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Space Science

Study Finds the Universe Might Be 2 Billion Years Younger (apnews.com) 132

Posted by msmash from the upon-further-reflection dept.
The universe is looking younger every day, it seems. New calculations suggest the universe could be a couple billion years younger than scientists now estimate, and even younger than suggested by two other calculations published this year that trimmed hundreds of millions of years from the age of the cosmos. From a report: The huge swings in scientists' estimates -- even this new calculation could be off by billions of years -- reflect different approaches to the tricky problem of figuring the universe's real age. "We have large uncertainty for how the stars are moving in the galaxy," said Inh Jee, of the Max Plank Institute in Germany, lead author of the study in Thursday's journal Science. Scientists estimate the age of the universe by using the movement of stars to measure how fast it is expanding. If the universe is expanding faster, that means it got to its current size more quickly, and therefore must be relatively younger.

The expansion rate, called the Hubble constant, is one of the most important numbers in cosmology. A larger Hubble Constant makes for a faster moving -- and younger -- universe. The generally accepted age of the universe is 13.7 billion years, based on a Hubble Constant of 70. Jee's team came up with a Hubble Constant of 82.4, which would put the age of the universe at around 11.4 billion years. Jee used a concept called gravitational lensing -- where gravity warps light and makes far away objects look closer. They rely on a special type of that effect called time delay lensing, using the changing brightness of distant objects to gather information for their calculations. But Jee's approach is only one of a few new ones that have led to different numbers in recent years, reopening a simmering astronomical debate of the 1990s that had been seemingly settled.
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Study Finds the Universe Might Be 2 Billion Years Younger More

Study Finds the Universe Might Be 2 Billion Years Younger

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  • in God years?

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by hcs_$reboot ( 1536101 )
      Nope. The Earth is 6k yo. What the bubble says about the Universe?

      • Re:So 4000 (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Empiric ( 675968 ) on Saturday September 14, 2019 @12:34AM (#59193118)

        Tiresome. Origen of Alexandria was clear on the metaphorical nature of "6 days" in the third century, and he wasn't the first.

        Young Earth Creationism is a dogmatic position is a recent phenomenon.

        • Oh yeah? Did Origen have a direct line to God? In all seriousness, if you're going to say the Bible is God's literal word then a lot of stuff follows from that. Although the 6000 years was calculated from Genesis "begots" count times the guess at how long between generations. Except the Bible also says some folks were living way the fuck longer than we do today so 20 years per generation would be wrong. Of course saying the world is 60k or 600k years old is just as silly but I don't know why we bother

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by zifn4b ( 1040588 )

          Young Earth Creationism is a dogmatic position is a recent phenomenon.

          You mean, like Scientology? Praise Xenu!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by zifn4b ( 1040588 )
        My Earth is riding on the back of a turtle, so there!
    • God damn years

  • . . . the universe lies about her age.

  • and we'll get it down to 6 days!

    And then a LOT more people will be happy!

    (I happen to think the "days" mentioned in the bible are allegorical for (periods of creation), and I think the sequence shown in the Bible is a good pattern for what is necessary for life to be established here. But then again, I'm also a fan of panspermia as well. I mean, look at how carefully we're looking at other "local" life-capable planets.)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gtall ( 79522 )

      There are two creation myths in Gensis, written by two different authors. The first was the one G-d dictated, the second was the one G-d dictated with the preface, "Um, um, um (G-d's a stutterer)...I may have made a Biden or Trump in remembering what I did and when I did it...write this down instead...and no sneaky telling anyone I might have misrembered...All Powerful here, I have a rep to uphold!"

  • I know there is something important here. But it been a while since studies like these are guessing the age. Is it really news worthy any more?

    • I know there is something important here. But it been a while since studies like these are guessing the age. Is it really news worthy any more?

      These studies are not "guessing" the age of the universe. They are performing rational analysis of observational evidence to determine that age.

      Is it newsworthy? Hell yes, for the same reason that discoveries of exoplanets, black holes, the Higgs boson, gravity waves, and countless other things are newsworthy. The universe is an extremely cool place, full of intriguing puzzles and mysteries. It's hardly surprising that we as a species want to spend some of our time and talent studying it.

    • NASA, astrophysists, and some astronomists may have use for this information. Projecting where planets are going to be, etc. Exoplanetary sciences beyond rocket science. Perhaps it is relavant to quantum physics? Anyway, nerds would be the ones most likely to care.

      For the general layperson going about their daily lives it would seem to neither be news nor important to anything one would encounter. Its kind of like computing another digit of Pi, when most of the world stops caring after 3.14. The universe
  • Universe is 2 byo younger? What does it mean exactly... The time at the time was probably not even the same time as nowadays.

  • The bigger mystery (Score:4, Interesting)

    by OYAHHH ( 322809 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @09:18PM (#59192886)

    Is why in on breath scientists say all matter in universe is moving away from all other matter while we know, for example, that Milky Way & Andromeda galaxies are moving in a manner that will yield a collision,

    What gives?

    • Scientists did not say "all matter in universe is moving away from all other matter".

      Expansion means distance between distant parts of the universe is increasing with time. That expansion doesn't change distance in bound systems such as from Sun to Earth, or distance and movement of galaxies in the Local Group (which includes Milky Way and Andromeda) which are bound by gravity.

      There are all kinds of photographs of colliding galaxies, and evidence of past collisions of the Milky Way with other galaxies nea

      • My theory, with no real facts behind it, is that the expansion could be a local phenomenon. For example, throw a stone into a river and you get a wave moving away from the impact. The river is still flowing towards the sea, but to a fish near the stone the energy is expanding away from the point of impact.

        I guess my problem with the big bang is that it doesn't answer any questions about what exists outside. But then again I'm no physicist.

        • That is definitely not the problem I have with the big bang.

          Currently we do not have the ability to measure the entire area of "the universe". Nor do we have the ability to account for every object and interaction in the Universe, to establish that there might be something outside of it at all. Dark Matter is a thing, it could be in part evidence of what exists outside the universe, though that is unlikely.

          We humans are a curious folk, we seek answers, but that doesn't mean we have them, or will have th
    • Space is expanding, but objects in that space can move. If they are moving faster than the space is expanding, they can get closer to each other. On a short distance, even the vast distance between galaxies, the force of gravity can move objects faster than the expansion rate. But, if they are far enough apart, the effect of gravity is too weak to cause movement faster than the expansion rate. So objects drift apart. The expansion of space is not causing objects to move, it just creates more space between t

    • Re:The bigger mystery (Score:5, Interesting)

      by CaptainDork ( 3678879 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @09:50PM (#59192940)

      It does seem to be a paradox and it's an often-asked and thoughtful question. It shows you're thinking.

      The Milky Way and Andromeda are, indeed, on a collision course. Appreciate that they are in close proximity to each other. That's the answer to your question.

      LOCALLY, across the universe, objects like galaxies close to each other, yield to mutual gravitation. The attraction is strong because the two are close (2.5 million light-years apart). So, the two are merging.

      However, the universe as a whole is expanding.

      From a great distance "out there," it looks like both the Milky Way and Andromeda are about in the same spot and flying away.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by kbahey ( 102895 )

        Well said ...

        In addition to that, the expansion is that not that matter is moving apart, it is space time itself that is expanding. Imagine a 1 x 1 grid that is expanding to 2 x 2 grid. Picture a surface of a balloon that you drew dots on, and then blew some air in it, and now the dots are further apart, because the surface of the balloon is what expanded. The same is true for space time.

        At a small scale (cosmologically speaking), things are held together by gravity. That is true in the Solar system, Milky

    • Is why in on breath scientists say all matter in universe is moving away from all other matter while we know, for example, that Milky Way & Andromeda galaxies are moving in a manner that will yield a collision,

      What gives?

      All matter that is not gravitationally bound, and thank goodness for that otherwise we would slowly drift away from the planet

    • Think of a piece of elastic paper. You stretch it : this is expansion. You use 2 sharpie and make a 2 points on the stretching paper : those are you galaxy. As the paper stretch matter move away from each other. But those galaxy are not immobile, they run in various direction. In our case of the 2 galaxy they run toward each other : take the aforementionend sharpie clean up previous position put a new position nearer from each other even during stretching. So in spite of the paper stretching they run toward

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by meglon ( 1001833 )

      Is why in on breath scientists say all matter in universe is moving away from all other matter ....

      Because they don't.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Livius ( 318358 )

      "All" is a generalization, not an exact quantitative statement.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Livius ( 318358 )

      I saw two cars collide the other day. Maybe they meant something else.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Tablizer ( 95088 )

        I saw two cars collide the other day.

        Don't drink and ponder the universe at the same time.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      scientists say all matter in universe is moving away from all other matter while we know, for example, that Milky Way & Andromeda galaxies [will merge]

      Because Trump purchased Andromeda. It was cheaper than Greenland.

      Only a serious note, I don't believe scientists said "all" matter was moving away. It's a large-scale phenomenon, but local scale forces can still overpower the expansion's effects.

  • ... we've used "standard candles" like Cepheid variable stars that, generally, give off the same light wherever they are. We can use that information to examine them close and far away and, based on predicted luminosity, figure out how far some galaxies are.

    In truth, all Cepheid variables are not precisely, exactly the same, so it's a little sloppy and it works pretty well but things get hairy with distance. So that method has a distance limit.

    We know that the further away galaxies are from us, the faster t

  • In different places, but that would suggest it wasnt quite a big bang right.
  • Ants trying to guess the age of the tree they're on.
    • They're not guessing. Do we navigate space probes with guesses?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Dunbal ( 464142 ) *

        What does navigating space probes have to do with what I said? Estimating the "age of the universe" when we're still not sure what the universe is, if it even begins or ends, why it's expanding, etc; is quite different than well established mathematics. Every time we push back the boundary between what we're sure of and what we speculate about, science gains. But there's always that area a bit further out on our map marked "Here be Dragons". The map itself seems to never end. Astronavigation was conquered a

  • Why all the fuss (Score:3)

    by techdolphin ( 1263510 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @10:40PM (#59192996)
    I don't care what anybody says. The universe doesn't look a day over 8 billion years to me.

    • If here are older sentient species, the universe may have had some work done. There are still some very peculiar measured events in the universe that do not have reliable explanations, and it's been fascinating to speculate which of them might be caused by civilizations taming and tapping resources of stars or of galactic center black holes.

  • Except ... that it's not. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Alwin Barni ( 5107629 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @11:28PM (#59193072)
    Just at the end of the article (and any other I read about this topic):

    Jee and outside experts had big caveats for her number. She used only two gravitational lenses, which were all that were available, and so her margin of error is so large that it’s possible the universe could be older than calculated, not dramatically younger.

    So actually the title should be "New preliminary calculations show that the Universe is either older or younger than we currently know, but the error is so big that it actually doesn't say anything" - but who would've clicked on such a title.

    • More like, "...could be either younger or older..." It's not like the borderline-accepted value is somehow rejected.

  • Fundamentalist mouthbreathers asserting that it's only a matter of time until science agrees the universe is 6,000 years old in three...two...one...

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gtall ( 79522 )

      Studying Fundamentalism is a great way to understand human nature. When Jesus alive, he said he'd be back before the current generation went tits up, however he expressed it a bit differently. Anyhow, after that generation was up, the next generation said "so he's off by a few years, big deal". When that generation went away, the Fundies said that Jesus was a metaphysical sort of chap, so he was taking metaphorically...as opposed to literally everywhere else.

      His claim that he was the Son of G-d was a common

  • Every time you say something about stuff happening billions years ago he turns in his grave.

  • No, that makes no sense. (Score:3)

    by mark-t ( 151149 ) <markt AT nerdflat DOT com> on Saturday September 14, 2019 @09:47AM (#59193802) Journal

    The furthest objects in the universe that we can see are over 13 billion light years away. How can we see them if the light hasn't had time to reach us yet?

    If these objects are actually closer than that, then that would *reduce* the Hubble constant, not increase it, wouldn't it?

    • The furthest objects in the universe that we can see are over 13 billion light years away. How can we see them if the light hasn't had time to reach us yet?

      At such extremes, astrophysics gets a little bit circular in its reasoning. Nobody is actually measuring the distance to the furthest objects. Nobody is measure any distance that large. What people are measuring is brightness, and attempting to generalize based on brightness of apparently similar objects that are much closer.

      Age of the universe and farthest distances are all based on brightness measurements which we're slowly learning aren't nearly as reliable as people have liked to claim for the last 1

  • So how does this affect estimates about dark matter?

    With the universe substantially younger the galaxies are closer and thus smaller for a given visual width, but the velocity toward/away from us as measured by doppler shift doesn't change. So you'd need less dark matter to explain the apparently anomalous fast orbit.

    Is there an estimate of the age of the universe / Hubble constant where the need for dark matter (beyond expected cold normal matter) goes away? Or are there other measurements (such as anomalous DISTRIBUTION of mass within a galaxy) that still require it or something like it.

    • This also impacts estimates about civilised life. It appears to have taken about 4 billion years for life to evolve to the point it has now on Earth. That's already not a small portion of the life of the universe, between a third to a quarter. With this it would put it decisively at a third. It's also half the time it takes for intelligent life to arise by our current example.

      The 4 billion mark is very little to go on but it's all we have to go on. Probability speaking even with a sample of one, it's pro

    • So how does this affect estimates about dark matter?

      For most evidence, nothing. Galactic rotation curves, velocity dispersions, gravitational lensing all are on scales smaller than Hubble expansion would have much effect and would be dwarfed by the effects given to dark matter. It might be part of the cosmic microwave background radiation but I doubt it. The only independent way that we have seen evidence of dark matter that this would effect would be standard candle distances and that is a calculation with dark energy and normal matter, and highly doubtful

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