Quote:
Originally Posted by sirChuck
In particular, the stars we know and the charted data of the movements of these stars. Perhaps you could give me some referance to other methods used to determine the age of the universe other than the stars we observe.
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Olbers Paradox would indicate that the Universe is of finite age and finite extent.
The CMB radiation would indicate that the Universe was once hot and dense. Very hot and very dense. We call this the "Big Bang". The ratio of hydrogen to helium observed in our Universe is consistent with what we know of the physics of this event.
The redshifted spectra of galaxies, and the apparent magnitude of Type 1A supernova gives a Hubble constant which indicates a age of 13.7 billion years for the Universe.
When we look into the deep Universe, the galaxies look like what we would expect young galaxies to look like at a much earlier age in the Universe's history, consistent with us looking back in time.
The ages of stars in globular clusters, as derived from our understanding of physics, are consistent with this.
Space-time appears to be largely flat with insufficent matter in the Universe to constrain continued expansion. This is consistent with the picture above.
As this sounds somewhat like a homework question, you are invited to look these up yourself. Be prepared for lots of reading.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sirChuck
Maybe we are talking about two differnet things when we say universe so let me clarify, perhaps I am using the wrong word. To me the universe is everything in our three dimentional space. I dont think you can put an age on the beginning of the universe the way I see it because then you could always ask what was in the universe before it was born?
I think when you say universe your talking about the known universe in wich case you are probably right. 15billion years ago or so perhaps our known universe was born.
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So when you talk about the
universe what you really mean is the
unknown universe not the
known universe.
I don't think that there is much evidence for this
unknown universe.
So whatever you want to make up, that's fine.
Over the last few years, our understanding of the physics of the Big Bang has improved up to the first few milliseconds after this event, with some indications of what happened before. I am optimistic that the future will allow us to push back our understandings of the Universe even further.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sirChuck
In my opinion asking questions is the fundamental epicenter science. Ever since you asked your mom why the sky is blue. At some point it was a question without a way to determine the answer. To switch to philosophy how does this grab you, Who is to say what cannot be known, or what we cannot know the answer too?
Thank you for your input, and I realize I am probably way wrong I am a computer programmer not a scientest.
cheers  |
Philosophy seems happiest when it is answering questions to which no-one knows the answer.