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Dark matter and dark energy

Another inscrutable thing is dark matter and dark energy. The universe seems to consist of 95% of this. So everything we see in the universe is only 5% of all matter and energy. So there's a lot more that we don't see.

The discoverer of this was Fritz Zwicky.

How did this Zwicky come to this conclusion?

He looked at several clusters of galaxies and came to the conclusion that the rotation speed of these galaxies around a common center of gravity was much too high. You can compare that to swinging a bucket of water around. If you know the breaking strength of the rope and the amount of water, you can calculate at what rotational speed the rope will break. Astronomers can apply the same to our galaxy. Only that doesn't happen with our galaxy. The stars on the edge don't fly out. The rope is much stronger than calculated. How is this possible? The explanation Zwicky gave was that there was an invisible force beyond that of the black hole at the center of our solar system. A force invisible, undetectable and throughout the universe. And it held the galaxy together. In his time, Zwicky was scorned. In addition, it was also a rather unpleasant type. He made few friends, rather many enemies. He was what is nowadays called “not socially skilled”. That can sometimes be very inconvenient in life.

Still, I have great admiration for him. By the way, sometimes I even think I look like him. It's also hard for me to sell my ideas and I don't make friends easily either.

Yet his ideas are now widely accepted but not understood at all. It remains a mystery. Even though CERN (European laboratory for particle research in Geneva) is doing its very best to solve the riddle of all riddles.

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