He discovered two astroids and another was named after him, oh, and a comet to boot. But the most intriguing aspect is the paradox named after him which tries to answer the world's most asked question, well, the world's second most asked question perhaps. Who is responsible and what is the paradox?

lanfranco

Might that be Heinrich Olbers (1758-1840), who asked why, if stars are distributed evenly, the night sky is dark? http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0836516.html May 02 05, 6:16 PM

peasypod

That would be the one, yays for both you and the Maven. If the universe is infinite in time and space (as logic and common sense would suggest) then, according to Olbers Paradox, the whole nightsky should be infinitely bright (or at least as bright as the surface of the sun). This argument is frequently used by cosmologists in order to justify the 'Big-Bang' theory, but we won't be going into that.... Now, the worlds most asked question is? May 02 05, 6:35 PM

lanfranco

Well, depending on whence and from what culture you come, it could be "What is the meaning of life?" Or, "Where the hell did Cain get his wife?" Then again, Freud supposedly asked, "What do women want?" It seems to me that with a bit of thought, you could combine all three questions into one. May 02 05, 6:53 PM

peasypod

Keeping in conjunction with the physics theme, I was pushing towards "Why is the sky blue?", but yep, all of the above counts too, I guess. May 02 05, 7:07 PM

Arpeggionist

According to the author of "What Einstein Told his Barber" the two most asked questions are "do you love me?" and "how come birds don't get electricuted when they stand on wires?" May 03 05, 1:32 AM