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October 3rd 04, 06:16 AM

On Sat, 2 Oct 2004 23:01:27 -0500, (Richard
Harrison) wrote:

Richard Clark wrote:
"This paradox (differing light intensities in various directions) was
solved by?"

There may be a time shortage too as Einstein has shown time slows as a
thing moves faster.

A close and suggestive answer.

Hi All,

Well, it is notable that no "astronomer" got this one right ;-)

I will 'fess up in that it was a trick question because it contained a
ringer (one that three out of three sprung for).

However two out of three got the extra credit question (Olber's
Paradox). No doubt second tier, and to date silent, observers may
chime in with "authority." ;-)

No, Hubble may have described an answer that satisfies the paradox,
however the FIRST (1848) and ACCURATE response to this issue was
written by Edgar Allen Poe in "Eureka!" what he calls a prose poem
dedicated to Alexander von Humboldt:
"Were the succession of stars endless, then the background of the
sky would present us an uniform luminosity, like that displayed by
the Galaxy -- since there could be absolutely no point, in all
that background, at which would not exist a star."

Poe's work is a very large monograph on the nature of electricity,
gravitation and a very sophisticated description of the cosmology of
cluster galaxies (including what are still current theories of
condensation during stellar and planetary formation). To bring the
paradox to a conclusion he offers: for our being able to view this
totality of solar flux as a continuous sheet of luminosity requires
that the universe must have existed FOREVER. The concept of light
traversing space at less than instantaneous velocity (and that there
are huge and vast distances involved) shows a deep consideration of
the topic. This monograph is exceedingly developed with a style of
irony that I enjoy.

This intelligence touches on a topic that I have broached on one other
occasion. Poe was at one time an engineering student at West Point,
THE pre-eminent engineering school of America (7 presidents were
engineers). Most of us only encounter his work through recitations of
"The Raven," or, for many of us, with the drive-in movies produced by
Roger Corman in the early 60s with Vincent Price et al ("The Tell-Tale
Heart," "The Fall of the House of Usher," "The Pit and the Pendulum"
and others).

73's
Richard Clark, KB7QHC