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Not really. They hadn't put this data together before. Now they did, and they found the ring. The conclusions about other galaxies are also based on data. It's
by bdr 17y ago
Not really. They hadn't put this data together before. Now they did, and they found the ring. The conclusions about other galaxies are also based on data. It's not like anyone had previously said that there is no such ring around the solar system, the data just wasn't there.
- roundsquare 17y agoSure, but I guess my point is that we had only indirect data about the fringe of our solar system before, and now that we have more direct data (i.e. actually sending a satellite out there) we discover something pretty big. The data we have about further away galaxies is even more indirect and the light we get from them is subject to any number of possible phenomena we may not have accounted for. The level of confidence about the conclusions we draw though seems way to high given that its clear there are phenomena we don't know about.