Dear Michael Helland:

"Michael Helland" wrote in message
...
On Mar 20, 12:36 pm, wrote:


Here's a bonafide crackpot idea.

The Big Bang and expansion of space is an
illusion.

.... good so far ...

We look at light coming from a far away place.

We notice it takes longer to get here than it ought to.

We can't know that. What we see is that:
- wavelengths are longer than they should be
- intensity is in agreement with red shift
- duration of characteristic events is redshifted similarly to
the wavelength

As if light slows down on its way here.

.... No ...

But because of relativity, we don't allow that.

.... No, Maxwell shows that the speed of light is a constant. And
try as we might, light is so smart that it remembers to reflect
in such a way that its two-way light speed is always c. So not
"because of relativity", but because it agrees with Nature *here*
and *now*.

So, instead we say it takes longer because
space expands.

But that's sort of silly.

Only because you made a mistake.

What's really happening is light just slows down.

Relativity breaks down at certain distances.

If you are interested in cosmology, you might read these pages:
http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/cosmo_01.htm
.... that way you can know what the observations *are*.

David A. Smith