SECRET OF UNIVERSE

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 63, 8 December 1931, Page 9

SECRET OF UNIVERSE

Breaking-up Process REMARKABLE ADDRESS Britain’s leading scientists explained their theories relating to the universe at a meeting of the British Association in London recently. It was arranged by the Mathematics and Physical Science section, and so great was the demand for tickets from scientists of other sections that the meeting was transferred from South Kensington to the Central Hall, Westminster. A further meeting with the same subject was held with Sir James Jeans as the speaker. His address, says a London exchange/ was one of the most remarkable ever given on this topic. “A general breaking up process is in operation throughout the universe,” said Sir James. “It might be thought that the attractive forces of gravitation would continually draw ail the broken pieces together again. The exact reverse appears to be the case. Not only is the substance of the universe for ever being broken into smaller pieces but these pieces for ever tend to scatter further and further apart. Driving the Moon Away.

“To take the example nearest home —the earth is for ever driving the moon further away by the agency known as tidal friction. When we watch the waves of the sea being checked by a beach or a headland we may reflect that their Impact is not only slowing down the earth’s rotation and so lengthening the day, it is also lengthening the month by driving the moon further away from the earth. Incidentally, it is also, through the solar tides, driving the earth further from the sun and so lengthening the year.

“Again, every ray of sunlight that enters our eye," he said, “carries mass with it; eight minutes previously this mass was part of the mass of the sun. Every second the sun loses more than four million tons of mass in the form of sunlight and sunheat. “As the result of this continual loss of mass, the sun’s gravitational hold on its family of planets for ever weakens and these are driven further off into space. The earth’s orbit round the sun is not so much like a circle or ellipse as like a coiled watch-spring—a spiral for ever receding into the cold and dark of space. “The same tendency affects the galactic system as a whole,” said Sir James. “The stars of which it is formed continually scatter their mass’ broadcast in the form of radiation. As they do so, their gravitation hold on one another weakens so that the whole galactic system for ever expands. Star System Receding. “And it must be the same with the other star systems in space. Throughout the universe all the smaller broken pieces—satellites , planets, stars —are scattering away from one another in apparent opposition to the laws of gravitation.” Sir James explained that these other star systems are receding from the earth’s star system at a terrific rate. The last one which was investigated showed a recession speed of 12,300 miles a second. “On the face of it,” he said, “this looks as though the whole universe were uniformly expanding, like the surface of a balloon while it is being inflated, with such a speed that It doubles its size every 1400 million years. “One of the great puzzles of astronomy is whether these apparent motions of recession are real or not. If the motions are real, the universe is only at the beginning of its career; it can not have doubled many times since it started. And as it appears to be doub ling iu size every 1400 million years, the few doublings which these figures permit cannot have occupied more than 10,000 million years at most. “General calculations on the ages of astronomical bodies point to far longer periods, of time than this. The ■Klars carry intrinsic evidence of having lived through far longer periods. There is, I think, every reason to hope that within a very short time we shall know the truth about this puzzle, and whatever the solution may be there seems to be a considerable chance that it may provide us with a clue, perhaps even with a key, to the structure of the universe ns a whole."