Since the light from the stars takes so long to get here, how do we know the stars are still there?

Question

Could there be some type of cosmological disaster, that we are still waiting to learn about?

What does Jared mean by this: "we are certain that most of the stars in the universe are indeed dead"?

There is a bible verse that says the stars will fall from the sky...I think that's how it goes. Most, who believe these prophecies, think this predicts comets or meteors hitting the Earth...would it be possible for the stars to simply disappear?

Answer 1

Those are too many questions.

Q1 Are they there?: We don´t know if they’re there.
Q2 Incoming disaster: There could be a disaster. There was a Big Bang once, we suppose. Time could end. Another universe could form.

Q3 “Already dead”: The mysterious Dark Matter could be just dead stars. That’s a huge amount of mass.

Q4 “Stars will fall from the sky”: Yes, there are some biblical references. Rev. 6:13; Mark 13:25. But, Rev 12:4 mentions falling to Earth: “And his tail draweth the THIRD PART OF THE STARS of heaven, and did cast them to the EARTH" —which could be interpreted as a fragmented comet or a meteor shower. Or as a sudden change in Earth rotation, caused by a great impact; stars would seem to fall and we’d be history—.

However, the most probable disaster, I think, would be a neighboring Super Nova. Its cosmic rays would be lethal. And we have no way to know if that has occurred four years ago or whatever it takes.

Answer 2

We don't. But we can see some stars as they were four years ago, others as they were 1000 years ago, others as they were 10000 years. We know that over long periods the stars don't change much, so the chances are most of them are still there.

But every so often a star explodes. Some years later the light from the explosion reaches us. Just before we see the explosion (known as a supernova), we are looking at the star and it no longer exists.

It is exactly the same on earth. We don't see anything as it happens, we see it a tiny amount of time later. When you look at your computer, it might have stopped existing a nanosecond earlier and you wouldn't yet know about it.

Answer 3

We don't know that they are still there. It can take billions of years for the light from objects in space, such as stars, to reach us. If a cosmological disaster has occurred, we will probably see it billions of years after it occurred. However, if something that is significant to the Earth occurs, such as the sun exploding, we would probably notice an immediate change in the force of gravity acting on the Earth.

Answer 4

We don't know if a disaster has happened. Star gazing is a bit like looking back in time. The light be see today left the stars themselves years ago (in most cases before any of us were born). Only future generations will be able to determine if anything astronomically interesting happened to a star in 2007.

Answer 5

We don't. If the star is 100,000 light years away, the light that reaches earth shows what happened 100,000 years ago. That star might very well not be there today. If we see some sort of cosmological disaster, it happened 100,000 years ago.

Answer 6

Of course... We cant even say the sun exists at present. If it had burst, we would take about 8 mts 17 sec to know that by means of light. Light is supposed to be the fastest medium of communication. But there is also the other theory of 'action at a distance' i.e. we should know it immediately since gravity would be affected instantaneously according to this theory. Same with other stars. The final word on 'action at a distance' is not yet said.... its an open debate..

Answer 7

the pure force from the explosion of the closest stars would blow solar winds powerful enough to strip the earth's atmosphere right off. and since we can still breathe air, or atmosphere is still there. we are certain that most of the stars in the universe are indeed dead, but the closer stars are still living. science proves it.

Answer 8

It's possible that the star is not there anymore! Yes, we certainly could have a cosmological disaster coming and we just don't know it!

Answer 9

Your conjectures seem most unlikely but the Sun could have blown up eight minutes ago for all we know.

What we see in thee sky is always what happened then but not what is happening now.

But wasn't it Chicken Little who ran around say "the sky is falling". Lots of things COULD happen but I don't think they are things children should be made to worry about. We have enough worries here already!

Answer 10

We don't.
In 1987 a large star in a galaxy exploded,it took 70,000 years for us to find out about it.
The star was a blue giant that was known to astronomers,I think it was caller Sanduliac, ER somethin.