Is the Universe Homogeneous on Large Scales?

Abstract

This contribution is the affirmative side of a debate held with Dr. L. Pietronero at Princeton in June, 1996. I present the observational evidence that the fractal behavior which characterizes the small scale galaxy distribution does not continue to arbitarily large scale, but has a well defined cutoff with an outer length scale of order 30h$^{-1}$ Mpc. For example, plots of the IRAS 1.2 Jy survey exhibit a very clear approach to homogeneity on large scale, in complete contradiction to the endless fractal model.

11 pages Latex with 1 postscript figure. To be published in ``Critical Dialogues in Cosmology'' ed. N. Turok. Postscript also available at ftp://coma.berkeley.edu/pub/mdavis/pu250.ps.gz