20130814

Milky Way Star Older than the Universe


Lucy, looks like the Big Bangers have some ‘splaining to do! The ages of the oldest stars in the Milky Way are supposed to be about 13.2 Ga (billion years), about 600 million years younger than the “age of the universe” calculated from Big Bang Theory. Unfortunately, star HD 140283, only 190 million light years away, dubbed “Methuselah,” seems to be between 14 and 15 Ga. And within that range, astronomers have difficulty getting an age much below 14.5 Ga. There is only a slight chance that the poor precision of the estimate (+0.8 Ga) still might allow it to fit the theory:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/03/08/astronomers-find-ancient-star-methuselah_n_2834999.html

No doubt, the theoreticians will make some adjustments. After all, the universe just keeps on getting older. Why, just the other day it was 13.7 Ga—before they recently changed it to 13.8 Ga. Gosh, looks like I need to make some revisions for the second editions of a few books… 
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2 comments:

  1. WestmillerAugust 14, 2013 at 9:43 PM

    GB: "No doubt, the theoreticians will make some adjustments..."

    Actually, that IS an adjustment. The estimate in 2000 was that it was 16byo +-2by. That was adjusted to 14.5byo +-800my:

    http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2013/03/the-methuselah-star-could-it-be-older-than-the-age-of-the-universe.html

    So, "Methusela" could be only 13.7byo, still "older than the universe." Even if it's adjusted further down, the contradiction is that 13.2bya the entire universe was supposed to be a singularity, with no stars at all.

    What is truly a miracle is that cosmologists have no problem with such factual and logical contradictions and still call themselves scientists.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Glenn BorchardtAugust 15, 2013 at 8:27 AM

    Bill:

    Thanks again for the comment. You are right. All this stuff fits with the discovery of elderly galaxies near the limit of observation:

    http://thescientificworldview.blogspot.com/2011/07/elderly-galaxies-plague-big-bang-theory.html

    It is sad to watch otherwise smart folks having to suffer these inglorious contradictions. Sort of like being nibbled to death by ducks...

    ReplyDelete

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