From LEN HUGHES
Your interview with cosmologist Fred Hoyle (“The space molecule man”, 10
September) touched on two issues which could be of crucial significance to the
development of cosmology over the next decade. In fact they could well lead to
the reinstatement of the “steady state” model at the forefront cosmology.
Firstly, Hoyle correctly takes the view that the black body microwave
radiation is not unique to big bang cosmology despite the fact that it was
predicted by Gamov and his associates during the 1940s as a relic of the big
bang in an expanding universe.
The observed background radiation can equally well be generated by a
distribution of discrete sources in an expanding universe. Hoyle failed to
point this out during the 1960s, and played into the hands of the big bang
cosmologists. However, since that time he has changed his views on the manner
in which matter could enter his model universe, preferring the rate of entry
to increase with the strength of the gravitation field in any locality.
In this way quasars can have their use in steady state cosmology, as they
would make excellent entry points for newly created matter, provided of course
that they were not massive black holes, which would then trap the newly
created matter, preventing it from being used in the manner required in steady
state cosmology.
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This brings us to Hoyle’s second issue, namely, that there is no real
evidence for the existence of black holes anyway, only dense distributions of
matter generating intense gravitational fields. In Hoyle’s model universe
black holes cannot exist because they are being prevented from doing so by the
continuous creation of matter.
It is difficult to understand Hoyle’s need for iron whiskers to generate
the microwave background in his model universe when he admits a few lines
further on that there would be continuous bursts of gamma rays. Surely such
gamma rays continually created via a black body emitter could account for the
microwave background in his expanding model universe?
Hoyle’s reluctance to believe in black holes could well be the beginning of
the revival of steady-state cosmology because both the continuous creation of
matter and the microwave background could be accounted for, provided the
continuous creation process was not limited to hydrogen atoms.
