On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 4:33 PM, Levi Pearson <[email protected]> wrote: > On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 3:09 PM, Jacob Albretsen <[email protected]> wrote: >> On Thursday 26 May 2011, Levi Pearson wrote: >>> On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 2:40 PM, Jason Van Patten <[email protected]> >> wrote: >>> > However it is theoretically possible to establish a context from the >>> > center of existence if you assume that such a point exists. >>> >>> You might think so, but by calculating the doppler shift in the light >>> coming from stars in any direction from the Earth, we know that they >>> are all red-shifted roughly the same amount. >> >> No, this is not true. >> >> The further away astronomers look into space (time), the more red-shifted >> objects appear to be. However, in the local area, you can have objects which >> appear blue-shifted (example: Andromeda Galaxy). This is because in the >> local area, Doppler shifts of light due to relative motion are dominate over >> the cosmological redshift due to the expansion of the universe. However once >> you get much further away, there is a larger cosmological redshift and >> Doppler >> shifts of light due to relative motion are negligible. > > Thanks for the clarification. I think my overall point was still > correct, though: there's no "center point" to the universe that > everything moves away from. The entirety of space once *was* the > center point, and the universe itself is expanding. I realize the > universe is probably also not a spherical geometry, that was just an > illustration of the idea of an expanding geometry rather than a > conventional explosion. When one gets far enough into physics, any > discussion in lay English about it becomes hopelessly vague and > inaccurate, unfortunately. As the Doctor says, "It's not like that at > all, but if it helps...." > > --Levi > > /* > PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net > Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug > Don't fear the penguin. > */ >
I love how this thread is still titled "Re: [OT] Social Network Privacy"-Joh Not complaining, mind you. I just think it's funny that somehow shifted from privacy to this. -John /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
