MetaFilter posts tagged with Universe

At 1,789,549 mph, that's a hell of a flow ...

WCityMike — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 20:03:03 -0800

"You have no idea how big that is. This is giant on a scale where it's not just that we can't see what's doing it; it's that the entire makeup of the universe as we understand it can't be right if this is happening."

Zoomable Universe

paradoxflow — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 14:02:24 -0800

Amazing zoomable images of the Extended Groth Strip and Orion Nebula.

The Size of Things

nola — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:13:16 -0800

Welcome to the Universe - III: The Size of Things . . .we take a breif trip through the Solar System and beyond to see the size of the Universe. A youtube video by AndromedasWake about the scale of the Universe.

It's full of stars

Hactar — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:06:50 -0800

One of the hardest things for people to understand about the universe is just how big it is. There are three approaches typically used in describing its size. The first, the song, was pioneered by Monty Python (NSFWish, wireframe of naked woman) and then done just as masterfully by the Animaniacs. The second, the zoom method has been featured twice before here on the blue. The third method is the comparison method (skip to 1:30, unless you like looking at a image of the solar system with terrible distorted orbits), yielding some truly beautiful videos (this one found via the fantastic Bad Astronomy blog). These videos go, at most, as far as looking at the local cluster or the Virgo Supercluster. There are two videos that attempt to show the size of the entire universe, one unsuccessfully (although with great music) and one successfully. (Warning, all links except the first one, are to YT videos). (These links are not YT videos, with the one noted exception) The last video shows the Sloan Great Wall (although it confuses the entire image with just the wall itself, which is only the largest galaxy filament (large mpg of a filament) that we can see in the sky. These filaments create the large scale structure of the universe, resembling a web or a cotton ball. (YT Video) Once one looks larger than the filaments, one hits the "End of Greatness", where the universe appears homogeneous. (This can be seen, more or less, in the first link.) Finally, and perhaps the best link of the bunch, more pictures and videos of similar things from the Max Planck Institute of Astrophysics.

Gamma-Ray Burst

homunculus — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 17:40:59 -0800

New burst vaporizes cosmic distance record. "NASA's Swift satellite and an international team of astronomers have found a gamma-ray burst from a star that died when the universe was only 630 million years old, or less than five percent of its present age. The event, dubbed GRB 090423, is the most distant cosmic explosion ever seen."

What Lies Past Eternity, for the Universe?

WCityMike — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 22:38:46 -0800

Exit Mundi's thoughts on the latest anticipated apocalypse: the coming apocalypse in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 A.D.. (No kidding.) (Previously and previously.) (head asplode) The subpage lists as sources Evolving Cosmos and Stephen Battersby's February '05 article in New Scientist, "The Final Unravelling of the Universe." Although the site at large is familiar to many Mefites, this particular subpage seems to have been added rather recently and I thought contained ideas that are unusual and interesting enough to be worthy of highlighting ...

Making the Title of Miss Universe a Little Less Impressive

Bookhouse — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 14:34:02 -0800

Is the Multiverse Real? Discover takes a look at theories that our universe is one of many. This blogger adds some interesting commentary. via

Beyond the Reach of God

WCityMike — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 12:25:36 -0800

Beyond the Reach of God. Thought experiments involving the God-universe and the Nature-universe, the Turing-complete Game of Life, and a lot of insightful back-and-forth in the comment section, to boot. One of the most interesting and thought-provoking essays I've read on the Internet in a very long time, by Eliezer Yudkowsky on his blog, Overcoming Bias (via).

Dark Flow

homunculus — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 14:28:16 -0800

Mysterious New 'Dark Flow' Discovered in Space. "As if the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy weren't vexing enough, another baffling cosmic puzzle has been discovered. Patches of matter in the universe seem to be moving at very high speeds and in a uniform direction that can't be explained by any of the known gravitational forces in the observable universe. Astronomers are calling the phenomenon 'dark flow.' The stuff that's pulling this matter must be outside the observable universe, researchers conclude." Here's the paper (subscription required): A Measurement of Large-Scale Peculiar Velocities of Clusters of Galaxies: Results and Cosmological Implications. NASA has preprints you can download: results and implications and technical details (PDFs).

Universe Sandbox

stavrosthewonderchicken — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 23:44:31 -0800

An Interactive Space Simulator "Smash planets together, introduce rogue stars, and build new worlds from spinning discs of debris. Fire a moon into a planet or destroy everything you've created with a super massive black hole. You can simulate and interact with our solar system: the 8 planets,160+ moons, and hundereds of asteroids, the nearest 1000 stars to our Sun, and our local group of galaxies." [31Mb, Windows only, sorry, but see inside for similar Mac and Linux apps] If you're keen and you're not an XP or Vista user, you'll probably like Stellarium [Linux, Mac or Windows] and Celestia [Linux, Mac or Windows] [previously] as well, which are less physics simulation and more 'fly through the universe' brain food, but heaps of fun, too.

asleep at light speed

plexi — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 08:47:36 -0800

Google Sky we'll help us find our way, someday.

There's a hole in the Universe, dear Martha, dear Martha

scalefree — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 07:16:50 -0800

Astronomers find a giant hole a billion light years across & located 8 billion light years away from us. They believe it could be evidence of another Universe at the edge of ours.

Collective Perception

Soup — Sun, 18 Nov 2007 15:08:45 -0800

Collective Perception

Half of he Universe

bru — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:02:24 -0800

The Horizon Simulation 70 billions particles : a new world record for a large scale simulation of the universe. For the first time, we have performed a simulation of half the observable universe, with enough resolution to describe a Milky Way-like galaxy with more than 100 dark matter particles. The images of the universe at different resolutions are splendid and the animation is breathtaking.

The Universe is Finite

snsranch — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 17:52:17 -0800

Remember CERN from The Da Vinci Code? And their mega-project the Large Hadron Collider(previously mentioned here?) This BBC Horizons show, The Six Billion Dollar Experiment, does a good job illustrating why such an experiment is so cool, important and fascinating. Apparently, the universe is finite. (Includes Google Video-last link)

Universe, by Jonathan Harris and the world

stavrosthewonderchicken — Wed, 25 Jul 2007 02:23:49 -0800

Universe is the newest project from Jonathan Harris, who was also behind the amazing WeFeelFine, and the Yahoo Time Capsule. Here's a talk he gave about his projects at TED 2007.

Logarithmic timeline of the universe

hoverboards don't work on water — Sat, 19 May 2007 14:43:53 -0800

From the Big Bang to Iraq: Jorn Barger's logarithmic timeline of the universe [Previous RobotWisdomFilter: 1, 2, 3, 4].

Universcale

stavrosthewonderchicken — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 05:02:04 -0800

The universe [flash]. I know, it's on a corporate site, and you have to sit through some pretentious Japanglish while it loads, but being able to use your mousewheel to scroll from femtometers up to the 100 billion lightyear scale is dazzling. I love cosmic zooms. Remember to pray that there's intelligent life in space, because there's bugger-all down here on Earth, except for folks like Metafilter's own kokogiak, who shows us everything in the solar system bigger than 200 miles in diameter.

"The sun descending in the west, The evening star does shine;"

wander — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 14:12:27 -0800

Have you ever wondered what a solar eclipse would look like from space? The STEREO (Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory) has just sent back its view (awe-inspiring video included). It has also sent back some gorgeous pictures of our sun (and the McNaught Comet). For more media, check out the other galleries (including some 3D images). For more about the project, see NASA's STEREO homepage. Be sure to also stop by the Johns Hopkins University STEREO Page, where you can download a mission guide (pdf), view animations, watch a video of the launch, or even make your own papercraft STEREO model (pdf). You can also learn more in six minute segments with their series of short educational videos.

Blowing up the universe.

blahblahblah — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 22:41:18 -0800

How to blow up the Earth (with a coffee can), and why we should, along with some discussion of how it is done in fiction. Blowing up the moon (and how the US nearly did in 1958, with the help of Carl Sagan), and lots of reasons why, including one in song [YouTube]. How to blow up a star. How we might accidentally blow up the universe in November. [prev. discussion of Earth destruction]

The Big Hum

zaebiz — Thu, 05 Oct 2006 17:39:22 -0800

The sound of the Universe being born. University of Washington professor calculates the frequencies of sound waves propagating through the Universe during its first 760,000 years by analyzing small differences in sky temperature. More information here and here.

Imagining the Tenth Dimension

Jimbob — Tue, 04 Jul 2006 05:38:15 -0800

Imagining the Tenth Dimension (Flash). 10th dimensional physics and string theory don't get any easier than this.

The Simulacrisation of Technology into Life

0bvious — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 20:09:26 -0800

As the Pentagon ousts plans to turn insects into cyber war machines you'd be forgiven for asking the question: Where does the real digital end and the faked life begin? Are we simulating life synthetically? or just speeding up an entirely natural process? Technologically engineered life is here to stay. Its not far fetched to speculate that simulacra may become all there is.

extrapolation and beyond

moonbird — Fri, 17 Feb 2006 05:55:30 -0800

The Wiki History of the Universe in 200 Words or Less [via]

This so called reality

0bvious — Tue, 22 Nov 2005 01:38:08 -0800

If the universe is a hologram and the healthy human brain a valve of consciousness then where'd this mental infinity come from? Are we simply living the simulacrum? Or does Pi protect us all, forever, infinitely?