Hubble Law or Hubble-Lema\^itre Law? The IAU Resolution

TL;DR

The paper critically examines the IAU's proposal to rename the Hubble law as the Hubble-Lemaître law, highlighting historical and conceptual issues to inform the union's decision.

Contribution

It provides a detailed critique of the historical arguments behind the proposed renaming and offers a more accurate background for the IAU's decision-making process.

Findings

The resolution has significant historical and conceptual flaws.

A critical review of the arguments questions the justification for renaming.

The paper aims to inform the IAU's voting process with a nuanced historical perspective.

Abstract

The Hubble law, widely considered the first observational basis for the expansion of the universe, may in the future be known as the Hubble-Lema\^itre law. This is what the General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union recommended at its recent meeting in Vienna. However, the resolution in favour of a renamed law is problematic in so far as concerns its arguments based on the history of cosmology in the relevant period from about 1927 to the early 1930s. A critical examination of the resolution reveals flaws of a non-trivial nature. The purpose of this note is to highlight these problems and to provide a better historically informed background for the voting among the union's members, which in a few months' time will result in either a confirmation or a rejection of the decision made by the General Assembly.