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Articles

Astrophysics & the Question of Sample Size

Michael Philips on the search for cosmic laws and theories.

Anyone familiar with the problem of induction has reason to worry about our theories of the origins of the universe. After all, the universe is unimaginably large and unimaginably old. Comparatively speaking, the part we occupy is exceedingly small and the time we have been observing it is exceedingly short. Yet some of us claim to know what happened when the universe was 10^-35 of a second old.

According to these people, our discovery of these events is among the most astonishing achievements of our species.

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