New Dicovery: Universe Beyond..?

[Azukre]

My friend called me up a few minutes ago ranting about how his co-worker had told him that as recently as two weeks ago a new discovery was made, in which us earthlings unearthed a separate universe and found earth like planets within it....

 

I don't see how this is possible, and upon scouring the net I found nothing at all... I'm just wondering if anyone else has heard something along these lines..

[iNow]

Huh? We've found other earth-like planets in other solar systems. What do you mean that we "unearthed a separate universe?" Either your friend is pulling your leg or you're doing a somewhat poor job of communicating here the details of what you discussed with them.

 

 

Something like this, maybe?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9796321

 

Or this?

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/08/26/new.planet/index.html

 

Or this?

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2005/06/13_planet.shtml

 

 

ellipsis...

[Mr Skeptic]

A solar system is not a universe.

[thedarkshade]

A solar system is not a universe.

That far too simple. Everybody know that! I think he was referring to something else, but is just did explain it the best way!

[Edtharan]

A solar system is not a universe.

I used to work in a Science museum. You would be surprised at how many people (non astronomers) make this kind of mistake.

 

I had heard people use the word "Universe" to mean everything from: The Earth Moo system" to "The Solar System" to "the Galaxy" and to "Galaxy Clusters".

 

It is a common mistake and can usually be attributed to a slip of the tongue, or ignorance of the meaning of the word.

[Sayonara]

I can corroborate what Edtharan has said; I know many otherwise perfectly knowledgeable and intelligent people who simply do not know the correct terminology.

 

It can be difficult to get your head around that if you regularly ponder or discuss cosmological topics, but for many people it simply doesn't figure in their day-to-day musings.

[ghstofmaxwll]

The Earth Moo system" .

 

Was that from a cow? ...No seriously though, that is disturbing there are people out there who think the earth and moon is the universe.

[Edtharan]

Was that from a cow?

Hey Diddle diddle...

 

that is disturbing there are people out there who think the earth and moon is the universe.

I have actually met people that believed the Earth was flat .

 

Either through ignorance passed down, or plain misunderstandings people do get confused about these things.

 

If you think about it, most people don't usually deal with a lot of astronomical terms. Just like you might misunderstand about CPUs, GPUs or Co-Processors if you didn't know much about computers.

 

Most of these people that make these mistakes, what they remember of astronomy at school is that the Universe is "out there" and that the Moon orbits the Earth. As the Moon is out there, then it is part of the Universe.

 

The don't remember (or vaguely remember) stuff about planets, but as they are not obvious (like the moon and sun are) and they couldn't point them out to you, they are not though about. And the Stars just seem as if they are little lights in the sky, not actual objects.

 

Also, a lot of the Sci-fi shows and books (at least the earlier ones) made a lot of little mistakes like this and this is usually what most people (who make these mistakes) are exposed to. They have learnt their terminology from sources that have made mistakes and then these mistakes perpetuate if they are never corrected.

 

It is not all that surprising. You might confuse the function of a fuel injector and a turbo if you had only heard little bits about them and never understood the context they were used in. If you don't know a lot about a subject (and why should everybody what to learn about astronomy?), then you will make mistakes about it.

 

It is only when they keep insisting that they are correct, or they use these mistakes to justify their beliefs (or knowingly perpetuate these errors) that there is a problem.