Steady State Theory

Ppl were sceptics about the beginning of the universe. So they tried to develop a theory to avoid this conclusion. And so borns the steady state theory (1948, Hermann Bondi and Thomas Gold).

The idea was that as galaxies moved away from earth other, new galaxies were continually forming in the gaps, from new matter that was continually created. The universe would therefore look roughly the same at all times as well as at all points in space. 

This idea required a modification of GR to allow for continual creation of matter, but the rate that was involved was so low that it was not in conflict with experiment. 

It was a good scientific theory. 

A prediction was that the number of galaxies or similar objects in any given volume of space should be the same wherever and whenever we look in the universe. In late '50 and early '60 a survey of sources of radio waves from the outer space was carried out at Cambridge by a group of astronomers. 

They showed that most of these radio sources must lie outside our galaxy and also that there were many more weak sources than strong ones. They interpreted the weak sources as being the more distant ones, and the stronger ones as being nearer. Then there appeared to be less common sources per unit volume of space for the nearby sources than for the distant ones. This could mean that we are at the center of a great region in the universe in which the sources are fewer than elsewhere. Alternatively, it could mean that the sources were more numerous in the past, at the time that the radio waves left on their journey to us, than they are now. Either explanation contradicted the predictions of the steady state theory. 

Moreover, the discovery of the microwave radiation by Penzias and Wilson in 1965 also indicated that the universe must have been much denser in the past. The steady state theory therefore had to be abandoned.