Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1932-01-03

Ting in their studies and their meet
tngs with problems that in more remote days
were reserved to philosophers and theoIoglsts.
Boldly they look at the universe around them
and ask whsnce it came and where it is going.
Giant telescopes and the intricacies OF the
higher mathematics are appealed to for answers
to the questions, and a succession of eminent
scientists have been spending their lives on the
problem, just as Darwin, Haeckel, Huxley and
other nineteenth century biologists studied
organic evolution and the descent of man.
And the evolution of the universe promises
to be just controversial a question as the
evolution of man, althougE-due to the rising
tide of science in philosophy and religion
there probably will not be acrimonious debates
between the astronomical physicists and the
clergy analogous to the evolution controversy
that echoed down the years from Darwin to
Dayton, Tenn
Only when giant telescopes, like the 100-inch
reflector on Mount Wilson, Calf, swung into
action and penetrated the depths of space and
only when EinSten and his fellow workers de-
veloped new ways of looking at the cosmos, was
it possible to picture correctly the universe.
Only then could scientists study the vast ex-
panse of space and time that lies beyond the
immediate vicinity of the sun and its planet
airy family, which nearly lost in the i'm
mensely large group of stars commonly called
the Milky Way.
Ii
! of stars that number millions But the
surprising discovery of astronomy is that this
galaxy with its millions of stars, is but one
of many such stellar systems which themselves
number several millions at the very least.
These island universes" scattered
throughout all observable space far as the
telescope can reach. The frontier of observable
space lies about 300 900 900 light years from the
earth and this immense radius of known space
can be appreciated when it is known that each
light year the distance that light at 10000
miles a second goes in year, is six trilhon
miles.
On the photographs taken after many hours
Of exposure through the large telescopes, the
far distant galaxies appear as nebulae falnt
patches of light that powerful telescopes show
to be composed Of myriads Of individual stars.
And each nebula on the average Is actually
q hundred million times as bright as the sun,
although it may look very faint when viewed
from the earth. Only four of them are ordi-
nArily visible to the unaided eye.
That In rough outline, Is what is known OF
the visible universe. Beyond the reach OF teie-
scopes the relatively theories of Einstein, and
their subsequent developments by other physi-
cists and mathematicians paint the picture OF
the cosmos.
1t is q portrait that cannot be visualized &C
tually in mental images that come out Of this
workaday, three dimension world. It Is
bending of space and time, finite but bound
less The whole OF the universe can best be
portrayed by mathematical equations and. even
these are only models and approximations.
THERE is no jumping off place, yet there
Is sort of end to the extent Of the uni-
verse II you could go on long enough In 1t
you would be likely to get back to where
you started.
Aside from this relativistic view of the cos