Recent content by drollere

nope. the wavelength of a specific absorption or emission line in the receding galaxy spectrum is measured. the wavelength of the matching absorption or emission line is measured in a terrestrial laboratory. the ratio is taken, using the 19th century doppler formula. this is called a calculation...

supermassive stars appear to have formed relatively early in the history of the universe (around 13 billion years ago, more or less) and would have very rapidly (within a million years or so) begun spewing out heavier elements. life on our planet evolved within 1 billion years after the...

in other words, you can either accept that a language error is nonsensical and cannot be given a sensible answer, or you can accept that a language error is sensible and leads to a fruitful substantive discussion. the first position is the general posture of science and scientific discourse...

dark energy is a hypothesis hung on a number that has no physical explanation, except that the number is necessary to make cosmological expansion fit cosmological observations as cosmological theory is currently formulated. recall that einstein first proposed the constant, because it was...

"center" is a term that follows after or only in relation to "boundary". the focus on "boundary" leads naturally to the idea of a sign somewhere in space that says "end of space. sorry for the inconvenience." but then, what would be on the other side of the boundary? if it's not space...

i'm baffled by the confusion here. the doppler shift is used to describe the expansion related red shift in light: the calculation used to determine the red shift z is simply the doppler formula, applied to measured galactic spectra with the standard scale of wavelength. to say the red...

the first poster's answer was the only correct one. once the terms "probability", "statistics" or "error" are introduced into a discussion, then the fundamental model is the relationship between a singular occurrence and a population or sample of occurrences. note the plural...

ok, but don't stop there. what's the probability of your possibility? what specific type of alternative life form do you have in mind? what evidence do you have that an alternative metabolic chemistry can produce the required energy to sustain an organism that will require the components of...

it's always amusing to see science turned to religion, politics and other completely irrelevant issues. but back to the topic: my intuition is that alien contact is extremely improbable. i did my own version of the drake calculation roughly as follows: number of galaxies: 1 (ours...