The Indianapolis times., 1933-11-30
-Dietz on Science
SCIENCE OFFERS
NEW THEORY OF
COSMIC STRIFE
Gravitation and RepuISion
Pictured as Engaged in
Unending Fight.
BY DAVID DIETZ
soripps- Howard Science Editor

BY DAVID DIETZ
soripps- Howard Science Editor
NEW YORK, N. Y, Nov. 30.-The
story Of the universe is the story Of
an unending struggle between two
opposing forces, according to the
latest theory of the Able Georges
lie Maitre, world famous Belgium
physicist now visiting professor at
the Catholic University in Wash
ington.
Thus, in the very latest theory of
science is found a return to one of
the oldest ideas of mankind the
idea Of a universe founded in a
battle Of contending elements.
1t is to be found in the ancient
ideas of the Babylonians and the
Egyptians. 1t underlies the stories
Of the Morse gods and their battles
with the giants.
Man has always been fond Of
splitting his concepts into two op-
posing sets - good and evil, light
and darkness, heaven and hell, and
SO on.
The two forces in the Able lie
Maitre's cOsmOgOny are the force Of
cosmic repulsion and the force Of
gravitation. Gravitation, for many
decades, has been represented in
scientific formulae by the letter
"G."
Cosmic repulsion first made It's
appearance in one of Professor Al
bert Einstein's equations in which it
was represented by the Greek letter
lambda"
Battle of &c" and lambda"
The universe, therefore, may be
represented as a battle between &c"
and lambda"
The force Of cosmic repulsion Is
the force which causes the universe
to expand. It is because Of this
force that the universe as a whole
is gradually blowing up like a
gigantic soap-bubble.
The layman may object that this
tells what the force does, not what
it is. The only answer to that OBJ
lection is that we can do no more
by way of an explanation Of
gravitation. All we can do is tell
how gravitation behaves.
Able LIE Maitre'S new theory, how
ever, gives us a reasonably simple
picture of how these two forces
could carve out the visible universe
as we now see it.
In this theory, he postulates, that
the whole universe started as one
gigantic, exceedingly dense, super
atom. This atom, he thinks, had a
size about equal to that of the
present solar system, diameter Of
about eight billion miles.
Something caused that atom to
explode and the expanding universe
came into existence. What caused
the explosion can not be said, but
it may well have been the same
sort of release Of atomic energy
which causes the radium atom to
explode today.
Blast Scattered Matter
Calculating the age of the universe
by Shepley's method of calculating
how long it would take the spiral
nebulae to get back from their pres
ent positions to a common starting
point, we arrive at the conclusion
that LIE Maitre's initial explosion
took place five billion years ago.
This initial explosion scattered the
material of the original super atom
in all directions, but in unequal
amounts. 1t was now, according to
LIE Maitre, that the battle between
| cosnic repulsion and gravitation be-
gan.
Most space was practically empty.
AS a result, cosmic repulsion had the
upper hand in most places and the
universe as a whole began to ex-
pand like a gigantic soap bubble.
But in certain spots, matter was
dense enough to make the force Of
gravitation sufficiently strong to
balance cosnic repulsion. Here no
expansion took place. Instead a
state of equilibrium was reached.
In still other spots, gravitation was
| stronger.
Areas of Collapse Noted
In such cases, contraction set in
and there developed what LIE Maitre
chooses to call regions Of collapse
Examining space beyond our
Milky Way with big telescopes. we
find the spiral nebulae, some of
them gigantic clouds of gas, others
gaIaxies of stars like our own
Milky Way.
We find, moreover, that here and
there the spiral nebulae are grouped
into irregular confgurations. Such
group may contain hundred or
even several thousand Of such spi-
rails. Shapley has named these
groups the super -galaXies.
According to LIE Maitre, these su-
pergalaxies represent the regions
where cosmic repulsion and gravita-
ton are in equilibrium. That is
the reason they exist. He says,
further that when gravitation con-
quers cosmic repulsion, as it does
inside some spirals, that we then
loo1,a %ba condemnation Of tho oac