this post was submitted on 05 May 2025
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Do you or have you ever use thought experiments to some practical end?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 21 hours ago (4 children)

Why? Doesnt that just mean absence of light or somethijt?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 19 hours ago (3 children)

Yes. But why is there an absence of light?

If there are infinite stars, then every direction you look would encounter a star. (Things stay the same brightness per subtended angle as they get far away. Space dust doesn't matter, as it would thermalize and radiate.)

So, the universe can't have infinite luminous matter, be static and ageless, because if it were then the night sky would look like the surface of a sun.

This may all seem obvious, but it's neat that you can figure that out with the naked eye.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

Can't we see stars that do not show up in the night sky? Like that spot looks dark to the naked eye, with a hobby telescope it looks dark, but with a space probe telescope you can see a distant star is there?

You discounted space dust. But there has to be a near infinite amount of asteroids out there. If I wanted to see 1m lightyears into a specific spot, like the odds of not hitting an astroid would be pretty hard.

Like if you had a Lite Brite globe with each Lite Brite peg representing a sun. In the middle of the globe it would be completely lit up. However, if you started throwing around astroids around inside the globe, you'd start blocking pegs. Suns, pegs, are still behind the astroid. It's just blocking the light. A tiny astroid could cast a huge shadow. Even tiny space dust.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

You discounted space dust.

No I didn't


it would thermalize and radiate.

This is not my paradox, and it's not really a paradox at all, as the big bang model explains it nicely. There are many nice articles on the topic of you'd like to read more about it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 hours ago

I'm not trying to disprove you or anything, I know it's not your paradox. Apologies that it came off that way.

But like a tiny flake of space dust is enough to eclipse a sun for us a near infinite distance away. Matter is not going to let light through it. Even if some space dust thermalizes and radiates. The chances something like an asteroid, planet, moon, etc. Is high. Space seems mostly void, but an infinite amount of mostly void is still a lot of stuff.

I'll check then out!