🚀 go-pugleaf

ag...@connect.ab.ca (Aden Grue) wrote:

>Actually, In Stephen Hawking's book (I can't remember the exact
>title), he explained the theory that the universe doesn't end, but it
>also isn't infinite;  rather, it's a sphere.  It's like, if you could
>fit all of our 3 dimensional space onto the 2d surface of a sphere,
>that would be the universe.  So basically, if you travel far enough in
>one direction, you'll end up where you started.

Here's a question for ya, though: If that's true, what's on the
outside of this theoretical sphere?  Logic dictates that there must be
something on the other side of the theoretical boundary of the
universe (whatever/wherever that might be).

For that matter, if you tried to go from the center of this universe
out to the edge and beyond, would you be able to do so?

I think the train of thought that I'm following here points out a
shortcoming in the "spherical" curvature-of-space theory.  It would
make more sense to think of the Universe as an extension of the
Moebius loop.

To construct one yourself, cut a piece of paper into a strip, hold
both ends of the strip and flip one of them around ONCE, then tape the
ends together.  Now, draw a line along the middle of the strip from
start to finish.  You traverse the loop exactly TWICE in order to end
up where you started, but you pass the starting point in the process.
On that first time around, you end up ON THE OTHER SIDE of the strip
of paper from the starting point.

The analogy I'm drawing here has been thrown around in astronomical
theory for a while - if you were to travel infinitely in a straight
line in space, you'd eventually end up where you started, but you'd be
inverted somehow (probably left-to-right, ie. everything now reads
backwards) with respect to the rest of the world.

I don't know much more than that, and I certainly don't know how the
theory states that all this would happen.  I just know that this
particular theory seems to make more sense to me than the one stating
that the universe is a 3-dimensional environment.

-Matt Kellner (Dorsola the Dolphin)
 Dolphin Logic Computer Consultation Services
 San Luis Obispo, CA  93405
 http://www.thegrid.net/dlogic