If one counterexample disproves Intelligent Design, this is it.
Posted on 03/16/2006 11:31:54 AM PST by The_Victor
Physicists announced Thursday that they now have the smoking gun that shows the universe went through extremely rapid expansion in the moments after the big bang, growing from the size of a marble to a volume larger than all of observable space in less than a trillion-trillionth of a second.
The discovery — which involves an analysis of variations in the brightness of microwave radiation — is the first direct evidence to support the two-decade-old theory that the universe went through what is called inflation.
It also helps explain how matter eventually clumped together into planets, stars and galaxies in a universe that began as a remarkably smooth, superhot soup.
"It's giving us our first clues about how inflation took place," said Michael Turner, assistant director for mathematics and physical sciences at the National Science Foundation. "This is absolutely amazing."
Brian Greene, a Columbia University physicist, said: "The observations are spectacular and the conclusions are stunning."
Researchers found the evidence for inflation by looking at a faint glow that permeates the universe. That glow, known as the cosmic microwave background, was produced when the universe was about 300,000 years old — long after inflation had done its work.
But just as a fossil tells a paleontologist about long-extinct life, the pattern of light in the cosmic microwave background offers clues about what came before it. Of specific interest to physicists are subtle brightness variations that give images of the microwave background a lumpy appearance.
Physicists presented new measurements of those variations during a news conference at Princeton University. The measurements were made by a spaceborne instrument called the Wilkinson Microwave Anistropy Probe, or WMAP, launched by NASA in 2001.
Earlier studies of WMAP data have determined that the universe is 13.7 billion years old, give or take a few hundred thousand years. WMAP also measured variations in the cosmic microwave background so huge that they stretch across the entire sky. Those earlier observations are strong indicators of inflation, but no smoking gun, said Turner, who was not involved in the research.
The new analysis looked at variations in the microwave background over smaller patches of sky — only billions of light-years across, instead of hundreds of billions.
Without inflation, the brightness variations over small patches of the sky would be the same as those observed over larger areas of the heavens. But the researchers found considerable differences in the brightness variations.
"The data favors inflation," said Charles Bennett, a Johns Hopkins University physicist who announced the discovery. He was joined by two Princeton colleagues, Lyman Page and David Spergel, who also contributed to the research.
Bennett added: "It amazes me that we can say anything at all about what transpired in the first trillionth of a second of the universe."
The physicists said small lumps in the microwave background began during inflation. Those lumps eventually coalesced into stars, galaxies and planets.
The measurements are scheduled to be published in a future issue of the Astrophysical Journal.
Never heard of Jolly Roger. I lead a sheltered life. What is it?
the patron beer of Seatellites.
Didn't know that. Why do I have to google everything!!
http://seattle.citysearch.com/profile/36619090
I won't try to tell you how unlikely that is.
Now you know where to go. /maybe you will see some of your evolutionary compatriots down there.
The paper Ichneumon cited assumes up front that expansion is uniform. That is, it "works" everywhere. The paper then goes on to show that said expansion doesn't produce noticeable effects on the scale of solar systems or even galaxies. You have not addressed the paper.
If one counterexample disproves Intelligent Design, this is it.
LOL! Yeah, but....
Now you're seeing the light! So you ARE beginning to see how evolution works. It's always good when the light bulb comes on for someone. ;)
Oh yes, PW, the ole light bulb has flouresced, lol.
But it does work for areas bound by gravity. The entire universe is bound by gravity. It is just that gravity causes objects to move within space while space is busy expanding.
"...And if it can't work in an area bound by Gravity, then it couldn't work back when all matter was inside an area the size of a marble.
"Which is to say, it doesn't work for the Big Bang, either.
"So we know that it doesn't work for the Big Bang and we know that it doesn't work for areas inside Solar Systems...well, it's not a big stretch to say that Inflation Theory simply doesn't work.
Sorry, but your premises are incorrect.
Yeah, the thinking of infinity in math is scattered throughout the literature, usually not pulled together and treated in itself like Cantor did. Physicists tend to try to reduce dimensions to the minimum, but interesting things happen if dimensions are allowed to go to infinity.
In post 317, Ichneumon linked to an article which seems to be excellent in this context. I'll repeat the link here:
The influence of the cosmological expansion on local systems. On pages 5 and 6, the authors have a section titled "Order of magnitude estimates," where they compute the effect of the cosmological expansion on three different gravitationally bound systems.
For the earth-sun system, gravity "completely overwhelms the effect of the cosmological expansion by 44 orders of magnitude." For the sun-galaxy system, the cosmological expansion "is 11 orders of magnitude smaller ..." than gravity. For our galactic cluster, although cosmological expansion is "7 orders of magnitude smaller than the galactic cluster g and thus of considerably greater relative significance than was found for the galactic and the solar system scales, it is still nevertheless essentially ignorable."
Inflation Theory doesn't work in areas bound by Gravity such as inside Solar Systems, so it can't work "everywhere."- Southack
"But it does work for areas bound by gravity. The entire universe is bound by gravity. It is just that gravity causes objects to move within space while space is busy expanding." - b_sharp
B_sharp, you need to take up your complaint with Radioastronomer. Here's what's been said about your claims so far:
Actually, it is. Hubble's constant is about 71(km/s)/Mpc so the distance is growing very slowly. You can do the math yourself.
Ummm... Noooooo..
H (Hubble's Constant) is measured across the entire universe. However, our solar system, and yes even an entire galaxy is "gravitationally bound" which basically means there is no expansion going on within these small local areas.
This includes the distance between the Earth and the Sun.
How intense was local Gravity in the moments prior to the alledged Big Bang?
You know, when all matter existed inside an area the size of a marble?!
Was matter Gravitationally Bound then?
See posts #575 and #576, then ask yourself if Inflation Theory applies to areas that are bound by Gravity.
There's nothing quite so sad as watching a grown man trying to resuscitate a dead horse.
I was quoting RadioAstronomer's point (which just happens to dovetail with my own).
You should take up your disagreement with him.
Or you could ask your buddy Doctor Stochastic, who disagrees with your above paper, myself, *and* with RadioAstronomer about Inflation inside our Solar System. He says that it *does* happen back somewhere around post #325.
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