James Webb telescope

[Clovius Boofus]

Amazing images from James Webb telescope, two years after launch

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/id ... 5df138b6f6

[Dazzler]

Don't know how long it will take, but one of its key goals is to search for light from the first stars and galaxies that formed in the universe after the Big Bang.

That will be awesome

[bfcjg]

Amazing pictures. Can just imagine VAR operaters using it, they'd struggle to find the sun.

[Taffy on the wing]

Incredible stuff....thanks for posting.

[johnnyjones]

Amazing, so many stars impossible to think we are not alone

But also don't ever believe we will encounter any other life the distance is mind blowing

[IPAclaret]

I watched Professor Brain Cox recently and he said something along the lines of:

there are an estimated 2 trillion galaxies and each galaxy may contain up to 400 billion stars; each star will then have many plants revolving around it and each planet can have 1 or more moons revolving around it

I know, that's ridiculous

[Bigbopper]

Amazing, so many stars impossible to think we are not alone

But also don't ever believe we will encounter any other life the distance is mind blowing

Does "the great silence" not suggest we are alone?

[distortiondave]

We are alone in as much as we are uncontactable and cannot contact any extant civilisation, but we won't be alone in terms of life-giving planets. 2,000,000,000,000 x 399,999,999,999 other stars in the galaxy means its astronomically unlikely that there isn't at least one other life-giving planet out there. However, the chances of several disparate intelligent races coexisting at the same point in time, each having an advanced enough civilisation to communicate across light years, and close enough to each other to initiate contact, are vanishingly small.

[atlantalad]

Thanks for the link to the amazing images. I have a few questions though that perhaps some bright spark (sorry ) may answer.

• The Crab Nubula images shows one of the very early stars created shortly after the "Big Bang." Given space is a 3D entity how do astronomers know which location to point the Web telescope in to find these early star systems? ( i.e. space is 3D and looks pretty symmetric around us mortals on planet earth in our own minute galaxy).
  
  Is the concept of a Big Band a single point or a sporadic array of multiple start points?

Questions arose when considering this quote about the Crab Nebula by Dr Eric Smith:

"One activity that's sure to accelerate is the practice of making "deep fields". These are long stares at particular patches of sky that will allow the telescope to trace the light from the faintest and most distant galaxies. It's how Webb is likely to spot the very first galaxies and possibly even some of the very first stars to shine in the Universe."

[Hipper]

You have to also remember that we have only been in space for sixty years or so. It's taken us humans something like two million years to achieve this.

Then take into account our precarious and perhaps unusual situation - how our solar system and earth itself evolved leading to the the peculiarity that we have a moon and therefore tides, and the earth is off axis therefore we have seasons. Not to mention all the various mass extinctions that led to our opportunity.

There is the Drake Equation:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation

Of course we are assuming we know everything which undoubtedly we do not.

[morpheus2]

Does "the great silence" not suggest we are alone?

There are many theories of why we appear to be alone, the Fermi Paradox has many possible answers... when it seems possible that within a million years or so we ourselves could conquer the galaxy with self replicating machines...it's surprising that no other civilization appears to have done it yet in the previous 13 billion years.
If you are interested I highly recommend Isaac Arthur's youtube channel -


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZlhJsE ... saacArthur

[Spiral]

Thanks for the link to the amazing images. I have a few questions though that perhaps some bright spark (sorry ) may answer.

• The Crab Nubula images shows one of the very early stars created shortly after the "Big Bang." Given space is a 3D entity how do astronomers know which location to point the Web telescope in to find these early star systems? ( i.e. space is 3D and looks pretty symmetric around us mortals on planet earth in our own minute galaxy).
  
  Is the concept of a Big Band a single point or a sporadic array of multiple start points?

These two questions are somewhat related. The only reliable way we have of describing the universe in a way that makes any logical sense is by describing it mathematically. Our human intuition gets in the way of this ever making clear sense to us (even to physicists) because the word "space" is a noun and nouns are 'things', so we think of space as a thing, when in actual fact it's more of a clumsy way of describing the frame of reference for describing systems of relations between objects.

Thinking of a location in space is less like thinking of a corner of an object, and more a region where the things you're looking at are. Seems obvious, right? As such, there's not really a "point in space" because space is just a frame of reference. The big bang is a way of describing an event were a shittonne of energy started unravelling and cooling into matter and everything receded from itself, but it didn't really recede into something, those objects just moved away from each other. Mathematical models of what happened "before" the big bang totally break down and stop making mathematical sense when you rewind the clock (reverse the equations). This is an inadequacy not only of human intuition, but also the very language - mathematics - used to describe what's going on.

It's not so much that "space" is really big, it's that the relations between everything seems very distant, especially so a creature whose mind has evolved to comprehend much more local relationships between objects. We've hamstrung ourselves by thinking of space as having it's own presence and qualities. It doesn't. It's just how we organise objects.

This might seem like just another way of defining space, and it is, actually, but that's important because it allows you to shake off intuitive ideas about space as an object, and from that understanding you realise that a "point" in space doesn't exist in the way material things exist. To use the clumsy but admittedly more humanly intuitive meaning of the word, you find an old "point" in space by just looking off at further and further distances, because the really old stuff had a head start on the nearer stuff in running away from everything else. There's no centre of space as such. A centre presupposes an edge, but there might not even be an edge (here's intuition getting in our way again).

Biggest obstacle to overcome in begining to "understand" (lol) space is by shaking off any idea of it being an object with definable qualities and characteristics. The big bang doesn't make sense if you think of space as an object, because you naturally ask what was space before it existed? what did/does it expand into? what was there before there was space? None of that can be answered by thinking of space as an object. Space is a pure intuitive concept.

[Carlos the Great]

It is truly amazing how mankind has achieved so much in the last 50 years … to be able to see pictures from 13 billion years ago of forming stars nearly back to the Big Bang is hard to comprehend …when I hear space is infinite my brain freezes

[Westleigh]

These two questions are somewhat related. The only reliable way we have of describing the universe in a way that makes any logical sense is by describing it mathematically. Our human intuition gets in the way of this ever making clear sense to us (even to physicists) because the word "space" is a noun and nouns are 'things', so we think of space as a thing, when in actual fact it's more of a clumsy way of describing the frame of reference for describing systems of relations between objects.

Thinking of a location in space is less like thinking of a corner of an object, and more a region where the things you're looking at are. Seems obvious, right? As such, there's not really a "point in space" because space is just a frame of reference. The big bang is a way of describing an event were a shittonne of energy started unravelling and cooling into matter and everything receded from itself, but it didn't really recede into something, those objects just moved away from each other. Mathematical models of what happened "before" the big bang totally break down and stop making mathematical sense when you rewind the clock (reverse the equations). This is an inadequacy not only of human intuition, but also the very language - mathematics - used to describe what's going on.

It's not so much that "space" is really big, it's that the relations between everything seems very distant, especially so a creature whose mind has evolved to comprehend much more local relationships between objects. We've hamstrung ourselves by thinking of space as having it's own presence and qualities. It doesn't. It's just how we organise objects.

This might seem like just another way of defining space, and it is, actually, but that's important because it allows you to shake off intuitive ideas about space as an object, and from that understanding you realise that a "point" in space doesn't exist in the way material things exist. To use the clumsy but admittedly more humanly intuitive meaning of the word, you find an old "point" in space by just looking off at further and further distances, because the really old stuff had a head start on the nearer stuff in running away from everything else. There's no centre of space as such. A centre presupposes an edge, but there might not even be an edge (here's intuition getting in our way again).

Biggest obstacle to overcome in begining to "understand" (lol) space is by shaking off any idea of it being an object with definable qualities and characteristics. The big bang doesn't make sense if you think of space as an object, because you naturally ask what was space before it existed? what did/does it expand into? what was there before there was space? None of that can be answered by thinking of space as an object. Space is a pure intuitive concept.

Sorry to trivialise your super post ,but as you guys are so clever aren’t you able to give VK a few tips on how to win 9 more games.

[morpheus2]

These two questions are somewhat related. The only reliable way we have of describing the universe in a way that makes any logical sense is by describing it mathematically. Our human intuition gets in the way of this ever making clear sense to us (even to physicists) because the word "space" is a noun and nouns are 'things', so we think of space as a thing, when in actual fact it's more of a clumsy way of describing the frame of reference for describing systems of relations between objects.

Thinking of a location in space is less like thinking of a corner of an object, and more a region where the things you're looking at are. Seems obvious, right? As such, there's not really a "point in space" because space is just a frame of reference. The big bang is a way of describing an event were a shittonne of energy started unravelling and cooling into matter and everything receded from itself, but it didn't really recede into something, those objects just moved away from each other. Mathematical models of what happened "before" the big bang totally break down and stop making mathematical sense when you rewind the clock (reverse the equations). This is an inadequacy not only of human intuition, but also the very language - mathematics - used to describe what's going on.

It's not so much that "space" is really big, it's that the relations between everything seems very distant, especially so a creature whose mind has evolved to comprehend much more local relationships between objects. We've hamstrung ourselves by thinking of space as having it's own presence and qualities. It doesn't. It's just how we organise objects.

This might seem like just another way of defining space, and it is, actually, but that's important because it allows you to shake off intuitive ideas about space as an object, and from that understanding you realise that a "point" in space doesn't exist in the way material things exist. To use the clumsy but admittedly more humanly intuitive meaning of the word, you find an old "point" in space by just looking off at further and further distances, because the really old stuff had a head start on the nearer stuff in running away from everything else. There's no centre of space as such. A centre presupposes an edge, but there might not even be an edge (here's intuition getting in our way again).

Biggest obstacle to overcome in begining to "understand" (lol) space is by shaking off any idea of it being an object with definable qualities and characteristics. The big bang doesn't make sense if you think of space as an object, because you naturally ask what was space before it existed? what did/does it expand into? what was there before there was space? None of that can be answered by thinking of space as an object. Space is a pure intuitive concept.

Thanks, that made more sense than Lawrence Krauss's Origins podcast.
I enjoy trying to imagine the concept of infinity as much as the next stoner, the best place to blow your mind if you need somewhere to think about it is the Hilbert Hotel.

[atlantalad]

Thanks for the comprehensive response Spiral. I will sleep on it and see if it makes more sense in the morning. Based on your description I now have a vision of ‘space’ being like some kind of enormous doughnut shape 🫣. I need sleep.

ps is your username a coincidence.

[Carlos the Great]

I recently pointed out to Sky Tv when they informed me they can send a signal to my house but can’t guarantee it to go upstairs into my bedroom that we are still receiving signals from Voyager 2 which left our solar system having left in 1971 and technology has moved on …

[Clovius Boofus]

So glad I started this thread. Many thanks for making it such an informative read.

[atlantalad]

I recently pointed out to Sky Tv when they informed me they can send a signal to my house but can’t guarantee it to go upstairs into my bedroom that we are still receiving signals from Voyager 2 which left our solar system having left in 1971 and technology has moved on …

Be careful. Sky may indeed provide you with a TV signal upstairs. However, if it’s anything like my ‘recollection’ of the 1970’s it will be very grainy with significant buffering.

[Ilkley claret]

These two questions are somewhat related. The only reliable way we have of describing the universe in a way that makes any logical sense is by describing it mathematically. Our human intuition gets in the way of this ever making clear sense to us (even to physicists) because the word "space" is a noun and nouns are 'things', so we think of space as a thing, when in actual fact it's more of a clumsy way of describing the frame of reference for describing systems of relations between objects.

Thinking of a location in space is less like thinking of a corner of an object, and more a region where the things you're looking at are. Seems obvious, right? As such, there's not really a "point in space" because space is just a frame of reference. The big bang is a way of describing an event were a shittonne of energy started unravelling and cooling into matter and everything receded from itself, but it didn't really recede into something, those objects just moved away from each other. Mathematical models of what happened "before" the big bang totally break down and stop making mathematical sense when you rewind the clock (reverse the equations). This is an inadequacy not only of human intuition, but also the very language - mathematics - used to describe what's going on.

It's not so much that "space" is really big, it's that the relations between everything seems very distant, especially so a creature whose mind has evolved to comprehend much more local relationships between objects. We've hamstrung ourselves by thinking of space as having it's own presence and qualities. It doesn't. It's just how we organise objects.

This might seem like just another way of defining space, and it is, actually, but that's important because it allows you to shake off intuitive ideas about space as an object, and from that understanding you realise that a "point" in space doesn't exist in the way material things exist. To use the clumsy but admittedly more humanly intuitive meaning of the word, you find an old "point" in space by just looking off at further and further distances, because the really old stuff had a head start on the nearer stuff in running away from everything else. There's no centre of space as such. A centre presupposes an edge, but there might not even be an edge (here's intuition getting in our way again).

Biggest obstacle to overcome in begining to "understand" (lol) space is by shaking off any idea of it being an object with definable qualities and characteristics. The big bang doesn't make sense if you think of space as an object, because you naturally ask what was space before it existed? what did/does it expand into? what was there before there was space? None of that can be answered by thinking of space as an object. Space is a pure intuitive concept.

Fascinating read thanks

I’m really struggling however with the distances involved? The article quotes some of these stars being 630 light years from Earth but one single light year is 5 Trillion miles ( is that right?)
So seeing a star that’s 13.5 billion years old, is really that far ??
Telescope itself is 1.5 million kms away from Earth, which sounds a lot but really isn’t?

Ps was also chuckling to myself about how VK would explain to the players about “finding space in the box”

[Carlos the Great]

Nothing at present travels faster than light … so even if we knew of little green men on a planet currently it could take 20,000 years travelling at the speed of light to get there .. are we nearly there yet cries from the kids in the back perhaps .. I think one day it could be possible to travel Faster than speed of light which I think would mean travelling back in time

[A.Claret.Fan]

Try this... Travel through the Solar System at light speed from the Sun out.

No wonder most can't grasp the concepts of Universal time, space, and distance...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AAU_btBN7s

[Devils_Advocate]

We are very lucky that by chance our species have developed at a certain time in space that we can actually see traces of the outer galaxy's and the remnants of whatever the big bang was.

Because the universe is expanding given enough time we will not be able to see or detect any light outside the Milky Way so there will no evidence that anything beyond our galaxy exists or ever existed.

Just to think if we had formed and developed past a certain future point in time with the exact same intelligence and scientific capabilities we would have concluded that we are entirely alone in the universe and that space is just an empty void.

[Carlos the Great]

Humans have come and been so successful on this planet it could easily by our downfall …. Dinosaurs were here for approx 250 million years and prior to that in the Carboniferous period amphibians inhabited the earth for millions of years having initially climbed out of the ocean /.. nature and the earth will rebuild when we have gone ..imagine the earth having without humans .. talk about a detox !

[Gordaleman]

One statistic that really boggles my mind, is the fact that every single star that we are able to see from Earth with the naked eye, is in our own Milky Way galaxy. Stars in the trillions of other galaxies are just too far away to be visible, except to telescopes like Hubble and James Webb.

[Sproggy]

Nothing at present travels faster than light … so even if we knew of little green men on a planet currently it could take 20,000 years travelling at the speed of light to get there .. are we nearly there yet cries from the kids in the back perhaps .. I think one day it could be possible to travel Faster than speed of light which I think would mean travelling back in time

The speed of light (in a vacuum) is the cosmic speed limit - nothing can go faster as to accelerate anything with mass to the speed of light requires infinite energy. Unless you can discover worm holes.

So let's aim for something close to the speed of light instead. At these speeds, distances actually get shorter (kind of) which means that if you can get up to 99.99999999999% of the speed of light, those huge distances are significantly reduced and your 20,000 years would actually seem like about 300.

Good luck slowing down. And due to length contraction, the irrelevant bits of dust that used to be spread out across vast distances will now appear in front of you squashed up so you're going to hit lots of them. And of course if you manage all this, and arrive in-tact, becasue of time dilation, everyone you left behind on Earth will have died 20,000 years ago.

[Hipper]

One statistic that really boggles my mind, is the fact that every single star that we are able to see from Earth with the naked eye, is in our own Milky Way galaxy. Stars in the trillions of other galaxies are just too far away to be visible, except to telescopes like Hubble and James Webb.

Some of those stars are galaxies.

[Hipper]

I don't pretend to understand Spiral's opus but what I think I understand is that it is no help whatsoever! You may be right that we can only understand the universe using maths but most people don't think like that. I certainly don't. Beyond simple equations like E=mc2 I'm lost.

Firstly we need the concept of space, distance and time to survive as Spiral says. It's useful in everyday life. There are other things in everyday life that are useful but we don't fully understand - gravity is an obvious example. In physics/astronomy we have quantum mechanics (talk about unintuitive), dark energy and matter as well as gravity.

The concept of long lengths of time is something you learn if studying geology and evolution. Time spans are enormous, way beyond our everyday understanding but you can place them in context by using eons/eras/periods etc..

Anyway, on aliens, Clifford T Ward reported an incident back in the 1970s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wW5KX7sEPzY

In those days of course TV wasn't broadcast after midnight so it was possible to get these messages. Mind you some of the stuff on TV these days could be from aliens.

[Ampth7]

Amazing images from James Webb telescope, two years after launch

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/id ... 5df138b6f6

Have they found Elvis yet?

[distortiondave]

Elvis is in the Shady Rest retirement home in Texas, with the real black JFK.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubba_Ho-Tep

[Ampth7]

Elvis is in the Shady Rest retirement home in Texas, with the real black JFK.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubba_Ho-Tep

Hmm, thank you for clarifying.

Sounds like a truly awful film!

[Carlos the Great]

Mars confectionary made the Milky Way and galaxy bars but never made a magellenic dust cloud bar … I always found that strange …

[Gordaleman]

Some of those stars are galaxies.

Exactly! So they are NOT stars and I was talking about stars.

[4:20]

There's some absolutely brilliant YouTube channels producing cosmos related content. Here are some of my favourite channels, the first couple are documentary style producers, the rest are more 'in the here and now', so to speak. Please share your own favourites, I'm always on the lookout for space channels.


SEA
https://youtube.com/@sea_space?si=qwcfb2t9CcJ6pimZ

History Of The Universe
https://youtube.com/@HistoryoftheUniver ... 9oRQ9MXr6-

John Michael Godier
https://youtube.com/@JohnMichaelGodier? ... w7NEA7dGum

Anton Petrov
https://youtube.com/@whatdamath?si=DmvMtJWEWPradcdk

David Butler
https://youtube.com/@howfarawayisit?si=_Jqr2pKa3fQmnxUY

Fraser Cain
https://youtube.com/@frasercain?si=ZczBXH18dQtLOEKt