In a previous post entitled Giordano Bruno on the One and the Infinite, I presented Bruno’s (1548-1600) belief that the universe was infinite and that therein were multitudes of stars, all similar to our sun.
Stars emit light in all directions. The amount of light an observer sees is inversely propoprtional to the square of the distance. That is a power series with an upper bound. So it's easy to see that infinite stars do not add up to infinite light.
It would be best to read 'Mysterium Cosmographicum' and 'Harmonices Mundi' to understand that Kepler was not a scientist but a religious fanatic. He sought to prove the universe was based on Plato's polyhedra (distance between the planets, etc.) and the harmonics the planets produced as they traveled around the Sun. His books are books on religion. Today we would call him a new-ager.
Kepler's works are those of a deeply disturbed individual, which is what he was. Capar's work ignores the ugly side of his character. Astronomia Nova was a fraudulent work. It was translated into English for the first time in 1988 when it was discovered that he had fudged the Mars data.
Title: Kepler's Fabricated Figures - Covering up the Mess in the New Astronomy
Authors: Donahue, W. H.
Journal: Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol.19, NO. 4/NOV, P.217, 1988
A very interesting read John and a terribly perplexing problem, how could something as fundamental as the finite or infinite Universe still be in question? If physicists and cosmologists are confident in their Standard Model, there should be no question about it. It's not like you just switch a 1 for a zero and carry on with life, the laws of physics would be different in each scenario.
As you know I am a convert to the EU model and in my personal view the Universe as far as we can guess it's structure at the grand scale, the Cosmic Web is a vast connected plasma of unguessable dimensions. But as a plasma, electricity and information propagate through it's entire volume almost instantly and as there are many different fractal-like layers of biology within Earth's biosphere, I think it is reasonable to consider the entire Universe as an extended biosphere or even super-organism. It is because of this biologic nature of the Cosmic Web that we see it is ordered not random, shaped by electricity and it's influence over matter, into jets and filaments and diasy chains of stars - and ultimately to shape matter into biology and biology into conciousness.
I dont think the Universe can be infinite in scale. One of the strongest arguments against General Relativity is the time delay problem of a gravity fixed to the speed of light, causing the Solar System to become increasingly unstable until the planets would be scattered into the cosmos. Even if the speed of information within the plasma is nearly infinite, that is still going to lead to instability in an infinite Universe. I would say our Universe is ludicrously vast from our perspective, but finite.
We still have to shake off the assumptions that come with the Big Bang model to see the bigger picture. The Red Shift "expansion of the Universe" theory was what lead to the idea of a beginning and ending of Time, but if the Universe is not really expanding, does it still make sense to speak of time in the same way? Are we in fact looking at a Universe of infinite age?
Eric Lerner in his The Big Bang Never Happened, presenting the plasma universe ideas of Hannes Alfvén and colleagues, considered said universe to be infinite both in space and time.
Bruno wrote that “Innumerable celestial bodies, stars, globes, suns and earths may be sensibly perceived therein by us and an infinite number of them may be inferred by our own reason.”
By that, I take it, is meant that a finite, yet innumerable, universe may be ‘perceived’, i.e. proven, but that an ‘infinite’ universe may only be ‘inferred’, i.e. assumed.
An infinite universe may therefore never be proven, no matter how powerful our telescopes, it may only be assumed. Also, an infinite universe implies a universe with no possible expansion. But doesn’t no expansion infer that it has a limit. And a limit would imply a finite universe.
However, contrary to both a finite universe and an infinite universe, an expanding universe does not necessarily imply infiniteness, but can posit a finiteness onto an assumed infinity.
I like Humboldt who said that the universe is expanding - at the same rate, as the improvement of our telescopes.
By innumerable, Bruno meant such a large number that we lose count. When he wrote that the innumerable bodies may be "sensibly perceived", he meant that we can at some point detect them with our senses, possibly expanded (this is before Galileo writing about his use of the telescope in the "Sidereus Nuncius", of course).
With respect to the infinite nature of the universe, Bruno proved it by systematically taking apart the arguments put forward by Aristotle, whose argumentation Kepler agreed with, it must be noted. One of the key points put forward by Bruno is that if there is a limit to the universe, what is beyond this limit?
As for whether there is expansion to the universe, it must be understood that this is a 20th century question, based on the fact that the light from many galaxies seems to be redshifted. I will focus on this question in future posts. This particular post is focussing on a debate that took place at the turn of the 17th century.
Nevertheless, in the Fifth Dialogue of Bruno's "Cause, Principle, and Unity", Teofilo gives a paragraph-long exposition that brings to life Parmenides's monism. He explicitly argues against any idea of expansion in the infinite universe:
"The universe is, therefore, one, infinite and immobile.... It cannot diminish or grow because it is an infinity to or from which nothing can be added or subtracted, since the infinite has no measurable parts. It is not alterable in terms of disposition, since it possesses no outside to which it might be subject and by which it might be affected."
Stars emit light in all directions. The amount of light an observer sees is inversely propoprtional to the square of the distance. That is a power series with an upper bound. So it's easy to see that infinite stars do not add up to infinite light.
How can infinity even be understood? Maybe it’s part of a definition of God - also beyond comprehension.
Why is it a problem anyway? How does it even really impact science? I don’t get it.
Infinity is everywhere
Our bodies are finite but our imagination is infinite.
“Unfortunate Bruno…”
Great post. Great comments.
It would be best to read 'Mysterium Cosmographicum' and 'Harmonices Mundi' to understand that Kepler was not a scientist but a religious fanatic. He sought to prove the universe was based on Plato's polyhedra (distance between the planets, etc.) and the harmonics the planets produced as they traveled around the Sun. His books are books on religion. Today we would call him a new-ager.
Kepler's works are those of a deeply disturbed individual, which is what he was. Capar's work ignores the ugly side of his character. Astronomia Nova was a fraudulent work. It was translated into English for the first time in 1988 when it was discovered that he had fudged the Mars data.
Title: Kepler's Fabricated Figures - Covering up the Mess in the New Astronomy
Authors: Donahue, W. H.
Journal: Journal for the History of Astronomy, Vol.19, NO. 4/NOV, P.217, 1988
Bibliographic Code: 1988JHA....19..217D
https://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu//full/1988JHA....19..217D/0000217.000.html
I wrote several posts about Mysterium Cosmographicum, Astronomia Nova and Harmonices Mundi. Do a search for Kepler on my Substack.
A very interesting read John and a terribly perplexing problem, how could something as fundamental as the finite or infinite Universe still be in question? If physicists and cosmologists are confident in their Standard Model, there should be no question about it. It's not like you just switch a 1 for a zero and carry on with life, the laws of physics would be different in each scenario.
As you know I am a convert to the EU model and in my personal view the Universe as far as we can guess it's structure at the grand scale, the Cosmic Web is a vast connected plasma of unguessable dimensions. But as a plasma, electricity and information propagate through it's entire volume almost instantly and as there are many different fractal-like layers of biology within Earth's biosphere, I think it is reasonable to consider the entire Universe as an extended biosphere or even super-organism. It is because of this biologic nature of the Cosmic Web that we see it is ordered not random, shaped by electricity and it's influence over matter, into jets and filaments and diasy chains of stars - and ultimately to shape matter into biology and biology into conciousness.
I dont think the Universe can be infinite in scale. One of the strongest arguments against General Relativity is the time delay problem of a gravity fixed to the speed of light, causing the Solar System to become increasingly unstable until the planets would be scattered into the cosmos. Even if the speed of information within the plasma is nearly infinite, that is still going to lead to instability in an infinite Universe. I would say our Universe is ludicrously vast from our perspective, but finite.
We still have to shake off the assumptions that come with the Big Bang model to see the bigger picture. The Red Shift "expansion of the Universe" theory was what lead to the idea of a beginning and ending of Time, but if the Universe is not really expanding, does it still make sense to speak of time in the same way? Are we in fact looking at a Universe of infinite age?
Eric Lerner in his The Big Bang Never Happened, presenting the plasma universe ideas of Hannes Alfvén and colleagues, considered said universe to be infinite both in space and time.
Bruno wrote that “Innumerable celestial bodies, stars, globes, suns and earths may be sensibly perceived therein by us and an infinite number of them may be inferred by our own reason.”
By that, I take it, is meant that a finite, yet innumerable, universe may be ‘perceived’, i.e. proven, but that an ‘infinite’ universe may only be ‘inferred’, i.e. assumed.
An infinite universe may therefore never be proven, no matter how powerful our telescopes, it may only be assumed. Also, an infinite universe implies a universe with no possible expansion. But doesn’t no expansion infer that it has a limit. And a limit would imply a finite universe.
However, contrary to both a finite universe and an infinite universe, an expanding universe does not necessarily imply infiniteness, but can posit a finiteness onto an assumed infinity.
I like Humboldt who said that the universe is expanding - at the same rate, as the improvement of our telescopes.
By innumerable, Bruno meant such a large number that we lose count. When he wrote that the innumerable bodies may be "sensibly perceived", he meant that we can at some point detect them with our senses, possibly expanded (this is before Galileo writing about his use of the telescope in the "Sidereus Nuncius", of course).
With respect to the infinite nature of the universe, Bruno proved it by systematically taking apart the arguments put forward by Aristotle, whose argumentation Kepler agreed with, it must be noted. One of the key points put forward by Bruno is that if there is a limit to the universe, what is beyond this limit?
As for whether there is expansion to the universe, it must be understood that this is a 20th century question, based on the fact that the light from many galaxies seems to be redshifted. I will focus on this question in future posts. This particular post is focussing on a debate that took place at the turn of the 17th century.
Nevertheless, in the Fifth Dialogue of Bruno's "Cause, Principle, and Unity", Teofilo gives a paragraph-long exposition that brings to life Parmenides's monism. He explicitly argues against any idea of expansion in the infinite universe:
"The universe is, therefore, one, infinite and immobile.... It cannot diminish or grow because it is an infinity to or from which nothing can be added or subtracted, since the infinite has no measurable parts. It is not alterable in terms of disposition, since it possesses no outside to which it might be subject and by which it might be affected."