This is the announcement that was being hyped up in that aliens or time-travel thread a few days ago.

The announcement is that the scientists who were studying gravitational waves found gravitational waves. This was perhaps a bit overhyped.

To be fair, it's a very big experiment and it's nice that they got it all to work. They also found more gravitational waves than expected.

  • quarrk [he/him]
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    edit-2
    1 year ago

    It’s monumental for astrophysics I think. Just not to the layperson or even physicists outside astronomy. Though honestly, sometimes monumental events are only clearly visible as such in hindsight. If Hubble himself announced the discovery of the expanding universe today, it would be met with a similar “So what?” response because it really doesn’t mean a lot in everyday life, but it means everything for cosmology and astrophysics.

    To be clear, I agree it was a bit overhyped.