it does not fall prey to a rebuttal based on the Anthropic Principle. (I believe that AP is the last, desperate, refuge of the cornered atheist.)

See the YouTube video The Hubble Ultra Deep Field in 3D by Deep Astronomy. (Or just look out your window.)

God designed the universe very carefully because I think that He wants us to marvel at the sheer majesty of His creation and see what He hath wrought. He wants us to see it. And in doing so we cannot help but be forever humbled by it.

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. (Ps 19:1)

56 posted on 04/11/2016 9:34:05 PM PDT by Gideon7
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To: Beowulf9

Their loss!


57 posted on 04/11/2016 9:43:03 PM PDT by I am Richard Brandon
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To: MtnClimber

That the universe is expanding, because if it is expanding, what is it expanding into?


58 posted on 04/11/2016 9:45:39 PM PDT by I am Richard Brandon
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To: MtnClimber
Consider that the Universe, with everything in it the way it is, didn’t have to be this way. It didn’t have to even be close.

I don't understand where he gets that. Physicists don't really know what the pre-Big Bang universe consisted of, what state it existed in or what caused it to go Big Bang. To my mind Occam's Razor says that what the universe is is the only thing it could be.

59 posted on 04/11/2016 9:53:31 PM PDT by TigersEye (This is the age of the death of reason and rule of law. Prepare!)
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To: GrandJediMasterYoda
That we would have a God so cruel as to create this.......

Original sin is responsible for many terrible things.
That is the result of thousands of generations of ex post facto sins.

60 posted on 04/11/2016 10:02:41 PM PDT by TigersEye (This is the age of the death of reason and rule of law. Prepare!)
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