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Astronomers Find Most Distant Protocluster of Galaxies
The Bad Astronomer writes "Using the monster 8.2-meter Subaru telescope, astronomers have identified the most distant cluster of galaxies ever found: a collection of galaxies at a staggering distance of 12.7 billion light years. This is the most distant cluster ever seen that has been confirmed spectroscopically (PDF). Technically, it's a protocluster, since it's so young — seen only a billion years after the Big Bang itself — the cluster must still be in the process of formation."
It is incredible what we can accomplish as humans, imagine if we did not waste trillions on useless battles for the hear and minds of primitive retarded people with stone age believes.
12.7 billion years ago it might have been 12.7 billion light years away, but where is it now?
Exactly where we see it. The 12.7 billion years haven't passed, because there is no common point of reference between us and them for that time to have passed in.
"Now" and "then" makes no sense except for local distances, without introducing FTL, time travel and violating causality. We can only measure round trip times, not one way time.
The photons haven't experienced 12.7 billion years of travel - they just left.
If this makes your head hurt, good.
Wrong on several counts. What the 12.7 refers to is when the light left the cluster in question (in billions of years). At the time the light left the cluster it was actually much closer to us than 12.7 light years. The observable universe is actually larger in light years than the time since the Big Bang, due to the expansion of space. This expansion also stretched the travel time for the cluster's light to reach us. Now the cluster (to the extent 'Now' has any meaning) may be 25+ light years away (I apologize for the imprecision, as I don't have the exact figures at hand).
Actually look at the Subaru Car logo and consider the meaning of "Subaru" and you'll see why the discovery of a galaxy cluster is very fitting for the Subaru telescope...
Short answer: yes. For anything traveling at luminal speeds, time is not perceived. If you were a photon, it might take you 12.7 billion years to get here, but for you it is an instant.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
To paraphrase: Astronomer: What am I looking at? When does this happen in the Big Bang? Telescope Operator: Now. You're looking at now, sir. Everything that happens now, is happening now. Astronomer: What happened to then? Telescope Operator: We passed then. Astronomer: When? Telescope Operator: Just now. We're at now now. Astronomer: Go back to then. Telescope Operator: When? Astronomer: Now. Telescope Operator: Now? Astronomer: Now. Telescope Operator: I can't. Astronomer: Why? Telescope Operator: We missed it. Astronomer: When? Telescope Operator: Just now. Astronomer: When will then be now? Telescope Operator: Soon.
All it really proves is that humans cannot comprehend distance as vast as this.
My understanding, and im sure its flawed, is that something like a Photon doesn't experience time. To it, it pops into and out of existance, one end at the surface of a star in a galaxy cluster 12.7 billion light years away, the other end at the Subaru telescope in this case. Just as suddenly as this happends, its gone again.
This is because its traveling at the speed of light. Time and space are linked. Beyond this my understanding breaks down, but I suspect it has something to do with moving through space at that speed, and our misunderstanding of what time really is. We experience time where there is a 'universal' time in our refrence, because really anything we need to reference is already here, moving with us at the same speed around the sun. There is no 12.7 billion years ago to this galaxy, per our reference, because nothing that is happening 'now' as you and I understand it can possibly affect us here, without violating the speed of light. We're not looking at a galaxy we're literally looking back in time at a galaxy. If this galaxy exploded ripping a hole in the fabric of space-time and ended the entire universe right now, we'd not be aware of it for another 12.7 billion years. Per our reference, nothing has happened, or will happen, for that span of time. So in effect, for us, what we're seeing is what IS happening.
Now please correct my misunderstanding, those of you lurking out there who do know better, because i'd love to understand all this!