The Space Thread

Thats Trump claiming the moon as USAs then!

charltonkeston said:

CharltonManor1966 said:

I love all this - just wish I had paid attention in physics when at school.
I was 10 when the moon landing happened in 69.
Serious question.......
If as everyone believes the universe is expanding.........into what is it expanding? Nothing? Blank space? any boundaries?
Simple answers only please for a simple man with a simple but inquisitive mind...

I can't even begin to get my head around questions like that, to my mind nothing can exist to infinite distance or keep expanding indefinitely, I haven't a clue. The proportions of our bit of the universe are so huge I don't the average human cannot appreciate the scale. The fact that light takes billions of years to cross the universe is a hard concept to understand the distance involved. 
I think the flat earthers have the right idea, don't look too hard and ignore the science. 

The one that always gets me is that when you look at the stars you're looking at each star how it was however many thousand (millions if you've got a good telescope) years ago etc.

That star might not even exist anymore (although they have such a crazy long lifespan they almost certainly all still are).

The closest star to Earth, other than the sun, is Alpha Centauri at some 4.4 light-years away. So, scaling the Earth-sun distance at one inch places this star at 4.4 miles (7 km) distant.

CharltonManor1966 said:

This is a good one to put vast cosmic distances into context.......

https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-far-is-a-light-year/

There is a curious thing about some of these enormous distances.  They are matched by incredibly small things as well.

I'm not saying that our 'scale' means that we sit in the exact middle, but it's striking (to me, anyway) that we can go both up or down in scale to incredible extents.  That feels odd, even strange ... or maybe unique.

Or maybe it's the opposite.  What if all species or things that exist experience the range in scale, in both directions?

Like numbers (infinite in all directions), what if there is infinite scale in each direction?

It answers the expanding Universe question ... our balloon is expanding inside a larger balloon, which is also expanding inside a larger balloon ... etc etc.

And, as things get smaller, we find that these are made of yet smaller things.  The Greeks thought they had cracked it with the atom (which means 'indivisible'), but we have gone way further down the scale since then.  The Lego bricks are made of smaller Lego bricks and the limit is really defined by our ability to detect.  There may not be a 'true' limit.

I think we'll beat Bristol City tomorrow.  Anyone else agree?

sam3110 said:

And to think that within each of the infinitely small building blocks that make up the universe that we know, there may well be components within that, that are defined as a universe, by something even smaller, so incomprehensibly small that we can't begin to imagine it, and vice versa, whereby our universe is but one component that makes up another being, universe or something else entirely.

Too much to think about tbh

I like your thinking.

2-1, I reckon.  Kelman and Carey.

Dave Rudd said:

CharltonManor1966 said:

This is a good one to put vast cosmic distances into context.......

https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-far-is-a-light-year/

There is a curious thing about some of these enormous distances.  They are matched by incredibly small things as well.

I'm not saying that our 'scale' means that we sit in the exact middle, but it's striking (to me, anyway) that we can go both up or down in scale to incredible extents.  That feels odd, even strange ... or maybe unique.

Or maybe it's the opposite.  What if all species or things that exist experience the range in scale, in both directions?

Like numbers (infinite in all directions), what if there is infinite scale in each direction?

It answers the expanding Universe question ... our balloon is expanding inside a larger balloon, which is also expanding inside a larger balloon ... etc etc.

And, as things get smaller, we find that these are made of yet smaller things.  The Greeks thought they had cracked it with the atom (which means 'indivisible'), but we have gone way further down the scale since then.  The Lego bricks are made of smaller Lego bricks and the limit is really defined by our ability to detect.  There may not be a 'true' limit.

I think we'll beat Bristol City tomorrow.  Anyone else agree?

Is not the theory of 'infinite' anything an offence to our knowledge of mathematics and physics?
Everything has to have a beginning and an end and a measurement or distance or size even if it is moveable? everything has to have an equation that works out 
I find it interesting that theoretical physicists will happily hypothesise about infinite multiverses etc which are way beyond our physics and mathematics but go all weird and shaky when they are asked to contemplate even the hypothetical possibility of an intelligent being behind it all!!??
Charlton 2 Brizzle 0.......

CharltonManor1966 said:

Dave Rudd said:

CharltonManor1966 said:

This is a good one to put vast cosmic distances into context.......

https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-far-is-a-light-year/

There is a curious thing about some of these enormous distances.  They are matched by incredibly small things as well.

I'm not saying that our 'scale' means that we sit in the exact middle, but it's striking (to me, anyway) that we can go both up or down in scale to incredible extents.  That feels odd, even strange ... or maybe unique.

Or maybe it's the opposite.  What if all species or things that exist experience the range in scale, in both directions?

Like numbers (infinite in all directions), what if there is infinite scale in each direction?

It answers the expanding Universe question ... our balloon is expanding inside a larger balloon, which is also expanding inside a larger balloon ... etc etc.

And, as things get smaller, we find that these are made of yet smaller things.  The Greeks thought they had cracked it with the atom (which means 'indivisible'), but we have gone way further down the scale since then.  The Lego bricks are made of smaller Lego bricks and the limit is really defined by our ability to detect.  There may not be a 'true' limit.

I think we'll beat Bristol City tomorrow.  Anyone else agree?

Is not the theory of 'infinite' anything an offence to our knowledge of mathematics and physics?
Everything has to have a beginning and an end and a measurement or distance or size even if it is moveable? everything has to have an equation that works out 
I find it interesting that theoretical physicists will happily hypothesise about infinite multiverses etc which are way beyond our physics and mathematics but go all weird and shaky when they are asked to contemplate even the hypothetical possibility of an intelligent being behind it all!!??
Charlton 2 Brizzle 0.......

Why?

Dave Rudd said:

CharltonManor1966 said:

Dave Rudd said:

CharltonManor1966 said:

This is a good one to put vast cosmic distances into context.......

https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/how-far-is-a-light-year/

There is a curious thing about some of these enormous distances.  They are matched by incredibly small things as well.

I'm not saying that our 'scale' means that we sit in the exact middle, but it's striking (to me, anyway) that we can go both up or down in scale to incredible extents.  That feels odd, even strange ... or maybe unique.

Or maybe it's the opposite.  What if all species or things that exist experience the range in scale, in both directions?

Like numbers (infinite in all directions), what if there is infinite scale in each direction?

It answers the expanding Universe question ... our balloon is expanding inside a larger balloon, which is also expanding inside a larger balloon ... etc etc.

And, as things get smaller, we find that these are made of yet smaller things.  The Greeks thought they had cracked it with the atom (which means 'indivisible'), but we have gone way further down the scale since then.  The Lego bricks are made of smaller Lego bricks and the limit is really defined by our ability to detect.  There may not be a 'true' limit.

I think we'll beat Bristol City tomorrow.  Anyone else agree?

Is not the theory of 'infinite' anything an offence to our knowledge of mathematics and physics?
Everything has to have a beginning and an end and a measurement or distance or size even if it is moveable? everything has to have an equation that works out 
I find it interesting that theoretical physicists will happily hypothesise about infinite multiverses etc which are way beyond our physics and mathematics but go all weird and shaky when they are asked to contemplate even the hypothetical possibility of an intelligent being behind it all!!??
Charlton 2 Brizzle 0.......

I thought Descartes had nailed that one.  Is it still up for debate?

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