[Solstinox]

"Such large structures should not exist according to one of the guiding principles of astronomy, called the cosmological principle. This states that all matter is spread smoothly across the Universe."

This passage/article doesn't make intuitive sense to me here. What in this physical universe is smoothly spread? Only if you average or look at a massive aggregate level, sure. But at each "zoom level" there should be another non-smooth structure, while things at a smaller level smooth out.

It's more or less fractal all the way up and down.

I don't think this challenges our thinking on the cosmos?

[danparsonson]

To put it crudely, it's about how it started vs how it's going - initial distribution is expected to have been uniform with small fluctuations that over time were exacerbated by gravity resulting in the Universe we see today. A ring of galaxies implies some unexpected very early structure - like seeing shapes in an explosion.

[T-A]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmological_principle