Did Dark Energy Just Disappear? | Space Time | PBS Digital Studios

Did all of dark energy just vanish? A team of scientists have just analyzed new data and claim that we need to completely rethink its existence. This episode is supported by The Great Courses Plus. Go to http://ow.ly/EMoC304OIsh to start your free one month trial.

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Why are we talking about dark energy again? Because another team has just announced a new analysis of updated supernova data. They claim that the data are consistent with there being NO dark energy – no accelerating expansion. They suggest that the universe may just be expanding at a constant rate – never speeding up, but also not slowing down. In this episode, Matt discusses this controversial claim, and whether or not we should throw away nearly twenty years of work on dark energy.

Links to Sources
Marginal Evidence for Cosmic Acceleration from Type Ia Supernovae
J. T. Nielsen, A. Guffanti & S. Sarkar (2016)
http://www.nature.com/articles/srep35596

Statistical hypothesis testing
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statistical_hypothesis_testing

Wolfram error analysis tutorial
https://reference.wolfram.com/applications/eda/ExperimentalErrorsAndErrorAnalysis.html

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