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It is an intersting reflection on the general climate throught beforethr 20th century that no one had suggested that the universe was expanding or contracting.It was generally accepted that either the universe had existed forever in an unchanging state, or that it had been created at a finite tike in the past more or less as we observe it ioday .Even those who realised that Newton's theory of gavity showed that the universe could not be staticdidnot by making the graviational force repulsive at very large distances .This did not significiant this didnot significiantly affect their productions of the motions of the planets,but it allowed an infinite distribution of stars to remain in equilibrim -with the attractive forces between near by stars balanced by the repulsive forces from those that were farther away.However we now believe such an the attractive forces so that the stars would continue to fall toward each other.On the other hand,if the stars got a bit farther away from each other the repulsive forces would dominate and drive them farther apart.