Horizon:Is everything we know about the universe wrong?

awallace

Is anyone watching this?

I wish i studied harder at school, id love to be this clever!!

Its got me thinking about one of my favourite "How/why?" questions.

How can the universe be infinite?

Is there life on other planets? - There must be.

What was there before the big bang?

The universe is so vast i struggle to comprehgend it all!

Anyone else baffled by space?

zanes

Extremely happily this is basically part of my degree course

crumbschief

Yes it grows,expands,Before the big bang? hmm that's always an interesting thought and makes me smile.The universe is only as small as the barriers you place.

awallace

Are you as clever as the cosmologists on the telly?

My head spins thinking about it let alone studying it!

zanes

I doubt it These people are speaking from a lifetime of work/research in one specific area!

Cosmology makes my head spin too sometimes!

If you're interested (Hope i'm not treading on any toes with this!) The OU has some introductory courses that are generally very well rated;

eg.

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... e/s194.htm

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... ifications

Smokin Joe

And if there is life on a planet in a distant Galaxy, are they more advanced than us? Maybe they have 15 speed electronic shifting and a laden touring bike weighs just 5 kilos :shock:

Buckled_Rims

They still haven't a clue.

What is it, 90% of the universe is missing? Also, how can you have a Number like "Grahams number" when it's bigger then the entire number of atoms in the universe!

Oh dear......and being on a turbo can sometimes feel like infinity.

crumbschief

Don't you think it's great that we don't have the answers to everything?we have so much to learn.Baby steps,i have found it's best to look at small bits at a time,whenever that is for you.

awallace

zanes wrote:

I doubt it These people are speaking from a lifetime of work/research in one specific area!

Cosmology makes my head spin too sometimes!

If you're interested (Hope i'm not treading on any toes with this!) The OU has some introductory courses that are generally very well rated;

eg.

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... e/s194.htm

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... ifications

Thanks!

I think i need to retire (only got 30 years to go). I could quite easily fill my time with learning all sorts like the above, learning the piano, travelling, riding my bike(s).

If there is life on other planets that is more advanced they would give every person a free bike each year.

I like the idea that there could be other people out there that have developed in the same way as we have based on distance from the sun creating a similar climate/atmosphere etc but maybe they are still in the equivalent of 1400s or maybe in the year 2500. It would be like time travel.

softlad

if the universe is 'infinite' - how can it be expanding..??

crumbschief

Yes imagine other life older,much older,who have developed over their time,say 100,000 years or more?

andrewJohnson

softlad wrote:

if the universe is 'infinite' - how can it be expanding..??

Maybe it's not infinite, just tends to infinity.

Like n = n + 1.

whyamihere

softlad wrote:

if the universe is 'infinite' - how can it be expanding..??

Two different things. There's infinite space containing a finite amount of 'stuff'. The 'stuff' is all racing apart, expanding.

crumbschief

softlad wrote:

if the universe is 'infinite' - how can it be expanding..??

I think infinite is a guess by humans,it is growing and i accept that,of course i want to know more,we all do.

finchy

I'm just about to start studying the Earth and solar system as part of my OU course. I'm still undecided as to whether I should go down a physics route or a more practical engineering degree. The astronomy units look absolutely fascinating.

Wish I could watch this programme, but BBC won't let me from Slovenia, and I can't watch through a proxy.

finchy

awallace wrote:

zanes wrote:

I doubt it These people are speaking from a lifetime of work/research in one specific area!

Cosmology makes my head spin too sometimes!

If you're interested (Hope i'm not treading on any toes with this!) The OU has some introductory courses that are generally very well rated;

eg.

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... e/s194.htm

http://www3.open.ac.uk/study/undergradu ... ifications

Thanks!

I think i need to retire (only got 30 years to go). I could quite easily fill my time with learning all sorts like the above, learning the piano, travelling, riding my bike(s).

If there is life on other planets that is more advanced they would give every person a free bike each year.

I like the idea that there could be other people out there that have developed in the same way as we have based on distance from the sun creating a similar climate/atmosphere etc but maybe they are still in the equivalent of 1400s or maybe in the year 2500. It would be like time travel.

The short courses aren't particularly time consuming - it's about 100 hours of study, and you can do them over a few months (I think 5). My girlfriend's doing one on fossils at the moment, and she's studying about 1 hour a day and is well ahead of schedule.

Bunneh

My father's an astronomer and he left his PhD at home before he went to work in Germany back in the 70s. It boggles my mind some of the stuff that's in there. My maths is atrocious and I don't see how these people can understand it all. Brains seems to skip a generation

freehub

One day everything will be so far apart it will be a dark place, then all the hydrogen will get used up and the lights will go out forever.

softlad

freehub wrote:

One day everything will be so far apart it will be a dark place, then all the hydrogen will get used up and the lights will go out forever.

have you been listening to Pink Floyd again..?

awallace

What gets me in awe of it all is its so unknown that at any moment we could be swallowed up by something in space, there could be a collision or explosion. Then will we all die slowly or will it be instant?

Nice thoughts at 1040 in the morning!

At least it might help me justify a new bike -

Me - the world may end any time, live for the moment, let me get a new bike!?

Mrs W - Shut up. I hate those programmes you watch.

skyd0g

The DARK MATTER hides inside my frame and tyres.

Cressers

What was there before the Big Bang? How could time begin?

These questions give me a headache. Perhaps our ape brains could never ever grasp what the universe actually is. There is a quote running along the lines of "The universe isn't just stranger than we think, it's stranger than we can imagine" that seems to sum it all up.

Ectomorph

It's the sheer size of the blo*dy thing that gets me. There are around 100,000,000,000 stars in our galaxy alone, and there are something like 100,000,000,000 galaxies in the universe. So thats... oh, I think I need to lie down.

Google "Hubble deep field" for a real headf*ck!

Gav888

Cressers wrote:

What was there before the Big Bang? How could time begin?

These questions give me a headache. Perhaps our ape brains could never ever grasp what the universe actually is. There is a quote running along the lines of "The universe isn't just stranger than we think, it's stranger than we can imagine" that seems to sum it all up.

Before the big bang was a team of experts crowded round something called 'The world's biggest atom-smasher' just before they pressed the button to go full power they said - watch this..... then it was the big bang, and now we have almost come full circle, im sure they will press the button to go full power in 2012, which is when the world ends LOL

How about this for a brain f**k up, how do you bend time to jump from one side of the galaxy to another, like in Event Horizon.....

awallace

I like how this thread asks question after question. It sort of sums up how immense it is.

Porgy

Buckled_Rims wrote:

We still haven't a clue.

corrected for you

Ben6899

They who control the monoliths have all the answers.

shockedsoshocked

Have X-Wings been invented yet?

Gav888

ShockedSoShocked wrote:

Have X-Wings been invented yet?

Yep, I presume you are referring to this - http://www.strange-mecha.com/aircraft/x/X-Wing.htm

shockedsoshocked

Gav888 wrote:

ShockedSoShocked wrote:

Have X-Wings been invented yet?

Yep, I presume you are referring to this - http://www.strange-mecha.com/aircraft/x/X-Wing.htm

Damn

Ok, what about Battlestars?

Gav888

ShockedSoShocked wrote:

Gav888 wrote:

ShockedSoShocked wrote:

Have X-Wings been invented yet?

Yep, I presume you are referring to this - http://www.strange-mecha.com/aircraft/x/X-Wing.htm

Damn

Ok, what about Battlestars?

Yep, number 18 - http://mywarhistory.com/uploads/myWarPi ... le-Eas.jpg