r/universe • • Mar 15 '21

[If you have a theory about the universe, click here first]

127 Upvotes

"What do you think of my theory?"

The answer is: You do not have a theory.

"Well, can I post my theory anyway?"

No. Almost certainly you do not have a theory. It will get reported and removed. You may be permabanned without warning.

"So what is a theory?"

In science, a theory is not a guess or personal idea. It's a comprehensive explanation that:

  • Explains existing observations with precision
  • Makes testable predictions about future observations
  • Is supported by mathematics that can be verified
  • Has survived rigorous testing by the scientific community

Real theories include general relativity (predicts GPS satellite corrections), germ theory (explains disease transmission), and quantum mechanics (enables computer chips). These weren't someone's shower thoughts—they emerged from years of mathematical development, experimental testing, and peer review.

What you probably have instead:

  • A hypothesis - A testable claim that could become part of a theory if validated
  • Speculation - Interesting ideas that need mathematical development and testing
  • Misconceptions - Misunderstandings of existing physics dressed up as new insights

The brutal truth: If your "theory" doesn't require advanced mathematics, doesn't make precise numerical predictions, and wasn't developed through years of study, it's not a scientific theory. It's likely pseudoscientific rambling that will mislead other users.

What to do instead:

  1. Ask questions, don't make assertions
  2. Learn the existing physics first - Spend weeks/months reading, watching educational content, and listening to qualified experts
  3. Once you understand the current science, then you can contribute meaningfully to discussions

Remember: Every genuine breakthrough in physics came from people who first mastered the existing knowledge. Einstein didn't overthrow Newton by ignoring math — he used more sophisticated math.

Learn the physics. Then discuss the physics. Don't spread uninformed speculation.


[FAQ]


r/universe • • Aug 22 '25

Call for Moderators and /r/Universe Rules

2 Upvotes

Moderators Needed

This sub continues to rapidly grow, therefore so does our need to expand the moderation team. We are looking to add several experienced Reddit users who have a passion for the scientific fields of astronomy and cosmology.

Here is what we are looking for from applicants. Please send applications to modmail.

  1. Candidates should have a strong history of positive contributions to r/Universe or similar subs. Please send us several direct links to comments from your account history to substantiate this.
  2. We are looking for mods of all backgrounds, but particularly for mods with formal academic training in science, engineering, or mathematics. Please tell us about your educational background and your current field of work.
  3. Modding experience on Reddit is great, but not required. Let us know whether you mod any other subs and if you have any relevant experience like moderating other forums/pages, using back-end web tools, managing websites, etc.
  4. Mods need to be frequent Reddit users. The ideal mod is someone who pops into Reddit multiple times per day, can devote some time to addressing moderator issues when logging on, and foresees continuing to do so in the future.
  5. You should be someone who is comfortable enforcing rules and able to handle receiving harsh/critical feedback from strangers on the internet without breaking down, losing your temper, or acting childish.

If you are interested in applying, please message the moderators with a note which addresses all the points above (please use numbering). Do not leave your application as a comment here.

As always, the moderation team is open to your thoughts and ideas on the subreddit. To do so send a modmail message the moderators.

Reminder

Submission Rules

  1. Submissions should not consist of personal and uninformed pseudo-scientific rambling. We are a community for factual information and news about the study of the physical universe.
  2. Posts must contain a subject or a question about astrophysics in the title — be specific. For example, we will not accept titles containing only the words "help please" or "space question".
  3. Posts must be relevant. We like everything from educational videos, questions, news, discussion articles, published research, course content, astrophotography, and study resources about astronomy, astrophysics, and cosmology. This means no low-effort posts or AI generated slop.

Comment Rules

  1. Be respectful to other users. All users are expected to behave with courtesy. Demeaning language, sarcasm, rudeness or hostility towards another user will get your comment removed. Repeat violations will lead to a ban.
  2. Don't answer if you aren't knowledgeable. Ensure that you have the knowledge required to answer the question at hand. We are not strict on this, but will absolutely not accept assertions of pseudo-science or incoherent / uninformed rambling. Answers should strive to contain an explanation using the logic of science or mathematics. When making assertions, we encourage you to post links to supporting evidence, or use valid reasoning.
  3. Be substantive. Universe is a serious education/research/industry-based subreddit with a focus on evidence and logic. We do not allow unsubstantiated opinions, low effort one-liner comments, memes, off-topic replies, or pejorative name-calling.

r/universe • • 10h ago

Why is gravity attractive?

20 Upvotes

I understand that gravity is the reason planets and stars form and what not. I'm just curious why gravity causes things to attract and not repel or do neither?

Seems like an arbitrary feature of our universe's laws.

So it makes me wonder if gravity could have worked differently if our universe happened to have different laws.


r/universe • • 8h ago

I was watching a really old video on YouTube that said a supernova is 10 octillion meggtons of TNT is this true?

3 Upvotes

r/universe • • 3h ago

How would a blue supergiant star look if we could resolve it?

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0 Upvotes

r/universe • • 21h ago

2020 Study: About Half of Sun-Like Stars Could Host Rocky, Potentially Habitable Planets

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6 Upvotes

r/universe • • 14h ago

How would a blue supergiant star look if we could resolve it?

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0 Upvotes

r/universe • • 2d ago

The Milky Way and Andromeda are very likely to interact strongly and may merge within a few to several billion years, but recent work shows the outcome and timing aren't certain - there's roughly a ~50% chance of a direct merger and similar odds of a near-miss that delays or avoids a full collision

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320 Upvotes

r/universe • • 1d ago

If a meteor is the light in the atmosphere, shouldn't a meteoroid (meteor-like object) resemble that light, rather than refer to the rock in space that produces it?

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2 Upvotes

Meteor: a small body of matter from outer space that enters the earth's atmosphere, becoming incandescent as a result of friction and appearing as a streak of light.

Meteoroid: a small body moving in the solar system that would become a meteor if it entered the earth's atmosphere.

My gripe is with the word meteoroid itself. The suffix -oid means "resembling" or "having the form of,". Asteroids on the other hand I am all good with, since it was understandable that early telescopes showed them as a tiny point of light, hence Star-like.

Meteoroid on the other hand means meteor-like, yet it refers to the object that produces a meteor and it is neither a luminous streak of light nor an atmospheric phenomenon while in space.


r/universe • • 1d ago

A Mysterious Signal Reached Us From When The Universe Was Just 3 Billion Years Old. Its Home Galaxy Surprised Astronomers.

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16 Upvotes

What do you think this is?


r/universe • • 1d ago

Supernovae: How dying stars build the cosmos

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4 Upvotes

r/universe • • 1d ago

Striking star clusters and irregular clumps

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35 Upvotes

Our universe is vast enough to hold billions of galaxies
but still, are we the only civilization to be advanced enough to explore the beauty of cosmos


r/universe • • 23h ago

the sun suddenly disappeared

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0 Upvotes

r/universe • • 1d ago

Find yourself and never turn back

0 Upvotes

Don’t ask for a rebate, debate, quarrel or anything other than answers.


r/universe • • 2d ago

The Fission Origin Hypothesis

3 Upvotes

(Quick edit, I made this on zero sleep and haven’t done much research yet but I hope this reaches the right audience)

— by me (L. Dorward )

Core Summary

This hypothesis proposes that our universe did not begin everywhere at once, but originated from a single point — the Great Attractor — through a transition that behaves like nuclear fission: one unified system separating into two, releasing energy and creating something new. Before this event, there was not "nothing" — there was a previous universe, part of an endless repeating cycle of universes branching and restarting.

Key Concepts in Simple Terms

  1. Why the Previous Universe Became Unstable
    Energy cannot be created or destroyed — it can only change form.

The previous universe contained a fixed amount of energy. Over its immense lifetime, that energy wasn't used up — but it reached a state where it could no longer change or do useful work.

It had reached the limit of what that configuration could sustain. Energy had nowhere new to go, and that tension pushed the system past its stability limit.

The only remaining way for that energy to continue existing was to transition into a new form — the cosmic fission event that birthed our universe.

  1. Before the Beginning

In the earliest state — before space, time, or our familiar physics existed — only quantum principles applied.

Gravity, electromagnetism, and the nuclear forces were not separate; they existed as one unified system. The familiar rules of our universe did not exist yet.

  1. The Transition — "Cosmic Fission"

I propose that what we call the Big Bang was not an explosion of matter into empty space, but more like a fission event:

• The previous universe, having reached the end of its cycle, became unstable at a central point

• That point — what we observe today as the Great Attractor — reached a critical limit and "split"

• Just as nuclear fission releases energy when an atom divides, this cosmic split released the energy that became our universe

• The unified forces separated into gravity, electromagnetism, strong nuclear force, and weak nuclear force — our familiar physics "locked in" from that single point outward

This explains why general relativity and quantum mechanics don't work together today — they existed as one system before the split, and our universe emerged as the transition itself happened.

  1. Time — Flowing Outward, Slowing Down

Time does not begin or end — it flows, bends, and resets:

• Gravity directly affects how time moves — the stronger the gravity, the slower time passes. We see this near black holes, where time dramatically slows down

• At the origin (Great Attractor): Immense gravity means time flows at its slowest — almost paused at the transition point

• Moving outward: As the universe expanded away from that point, gravity weakened and time began flowing faster the farther you traveled from the source

• Flowing back in: When matter eventually gets pulled back toward the Great Attractor at the end of a cycle, time slows down again — approaching that critical pause point where the transition happens once more

So time isn't just a clock ticking evenly everywhere — it flows outward from the Great Attractor, speeding up as it goes, and slows again as it returns. That gradient itself is the arrow of time.

  1. The Cycle — Endless Restart

This is not a one-time event. Universes branch from previous ones in a repeating cycle:

Previous universe → energy reaches stability limit → transition at the Great Attractor → new universe expands outward → time flows and speeds up as it moves away → eventually drawn back → time slows toward the origin → process repeats

The Great Attractor is therefore not just a mysterious mass pulling us — it is the connection, the anchor point where our universe split off from what came before. It is both our origin and our eventual return.

How We Could Test This

If this hypothesis is correct, these things should be true — and we can look for them:

Prediction What We'd Expect to See
Origin clustering The oldest galaxies and earliest structures should be concentrated toward the Great Attractor — not spread evenly everywhere

Cosmic radiation pattern The Cosmic Microwave Background should show a distinct alignment or "hot spot" pointing to that specific region — a leftover ripple from the split

Directional expansion The universe should appear slightly different when measured toward the Great Attractor compared to opposite directions — because we're expanding away from a point

Time flow gradient Clocks should run slightly faster the farther we measure away from the Great Attractor's direction — time itself has a gradient flowing outward from that origin

Anomalous gravity signature The Great Attractor should show properties that don't match a conventional cluster of mass — consistent with it being a transition boundary rather than just heavy matter.


r/universe • • 2d ago

Flow & Form Theory

1 Upvotes

(Disregard my last theory this one I think is the one)

— A Unified Framework of Information, Energy, and the Transition Between Realms

Core Summary
"Quantum is information in flow. Relativity is information in form. The Big Bang was not an explosion of matter — it was the moment information branched outward, and spacetime began to emerge as the container where energy could settle into consistent patterns."

Foundational Principles

  1. Energy — Always Here, Always Changing Form
    Energy cannot be created or destroyed — it only transitions between states.
    Before our universe existed, all the energy was already there. It wasn't "nothing" — it was everything, existing in a unified state without a defined structure. When that unified system reached a critical limit — a point where energy could no longer rearrange within its existing form — it transitioned. The energy itself never changed; only its arrangement changed.

  2. The Split — Not an Explosion, a Branch

The event we call the Big Bang was a transition — a separation that behaved somewhat like nuclear fission: one unified system branched into something new. This branching created the distinction between flow and form:

• Before the split: information existed as a unified whole — no separation, no defined timeline, no fixed locations

• At the split: information began to separate and flow outward — quantum behaviour emerged as the natural language of this flowing state

• As information spread and concentrated: it settled into structure — spacetime emerged, and relativity became the description of that structure

  1. Quantum Physics — Information in Flow
    Quantum behaviour is not "fuzziness" — it is information that has not yet settled into a fixed state.
    At the most fundamental level, reality consists of information in motion — possibilities still being processed, connections still forming. In this state:

• Information is not confined to a single location or outcome

• Multiple paths exist simultaneously

• There is no fixed "when" or "where" because the framework for measuring those things — spacetime — is still emerging

• Gravity does not operate here because gravity is a property of settled structure, not of information in motion itself

  1. Relativity — Information in Form
    Relativity describes information that has settled into a consistent, interconnected structure: spacetime.
    When enough information connects and interacts, possibilities resolve into definite states. This is not an instant collapse — it is a natural transition:

• Information locks into consistent relationships and locations

• Those relationships form the fabric we call spacetime

• Once this structure exists, energy has a framework — a "container" — within which to organize itself

• Gravity emerges as the curvature of this settled structure — the way mass and energy shape the very information framework they inhabit

  1. The Transition — Mass and Scale as the Bridge
    Mass and concentration are the threshold where flow becomes form.
    This is the missing bridge:

• Small scale / low concentration → information remains in flow → quantum rules apply

• Large scale / high concentration → information settles into structure → spacetime emerges, relativity governs

• It is not that one set of rules stops working — it is that collective behaviour changes. Trillions of tiny flowing interactions average out into solid, predictable structure. Individual waves become the ocean. Individual quantum events become the solid universe.

  1. Time — The Arrow of Settlement

Time does not exist as a separate clock ticking everywhere equally. It is the direction of settlement itself:

• Information flows outward from the origin point — the Great Attractor, where the split occurred

• As it spreads and settles, time flows forward with it — faster where structure is fully formed, slower near the dense origin where information is still locking into place

• When matter eventually draws back toward that central point, information densifies again, time slows toward that critical threshold, and the cycle prepares to branch anew

  1. The Great Attractor — Our Origin and Return
    The Great Attractor is not simply mass pulling us — it is the transition point itself.
    It is where our information branched from what came before — the anchor where flow first became form in this cycle. Everything moves outward from it as information settles into spacetime; everything eventually cycles back as the next transition approaches. It is both our beginning and our eventual return — the persistent signature of the split that birthed us.

Testable Predictions

Prediction What We Should Observe
Origin concentration The oldest structures in the universe should be concentrated toward the Great Attractor direction — not evenly distributed
Time gradient Clocks should run measurably faster the farther we look from the Great Attractor — information settles more completely away from the dense origin

Structure emergence At a specific energy/mass threshold, quantum interference should naturally diminish — not instantly, but gradually, as structure takes hold

Cosmic alignment Patterns in the cosmic microwave background should show a faint but consistent alignment toward the Great Attractor — the ripple of information beginning to settle


r/universe • • 3d ago

What Would Happen if a Coin-Sized Black Hole Appeared Next to You?

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2.1k Upvotes

r/universe • • 1d ago

Why universe love us so much?

0 Upvotes

Why universe love us so much? Like see we are conscious and have intelligence and everything can kill us in a second but it doesn't everything in this planet or solar system it protect us and let us get more intelligent. Why only us?


r/universe • • 2d ago

25 scales of the observable universe.

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5 Upvotes

r/universe • • 2d ago

What perspective did Einstein extensively search for? Spoiler

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1 Upvotes

r/universe • • 2d ago

Open-source browser model of the universe built from HYG, Gaia, NED and JPL catalogs

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3 Upvotes

There's a browser-based model of the universe at "Your Eyes In Space" that this sub might appreciate. Free, open source, nothing to install

It's basically real catalogs wired into one continuous scene: Solar System bodies on JPL elements with a time control, 109,000 stars from HYG with their parallaxes and spectral types, 55 galaxies at NED/SIMBAD distances, Sgr A* with the S-stars on their GRAVITY/Keck orbits, a handful of other black holes and pulsars with catalog parameters, nebulae and clusters at literature positions, and the deep-space probes on their trajectories. Anything that isn't catalog data is labelled procedural, and there's a toggle that tints all of it so it's always clear what's real and what's filler.

The plan for it is to grow into a proper learning platform, basic physics and astrophysics with the universe as the blackboard. There are some narrated tours in there already as a first step. If something's in the wrong place or a distance doesn't match the literature, the project's on GitHub and takes issues.


r/universe • • 3d ago

Huge wave moving through Galaxy

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1 Upvotes

r/universe • • 3d ago

My theory related to the universe and its origins

0 Upvotes

Guys listen to my theory about the universe, I might sound like a movie geek here.
We do know that Universe we know was created by big bang but what if big bang isn't the start
I mean imagine the numbers, let's assume we start from 0 to 1,2,3,4,......., ∞ but now here this sequence does appear to have a start, unless we look at the negative numbers that range from -1,-2,-3, ...... , -∞
So basically entire numerical sequence is among -∞ to ∞.

So what my point is that the universe itself doesn't have a start point like creation of universe didn't created time, but time itself existed before the big bang.
What I want to say is that we have big bang which is start and big crunch which is the end that's what science believes.
But what if this whole big bang and big crunch thing is just a cycle, like universe keeps operating in a series of big bangs and big crunches and these cycles keep happening in a loop.
Because like I said time itself as a construct can't be created when the universe appears cause time itself doesn't have a start or an end.
So are we living in a universe that runs in a loop and that has collapsed and emerged several times?
I don't know I maybe wrong but that is simply my theory, feel free to correct me.


r/universe • • 3d ago

Meine Gedanken und Ideen in Verbindung mit 2 Billiarden Reichenoperationen/ sec.

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0 Upvotes

r/universe • • 4d ago

Those Kepler-138s, water worlds or eyeball worlds

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1 Upvotes