Not so fast:
The DESI 2024 hint for dynamical dark energy is biased by low-redshift supernovae
'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
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Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#92Lots of non-paywalled coverage out there in the mainstream press, eg: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/mar/19/dark-energy-...
The Guardian is now paywalled. ... Hmmm not exactly - there's a page overlay which can be clicked past or something.
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why would you be concerned? Earth and everything living on it will be long dead by then, and probably gone and swallowed by the sun. And maybe the Sun dies before that, too. So what would be particularly concerning about merging of our galaxy with another one?
> Earth and everything living on it will be long dead by then How do you know? It's not far fetched to think that, if humans don't go extinct in the meantime, they will continue to find ways to shape the world according to their needs. By the time the Sun goes red giant, we may well have found a way to alter the orbit of Earth. By the time the Sun goes supernova, we may be able to move to another star. Who knows. But…
I don't think climate change, even if it lives up to the most alarmist of predictions will make humanity extinct. We'll all be gone regardless of that. A functioning civilization is composed of humans (at least in our case), and every generation of humans must have as its first priority the task of making more humans to replace the oldest (dying) generation. The fertility rate is sub-replacement, the effects of a demographic implosion cause more fertility rate issues, not less, and so that will accelerate. Too neurotic to have sex and make babies. Climate change wasn't what you needed to tackle after all.
We don't even survive for centuries.
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#94Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Still, we’ve got a little while to go before star formation can no longer occur. Some estimates put the star formation period from 1 to 100 trillion years. I’d be more concerned about our collision course with the Andromeda Galaxy in four to five billion years.
Like two gas clouds colliding, not like two cars colliding.
like two flammable gas clouds colliding perhaps. Literally one of the most energetic processes in the known universe, with 100x the rate of star formation.
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Earth and everything living on it will be long dead by then How do you know? It's not far fetched to think that, if humans don't go extinct in the meantime, they will continue to find ways to shape the world according to their needs. By the time the Sun goes red giant, we may well have found a way to alter the orbit of Earth. By the time the Sun goes supernova, we may be able to move to another star. Who knows. But…
> How do you know? Hmm, yes, I don't. I just honestly don't get why that galaxy collision is concerning. What's the concern? For whom? Four billion years is very, very long compared to humankind's evolutional history. Homo may be 2 My old, that's 1% of the time it takes the sun to rotate a single time around the center of the galaxy. Sol completed already ~20 rotations since it exists. Homo's whole history is 1/2000t…
I wish there way to stop this bus and let all of the edgy nihilists off.
They said more concerning than the end of star formation. That doesn't mean they are losing sleep over it.
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
I too enjoyed Unsong, but I've never gone back and reread it because I found the chapter about The Broadcast so haunting.
It is a very well written, truly horrible chapter. It doesn't have a huge bearing on the story, so can be skipped - and I think a lot of people probably should.
I didn't have much interest in reading this book until I read this comment.
To Amazon!
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How do you know? Hmm, yes, I don't. I just honestly don't get why that galaxy collision is concerning. What's the concern? For whom? Four billion years is very, very long compared to humankind's evolutional history. Homo may be 2 My old, that's 1% of the time it takes the sun to rotate a single time around the center of the galaxy. Sol completed already ~20 rotations since it exists. Homo's whole history is 1/2000t…
I wish there way to stop this bus and let all of the edgy nihilists off. They said more concerning than the end of star formation. That doesn't mean they are losing sleep over it.
:-)
Existence, universe, galactic processes and time scales are very fascinating. I do loose sleep over it, but because it is impossible to grasp, so marvellous and unlikely. And it is treated like shit by too many of my fellow earthlings. My worries are much closer and much more concrete than a galaxy collision, and I think much more urgent.
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#99> If dark energy really is Einstein’s constant, the standard model portends a bleak future: The universe will keep speeding up, forever, becoming darker and lonelier. Distant galaxies will eventually be too far away to see. All energy, life and thought will be sucked from the cosmos. The laws of thermodynamics pretty much guarantees this anyways does it not?
The laws of thermodynamics are statistical laws, not fundamental laws. On a long enough timescale entropy might reverse
Re: 'More than a hint' that dark energy isn't what astronomers thought
#100An interesting part from a different article mentioned here in the comments: The results do not meet the so-called five-sigma threshold of statistical certainty that is the gold standard in physics for claiming a discovery. But many in the collaboration have shifted in recent months from a position of scepticism to confidently backing the finding. Source: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2025/mar/19/dark-energy-..…
As a former astronomer, one thing to highlight here is that statistical uncertainties aren't usually all that important in assessing how likely a result in astronomy is to be true. The main issue you grapple with in the field are your systematic uncertainties. When you report your uncertainty, it always is an uncertainty in the context of some model. However, if certain assumptions that your models have made are wron…
interesting, thanks. I can't edit my old comment, but my original intention wasn't to discredit the news, or the study. I will word my comments better in the future.