Thursday, November 27, 2014

cosmology - Has infinity been observed yet?


Has infinity been observed yet? Or in other words. Does infinity actually exist or is it just a concept?


Is it just another way of saying very or extremely?



Answer




Usually, when I encounter infinity in my classes or in my work, I define infinity relative to something--that is, it's usually something that is very, very large that, for all intensive purposes, is the usual mathematical notion of infinity.


Empirically, I don't think we have ever come to witness true infinity. Of course, some theories predict infinities. Einstein predicts that, if you fell into a black hole, there would be an truly infinite density in the center. According to Penrose's "cosmic censorship" theory, we can never have a naked singularity--that is, you can't have some infinity in the black hole that effects things outside the black hole. Therefore, there might be true infinities in nature, but their nakedness is censored from observation.


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