Australian Study Backs Major Assumption of Cosmology

cylonlover writes "In mankind's attempts to gain some understanding of this marvelous place in which we live, we have slowly come to accept some principles to help guide our search. One such principle is that the Universe, on a large enough scale, is homogeneous, meaning that one part looks pretty much like another. Recent studies by a group of Australian researchers have established that, on sizes greater than about 250 million light years (Mly), the Universe is indeed statistically homogeneous, thereby reinforcing this cosmological principle."

Comments

Re:Aliens?

[Antipater]

(and, shouldnt that be a unit of volume, not length?)

When talking in terms of scale, it's generally better to use fundamental units, not derived ones. Volume is derived from length (length^3), so a volume scale is inherently a length scale, but less precise. If you were to use a volume scale, say 250Mly^3, then that could mean different averages looking in different directions (i.e. the universe is homogenous every 250kly looking up, every 10ly looking left, and every 100ly looking forward). Just using a length scale ensures all 3 dimensions are covered equally.