There might be no Big Bang?

[Picturesque Orion]

the big bang is just an idea left in place for lack of a better concept. nothing more and much less than a true theory.

You are wrong.

The Big Bang has been accepted as a theory by the Scientific Community for a number of well known reasons.

The Big bang holds enough observable data and consequences, also evidence, experiment, research and observation to be accepted as a mathematical and scientifical theory. And this is to not say much more.

sunnnz, please turn your Caps Lock off before making your next pot, thank you.

What pot?

Edited February 18, 2008 by Alex01

[Torgo]

I again point to the age of the earth and universe thread where I did my best to explain how we get the age of the universe - it includes most of the evidence for the big bang.

http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/forum...howtopic=119058

[Alondro]

My biggest question is, why did it go 'bang' in the first place? This little dot of everything was just sitting there forever and ever, and suddenly it went KA-BOOM!

No no no, we're still missing something crucial in the process. What was the trigger? That's the most important piece of the puzzle.

I suspect the universal acceleration of expansion is the answer. A 'Big Rip' would create a region of absolute vaccum; a place devoid of everything, including space and time. It's mere conjecture since i'm not a physicist and can't even begin to fathom the equations, but I wonder if the universe's abhorrence of a vaccum (ie, virtual particles) might go even further once an absolute void appeared... the opposite of an utter void being an utterly dense singularity or a new expansion of new matter; a new universe explodes into being to fill in this gap forming as space time beings to fragment, this total void that the quantum fabric cannot allow to exist because infinite nothingness may actually be something that the very nature of universal structure forbids from existing.

This would seem to violate the First Law of Thermodynamics, but no matter how you look at it, the First Law is violated by the Big Bang, because one way or another, the universe came from something that either burst into existance from nothingness or was there forever. It's quite unfathomable for our finite minds!

We can't really even calculate something like this, because how can you assign a value to utter nothingness? What properties would 'nothing' have! If you put infinite nothingness into an equation, all teh values become zero or infinite negatives!

Then there's the other weird question of what was the universe expanding into? Space-time was expanding... what was beyond its edge? Nothing? It sounds funny to think about it, but the key to everything is to prove nothing!

[Picturesque Orion]

My biggest question is, why did it go 'bang' in the first place? This little dot of everything was just sitting there forever and ever, and suddenly it went KA-BOOM!

No no no, we're still missing something crucial in the process. What was the trigger? That's the most important piece of the puzzle.

There is no consensus about how long the Big Bang phase lasted: for some writers this denotes only the initial singularity, for others the whole history of the universe. Usually at least the first few minutes, during which helium is synthesised, are said to occur "during the Big Bang".

The early hot, dense phase is itself referred to as "the Big Bang", and is considered the "birth" of our universe. Based on measurements of the expansion using Type Ia supernovae, measurements of temperature fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background, and measurements of the correlation function of galaxies, the universe has a calculated age of 13.7 ± 0.2 billion years. The agreement of these three independent measurements strongly supports the ΛCDM model that describes in detail the contents of the universe.

I suspect the universal acceleration of expansion is the answer. A 'Big Rip' would create a region of absolute vaccum; a place devoid of everything, including space and time. It's mere conjecture since i'm not a physicist and can't even begin to fathom the equations, but I wonder if the universe's abhorrence of a vaccum (ie, virtual particles) might go even further once an absolute void appeared... the opposite of an utter void being an utterly dense singularity or a new expansion of new matter; a new universe explodes into being to fill in this gap forming as space time beings to fragment, this total void that the quantum fabric cannot allow to exist because infinite nothingness may actually be something that the very nature of universal structure forbids from existing.

In the most common models, the universe was filled homogeneously and isotropically with an incredibly high energy density, huge temperatures and pressures, and was very rapidly expanding and cooling. Approximately 10−35 seconds into the expansion, a phase transition caused a cosmic inflation, during which the universe grew exponentially.After inflation stopped, the universe consisted of a quark-gluon plasma, as well as all other elementary particles.Temperatures were so high that the random motions of particles were at relativistic speeds, and particle-antiparticle pairs of all kinds were being continuously created and destroyed in collisions. At some point an unknown reaction called baryogenesis violated the conservation of baryon number, leading to a very small excess of quarks and leptons over antiquarks and anti-leptons—of the order of 1 part in 30 million. This resulted in the predominance of matter over antimatter in the present universe.

This would seem to violate the First Law of Thermodynamics, but no matter how you look at it, the First Law is violated by the Big Bang, because one way or another, the universe came from something that either burst into existance from nothingness or was there forever. It's quite unfathomable for our finite minds!

The Universe is existence itself. The Universe is everything that exists and everything that does not exist. The Universe is everything that exists, has existed and will exist.

Then there's the other weird question of what was the universe expanding into? Space-time was expanding... what was beyond its edge? Nothing? It sounds funny to think about it, but the key to everything is to prove nothing!

The Observable Universe does not have an edge. Let's use the balloon explenation for this one. Let's take an inflated and expanding balloon.

An ant travelling on the surface of a balloon will never reach an edge. In the worst case it will return to its starting point.

Anyhow, you can't really compare a balloon with the Universe! So I'll explain it like this:

The Universe is everything in existence, consisting of time, space, matter, energy, etc....., so you could say the universe is everything, now tell me, can everything have a center? I hope your answer isn't yes. The Universe being everything is being infinite. For example picture a shape of infinite size in your mind, something infinite does not have a shape right? Something to have a center must have a shape and an edge, but the universe being everything in existence is infinite, no? So it can't have a center or edge. The Universe cannot have a shape!

Point is, the universe being everything in existence is so, infinite. Something infinite cannot have a shape (try to picture a shape of infinite size in your mind), and so the Universe having no shape has no center or edge.

I know it's a bit complicated.

Edited February 19, 2008 by Alex01

[Sorin Cezar]

http://www.elkadot.com/relativity/

Dear all,

It seems that a ,,common sense” explanation of relativity represent only a dream in some imaginative minds.

Appearances are generally deceptive. At http://www.elkadot.com/relativity/ there are some texts about relativity and their common sense interpretation. The explanations are simple and use only Euclidian space combined with limited light velocity .

Best regards,

Sorin

[MarkSteven]

space is more than just 3 dimensions, even Einstein talks about that. if an observer on earth is viewing the movement of the stars and these starts appear to be moving outward from the observer, what time frame are they viewing these stars, a couple hundred years. that's weak considering the age of everything. how about their directions, they appear to move out but what exact direction and path, how long were they on this path. there isn't enough evidence to prove anything so they dream up an educated guess calling it a theory. some of it is on track but the rest is just speculation and we may never know.

the shear scale of the universe isn't something that we can comprehend, the fact that we don't even know what dark matter is proves that we know very little of what's really going on. but this is what makes the search interesting, there's always something new to look for.

edit, i just thought of this - if there was a big bang, why is there so much in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field? one would think that there would be less stuff the farther you go outward. so even if the stuff that we can observe is moving outward, we still can't say where it all started.

Edited February 20, 2008 by MarkSteven

[lostinamysteriousworld]

I JUST LOVE THREDS IN ALL CAPS!!!! (sarcasm)

[Torgo]

space is more than just 3 dimensions, even Einstein talks about that. if an observer on earth is viewing the movement of the stars and these starts appear to be moving outward from the observer, what time frame are they viewing these stars, a couple hundred years. that's weak considering the age of everything. how about their directions, they appear to move out but what exact direction and path, how long were they on this path. there isn't enough evidence to prove anything so they dream up an educated guess calling it a theory. some of it is on track but the rest is just speculation and we may never know.

the shear scale of the universe isn't something that we can comprehend, the fact that we don't even know what dark matter is proves that we know very little of what's really going on. but this is what makes the search interesting, there's always something new to look for.

edit, i just thought of this - if there was a big bang, why is there so much in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field? one would think that there would be less stuff the farther you go outward. so even if the stuff that we can observe is moving outward, we still can't say where it all started.

I take issue with you calling the models produced by observing the motions of stars and galaxies speculative. What possible reason would there be for the universe to LOOK like everything is expanding when that isn't really the case?

As for the Hubble Deep Field - you are suffering from the most common misconception of the big bang. The theory is NOT AT ALL that there was some dense kernel of matter that exploded. The idea is that in the distant past the universe was in a very hot and dense state, and that since that time space has expanded and the distances between any two given points have expanded (gravity overcomes this on small scales but on scales larger than galaxies the expansion usually wins). As near as we can tell matter was always embedded in space and space has been pretty well homogenous throughout the history of the universe.

I again refer people back to the age of the universe thread. It contains a lot of the evidence for the big bang.

[War Eagle]

The difference between a fact, a theory and a hypothesis is really important one, and one that would clear up all manner of misunderstandings on this board. Lets not forget that something can be a fact and a theory at the same time. Take gravity - that it exists is a fact, the best reason we can come up with as to why is a theory.

Hows that possible Emma; something can be fact & theory at the same time?

You have a theory and it remains a theory until such time that it becomes an established fact, be it scientific or whatever(?)

_{I'm sensing a conspiracy theory looming behind all this anyway...}

[Atheist God]

I thought THE BIG BANG was/has always been a ''theory'' a ''hypothesis'' if ya like.

What makes anyone think it's ''factual'' anyway?

Observation and math that fit the theory.

space is more than just 3 dimensions, even Einstein talks about that. if an observer on earth is viewing the movement of the stars and these starts appear to be moving outward from the observer, what time frame are they viewing these stars, a couple hundred years. that's weak considering the age of everything. how about their directions, they appear to move out but what exact direction and path, how long were they on this path. there isn't enough evidence to prove anything so they dream up an educated guess calling it a theory. some of it is on track but the rest is just speculation and we may never know.

Well Einstein didn't believe in quantum physics either... also he said there were 4 not 3 but who's counting right?

While you may choose not to accept valid science due to ignorance we puny humans know a lot more about how things work then in Einsteins time. The scientific community accepts the big bang theory as fact and merely call it theory to be politically correct.

[MarkSteven]

observing the motions of stars and galaxies speculative

i did not say that, i said that in our lifetimes of observing, we can not say where it all started. so far we have only been able to view a very small bubble of our local universe. we can not say logically that "this is the way it is and there is no other explanation"

we do know more then Einstein did, are we so sure, he just died before he could complete his work, work that will never end. but even those theories are just a scratch on the surface. the reason we search, learn and grow. if everything was answered there would be no debate, everyone would just agree with one another.

for one thing, science often proves itself wrong, then a correction is made. so we'll see in 500 million years, who knows what we will have found out. oh wait, what's the life of the sun btw lol.

big bang = the very start of existence of our universe, "the world is flat" is also what we used to think.

as for the Hubble comment, the scientific community had no idea the Ultra Deep Field would have so much in it, millions of galaxies per square inch. mind boggling, we have a lot to learn.

[I Am Will]

do believe there are 8 dimensions calculated with string theory

there are surely an infinite number of possibilities other than the big bang? i believe it will be very difficult for us to prove what actually happened or happens as it may occur frequently in other dimensions. so i wouldnt bank 100% that the big bang occured

it is merely the conclusion from the evidence we have now.

Edited February 21, 2008 by I Am Will

[War Eagle]

Observation and math that fit the theory.

Well Einstein didn't believe in quantum physics either... also he said there were 4 not 3 but who's counting right?

While you may choose not to accept valid science due to ignorance we puny humans know a lot more about how things work then in Einsteins time. The scientific community accepts the big bang theory as fact and merely call it theory to be politically correct.

As i tried to explain earlier (i'm thinking only MID & Waspie may have picked up on it(?)...They're not actually basing the Big Bang on ''theory'' but a ''hypothesis'' according to Encarta® World English Dictionary & correct me if i'm wrong here but that would make it even less credible as a scientific fact eh? So therefore we're expected to believe in something thats really nothing more than scientific imagination?

[Picturesque Orion]

So therefore we're expected to believe in something thats really nothing more than scientific imagination?

It's not just scientific imagination.

Rebel, a theory, or a hypothesis if you want to call it, which provides observable evidence and data is not just scientific imagination. We find evidence and observable evidence of the Big Bang in every corner of the Universe where we look, also by the methods of research and scientific investigation.

[War Eagle]

It's not just scientific imagination.

Rebel, a theory, or a hypothesis if you want to call it, which provides observable evidence and data is not just scientific imagination. We find evidence and observable evidence of the Big Bang in every corner of the Universe where we look, also by the methods of research and scientific investigation.

I understand Alex...but the Big Bang is not as yet 'proven fact', right? but still remains a theory & or hypothesis?

lol! those two words are getting a hammering in here lol!

Theory:

1. rules and techniques: the body of rules, ideas, principles, and techniques that applies to a subject, especially when seen as distinct from actual practice

economic theories.

2. speculation: abstract thought or contemplation

3. idea formed by speculation: an idea of or belief about something arrived at through speculation or conjecture

4. hypothetical circumstances: a set of circumstances or principles that is hypothetical

That's the theory, but it may not work out in practice.

5. scientific principle to explain phenomena: a set of facts, propositions, or principles analyzed in their relation to one another and used, especially in science, to explain phenomena

Hypothesis:

1. theory needing investigation: a tentative explanation for a phenomenon, used as a basis for further investigation

The hypothesis of the big bang is one way to explain the beginning of the universe.

2. assumption: a statement that is assumed to be true for the sake of argument

That is what would logically follow if you accepted the hypothesis.

3. antecedent clause: in logic, the antecedent of a conditional statement

Encarta® World English Dictionary, North American Edition

EDIT:...maybe i'm looking at it all wrong....ignore this last post.

Edited February 22, 2008 by REBEL

[MIB-Agent]

I never believed that the Big Bang theory was a good one anyways. But this probably will change the textbooks in schools if this is correct.