PieFedRegarding the dark energy debate/question, has anyone factored for the output of the stars themselves?
Disclaimer: I know enough about astronomy to know that I know pretty much nothing.
As dark energy was explained to me, it is a placeholder in the equation(s) for measuring the expansion of the universe. Rephrasing, we know the universe is expanding but we can’t account for some amount of the force involved.
I hope I am making sense and I am not too far out in the weeds.
To my question: all of the stars are blasting out not just photons but also substantial amounts of physical matter in various states (gas, plasma, solid) that also includes material from the various objects in the solar system (eg atoms of water from mars). Wouldn’t that mixture of massless photons and physical material have some significant influence on everything else?
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The universe is expanding. The rate at which it’s expanding is increasing. It should be increasing a lot more; something is holding it back, some kind of energy. We have no clue what that energy is or where it comes from because we can’t detect it. We only it know it has to exist because nothing else makes the equation balance. Since we don’t know anything about it other than it (theoretically) exists, we call it “dark” energy.
Relativity tells us that matter and energy are equivalent. Therefore, all energy has a corresponding particle. Particles have mass. All things with mass are “matter”. We have no information about the matter corresponding to dark energy, we only know it (theoretically) exists. Since we don’t know anything about it, we call it “dark” matter.