An Historical Overview of our perspective on the Universe

[kovil]

Once Upon A Time:


The earth was the center of the universe,
http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect ... totle.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ptolemaic_system


It was flat,
http://home1.gte.net/deleyd/religion/ga ... earth.html
http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/fe-scidi.htm


Then it was round, and it circled the sun.
http://www.bluffton.edu/~bergerd/NSC_111/science3.html
http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect ... nican.html


It was no longer the center of the universe, it was a tiny part of the Milky Way.
http://casswww.ucsd.edu/public/tutorial/MW.html
http://seds.org/Messier/more/mw.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/diamond_jub ... lplan.html
http://cosserv3.fau.edu/~cis/AST2002/Le ... Trans.html


The Milky Way was the only galaxy,
http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/ ... alaxy.html
http://www.1911encyclopedia.org/Nebula
[the Great Spiral Nebula in Andromeda was early on thought to be wholly within our galaxy.]


Except it wasn’t,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andromeda_Galaxy
http://www.noao.edu/image_gallery/galaxies.html
http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/gr/public/gal_home.html


It was only one of billions of galaxies, floating in space without end.
http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archiv ... es/1996/01
http://www.space.com/galaxy/
http://www.astro.princeton.edu/~frei/ga ... talog.html
http://www.astr.ua.edu/keel/galaxies/


Every single time we think we’ve got it all figured out, we realize we’ve merely found another piece of the picture.
http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?i ... 4k15byqykn
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/d ... 50228.html
http://record.wustl.edu/news/page/normal/4768.html


It is a big picture, with many pieces.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/m ... 40524.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Observable_universe


Sir Isaac Newton was the first to state the Law of Gravity.
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/newton.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton


Eventually everybody agreed that gravity alone formed galaxies and stars and planets,
http://science.hq.nasa.gov/universe/science/stars.html
http://science.hq.nasa.gov/universe/sci ... axies.html


And that gravity alone holds the universe together.
http://www-scf.usc.edu/~kallos/gravity.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_ ... d_theories


Then we discovered a force a thousand million billion billion billion times more powerful than gravity. (10^35)
http://library.thinkquest.org/10796/ch12/ch12.htm
http://www.physicsforums.com/archive/in ... 27128.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_field
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hb ... lefor.html


Until recently we believed the space between the stars and planets was empty, a vacuum.
http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/de ... .As.r.html
http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/kids/scien ... Vacuum.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum


We now know it is teeming with charged particles.
http://www.plasmas.org/space-plasmas.htm
http://public.lanl.gov/alp/plasma/plasma_space.html
http://web.mit.edu/space/www/
http://ion.le.ac.uk/
http://sspg1.bnsc.rl.ac.uk/
http://www.fmi.fi/research_space/space_2.html
http://public.lanl.gov/alp/plasma/elec_currents.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birkeland_current
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bennett_pinch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_(physics)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supernova_remnant
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2006/2 ... 1934.shtml
http://www.bigbangneverhappened.org/
http://www.plasma-universe.com/index.php/Filamentation
http://www.5th-state-of-matter.info/5th-state.html
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/BIGBANG/Bigbang.html
http://www.the-electric-universe.info/S ... atter.html


We see glowing electric filaments spanning thousands of light years,
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap030118.html
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2006/ ... ornado.htm
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2006/ ... vortex.htm
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/ ... eeelec.htm
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/ ... ricity.htm


We see stellar and galactic formations shaped by magnetic fields.
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070429.html
http://hubblesite.org/gallery/album/ent ... r2004027a/
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap050501.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010903.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap980427.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap050403.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap060326.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070416.html
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap070107.html


Only electric currents can create magnetic fields this size.
http://www.iop.org/EJ/article/0295-5075 ... node8.html
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/login ... ber=787980
http://newton.ex.ac.uk/aip/physnews.614.html
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?recor ... 93&page=11
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 193246.htm
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1990IAUS..140..169P
http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~vawter/PhysicsNe ... ateMF.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v2 ... 543a0.html


Is it possible the predominant force is not gravity, but something else?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_(physics)
http://plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il/PlasmaI.html
http://www.plasmas.org/
http://www.plasmaphysics.org.uk/
http://w3.pppl.gov/gradprogram/
http://wwwppd.nrl.navy.mil/
http://pop.aip.org/
http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/00current.htm
http://www.holoscience.com/views/view_charge.htm
http://www.sciam.com/askexpert_question ... topicID=22

[Maddad]

Is it possible the predominant force is not gravity, but something else?

I've been wondering exacly that for some time. It would be an alternative explanation to the Dark Matter Tooth Fairy.

[BMAONE23]

nice post kovil.

[Nereid]

[snip]

Is it possible the predominant force is not gravity, but something else?

[snip]

Of course!

Is it possible the Sun has a brown (or red) dwarf binary companion ("Nemesis"), indirectly responsible for the death of the dinosaurs?

Of course!

Is it possible the 1918 flu pandemic was caused by viruses shed by Halley's comet?

Of course!

Is it possible that kovil, Nereid, Maddad, and BMAMONE23 each, separately, went to the Moon and back in the last 24 hours, by quantum tunnelling?

Of course!

Is it possible that the Moon is made of green cheese?

Of course!

- - - - - - - - -

How did the Earth go from being flat, and the centre of the universe?

How did it become round, and circle the Sun?

How did it become just a tiny part of the Milky Way?

How did the Milky Way cease to be an orphan?

What lead 'everyone [to] agree that gravity alone formed galaxies and stars and planets'?

How did 'everyone' conclude 'that gravity alone holds the universe together'?

How many other forces, a great deal more powerful than gravity, did we discover?

What lead 'us' to 'believe the space betwen the stars and planets was empty, a vacuum'?

How did it come about that 'we now know it is teeming with charged particles'*?

How do we know what we 'see' is 'glowing electric filaments spanning thousands of light years'*?

- - - - - - - - -

Maybe the methods 'we' used can also be used to answer the above 'is it possible' questions?

What were the methods we used?

(to be continued)

*Perhaps kovil is giving us some kind of IQ test - you know, which statement cannot be (fully) backed up by references to papers published in the relevant, peer-reviewed journals?