I didn't have the URL for this and the file is too big to post here, but
here are excerpts about this 'new' <HA! where have these guys BEEN??>
pushing force;
...The mutual gravitational attraction of all matter in stars, planets,
and everything else known or hypothesized should be putting a gradual
brake on the outward rush of space since the explosive moment of cosmic
creation in the theorized Big Bang.
The preliminary results of the search are now in, and they are stunning.
The expansion of the universe appears to be accelerating, instead of
decelerating.
...the astronomers are increasingly confident that they have detected the
first strong evidence that the universe is permeated by a repulsive
force, the opposite of gravity. The simplest explanation, other
astrophysicists agree, is that the force is something called the
cosmological constant.
As conceived by theorists, this force is a property of the vacuum of
space itself, an energy that acts on a large scale to stretch space and
thus counteract gravity's restraining power.
Dr. Brian Schmidt, of the Mount Stromlo and Siding Spring Observatory,
in Australia, said in an interview reported in the current issue of the
journal Science that his team concluded with a statistical confidence of
between 98.7 and 99.9 percent that cosmic expansion is receiving an
antigravity boost, presumably from energy of the cosmological constant.
...The cosmological constant as a repulsive energy force may exist, after
all. Physicists can think of no known principle to forbid it. Indeed,
theories of quantum mechanics suggest that the energy of the cosmological
constant could come from "virtual particles," which may be winking in and
out of existence in empty space.
Tuesday, March 3, 1998 - Copyright 1998 The New York Times
-- Jerry W. Decker / jdecker@keelynet.com http://keelynet.com / "From an Art to a Science" Voice : (214) 324-8741 / FAX : (214) 324-3501 KeelyNet - PO BOX 870716 - Mesquite - Republic of Texas - 75187