Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:

>   At the beginning the Universe expanded much more rapidly than c
> (and in fact, that's still happening today). This is not against general
> relativity, as it fully allows this... [etc.]

Something I've always wondered about (and which I've never been able to find an
answer to, in any layman's science book) is this: If space expands (not just the
space *between* objects, but space itself), then at what scale, what microscopic
level, does this process cease? If at all? In other words, does the *relatively*
vast space inside an atom itself--between the nucleus and its electrons--also
expand? If it does, then, since essentially *everything* expands equally, how is
the 'expansion of space' to be measured? (Other than, "Space must be expanding
because the cosmological red-shift relationship shows that it's happening." Or,
"because Einstein's equations say so.")

I find that every time I read about this particular subject, the explanation
seems to be different than the *previous* explanation I've read. :-/ One
particularly vexing explanation is this one (which seems kind of dubious): That
the space between galaxy *clusters* expands, but the space between the galaxies
*in* the cluster doesn't--"because local gravity effects overwhelm the greater
cosmic expansion." That may well be true--from a simple observational
standpoint--but it's no real answer to the more basic question, IMHO.

Ken

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