Doughnut-Shaped Universe Back In the Race

SpaceAdmiral writes "The once-popular idea that the universe could be small and finite is making a comeback. Many researchers thought that a 'wraparound' universe would mean that distant objects would be seen multiple times in the sky, but new research suggests that a '3-torus' (or 'doughnut universe'), as well as other shapes, could fit our actual observations, particularly the WMAP data."

That's silly.

[ivanmarsh]

Though it's possible, how many other things in the universe are naturally doughnut shaped?

Pay for the article?

[NecroBones]

I'd love to read it, but... what's with all these pay-to-read links lately?

$8 for an article? Most magazines cost less.

Re:That's silly.

[mikael]

You mean we're trapped inside a giant Asteroids-3D screen level?

suggestion /. stop advertisementing for pay sites

[frovingslosh]

To read this story in full you will need to login or make a payment

So what's the point in running this if we have to pay to RTFA? Supposedly anyone already paying is likely to read it anyway, so the only ones this posting is for is for those who do not already subscribe to the site. In a world where information wants to be free, I hardly see it as appropriate for Slashdot to hype up a pay site. Were there no interesting articles on any free sites today? Or did Slashdot get a payment for posting this advertisement for this pay site? Did paid subscribers to /. also see this ad sneakily disguised as an article (if so I bet they resent it even more than I do).

Re:That's silly.

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

Yes. There's no need for these long-winded explanations. Asteroids is played on a 2-torus and if it were a 3D game where going off the 'front' brought you on at the 'back' then it'd be played on a 3-torus. Interestingly, asteroids played on a circular screen where going off one side brought you back on the other would be on a completely different topological space, the cross cap [wikipedia.org]. But if you think about it there's an interesting issue with that: going off one side would bring you back on the other side reflected. There would be some pretty weird consequences if our universe were like that.

Re:suggestion /. stop advertisementing for pay sit

[liegeofmelkor]

I think it is completely reasonable for slashdot to assume a base level of resources available to its user base. In this case, the presumed user base is everyone who knows ANYBODY attending ANY college. Pretty much every university provides off-site journal access to their students (whether the students know about the service or not). I think that covers most everyone here.

Additionally, when a college subscribes to journals, it usually subscribes to hundreds or thousands. It seems a bit naive to say:

Supposedly anyone already paying is likely to read it anyway...

Re:Pay for the article?

[Metasquares]

I could understand that rationale if the peer reviewers were paid employees, but they aren't, at least for most journals; they're unpaid volunteers.

(Moreover, I don't think the screen they provide is particularly useful - in fact, I think it's even harmful because it imposes a socially constructed restriction on one's exposure to new ideas - but that's just my own opinion).

In the case of Nature, I think most people pay to have their work in it because of the prestige of having an article published in Nature rather than the journal's audience. If they just wanted others to read it, they could find other journals to accomplish this goal.

The whole thing is a pretty nasty scheme: the authors sometimes pay, the readers always pay, and the reviewers don't cost anything, so where is the money going?

Re:Pay for the article?

[LurkerXXX]

One of my old mentors was the editor of a journal. He had a secretary who was paid by the journal because there is a boatload of work to do in managing submissions, finding reviewers, sending copies of submitted articles out to them, bugging them to get in their reviews, sending out critiques to submitters, checking rewrites, resending out answers to criticisms,etc, etc, etc. Editors also get pay, because it sucks up a LOT of time. Much more than reviewer time, which can already be a lot for some folks.

So there are defiantly costs involved. There's also the salary for the folks working the presses making the dead-tree copies. Magic faeries also rarely run the journals website. I know I'd want to be paid for running it. Wouldn't you? So there are lots of costs involved. The publishing companies also want to make a profit on top of that. Now I won't argue with you about how much profit the publishing companies should make off it. Just wanted to point out that there are very real expenses involved in making a journal, even with free reviews.