Ewen

That pretty much sums it up. Thank you

What do you hope to gain by asking this? (Not that I don't think it's a valuable argument)

It would be like a balloon: expanding and appearing to be getting expand, but not having a boundary. What's north of the north pole?

I think we're too used to thinking that everything is a part of something greater. The "Universe" is a collective term for everything. Anything that seems to be "outside" of the Universe is just a part of the Universe itself.

I think it's because they know there isn't a cat in hell's chance of anything disastrous coming from what's happened.

Thank you I'll deffinately look into that.

You're welcome. I have a couple of programs that makes conversion very easy. Was no trouble.

That video is superb. I've converted it to WMV for you. Feel free to share the link / file with anyone else who's after a copy in a different format. http://www.louse101.com/files/deep_impact_full_video_wmv.wmv Enjoy!

It reminds me of something I've thought about before. I pictured it as like a sqeezebox or accordian. Though would I be right to assume that this would imply a repeating contraction and expansion sequence that would give us a closed universe?

And that's the only difference? The only constituent of a quark is its energy?

I've been reading various different books on various subjects but I'm after some suggestions of books that can offer introductions to Astronomy, Cosmology and the physics of those and related fields. Basically what books would you suggest a beginner to read and why? Amazon awaits a few orders!

I am having difficulty understanding the uncertainty principle. I am aware that it says that you cannot acurately know both the speed and position of a particle at any given time, but I'm struggling to picture how that works. I'm sure it's a very simple concept but having only read some quite deep reading on the subject I feel like I'm missing out a key element. Could anyone explain it or give a for instance? Thank you.

I appologise if this is posted in the wrong section. I wasn't sure exactly where to post it. The Big Bang seems to be described as a black hole in reverse. Or at least it has in some of the books I've read. If this is the case, how come other black holes just fade away or evaporate? How come we havn't detected a similar explosion like that which supposedly created our Universe? Or am I missing a vital point?

I'll keep this simple mainly because my understanding of thia field is very small and I'm running the risk of trying to describe things in my own words that'll ultimately confuse you! Basically my question is this. If a quark is elementary, what makes them "appear" in 6 different forms? In my head I see that if two "things" are different, it is because they have differing constituents. Something that is elementary doesnt have constituents? I'm sorry for the unusual way of wording this question but I've only got the tip of my toe in this particular area and this is a question that's been bugging me. I'm sure it's a simple answer that I'm just not picking up on. Any comments would be wonderful.

Well yes, but it seems to me that everything is a part of something greater and everything has a collective name. I'm interested in knowing where that rule ends. What is a group of super clusters? And then what is a group of those? And so on and so forth. As Severian said, "The 'universe' is defined as everything there is, so if there is something beyond what we currently the call 'the universe' we would have to relable this as the universe instead." and that is a very good point. I'm just interested in knowing where the groups of groups end and the imaginary boundaries of the universe begins.

I think you're right. I'd have to look it up but I think that's the right term. But it's easy to go further and ask what is a collection of super-clusters called?

Some people don't consider it a planet but in many people's opinions, it is. It's a lot bigger than asteroids in its vicinity and that's the only thing that's helping it keep its status as a planet I think.

The ones beyond Pluto are really just large asteroids. Pluto is really, but it's considered a planet by most people these days. There's a great line in the film / book 'Contact', that runs something like: "If just one in a million of [the galaxies in the universe] had a solar system, and if just one in a million of those had planets, and just one in a million of those had life, then there would be literally millions of other civilisations our there". The mathematics are missing but it's still a valid point to theorise from.

Okay, but if a galaxy is effectivly a collection of stars and planets (superficially), and a wall is a collection of galaxies, could there be a collection of walls?

I think the Big Bang theory is fairly well supported. Objects are red-shifting. In reverse, they'd be blue-shifting and ultimately would (theoretically) for a singularity? The big question is what came before that? But, obviously, we don't know.

Nuclei, atoms... the Earth and planets, the sun and stars, black holes, solar systems, galaxies... everything is a part of something and everything seems contained in a spherical manner. If the Earth is part of the solar system, the solar system is part of the galaxy and (discounting walls etc..) the galaxy is ultimately part of the universe, who's to say what we call the universe isn't part of something greater?

As long as there is a universe, more could be made? I'm unsure because new matter isn't being created like it was shortly after the big bang.

You'd have to work with a vastly assumtious model of the universe based on current evidence. We have no idea in short.