Quote:
Originally Posted by jeff Mitchell
The question posed by Missmoo was finding the center of the galaxy without the ability to see it. Your hints require observations of the galaxies that are not today possible because of distances involved.
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Take any 2 galaxies. Determine their position (parallax is one way). Determine their direction and speed of travel (done with the aid of redshift).
Now you have 2 vectors of travel. Now draw a perpendicular line from each vector such that they cross.
If there is a center, it would be impossible for them to be completely parallel.
Where they cross is the center of the universe.
Now; here's the tricky part. Given that you have a point, any other observation will produce a vector that is perpendicular to a line from that vector to the point you have determined if there is a center to the universe.
I'm fairly certain that it wouldn't take too many observations to find one that isn't.