Are we ready for another chat? Let's shoot for this coming Saturday, December 9th, at 3:00pm Central Standard Time (CST). I'll update the chat software before then.
The chat topic is....
The Edge of the Universe?
I started off with a different topic, "The Speed of Light", but then wondered about the Edge of the Universe and recalled how, when I was a little boy, I imagined the edge of the universe was where the sky meet the earth and beyond that were all the broken toys, furniture and trash that people threw out, and was piled so dense and thick that nobody could get through. Now I'm wondering if the edge of the universe is just beyond the leading edge of the farthest traveling photon from the center of the big bang. Or does the universe loop back upon itself somehow. Or ..
Questions to ponder:- Is there an edge to the universe?
- If so, what is it made of? bricks? a celestial sphere? the edge of a petri dish?
- What is beyond the edge?
- Why is there an edge or why isn't there an edge.
- Are we living in a giant black hole? Why couldn't we be?
- If we're living in a black hole and looking toward the inside of the event horizon would it look like the cosmic background radiation that our instruments currently detect?
It seems like there might be multiple edges to the universe. There is the edge of the visible universe which is more like an event horizon that is expanding at the speed of light. But this is not a real edge is it? It is more of a limit on how far we can see. Beyond this is darkness but the darkness can be entered so is not an edge. Travelling into this darkness past the horizon are there any other edges.
Timezone Information:
I have added a countdown to the chat session on the
home page, or you can use the
timezone converter to convert to your local time. Once there, enter the day and time as specified above, then select US/Central in the "From Time Zone" column and your own location in the "To Time Zone" column, then click Convert. Be sure and unclick the "Use Current Date/Time" option. This will give you the time of the chat meeting in your own local time.
Some other areas:Texas, U.S. - Saturday, 3:00pm
California, U.S. - Saturday, 1:00pm
India - Sunday, 2:30am
London - Saturday, 9:00pm
Madrid, Spain - Saturday, 10:00pm
Melbourne, Australia - Sunday, 8:00am
New Zealand - Sunday, 10:00am
Sweden - Saturday, 10:00pm
Canada, Eastern - Saturday, 4:00pm
Pakistan - Sunday, 2:00am
Let's meet in the Flash Chatroom. Hope to see you there! It's optional, but you're encouraged to select the appropriate option in the poll so we know who's coming.