Evening star., 1940-07-06
Of Stors, Men
And Atoms
Notebook Of Science Progress
In Field, Laboratory
And Study
BIZ Thomas r. Henry.

And Study
By Thomas r. Henry.
A minimum Of 1000, 900 0O0, 900 900, 900
years for the age Of the universe has
been reported to the National Academy
OF Sciences here by DR.. Fritz Zwicky OF
the California Institute OF Technology.
This is half billion times greater than
recent estimates by other astronomers
who have calculated that all the far
flung systems Of countless billions of
stars were In a compact mass with es-
sentially no space between them about
2,000,000,OO0 years ago, or essentially
twice the period of known life on earth.
The case for the youth of Father
Time has depended on the so-called "red
shift" in the light of great star systems
millions of light years distant from the
space frontiers of the Milky Way galaxy.
The light of an object receding from
the observer is slightly redder than that
from stationary object. The faster 1t
is moving away the redder it becomes.
Some years ago it was observed that
the more distant a galaxy the faster it
was moving outward until, at the great
est distances observable, systems of bill
lions of stars appeared to be flying off
i,to ot
the speed of light This indicated that
creation was becoming more and more
dispersed as it got away from some
cosmic center. 1t would have required,
the astronomers calculated, about two
billion years for the stars systems, mov-
ing at such speeds relative to each other,
to have reached their present positions.
A common explanation was that the
whole thing started in some great explo-
sion of the compact mass of all the mat
ter in creation, and that the galaxies
and stars are flying fragments like bits
OF celestial shrapnel. When everything
was in one mass there could have been
no space and no time in any ordinary
understanding of the words, but only a
SOilS VI 1ldGtSI Ill d SUdCGipSS.
timeless nothingness.
DR.. Zwicky, in his report to the Ma
tional Academy, says that If this hy-
pothesiS were true the greater outer
galaxies could not have arrived at their
present distribution in space They would
have been scattered at random Actually,
recent observations have shown, they
fN h,t,> al,
galaxies, sometimes thousand or more
systems of stars each relatively as large
as the 100000, ,O00, ,O0O-star Milky Way
| galaxy, which remain quite close together
and keep the same positions in respect
| to each other. 1t can be demonstrated,
he says, that they constitute dynamic
systems, held together by the gravita-
tional field set up in space by their
masses
They must have gotten together, he
says, since the beginning of the ex-
pansion of the universe, or else have
been together at the start and thrown
off from the central mass in a clus-
ter. If the latter were true, he argues,
they would be expanding from their CEN
law of dispensing matter. Careful OBJ
servation at the Mount Wilson Observa-
tory Of the Carnegie Institution of WASH
ington show no such dispersion within
the systems themselves. Also different
types OF star systems would be distri-
buted at random within the great meta
galaxies, whereas regular pattern of dis
tribution can be demonstrated for all
| of them.
The first hypothesis requires that they
should have come together by accidental
near collisions which would have brought
three or more of them within the field
OF each others gravitational attraction,
| where they would be held indefinitely.
DR.. Zwicky then applies the laws of prob
ability of such close approaches such as
might have allowed for the formation OF
such groups of galaxies within the max
imum space occupied by any of them.
He finds that for a single triple COL
| lision necessary to have established the
beginning of such system at least 3OO,-
600, 600 100000 years would have been re-
quired. For the formation of an entire
system sextrillion years would have
been necessary.
This is the minimum, DR.. Zwicky points
out, if the expanding universe theory is
true. It does not fit at all with the al
legedly observed rate of expansion. The
indication, he stresses, is that the uni
verse actually is stationary and cannot
be traced back to its beginnings from
any observations now available.
An acid test will come, he says, with
new telescopes which will admit observa-
tions of star systems at much greater
distances than is possible at present.
There may still be some possibility that
they were thrown off as systems and not
individual fragments and that they are
now breaking apart. If this is true, he
Says, the more distant in space the more
condensed they should be since, because
Of the time required for the passage of
Eol,f - r%l L.