Wild New Study Suggests The Universe Is a Closed Sphere, Not Flat

[Disir]

When you're inside something, it's hard to see its shape. We're still finding out new things about the shape of our galaxy.

The shape of the Universe? That's a lot harder to gauge, but years of observational data, cosmological models and physics suggest it's flat. Send a beam of photons out across the void, and it will just keep going in a straight line.


A new study argues otherwise. Based on data released last year collected by the European Space Agency's Planck satellite, astronomers have argued the case that the Universe is actually curved and closed, like an inflating sphere.
Wild New Study Suggests The Universe Is a Closed Sphere, Not Flat

That's interesting.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

That is not a new idea. I heard this decades ago. I always thought it was already accepted science.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

That is not a new idea. I heard this decades ago. I always thought it was already accepted science.

Nope. Scientists still generally believe the geometry of the universe is "flat". This study challenges this notion, but it is just one study.

 

[zaangalewa]

When you're inside something, it's hard to see its shape. We're still finding out new things about the shape of our galaxy.

The shape of the Universe? That's a lot harder to gauge, but years of observational data, cosmological models and physics suggest it's flat. Send a beam of photons out across the void, and it will just keep going in a straight line.


A new study argues otherwise. Based on data released last year collected by the European Space Agency's Planck satellite, astronomers have argued the case that the Universe is actually curved and closed, like an inflating sphere.
Wild New Study Suggests The Universe Is a Closed Sphere, Not Flat

That's interesting.

Sounds not very plausible in my ears. I read one or two years ago an article, where some physicists measured a triangle in the universe over the size of billions of lightyears. If the sum of all angles = 180° then the space is flat (=> Euclidian geometry is useful also in very big distances). And that's exactly what they found out - even in this gigantic distance.

Ah - found a video about:

 

[Wuwei]

When you're inside something, it's hard to see its shape. We're still finding out new things about the shape of our galaxy.

The shape of the Universe? That's a lot harder to gauge, but years of observational data, cosmological models and physics suggest it's flat. Send a beam of photons out across the void, and it will just keep going in a straight line.


A new study argues otherwise. Based on data released last year collected by the European Space Agency's Planck satellite, astronomers have argued the case that the Universe is actually curved and closed, like an inflating sphere.
Wild New Study Suggests The Universe Is a Closed Sphere, Not Flat

That's interesting.

Sounds not very plausible in my ears. I read one or two years ago an article, where some physicists measured a triangle in the universe over the size of billions of lightyears. If the sum of all angles = 180° then the space is flat (=> Euclidian geometry is useful also in very big distances). And that's exactly what they found out - even in this gigantic distance.

Ah - found a video about:

One thing I don't understand about the study in the video is that gravitational curvature is in the four dimensions of space and time. The use of angular size in the video only measures the space curvature and ignores time.

If space is flat it's hard to imagine that you can see the CMB no matter where you look. If our sight followed the curvature of the earth, with a strong telescope you would always see the back of your head. However when it comes to the universe, the back of your head didn't exist in the distant past, so you will only see the cosmic burst that gave the CMB. The CMB seems to indicate that the universe is closed and curved.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

The CMB seems to indicate that the universe is closed and curved.

I think the error you are making here is to imagine space "expanding into" something. The CMB would appear to come from every direction, no matter the geometry of the universe.

 

[Wuwei]

The CMB seems to indicate that the universe is closed and curved.

I think the error you are making here is to imagine space "expanding into" something. The CMB would appear to come from every direction, no matter the geometry of the universe.

Maybe I don't understand what they mean by flat space. I'm assuming they mean a Euclidean metric. To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up. If you were on a piece of shrapnel, you would look back and see the origin of the bang as a small distant region.

However the universe is supposed to be isotropic from the perspective of every galaxy. The curved metric is sort of like George Gamov's dots on an expanding balloon.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up.

And there it is...the error. It is actually not like that at all. An explosion like your analogy expands into space. Space isnt expanding into anything. The expansion is space.

Maybe this will help:

There is no "origin point" of the big bang. You cannot point a telescope at a point in the sky to look at this point, because it does not exist. So, the only other option is that the CMB comes from every direction.

 

[Natural Citizen]

Like this?

 

[there4eyeM]

The CMB seems to indicate that the universe is closed and curved.

I think the error you are making here is to imagine space "expanding into" something. The CMB would appear to come from every direction, no matter the geometry of the universe.

In which case, it could be said that the universe is coming into being every instant of some immeasurably short moment.

 

[Wuwei]

To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up.

And there it is...the error. It is actually not like that at all. An explosion like your analogy expands into space. Space isnt expanding into anything. The expansion is space.

Maybe this will help:

There is no "origin point" of the big bang. You cannot point a telescope at a point in the sky to look at this point, because it does not exist. So, the only other option is that the CMB comes from every direction.

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

This picture of an expanding universe is closest to explaining my point. Suppose the milky way is the spiral near the top of the largest sphere. Suppose we aim a telescope at the fuzzy galaxy near the center of that same sphere. Since we are looking back in time, we must instead consider a space-time geodesic to the fuzzy galaxy, for example, in the middle sphere, earlier in time. We also see the CMB in the FOV of the telescope. But the CMB is not in the linear line of site between the two spheres, it has to curve in order to reach the CMB shown at the smallest sphere. So even if space is flat, I can't see that space-time is flat.

Maybe I'm reading more into it than was originally intended.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

Okay, I figured, but the grenade analogy is completely at odds with this.

The illustration is also not appropriate. The CMB comes from every direction.

 

[DOTR]

To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up.

And there it is...the error. It is actually not like that at all. An explosion like your analogy expands into space. Space isnt expanding into anything. The expansion is space.

Maybe this will help:

There is no "origin point" of the big bang. You cannot point a telescope at a point in the sky to look at this point, because it does not exist. So, the only other option is that the CMB comes from every direction.

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

This picture of an expanding universe is closest to explaining my point. Suppose the milky way is the spiral near the top of the largest sphere. Suppose we aim a telescope at the fuzzy galaxy near the center of that same sphere. Since we are looking back in time, we must instead consider a space-time geodesic to the fuzzy galaxy, for example, in the middle sphere, earlier in time. We also see the CMB in the FOV of the telescope. But the CMB is not in the linear line of site between the two spheres, it has to curve in order to reach the CMB shown at the smallest sphere. So even if space is flat, I can't see that space-time is flat.

Maybe I'm reading more into it than was originally intended.

You seem to know what you are talking about. Here is a serious question.

 

[Wuwei]

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

Okay, I figured, but the grenade analogy is completely at odds with this.

The illustration is also not appropriate. The CMB comes from every direction.

Suppose you are in the fuzzy galaxy on the center line of the big sphere. And suppose you look at the spiral galaxy on the center line at the edge of the picture slightly cut off. Spatially you are looking away from the CMB (albeit in a simplified picture of the expanding universe).

However since that galaxy is also in the past what we actually see would be in the middle of the middle sphere. The line of sight still points to the CMB.

In short we are always looking at the past and the deepest past always includes the CMB. I'm no expert on astrophysics, but it seems that even if space is flat and has no origin space-time does have an origin, and is not flat.

 

[Wuwei]

You seem to know what you are talking about. Here is a serious question.

I think the answer to you question is to cut along the dotted line and throw away your "what's here" labeled areas.

A better diagram would be to have all the spheres concentric like layers of an onion (Way to messy to draw.) Space is on the surface of the spheres and time is along the radius. The largest sphere (the outer sphere) would be the "right now" space of the universe. Anywhere you look has to be in the past, toward the center. As time goes on, the location of a galaxy is on what are called "world lines".

In this concentric model if we could look outside the "right now" sphere at your "what's here" areas, we would be looking into the future.


.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up.

And there it is...the error. It is actually not like that at all. An explosion like your analogy expands into space. Space isnt expanding into anything. The expansion is space.

Maybe this will help:

There is no "origin point" of the big bang. You cannot point a telescope at a point in the sky to look at this point, because it does not exist. So, the only other option is that the CMB comes from every direction.

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

This picture of an expanding universe is closest to explaining my point. Suppose the milky way is the spiral near the top of the largest sphere. Suppose we aim a telescope at the fuzzy galaxy near the center of that same sphere. Since we are looking back in time, we must instead consider a space-time geodesic to the fuzzy galaxy, for example, in the middle sphere, earlier in time. We also see the CMB in the FOV of the telescope. But the CMB is not in the linear line of site between the two spheres, it has to curve in order to reach the CMB shown at the smallest sphere. So even if space is flat, I can't see that space-time is flat.

Maybe I'm reading more into it than was originally intended.

You seem to know what you are talking about. Here is a serious question.

View attachment 290046

To me a Euclidean picture would be like a hand grenade blowing up.

And there it is...the error. It is actually not like that at all. An explosion like your analogy expands into space. Space isnt expanding into anything. The expansion is space.

Maybe this will help:

There is no "origin point" of the big bang. You cannot point a telescope at a point in the sky to look at this point, because it does not exist. So, the only other option is that the CMB comes from every direction.

Yes, I'm well aware that space itself is expanding and there is no entity it is expanding into. I also mentioned that the universe is isotropic from the POV of every galaxy. So there is obviously no center.

This picture of an expanding universe is closest to explaining my point. Suppose the milky way is the spiral near the top of the largest sphere. Suppose we aim a telescope at the fuzzy galaxy near the center of that same sphere. Since we are looking back in time, we must instead consider a space-time geodesic to the fuzzy galaxy, for example, in the middle sphere, earlier in time. We also see the CMB in the FOV of the telescope. But the CMB is not in the linear line of site between the two spheres, it has to curve in order to reach the CMB shown at the smallest sphere. So even if space is flat, I can't see that space-time is flat.

Maybe I'm reading more into it than was originally intended.

You seem to know what you are talking about. Here is a serious question.

View attachment 290046

We dont know. The question itself may be nonsensical. In the context of that picture, it is definitely nonsensical. But, in a more general sense, there may be other universes.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

Spatially you are looking away from the CMB

False. You are always looking directly into CMB radiation, no matter which direction you face.

 

[Wuwei]

Spatially you are looking away from the CMB

False. You are always looking directly into CMB radiation, no matter which direction you face.

Of course... I worded it poorly. It was in the context of a possible misunderstanding of the less than ideal graphic. My actual wording was "Spatially you are looking away from the CMB (albeit in a simplified picture of the expanding universe).

I should have said, no matter where you look in the rightmost sphere, you are still looking in the past -- toward a smaller earlier sphere, and ultimately looking at the CMB.

As I said, mentally visualizing (it's too hard to draw) the spheres as concentric is a much better picture for illustrating the space time geometry more directly. It separates space and time into locally orthogonal axes. That way it's easier to illustrate that you are always looking toward the CMB even though it's the smallest sphere.
.

 

[Fort Fun Indiana]

I should have said, no matter where you look in the rightmost sphere, you are still looking in the past -- toward a smaller earlier sphere, and ultimately looking at the CMB.

That's true of all spheres in the picture. Of all looking, actually. You are even seeing your PC monitors it appeared in the past.

As I said, mentally visualizing (it's too hard to draw) the spheres as concentric is a much better picture for illustrating the space time geometry more directly.

See, I don't think it is. You are still making the same error of analogizing an expansion "into" something. Your sight lines still only fall on the surface of the sphere. The picture is misleading in a few ways, not least of which is that it doesn't explain that it is a "reduced dimension" analogy, and we are 2D creatures on these closedl surfaces. You aren't looking backwards at any "smaller, concentric spheres". There are no "spheres", only a 2D surface, in the reduced-dimension analogy image you posted. The only thing that matters is the 2D surface of the spheres, and these surfaces aren't actually "expanding into" anything. That's another way the picture is a bit misleading. But you had it right when you said we could not see the back of our own heads.

 

[007]

So... was the universe CREATED, as the Bible suggests?

Perhaps we're finally seeing what God created?

No? Not God? Then who or what created this damn thing? What in the hell are we living in?

Is it even real, or a matrix?