Epic Discovery: Our Colossal Universe -"250 Times Bigger than What We See"

Is our universe infinite or closed? Because the visible Universe is expanding, the most distant visible things are much further away than its estimated 14-billion year age. In fact, the photons in the cosmic microwave background have traveled a cool 45 billion light years to get here. That makes the visible universe some 90 billion light years across.

link here




so if the numbers and theorys are correct the age of the universe may require adjusting
which means the amount of universe outside of what we can see, (the hubble volume)
may in fact be much much larger.




which makes the question, if the universe is truly at least 250 times bigger than the Hubble volume,
what is in this area of space?
how does the size, "change the age of a universe"
well if the universe is much bigger than we can see then its also much older than previously thought
because we can "see" into 13.4 billion years into the past at the earlyest galaxy formation through gravity lenses, but what else is out beyond the furtherest galaxys we can see?





so if we can only "see" 14 billion years into the past does that mean there is nothing out further in space or is that the limit for the distence for light traveling accross the universe?
so if light had more energy it would travel further?





could it be that if light could reach us from further out in the universe we would say the universe is 20 billion years old as we could now "see light" from that age?



so how big is the universe outside of what we can see?

we currently use gravatationl lenses to see far back into the far reaches of the universe




this allows us to see to the limit of the hubble universe




but with unexpected lenses all over the foreground are the images really where the "appair" to be?




the effect is to magnify and distort the observable universe




which makes for strange pictures that are difficult to interperate
but also adds to the problem of distence to galaxies and how large they are compaired to the size they "appair"





LSST lensing simulator video of gravatational lensing
very interesting downloadable lensing simulators


xploder

I have been tinking about this lately. Not a new concept, I understand, but one that might b plausible nonetheless. S + F

Anytime you deal with "millions " "billions" of year old its just scientism dressed up in real science .

This will be more evident as times passes . Our ego is more inflated then the universe expansion rate


"A galactic fossil: Star is found to be 13.2 billion years old"

www.physorg.com...

13.2 billion...then whats that make the universe?

cool info, its hard to imagine how big the universe truly is. that link with the 13.2 billion old star is crazy. How long does it take a star to form?

reply to post by XPLodER

Here's what I don't get:

If the photons traveled 45 billion years to get here, then how can the Universe only be 13.7 billion years old?

If the photons traveled 45 billion years to get here, and the universe appears to be expanding even then, then how far away are the sources of those photons right now?

What do we really know about the effects of time and distance on the properties of a light wave?

How can we be so sure that light waves traveling for 10 billion years don't naturally "stretch out" to make them appear as though their sources are traveling away from us (Doppler effect)?

Isn't it true that the only information we have to determine whether our Universe is expanding is billions and billions of years old? If true, then how can we conclude that it's STILL expanding, and not contracting?

reply to post by seedofchucky


Wait are you trying to ridicule the same science that is revising theories and making new ones?

reply to post by IDKWTB


For the most part Main Sequence stars like our own would be around 50 million years from the start of accretion of stellar dust and material into the protostar and ending with the ignition of nuclear fusion in the stars core where it will begin to start burning through it's hydrogen. These normal stars will end up "living" for an incredibly long time. Although very massive stars with large amounts of material to begin accretion will form much quicker and supernova much quicker.

A much bigger and older universe has always appealed to me just as much as the 14 billion years although like science I don't have a care for one over the other, which ever one the evidence points to is the one I'll go with.

Edit: Looks like another thread was already created
abovetopsecret.com...

Originally posted by harrytuttle
reply to post by XPLodER

 

Here's what I don't get:

If the photons traveled 45 billion years to get here, then how can the Universe only be 13.7 billion years old?

If the photons traveled 45 billion years to get here, and the universe appears to be expanding even then, then how far away are the sources of those photons right now?

What do we really know about the effects of time and distance on the properties of a light wave?

How can we be so sure that light waves traveling for 10 billion years don't naturally "stretch out" to make them appear as though their sources are traveling away from us (Doppler effect)?

Isn't it true that the only information we have to determine whether our Universe is expanding is billions and billions of years old? If true, then how can we conclude that it's STILL expanding, and not contracting?

it is true that the objects we see are in the distent past, not what would be there by now.
if we could see the distence in "no time" what would be there "now"
we dont really know the effect distence has on a photons travel but lenses allow a telescoping effect backwards in time and allow for us to see light that had already traveled a long distence before being lensed into an image we see.

you ask some very good questions
xploder

reply to post by seedofchucky


if we can "see" a star in our galaxy that 13.4 billion years old,
how old are the one at the observable edge of the universe?
if we are using gravatational effects to "see" the distent universe, or how far back in time we look,
we "see" an object say 13.4 billion light years away,
how old is that object now? in time in our terms?
if the light took 13.4 billion years to get here, whats there now?
and how far out would light have spread from the object in the other direction?

In Big Bang cosmology, the observable universe consists of the galaxies and other matter that we can in principle observe from Earth in the present day, because light (or other signals) from those objects has had time to reach us since the beginning of the cosmological expansion. Assuming the universe is isotropic, the distance to the edge of the observable universe is roughly the same in every direction—that is, the observable universe is a spherical volume (a ball) centered on the observer, regardless of the shape of the universe as a whole. The actual shape of the universe may or may not be spherical. However, the portion of it that we (humans, from the perspective of planet Earth) are able to observe is determined by whether or not the light and other signals originating from distant objects has had time to arrive at our point of observation (planet Earth). Therefore, the observable universe appears from our perspective to be spherical. Every location in the universe has its own observable universe which may or may not overlap with the one centered around the Earth.

observable universe
whats outside the observable universe, if the cosmic microwave backround is a much larger a sphere?
whats between the edge of our observable universe and the microwave backround?

xploder

reply to post by harrytuttle

How can we be so sure that light waves traveling for 10 billion years don't naturally "stretch out" to make them appear as though their sources are traveling away from us (Doppler effect)?

if that was the case our observable universe would also be the maxium distence light could travel in distence not the age of the universe.


xploder

A flat Universe would also be infinite and their calculations are consistent with this too. These show that the Universe is at least 250 times bigger than the Hubble volume.

I'm usually not too critical of scientific articles like this, but...it takes talent to, in the same breath, say that the universe is both infinite AND 250 times the size we see. They should choose one.

Admittedly, cosmology is a bit iffy. But, there are some basic facts:

- the visible universe was at least 6 billion light-years in diameter when the light from the most distant supernovae left the source
- the universe is at least 6 billion years old, because this is the time required for light to travel 6 billion light-years (and this doesn't take into account the time required for the supernovae to form)
- the expansion of the universe was accelerating around 5 billion years ago (supernovae from that redshift range are up to 25% dimmer than they should be)
- there is really no reliable way to tell if the expansion is still accelerating, but, chances are, the expansion has not reversed; this sort of change should be detectable in "nearby" galaxies
- the timing of the CMB depends entirely on what model you use, because its redshift is not directly measurable; it may have been locally emitted in the 18th century for all we know

Aside from these, it's anyone's guess, and the most successful model is not necessarily the right one.
Personally, I believe that it's pointless to assume we know the history of the universe for as long as we don't have a quantum theory of gravity. If the quantum nature of gravity is not understood, then our understanding of the formation of the universe can't possibly be reliable.

But, then, I also find it likely that the universe is inside a black hole.

reply to post by CLPrime


there is an interesting finding

We show that gravitational lensing by foreground galaxies will lead to a higher number of galaxies to be counted at redshifts z>8-10. This number may be boosted significantly, by as much as an order of magnitude. If there existed only three galaxies above the detection threshold at redshifts z>10 in the Hubble field-of-view without the presence of lensing, the bias from gravitational lensing may make as many as 10-30 of them visible in the Hubble images," explains Windhorst

link

so if there is a red shift bias and most galaxies may be lensed,
at what point do we start to thing that most red shifted sources are lensed and are "shifted"
because of lensing?
if most galaxies in the fore ground are lensing back round galaxies and they are much higher shift then is there a corrolation with shift and lensed properties we observe?
do we really think we are in the centre of the universe?

if there is a corrilation between shift and lenses, how does this effect the hubble constant?
does red shift indicate lensed distence?
if so how does our distence scale account for gravatationally lensed red shifted stars?

is everything in our observable universe lensed, except for only the very closet objects?
if this is the case then how much of the red shift is attributed to the lense and how much to cosmilogical expansion? and how much to the doppler effect?

theory follows

if we were to veiw the red shift as
10% (cosmological) increase in our galaxy bubble size
60% gravatational lense induced shift
20% doppler shift

then the distence calculation to the object would be radically different.

we asume resesional speed can be faster than the speed of light?

xploder

reply to post by CLPrime

Something Is Ripping The Universe Apart
Recently the composition of the universe has become even more puzzling: observations imply an acceleration of the universe's expansion over the past few billion years. In order to explain such an acceleration, we need "dark energy" with large negative pressure to generate a repulsive gravitational force. The evidence comes from studies of the total energy density of the universe and from supernova observations. Precision measurements of the cosmic microwave background have shown that the total energy density of the universe is very near the critical density needed to make the universe flat (i.e. the curvature of space-time, defined in General Relativity, goes to zero on large scales). Since energy is equivalent to mass (Special Relativity: E = mc2), this is usually expressed in terms of a critical mass density needed to make the universe flat. Ordinary matter such as stars, dust, and gas account for only 5% of the necessary mass density. Observations have shown that dark matter cannot account for more than ~25% of the critical mass density. Both the microwave background and supernova observations suggest that dark energy should make up ~70% of the critical energy density. When added to the mass-energy of matter, the total energy density is consistent with what is needed to make the universe flat.

so if the perceived "expansion" was an optical lense effect caused from an expanding galaxy lense
and dark energy is "distortions" to the lenses and magnifycation of objects and dispacement to location of those objects
and red shift could be from lensing bias

how can we be sure of the size or age of our universe.

xploder

could cosmological expansion be explained using lenses or optics?



here is a simple diagram to explain red shift from a galaxy lense




as light enters the expanding lense is is shifted
and we interperate that as expansion




does this explain some of the cosmological expansion?

xploder

reply to post by XPLodER


I remember a thread on ATS a couple of days ago that talked about physics and how time changes minutely the further you get away from earth and the Air force knows this and have to readjust and calibrate the GPS satelites timing mechanics every couple of hours. Maybe the light passing by planets and stars have a different gravitational pull distorting tim and the speed of light

reply to post by XPLodER



Anyone else feel some what skeptical when the mainstream answer is that: "it is flat". And how they use mysterious things, almost like sea monsters as proof that it is flat?

reply to post by agentblue


that is indeed what happens
its called strong gravatatioal lensing



you are correct

does this lensing give us a false distence perspective?
xploder

I'm so glad i opened this thread.

I think logic shows their theory is still fundamentally flawed.

So if it took 45 billion ly to get here, that makes the Universe 90 billion ly across?

This puts us smack dab in the middle of the Universe. It's entirely illogical at it's core.

What is more logical, is that our Devices will continue to see further and further as we develop more sophisticated sensory technology.

This could potentially go on indefinitely. That is unknown, and may never be known for sure.

reply to post by XPLodER



Interesting post, S & F!

Now how do I/we deal with this information?

Does this mean we need to look through a magnifying glass while looking through the Hubble?

Sorry, I couldn't resist!

reply to post by muzzleflash


No that is just the observable Universe, the Universe that we can detect / see. The actual Universe itself is much bigger than that, so we're not the centre of the Universe but ofcourse we are at the centre of our observable Universe. Ofcourse if you'd be living on a planet in the let's say the Andromeda galaxy, you would also be in the centre of the observable Universe seen rom that planet.
Because you will have the observable Universe seen from Andromeda.