Edwin Hubble’s greatest invention was not an invention at all it was a theory that helped to get other astronomers to acknowledge that there were galaxies beyond what could be seen. Born in 1889 Mr. Hubble became an astronomer later on in life after having a career as a lawyer and fighting in WWI.
Mr. Hubble largest contribution to astronomy was in providing the basis for the big bang theory. Mr. Hubble took great pains to prove his theory that the universe was constantly expanding beyond our own galaxy.
Hubble’s Law
Edwin Hubble walked away from a lucrative law career to pursue a career as an astronomer. He acknowledged that he may never become a famous astronomer but was willing to take the risk because he felt that understanding the galaxy was one of the most important things he could do.
Hubble formed Hubble’s Law by methodically taking pictures of stars he could see in the night sky and mapping them out. By calculating the distance of the stars according to the brightness of the stars Hubble was able to map the distance of stars to show that they were in fact moving outward in an expansion motion.
Hubble’s Law was accepted in 1929. One of the things that came out of the law was a formula that could measure the distance of stars but it also provided a formula that could help to measure the age of the planet earth.
His Error
Hubble made many contributions to astronomy but one major error in his assumptions was that the galaxies were evenly distributed in space. His theory was disproved by several other astronomers. Hubble apparently did not take a lot of pictures of small sectors of the sky and avoided areas around the Milky Way which he labeled an area of avoidance. Had he taken photographs of the sky in its entirety he very likely would not have made the error.
His theory was disproved by other astronomers that took pictures of the sky in its entirety including surrounding the Milky Way. While this major error did not in fact void his other contributions it did make his other findings a bit more suspect. As the father of the Big Bang Theory, Mr. Hubble’s contributions far outweighed his errors.
Mr. Hubble is still considered one of the greatest astronomers of modern times and was posthumously honored when NASA named the most powerful telescope after him in 1989.
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