How fast does the universe moves.?

Question

Wake me up and tell me. Or tell me anyway.

Answer 1

As far as we know, the universe does not move. We could only talk about it's motion if it were moving in relation to something else like another universe. Other universes may exist, we don't know about them yet, but it's possible

You may mean to ask about the speed of things IN our universe, like stars, galaxies, clusters of galaxies, etc., but you'll need to do another Yahoo Ask for that.

If you are talking about how fast the universe is expanding, then you are in for a debate because there is no generally agreed-upon answer since Hubble's Law uses Hubble's constant to calculate the precise numbers and there is little agreement about what that constant is. But, Generally Speaking, the universe appears to be expanding at ever-increasing rates as you get farther and farther away.

Answer 2

The Answer
The simple answer is that the observable Universe is about 10 billion light years in radius. That number is obtained by multiplying how old we think the Universe is by the speed of light. The reasoning there is quite straightforward: we can only see out to that distance from which light can have reached us since the Universe began. (But see my note marked * below).
We determine the age of the Universe in a number of ways. One is to estimate the age of the oldest stars we see. Our knowledge of how stars of a given size evolve with time is very good (based on what we know about atomic and nuclear physics) so the major uncertainty here is usually measuring how far away (and so how big) such stars are. The standard method is to look for very small changes in the apparent positions of the stars as the Earth moves around the Sun. (This effect is called parallax). A second way to get an age for the Universe is to try to figure out the time of the itself. Here the method is to use a series of techniques (based on how bright things appear to be - like stars - that we think we know the true brightness of) to determine first the distance of the nearby galaxies, then increasingly distant galaxies, until we have estimated distances for many galaxies for which relative velocity measurements have been made (using the red shift of features in their spectra). The relative velocities we observe for distant galaxies have been largely determined by the expansion of the Universe begun with the 'big bang'. So, once we've determined how expansion velocity correlates with distance for some range of distances, it's possible to extrapolate back (with some assumptions) to calculate the instant of the big bang, when all the matter in the Universe was at a single point.

(If any of these terms like 'parallax', 'Cepheid' and 'red shift' are unfamiliar, try entering them in the search window on our home page).

The determination of greater and greater distances is one of the great themes of astronomy. Most introductory books will give you an outline of the story, which you can then fill in to any level of detail with further reading.

Our website has a lot of material on recent developments. For instance, there are already several answers in the 'Ask an Astrophysicist' archive which deal with the size and age of the Universe. If you enter things like 'size of the Universe', 'age of the Universe', or 'distance scale' in our search window you will get lists of links to many of the most relevant discussions.

Paul Butterworth
for the Ask an Astrophysicist team

* Note: The observable Universe may be only a small part of the physical Universe. In some theories, the Universe may have expanded very fast just after the 'big bang', and only a little bit may have remained within range of detection. See, for instance: http://epunix.biols.susx.ac.uk/Home/John_Gribbin/cosmo.htm



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Answer 3

The speed at which the universe is expanding in known as the Hubble constant. Estimates of the exact speed vary but it's though to be around 72 km/s.

Does this help?

Answer 4

Whoa! The universe moves? I only learned how fast the Earth revolves around the sun!

Answer 5

only as fast as it really has to, the universe is a giant entity with few matters of concern other than continuing its existence. therefore it moves in an unhesitant and purposeful way yet with no real sense of urgency maintaining an overall consistent pace so much so it is barely is aware of its self let alone the multitude of movements within its immensity. i think of it much like a titan surfer dude dreaming inside a dream in a moment between moments while riding a crest of a wave which just ceased to exist yet isn't entirely gone yet. though i guess its really a matter of perspective and context, and one's own awareness.

Answer 6

the universe is everything

motion only has meaning relative to something else

driving your car you are going 60 mph relative to the road and the earth, but you are going zero relative to the car, and some very high speed relative to the sun

the universe cannot have motion relative to anything because the universe is everything

so, the universe is motionless

Answer 7

i chosen section 3 ok u might desire to comprehend if question is basic and short then how comes its 2d section exists ok the universe strikes greater advantageous than the value of sunshine i comprehend i comprehend that many won't in simple terms believe e yet i can instruct that yet that's the asnwer of fourth section so dont ask

Answer 8

Universe moves at the really slow speed untill you also cannot see because of its massive weight.It is continue to expand more and more.

Answer 9

As fast as it needs to. But not fast enough to break any laws.

Answer 10

how are we supposed to know..its not like we can just get a stopwatch and say go around the sun as fast as you can