Hubble Ultra Deep Field baby galaxy examination

[aib]

Hubble Ultra Deep Field "baby" galaxy examination

It turns out that galaxies from over 12 billion years ago are anything but small and young.

Scientists studying the Ultra Deep Field found this galaxy in Hubble's infrared images. They expected it to be young and small, like other known galaxies at similar distances. Instead, they found evidence the galaxy is remarkably mature and much more massive. Its stars appear to have been in place for a long time.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/10/051003233710.htm


Is it possible that we got the age of the universe wrong, as it doesn't seem very likely for a mature looking galaxy, with mature stars to have formed in such a short period? Sure some people would say "hey, it's just faster formation", but a galaxy from before 12 billion years to look more mature than our own and other neighbor galaxies - it just doesn't seem likely to me. Is it possible that the universe is much older, and the big bang was more of a local event than the kick start of the whole universe? I was always amazed scientists dared to talk about the WHOLE universe, something we very well know falls beyond our observation range. What if it is way bigger and way older?

 

[sylas]

It turns out that galaxies from over 12 billion years ago are anything but small and young.

That report is from 2005, and was probably incorrect. The galaxy is most likely much older than originally reported.

But even if it had been as described in that report, there are still hundreds of millions of years still available, so "young" is a relative term. Science daily sometimes gets a tad, well, "breathless" in reporting exciting discoveries. What the report actually says is "appears to be unusually massive and mature for its place in the young universe". So it is massive by comparison with its place in a young universe...

...except that subsequent work has suggested that the original distance estimate was incorrect, and actually it is much much closer. See http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0004-637X/665/1/257/ by Ranga-Ram Chary et. al (2007) in Astrophys.J. 665, pp 257-264. (also at arXiv:0705.0660v1).

Other galaxies of the very young age suggested in the original report have been found rather more reliably; but they not as massive as reported in this 2005 release.

Is it possible that we got the age of the universe wrong, as it doesn't seem very likely for a mature looking galaxy, with mature stars to have formed in such a short period?

What is more likely in this case is that the galaxy identification was incorrect. That seems to be the case now.

Is it possible that the universe is much older, and the big bang was more of a local event than the kick start of the whole universe? I was always amazed scientists dared to talk about the WHOLE universe, something we very well know falls beyond our observation range. What if it is way bigger and way older?

This galaxy, even if it had turned out to be what was originally reported back in 2005, would have done nothing to help that speculation. The extreme redshift used in the original report is part of the evidence for Big Bang expansions. Scientists are actually pretty good at recognizing the limits of what their models can do, and there are all kinds of ideas about what might exist beyond our own observable field of view.

But to give any kind of coherent alternative, you need a better understanding of the basics for what we know of the bits we can see... which certainly includes this new galaxy... and all of that is well within the region of conventional Big Bang expansion.

I recently heard a great comment which I'd recommend to anyone aspiring to overturn our pictures of the universe:

You can't think outside the box until you know where the box is.​

The scientists who actually know and understand the Big Bang in its conventional form are often the wildest and weirdest at speculating about the range of possibilities for the nature of the universe... I'd encourage you to learn as much as you can about the conventional models, which apply for everything we can see at least. They are strange and wonderful; and they are based on a wealth of observational evidence.

Cheers -- sylas

 

[aib]

Your opinion is in strong support for the well established mainstream science :) Can you perhaps come up with a source for your presumptions? I've tried to google that galaxy and found it was posted in numerous places all over the web at that time, however I could not find any evidence it is a case of wrong information.

I don't think "hundreds of millions" is enough to form such a galaxy, more massive than our, that's billions of years old. It may be enough for some stars, dunno, but not such a galaxy, so it all comes to that - is the age and distance data wrong or not?

I think "outside of the box" besides an external point of observation can also suggest an "outside of the established mainstream universal model" - and as far as I remember this forum does not tolerate such things - a while ago I got banned for my one and only post, that was about alternative sources of the CMBR, besides the BBANG

 

[sylas]

Your opinion is in strong support for the well established mainstream science :) Can you perhaps come up with a source for your presumptions? I've tried to google that galaxy and found it was posted in numerous places all over the web at that time, however I could not find any evidence it is a case of wrong information.

I already did. I gave a link to a paper which showed the now more accepted identification. You will find it a bit hard to read, but the link is there as the source for you.

The original description, to which you linked, was strange and unusual, and now it seems it was incorrect.

I think "outside of the box" besides an external point of observation can also suggest an "outside of the established mainstream universal model" - and as far as I remember this forum does not tolerate such things - a while ago I got banned for my one and only post, that was about alternative sources of the CMBR, besides the BBANG

Yes, the idea of this forum is to learn about the box of modern science. This will expand your mind more than you can imagine, if you will let it.

The forum is not intended as a place for anyone to post any idea they have. You are better to learn about what we know already. Honestly, that will serve you much better in the long run if you aspire to discover something new.

If you continue to just make random speculations without actually understanding how a scientific model is supported and based on careful observation, and attempt to put up random ideas as if they were already a useful alternative to practicing science, you'll just get banned again.

Don't go that road. Ultimately, the road of learning about science is far more rewarding and exciting.

Cheers -- sylas

 

[aib]

10x for the throughout response.

Without any intent to advocate some alternative theory, I will only talk about the box of modern science. Since the days of Einstein science has shifted from practical to theoretical. There is nothing wrong with that, but there are so many scientist that act like they are fathers/children/relatives to the universe, who say they understand it, but IMO what they understand is not the universe, but their own theories. It may sound like fiction, but if someone claims to understand the universe itself, then that person should be able to interact with it in a more sophisticated way.

For example, Joe is a car mechanic, and as such, he understands how cars work. He is able not only to repair, but also to modify and improve cars. It may sound far fetched, but I think if someone has the actual knowledge of how and why the universe works, his theories should be able to morph into practical applications like anti-gravity, FTL, free energy and so on.

I don't want to solve tons of equations, I want to explore space, to go to different worlds and so on. Theoretical science does nothing about that unfortunately.

Then there is the strongly moderated science - for example, mainstream supporters get research grants, and their work gets funded, in contrast, those who don't agree with the mainstream, and have their own ideas, no matter how promising or interesting - those researchers get cut out, they have to fund their own research, and it happens so that not every person is a billionaire. Furthermore those people get labeled as charlatans, pseudo scientists and so on, just because they work on something that does not fit in the box.

I have the feeling science no longer works to find out things, it works to find some specific, predetermined version. And no matter all the holes in the standard models, and numerous indications it may be headed the wrong way, it gets pushed and insisted upon. There are countless examples, Einstein did his work on the general relativity, but left it unsolved, when people began to solve it, it turns out there is a huge hole, occupying over 90% of all there is, so science does not investigate the equations, it assumes it is correct, and adds hypothetical things like dark matter and energy, that cannot be observed or measured or anything, in order to make the whole thing work. And it's not just that, for example, when science wondered how come protons and neutrons stick together in an area that has only positive charge and by all logic should explode - no investigation of that matter is done, instead we go to say "it is a strong force that does it".

And probably the most controversial of all claims - I read that gluons are no longer hypothetical, but have been confirmed to exist, so I read about it. And what a confirmation it is - turns out that no one ever managed to produce a free quark, so the "logical" explanation was there "must be" gluons to prevent that from happening. Note that a free quark has never been produces, and then see how things top on each other, the FAILURE to produce one hypothetical particle is the confirmation of another hypothetical particle. It doesn't make sense, unless you are after proving your theory, and not after some unbiased form of scientific achievement.

To me it seems the current scientific views have a hard time building a truly "relative", free and floating theory, that could hopefully some day yield into something practical, so instead it concentrates all efforts, despite all the holes and evidence of mistakes, into a theory that has both a starting point and also a fundamental particle. The more powerful colliders we build the smaller particles we manage to produce, and chances are we can keep doing this for as long as we can put more energy into those experiments.

Well, no matter how much effort you put into building up, supporting and reinforcing, if the fundament is flawed the whole structure is doomed to collapse

And what if there is no starting point and no starting particle, all the time, effort and resources would be wasted...

I've always been interested in science, but it seems to the majority of established scientists, science is not what it should be, but more like a religion they swore allegiance to. It is no longer about advancing in all directions, it's about one very narrow, predetermined and biased direction along many signs that say "wrong way".

I hope people see that as my unbiased ideas, not like BLASPHEMY of some sort

My 2 cents...

EDIT: I got a PM that I am breaking forum rules and being anti-mainstream, it may sounds like, but that is not the case, I agree with everything that works for my logic, my frustration is with very limited instances that in my humble opinion simply don't work. Skepticism should be applied with no bias as well, and this is not math or Newtonian physics, it's theoretical cosmology, that is not set in stone.

 

[sylas]

I don't want to solve tons of equations, I want to explore space, to go to different worlds and so on. Theoretical science does nothing about that unfortunately.

I'm going to pull out this one sentence.

You describe a view of science that is so far out of my own experience and understanding that it is if we live on different planets.

If you have such a low opinion of modern science, then I think you are in the wrong forum.

Personally, I don't think you know much about science at all. Your descriptions of of what is supposedly wrong with science are based on all kinds of misconceptions of what the scientific models actually say. I don't think you have any idea about how much science is open to alternative ideas, or how it progresses and develops in ways that no-one can expect. The real constraint is simply that ideas are actually consistent with what we can see and touch and measure. Science let's you interact with the real world more deeply and more profoundly than ever, and your account seems to be based not on any real argument or understanding or comprehension, but on some strange set of ideas and analogies that you've invented for yourself. That's about as unpractical and disconnected from the real universe as can be. Until you lose the attitude you'll never get at what is available to those who can take the time and effort to learn about it.

You certainly won't get it here with this attitude. We've got nothing to offer you other than what you have apparently already rejected. I gave you good advice previously. If you'd rather reform the fundamentals of science without taking the time to learn them... you're going to need to do it somewhere else.

Cheers -- sylas

 

[aib]

I don't have low opinion for science in general, there are very few things that I simply see no logic in.

Funny thou, despite the fact I stated it, my post was interpreted exactly as blasphemy, you shouldn't feel personally attacked, like you act, by it in any way.

I registered here with the hope that someone can shed some light on my doubts. But I don't get a straight answer, what I get is "you don't understand, you think so because you are dumb" and last but not least "if you disagree with anything you get kicked out"

I registered here to learn, not to conform, there is QUITE a difference.

 

[sylas]

Funny thou, despite the fact I stated it, my post was interpreted exactly as blasphemy, you shouldn't feel personally attacked, like you act, by it in any way.

Perish the thought. I don't feel personally attacked at all, and I don't think of your post as "blasphemy". Questions are welcome and not any kind of problem. Your criticisms of how science works were not blasphemy; merely naïve.

I registered here with the hope that someone can shed some light on my doubts. But I don't get a straight answer, what I get is "you don't understand, you think so because you are dumb" and last but not least "if you disagree with anything you get kicked out"

I registered here to learn, not to conform, there is QUITE a difference.

It looks to me that you still need to learn about learning.

I really and truly CAN answer many of your questions... such as the one about the galaxy you mentioned. The description given in your press release was apparently incorrect, and more recent work has substantially altered our understanding of that galaxy you mentioned. Did this answer give you any help at all?

As far as I can tell, you skipped over this answer so quickly that you didn't even notice the reference I gave; but instead asked for sources for my "presumptions". As far as I can tell, you just don't like the answer, because it is too aligned with "mainstream science".

If you disagree with mainstream science, that's fine, your choice by all means. But it does mean this forum is not for you. Not because you are being blasphemous, but because you are distracting the forum from its clearly advertised purpose and from what other users are focused upon. There are other forums which may be more to your taste, and where you can explore to your heart's content without the explicit focus we have here on learning about what is current practice in science.

As far as I can tell, you just don't like answers that I can give you. As far as I can tell you don't like Big Bang cosmology (despite not actually understanding it particularly well) and so you don't like answers that indicate it might actually be a real discovery about the universe. There are certainly lots of unsolved problems in cosmology, and the more you learn about where cosmology is right now the better able you will be to understand the open questions.

As far as I can tell, you seem to want your own speculations to be taken seriously in the same way as speculations by working scientists who understand the details of existing cosmological theories. Sorry; no can do. I do take your questions seriously as things you might like answered and I have tried to answer in good faith. If you don't like the kind of answers I can give you, then you won't like this whole forum. I represent pretty much the only kinds of answers you can get here. There are people here who know a lot more than me, but it will all be more of the same mainstream science. This is all we have on offer.

Cheers -- sylas