Questions to a cosmologist

Edwin Hubble observed the motions of 24 galaxies. You extrapolated from the motions of 24 galaxies to the universe as a whole. Do you think these 24 galaxies are representative of the universe as a whole?

In order to generalize to the universe as a whole your sample must be representative. But your sample is not representative.

So you make the hidden assumptions that the universe is made of galaxies only and galaxies in the observable universe constitute a representative sample. These assumptions are not justified. Do you agree? If not, how do you justify these assumptions?

In order to know if your sample is representative of the whole, you need to know the whole, that is, you need to know the total number of galaxies in the universe. But you don’t know this. And you can never know it. The reason is simple. There is a part of the universe from where no light reaches us. So there is no information coming to us from that part of the universe. This means that, by definition, you don’t know, and you can never know, the universe as a close system in its totality. Being a scientist is to acknowledge this fact. Being a cosmologist is not having the honesty to admit this fact. Do you agree?

If it is true that no information is coming from a part of the universe, and this is true, then how can you claim that Big Bang was the beginning of the universe as a whole, everything that exists?

So, you observed 24 galaxies, you defined those 24 galaxies to be a representative sample, then you extrapolated linearly to 14 billion years. And you want me to believe that this absurd chain of reasoning is good science.

Here’s a good analogy of your absurd chain of reasoning: Assume that you took 24 measurements of temperature in New York’s Central Park. It was 10 am and temperature was rising. You then extrapolated linearly to 24 hours and you concluded that in 24 hours Central Park will reach temperatures hotter than the center of the sun. Or you extrapolate linearly backwards and conclude that 24 hours ago Central Park was as cold as South Pole.

You see that by extrapolating linearly from small data you can arrive at absurd conclusions. People will laugh at your predictions of temperature at Central Park because your conclusions will be disproved quickly. But when you make a ridiculous linear extrapolation from 24 galaxies to 14 billion years ago no one can confirm or disprove your absurd conclusions.

The temperature does not rise and fall linearly. It varies as a sine wave. But you assume that the most complicated system that exists, the universe as a whole, varies linearly to conform to your linear extrapolation to 14 billion years.

You need to know the cycle of the whole to extrapolate but you don’t know the whole. So what do you do? You assume the whole and then you claim to know the whole. This is called circular reasoning. No new knowledge is obtain from circular reasoning.

As a cosmologist, you are guilty of circular reasoning, anthropocentric reasoning and silly extrapolation and then you claim that cosmology is science.