| Although science teachers often tell their students that the periodic table of the elements shows what the Universe is made of, this is not true. We now know that most of the Universe — about 96% of it — is made of dark material that defies brief description, and certainly is not represented by Mendeleev's periodic table... While it is true that the nature of this dark matter is largely irrelevant in day-to-day living, it really should be included in the main-stream science curricula. Science is supposed to be about truth and the nature of the Universe, and yet we still teach our children that the Universe is made up of a hundred or so elements and nothing more. Dark matter provides a further reminder that we humans are not essential to the Universe. Ever since Copernicus and others suggested that the Earth was not the centre of the Universe, humans have been on a slide away from cosmic significance. At first we were not at the centre of the Solar System, and then the Sun became just another star in the Milky Way, not even in the centre of our host Galaxy. By this stage the Earth and its inhabitants had vanished like a speck of dust in a storm. This was a shock. In the 1930s Edwin Hubble showed that the Milky Way, vast as it is, is a mere 'island Universe' far removed from anywhere special; and even our home galaxy was suddenly insignificant in a sea of galaxies, then clusters of galaxies. Now astronomers have revealed that we are not even made of the same stuff as most the Universe. While our planet — our bodies, even — are tangible and visible, most of the matter in the Universe is not. Our Universe is made of darkness. How do we respond to that? The last fifty years have seen an extraordinary change in how we view the Universe. The discoveries that perpetuated the Copernican revolution into the twentieth century have led to ever more fundamental discoveries about how the Universe is put together... [However,] the problem is that each new discovery seems to show not more about the Universe, but simply how much we have yet to learn. It is like a person who wakes in a dark cave with only a candle to push back the darkness. The feeble glow reveals little but the floor of the cave and the surrounding darkness. Hope rises when a torch is found; but the additional luminance does not reveal the walls of cave, rather the extent of the darkness. Just how far does the darkness extend? We have yet to find out. | — Ken Freeman, Geoff Mcnamara, In Search of Dark Matter | Indexes/06 |
1 comments:
Glow revealed little weak, but the floor of the cave and the surrounding darkness. Up hope when a torch found, but the brightness does not reveal holes in the walls, rather than degree of darkness.
Post a Comment