In article , "Richard S.
Sternberg" writes:

BTW, Charlier's cosmology apparently leads to an infinite static universe
which does not suffer Olber's paradox.

I haven't heard of that, and I'm quite interested. Could you either provide
a brief synopsis of Charlier's cosmology or provide a current hyperlink.
Thx.

Basically, this is a hierarchical model. Galaxies are grouped into
supergalaxies which in turn are grouped into hypergalaxies etc. This
occurs in such a way that the average density decreases the larger the
volume. It's not viable as a realistic cosmological model, but is an
interesting test case for testing assumptions etc, the exception that
proves the rule.

I believe Harrison discusses it in the book I mentioned previously in
this thread.

(Note: The word "prove" in this old adage means "test", as in the German
"pruefen" (to test) "Pruefung" (test, examination) etc and in the English
"proving ground" (e.g. for testing rockets). I never cease to be amazed
to what extent this is mis-interpreted; some people really think that
exceptions PROVE rules in the more usual sense of the term. There isn't
a German adage "Die Ausnahme prueft die Regel", but there IS "Die
Ausnahme bestaetigt die Regel", which is obviously a translation of the
mis-interpretation of the English adage.

[Mod. note: accented characters, mangled in transmission, turned into
7-bit ASCII digraphs. In general, please try to post in plain ASCII --
Usenet and e-mail are often not 8-bit clean.]

[Mod. note #2: An alternative, and in my view correct, point of view
about this expression is that it means that the fact that an exception
is documented proves *that the rule exists*; for example, in legal
contexts. The German version of the expression seems consistent with
this. See also http://alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fxtheexc.html.
But we wander away from astrophysics -- mjh]