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James Webb Space Telescope reveals that most galaxies rotate clockwise

(www.smithsonianmag.com)
352 points instagraham | 2 comments | 31 Mar 25 10:31 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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keyle ◴[31 Mar 25 10:59 UTC] No.43533500[source]▶
Potentially a very dumb question, but seeing the difference between cyclones and hurricane on earth (clock-wise, anti-clock-wise)...

Does it mean that we are, potentially, on one of two poles(?) of the observable universe, if we're observing most galaxies around us rotating a certain way?

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fennecfoxy ◴[31 Mar 25 12:03 UTC] No.43533969[source]▶
That would be super cool to find out! And then it also begs the question, is there something at the center that unites the two poles? If so then what is it!

It would also imply that our whole universe is rotating - the only reason this happens on Earth is because of our planets rotation and the Coriolis effect.

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thunder-blue-3 ◴[31 Mar 25 12:16 UTC] No.43534093[source]▶
I've been following this news for the past couple of weeks-- in essence your statement is what they are hypothesizing, and that the "something at the center that unites the two poles" might be that we are within a black hole. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_hole_cosmology for the curious.
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1. bencyoung ◴[01 Apr 25 14:50 UTC] No.43547479{3}[source]▶
From what I remembe of Undergrad physics this isn't actually possible. According to GR, within an event horizon, space-like pths become "time-like" which effecitvely means the singularity is unavoidably "in the future". No matter how big a black hole is, you can't just drift around inside it as literally all paths lead downward (hence even light not escaping)

If you were inside a black hole you wouldn't be able to see light from "deeper" because it wouldn't be able to travel towards you.

This is not what we see within the universe, so I don't think we can be inside a black hole

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2. kadoban ◴[01 Apr 25 18:40 UTC] No.43550095[source]▶
All paths _eventually_ lead downward. Is there any limit to how long? Can't we just be near the outside of the blackhole and can't see the doom yet?