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The universe is all of space and time [a] and their contents. [10] It comprises all of existence, any fundamental interaction, physical process and physical constant, and therefore all forms of energy and matter, and the structures they form, from sub-atomic particles to entire galactic filaments. Space and time, according to the prevailing ...
- 13.787 ± 0.020 billion years
- At least 10⁵³ kg
- 9.9×10−27 kg/m³
The universe contains all the energy and matter there is. Much of the observable matter in the universe takes the form of individual atoms of hydrogen, which is the simplest atomic element, made of only a proton and an electron (if the atom also contains a neutron, it is instead called deuterium). Two or more atoms sharing electrons is a molecule.
Learn how the universe evolved from the big bang to the present day, and what mysteries remain to be explored. Discover the key events, eras, and discoveries that shaped our cosmic story, from cosmic inflation to dark energy.
- Overview
- Earliest conceptions of the universe
- Astronomical theories of the ancient Greeks
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universe, the whole cosmic system of matter and energy of which Earth, and therefore the human race, is a part. Humanity has traveled a long road since societies imagined Earth, the Sun, and the Moon as the main objects of creation, with the rest of the universe being formed almost as an afterthought. Today it is known that Earth is only a small ball of rock in a space of unimaginable vastness and that the birth of the solar system was probably only one event among many that occurred against the backdrop of an already mature universe. This humbling lesson has unveiled a remarkable fact, one that endows the minutest particle in the universe with a rich and noble heritage: events that occurred in the first few minutes of the creation of the universe 13.7 billion years ago turn out to have had a profound influence on the birth, life, and death of galaxies, stars, and planets. Indeed, a line can be drawn from the forging of the matter of the universe in a primal “big bang” to the gathering on Earth of atoms versatile enough to serve as the basis of life. The intrinsic harmony of such a worldview has great philosophical and aesthetic appeal, and it may explain why public interest in the universe has always endured.
The “observable universe” is the region of space that humans can actually or theoretically observe with the aid of technology. It can be thought of as a bubble with Earth at its centre. It is differentiated from the entirety of the universe, which is the whole cosmic system of matter and energy, including the human race. Unlike the observable universe, the universe is possibly infinite and without spatial edges.
All scientific thinking on the nature of the universe can be traced to the distinctive geometric patterns formed by the stars in the night sky. Even prehistoric people must have noticed that, apart from a daily rotation (which is now understood to arise from the spin of Earth), the stars did not seem to move with respect to one another: the stars appear “fixed.” Early nomads found that knowledge of the constellations could guide their travels, and they developed stories to help them remember the relative positions of the stars in the night sky. These stories became the mythical tales that are part of most cultures.
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When nomads turned to farming, an intimate knowledge of the constellations served a new function—an aid in timekeeping, in particular for keeping track of the seasons. People had noticed very early that certain celestial objects did not remain stationary relative to the “fixed” stars; instead, during the course of a year, they moved forward and backward in a narrow strip of the sky that contained 12 constellations constituting the signs of the zodiac. Seven such wanderers were known to the ancients: the Sun, the Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Foremost among the wanderers was the Sun: day and night came with its rising and setting, and its motion through the zodiac signaled the season to plant and the season to reap. Next in importance was the Moon: its position correlated with the tides, and its shape changed intriguingly over the course of a month. The Sun and Moon had the power of gods; why not then the other wanderers? Thus probably arose the astrological belief that the positions of the planets (from the Greek word planetes, “wanderers”) in the zodiac could influence worldly events and even cause the rise and fall of kings. In homage to this belief, Babylonian priests devised the week of seven days, whose names even in various modern languages (for example, English, French, or Norwegian) can still easily be traced to their origins in the seven planet-gods.
The apex in the description of planetary motions during classical antiquity was reached with the Greeks, who were of course superb geometers. Like their predecessors, Greek astronomers adopted the natural picture, from the point of view of an observer on Earth, that Earth lay motionless at the centre of a rigidly rotating celestial sphere (to which the stars were “fixed”), and that the complex to-and-fro wanderings of the planets in the zodiac were to be described against this unchanging backdrop. They developed an epicyclic model that would reproduce the observed planetary motions with quite astonishing accuracy. The model invoked small circles on top of large circles, all rotating at individual uniform speeds, and it culminated about 140 ce with the work of Ptolemy, who introduced the ingenious artifact of displaced centres for the circles to improve the empirical fit. Although the model was purely kinematic and did not attempt to address the dynamical reasons for why the motions were as they were, it laid the groundwork for the paradigm that nature is not capricious but possesses a regularity and precision that can be discovered from experience and used to predict future events.
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The application of the methods of Euclidean geometry to planetary astronomy by the Greeks led to other schools of thought as well. Pythagoras (c. 570–c. 490 bce), for example, argued that the world could be understood on rational principles (“all things are numbers”); that it was made of four elements—earth, water, air, and fire; that Earth was a sphere; and that the Moon shone by reflected light. In the 4th century bce Heracleides Ponticus, a follower of Pythagoras, taught that the spherical Earth rotated freely in space and that Mercury and Venus revolved about the Sun. From the different lengths of shadows cast in Syene and Alexandria at noon on the first day of summer, Eratosthenes (c. 276–194 bce) computed the radius of Earth to an accuracy within 20 percent of the modern value. Starting with the size of Earth’s shadow cast on the Moon during a lunar eclipse, Aristarchus of Samos (c. 310–230 bce) calculated the linear size of the Moon relative to Earth. From its measured angular size, he then obtained the distance to the Moon. He also proposed a clever scheme to measure the size and distance of the Sun. Although flawed, the method did enable him to deduce that the Sun is much larger than Earth. This deduction led Aristarchus to speculate that Earth revolves about the Sun rather than the other way around.
Learn about the universe, the whole cosmic system of matter and energy, from its origin in the big bang to its current expansion and future fate. Explore the observable universe, the solar system, the stars, the galaxies, and the multiverse with Britannica.
- Frank H. Shu
- Exoplanets. Worlds beyond our solar system.
- Stars. Giant balls of hot gas that burn for millions to billions of years.
- Black Holes. Concentrations of matter with gravity so powerful not even light can escape.
- Galaxies. Collections of stars, planets, and vast clouds of gas and dust bound together by gravity.
Jan 17, 2017 · Learn how the big bang theory describes the birth and evolution of the cosmos, from the first second to the present day. Discover the evidence, mysteries, and challenges of cosmology, the science of the universe.
Jun 2, 2023 · Learn about the origins, history and future of the universe from the Hubble Space Telescope, which provides a clearer sense of our place in it. Explore the big bang, dark energy and the Hubble Deep Fields with articles and images.
