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From: REM@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU (Robert Elton Maas)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Olber's paradox
Message-ID: <8602210943.AA05597@s1-b.arpa>
Date: Fri, 21-Feb-86 05:30:54 EST
Article-I.D.: s1-b.8602210943.AA05597
Posted: Fri Feb 21 05:30:54 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 24-Feb-86 21:05:28 EST
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Reply-To: REM%IMSSS@SU-SCORE.ARPA
Organization: The ARPA Internet
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(If the number of the Fixt Stars were more than
 finite, the whole superficies of their apparent light would be infinite)

M> Date: Fri, 14 Feb 86 09:53:56 PST
M> From: mcgeer%ji@ucbvax.berkeley.edu (Rick McGeer)
M> Of course, the solution to the above paradox is that the universe
M> expands, and hence the light from the furthest galaxies is redshifted,
M> asymptotically to invisibility, and hence the total illumination of
M> the sky is finite.

Not quite correct, "A" (not "the") solution.

Here's another, not needing redshift, nor even expansion although
needing finite time: It's been a finite time since the Universe
started, thus stars have burnt for only a finite time. Looking back in
time, we see the complete life history up to the present for nearby
stars, but only the early parts for stars further away because more
recent life history hasn't had time to be transmitted to us at the
speed of light. What we observe is a cone of space-time extending back
to the origin of the Universe, a cone of finite space-time volume thus
having only a finite amount of star*years of light-emitting, thus
having only a finite total amount of light we can see. Therefore, even
ignoring inverse-square dimming and redshift dimming, we have a finite
total amount of light in the night sky. The inverse-square and
redshift merely decrease an already-finite amount of light by orders
of magnitude.