The Universe Has 20 Times More Galaxies Than We Thought (gizmodo.com)

A new study by a team of international astronomers has produced some astounding results: they concluded that the universe contains at least two trillion galaxies -- as much as 20 times more than previously thought. The study adds that 90 percent of all galaxies are hidden from us. This hidden portion can't be seen even with our most powerful telescopes. Gizmodo adds: Consequently, this means we also have to update the number of stars in the observable universe, which now numbers around 700 sextillion (that's a 7 with 23 zeros behind it, or 700 thousand billion billion). And that's just within the observable universe. Because the cosmos emerged some 13.8 billion years ago, we're only able to observe objects up to a certain distance from Earth. Anything outside this "Hubble Bubble" is invisible to us because the light from these distant objects simply haven't had enough time to reach us. It's difficult -- if not impossible -- to know how many galaxies reside outside this cosmological blind spot.

Comments

So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[DrPeper]

How much more probable is Alien life now?

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's very probable. But since we also know that the Periodic Table of Elements is universal, as well as the fundamental forces, we also know things like warp drive are just not feasible...

So they are over there, and we are here. End of story.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[mark-t]

How probable is it that in a quite literally infinite pool of real numbers, there are numbers other than 0 that possess the additive identity property?

My point is not that we are necessarily alone, but that even in an infinite sample size, uniqueness is possible... the universe is unimaginably vast, but still finite. It seems it must be similarly possible, and not even necessarily improbable, that we might be alone as well. We cannot ascertain the actual odds of life existing because we don't know enough about any exoplanets so far discovered that appear to be hospitable to life to know if life actually exists on them or not.

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Stephen Hawking will invent more science fiction to sell to physicists and children that not even NASA could re-enact undderwater. You will have warp drive, but not in your lifetime: operaters and senators are standing by... with expensive doctored pictures that prove no-matter what the political turmoil YES WE CAN! Failing bank, political corruption, bogus laws, malicous codes, and bad food quality? Let us improve morale by... omg Spacewalk! omg first on Teh Mooon! omg first to mine a shitting star! omg! omg! omg!

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[gQuigs]

The Drake Equation just deals with our galaxy, so it doesn't have any effect.

I believe it was limited as such because it would be "more feasible" to have a meaningful conversation with a species in this galaxy thanks to the distances involved.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Quirkz]

It's an anonymous coward post. It's not modded down, it just starts at 0 by default. I'd say that won't change until there's AI good enough to automatically tell intelligent posts from poor ones. Since humans don't even have that skill down yet, I'd say it could be a while.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[cfalcon]

Bullshit.

The numbers are too damned big. It's strange enough that we either no not see or do not recognize signs of some vastly distant (and vastly in the past) society. They are TOO damned big. If we exist, then other societies in space exist. If you could wave a wand and KNOW whether or not any intelligent life exists in the universe besides us, and the answer was "no it does not", then it would be an argument for special creation by mathematical certainty.

It's too big. It's too old. If you accept anything resembling evolution, then there are aliens in that void, and a shit lot of them.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

While you are quite right saying that our circumstances may be unique, your analogy doesn't seem to be a good one in this case. It is demonstrable that there is a single number with the additive identity property but it's more than likely that, given the same set of circumstances elsewhere in the universe, similar life to ourselves could conceivably exist.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[MightyMartian]

The Drake Equation is just plain gibberish.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

as are drake's rhyming abilities....

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[hackwrench]

Except all alien life that would be spacefaring would be the most energy-efficient and would be turning the universe into more of itself. In fact most life may simply be/or even simply be thought of the best way to get to that state where we are part of a collective universal consciousness where we shall know fully even as we are fully known.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Props for saying "not feasible" instead of "not possible".

There are solutions within relativity that suggest FTL may indeed be possible (or at least, not impossible), although none of them are feasible in the forseeable future.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[wonkey_monkey]

It's not gibberish. It was devised as a tool for promoting discussion. It's not and never was meant to used in earnest.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[beelsebob]

I mean, it's literally only 120 years since people were saying things like "heavier than air flight is impossible, we know the physics, we know the materials, it's just not feasible"

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[mark-t]

The size of the numbers is irrelevant if the probabilities are tiny enough. As unimaginably large as the universe might be, we know absolutely nothing about how unimaginably small the chance of life is elsewhere. Life here might have been a one in a googleplex longshot for all we know... and if the odds were indeed that low (and I'm not suggesting that they were) it's actually not at all likely to exist anywhere else (although still not impossible either). My point being that we just don't fucking know shit... and saying *anything* about the actual likelihood of life elsewhere when we still have a sample data size of one is just so much blabbering about what someone might want to think or believe in rather than an intelligent conclusion based on deductive reasoning and observable evidence.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[sexconker]

I mean, it's literally only 120 years since people were saying things like "heavier than air flight is impossible, we know the physics, we know the materials, it's just not feasible"

Who the fuck ever said that? Are birds lighter than air?
You said "literally" so I expect a quote backing your bullshit up.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hate the Drake!

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[gtall]

The Drake equation is still bullshit, this doesn't change it.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[gtall]

Yeah, people have said cold fusion is impossible. If we wait long enough, anything is possible.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[uvajed_ekil]

It's very probable. But since we also know that the Periodic Table of Elements is universal, as well as the fundamental forces, we also know things like warp drive are just not feasible...

So they are over there, and we are here. End of story.

Not end of story. In fact, we have no idea how the story ends, or even how long it is. The human notion of accepted physics has been constantly evolving and is still changing every year. For example, two hundred years ago we had virtually no understanding of electromagnetism, or that our theories of electricity and magnetism would be unified. I find it incredibly arrogant and shortsighted to believe that FTL travel via warp drive must be impossible simply because our current understanding of the universe (which we know to be incomplete) can't make it work.

We believe antimatter exists yet we are terrible at working with it. Hell, we still don't know anything about dark energy or dark matter, though we think they probably exist. We spend billions of dollars searching for predicted subatomic particles and find things we hadn't even imagined, and we are just beginning to get into quantum spookiness. It was not so many generations ago that terrestrial human flight sounded preposterous, so I'm a long way from accepting the conjecture that warp drive is not possible. It could be that we are multiple currently-unimaginable breakthroughs away from starting to understand how.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[uvajed_ekil]

Yes, yes, yes. We are learning more and more all the time, so it is reasonable to surmise there is much that we still don't know, and potential technologies that would appear to be ludicrous today. We can't make FTL travel work today, even in the most basic theoretical sense, but I can't get on board with the idea that it can't possibly ever happen.

And don't get me started on the Drake equation, which is utterly unprovable and reliant on blind assumptions. I hate how some people treat it as gospel while it is more like junk math than science. Interesting, yes, but ultimately just a thought experiment that should neither dissuade us from dreaming nor blind us from what we can observe. Any current estimates resulting from use of the Drake equation should be taken with a grain of salt, as they are complete bullshit.

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

one notable thing is that were still primative enough to think in finite... not that i know much of what im talking about,, but to me finite means absolute., i feel like as an existance were in the teenage phase.. everything up until now weve been sure about until disproven.,

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Awfully sure of that aren't you? Ever hear of the concept of Electrogravitics?
Professor Francis E. Nipher was one of the first to show electrogravitic action in 1916, others followed suit including Thomas Townsend Brown whose work became classified. It is not taught in school anymore, fancy that.

https://books.google.com/books?id=3rI5AQAAMAAJ&pg=RA11-PA18&lpg=RA11-PA18&dq=Francis+E.+Nipher+electricity+gravity&source=bl&ots=Gc3NnQyQjX&sig=HZ_1g4p6dzbpwwUtxXCBaccY5Po&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CDkQ6AEwBGoVChMIj9eczeaBxwIVSn-SCh0z2AXN#v=onepage&q=Francis%20E.%20Nipher%20electricity%20gravity&f=false

Reproduced from the above Literary Digest dated December 22, 1917:

“Experiments recently reported by Prof. Francis E. Nipher of Washington University, St. Louis, indicate that gravity depends to some extent upon electrical charge and that in certain cases it’s sign may even be altered sot that it becomes negative and the bodies concerned repel each other instead of attracting. It would seem to follow that if Professor Nipher’s experiments could be carried out on a sufficiently huge scale the weight of objects on or near the earth’s surface might be increased, lessened, or abolished, and that they might even be caused to fly off into space. . .”

“gravitational attraction between masses of matter depends on their electrical potential due to charges upon them”

Prof. Nipher stated in his paper printed in The Transactions of The St. Louis Academy of Science: “Every working-day of the following college year has been devoted to testing the validity of the above statement. No results in conflict with it have been obtained. Not only has gravitational attraction been diminished by electrification of the attracting bodies when direct electrical action has been wholly cut off by a metal shield, but it has been made negative. It has been converted into repulsion. This result has been obtained many times throughout the year. On one occasion during the latter part of the year this repulsion was made somewhat more than twice as great as normal attraction.”

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[suutar]

well, it's 121 years, but according to this article on Lord Kelvin, he said something like that (not exact - but exactness was not specified). I'm inclined to give him the year.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[painandgreed]

I mean, it's literally only 120 years since people were saying things like "heavier than air flight is impossible, we know the physics, we know the materials, it's just not feasible"

Who the fuck ever said that? Are birds lighter than air? You said "literally" so I expect a quote backing your bullshit up.

Lord Kelvin said some things along those lines within ten years of the Wright Brothers. He also said lots of other silly things on other topics like calling x-rays a "hoax". This page cites sources and has links to scans and such.

"I have not the smallest molecule of faith in aerial navigation other than ballooning or of the expectation of good results from any of the trials we hear of ... I would not care to be a member of the Aeronautical Society." [Source]

"The air-ship, on the plan of those built by Santos-Dumont, is a delusion and a snare. A gas balloon, paddled around by oars, is an old idea, and can never be of any practical use. Some day, no doubt, some one will invent a flying machine that one will be able to navigate without having to have a balloon attachment. But the day is a long way off when we shall see human beings soaring around like birds." [TLWT, vol. 2, p. 1168]

"They never will be able to use dirigible balloons as a means of conveying passengers from place to place. There never was and never can be any commercial value to any such affair. It is all a delusion and a snare. Santos-Dumont is a very bright young man, but an air ship as planned by him is not practicable." [Said to reporters after having arrived in New York on April 19, 1902. Quoted in the New York Times, p.2, the next day.]

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

This doesn't mean that everyone who is skeptical is wrong. And it doesn't mean everyone with fantasies is right.

*YOU* have to prove your fantasies. Otherwise you are no different than a religious loon talking about the end of the world. You have the same faith.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Gavagai80]

According to your quote, Lord Kevin specifically said that he believed airplanes would no doubt eventually be invented: "Some day, no doubt, some one will invent a flying machine that one will be able to navigate without having to have a balloon attachment. But the day is a long way off when we shall see human beings soaring around like birds."

That's the opposite position from what was asserted. The context here was a claim that scientists who believe warp drive is physically impossible and cannot be invented even with unlimited resources and a billion years are equivalent to historical scientists like Lord Kelvin denying the possibility of airplanes. But you've just shown us that Lord Kelvin was completely confident that airplanes could and would eventually be built, and simply greatly miscalculated the timing.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

We can't make FTL travel work today, even in the most basic theoretical sense, but I can't get on board with the idea that it can't possibly ever happen.

So you'd like to join the list of 100 scientists against Einstein? I would really suggest acquiring a better understanding of Einstein before criticizing him. Relativity was a description of the geometry of the universe, and an exceedingly exact one. Nevertheless its effects are very small and difficult to measure directly. We know Relativity is wrong, because all theories are wrong, but that affects its accuracy, not its basic tenets. Apples were not discovered to fall up when Newton's mechanics were superseded, and what we know of relativity has been experimentally verified as being true. The impossibility of FTL is not a theory, it's baked in to how time and space relate to each other.

Because of that, when you start assuming that FTL exists, you start breaking physics. With FTL travel or communications, it would be trivial to set up a causality violation -- to have events precede their causes. Personally I'd rather live in the world where causes and effects happen in a defined order than the one that lets us go zipping about freely.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Gavagai80]

We now know that the building blocks of evolution and the conditions it required are not at all unique to Earth. That gives us good reason to suspect there's other life even in our own solar system, probably several places in it. Technological civilizations are much harder to predict the frequency of, but we be pretty sure there's life.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[penguinoid]

My theory is that intelligent life is harder to detect than a galaxy, and it seems almost all galaxies have been undetected until now...

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

So?
Since we also know that the Periodic Table of Elements is universal, as well as the fundamental forces, we also know things like warp drive are just not impossible either

Last time I checked it was just not feasible for the ancient Sumerians landing on the moon either

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[meglon]

....when you start assuming that FTL exists, you start breaking physics.

....when you start assuming that FTL exists, you start breaking physics as we understand it today.

Fixed that for you.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

The funny thing about that is that your objection was what the parent poster was specifically responding to. It's cool, though, reading is fundamental.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[meglon]

.... and reiterating the point is apparently needed when people suddenly of themselves as the end-all-be-all of science, who's word is so infallible that foresight and questioning are no longer needed. We have no idea what the next few years may bring in the fields of scientific research, let alone what it will bring 100 years from now. To suggest we do is unfathomably silly and egotistical.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

According to your quote, Lord Kevin specifically said that he believed airplanes would no doubt eventually be invented.

That's the opposite position from what was asserted.

You'll have to forgive him, he only heard the TREMENDOUS edited version on Fox News, Believe it!

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[stealth_finger]

How much more probable is Alien life now?

Practically guaranteed, but the possible places they might be just exploded exponentially.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[stealth_finger]

It's very probable. But since we also know that the Periodic Table of Elements is universal, as well as the fundamental forces, we also know things like warp drive are just not feasible...

So they are over there, and we are here. End of story.

We know what animals are out there, you will never get better transportation than a horse. Making your own energy is just not feasible, even the technological wonder that is a boat are at the mercy of the wind and elements, far beyond man's control.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[stealth_finger]

I wonder how many many millenia must pass for realistic posts like yours to not be modded at 0

The same amount that it will take to login to an account.

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

The coupling of space and time via Relativity is its biggest undoing.
You'll see soon enough, friend.

Time has no limit. There is no causality breaking or time travel with wormholes or FTL because you merely arrive quicker, rising as an asymptotic curve towards infinity.
Quantum Mechanics holds more weight than Einsteinium physics ever will.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Maritz]

If you believe in Eternal Inflation (which you should) then this only applies to the visible universe, and there is an infinite amount of space beyond that. Various big bangs, some like ours, some not. I mean yeah, there's definitely life out there, there's probably other "you"s out there, but so far that it makes no difference to anything.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

COLD fusion, yes. The current attempts at fusion are insanely hot, and even they are not at break even energy-wise.

Hot fusion has been known to be possible since before the word fusion was invented, except possibly to cave dwellers. Anyone who went out in the daylight knew it was possible (but probably not that their descendants would one day be able to create the same thing on a smaller scale).

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Maritz]

It's a thought experiment, and was never intended to be taken particularly seriously. You cannot know the factors with any accuracy. If you did, sure, it would be an alright approximation.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

> "Lord Kelvin said some things along those lines within ten years of the Wright Brothers. He also said lots of other silly things on other topics like calling x-rays a "hoax". "

Does not say much about science and engineering in general.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[fbobraga]

leaving each time more the "probable" and coming to "sure" :P

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[tehcyder]

We can't make FTL travel work today, even in the most basic theoretical sense, but I can't get on board with the idea that it can't possibly ever happen.

To paraphrase Fermi's Paradox, if FTL travel is possible, why haven't we seen any evidence of time travelling aliens?

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[kilfarsnar]

It's very probable. But since we also know that the Periodic Table of Elements is universal, as well as the fundamental forces, we also know things like warp drive are just not feasible...

So they are over there, and we are here. End of story.

I like to hold out for the possibility that we don't yet know everything there is to know about physics. History is replete with examples of people doing things previously thought impossible.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[kilfarsnar]

This doesn't mean that everyone who is skeptical is wrong. And it doesn't mean everyone with fantasies is right.

*YOU* have to prove your fantasies. Otherwise you are no different than a religious loon talking about the end of the world. You have the same faith.

Leaving oneself open to the unimagined possibilities is not the same as indulging in fantasies. There is a tendency in our culture to say that things we don't know about don't exist or are impossible. The real truth is that we simply don't know. I guess people are uncomfortable with uncertainty. But I think it is better to not foreclose the future based on our understanding of the present.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[painandgreed]

Ya, Lord Kelvin gets quoted a lot so I looked up that but took the time to actually hunt down what seem to be actual quotes with citations. Further more, he expresses that he thinks things might eventually be invented in one quote but not others. So, if I wanted to post unverified or singular quotes, I could have, but instead post the selection with link so people can read for themselves. I would bet that if I wanted to spend more time to do fact checking, that I could find similar evidence of notable people of the day expressing doubts for all sorts of things, but, while I am interested in it, it's not really might fight. That great and learned people call something impossible right on or even just past their discovery is certainly reasonable as it happens almost all the time well into the present era with most great discoveries.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

When the universe gets old enough, cold fusion will be the only fusion possible.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

We will NOT BE FOUND!!! EVER!

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[david_thornley]

Thing is, Lord Kelvin was one man, and he said heavier-than-air flight was impractical, not impossible. What we've got is pretty much the entire field of physics saying that warp drives are impossible without something with negative mass.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[david_thornley]

Instead of saying "impossible according to the laws of physics as we understand them", isn't it reasonable just to say "impossible"? There's a big difference between saying that large colonies in the Asteroid belt are impossible and saying that time travel is impossible.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[rhyous]

Well, 100% of planets we humans have set foot on have intelligent life. :-)
Unfortunately 100% of the moons humans have set foot on did not have intelligent life.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[michael_wojcik]

Indeed, if you want to quibble, you could note that we still don't have "humans beings soaring around like birds", under pretty much any reasonable definition. There are a few folks with wearable powered-flight gear, like Yves Rossy, but those are hardly practical.

LTA commercial travel ("dirigible balloons as a means of conveying passengers") was economically feasible for a few years, so he missed out on that one, but it was never a mass transport, and my guess is that it never would have been. The Hindenburg maxed out at 72 passengers, and airships are too subject to the whims of weather. Even if successful HTA travel hadn't been invented, for some unguessable reason, I imagine LTA travel would have remained largely a novelty for the wealthy. It wouldn't be anything like the sort of mass air transit we have today.

And it seems to me that in 1896 it was perfectly reasonable to dismiss, in a private letter, "the expectation of good results from any of the trials [in HTA aircraft] we hear of". The Kitty Hawk flight was still seven years away; it was another five years before the Wrights had anything that could fly with any reliability.

So while Kelvin may have underestimated how soon HTA flight would, er, get off the ground, the verifiable quotations are hardly outrageous. Certainly they don't do anything to support that tired "scientists deny the possibility of FTL travel out of hubris" argument.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[michael_wojcik]

If we wait long enough, anything is possible.

Patently untrue. Some things that will never be possible:

- A complete and consistent formal system

- Solving the Halting Problem for Turing Machines

- An algorithm for computing Chaitin's Omega for a given encoding

- Having both faster-than-light communication (which, obviously, includes travel) and intact causality

- Perpetual motion

- Convincing everyone that "anything is possible" is false

In exchange for any of those, you break the universe. After that, there's no human-meaningful definition of "possible". There won't be any humans, for that matter.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[minstrelmike]

The probability of life in the universe goes up if the size of the universe goes up, but the probability of finding other life forms doesn't increase since they can't pass the Hubble limit either.

But the Drake equations themselves are bogus because adding time to probability is like dividing by zero.
The law of large numbers states that anything happens given enough rolls of the dice.
If you want to calculate _probability_ correctly, do so without adding in time or a bazillion "events."
If there are 10 to the twenty-fourth number of stars in the universe, then for life to be unique to Earth only requires 24 events in a row, each with a one-tenth chance of occurring.

If we're going to be guessing anyway, we should at least try to use the mathematical tools correctly.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[dddux]

I know one thing that will never be possible, too. It's intelligent life on Earth.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[suutar]

Very true, but that's not the question I was addressing. The question I was replying to is "who said something like that 120 years ago".

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[cfalcon]

> if the probabilities are tiny enough

Its reasonable to assume that they are NOT that tiny, because we exist. More importantly, it is reasonable to assume that they are not tiny because of the diversification of life and the parallel evolution sometimes seen.

If your science relies on a really special case to happen, then it is pretty fucking fragile, and probably not really science. In all things, we have done pretty well assuming that there's NO special event happening. Gravity isn't unique to Earth. The earth isn't the only planet in the solar system. The sun isn't unique to this solar system. Stars aren't unique to the milky way. The milky way isn't unique to the local group. And so on.

> what someone might want to think or believe in

If you believe that there's a nonzero chance that we are the only sentient life in the universe across all time, then that is something YOU want to believe in, and are relying on a "one in gugleplex" chances to prove the case.

Remember, we aren't talking about OBSERVABLE intelligences, and certainly not ones we can interact with on any timescale. We are discussing the observable universe.

That means that whatever your guess for "how many intelligent societies should there be" was several years ago, you would have had to multiply it by a number greater than 1 several times over the years. Meaning that you'd have to be progressively adjusting your "odds for one intelligent species" down, down down down.

The chances of only humanity being an intelligent society are zero. Those odds are dust. The universe is *too damned big*. That's your only conclusion unless you believe in special creation. That's why I say, if we really WERE sure we were the only ones, the ONLY explanation left would some kind of supernatural action- an action outside of nature. Gods, a simulation, whatever the current zeitgeist wants to hypothesize all boil down to, life couldn't start without something else. Again, that's ONLY the case if you had magically gained the infallible knowledge that we were alone, which of course, we have not.

How many intelligent civilizations are out there? Were out there? Will be out there? You are correct that we can't guess the number, but our own existence and the LUDICROUS size and age of the universe means it isn't just one. That's impossible.

> we just don't fucking know shit

We know that other stars exist, other galaxies, other galactic groups, other superclusters. It's absurd.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/w...

You are correct that we don't fucking know shit, however, over the overall field of astronomy. There's too little matter to explain the gravity we see in galaxies, so we have like 80% of matter being dark matter or something. Then we have the opposite problem at greater scales, so we have dark energy as 70% of everything. So there's 5% of the universe we can explain and 19/20ths of it is totally unknown. We could be in some fucking nature preserve for all we know.

But for "does life exist elsewhere", the answer is "yes, many times" or "no, and it exists here because X", where we cannot solve for X. Unless you have a good argument for X, then the answer is, yup.

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Indeed, if you want to quibble, you could note that we still don't have "humans beings soaring around like birds", under pretty much any reasonable definition.

I'll quibble. Soaring like a bird is easy, and has been for decades. Soaring is nothing more than gliding while using rising warm air (thermals) to maintain/gain altitude. Flying like a bird is still hard though.

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[mcswell]

Not much. These are a long time ago in a galaxy far away.

Re: So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[mcswell]

In what way is it bullshit?

Re:So how does this affect the Drake Equation?

[mark-t]

Its reasonable to assume that they are NOT that tiny, because we exist.

As shown by the uniqueness of properties specific to particular numbers in the set of real numbers, which is literally infinite in size, the mere existence of something for which no duplicate has been found does not say anything about the probability of its existence elsewhere in even the vastest possible set of interest other than that its probability is non-zero.

As I said... one in a googleplex is non-zero... and that might, for all we know, be the probability the life would arise anywhere. With odds that low, the fact that we are here at all would just be a fortunate happenstance... but the mere even astronomical odds against it happening in such a case would still not preclude it from happening at all... nor even would they preclude it from happening multiple times. All that can be said in such a case is that it would be unlikely. Nothing more.

Right now, all we have is an upper bound on the likelihood of life arising on a planet... based almost entirely on what we know about a sample-size of one, plus the limited observations that we have made of other worlds in our solar system which have not yet found any evidence of life elsewhere. As we find more planets around other stars that appear like they should be hospitable to life, if we should discover that they have none, then we can slowly whittle away at the upper bound some more. But if we ever *do* find life on other planets, then we'll have a clearer picture of what the the lower bound of the probability actually is (right now all we know is that it is non-zero... but even one in 600 quintillion is still non-zero), and from there we will be in a better position to predict how likely life actually is, and even about how many worlds there will be in the universe with life on them.

So. the answer to if there is life elsewhere is not "yes, many times", It's "I don't know, because we haven't found it yet and don't know enough about the actual probability of life existing to come to any conclusions about the probability of life". At best, all we know right now is approximately the likelihood of planets that should be hospitable to life, but this does not dictate that such planets will necessarily have life. Concluding that it is somehow a certainty or even necessarily particularly likely that life elsewhere exists just because we do is simply begging the question.

No.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Universe Has 20 Times More Galaxies Than We Thought

20 times more than YOU thought, perhaps, but not me. I hadn't thought.

Re:No.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Universe Has 20 Times More Galaxies Than We Thought

20 times more than YOU thought, perhaps, but not me. I hadn't thought.

I read it as "20 More Galaxies Than We Thought"

Re:No.

[Tablizer]

So that's what happens when you multiply Null by 20.

Re:No.

[Anonymous Coward]

Before, science was only unaware of 96% of the universe
http://www.space.com/11642-dark-matter-dark-energy-4-percent-universe-panek.html

Does this mean they are unaware of 95% or less?

Infinite?

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't that mean also infinite number of stars and infinite number of galaxies and inifite times as much as observable and infitite times as much as those 700 sextillion stars?

Re: Infinite?

[Anonymous Coward]

No

Re:Infinite?

[OrangeTide]

It's kind of pointless to guess at what is outside of the observable universe. Saying that it is composed of marshmallow fluff is not really any more absurd as saying it is full of ordinary galaxies or it is pure vacuum.

Re:Infinite?

[cfalcon]

Well, the observable universe increases continually, and will do so either forever or for some great amount of time in the future. So we are forever shrinking the volume of potential marshmallow fluff, moment by moment!

Re: Infinite?

[Anonymous Coward]

No.
The observable universe is actually shrinking due to the accelerated expansion (dark energy)

Re: Infinite?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, yes.

Mind Blown...

[Anonymous Coward]

That has blown my mind.

What about dark matter ? Does anyone know how that figures into this ?

Re:Mind Blown...

[ClickOnThis]

That has blown my mind.

What about dark matter ? Does anyone know how that figures into this ?

It doesn't.

Dark matter is used to explain the rotation rates of galaxies (there isn't enough visible matter to account for those rates.)

This study says we have more galaxies than we thought, not more stars within them than we thought.

Re:Mind Blown...

[Hognoxious]

It's criminals, it's rapists.

I'm going to build a wall to keep it out. And make Astronomers pay for it.
--
    Donny Fartpants.

Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[QUASAR_FREAK]

Does this change then the need for dark matter? or it doesn't matter? xD

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[WalksOnDirt]

No, and the summary gets it wrong, too. In the early universe the galaxies were smaller, so there were more of them. The number of stars and the mass of dark matter hasn't changed.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[suutar]

as far as I can tell it doesn't matter - dark matter is invoked to explain why individual galaxies don't fall apart, because the mass we can see doesn't seem to be enough to keep it together at the rate they spin; having more galaxies doesn't change that.

(I find it amusing that dark matter is handwaving why big things don't fly apart and dark energy is handwaving why bigger things do :) But I'm weird :)

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

>because the mass we can see doesn't seem to be enough I think you answered the question differently than you thought you did. You are correct.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[gtall]

No, we still need dark matter or a lot of our physics theory is bunk. The bunk bit needs to be avoided.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's normal.

We observe something that our model can't explain. What do we do?

We can't go about completely redesigning the model until we have enough understanding of whatever-it-is to do so. So, all we are left with is injecting something to represent the disturbance, model it as best we can, and use it as a tool for the gathering of further evidence (keep repeating until it is all explainable).

We are in the early stage of that with dark matter. We have no idea if it is even matter at all. We just see something that doesn't add up, so we invented a variable to account for it and give us a way to talk about it. Once we have the data we need, we will banish the concept of dark matter and replace it with a better model.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[painandgreed]

(I find it amusing that dark matter is handwaving why big things don't fly apart and dark energy is handwaving why bigger things do :) But I'm weird :)

Galactic rotation curves was just the first bit of observational evidence that we saw over 80 years ago. Since then, every other explaination has been shown not to be the case. Since then, there have been many other observed evidence such as gravitational lensing, fluctuations in the CBR, etc. which is all under Observational Evidence under the Dark Matter Wikipedia page. All have been pointing more and more towards matter than only interacts via gravity, while all other competing theories fail to explain other observations. Furthermore, it tends to be called dark matter, and dark energy, energy, because they end up with unknowns that have specific units, and when those units are those of mass or energy, they get called mass and energy.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

Would ya fuck off with the xD smilie-face shit.

Your post was nearly mildly humorous until you vomited that cutesy, trite garbage at us.

Makes one wonder whether you're 12 years old, or you belong in YouTube's comment section.

The internet does not need a laugh track.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

Two stupid fucking smilie faces in one comment?

You ruined an otherwise Informative or Insightful comment by acting like a 12 year old.

Take that shit to a site populated by retards, they like that kind of thing.

The internet does not need a laugh track.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[suutar]

Ah, cool. I was pretty sure that they had other reasons besides galactic spin by now, but I didn't realize that the units worked out that way. Thanks!

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

dark matter is invoked to explain why individual galaxies don't fall apart

There are more compelling reasons to invoke cold dark matter.
Our best simulations of how the universe evolved from a big bang only produce states that resemble our universe when they include dark matter.
Different simulations, to get the percentage of different elements (H, He, Li, etc) in the universe, also only produce the real numbers when the simulation includes dark matter.
And the required amount of dark matter in both simulations matches, and is also compatible with the amount of dark matter we calculate for galactic rotation.

I find it amusing that people call dark matter handwaving, while we already know there is a particle, the neutrino, that is "almost dark".
Many people didn't believe it existed either at the time, until it was detected 20 years after they found first experimental hints about it.

Re:Does this change then the need for dark matter?

[Anonymous Coward]

(I find it amusing that dark matter is handwaving why big things don't fly apart and dark energy is handwaving why bigger things do :) But I'm weird :)

There are an infinite number of forces occurring on an infinite number of scales following a logarithmic decay and alternating between attraction and repulsion. electricity attracts, magnetism repels, Gravity attracts, dark energy repels, dark matter attracts, etc. It's all just 2 forces but we call them different things based on scale and properties, whenever one exists it induces the other to a lesser degree in surrounding matter thus the logarithmic decay over an infinite scale.

Face palm

[Anonymous Coward]

And we had to get stuck with Drumph!

Re:Face palm

[Tablizer]

And we had to get stuck with Drumph!

Worse, this could mean there are millions MORE trumps out there. Tread carefully...

Re: Face palm

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that the noise Hillary makes when she deletes her emails?

Re: Face palm

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that noise would be, "still gonna win, suckit, still gonna win, suckit, still gonna win, suckit..."

Where?

[jbmartin6]

Not sure why they have the digression into the non-observable universe. The 90% refers to the observable universe only.

Re:Where?

[Anonymous Coward]

They're clarifying what's being counted (galaxies in the observable universe) by contrasting it with what's not being counted (galaxies in the entire universe).

Drake Equation....

[tekrat]

So, how does this affect the Drake Equation? Even if we assume a very, very low percentage of extraterrestrial life and even a lower percentage of *intelligent* extraterrestrial life, we're still looking at "billions and billions" (sorry Carl) of potential intelligent species out there, we just can't seem to contact them though due to the vast distances involved.

Too bad really. Until we can come up with some way of cheating physics, we are stuck in this solar system for the foreseeable future.

Re:Drake Equation....

[Quirkz]

Short answer is, it multiplies the number by 20. Drake equation is just a string of multipliers. One of them reflects the total number of worlds. 20x more galaxies is 20x more worlds. (Assuming the extra 19 galaxies are of equivalent size.)

Re:Drake Equation....

[cfalcon]

It doesn't. The Drake equation only applies to the Milky Way. If you want to expand the Drake equation to the entirety of the universe, you take whatever number you get from the Drake equation, and multiply by the number of galaxies in the universe, which keeps being revised upwards with more detection. So at minimum, you are looking at whatever your Drake equation is times a hundred billion.

Re:Drake Equation....

[Anonymous Coward]

Does not affect it at all, other than what is input into the formula.

Your question is along the lines of 'how does this affect the volume formula if I add 2000sqft to my house'

His formula probably holds true. It is just a theory. However, we are unsure of all the components of it. The further right you go in the formula the less certain we are of the numbers. We have some 'good guesses'. Which still need to be proven true. They are only statistically true at the moment.

Re:Drake Equation....

[mrbester]

And assuming they haven't developed into Siefert galaxies and thus inimical to life...

Re:Drake Equation....

[Anonymous Coward]

It remains as meaningless as it always was, and always will be. There is always at least one quantity that will remain unknown in the Drake equation until we make contact with aliens. Therefore the equation tells us nothing - all people can do is make baseless guesses at an unknown. But even worse for the equation, either we

1) Never contact an alien, so only bound the quantity from above, never getting useful information

or

2) Contact aliens, in which case who cares about the stupid equation - we have empirical evidence that they exist.

The unknowns in the Drake equation basically make the whole process into trying to guess what colour shoes I'm wearing given that you know South America is a continent - the factors required to fill in the gaps are harder to work out than the final result is to observe!

Re:Drake Equation....

[aliquis]

some way of cheating physics

I doubt we will ever CHEAT physics.
If anything have a better understanding of it and hence a better method to use what is there.

Re:Drake Equation....

[mcswell]

"Assuming the extra 19 galaxies are of equivalent size." They're not, at least not equivalent to the one. Apparently the astronomers think the large nearby galaxies we see near us are the result of mergers of much smaller ones over time. In other words, the old galaxies--those 19--are much smaller (perhaps 1/20th, IIUC).

Re:Drake Equation....

[mcswell]

We can set upper bounds on most of the unknown variables. So no, it isn't meaningless.

Re:Drake Equation....

[Anonymous Coward]

It can set one upper bound on the product of a bunch of unknown and unknowable until they become redundant variables. Complete waste of time and effort. It's utterly useless for anything scientific. As stated before - either we see aliens, in which case, yay, no need for Drake any more, or we don't in which case we know no more than we did yesterday.

No, it does not explain dark matter

[Anonymous Coward]

It does not explain dark matter because its existence is inferred from the rotation of individual galaxies.

Wait

[wwalker]

Does this imply that the universe is expanding faster than the speed of light? Wouldn't that be a contradiction of the speed of light being the fastest speed you can travel at? Can someone who read the article shed some light on this? :)

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this imply that the universe is expanding faster than the speed of light?

Yes, but there is no valid explanation of how/why. Doppler shift of light from many stars going away show they are going away at faster than speed of light and will one day reach the point where they too will become invisible to Earth.

Re:Wait

[shaitand]

If I'm traveling at the speed of light in one direction and something else is traveling at the speed of light in the opposite direction, how long is it before it's light reaches me?

Re:Wait

[Plus1Entropy]

The speed of light limits how fast you can travel through space. The expansion of the universe is due to space itself expanding, and there is no limit (as far as we know) to how fast this can happen.

Re:Wait

[suutar]

The "inflationary period" theory does indicate that space expanded at rates faster than light would be able to travel (for a while - the description I read of the theory says it was done by 10^-32 seconds after the big bang and that in that time the universe expanded by 10^26 or more), but it seems that since it was space expanding and not matter moving through space, it's not considered a contradiction - like saying that a boat with a top speed of 10 knots relative to the water could be carried by a fast current at 30 knots relative to land (those numbers were pulled out of the air - if you know boats and those are insane, please don't hold it against me :)

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

never

Re:Wait

[friesofdoom]

The universe can expand faster than the speed of light with out violating any physical laws. See Inflation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

But you will probably need someone smarter than me to explain it to you...

Ill give it a try but I might be quite wrong: During inflation, even though the universe was expanding faster than the speed of light, no information was traveling faster than light, no causal effects traveling faster than light, and no laws broken.

Now I'll just wait for a real scientist to tell me why I'm wrong.

Re: Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, the distant universe is receding faster than the speed of light. This has been known for quite some time. It isn't a problem because the distant object isn't really moving that fast, it is just that space is expanding between us. Dots on a balloon dont' actually move when you inflate it, the balloon gets bigger between the dots.

Re: Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Shaitand, the light will never reach you. What will really cook your noodle is if spacecraft A is moving away fom you at 90% of the speed of light, and spacecraft B is moving away from you at 90% of the speed of light in the opposite direction, how fast is spacecraft A moving in relation to spacecraft B?

Re:Wait

[thorndt]

Well....let's change that to something that is physically possible.

If you were travelling 99.99% the speed of light in one direction, and something else, say 1 light year away, was travelling in the opposite direction at 99.99% the speed of light. From YOUR perspective in the first ship, the light from the other ship would take....wait for it.....1 year.

Spacetime stretches and squishes based on your speed. That's WHY time dilation occurs.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly, but the *frequency* of the signal received would be completely different from the signal sent...

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Wouldn't that be a contradiction of the speed of light being the fastest speed you can travel at?

No, because the expanding universe doesn't count as "travel". It's not moving from point A to point B in space, it's making space bigger.

This is the same principle behind the Alcubierre (and variations thereon) warp drive: you shrink space ahead of you, expand it behind. At no time do you exceed the speed of light within the warp bubble, but the bubble itself "moves". Edge effects are left as an exercise for the reader.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

The faster you expand, the more star systems will slip through you fingers, observable Universe.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Both time and space, go to zero, at the speed of light, IE there is no space or time.
So if you were traveling at the speed of light every where in the universe is instantaneous.
Do the math.

Re: Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

It depends upon the perspective of the person doing the measuring. Since a measurement of speed involves time in addition to distance, if the passage of time isn't constant for all observers, then the measurement of speed will only be valid locally (i.e. valid only in the frame of reference where it was recorded).

Re:Wait

[idji]

The universe can expand faster than the speed of light. As space expands the space between locations grows. Since no object is moving faster than the speed of light, this doesn't break relativity. If you see something go left at 0.8c and something go right at 0.8c, they are going apart from each other at 1.6c in your frame of reference, but not in their frames of reference, because they have very different times. But you won't see objects moving at 1.6c, you just see locations receding. If a line of people from here to the Moon did a Mexican wave such that the person on the Moon started 1 second after the person on the Earth, then you would see the wave traveling just faster than c (light takes >1 s to get to the Moon), but the wave is not an object, nor is if information. The Person on the Moon started doing the wave before they saw the person on the Earth do the wave.

Re:Wait

[mpeskett]

The expansion of the universe doesn't involve anything travelling - it happens via the addition of more space in between all the objects. Everything ends up further away from everything else, but nothing actually moved through space. The amount of new distance that gets added then depends on how much distance is already there, so if you consider something far enough away, the amount of new distance appearing between you and it is more than light can travel across in the same time period (so any light trying to make that trip will never actually arrive).

It also doesn't have any effect on objects that are tightly bound to each other by gravity (or other forces). In the commonly used analogy of a balloon being blown up beneath our feet, objects connected by gravity are like a sticker fixed to the balloon; the outward "push" of expansion is too slow/weak to overcome their hold on each other. That's true of our galaxy as a whole, and I think of the whole cluster of galaxies in which we reside, so the appearance of new space is only actually visible on the largest scales. At least for now; if the rate of expansion accelerates then nearer objects might start to be "carried away", until eventually they end up too far away to be part of the Observable Universe.

Also noteworthy, "The speed of expansion" is a misnomer, because it's not a speed. A speed would be some amount of distance per time, but the unit used to describe expansion is the "km per second per megaparsec" - a distance per time per distance (i.e. every second, where before there was 1 megaparsec of distance between two objects, there is now a megaparsec plus some number of additional kilometres). But that's kind of a weird unit because it's distance / time / distance... which cancels out to just 1 / time. Which brings us on to the fun fact; when you measure the actual value of the rate of expansion, dividing one by that value gives you an approximation of the age of the universe (it's not exact because the expansion hasn't been linear)

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

About the same time it will take for people to learn the difference between its and it's.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

... Space-time stretches and squishes based on your speed.

Because we've assumed the speed of matter has a universal limit. This model of a universal limit is proven correct by empirical evidence. When we are getting readings saying the speed (of matter) is greater than the universal limit; there is a fault in our measurements or our model of a universal limit is flawed.

... That's WHY time dilation occurs.

In your example, light can travel 0.01% faster than the spaceship carrying you. If one assumes matter can travel at the speed of light, as the GP did, then 2 such ships will be invisible to each other. We can still argue for time dilation, where time has stopped since it will take an infinite duration of time for the light to arrive. Einstein also pondered the problems caused by travelling at the speed of light.

Re: Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

You are essentially correct. The speed of light is measured using distance and time. If the very concept of distance increases, such as in expansion, no laws are being violated because the same distance is technically still being traversed in the same amount of time.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

The speed of light limit does not apply to the expansion of space continuum itself only to what is contained in between

Re:Wait

[aliquis]

Even if space expanded from one singularity into all three directions at the speed of light you wouldn't be able to see all of it (the stuff on the other side of the singularity is moving away with the speed of 2 times that of light relative you.)

Re:Wait

[aliquis]

.. and if you let time go slower and slower and the speed of light remain the same relative that time unit even at the expansion of the speed of light the universe would be more than twice the radius (assuming spherical here) of the age * speed of light distance across.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

I can shed some light that might help you out:

Use of emoticons and emoji makes one look like a child or a retarded adult.

Take that shit somewhere else please.

The internet does not need a laugh track.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Only things with no mass (e.g. photons) can travel *at* the speed of light. That which has mass can never travel as fast as light.

Re:Wait

[wkwilley2]

That's the fastest that a mass-less particle can travel through space, not how fast the universe itself can expand.

We don't even know what the medium is outside of the universe (if there even is anything) and even then, our speed of light "speed limit" might not apply there.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

For a thought experiment, think about holding an impossible-strength laser pointed at an impossible wide screen a light year away. After a year, your fictional laser point will show up on the far-away screen. Back on Earth meanwhile, you wildly swing your laser left and right. The corresponding spot on the screen will also dance around, and due to the distances involved will do so faster than the speed of light. But no laws are broken, because the actual light particles from your laser still had to travel by their normal speed to the dancing spot.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

If I'm traveling at the speed of light in one direction and something else is traveling at the speed of light in the opposite direction, how long is it before it's light reaches me?

Assuming you start at p1 and they start at p2? You meet at p3 in exactly D/c.
1) Let distance D be the one half the distance between point p1 and p2.
2) Assume p3 is the location known as "the speed of light" at which you are both traveling.

*bold for the uncool readers that don't get it, unlike those sexy, brilliant, "with it" mods that do.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Spacetime stretches and squishes based on your speed. That's WHY time dilation occurs.

While true, I felt I'd elaborate on this. Special relativity is based on two premises, 1) that there is no "preferred" frame of reference (meaning that physics works the same regardless if you're in motion with respect to another object or not), and 2) the speed of light is always c (2.998e8), independent of your frame of reference.

So if I'm in a really tall building (with height h) that has a mirror on the ceiling and I shine my laser pointer straight up, the time t it takes for the light to get back to me will be 2*h/c. If this building is now traveling at relativistic speeds (lets say horizontally at c/2 for the ease of calculation) with respect to you, an outide observer, and you're watching me shine my laser at the ceiling (suppose the walls of my building are transparent), your observation of the light path will form an upside-down V. The hypotenuse d of this right triangle will be d = ct'/2 where t' is the time it take the light to move along the upside-down V. With Pythagoras' help we find that d^2 = h^2 + (c*t'/2)^2 , and substituting d and h leads to t' = sqrt(2)*t. So the light you (the outside observer) was observing traveled a longer distance from your system of reference (the hypotenuse of a right triangle is longer than either of its legs), and therefore more time passed for you as the speed of light remained constant for both you and me.

Re:Wait

[david_thornley]

If you could travel at the speed of light, you would not experience time. Not that you'd notice.

Re:Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Because we've assumed the speed of matter has a universal limit

This is not an assumption. I believe I am correct in saying that this is a mathematical consequence of certain conservation laws. Our measurements have proven the math, but that there was some "ultimate speed limit" is a validated prediction, not an assumption.

Relativity is the geometry of the universe. Like Newtonian mechanics, it is imprecise, but we're not going to have a scientific discovery that will let objects fall up. Relativity is wrong (all models are) but the size of the discrepancy is (again, like Newton's theories) pretty hard to notice. Nothing will ever contradict Relativity in a major way. That's just not how science works, we have to explain all prior observations.

Re:Wait

[mcswell]

My god, it's full of stars!

Dark Matter Ratio

[Anonymous Coward]

So if there's now 20x as many galaxies as before, does this also imply that there's 20x as much observable baryonic matter? Moreover, since regular matter has been previously estimated to be less than 5% of the universe, what does this mean for the ratio of matter to dark matter, given that a naive recalculation would put regular matter close to 100%?

Re:Dark Matter Ratio

[Anonymous Coward]

This new 20x sits at the limit of the observable universe, it doesn't change the density of galaxies.

Re:Dark Matter Ratio

[Plus1Entropy]

The presence of dark matter is inferred from the behavior of individual galaxies. The gravitational binding energy of galaxies should be much higher than what we can attribute to baryonic matter alone. So even though there are more galaxies than we thought, they still require dark matter to account for this discrepancy.

Basically, if we assume that 20x the number of galaxies means 20x the amount of baryonic matter (which not necessarily true, but whatever), then there must be 20x the amount of dark matter as well. So the ratio of baryonic matter to dark matter would remain the same.

Re:Dark Matter Ratio

[gtall]

No, it means there are 20x as many Space Women as before. I cannot wait for interstellar travel.

Re:Dark Matter Ratio

[mcswell]

And they're all like Seerlena.

How many of them are made by Samsung?

[Anonymous Coward]

rt

Re:How many of them are made by Samsung?

[ffkom]

Probably only the ones that have their sources of energy exploding... oh wait, there's a lot of suns exploding, so it seems most Galaxies were made by Samsung...

Rush

[Tablizer]

Even if we could travel at the speed of light, we probably couldn't even catch/contact many of those near the edge of detection, yet still visible.

Due to accelerating expansion, they would be moving too fast to catch by the time we got close.

Thus, they are effectively shut off from us such that we perhaps should consider them just shadows of the past, fossils, rather than tangible things. If they launch ET or messages from ET, they better do it soon, or should have already done it, if they want us to see.

Note they are NOT traveling faster than the speed of light from our perspective. From our perspective they are slowing to a crawl, nearly frozen. Thus, no violation of the speed of light is happening (relatively speaking). That's why their "light" is shifted to the infrared spectrum: their "waves" are slowed down for us, wiggling real slow. From "Gods'" perspective perhaps we can say some are or will be rushing away from us faster than light, but us muggles don't get to see it.

Read The Fine Paper

[Netdoctor]

So I had to click around awhile, but here's the actual paper:

http://www.spacetelescope.org/...

For some of us, it makes a huge difference if we're reading the actual paper, or trying to understand the watered-down version on a click-bait site.

Re:Read The Fine Paper

[drunken_boxer777]

Thanks. The authors state that their calculations estimate the number of galaxies in the universe to be 10x greater than estimated via observational data. I assume Gizmodo, the submitter, and the Slashdot editor all did not even read the abstract.

Any idea why the discrepancy? (How do you get from 10 to 20 other than fat finger? Am I missing something in the paper?)

Re:Read The Fine Paper

[mcswell]

I'm not sure how you get from 10 to 20, but I know how to get from 10 to 2.

Hint: there are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary arithmetic, and...you can fill in the rest.

Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

there probably will be a dimension reached by another Mario Bro's pipe. It is happening http://adnium-mjhost.netdna-ssl.com/e2/a8/9218/00000039215.gif

The Universe is a TARDIS

[KalvinB]

It's bigger than it looks.

The current scientific view is that the big bang exploded the universe out far faster than the speed of light. They think it got to the size we see within a trillionth of a second.

Total Perspective Vortex

[cliffjumper222]

Every time I read news like this I feel like I've just entered the Total Perspective Vortex http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/w.... For those that don't know (shame!), this invention, originally created by Trin Tragula as a way to get back at his wife (who was always telling him to get a "sense of proportion"), is now used as a torture and (in effect) killing device on the planet Frogstar B. The prospective victim of the TPV is placed within a small chamber wherein is displayed a model of the entire universe - together with a microscopic dot bearing the legend "you are here". The sense of perspective thereby conveyed destroys the victim's mind; it was stated that the TPV is the only known means of crushing a man's soul.

You Mom also has

[Anonymous Coward]

20 times more boyfriends than previously thought.

Drake Equation == 1

[TiggertheMad]

... we also know things like warp drive are just not feasible...

Yet. Three hundred years ago, most of the mundane tech we use on a daily basis would have been considered to be impossible. FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration, but there are many ways to skin a cat. I think that if we don't accidental wipe ourselves out, we will eventually work out some way to travel between stars.

And there is alien life out there. The trick is just finding it.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Hognoxious]

FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration

How do you get from a velocity of "a bit" to a velocity of "a fucking fucking bastard fucking lot" without accelerating?

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy: you bring the place you are and the place want to go closer to each other.

Yes, that's serious.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Person147]

Fold, or pinch, space-time. Mosey on to the part of space that you have folded to just in front of you, then unfold. Ta-dah! That's just one way I can think of.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[PsychoSlashDot]

FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration

How do you get from a velocity of "a bit" to a velocity of "a fucking fucking bastard fucking lot" without accelerating?

Understand I do not believe the following to be true, but they are answers that fit...

1} We discover that the universe is a simulation and learn how to edit parts of it, like X/Y/Z coordinates.
2} We discover unforeseen properties of the universe below our current observable/theorized smallest qualities that allow bypassing conventional transit.
3} We discover access to what is best described as "parallel universes" and can step from one to another, selecting specific parameters as differences between them, such as "my location".

Again, I don't buy any of those as likely. And #2 is nebulous at best. But the point the OP was making is that our understanding of the universe is not yet complete and given a long period of time, the discoveries yet to be made may be very, very startling to someone of our time period. Things we currently think impossible may be possible, just because our understanding of possible is incomplete. This mindset isn't science-fiction... it's just being humble. Speculating precisely what discoveries will be made and how they will work... that's fiction. But believing that we don't have an exhaustive understanding of physics is just sensible.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration

How do you get from a velocity of "a bit" to a velocity of "a fucking fucking bastard fucking lot" without accelerating?

worm hole and other sci-fy stuff would get you faster than light without going faster than light

Re: Drake Equation == 1

[limaxray]

By 'warping' spacetime obviously. Not only does general relativity say FTL is possible, how do you think all those other galaxies got further away from us than light has had time to travel? If the universe was expanding slower than the speed of light, we would be able to see everything instead of just the tiny, *shrinking* horizon we have. Based on our current understanding of the universe, warp drive is possible, the math supports it, and it would take a feasible amount of mass-energy to pull it off. Of course, our current understanding of physics is still quite lacking so only time will tell.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Magnets.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[gtall]

I like point 1, it gets people with waaaay too much money all excited and they start spending it on proving that 1 is true.

I happen to have a method for proving 1. It only requires a few morons to fund me.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Hognoxious]

OK, you got me.

s/accelerating/accelerating or using magic/

Re: Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

C. Clark to the rescue: Any technology advanced enough...

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Zak3056]

there are many ways to skin a cat.

While that may be true in the literal sense (one could use a knife, or a vegetable peeler, or a melon baller, etc) in the general sense, I'm reasonably certain there is only one (removal of the epidermis from the underlying muscle, bone, etc).

<insert "The More You Know" star here>

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet. Three hundred years ago, most of the mundane tech we use on a daily basis would have been considered to be impossible.

Yet, 3 decades ago we assumed that many things would be not only be possible today which are not. There are even things which definitely are possible, but which we can not achieve for various reasons.

E.g., remember when the US has Space Shuttles and stuff?

I guess we don't need them now that we all have flying cars!

Then again, who needs a flying car when ubiquitous networked technology will make the physical commute obsolete?

Re: Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

But, how do they work?

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[painandgreed]

FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration

How do you get from a velocity of "a bit" to a velocity of "a fucking fucking bastard fucking lot" without accelerating?

Well, as velocity is the change of location according to time, not speed which is affected by acceleration, what people are usually saying is that they get from point A to point B in a time faster than light can through a vacuum through Minkowski space (flat space). If you are talking about raw speed, it could be that particles could be created going faster than the speed of light, therefore never need to accelerate. Those would be tachyons and the only real serious talk about them was in a Michael Kaku book saying that somebody figured out they were possible, but only in a universe that was at a false vacuum and this probably happened at the beginning of the universe but such things would cause instability and for the universe to fall to a more stable vacuum state. Beyond that, there is the idea of warping space such as the Alcubierre drive as while the speed of an object through local space cannot get to or go beyond light speed, a section of space can move fast enough for the effect with something inside of it or by shrinking space ahead stepping across and then letting it re-expand. However, space is really, really hard to get to bend even though we know it does, taking planet or sun sized chunks of matter just to do it a little. The other ways such as hyperspace or worm holes are assuming that there is a separate path to where you want to go that is shorter than normal space. In hyperspace it would be other dimensions (such as those string theorists keep talking about) that are still connected to our normal space or drastic bits of Riemannian space (curved space). We can see a similar example of this in gravitational lensing where two paths both follow light like paths to a single point, but one can be shorter than the other. It is also possible that if there are other dimensions, such as possibly where our space and universe was born from, that the laws of physics would be different and there might not even be a lightspeed limit.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

FTL travel might be impossible via acceleration, but there are many ways to skin a cat. I think that if we don't accidental wipe ourselves out, we will eventually work out some way to travel between stars.

Yes, there's LUDICROUS SPEED! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAWL8ejf2nM

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

You Sir suffer from one serious short-coming none of our greatest minds to date were stricken with: lack of fucking imagination.

See some time in the future a person will come along (and it only takes one) who will answer your pedantic question.

More to the point: even you should know there are things in the universe that go "a fucking fucking bastard fucking lot" without accelerating.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no a limitation with the physics as per our current understanding to allow workarounds to the speed of light limit, e.g Alcubierre drive, worm holes....
The problem is the technology and the ability to deal with the amount of energy required, will be ever be able to achieve a sufficient technology level? perhaps not, but since the problem is not a limitation of the physic laws and not so long ago the maximum amount of energy that we could work with amounted to that produced by burning wood and only a few thousands years after we are playing with the energy produced by the fusion of the atoms, maybe all the hope is not lost

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

But muh causality!!!

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

If we could prove point 1, wouldn't it make more sense to take every precaution possible to stay within the parameters of the simulation.
We do not want to do anything that triggers someone to abort, bugfix and recompile.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

Fun thing is, we already know space works like this. It's the exact same mechanism that causes the universe to expand.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[taylorius]

Indeed, and not only that, but trying to find a way to "break out" of the simulation. That seems optimistic. Imagine if Super Mario discovered he was in a game and tried to break out into our world, I doubt he'd have much luck.

Re: Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

By 'warping' spacetime obviously. Not only does general relativity say FTL is possible, how do you think all those other galaxies got further away from us than light has had time to travel? If the universe was expanding slower than the speed of light, we would be able to see everything instead of just the tiny, *shrinking* horizon we have. Based on our current understanding of the universe, warp drive is possible, the math supports it, and it would take a feasible amount of mass-energy to pull it off. Of course, our current understanding of physics is still quite lacking so only time will tell.

General relativity says faster than light travel is impossible. You are wrong that it says faster than light travel is possible. If faster than light travel was a fact than general relativity would of failed to predict every empiric observation. Your are confusing the expanding universe where it is the spacetime continuum itself that expands with traveling through that same spacetime continuum.
 
But the expanding universe is only a theorized concept that has not been proven by empiric observation, nor is it described in the theory of general relativity. The only thing that has been observed are red shifts and those might hint to an expanding universe that started with a 'bang'. This doesn't mean it is 'the truth' nor that general relativity predicts the big bang. However, the big bang theory doesn't exclude general relativity which is probably where your confusing comes from. But if faster than light travel was possible, you wouldn't see the red shifts like we see them with our current instruments either because the red shifts are the consequences of the impossibility of faster than light travel through the spacetime fabric.

The big bang theory fits within the Christian theology of creation, hence why it is accepted by many scientists with a Christian background (you don't have to be a believer to still be influenced by the religion of your parents or your society). But there is an equally possible explanation without a big bang or without a beginning. Many pagans believed in a universe without a beginning or an ending. If scientists were pagan, the big bang theory would not have been accepted as 'most probable explanation' over other explanations without a beginning. Our observations are still limited by our senses while our reason is still limited by our dogmatic believes.
 
Just compare for example racialist/racist scientists of the 19th century with those of the 21th century. There are no racialist/racist scientist anymore. Darwin happened, was misused by politicians with pseudo-scientific political theories and racialist/racist theories became invective. The science of races has been replaced by genetic sciences (which is part of science of races), but even there you see more and more opposition from both religious and non religious people because it conflicts with their ethics.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

The moment he disappears off-screen the player would just hit reset.
If the problem persists and blowing at the cartridge doesn't work it will just go back into the box and another copy that doesn't have the problem will be used.

Trying to break out of the simulation isn't much of a problem. Actually succeeding will probably lead to bugfixing and a reset.
It will be a minor setback for the one running the simulation but a fairly apocalyptic event for anyone previously simulated.

Re: Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

This is one thing I worry about with warping space for travel.
We know space can be violently warped at extreme masses.
But look how hard it was for us to find the waves from said warping.
And that was 2 black holes doing the dance of death. (Was blackholes, right?)

Equally, what if warping space with too high an 'amplitude' is the very thing that causes black holes?
Such massive stretching between tip and dip that it violently rips.
We may very well be the thing that causes our own undoing.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[codeButcher]

All these fundamental particles. Electrons, photons; then leptons, muons, fermions, bosons, hadrons, .... And now morons!!! What new discoveries does science still hold?

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[luis_a_espinal]

OK, you got me.

s/accelerating/accelerating or using magic/

Any technology advanced enough will look like fucking hocus pocus to the (relative) primitive observer.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Anonymous Coward]

We develop dragons we can ride that can teleport "between" space and time. Then we all move to Pern.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[BubbaJonBoy]

Re #1 - maybe the experimenters are correcting the simulation after we figured out there wasn't enough matter to satisfy the other theories.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[david_thornley]

It worked on Babylon 5, last episode of season 4, "Deconstruction of Fall[ing|en] Stars" (can't remember the exact title). The simulated Garibaldi, aware that he was a simulation, hacked into the computer he was running on and controlled a thing or two.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[david_thornley]

The Alcubierre drive requires something of negative mass, which may well be impossible, or there may be other impossibilities involved. If it works as an FTL drive, it's also a time machine according to Special Relativity, and we get even more weird things to think about.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[david_thornley]

Wormholes are shortcuts, not FTL travel, if they exist and we can safely transit them.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Dread_ed]

While we're at it lets add in:

4} We discover that consciousness is not bound to physical form and we can travel to any location, disembodied but conscious and aware.
5} We discover that all particles in the universe are subatomically entangled with each other and we can infer the position and velocity of every other particle in the universe from observing a single atom.
6} We discover that machine elves are actually aliens telling us not to leave the Earth because the rest of our galaxy is being used as an intergalactic waste dump. DMT now has a government required daily dosage.

Science fantasy is such fun! Keep it up!
 

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[dddux]

Our understanding of the Universe? We've just scratched the surface. We're still simple barbarians without any clue about anything.

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[RatchetDriver]

Would that be Schroedinger's cat?
Quantum space travel, anybody?

Re:Drake Equation == 1

[Mattcelt]

Alternatively, (as far as I understand it) if you can figure out how to bypass inertia, you don't need acceleration. If we can find a way to manipulate our inertial reference frame directly, we can skip the whole 'acceleration' business altogether and change velocities instantaneously.

Interestingly, this ability would also enable us to ignore gravity completely. So I think we should get started on it immediately.

SPACE

[Anonymous Coward]

History has taught us that the if it can be dreamed of then it can be made possible. We will find a way to travel extremely long distances in space.

Re:SPACE

[tehcyder]

History has taught us that the if it can be dreamed of then it can be made possible. We will find a way to travel extremely long distances in space.

Untrue. I can dream of a time machine that lets me go back and kill Hitler's grandmother. That doesn't mean it's possible.

Does this effect the concept of Dark Energy

[Camel Pilot]

If there is much more mass beyond the observable universe won't that help explain why the observable universe is expanding faster than it should (based on the mass of the observable universe)?

Re:Does this effect the concept of Dark Energy

[Anonymous Coward]

No because the force of gravity travels at the speed of light. If the galaxies are too far away for their light to reach us then they're too far away for their gravity to affect us.

And they're full of rapists

[Hognoxious]

And they're full of rapists and bad people. I'll build a Dyson sphere and make the little green men pay for it.

Re:And they're full of rapists

[ffkom]

Let's elect Trump to become president of our galaxy. And tell him his shiny new office is at Saggitarius A*.

Re:And they're full of rapists

[gtall]

He'd only complain that his election to president of the Universe has been stolen by Hillary prancing around in devils' horns and a tail, Paul Ryan (as if he had the wit or the balls), and the New York Times. He's a monument to his own ego, sort of a geometrically expanding pile of reflexive referencing bullshit.

Re:And they're full of rapists

[Anonymous Coward]

The Total Perspective Vortex is on Frogstar B

Such arrogance

[Hylandr]

Because the cosmos emerged some 13.8 billion years ago

Lets just ask an infant how long the Earth has been around by staring at a few rocks, blades of grass and a fart in the wind.

Then accept that answer as absolute dogma to be defended in online discussion forums with rating systems to down-vote everyone that disagrees with that dogma.

GO :>

Re:Such arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

As opposed to some scroll a shepherd wiped his arse with a couple thousand years ago. There's no need to downvote you, you should be voted up so we can all point and laugh.

Re:Such arrogance

[GuB-42]

It is not a dogma, it is the most likely answer compatible with the law of physics as we know them.
How they got to this number is actually fascinating. How we combined methods to get further and further measurements, which, given the speed of light, allow us to tell the age of what we are seeing. How we observed the movement of things and derived equations which allowed us to go back in time and find the singularity which corresponds to the beginning of the universe. How we backed our research using independent observations.
We don't know everything yet, in fact we don't know the real beginning of the universe, 13.8 billion year is actually the age of the universe that can be described by the current laws of physics. Maybe better theories (string theory, LQG, ...) and new observations (gravitational waves, neutrinos, ...) will allow us to go further.
Or maybe the 13.8 billion number is just completely wrong. It is unlikely considering the pile of evidence but who knows. That scientific results could be wrong is part of what makes science science.

Re:Such arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, we shall believe you, wise one.

Re:Such arrogance

[Hylandr]

How they got to this number is actually fascinating.

The amount of data you can obfuscate by the innocent displacement of a decimal point is fascinating.

Assuming of course the speed of light proves a constant and not a variable across the galaxy.

Where are all the new stars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm, Google says that 700 sextillion stars in our visible universe divided by 14 billion years divided by 365 days a year (((7 * (10 ^ 23)) / (14 * (10 ^ 9))) / 365.25) = 137 billion (roughly rounded) stars, on average, have appeared every day in the past history of our universe.

Why didn't we see a few new stars, or a few billion new stars, appear last night?

Re:Where are all the new stars?

[ffkom]

Because they appeared so far away that we cannot spot them (or discern them from the rest of the galaxy they are part of). And it's a good thing this is so, because if earth was near any region where new stars form, earth would most likely not be inhabitable by life-forms such as ours.

Re:Where are all the new stars?

[BlueStrat]

Why didn't we see a few new stars, or a few billion new stars, appear last night?

You didn't look up?

The link below is a 'star nursery' in the Carina Nebula.

http://www.space.com/images/i/...

Astronomers have catalogued many "star nurseries". It's a certainty that there are many, many more beyond our ability to detect if this study has things basically correct.

This shows and labels a newborn star in the Horsehead Nebula.

http://amazingspace.org/news/a...

Just because you don't see bright flashes in the sky every night doesn't mean no stars are being born, they're just usually too incredibly-far away. As another poster who replied pointed out, be thankful they *are* so far away that you don't notice stars being born.

Depending on how close the new star was and when it was born relative to our Earth and Solar system's formation, it could have conceivably prevented the formation of the Solar system as we know it, never mind Earth likely becoming a radiation-blasted, barren, and airless rock if Earth did form first.

Strat

Re:Where are all the new stars?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe you missed the brunt of the question.

If there are 700 sextillion stars in the *observable* universe, then, on average, a billion new *observable* (not hidden) stars have appeared every day over the course of 14 billion years. Why didn't we see a billion new stars appear in the night sky last night?

One possibility: most of the observable stars were created at one time, say in the beginning of the cosmos, and have only sporadically been born since.

Another possibility: observable stars are born during "growth spurts", so that every few million years, several billion stars appear all at once, and we are currently not in a "growth spurt" period.

Another possibility: observable stars are born (or more accurately, their light is reaching us), on average, at a rate of one billion stars a day, as the math would indicate, which means a billion stars were born last night, and the night before. This third possibility conflicts with the actual observations.

Re:Where are all the new stars?

[Anonymous Coward]

And did a billion new stars (or even one) appear in that star nursery last night? Did that newborn star in the Horsehead Nebula appear last night?

Concerning the lack of bright flashes in the sky, if 700 sextillion *observable* stars are in the night sky, then, on average, a billion new *observable* stars have appeared every night over the course of 14 billion years. A few claims of, "Ah, that's where a new star is forming," is a far cry from what the math indicates we should be seeing.

Re:Where are all the new stars?

[BlueStrat]

And did a billion new stars (or even one) appear in that star nursery last night? Did that newborn star in the Horsehead Nebula appear last night?

"They appeared at night, it just wasn't *last* night."

No, last night billions of stars were born in other places where we didn't happen to be looking at especially hard, or where it's so far away we can barely detect galaxies and so was buried in the noise here.

Concerning the lack of bright flashes in the sky, if 700 sextillion *observable* stars are in the night sky, then, on average, a billion new *observable* stars have appeared every night over the course of 14 billion years.

You're taking the "observable" part of "observable universe" too literally. Just because some event occurs within the current boundaries of what's referred to as the "observable universe" does not mean it is even detectable, easily or otherwise. We are steadily discovering new major events like colliding galaxies and pulsars within the "observable universe" that have been going on for longer than humans have existed, so how could we possibly be capable of observing all or even most of the comparatively minor and relatively nearly invisible distant events like star formation?

You start with too many assumptions, the most glaring being regarding the relative size of the universe compared to our ability to observe distant events of relatively small magnitude.

"Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly hugely mindbogglingly big it is. I mean you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space."

- HHGTTG

Strat

To clarify

[wonkey_monkey]

To clarify, because the summary makes a mess of it, the twenty times more galaxies they are talking about are within the observable universe.

The stuff about galaxies we can never see because they're outside the OU was just a bit of colour at the end of the article.

Re:To clarify

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, summary is wrong.

The 20x extra galaxies are at the limits of the observable universe. When we see distant objects in space we are seeing them as they were in the distant past. Objects at the limits of the observable universe are seen from Earth as they were at around the dawn of the universe. The article mentions that these were small galaxies which later condensed into the larger galaxies we find close to the Milky Way (and which, if we could go visit one of these 'new' galaxies as they are today, we would find ourselves within).

So the number of actual galaxies expected to exist in the present universe is about the same, but the number of observable galaxies has raised by 20x since we are expected to find more, smaller ones as we peer back in time.

Presumably this process is continuing today and the present number of galaxies will shrink as they merge into larger supergalaxies.

Re:Relativity

[hackwrench]

Since every single explanation of relativity I keep seeing, describes it in a way in which there are elements that do not work given the original phenomenon, I don't know what is possible with acceleration. They keep describing motion relative to the speed of light in such a way that fails to conserve the fact that for the object moving, they aren't moving relative to the speed of light, for one thing.

Electric universe dispenses w/ it afaik

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject & take a peek @ that theory (sometimes called "the magnetic universe") to understand WHY I said that.

* Especially when shown the video in particular from the link of them below on "the PRIMER fields"...

(That one in particular shows how spirals form on BOTH poles of magnetic polarity in the same shape as galaxies do (using extremely FINE metal filings placed into a plasma containment magnetic field's poles off the 'zero-point' (void of charge area?)))

A simple design is the better one. Iirc also, this makes subatomic areas act just like the "macroverse" relativistic frame WE live in act the same (no true differences iirc).

APK

P.S.=> Interesting stuff https://www.youtube.com/result... & it does away w/ the need for chickenwire/rubberbands/superglue "dark-matter" bs put-up job thinking... apk

Re:Electric universe dispenses w/ it afaik

[meglon]

HAHHH AHHAH H AHHAHAHA A HH AHAHHAHA HA AHAH HAHAH A

Dear sweet Mitra, there's still idiots who bring up the electric universe theory? HAHAHHAHHAHHHAHHHHA AHAH AHHA AHHA HA AHAHAHA HAH HA. No, i'm not laughing WITH you.

Re:really lot

[hackwrench]

Maybe the same way you get any acceleration at all while from your perspective remaining in a fixed position relative to the speed of light, but all explanations of the concepts I have seen botch the job.

Wait a minute....

[Tulsa_Time]

Visible matter was only 4% of the Cosmos... so 20x more galaxies means baryonic matter now makes up 80% of the Cosmos ? I know the math is not precise... but what was wrong with the assumptions that were made about the total mass of the Cosmos... (Matter, Dark Matter, Dark Energy)

Noise

[Anonymous Coward]

When I took astronomy these cosmological values would have error estimates of at least one order of magnitude.

Re: An explanation of relativity

[hackwrench]

Now, do you know of a really good explanation of relativity that does not introduce elements that fail to work given the initial phenomenon.

water

[Anonymous Coward]

We now know that there is much more water in the universe than previously thought, what is that do tot he drake equation?
The drake equation does not take all the logistics in to account. It like saying: religion explains what god is, or if he exist...too simple for such a complex question.

 

Unfortunately..

[Anonymous Coward]

.. 90% of them contain stupid bullshit.

So just how many galaxies....

[Anonymous Coward]

Did Ford build?

Re:Nope, wrong.

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't "know" that there isn't an integer between 3 and 4, we assume that.

"We haven't traveled to a different galaxy, done some tests, and determined that all of these things are the same, so we don't "know" this."

Then please explain the value of spectroscopy on distant light, or indeed, why you even believe stars are distant. After all, you haven't traveled there.

" I am stating the principles of science."

No, you are upset that your prevailing personal belief that the universe owes you a Star Trek future is wrong. You are twisting science into your personal belief system.

Truman Show

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't wait until we're one year into traveling to one of those galaxies and we run into the back drop of the universe. It's going to be hilarious.

Just foolin'

[AndyKron]

God put those extra galaxies there to fool unbelievers. /s

Similar to Avogadro's number ???

[Anonymous Coward]

"(that's a 7 with 23 zeros behind it, or 700 thousand billion billion)" Very similar to Avogadro's number 6.02 10^23

Tell us the downsides of it then... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject "your majesty" (lol, not) - I'd be willing to listen to anything VALID from you (unlike your post I replied to).

APK

P.S.=> I'm here to learn, so might as well hear what I ask for from you (provided it's true & I'll check into it either way so I can learn more)... apk

Re:Tell us the downsides of it then... apk

[meglon]

Ahh yes yes, another person that can't seem to understand how Google works.

The electric universe theory, while more a fringe acid trip than an actual theory, occasionally rears it's misguided head-in-the-sand self from the few people stuck in the 1990's who think their genius was overlooked by all, and if only academia would ignore those other "loser" guys like Einstein, Hubble, well hell, basically ANY actual astronomer or physicist, then they'd rightly get their due.

These guys sum it up pretty well: http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/E...

Lets hit the high points of how the EU people solve all their problems:

Einstein's postulates are wrong.[8]
General Relativity (GR) is wrong.[9]
The universe is not expanding.[10]
The electric force travels faster than the speed of light with near infinite velocity.[8]
Gravity has two poles like a bar magnet; dipole gravity.[11]
A plenum of neutrinos forms an all-pervasive aether.[8]
Planets give birth to comets.[12]
Stars do not shine because of internal nuclear fusion caused by gravitational collapse. Rather, they are anodes for galactic discharge currents.[13]
Impact craters on Venus, Mars and the Moon are not caused by impacts, but by electrical discharges.[14] The same applies to the Valles Marineris (a massive canyon on Mars) and the Grand Canyon on Earth.[15]
The Sun is negatively charged, and the solar wind is positively charged -- the two systems forming a giant capacitor (this is James McCanney's particular erroneous belief.)[citation needed]
EU proponents from the Thunderbolts Project claim to have predicted the natures of Pluto and Comet 67P more accurately than NASA or ESA.[16][17]

Science work fairly simply. If you come up with an idea, and can test to show your idea has some validity, other people will look at it as well. When Hannes Alfvén couldn't find the radio emissions that his idea said MUST BE THERE.... that pretty much was cased closed, except for the few who,for some reason, had become so invested in it that they couldn't except that it was flat out wrong.

The downside you ask? Believing total bullshit instead of looking at reality. EU predicts things we've confirmed don't exist, and requires things we actually have confirmed to not exist. The downside... it's just fucking wrong.

Re:Tell us the downsides of it then... apk

[mcswell]

"...and the Grand Canyon on Earth" Interesting, I hadn't heard that one. A few months ago I was in the Skocjan cave in Slovenia, see pics here: https://travelslovenia.org/sko.... While most caves in limestone are formed by carbonic acid dissolving the rock, and doubtless this one started that way, it looked pretty clear to me that the canyon you see in those pictures was carved by running water in the same way the much larger Grand Canyon was. Do these AU people think the electric discharges went underground?

I see what you did there...

[claykarmel]

so only time will tell.

The reletivity of wrong

[TapeCutter]

Isaac Asimov has a great response to that old canard.

So....

[Anonymous Coward]

11?

Darn.

[Snufu]

The Universe Has 20 Times More Galaxies Than We Thought

Just when I finished my bucket list.

Okay - does that mean we don't need dark matter?

[mmell]

I'm not looking to support "Steady State", but if the dimensions of the Universe are not what we thought is the "flat, infinite" model of the Universe back on the table for discussion? Without dark matter and dark energy (a pair of modern Cosmological Constants), does a larger Universe account for the apparent universal expansion we've recently observed?

Wheh...

[Anonymous Coward]

Great, now I can sleep at night knowing the correct amount of galaxies in the universe.
I could have been off by 200 sextillion.

20?!

[Anonymous Coward]

What?! There are 20 galaxies? where did those other 19 spawn from?

lol

[Anonymous Coward]

>Gizmodo
what a cancerous website.

It Doesn't Matter How Many

[Danilushka]

The problem is not that there are likely other forms of life out there, it is that they are so far away, and faster than light travel is impossible except at the sub-atomic level. Certainly not for complex biological life. They and we will be extinct before we can even exchange messages let alone travel to see each other. It is probably better that way anyway: if life on earth has taught us anything, there can be only one dominant life form at a time so they or us would be wiped out in the ensuing conflict.

Stars in the observable universe

[Drethon]

"Consequently, this means we also have to update the number of stars in the observable universe"

If these stars are not observable, why do we have to update the number of observable stars?

Where's proof of "dark matter"?

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject: You seem so sure of yourself (even Einstein doubted himself on his theories) so you must be God Almighty - Only HE would have the answers to absolutes here - you don't. Not even to dark matter's existence.

APK

P.S.=> I'll look into what you wrote but the "stars are only anodes" thing I NEVER ONCE SAW in the links I posted - only excellent experiments that illustrated their point (especially the "PRIMER FIELDS" example)... apk

Re:Where's proof of "dark matter"?

[meglon]

Are you simply a fucking idiot?

If your theory, when tested, does not show evidence for what your theory says MUST be there... you're theory is fucked up. If that same theory says 5 or 10 things CANNOT happen if the theory is correct, and all of those things are ACTUALLY OBSERVED TO HAPPEN..... you're theory is fucked up. If both of those happen, you're theory is FUCKING WRONG, and anyone who still ascribes to it is no longer dealing with science, they're dealing with DOGMA.

Obfuscating and trying to shift the attention to something else when YOU'RE FUCKING WRONG only says you know your theory is bullshit, but for some reason you still want to "believe" in it.

I accept that actual physicists and cosmologists know a he of a lot more than i do, and when EVERY CREDIBLE SCIENTIST IN THE FIELD says something is pseudo-science bullshit, i am much more inclined to accept their opinion... one based on actual knowledge.. than some random idiot on the internet who bought into theory that's been proven wrong, but can't seem to let it go.

You'd be a lot better off in life if you didn't get sucked into fringe crap, and if you were a little less gullible.

Confused...

[Xenna]

Then why the tell did Samsung just issue a profit warning?

Light hasn't reached us

[ryanmc1]

This line fascinates me

"Because the cosmos emerged some 13.8 billion years ago, we're only able to observe objects up to a certain distance from Earth. Anything outside this "Hubble Bubble" is invisible to us because the light from these distant objects simply haven't had enough time to reach us."

The light has been traveling for 13.8 billion years and it still hasn't reached us. That is amazing.

Re:Light hasn't reached us

[Hognoxious]

//TO DO: Joke about The Hurd goes here

Contact with alien life probability == 0

[Anonymous Coward]

If the Drake equation was a generally accurate description of reality and there were many other intelligent species in other star systems, isn't it reasonable to assume that some number of those species would have a headstart on us of a few million years? Even the most reactionary skeptics of the technological singularity would agree that our technology and our relationship with our technology will be dramatically different a millions years from our current level of development.

So if there are many civilizations which are effectively "post-singularity", then they would probably know we are here (if they cared) and would probably be able to send us a message we would notice (if they cared), but since we aren't observing any such message they either don't exist (entirely possible if our civilization is a simulation) or they don't care (also plausible - once you have effectively infinite computing capacity do you really care what's "real" anymore? Your civilization could spend its time naval gazing inside its own simulated realities).

If there are other intelligent lifeforms out there, they're not interested in talking.

Now Go has less move than atoms in the universe?

[MrJones]

Can we say now that the GO board game has less moves than the atoms of the universe?

You think

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually scientist are wrong about that too.
The Universe has even more Galaxies than that.
The Galaxies that are known are just a fraction of a fraction of a fraction ... infinity of the Galaxies that are out there.
And we are just on the outer edge of the Universe.

Dark matter down?

[whitroth]

So, if the Universe has 20 times as many galaxies, and so, presumably, 20 times as much normal matter, then the estimate that the Universe is only 4% normal matter jumps to 80% normal matter, and a *lot* less dark matter, right?

Re:Dark matter down?

[mcswell]

That occurred to me, and I guess a lot of other people. But that is apparently not where the estimate of black matter came from, it came from observations of the rotation of single galaxies. There are posts above about this--look for "rotation."

Repeat:Where's proof of "dark matter"?

[Anonymous Coward]

"If your theory, when tested, does not show evidence for what your theory says MUST be there... you're theory is fucked up." - by meglon ( 1001833 ) on Friday October 14, 2016 @01:49PM (#53076847)

See subject: Well, big mouth - where's YOUR evidence of "dark matter" then? ANSWER = it's not - you're caught w/ your pants down & on the VERY GROUNDS you use... lol!

"Obfuscating and trying to shift the attention to something else when YOU'RE FUCKING WRONG only says you know your theory is bullshit, but for some reason you still want to "believe" in it." - by meglon ( 1001833 ) on Friday October 14, 2016 @01:49PM (#53076847)

It was tremendously easy using your own words against you so again - see subject - answer that...

* You can toss names @ me you cannot backup but I easily do vs. your OWN "illogic-logic", lol... easily.

APK

P.S.=> What's the matter "wannabe"? Can't backup your bs?? Absolutely... apk

Re:Repeat:Where's proof of "dark matter"?

[meglon]

I don't know why i bother, as you obviously don't have a living brain cell in your head.

There is currently no testing or experimentation capable to show evidence of dark matter because of the lack of sensitivity of our instrumentation, just like it took 100 years to develop instrumentation sensitive enough to confirm Einstein's gravitational waves. On the other hand.... that piece of shit EU "theory" you have latched onto like a hooker sucking dick HAS been tested through experimentation.... and has been found to not be able to predict a fucking thing correctly.

If you're too fucking stupid to understand that, you probably just need to do the human population a favor and go kill yourself.

Re:Relativity

[david_thornley]

You can learn to understand Special Relativity, which apparently you haven't yet. General Relativity is far more difficult. The foundation of SR is that physical laws are the same in all inertial reference frames, which means that everything is stationary relative to itself.

To give you a start, an inertial reference frame is one that doesn't have a perceptible force acting on it. All laws of physics are the same in every such frame, no matter how it's moving relative to you, according to SR. To derive a lot of useful things, the only physical law you need is that the speed of light in a vacuum is always the same. You will find that you need to drop any ideas of absolute space and absolute time, and realize that "at the same time" doesn't have a real definition for two events that are in different places.

Re:Okay - does that mean we don't need dark matter

[david_thornley]

Dark matter has been observed through gravitational lensing, and it's pretty definite it's there.

Gizmodo Is Talking Out of Its Posterior

[crunchygranola]

No we do not have to update the number of stars in the Universe, and no they did not "discover the Universe has 20 times as many galaxies as we thought".

This discovery is actually detecting young, numerous galaxies that we believed were there but could not see. In fact, it is simply confirming the accuracy of the existing Lambda-CDM model.

When galaxies first formed there were very numerous small galaxies that merged into fewer more massive galaxies that we can easily see (since they are brighter and closer, being more recent in time). We knew those ancient small galaxies were out there, waiting to be detected. A nice discovery, but no new revelation is involved at all.

Infinite

[NewYork]

Its INFINITE, not 20 times :)

I never said I believed it

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject: YOU said I believed it. I never said that. Putting words in my mouth for me = poor tactic on your part. I said I found it interesting but I saw in the PRIMER FIELDS example you could see results in tests (spiral galaxy formations via magnetic containment fields)...

Haven't seen any "dark matter" yet though, lol - have you?

APK

P.S.=> You fail on ALL accounts - period (& you know it, including providing evidence of your words (lol, cheap "out" in "our instruments aren't sensitive enough" - you mean your brain isn't))... apk

Re:Relativity

[RespekMyAthorati]

everything is stationary relative to itself.

Can't argue with that!