novapsyche: Sailor Moon rising into bright beams (Default)
novapsyche ([personal profile] novapsyche) wrote2007-11-23 10:50 pm

found via [livejournal.com profile] physics

Mankind 'shortening the universe's life'

The startling claim is made by a pair of American cosmologists investigating the consequences for the cosmos of quantum theory, the most successful theory we have. [...] New Scientist reports a worrying new variant as the cosmologists claim that astronomers may have accidentally nudged the universe closer to its death by observing dark energy, a mysterious anti gravity force which is thought to be speeding up the expansion of the cosmos.

The damaging allegations are made by Profs Lawrence Krauss of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, and James Dent of Vanderbilt University, Nashville, who suggest that by making this observation in 1998 we may have caused the cosmos to revert to an earlier state when it was more likely to end. "Incredible as it seems, our detection of the dark energy may have reduced the life-expectancy of the universe," Prof Krauss tells New Scientist.

[identity profile] johanna-hypatia.livejournal.com 2007-11-24 04:49 am (UTC)(link)
I've heard some crazy-ass things in the name of science, but this takes the cake.

Wouldn't it be just so freakin cool if it were true?

[identity profile] simianpower.livejournal.com 2007-11-24 05:55 pm (UTC)(link)
I had a good laugh from this one a few days ago. Always take anything from New Scientist magazine with a cup of salt. They'll publish anything that sounds scientific, and have no interest in peer-review.