Download The Universe: “Beyond the Big Bang” Video Questions

Name_____________________________________ Date__________________ Period______
The Universe: “Beyond the Big Bang” Video Questions
1. The Big Bang is the “theory of cosmic ____________.”
2. What is a major problem with the Big Bang theory?
3. The Big Bang theory only deals with the ____________.
4. What is the sun mostly made of?
5. What is the surface temperature of the Sun?
6. When did our Solar System form?
7. How many stars in the Milky Way might have planetary systems like ours?
8. To explain nature, earlier people described celestial bodies like stars and planets as ________.
9. The nighttime sky is basically a large __________.
10. To early astronomers, it appeared that _______ was the center of the Universe.
11. What were the 2 types of stars the Greeks observed, with their two main characteristics?
a. _______________: ___________ and ___________
b. _______________: ___________ and ___________
12. How did Aristotle imagine the Universe looked?
13. What did Ptolemy figure out and predict?
14. Why didn’t Astronomy progress after the collapse of Rome?
15. How many years lapsed between the fall of Rome and renewed interest in Astronomy?
16. What is the Heliocentric universe?
17. What two things did Nicolas Copernicus discover about Earth?
18. What were two of Johannes Kepler’s contributions to the understanding of planetary orbits?
19. What tool (instrument) was invented that changed Astronomy?
20. Give two examples of discoveries made by Galileo using the telescope.
21. Why did Galileo get in trouble with leaders of the Catholic church?
22. Isaac Newton united the theories of Kepler and Galileo into what new theory?
23. Newton’s Book Principia explained how objects _________ on each other.
24. Newton knew that gravity worked but he never ___________ or _____________ it.
25. Albert Einstein revolutionized our understanding of __________ and ____________.
26. Einstein didn’t like the idea of a dynamic, finite universe. He preferred a __________ and
___________ universe.
27. What did Einstein include as part of his theory of General Relativity?
28. Einstein proposed that gravity worked because space and time were ____________ in the
presence of matter.
29. Despite what Einstein believed, his theories led to the idea of a moment of _____________.
30. What was George Lemaître’s profession?
31. What radical idea was Lemaître’s contribution to understanding the universe?
32. Lemaître theorized that the universe came from a ______________ _____.
33. In 1925 the Milky Way galaxy was considered to be the _____________.
34. Edwin Hubble solved the problem of measuring distance between stars by using the
______________ ___________.
35. How far away is the Andromeda galaxy?
36. How many light years might the universe be in size?
37. Hubble revealed that the universe was much _____________ than originally imagined.
38. What was the competing theory of creation of the universe?
39. Hoyle based that theory on the _________ of elements.
40. What is nucleosynthesis?
41. Everything that forms after Helium is __________?
42. Hydrogen is what percentage of the detectable universe?
43. What was the problem with Hoyle’s preferred theory?
44. Who opposed the Steady State theory?
45. Alpher and Herman refined Lemaître’s prediction of detectable remnant ________, left over from
the Big Bang.
46. What was a problem for the Big Bang theory in the 1940s?
47. While conducting satellite communication experiments for Bell Labs, Penzias and Wilson heard
________________________.
48. Where did the sounds that Penzias and Wilson heard originate?
49. What was the “smoking gun” that Penzias and Wilson discovered?
50. In the end, parts of Gamov’s and Hoyle’s theories were shown to be _________.
51. Why is the temperature uniform in space?
52. Guth theorized that the Universe expanded __________________________________.
53. Guth called his theory ________________.
54. What did the WMAP satellite chart?
55. What is expected to happen to our Sun 5 billion years from now?
56. What will happen to the gas giant planets of our solar system, after the Sun’s nebula arrives?
57. What is the newest theory for the destruction of the universe?