The Scale of the Universe – Great Debate in 1996
The Scale of the Universe – Great Debate in 1996 Debate Proceedings Six published papers from the 1996 debate which appeared in the 1996 December Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. Included are the two introductory talks, an opening by the organizers, and a closing by the moderator. The Scale of the Universe […] The post The Scale of the Universe – Great Debate in 1996…
In April 1920, Harlow Shapley and Heber D. Curtis held the first debate over the scale of the universe at the Smithsonian's Natural History Museum in Washington, DC. Nearly six decades later, in April 1996, Sidney van den Bergh and Gustav A. Tammann revisited the same topic in the same auditorium. The 1996 debate focused on the ongoing controversy surrounding the determination of Hubble's constant, the expansion rate of the universe.
Recent observations from both space-based and ground-based telescopes have led to two distinct camps, each championing different values for Hubble's constant. At the 1996 Scale of the Universe debate, representatives from both sides outlined their arguments to support their respective positions on the number's implications for the size and age of our universe.
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