"Extravagent Universe"
... He talked more about Einstein and said how he hated the cosmological constant known as lambda. He thought that if we lived in an expanding universe then we did not need it. Hubble went away from some of Einstein’s ideas. Hubble’s law, which is the velocity-Distance relationship, shows that we live in an expanding universe. Professor Kirshner then began to discuss the history of cosmic expansion and supernovae, which is an exploding star. He said that a single star shines as brightly as a cluster of stars. He explained that light travel one foot in a nano second, which is one billionth of a second. We never see the universe as it is. Then he talked about the explosion of a white dwarf, and how the sun will not become a supernova. He mentioned that gravity slows expansion. Also, he discussed measuring the cosmic deceleration. Advances in technology have allowed seeing the effects. Ground based telescopes allow for greater visibility than that of the Hubble space telescope. He stressed that we live in an accelerating universe. The evidence pointing to this is the cosmic micro wave background. That is speeding up and cooling off. This can be seen as an echo of the Big Bang Theory. The last subject that Robert P. Kirshner brought up was that of the contents of ...