# Big questions, stretching the imagination and no answers



## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

How many think about a topic that can really exercise the brain and imagination but there are no answers or is it something that is dismissed because there are no answers? 

We are on a little planet in a solar system in a universe that we know nothing about apart from everything we have so far looked at cannot support life as we know it, is that not a strange situation that this planet supports life and there is nothing else we could live on for many light years and yet we are hell bent on destroying it.

In reality we are so small the entire human race could live on a Knats buttocks in comparison to whats out there and for all we know there could be funny little green men working in sheds with wood that we have never heard of and they could be contemplating just the same as us. Does this show that there does not have to be a reason or an objective for something to happen or be done?

Another stretcher, all the films depicting time travel, in my opinion much easier to dismiss but it does really fascinate so many people. Thinking logically for time travel to be realistic would suggest time itself is already there so everything you have done will be happening forever and everything you will do has already happened so you can dismiss it, just cannot happen but a lot of people do think the opposite but something else that makes the old imagination work. Where would all the fuel come from to keep things running forever at every point in time?


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## Trainee neophyte (15 Apr 2021)

Makes you think, doesn't it...



I often think about gravity polarisation which is a plot device of Larry Niven books (the Kzinti made use of it as a method of powering spaceships). There's no point to it, but at 4 am when I need distracting from all the things I didn't manage to get done in the day it keeps my mind busy - my version of counting sheep. If anyone has any good plans I'd love to hear them.


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## artie (15 Apr 2021)

If you could let us know what you've been smoking this morning, 

Here's one for you.

What do you know.

Not very much I wager.

We have been told lots of things and we believe lots of things, But what do we KNOW?


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## Chris152 (15 Apr 2021)

[youtube]OKnpPCQyUec[/youtube]
I can never get these things to work.


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## D_W (15 Apr 2021)

I think we have trouble figuring what else is out there "now" because now is light years away, and in some cases, millions or billions. 

The idea that there isn't life as we know it on other planets somewhere seems unlikely when we're still exploring things that exist in our own solar system, and just at the outset. 

There are a few good planetary documentaries about various moons, etc, that may be loaded with water or have life existing below the surface (though not of the human kind). 

estimates of galaxy count are about 100 billion. Average stars in each galaxy, about 100 billion. 

A more interesting question is how many stars had planets with life on them and destroyed by supernovae, expansion or by burning out and collapsing. 

What's also interesting about all of this stuff is that there are people who are militant that they have the exact right answer now and everyone else is an silly person. These people should have been politicians.


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## Jacob (15 Apr 2021)

The answer is 42


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## hunter27 (15 Apr 2021)

artie said:


> If you could let us know what you've been smoking this morning,
> 
> Here's one for you.
> 
> ...


I know for sure that if I put something down in my workshop / garage and turn around it will take me 10 minutes to find it again


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## francovendee (15 Apr 2021)

I remember Brian Cox exploring in depth what was needed to come together to sustain some form of life and how amazing that it did on earth. 
When answering the question 'Did he think that life existed other than on earth?' he said he doubted it.


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## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

artie said:


> We have been told lots of things and we believe lots of things, But what do we KNOW?


Yes we think of ourselves as the most inteligent beings as we are at the top of the food chain but we continually strive to disprove this, why?

Would an inteligent person keep drilling holes in the only boat that is floating and maintain conflict with others rather than just solve the issues.

Physics is a good example where they produce theories to things they cannot understand and people will believe until someone elses theory overides it, yes we really know very little apart from what is continously rejugated and or passed around through generations.


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## Fitzroy (15 Apr 2021)

Think about them all the time, as have many more capable minds than mine!

Fermi paradox
Pale blue dot
optimistic nihilism
Many worlds / multiverse Heisenberg uncertainty principle

Fitz.


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## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

francovendee said:


> When answering the question 'Did he think that life existed other than on earth?' he said he doubted it.


There you go, an odd answer from someone who is a highly regarded Physicist , although nowhere near the level of Einstein. A good scientist should have an open mind until such time evidence comes to light to support or dismiss an argument.

A good quote is:

As a human being, one has been endowed with just enough intelligence to be able to see clearly how utterly inadequate that intelligence is when confronted with what exists.


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## Fitzroy (15 Apr 2021)

Spectric said:


> Physics is a good example where they produce theories to things they cannot understand and people will believe until someone elses theory overides it, yes we really know very little apart from what is continously rejugated and or passed around through generations.



There are no proofs in science, only maths. 

"_They produce theories to things they cannot understand and people will believe until someone else's theory overrides it_" - you've basically reworded the scientific method. Either you accept what you don't understand and stand still, or you develop a hypothesis about a situation, and test your hypothesis against evidence. If the evidence is supportive you work with your hypothesis, but continue to test as new evidence become available and update/abandon as required. 

Fitz.


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## Ozi (15 Apr 2021)

Spectric said:


> There you go, an odd answer from someone who is a highly regarded Physicist , although nowhere near the level of Einstein. A good scientist should have an open mind until such time evidence comes to light to support or dismiss an argument.
> 
> A good quote is:
> 
> As a human being, one has been endowed with just enough intelligence to be able to see clearly how utterly inadequate that intelligence is when confronted with what exists.


If I may quote ACC "If an elderly but distinguished *scientist says* that *something is possible*, *he is almost certainly right*; but if *he says* that it is *impossible*, *he* is very probably *wrong*."


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## D_W (15 Apr 2021)

Fitzroy said:


> There are no proofs in science, only maths.
> 
> "_They produce theories to things they cannot understand and people will believe until someone else's theory overrides it_" - you've basically reworded the scientific method. Either you accept what you don't understand and stand still, or you develop a hypothesis about a situation, and test your hypothesis against evidence. If the evidence is supportive you work with your hypothesis, but continue to test as new evidence become available and update/abandon as required.
> 
> Fitz.



But there are proofs in math!! working through them let me know that I would stop my math degree after bachelor of science and leave the proofs to the people who could do them 4 times as fast as I could.


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## Fitzroy (15 Apr 2021)

francovendee said:


> I remember Brian Cox exploring in depth what was needed to come together to sustain some form of life and how amazing that it did on earth.
> When answering the question 'Did he think that life existed other than on earth?' he said he doubted it.



Seemed unlikely that this would be Brian Cox's view so I had to go and research. As far as I can see this is the basis for this missunderstanding, from a BBC programme.

"There is only one advanced technological civilization in this galaxy and there has only ever been one -- and that's us," Professor Cox, 

He does not discount life elsewhere, and thinks it likely that we would find simple life elsewhere in the solar system.

Regards

Fitz.


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## selectortone (15 Apr 2021)

Voyager 1, launched in 1977 to study the outer planets is travelling at 35,000mph and it took 40 years to reach the edge of the solar system. At its current speed, it will have to travel for something like forty thousand years to reach the nearest star in our Milky Way galaxy. It would take approximately 1,756,500,000 years to cross our Milky Way from one end to the other.

And after that, the nearest galaxy to The Milky Way is the Andromeda Galaxy, 2.5 million light years away. 2.5 million years for a radio signal to reach Earth. And that's the nearest galaxy - observations from the Hubble telescope suggest that there are hundreds of thousands of galaxies in our universe. And is there more than one universe?

And from macro to micro: I live near the beach. On walks down there I could ponder this - one of the single grains of sand I'm walking on contains more atoms (roughly 2x10 to the 19th) than there are stars in the universe (very approx 10 to the 12th according to the ESA).

.


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## francovendee (15 Apr 2021)

Fitzroy said:


> Seemed unlikely that this would be Brian Cox's view so I had to go and research. As far as I can see this is the basis for this missunderstanding, from a BBC programme.
> 
> "There is only one advanced technological civilization in this galaxy and there has only ever been one -- and that's us," Professor Cox,
> 
> ...


I think you're correct My error. 
I used google to check my facts and soon found that he wasn't referring any form of life being a likely.
Maybe the Martians will be coming.


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## Tris (15 Apr 2021)

It may have been and gone many times across the galaxy before life here started, and it may exist in a form we would struggle to recognise.


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## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

That is something else that is amazing, the fact you could be just looking at the light from a star that no longer exist, that really helps put distance into perspective but does not answer why this little planet in a far corner of the universe has life on it. Perhaps the creator used earth as a prototype and soon understood the errors so now each race is on it's own planet so far from the next nearest they do not know each other exist and no conflicts or wars.


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## Trainee neophyte (15 Apr 2021)

On the subject of aliens, Iain M Banks suggested that to spot an alien, the best place to be is on Earth, during an eclipse. The fact that the sun and moon are virtually the same size as viewed from earth is incredibly unusual cosmologically, so there should be lots of exotourists coming to gawp at the rare sight. Next time you are watching a total eclipse, look at the people next to you rather than at the sky.


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## doctor Bob (15 Apr 2021)

I always think the other way, what if an electron is a planet, and on one electron somewhere their is life. Like ours but on a completely different scale.


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## selectortone (15 Apr 2021)

doctor Bob said:


> I always think the other way, what if an electron is a planet, and on one electron somewhere their is life. Like ours but on a completely different scale.


The starting point of many an LSD inspired conversation in the 60s


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## Chris152 (15 Apr 2021)

They made a documentary about it, in 2000. Extraordinarily complex creatures, quite human-like.


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## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

It would be a pretty small planet but then it may have some very small life on it. Looks like selector is confessing to drug abuse in his youth, and could be of the right age as he lives in one of the reapers waiting rooms on the south coast !


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## AdrianUK (15 Apr 2021)

“for all we know there could be funny little green men working in sheds with wood that we have never heard of“

If there are little green men in sheds on another planet, I reckon they all agree on how to sharpen their tools


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## Dee J (15 Apr 2021)

D_W said:


> But there are proofs in math!! working through them let me know that I would stop my math degree after bachelor of science and leave the proofs to the people who could do them 4 times as fast as I could.


As far as I think I understand it... There are indeed proofs in maths. But tripping point comes in applying the maths to the physical world. At this point maths serves to become a useful algorithm for predicting and mapping physical phenomena. Newtonian maths was sufficient and coherent until Einstein and relativity came along. Einstein didn't say Newtonian maths was internally incorrect, but just that it wasn't a sufficiently detailed description of the physical world. Where, other than in the human brain (and its supporting systems of books and computers) does maths actually exist. It's a construct, a useful tool, nothing more.


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## Fitzroy (15 Apr 2021)

Trainee neophyte said:


> On the subject of aliens, Iain M Banks suggested that to spot an alien, the best place to be is on Earth, during an eclipse. The fact that the sun and moon are virtually the same size as viewed from earth is incredibly unusual cosmologically, so there should be lots of exotourists coming to gawp at the rare sight. Next time you are watching a total eclipse, look at the people next to you rather than at the sky.



I bloody knew my neighbour was weird!


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## Amateur (15 Apr 2021)

Sorry I'm late....
Emergency on Ultron.......

Right
Carry on...


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## Spectric (15 Apr 2021)

AdrianUK said:


> If there are little green men in sheds on another planet, I reckon they all agree on how to sharpen their tools


That is a human assumption that we are really clever but is it not possible that the little green men have vastly superior tools that never need sharpening.


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## Terry - Somerset (15 Apr 2021)

The galaxy is about 13bn years old. 13,000,000,000 years!

Only in the last few decades have we got remotely close to understanding how physics, chemistry and the universe works. We may anyway be wrong.

In terms of the 24 hour clock we are a few milliseconds to midnight. A second is about 150,000 years. 25 times as long as writing has been around, and around 250-500 times as long since the renaissance signalled the start of the scientific age.

A second behind us and neanderthals would be competing with homo sapiens for dominance. A second ahead and a further 5000 generations will have lived and died (if we haven't anaged to wipe ourselves out through war, disease etc).

To assert that we have the remotest idea about our relative place in the universe, how other planetary systems may have evolved in very different ways is complete arrogant nonsense. We don't even understand ourselves!!


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## Selwyn (15 Apr 2021)

This is all very well but its not as complicated as sharpening technique....


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## dickm (15 Apr 2021)

Am I the only one who gets annoyed at the billions spent of space exploration, which will do nothing for this planet (almost certainly won't offer us a bolthole for when we've destroyed this one). NHS? Non-polluting heating? Ditto surface transport? And so on.
Grumpy old git personified.


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## D_W (15 Apr 2021)

Terry - Somerset said:


> The galaxy is about 13bn years old. 13,000,000,000 years!
> 
> Only in the last few decades have we got remotely close to understanding how physics, chemistry and the universe works. We may anyway be wrong.
> 
> ...




When I was a kid, the universe was assumed to be 5 billion years old. It'll be interesting to see how that number changes over time. 

I'm more interested in the life cycles of individual stars, though. The idea that we have stars around that are only a few million years old is somehow more interesting - maybe because they have a chance of doing something observable for us (like eta carinae).


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## Peri (15 Apr 2021)

This is an absolutely stunning and thought provoking video - imo one of the best I've seen in a while.


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## Danieljw (16 Apr 2021)

Feed, cloth, and house our own population.
Everyone should have a toilet, shower, hot and cold water, a comfortable bed.

Then, go find another planet to plunder...
But get this one right first.
Start by making politicians pay for inadequate spending of our money.

I was a star trek fan as a kid, I'm now 64.
My dad used to come home from the pub, drunk, and dung all over me for watching "this mindless rubbish. Do you believe, in that stupid mind of yours that anyone could ever talk on a phone without a f*#$in wire in it" *smack around the head, goes off to bed....
He is dead...
I gave him his first cell phone.
Still we ponder, what's out there!


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## Stan (16 Apr 2021)

If there is intelligent life out there, it will make sure it hides from us. We would plunder its resources, try to kill it, or attempt to use it as an ally to dominate other people on this planet.


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## doctor Bob (16 Apr 2021)

Are there any really really simple inventions still to find, like the wheel, not complex.


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## Droogs (16 Apr 2021)

Don't know if it is simple but given we are stuck in the age of the wheel (all our tech requires rotary motion at some point in its creation or use) and appear to have been for a very long time; I often wonder if there is a really simple obvious technology that we are missing that would allow us to do so much more. I do believe that as a species this is not the first time we have reached a reasonable level of tech but think we have maybe forgotten some major stuff in the past due to unimaginably catastrophic disaster in the past, given the existence of the Megalithic period and what was left behind.


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## danst96 (16 Apr 2021)

The human mind will never be able comprehend the greatness of creation.


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## Spectric (16 Apr 2021)

dickm said:


> Am I the only one who gets annoyed at the billions spent of space exploration, which will do nothing for this planet


I think they are hoping to find an asteroid that contains a lot of Lithium so that the dream of everyone running electric vehicles becomes possible.



doctor Bob said:


> Are there any really really simple inventions still to find, like the wheel, not complex.


There may well be but whilst we seem to focus on complication we will not see it, we seem to have lost the ability to deliver clean simple solutions to a complex problem, we now deliver complex solutions to a simple problem, more money to be made.



Danieljw said:


> Start by making politicians pay for inadequate spending of our money.


As well as being accountable for spending they should also be looking at actually starting to do something to save this planet and not look out to the stars and hope there is a solution out there. Trouble there is they are so old they do not really care as they have had their lives.


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## D_W (16 Apr 2021)

Perhaps the most interesting thing for all of us as woodworkers is one way or another, we are massively interested in iron.

Without mature stars or star events, we'd probably never have it. That is, for anyone not into stars (I'm not that educated on them, either), star is the last fuel byproduct that no longer reacts. It's the last stop before a star either ceases to operate, or when enough of it is in a star and there's not enough fusion going, the star can collapse on its iron core and the sudden increase in compression causes it to go boom.

Or some such thing like that. Sort of the opposite of stars that release bursts of energy greater than their gravity can hold in without collapsing.


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## D_W (16 Apr 2021)

Stan said:


> If there is intelligent life out there, it will make sure it hides from us. We would plunder its resources, try to kill it, or attempt to use it as an ally to dominate other people on this planet.



Wait til they travel here and labour tells them they owe more than half of their time and stuff to other people. They won't stick around long.


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## Essex Barn Workshop (17 Apr 2021)

Something I ponder on and find interesting is that should we ever make contact, we will of course not share a common language. Other life forms might communicate in colour or heat etc, not sound. The only way we could begin to communicate is through maths. 
Showing our basic base 10 counting system, then indicating through diagrams that we know what Pi is so that they can begin to understand out numbering system, and us theirs, would be the only logical starting point.


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## Jacob (17 Apr 2021)

Essex Barn Workshop said:


> Something I ponder on and find interesting is that should we ever make contact, we will of course not share a common language. Other life forms might communicate in colour or heat etc, not sound. The only way we could begin to communicate is through maths.
> Showing our basic base 10 counting system, then indicating through diagrams that we know what Pi is so that they can begin to understand out numbering system, and us theirs, would be the only logical starting point.


Dunno, as a communication starting point I doubt that'd work with any strange life forms found on our own planet, let alone extra terrestrials.
Let's face it it wouldn't work with a very large percentage of our own species! They wouldn't know what you were talking about, or waving a diagram about in this case.
A simpler and more productive process would be to hand them a pencil and form with "Tick box if you can read this" on it.


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## RobinBHM (17 Apr 2021)

Essex Barn Workshop said:


> Something I ponder on and find interesting is that should we ever make contact, we will of course not share a common language



Every good British person knows that everybody elsewhere understand English, foreign languages are unnecessary. 

If they don't understand, just talk more slowly and louder. 
If that doesn't work, try a foreign accent


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## Jacob (17 Apr 2021)

RobinBHM said:


> Every good British person knows that everybody elsewhere understand English, foreign languages are unnecessary.
> 
> If they don't understand, just talk more slowly and louder.
> If that doesn't work, try a foreign accent


German accent could do it; "Ve haf vays off makink you talk" etc


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## Droogs (17 Apr 2021)

@RobinBHM don't forget about adding an "O" to the last word of the sentence to guarantee their understanding


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## Terry - Somerset (17 Apr 2021)

Watching another sci-fi movie the other night - aliens invading earth - scientists wanting to communicate, miilitary wanting to defend by launching an attack.

All very predictable, but it got me thinking about how utterly stupid humanity really is.

Aliens from another galaxy have developed to the point they can travel many light years to earth, hover indefinitely above the surface without apparently consuming power, wreak terrible havoc if they want, etc.

And we humans believe we can out think them (the scientists) or out nuke them (the military). 

FWIW the successor to the wheel will either be:

organic - eg: cars could have legs (electrically operated pistons??) not wheels to cope with all surfaces, or 
some form of magnetic technology - where different components repel or attract to create motion (maglev??)
Homo sapiens managed to evolve without wheels which were first used about 6000 years ago. Before then all was organic!


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## Essex Barn Workshop (17 Apr 2021)

I bought and read a book by Carl Sagan called Cosmos, on recommendation from a former rocket scientist who is now a pure mathematician in the city! She was a customer in a previous job.
Fascinating stuff, worth the read.
Loads of them on ebay for under £8 delivered.
Cosmos, Carl Sagan, Hardback | eBay


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## Sachakins (17 Apr 2021)

You have to have something in order to make something.
You have a tree, you can make furniture.
Ýou have precious metals you can make jewellery 
You have uranium you can make a bomb

They all follow the fundamental law of physics, 
matter/energy cannot be created or destroyed it can only change from/to something else.

So let's take the big bang view of creation, there was nothing then bang there is everything.
So the first event never adhered to the fundamental law of physics.

Does that not indicate a massive flaw in the premise of human physics.

So maybe, we are constraining our view of whats possible by working within the scientific formulation of ideas.


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## Stan (17 Apr 2021)

The term "big bang" was created by astronomer Fred Hoyle to mock the theory it names. 

I ask myself "what has all this got to do with the price of bread?"


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## Droogs (17 Apr 2021)

Essex Barn Workshop said:


> I bought and read a book by Carl Sagan called Cosmos, on recommendation from a former rocket scientist who is now a pure mathematician in the city! She was a customer in a previous job.
> Fascinating stuff, worth the read.
> Loads of them on ebay for under £8 delivered.
> Cosmos, Carl Sagan, Hardback | eBay


read the book, watched the TV series, bought and listened to the album and watched the remake with the degrassi tyson fella not a patch on the original in terms of presentation and feeling but lots of updated info. Sagan a god among minnows, truly one of the best human beings who ever walked the earth


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## Spectric (17 Apr 2021)

That is Newtons first law, the conservation of energy but dare say one day it will be challenged. 



Sachakins said:


> So let's take the big bang view of creation, there was nothing then bang there is everything.
> So the first event never adhered to the fundamental law of physics.



But define what was created, our galaxy, Earth or the universe. If there truly was nothing, complete and absolute nothing then there would be nothing to go bang, nothing to make it go bang or anyone to start the big bang. So does this mean time never started, it must always have existed because the universe has always existed but then where did it start, maybe it never started because it was always there. If time has always existed along with the universe then there is no reason for us to run out of energy because it will always have been there and as it cannot be destroyed, therefore always existing and can only changing form so we just need to find ways of using it in all forms.


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## Sachakins (17 Apr 2021)

Spectric said:


> That is Newtons first law, the conservation of energy but dare say one day it will be challenged.
> 
> 
> 
> But define what was created, our galaxy, Earth or the universe. If there truly was nothing, complete and absolute nothing then there would be nothing to go bang, nothing to make it go bang or anyone to start the big bang. So does this mean time never started, it must always have existed because the universe has always existed but then where did it start, maybe it never started because it was always there. If time has always existed along with the universe then there is no reason for us to run out of energy because it will always have been there and as it cannot be destroyed, therefore always existing and can only changing form so we just need to find ways of using it in all forms.


Regarding Newtonian physics, and Einsteins theories and quantum physics, there is a minority but growing band of scientists that are of the mind that these laws and theorems may only hold true for our galaxy,.
The problem I see with your energy analogy is that, given the that energy can be neither be created nor destroyed, this excludes the rest of the phrase of the theorem, which includes it can only have its state changed. That change of state may be to a form we as humans can not utilise. I liken it to photosynthesis in plants, if we could derive our bodily energy the same way, we would reduce reliance on fossil fuels, I think the nearest we have to it is photovoltaic energy, but we then turn this into electrical energy, which we use and then lose to another state, some being heat but where and what are the other states it changes to.?

Time? Is that not just a human invented measurement construct.

If you discount it, because it is an invention, then actual we are moving through space, it is because we visualise this movement as linear, we therfore assume there is something in front of us, hence everything we have done must be in the past. To conceptualise this into a structured format, mankind invented this into an artificial abstraction of a physical measurement and labelled it Time. Therefore time is not physical, like say gravity, its an imposed boundary, and as such mankind is stuck with the constrained view of past, present and future, which I see as analogous to needing a beginning a middle and an end. So the existence of everything, given by the trite but possibly accurate phrase of, it was, it is and always will be, this requires no beginning no middle no end, so just a simple answer could be "EXISTS" We label stuff like this as infinity, which is a construct we can not envisage, and a mathematical nightmare, destroying all possible results.

OK, off for some paracetamol for my headache ....


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## Echo-Star (17 Apr 2021)

It's all theory, nothing concrete. Until such things are proven as fact, then the giant teapot in the sky is as good as any theory.

unacknowledged documentary


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## Bodone (18 Apr 2021)

Giant turtle and elephants time.

progress should be measured based on us acknowledging the more we find out the more know we don’t know.


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## Crazy Dave (18 Apr 2021)

What an interesting subject.
Hi all I'm Dave and this is my first post here.

My thoughts are that the big bang wasn't so much of a bang but a tear a rip in space and time possibly caused by a giant black hole in another universe reaching critical mass and unable to contain all that it had consumed, bursting it's contents into a void which we call "the universe". From this point on everything came into existence and the rest is history.

Regarding aliens, they did travel long distances but now they're already here and evidence shows they were here when the pyramids were being built and helped the Mayans amongst other things too, evidence is being found all over the our planet. So where are they then I hear you ask, well they're living in places where we don't, like under the oceans in Antarctica and yes they have been seen traveling at rapid speeds through the water.

Sorry if I crashed the party but I couldn't contain myself.
On a positive note, it makes you realise how absolutely remarkable this planet of ours is so shouldn't we be taking better care of it.


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## Droogs (18 Apr 2021)

Ah but uncles Albert and Nathan fell into the trap that we all do in that they see time as a linearly observed thing rather than as what it really is - merely a method of observation. And given that the infinity in any calculation is in fact never equal to the infinity in any other then it is possible to both exist and not exist at any given point or points in the observable universe and at any (for want of a better expression) time/moment, all of which could be in the past present or future as we measure it. We just have to do the easy  bit and figure out how to resonate at the appropriate frequency to do so. Just remember folks it is all about frequencies


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## Limey Lurker (18 Apr 2021)

Stan said:


> The term "big bang" was created by astronomer Fred Hoyle to mock the theory it names.
> 
> I ask myself "what has all this got to do with the price of bread?"




I ask myself, "OK; but WHERE was it?".


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## Droogs (18 Apr 2021)

Limey Lurker said:


> I ask myself, "OK; but WHERE was it?".


Greenwich, obviously, where time where the Navy invented time


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## Spectric (18 Apr 2021)

Sachakins said:


> Regarding Newtonian physics, and Einsteins theories and quantum physics, there is a minority but growing band of scientists that are of the mind that these laws and theorems may only hold true for our galaxy,.


When you think about it that may not be that suprising as we really can only research our own area, who knows what happens in other galaxies many light years away.



Sachakins said:


> That change of state may be to a form we as humans can not utilise


That is what I mean, the energy is always there just in different forms so we need to find a system that upon first using the energy can then change this energy form back into it's original form for re-use but something we don't yet understand is preventing this. 

"Time? Is that not just a human invented measurement construct. " I think the units of time are a human unit but based upon natural phenomenon, ie movement of the moon and planets, the decay of a radioactive isotope or the resonant frequency of a crystaline substance.


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## Spectric (18 Apr 2021)

Who has noticed a major flaw in so many sci fi films and series, we seem to assume that the universe has learned and copied from us in so many ways.

Think about how many types of tools we have for the very wide range of fasteners and fixings out there, hex heads, torx, pozi etc etc and not to mention metric v imperial yet in sci fi they come across alien technology which must use the same range as us because our tools can be used, how odd! and then they are also using our technology because we know all about it and how to fix it. 

I think these film and program makers need to be more realistic, something more like " never seen a fixing like that before, we will need to make some tools" and as for just being able to operate all alien technology they come across is also ridiculous, what if that species has four arms and eyes in the back of it's head, it could take ambidextrous to all new levels.


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## Daniel2 (18 Apr 2021)

What is Space contained within ?


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## Spectric (18 Apr 2021)

Daniel2 said:


> What is Space contained within ?


Thats obvious, it is contained within another space.


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## Stan (18 Apr 2021)

Spectric said:


> Who has noticed a major flaw in so many sci fi films and series, we seem to assume that the universe has learned and copied from us in so many ways.
> 
> Think about how many types of tools we have for the very wide range of fasteners and fixings out there, hex heads, torx, pozi etc etc and not to mention metric v imperial yet in sci fi they come across alien technology which must use the same range as us because our tools can be used, how odd! and then they are also using our technology because we know all about it and how to fix it.
> 
> I think these film and program makers need to be more realistic, something more like " never seen a fixing like that before, we will need to make some tools" and as for just being able to operate all alien technology they come across is also ridiculous, what if that species has four arms and eyes in the back of it's head, it could take ambidextrous to all new levels.




LOL

If the film was realistic somebody would try to bodge it first and ruin it, a bit like using a badly set adjustable spanner to round a bolt head that holds the key to the universe.


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## Terry - Somerset (18 Apr 2021)

I've thought about all this very deeply and come to only one conclusion - we are a dot on a mobius strip.

We can travel an infinite distance and never come to the edge of space. A little like the original circumnavigators who were surprised that they never fell off the edge of the earth.


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## artie (18 Apr 2021)

I've seen some doozies on this forum over the years, but this thread is about as far out as I've seen. 

Has anyone considered that the world the galaxy, the universe whatever only really exists inside out heads.

We receive information through our five senses.

If our eyes had different filters we would be in a totally different world. Ditto with our other senses


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## Crazy Dave (18 Apr 2021)

Wow! Yes everything has a frequency and everything is made from atoms and what we see with our eyes is not what is actually there because our brains interpretation of what we are looking at is just that an interpretation.

Where was the big bang? Easy, it's right in the center of the universe where everything is moving away from and dare I add that it's still accelerating.

Love this topic, you guys are so cool.


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## Crazy Dave (18 Apr 2021)

Daniel2 said:


> What is Space contained within ?


Dark matter..


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## baldkev (18 Apr 2021)

Crazy Dave said:


> What an interesting subject.
> Hi all I'm Dave and this is my first post




Hi dave, where do you live? If its under the antarctic, welcome to our planet! 

They probably watch us and think ' what a bunch of halfwits'
In fact, earth could be a big version of the truman show, with the rest of the universe tuning in each day to watch us and have a laugh at how dumb humans can be


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## baldkev (18 Apr 2021)

Crazy Dave said:


> Dark matter..



But..... What is dark matter?

Im not up on space, but yes i understand it is constantly spreading and speeding up. We are like ants, scurrying around for no real reason. In fact its all pointless, I'd better go get another beer


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## D_W (18 Apr 2021)

It's unobservable energy or matter in the universe that's inferred because the observable bits don't work the way we expect. As in, if you had a lit metal object that changed direction and a magnet that was unseen, you'd learn of the magnet by the way the lit object behaves.


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## Crazy Dave (18 Apr 2021)

baldkev said:


> Hi dave, where do you live? If its under the antarctic, welcome to our planet!
> 
> They probably watch us and think ' what a bunch of halfwits'
> In fact, earth could be a big version of the truman show, with the rest of the universe tuning in each day to watch us and have a laugh at how dumb humans can be


How many of you know this?
It's going to spoil it now because we won't know if you're faking it like Truman did. Darn it and I just got here.


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## DrPhill (18 Apr 2021)

> *Dark matter* is believed to be a form of matter thought to account for approximately 85% of the matter in the universe and about 27% of its total mass–energy density or about 2.241×10−27 kg/m3. Its presence is implied in a variety of astrophysical observations, including gravitational effects that cannot be explained by accepted theories of gravity unless more matter is present than can be seen. For this reason, most experts think that dark matter is abundant in the universe and that it has had a strong influence on its structure and evolution. Dark matter is called dark because it does not appear to interact with the electromagnetic field, which means it does not absorb, reflect or emit electromagnetic radiation, and is therefore difficult to detect.


Wikipedia
So.... we understand the universe so well that only 85% of it is unexplained. Hmmmm
OK what about energy?


> In physical cosmology and astronomy, *dark energy* is an unknown form of energy that affects the universe on the largest scales. .... Assuming that the lambda-CDM model of cosmology is correct, the best current measurements indicate that dark energy contributes 69% of the total energy in the present-day observable universe


Wikpedia.
Well that is more reassuring - only 69% of energy is unexplained. Anyone get the feeling that we don't really know and don't want to admit it?


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## D_W (18 Apr 2021)

I wouldn't overreact to it. The reality is that not everything will be observable - there's a limit to how far we can see, and if what we can't is influencing something we can see, then how do we explain it?

Ultimately, the folks who pose a potential explanation to something that we can't just check off on the list are the ones who lead us toward confirming those ideas. If there's a bulk of energy or matter likely that we can't see or observe at this point, then we'll either figure out how to observe or confirm it or we will figure out a better explanation.


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## Sachakins (18 Apr 2021)

Got it, dark matter is one of those items that we know we dont know, unlike the bits we know we know and the bits we dont know we dont know.
Its all so complicated when you know that those who know, know that what we know is only the bits they want us to know, and make us believe they know, when really we know they don't know, but they believe that they know what the don't know.

So who knows, not me, but do you know the earths not flat, or do we just think we know.

Note to self, have one more beer, that makes 42, now that's another universe all together. Ha ha


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## Fergie 307 (19 Apr 2021)

D_W said:


> It's unobservable energy or matter in the universe that's inferred because the observable bits don't work the way we expect. As in, if you had a lit metal object that changed direction and a magnet that was unseen, you'd learn of the magnet by the way the lit object behaves.


Or it's just a convenient way for scientists to explain why their sums don't work, rather than considering that some of their fundamental principles may actually be wrong.


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## Fergie 307 (19 Apr 2021)

I fear than much of this is probably completely irrelevant. It's a sobering thought that dinosaurs were the dominant life form for over 100 million years. We have only really got out act together in the last 3000 or so, and yet we are well on the way to destroying ourselves. The way things are going I would be quite surprised if we are still here in another 1000 years, or even a few hundred. The whole of human history may well end up being a footnote in the history of the planet, nasty parasitic creatures that evolved, wrecked the joint and made themselves, and countless other species extinct, all in the blink of an eye in the timescale of the planet's history.


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## Stan (19 Apr 2021)

What Fergie 307 said.

Who knows? Maybe it will be the turn of the apes? ( Yes, I know we are sort of one of the more stupid kinds of ape!) Pierre Boulle might have been prophetic.


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## Fergie 307 (19 Apr 2021)

I find science fascinating, but find many scientists very frustrating, or even arrogant. They generally seem to have such great confidence that what they believe is correct, when if history tells us anything it is that they are almost certainly wrong. You only have to go back a few hundred years to find the most eminent scientists assuring you very solemnly that the sun revolved around the earth. I am quite sure that if we are still here in a few hundred years time, the scientists of the day will view some of our present 'knowledge ' as being equally flawed. Unfortunately as Hegel said " the only thing we learn from history is that no one ever learns anything from history".


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## DrPhill (19 Apr 2021)

The trouble is that 'science' is more than just 'a thing'. There is the 'scientific method' which is 'get some evidence to support or discount you assertions'. In other words a statement is only useful if it is falsifiable. Can you devise an experiment that will clearly show whether the statement is true or false? If so, do the experiment, observe the result. Add the information to your view of reality. Because you tested it, and proved it, it is allowed into the scientific world view.

At the other end of the scale is 'science as a religion'. Not knocking it as it has given us some really good things. Like with most religions you have to accept some 'givens' before you start. Once you have accepted these then you can build a consistent world view. Again nothing wrong with that. But people who teach science never touch on these 'articles of faith' and somehow treat science as so much more fundamental than other religions.

Articles of faith:

There is a real objective universe out there independant of individuals
The real universe has measurable state, and that everyone who measures it will get the same values
That the state of the universe is truly understandable by humans
That the state of the universe changes in ways that show regularities (laws of nature)
That the laws of nature can be comprehended by humans
That the laws of nature apply equally at every point in the universe, at every time in the past and will at every time in the future.
It seems to me that non of those are really 'provable' by the scientific method, and so are not 'scientific facts'. As a result they should not be allowed into the scientific world view - except that without them we will not get very far.


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## Spectric (19 Apr 2021)

I think we have a problem accepting when something cannot be explained so to make everyone happy someone comes up with a theory. 



Fergie 307 said:


> We have only really got out act together in the last 3000 or so, and yet we are well on the way to destroying ourselves.


It is a really sad fact that reasonably inteligent human life has been on planet earth for about 300,000 years, in a more modern guise where they started to live in dwellings and formed towns probably about 50,000 years yet in just several hundred years since industrialisation we have managed to pollute every part of the planet, hunt many species to extinction and generally start the process of human extinction, it is no wonder that nature would like to see the back of us.

On another note, how can time and the speed of light be linked. The theory says that time stops if you reach the speed of light, so how or what stops your body from ageing/decaying ? You could argue that by traveling anywhere faster you take less time to complete the journey and have therefore aged less anyway.


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## D_W (19 Apr 2021)

Those of us who are problem solvers understand the value that creative dreamers bring to society. What do I mean by that? The conscientious (the attorneys, engineers, etc) tend to keep things going day to day and set the structure for the worker bees. But they do not advance society in great leaps and bounds. 

What does the class of problem solvers who actually do that do? Well, they're often a bit crazy, but when something is unknown and you do not have a provable conclusion, you then have to posit a possible conclusion, and then see if you can prove it or disprove it. If you refuse to move on, you will...

...never move on. 

Most of the world likes to live in black and white, but not a single one of us can really definitively prove that the world exists as we perceive it. I can't. We have to assume it does. We either assume that there aren't multiple realities around us or that if there are, they're not materially important for us to recognize. 

The nutballs give us things like alternating current motors, rockets that can come back and land standing up, etc. Without them, we tend to just try to make the things already solved cheaper, faster, whatever else. 

As for the folks who confuse religion or proof or who think religion (I am a believer. I do not have to be, I choose to be) is the only non-provable conclusive thing that can exist, I don't have a lot of time for them. I don't think it does religion a whole lot of good to say "here, i aim to prove that I can ban my sect from having curiosity and I have countless generations before me to prove that it can be done....as I type this on my iphone and recognize that the starts and the universe aren't turning around us."


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## D_W (19 Apr 2021)

Spectric said:


> On another note, how can time and the speed of light be linked. The theory says that time stops if you reach the speed of light, so how or what stops your body from ageing/decaying ? You could argue that by traveling anywhere faster you take less time to complete the journey and have therefore aged less anyway.



The earth will be fine with or without us. There's no need to turn it into a vengeful person. 

As far as relative time, if you move away from something at the speed of light, then you see it as what it was at a point in time. I don't think there's an assumption that if you go "really really fast", you'll stop aging - just that anyone who could observe you moving away quickly would see you the same and you them. If you changed directions instantly and came back at them, you would not be the same age, nor would they.


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## Sachakins (19 Apr 2021)

Learning things from history is purely dependent on who and what history they observe. The future is unknown, unlike history, which unfortunately is a distortion brought on by the observer. So clearly we all know that we don't know the future, but we don't know what we know about history other than our own, but we know that others don't know either. So history is largely like the present future, it is dependent on the observer.


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## Sachakins (19 Apr 2021)

D_W said:


> Those of us who are problem solvers understand the value that creative dreamers bring to society. What do I mean by that? The conscientious (the attorneys, engineers, etc) tend to keep things going day to day and set the structure for the worker bees. But they do not advance society in great leaps and bounds.
> 
> What does the class of problem solvers who actually do that do? Well, they're often a bit crazy, but when something is unknown and you do not have a provable conclusion, you then have to posit a possible conclusion, and then see if you can prove it or disprove it. If you refuse to move on, you will...
> 
> ...


This is were belief constructs, of which religion is only one format, have the advantage over science. Religion as a subset is a belief construct, were as science requires quantifiable proof. One can prove or disprove a result, or undetstand a hypothesis is an unknown state. But belief requires no proof, no evidence, no experiential definitive construct.

This gives belief systems a security that science can not give.
So anything you have a belief in, as opposed to believe in, can never be neither proven nor disproportionately be unproven.
That view then encompasses belief constructs as anything that you as an individual neither want nor seek to be a proven factual event not requiring evidentiary proof.

Please note, I am careful to say a belief construct, not religious construct, as Athesim or agnostic beliefs are viewed as non religious, but they are STILL belief constructs, as anything that you believe in, without need of evidence or proof is still a belief tenet, whether it is constrained within or without religious context.

Landlord, another large brandy.


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## Fergie 307 (19 Apr 2021)

DrPhill said:


> The trouble is that 'science' is more than just 'a thing'. There is the 'scientific method' which is 'get some evidence to support or discount you assertions'. In other words a statement is only useful if it is falsifiable. Can you devise an experiment that will clearly show whether the statement is true or false? If so, do the experiment, observe the result. Add the information to your view of reality. Because you tested it, and proved it, it is allowed into the scientific world view.
> 
> At the other end of the scale is 'science as a religion'. Not knocking it as it has given us some really good things. Like with most religions you have to accept some 'givens' before you start. Once you have accepted these then you can build a consistent world view. Again nothing wrong with that. But people who teach science never touch on these 'articles of faith' and somehow treat science as so much more fundamental than other religions.
> 
> ...


I agree. The problem is that your proofs can only be based on what you know. There is always the risk that in the future someone will discover something you didn't know about that undermines or destroys the foundation of your proof. So rather than talk about absolute laws of nature of physics we should really add "as far as we can determine now". So Einstein's theory of relativity appeared to be spot on, until quite recently when it was discovered that sub atomic particles don't behave in accordance with Einstein's theory, so it turns out it is not universal after all.


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Crazy Dave said:


> Wow! Yes everything has a frequency and everything is made from atoms


But atoms are made of up and down quarks. Everying we see and can touch is made of just three particles (including the electron but not the neutrino) and they are controlled by only four forces. As ususal I should add "as far as we know at the moment"


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Fergie 307 said:


> Or it's just a convenient way for scientists to explain why their sums don't work, rather than considering that some of their fundamental principles may actually be wrong.


It is well known that some of the fundements theories have gaps and made need changing. Gravity and relativity are incompatable and something else is needed to explain what is out there. That is what makes science so exciting.


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Fergie 307 said:


> They generally seem to have such great confidence that what they believe is correct


I do not think any working scientist would ever say that. The pundits you get on TV to feed the masses are a different matter. The people who believe in one of the various faith systems, religions, or what ever you care to call them are usually the ones that have absolout certaintaty that they have all the answers. If scientists ever thought that they kew everying they would start looking for a new job. The unknown and the thrill of discovery is what keeps us working.


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Crazy Dave said:


> Where was the big bang? Easy, it's right in the center of the universe


 The correct answer at the moment is thought to be "on the tip of your nose and everywhere else" This can be difficult to think about but assuming the big bang theory is correct and it most likely is all the universe as we know it was once compressed into a infinately small space which has now expanded to what we can see. The big bang happened everywhere in the universe.


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Fergie 307 said:


> it was discovered that sub atomic particles don't behave in accordance with Einstein's theory, so it turns out it is not universal after all.


And that is exactly what makes science so exciting


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## Fergie 307 (20 Apr 2021)

Anthraquinone said:


> And that is exactly what makes science so exciting


I agree entirely. Just sometimes find it a bit strange. Dark matter is a good example. It is supposed to be all around us in considerable quantities, and yet in 20 years or more no one has been able to find any. Seems to me that it might be a good idea to look at the calculations which inferred its existence and question whether they might be flawed, however uncomfortable that might be. It seems there is little appetite for this, so we carry on searching for the elusive dark matter. Just doesn't seem very logical to me.


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## Anthraquinone (20 Apr 2021)

Dark matter by definition is extremely difficult to detect directly and so far all atempts have failed - that is not to say it is not out there. 
At the moment something is needed to explain the rotational speed of stars in Galaxies and galaxies in galaxy clusters. These differences are well observed and unexplained.

Dark matter can account for these as can some modifications of the Newtonian laws of gravity. Nothing definate has been proved one way or the other. Anyone who says that they know the answer is talking garbage. If / when this is sorted out there is a nailed on Nobel prize waiting as there is for the unification of gravity and relativity.


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## D_W (20 Apr 2021)

Fergie 307 said:


> I agree entirely. Just sometimes find it a bit strange. Dark matter is a good example. It is supposed to be all around us in considerable quantities, and yet in 20 years or more no one has been able to find any. Seems to me that it might be a good idea to look at the calculations which inferred its existence and question whether they might be flawed, however uncomfortable that might be. It seems there is little appetite for this, so we carry on searching for the elusive dark matter. Just doesn't seem very logical to me.



Without it, you probably have a problem, because the "light matter" or observable stuff has behaviors that don't follow formulaic patterns. That doesn't seem very likely. So, we press on with ideas, waiting to prove them or not prove them.

To me it seems at least as logical as the idea that everything that's out there would just be easily observable by us.


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## AlanY (20 Apr 2021)

I will have a pint of whatever you have been drinking, Roy.

And the rest of you. What a thread! Somebody has been watching Discovery Channel, I think!

Reminds me of the heavy conversations had when me and my friends were teenagers lying on the beach with a fire glowing and us looking at the stars, patiently waiting for the 'shrooms to kick in.

Again, great thread and well presented by all.


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## Fergie 307 (20 Apr 2021)

It just appears to me, as a layman, that there are broadly two possible explanations for the sums not working as anticipated. 1) The presence of dark matter to make up for what appears to be missing for the sums to work as expected. 2) There is something fundamentally wrong with the calculations, perhaps because of some other factor we don't understand or have yet to discover, or because some of our laws of physics may be flawed for similar reasons. From what I have seen and read, and admittedly not having delved into it exhaustively, option 1 is being pursued with some enthusiasm, option 2 less so. This doesn't seem especially logical, particularly after we have spent so long looking for dark matter without success. I entirely agree we should not expect the answer to be easily discoverable whatever it may be. My bet would be that it will probably end up being option 2 in the end, in which case the answer will probably be a real game changer. As you say whoever comes up with the solution will certainly be deserving of tea and medals.


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## D_W (20 Apr 2021)

I think option 1 is explored with vigor because it's there in front of us. You can observe it, set a hypothesis, try it and call it out of it fails. 

If there is something unobservable influencing observable matter, well - that's awfully difficult, because if we could observe the unobservable stuff, we could identify it and attach a formula to it. I think this is a more likely solution, but if you can't observe it, you can't prove it. Instead, we add the "Dark matter" fudge factor to explain the differences, but we perhaps back into that to show that our current formulas work. As we get more resolution, we find instances either where they don't, or we later find out that perhaps they did and our observations were incomplete. 

As one of my professors said "learning hurts". Once you get the easy stuff, most of the rest is painful and tedious to progress toward.


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## Reginald (23 Apr 2021)

My cheap answer to life the universe and everything isn't just 42, Its we are here, We exist (i think) and space is endless< Of course we are not alone.


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