Farthest Galaxy Yet Smashes Cosmic Distance Record

space.com ^ | 3/3/16 | Calla Cofield

[LibWhacker]

It takes a lot of clear thinking.

[Larry Lucido]

His word said there was light. Good enough for me.

[norwaypinesavage]

Clear thinking? Is that sort of like “space expands between clumps of mass”? That’s pretty impressive thinking when you consider that dust is quite evenly distributed.

[Verginius Rufus]

The James Webb Space Telescope is named for an early NASA administrator, not for the former senator Jim Webb.

That's good because NASA won't have to rename it if Hillary gets elected (now that Jim Webb says he won't vote for her).

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks LibWhacker.

---

· String Theory Ping List ·

---

---

· Join · Bookmark · Topics · Google ·
· View or Post in 'blog · post a topic · subscribe ·

---

[SunkenCiv]

Astronomers spot galaxy a record 13.4 billion light-years from Earth
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2016/03/04/astronomers-spot-galaxy-record-13-4-billion-light-years-from-earth.html?intcmp=trending

[LibWhacker]

No, that’s sort of like math, logic and physics. Never studied them? Yeah, no kidding; there’s a reason for that.

[onedoug]

Inflation seems a pretty good theory. And this appears to be pretty early large scale aggregation of matter.

I wonder how it eventually evolved and whether it’s still out there.

[discostu]

It’s actually fairly simple stuff. Einstein already said that the way to beat the speed of light was to condense space, if you take 1 unit of space and condense it to 1/4 the size you can cross THAT at less than the speed of light but get to the other side faster than light that had to go “the long way” (uncondensed). Same kind of thing happened right after the Big Bang space was condensed, travel speed ACTED faster, but really wasn’t.

It doesn’t take faith, it takes actually paying attention and not assuming you’re smarter than them. In this case it’s all about the elevator. If you can understand that you get it, if you can’t you type “riiiiiight” and act like other people are dumb.

[onedoug]

E=mc², yet the inflationary epoch was pure energy with no matter yet congealed.

[LibWhacker]

and whether it’s still out there

I read an article a couple of months ago about that very possibility; i.e., there may be regions of the universe still experiencing inflation. I'll see if I can dig it up for you.

[onedoug]

Thanks, LW. Meanwhile:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_inflation

I’ve been a follower - though not necessarily an advocate - of the work of Andrei Linde for some time, having attended a lecture of his at Caltech about a dozen years ago.

One really has to stretch the mind to take in some of these ideas, fascinating though they are.

[norwaypinesavage]

I guess you’re right. Far be it for a dummy like me to dispute a brilliant astrophysicist like you.

[norwaypinesavage]

"Inflation seems a pretty good theory."

I agree. It explains much of the currently observed universe. I'm still confused, though, about what happened BEFORE the Big Bang.

[onedoug]

So is everyone else.

The “Big Bang”, I think, was/is a quantum event which, by the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, will never be fully understood, i.e., it both did and didn’t occur.