Isaac Newton noted that there was a problem with assuming a finite and stationary universe (or rather, with infinite time), namely that it would sooner or later collapse into a single point. This problem, we now know, has been solved with the Big Bang Theory and the (accelerated) expansion of the Universe. Johannes Kepler had already noted in 1610, in his Dissertation on the Sidereal Messenger, that there was a problem with assuming an infinite world, due to what would become known as Olbers’ Paradox: the brightness of the stars would make the night sky bright, not dark. This problem is now known to be solved, for example, by the redshift caused by the expansion of the Universe, which makes very distant galaxies invisible, and by the fact that the Universe is not old enough to fill the sky with light (that is, there has not been enough time since the beginning of the Universe for starlight, traveling at the speed of light, to reach us from the farthest reaches of space\u2014a solution first proposed by the American poet and writer Edgar Allan Poe!).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Isaac Newton noted that there was a problem with assuming a finite and stationary universe…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-619128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cs-en"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n