Einstein was not sure if the universe was expanding, contracting or static. He famously had a constant he could use to change this:
“…Einstein’s cosmological constant, is a coefficient that Albert Einstein initially added to his field equations of general relativity.
Einstein introduced the constant in 1917 to counterbalance the effect of gravity and achieve a static universe, which was then assumed. Einstein’s cosmological constant was abandoned after Edwin Hubble confirmed that the universe was expanding.”
Son_of_Macha@lemmy.cafe 14 hours ago
He didn’t Hubble did, Einstein had trouble accepting it.
Blue_Morpho@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
Hubble proved it but it was also in Einstein’s equations. He thought his equations should balance so he added a fudge factor. That fudge factor was the experimentally proved Hubble Constant. Without the fudge factor, the universe expands.
gnutrino@programming.dev 12 hours ago
Einstein’s fudge factor was the Cosmological Constant, since revived as an explanation of the unexpected acceleration of the expansion of the universe. Hubble’s Constant is the current rate of expansion of the universe.
shane@feddit.nl 13 hours ago
I thought that without the fudge factor the universe collapses?
AlbertEinstein@lemmy.world 13 hours ago
Hubble’s and Lemaître’s mathematics is correct, but the physics is abominable.