Is Our Understanding Of The Universe Wrong?
Researchers have found that the universe is expanding at an entirely different rate than previously thought, a groundbreaking discovery that could undermine our current understanding of the cosmos.
In a new paper published in The Astrophysics Journal, an international team of researchers studied the light emitted from 1,550 different supernovae — some near our own Milky Way and some located in the furthest reaches of the universe millions of light-years away — to study the composition and expansion rate of the universe.
In doing so, their analysis, dubbed Pantheon+, includes some of the most comprehensive measurements ever made.
“With these Pantheon+ results,” Dillon Brout, co-author and researcher at Harvard’s Center for Astrophysics, told The Harvard Gazette, “we are able to put the most precise constraints on the dynamics and history of the universe to date.”
Excitingly, their findings corroborate some existing theories regarding dark matter, a mysterious yet abundant substance which scientists have yet to observe or measure directly, and dark energy, a hypothetical form of energy that behaves like the opposite of gravity.
Their research posits that the entire universe is roughly made up of two-thirds dark energy and one-third matter, the latter of which is mostly made up of dark matter.
“We’ve combed over the data,” Brout continued, “and can now say with more confidence than ever before how the universe has evolved over the eons and that the current best theories for dark energy and dark matter hold strong.”
But at the same time, the study fails to remedy one of the greatest discrepancies in the field of astronomy: the Hubble tension, or the apparent mismatch between previous, locally-measured estimates of the universe’s expansion rate and the measurement derived from the cosmic microwave background, electromagnetic remnants of the earliest known stages of the universe.
The new research suggests the universe is expanding at roughly 160,000 miles per hour, while previous measurements that take the cosmic microwave background into account concluded it was expanding far slower than that.
And while Pantheon+ may have confirmed the discrepancy, it didn’t exactly provide any answers for it.
“We thought it would be possible to find clues to a novel solution to these problems in our dataset,” Brout told the Harvard Gazette, “but instead we’re finding that our data rules out many of these options and that the profound discrepancies remain as stubborn as ever.”
“It certainly indicates,” the researcher told Agence France-Presse, “that potentially something is fishy with our understanding of the universe.”
Clearly, Pantheon+ has opened more doors than it has closed. But that, in a way, is the beauty of the scientific process — the research done by Brout and his team could still lay the groundwork for a number of future discoveries.
“We, as scientists, thrive on not understanding everything,” Brout continued to AFP. “There’s still potentially a major revolution in our understanding, coming potentially in our lifetimes.”
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Ken Hughes
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Expansion is observed as red shift. Red shift can be due to two things, or any combination of the two. 1), Physical expansion, or 2), A difference in time rate over the eons. (Time might be running faster now than in the distant past.
Accepting this, (and I think you must), then we also understand from general relativity, that time and space go hand in hand. Take this one step further and we can say that “Time rate” and the “Size” of space go hand in hand.
The mathematics of relativity does accept this.
We can say that if time runs faster then space gets “bigger”, relative to the past. Also if time runs slower, then space shrinks in size relatively to the past. (eg close to black holes)
The next issue is, “Which is fundamental and which is the cause of the other?” Time, or space?
From special relativity, we know that motion (through space), slows time for the traveler. Also that space shrinks as time slows, (inertial length contraction).
I assert that motion cannot have any direct effect on space, (which in itself, is an abstract entity). BUT, motion through space CAN slow time, (if we understand that time is wavelike. Moving faster through these waves (of energy) will result in a longer wavelength for the traveler, but the same wavelength for a less accelerated individual.
I conclude that time is fundamental and that space always exists as a result of time passing, (at some rate or other).
This can explain “inflation”, caused by the sudden emergence of the energy field we experience as time. Time must have come first and space emerged along with it.
So, what’s my point?
1), Well, we have no right to assume that the time rate must be the same in all positions in space. We must allow for variation as with all other things.
That being the case, when we look in a particular direction and see a little more or a little less red shift than we expect, we should not be surprised, and,
2), When we look into the past, we should not expect the variation in time rate over the eons to be linear. Hubble’s assumption was naive in that respect. It might follow some curve yet to be identified, but a linear change is only one very special event, no more likely than any other.
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Herb Rose
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Hi Ken,
Another option is that light is an electromagnetic wave, the speed of which varies with the strength of the electric and magnetic (energy) fields in which it travels. Einstein’s relativity is based on the assertion that the speed of time (in a vacuum) is constant and distance, mass, and time all vary depending on the perspective of the observer but all observers will measure time at the same velocity.
Herb
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T. C. Clark
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…”speed of time in a vacuum”? Einstein’s relativity is about the speed of light being the max speed in a vacuum. Time is variable ….if Herb would travel in a space ship at only 1/2 the speed of light for about a year and return to earth….Herb would be younger than if he had not made the trip…the amount can be calculated…maybe a day or so younger is a guess.
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