Why is the Universe Dark?

[taniwha]

That does tend to happen at night.

Yes its very dark here tonight because there is only clouds and rain lol.

[ChrLzs]

Dark matter can not be detected by any senses, human or machine.

Well, that's close to true, but them clever scientists do have some techniques apart from the 'deduction' it must be there for the rate at which galaxies rotate etc.. But you are largely correct - it's dark and not (normally) visible, so we are pretty much flying blind.

Where is the precedence for such a phenomenom?

I'm not sure what you were referring to, but there are certainly similar things much closer to home that we can't (or can't be bothered to) measure, eg how much dust/debris/ash is thrown up by a volcanic eruption or a fire - in daytime there are some ways to do it, but at night it gets a LOT more difficult and that is right here on terra firma, not outside our galaxy...

It is therefore unscientific to just assume that it even exists at all, apart from in the ficticious imaginings of speculation we might ponder their dynamics, but i think its possible the universe is being attracted by an exterior force rather than being repelled by an internal one.

The thing is, we know the local laws of physics quite well, and we can accurately measure the mass and orbits and rotation speeds of our local solar system and even some stuff that is well outside it, very accurately, and all those figures make sense. It's only when we look out into interstellar space that we notice that the masses and orbits and rotation speeds don't seem right.

So *something* is definitely wrong. It could be inherent in the way we measure things (unlikely), it could be that some physical laws are different out there (unlikely), it could be that there is quite a bit of mass that we simply can't see... and that last one is by far the simplest solution.. But all of those ideas and many more are still on the table and will remain so until we get to know more. For the moment all we can do is try to check and recheck and refine the measurements, because no interstellar probes are currently planned, and we will probably be extinct or have moved onto a much higher plane of existence by the time any such probe could possibly relay back its findings anyway.. Voyager has been going like a bat out of hell since 1977, and it has only just got to the edge of the solar system recently... That's not even a detectable / measurable distance when you look at a map of our galaxy (unless that map were many, many kilometres wide) and we really need to get much further out than just our galaxy. It's just too far...

But how is it that this formula is all that was needed for the creation of everything? This has always been my favorite mystery.

Mine too. Why isn't there just nothing at all? I'm afraid deities don't do it for me - it just pushes the identical question one step further away.

[Harte]

I rechecked the sky tonight, and yes its still pretty dark looking. I wonder what percentage of the universe visible light actually occupies.

Or invisible light for that matter. That might give us a clue to how much of the universe darkness actually occupies.

Invisible light occupies the entire universe.

It's called the Cosmic Microwave Background, discovered in the 1960's, IIRC.

Harte

[toast]

I rechecked the sky tonight, and yes its still pretty dark looking.

That you very much for keeping us up-to-date.

[ChrLzs]

Actually.. just to be an annoying offtopicker...

I went out two nights ago under the very full and very bright moon, and verified that I can easily read a newspaper by moonlight alone! And I didn't even need to wait the full fifteen minutes or so for my eyes to adapt, within about a minute I was happily reading...

That has absolutely nothing to do with the topic, just childish curiosity at work. Keeps my brain in shape..

[Weitter Duckss]

Dark matter can not be detected by any senses, human or machine. Where is the precedence for such a phenomenom? It is therefore unscientific to just assume that it even exists at all, apart from in the ficticious imaginings of speculation we might ponder their dynamics, but i think its possible the universe is being attracted by an exterior force rather than being repelled by an internal one.

It is probable that darkness has always prevailed, that nothing was all that there was to begin with. But how is it that this formula is all that was needed for the creation of everything? This has always been my favorite mystery. Empty darkness, total nothingness must be, in my view, absolutely everything.

I'm not talking about a tool for the detection of dark matter. Indirect way observing behavior and events in the "vacuum" is obvious the existence of dark matter.

Desires are one and the knowledge from books, but the reality is different, simple and not at all complicated.

That the universe is dark and see my grandmother, but what are the real causes it proves here. It is not clear to me that there are doubting Thomases. Why so much resistance or something is unclear or complicated, especially is completely verifiable?

See the topic of dark matter and the article Why the universe is dark.

PS. I'm sorry but there is no of nothingness.

[StarMountainKid]

I rechecked the sky tonight, and yes its still pretty dark looking. I wonder what percentage of the universe visible light actually occupies.

Or invisible light for that matter. That might give us a clue to how much of the universe darkness actually occupies.

nvisible light occupies the entire universe.

It's called the Cosmic Microwave Background, discovered in the 1960's, IIRC.

Following up Harte's answer, visible light occupies the entire universes, as well, except where it is blocked by interstellar gas and dust. From every point in space in the galaxy one can see see stars, and presumably, from every point in space in the universe one can see galaxies (if their light is not too dim for the human eye, and if so, use a telescope).

[Harte]

Following up Harte's answer, visible light occupies the entire universes, as well, except where it is blocked by interstellar gas and dust. From every point in space in the galaxy one can see see stars, and presumably, from every point in space in the universe one can see galaxies (if their light is not too dim for the human eye, and if so, use a telescope).

Yeah, but you can still see dark places between those galaxies you see with the strongest telescopes.

However, in microwaves, there are no dark spaces at all.

Harte

[taniwha]

I'm not talking about a tool for the detection of dark matter. Indirect way observing behavior and events in the "vacuum" is obvious the existence of dark matter.

However, what seems obvious to some people isnt so obvious to the largest darkmatter detectors ever built. So far anyway...

One of the quietest, darkest places in the cosmos isn’t out in the depths of space. It’s at the center of a tank of cold liquid xenon in a gold mine deep under the Black Hills of South Dakota. It needs to be that quiet: any stray particles could confuse the detectors lining the outside of the tank. Those detectors are looking for faint, rare signals, ones that could reveal the presence of dark matter.

The whole assembly—the container of liquid and gaseous xenon, the water tank enveloping that, and all the detectors—is called the Large Underground Xenon (LUX) dark matter experiment. So far, LUX hasn’t found anything, but the days of its operation are just beginning: the detector was installed and started operations just last year....

http://arstechnica.com/science/2014/07/the-quiet-search-for-dark-matter-deep-underground/

Desires are one and the knowledge from books, but the reality is different, simple and not at all complicated.

That the universe is dark and see my grandmother, but what are the real causes it proves here. It is not clear to me that there are doubting Thomases. Why so much resistance or something is unclear or complicated, especially is completely verifiable?

See the topic of dark matter and the article Why the universe is dark.

The answer is more complex than the question. From the article above i found this line interesting

"Dark matter is remarkable for its invisibility...it neither absorbs nor emits light of any wavelength."

Perhaps Its more like a gravitational wind then that moves the universe.

PS. I'm sorry but there is no of nothingness.

Something must come from something i agree.

Edited July 14, 2014 by taniwha

[taniwha]

Following up Harte's answer, visible light occupies the entire universes, as well, except where it is blocked by interstellar gas and dust. From every point in space in the galaxy one can see see stars, and presumably, from every point in space in the universe one can see galaxies (if their light is not too dim for the human eye, and if so, use a telescope).

How far does the void of space extend beyond where light currently exists is another puzzling question. The day our telescopes hear a reflection we might know the universe is finite. Ive thought that the CMBR could be simply that, the echo of light boucing back off the edge of space. Hmmm.

But its sensible to expect the domain of our universe increases at each moment by the distance light can travel each moment.

[taniwha]

Mine too. Why isn't there just nothing at all? I'm afraid deities don't do it for me - it just pushes the identical question one step further away.

It seems our universe is full of opposites and at the same time empty of them so whats the word for the opposite of 'opposite' ?

If the universe is so powerful it may have created deities also, or it may be a deity itself. Just a thought.

[ChrLzs]

I think it comes back to the one problem I've always had.. It's funny - I can come to terms with relativity, which contains some absolutely mind-blowingly counter-intuitive stuff, but I simply cannot grasp one simple concept -

infinity

I've always gotta ask - if there is a creator, who created it, and then who created that? And in what space were they existing when they did the creating and who or what created that space, and what was outside that space...? Aaargh! It does seem that there are some questions that simply have to be disallowed... or your head explodes.

[taniwha]

When we sleep where does the light come from so we can see our dreams. Or at least how do we watch our dreams while our eyes are closed?

All that we know exists only within our minds, but that isnt all that exists or we would never learn something new.

One way that helps me to compress the magnitude of creation is to think of a supreme being, or creator, as absolute energy.

From this eveything that is possible will happen. Everything that is impossible simply will not.

Is the universe a miracle? I would say so. Without it life cant exist. This might be obvious to some but it sure is hard to put into words.

[toast]

Ive thought that the CMBR could be simply that, the echo of light boucing back off the edge of space. Hmmm.

Arno should fix you and Robert should flog you then. Or contrariwise. Anyway, both options would be adequate.

Edited July 14, 2014 by toast

[ninjadude]

When we sleep where does the light come from so we can see our dreams. Or at least how do we watch our dreams while our eyes are closed?

energy moving between the synapses of our brain cells.Nothing to do with eyes.

[Weitter Duckss]

Article originated in the discussion here in the Forum.

Are we blind or we don't want to see the dark matter!

Just like the time air had been discovered, something similar takes place: we don’t know how to “see” it or detect it by instruments. We know that 90% of matter is missing, but we direct the search in the wrong way; we run through the dark matter looking for it.

The dark matter is here, around us, and the best place to see it is outside the Earth’s atmosphere. The dark matter doesn’t glow, unlike the visible matter, which does; the dark matter is cold and it is impossible for it to become warmer.

Let’s have a look at this example of evidence:

There are two rooms. The first one is full of light and the other is dark. There is a star (Sun) in the background of both rooms, at the same distance from both of them. The first room is filled with the visible matter, which is familiar to us, while the other is filled with the dark matter. When the visible matter from the outside gets inside the first room, it becomes visible. When it gets inside the second room, it becomes visible, too.

The first conclusion: the radiation of Sun, colliding with the visible matter, creates light, while, on the other hand, it is not the case with the dark matter, which is why it is dark.

Let’s have another example. There are two rooms again. In the first one there is water and in the other one the dark matter. Again, there is the Sun in their background at the same distance from both of them. When radiation, or as we prefer to call it: light, goes through water, its intensity decreases with the increase of distance from the source of radiation. When the same radiation goes through the dark matter, its intensity also decreases with the increase of distance from the source of radiation. In the room with water, the temperature also decreases, as the distance from the source of radiation increases (if there was no radiation here, this area would also become dark). In the room with the dark matter, with the increase of distance from the source of radiation, it also gets colder.

The second conclusion: the both areas follow the same laws of nature that can be applied for the visible matter.

Let’s remember the article: Why is the Universe cold?

“Already here, in our Solar system, there is a clear law of nature that shows us that the matter outside the cosmic objects (i.e. invisible matter and energy) also reacts with radiation.

It can not be neglected that elementary matter (invisible matter and energy) warms up, too, for some 100°K! It is less cold closer to Sun; ~ 100°K on the dark side of Mercury. It gets colder in the space further away; it is around 30°K on the dark side of Pluto, while at the end of the system, in the Oort cloud, it is ~4°K (~-269°C). At the end of Universe, it is 2,4 – 2,7°K. Even if we did not know that there was something out there (outside the membrane, in the so-called “empty” space), from this we would be able to deduce that there was something following the laws, similar to these of the visible matter. It can also be confirmed by the constant decrease of power or intensity of the waves, with the increase of distance from the object that emits them.

All these facts confirm that this is a kind of matter, too, and it can not be denied of similarities with the visible matter, but there are also some differences between them. The only impossible thing, when discussing these facts, is connecting our space with that empty space. Empty space can not follow the same laws like those of the visible matter; it is an empty space, in which there are no laws. It can only transfer an event or action further, without affecting them in any way.

The characteristic of the visible matter (which does not possess its own energy source or hot core) and invisible one, too, is that they are increasingly colder if the amount, power and intensity of incoming radiation decreases. Warmth and light are typical of the visible matter, and the significant reduction of cold is typical of the invisible matter and energy, when influenced by the radiation waves.”

At the end, it needs to be said that if there was a vacuum outside the space objects, they would collapse, or would not be formed at all, because the vacuum is by far greater force than the electromagnetic force (gravity). Just as matter, it abides the law of communicating vessels, where there are no different pressures. There would only have existed dispersal, i.e. the objects without atmospheres, but it does not exist.

[taniwha]

energy moving between the synapses of our brain cells.Nothing to do with eyes.

So its true! We have an internal eye

[taniwha]

Article originated in the discussion here in the Forum.

Are we blind or we don't want to see the dark matter!

But can anything without any substance even be considered matter to begin with? What can it be constituted from? Undetectable dark particles? Decayed energy? I have my doubts but the scientific community is hot in pursuit, but for all we know they may be chasing the wind!

For over 20 years, Pijushpani Bhattacharjee made a living by worrying about exotic stuff far away in the universe. Specifically, he has worked on the origin of the mysterious high energy cosmic rays and the even more mysterious dark matter, postulated by physicists like him to exist. No one can see this dark matter but everyone can sense it in the swirl of galaxies. After staring at equations for two decades, this physicist at the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics in Kolkata decided to get his hands dirty: he would participate in a big experiment to detect dark matter.

Read more at:

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/39451765.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

And from China...

China has begun expanding the world's deepest underground laboratory in southwest Sichuan province, where scientists are conducting experiments on mysterious dark matter.

The second phase of construction of the Jinping Underground Laboratory, located at 2,400 metres under the surface of Jinping hydropower station, was launched on Friday by Tsinghua University and Yalong River Hydropower Development Company, the university told state-run Xinhua.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Home/Science/China-expands-worlds-deepest-dark-matter-lab/articleshow/39490734.cms

No problem to power this little experiment.

And maybe a giant magnet will detect the undetectable

This from Chicago...

A 50 foot, 17 ton electromagnet settled into its new home at Fermilab on Thursday, where it will prepare to start searching for dark matter after a couple years of tweaking.

WBBM Newsradio’s John Cody reports the Muon g 2 superconducting particle storage ring arrived at Fermilab in west suburban Batavia a year ago, after spending a month traveling by truck and barge from the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York.

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2014/08/01/fermilab-installs-huge-magnet-for-dark-matter-experiment/

These experiments remind me of the Emperors new clothes, it maybe all in the mind of the beholder

With all this time and money being employed, if no dark matter is detected the irony might be that the experiments are a success in that dark matter might be undetectable, thus proving its existence (cough cough), so we can all rest easy. Good luck Mr Scientist

[lightly]

I think it comes back to the one problem I've always had.. It's funny - I can come to terms with relativity, which contains some absolutely mind-blowingly counter-intuitive stuff, but I simply cannot grasp one simple concept -

infinity

I've always gotta ask - if there is a creator, who created it, and then who created that? And in what space were they existing when they did the creating and who or what created that space, and what was outside that space...? Aaargh! It does seem that there are some questions that simply have to be disallowed... or your head explodes.

and don't ever forget eternity .. either? It's funny,, but "Infinite" can be used to describe Space or Time ... while "Eternal" only refers to time?

Just an odservation ...

[Weitter Duckss]

"No problem to power this little experiment.

And maybe a giant magnet will detect the undetectable

This from Chicago..."

That's the problem. Magnets can not detect a substance that has no charge. If there is a charge then it is visible matter.

For some projects need to be addressed using the new platform, because the old are not effective.

[SHaYap]

... and while we're at it ... where is the rest of the water in the universe ... ?

And the Earth is a Water planet ... its water that makes Terra Firma ~ otherwise all is dust ~

[Weitter Duckss]

... and while we're at it ... where is the rest of the water in the universe ... ?

And the Earth is a Water planet ... its water that makes Terra Firma ~ otherwise all is dust ~

Water is related to the age of the body. when the body give the molten core there is much higher geological activity when, among other things, creates and water.

When all is dust, should be added, gas and molten elements. Dust is related to lower body mass than Earth without hot cores.

[SHaYap]

Water is related to the age of the body. when the body give the molten core there is much higher geological activity when, among other things, creates and water.

When all is dust, should be added, gas and molten elements. Dust is related to lower body mass than Earth without hot cores.

Sill .... it seems to me there should be water elsewhere in this mighty expanse of the universe ~

[Lilly]

Sill .... it seems to me there should be water elsewhere in this mighty expanse of the universe ~

There is, it's just not in a liquid state.

Oh, and I still think that darkness is simply due to there being an absence of light.

[taniwha]

That's the problem. Magnets can not detect a substance that has no charge. If there is a charge then it is visible matter.

For some projects need to be addressed using the new platform, because the old are not effective.

If it has no charge how can it even be said to exist? But seriously, it is obviously a huge challenge to detect , capture and define what exactly is dark matter, and from what i read anyway, is taken very seriously. Why so? It might revolutionise mankind in ways i dont understand but all we can do for now is guess at it until the day of its revelation.

If dark matter exists 'beyond' our range, within a 4th dimensional spectrum perhaps then we might just fail in ever making contact with it, in a physical sense anyway.

One idea i have of what dark matter is, is that it might be caused by the interaction of energy within the fabric of our 3D universe by a 4th dimension pushing inwards, and by so doing influencing space-time in large volumes to stretch. Or ' bump'. This would never be seen unless we could somehow pierce the fabric to expose the 4th dimension, however one natural side-effect it would have is the ability to bend light and warp space-time.

Similar peculiar irregularities are theorised to have occured during the inflation phase of the big bang. At all the points of irregularity on the otherwise smooth surface of the universe, space-time it is thought to have collapsed setting in motion the chain reaction that ultimately formed galaxies. However here we are now.