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Questions tagged [observable-universe]

Questions regarding the region of space containing all the objects that we can detect using any method of observation.

61 votes
3 answers
16k views

What is the hottest thing in the universe?

Straight from my 7 year old to you, exactly what it says on the cover: What is the hottest thing in the universe? To make it Stack Exchange-friendly, I'll add the following caveats: it should be ...
Bruce Becker's user avatar
40 votes
3 answers
12k views

How do scientists know that the distant parts of the universe obey the physical laws exactly as we observe around us?

How do scientists know that distant parts of the universe obey the physical laws exactly as we observe around us? The question might look a bit odd but I am really stuck on my head. We know, ...
Sazzad Hissain Khan's user avatar
24 votes
8 answers
14k views

Why can't we see distant galaxies with the naked eye?

If light keeps travelling in a straight line, why can't we see distant galaxies with the naked eye? Surely if you stared long enough, the light from them would eventually hit your eye? I apologize if ...
Guit4eva's user avatar
  • 341
24 votes
2 answers
5k views

How much larger will the "observable by us" universe be when JWST becomes operational?

Right now, using all our various current means of observing, we can "see" a sphere of X diameter around us. Webb will increase that to Y diameter. So our observable volume will increase by ...
BradV's user avatar
  • 767
22 votes
1 answer
3k views

Does the recent news of "ten times more galaxies" imply that there is correspondingly less dark matter?

Nature: Universe has ten times more galaxies than researchers thought NASA feature: Hubble Reveals Observable Universe Contains 10 Times More Galaxies Than Previously Thought Headlines sometimes ...
uhoh's user avatar
  • 30.7k
21 votes
3 answers
6k views

How can telescopes see anything at all?

I'm impressed that we have any telescope imagery at all. Take the images we have from the "Pillars of Creation". The Pillars of Creation is in the Eagle Nebula, some 7,000 light-years away ...
Victor Debone's user avatar
21 votes
2 answers
2k views

Are there any galaxies which fell out of sight horizon due to cosmic expansion?

If farthest galaxies run away from us with acceleration making them exceed speed of light, we should expect them to disappear from sky among time with increasing quantity. Did we observe this? Can we ...
Waldemar Gałęzinowski's user avatar
20 votes
5 answers
4k views

Approximately what percent of the sky has nothing in it?

From my persepective here on Earth, the sky seems to look like a few large-ish things and a bunch of tiny things. Hubble teaches us that even the apparent void between the tiny things has many very ...
Him's user avatar
  • 337
17 votes
5 answers
7k views

Why are all quasars so far away?

Why are all quasars so far away? If the universe is homogeneous, we should expect to have a homogeneous distribution of quasars, but all of then seem to be far away from Earth. Why is that?
Carlos's user avatar
  • 503
16 votes
1 answer
3k views

Can we see the Big Bang happen if we look far enough?

The observable universe is constantly expanding as more light from the Big Bang reaches us. This light has been travelling for billions of years, so we are looking at the universe as it was a few ...
Nirvik Baruah's user avatar
13 votes
1 answer
2k views

As of now how much larger is our practically observable universe compared to just prior to JWST becoming operational

On April 2 2022 I asked for estimates of expected results. How much larger will the "observable by us" universe be when JWST becomes operational?. As of Jan 27 2024 with JWST operational for ...
BradV's user avatar
  • 767
12 votes
3 answers
3k views

Why can we observe the Cosmic Microwave Background no matter the direction we look?

I often read that the CMB was released from everywhere in the Universe, in every direction. If that statement is true, can someone elaborate what "everywhere in the universe, in every direction" ...
fab's user avatar
  • 223
12 votes
1 answer
321 views

Does CIBER Experiment from Caltech suggest that there can be lots of stars which are not in any galaxy?

My question is about the implications of the observations recently made by the Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment, or CIBER, from Caltech. I've read at Caltech web site: "The total light ...
Charo's user avatar
  • 221
11 votes
1 answer
1k views

How many individual extrasolar "shiny" objects has humanity identified?

Sorry, if this is a 'stupid' question of a non-expert, but this question came recently up in family discussion of mine and I couldn't give a satisfactory answer: I know we have good (?) estimates of ...
BmyGuest's user avatar
  • 281
10 votes
3 answers
8k views

Is there anything currently 46 billion light years away from Earth that we can see?

If the oldest galaxy ever discovered, i.e GLASS-z13, is at a present proper distance of around 33 billion ly from Earth, why then do we define the observable universe to have a radius of around 46 ...
William's user avatar
  • 657

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