Giant Sheets Of Dark Matter Detected 231
Wandering Wombat writes "The largest structures in the universe have been, if not directly found, then at least detected and pounced upon by scientists. 'The most colossal structures in the universe have been detected by astronomers who tuned into how the structures subtly bend galactic light. The newfound filaments and sheets of dark matter form gigantic features stretching across more than 270 million light-years of space — three times larger than any other known structure and 2,000 times the size of our own galaxy. Because the dark matter, by definition, is invisible to telescopes, the only way to detect it on such grand scales is by surveying huge numbers of distant galaxies and working out how their images, as seen from telescopes, are being weakly tweaked and distorted by any dark matter structures in intervening space.' By figuring how to spot the gigantic masses of dark matter, hopefully we can get a better understanding of it and find smaller and smaller structures."
Re:Heh (Score:2, Insightful)
It's really probably just a point of view issue. After all, should there be 'dark matter organisms' of some kind, they'd be most likely supremely uninterested in the likes of us for anything other than curiosity value. However, we're rather interesting to us, being as we -are- us and we tend to be somewhat self-interested.
Sheets and Filaments (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Three times larger? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:How can they tell this is caused by Dark Matter (Score:4, Insightful)
Atmospheric distortions are not consistent over time or different locations and those distortions do not "lense" like gravity does. Also standard astronomic technique is to have someone confirm your results with a different telescope, in a different part of the world.
It may not be dark matter, but it's not a smudge on their mirror either.
Re:It May Be Dark... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Sheets and Filaments (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Simulation error (Score:5, Insightful)
Another way to look at it: Every time a physicist describes a new effect with a formula, he has in fact given you a (mathematical) simulation of this effect. But that does not mean that this effect is a result from a simulation in the first place. And just because it is possible to think of a computational implementation that might behave similarly to an observed effect (which is a crude way of describing it mathematically if you can't do the maths) doesn't mean it is the result of a computational implementation in the first place. Assuming the Universe is a simulation does not add any insights, so why bother?
Also kinda reminded me of that old joke... An engineer thinks his equations are an approximation of reality but a Physiscist thinks reality is an approximation of his equations (meanwhile, the mathematician doesn't care....).
Re:Simulation error (Score:5, Insightful)
"There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable."
"There is another theory which states that this has already happened."
- Douglas Adams, HHGTTG
Re:Simulation error (Score:3, Insightful)