From the very beginning of the concerned consciousness, man began to explore the world around him, constantly expanding his horizons. But it so happens that no matter how you expand these horizons, even more distant horizons are discovered behind them, to which you have to stretch for a long time. So what? We get genuine pleasure learning something new. We are ready to gnaw on granite to get to the bottom of things. But we cannot solve some mysteries of science. Perhaps you can help?
Did the Universe begin with a Big Bang?
The Big Bang theory has been considered the most reliable one for explaining the beginning of the universe for many years. But is she really one hundred percent correct and the only answer?
The theory was called the "Big Bang" by one of its fiercest opponents, Fred Hoyle. He thought the universe was static and eternal - but his hypothesis quickly died. In 1929, Edwin Hubble proved that the universe was expanding. Then came new evidence in favor of the Big Bang theory: in 1965 it was the existence of microwave background radiation, the afterglow of the Big Bang.
But there is one thing. Hubble's measurements in 1929 were refuted in 1990. In fact, the universe was expanding more slowly than the Big Bang theory predicted. In response, Alan Guth made some adjustments to the Big Bang theory. He stated that the universe expanded rapidly at first and then slowly.
But as critics of the Big Bang theory point out, it's impossible to prove it. Maybe we need a new way to define the beginning of the universe?
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How to predict an earthquake?
Our understanding of the movements of the Earth began to take shape relatively recently. It wasn't until 1912 that Alfred Wegener came to the idea that continents are in constant motion. In the 1960s, the US Navy noticed that the seabed was not as smooth as it was supposed to be - it consisted of mountain ranges.
Scientists concluded that the seabed was also affected by volcanoes and earthquakes. This discovery led to the theory of plate tectonics, which explains the large-scale movements of the Earth's lithosphere. We now know that earthquakes are born when two plates creep on top of each other.
We were able to localize places that are more prone to tectonic activity than others. But we still don't know exactly when the earthquake will happen. For example, scientists can predict that an earthquake is about to hit Los Angeles. This could mean any moment from tomorrow to the next 30 years.
What Causes Ice Ages?
We still don't know what causes the ice ages. Milutin Milankovich proposed a solution in 1920. He stated that the Earth receives different amounts of solar energy at different times due to the way our planet moves. This leads to the appearance of ice ages at regular intervals. At first, Milankovitch's idea seemed correct, because ice ages did occur every 100,000 years.
But Milankovitch's theory cannot explain some of the major disturbances in this scheme - for example, a period of 200 million years without a single ice age. New theories have focused on the greenhouse effect, but this raises more questions than it answers. What caused carbon dioxide fluctuations when there were no humans yet? Scientists are racking their brains, but no one knows the truth yet.
Is there a missing link?
The missing link is a hypothetical evolutionary link between primates and humans. In 1912, Charles Dawson found a skull with a vaulted human and ape's jaw at Piltdown Common near Lewis in England. For 41 years, the scientific community believed we had found the missing link.
However, this unusual find turned out to be a fake, created by a zoologist at the British Museum named Hinton. What for? That was his revenge.
Hinton volunteered for the museum. When he asked for a salary, paleontology curator Arthur Smith Woodward turned him down. Therefore, Hinton forged the skull to undermine Woodward's credibility as a scientist. However, the plan did not work.
In 1956, William Strauss suggested that the Neanderthal was our direct ancestor. However, new methods of dating the fossils have shown that humans and Neanderthals lived simultaneously and were in contact. The vacancy is still open.
Why did the abstract communication system appear so late?
The earliest examples of art date from 35,000 years ago. However, the written language only developed 7,000 years ago, while mathematics took another 2,000 years.
Why was there such a big gap between the first abstract drawings and the first communication system? Most likely, our brain should be changed first. But how? The brain is such a complex structure that it can take several centuries before we fully understand how it works.
What are black holes?
The concept of black holes was initially met with disbelief. When physicist Sir Arthur Eddington first heard about them, he exclaimed: "I think there must be a law of nature that does not allow a star to behave in such a strange way!"
Oppenheimer was the first to welcome black holes in 1938. But Sir Arthur Eddington is understandable because the behavior of black holes is counterintuitive. Nobody knows what is going on inside the black hole. In the 1990s, scientists discovered the existence of supermassive black holes the size of a billion suns. They are usually located at the center of elliptical galaxies. Did they participate in the creation of these galaxies? We don't really know. And the black holes themselves are a real mystery for us, because we can neither see nor touch them, nor can we visit.
How old is the universe?
Nobody knows for sure. Answers range from 8 to 20 billion years, but this is quite a wide spread. The strangest thing about this problem is that the universe may be younger than its oldest stars. Research carried out in 1994 showed that the universe is 8 billion years old, which means that the oldest star in the Milky Way is older than the universe itself. Fortunately, measurements taken in 1999 contradicted previous studies.
But their triumph was short-lived. Another study carried out using modern technology showed that the universe was 15% smaller, and therefore 15% younger. According to this study, there are stars older than the universe itself. What are we doing wrong? Perhaps we don't understand the fundamental laws of physics?
Are there multiple universes?
The first concept of multiple universes was proposed by science fiction writer Jack Williamson in 1952. What inspired the physicist Hugh Everett. In 1957, he wrote his doctoral thesis on the topic of multiple universes. According to his model, each event creates a series of universes in which every possible outcome of that event takes place.
John Wheeler, Everett's boss, suggested a different version. In his opinion, the universe periodically expanded and then contracted to the size of an atom. But some scientists have noted that the universe does not appear to have enough matter to collapse.
Stephen Hawking developed the theory that there are an infinite number of universes with every possible future.
The only problem is that we cannot test these theories in practice.
What will be the end of the universe?
Some theories suggest that the universe will begin to shrink at some point until it reaches the size of an atom. Then there will be another big bang and the universe will be reborn.
But there is another possibility. The universe can expand indefinitely, pushing galaxies farther and farther apart. Eventually, the stars will burn out all their fuel and there will be nothing left.
Ilya Khel