What was before the "Big Bang"?

[INTELBYTES]

As many scientist believe, it was point of singularity. Singularity, roughly put, is the point where all laws of physics break down. But if that were that case, how did the laws of physics exert themselves into realitity causing the big bang?

and...

Is this why you have 8 buns in a bag, when 10 weiners comes in a package?:freak:

Forgive me, I thought I was in the lounge when I posted this and do not know how to move it.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

1. The Supreme Mathematician

[INTELBYTES]

25. Agreed! Mathematics is the foundation of the physics of all that is...

or was...or that ever will be! and mathematics surely did not come about on it's on cognizance.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

2. opps dupe

[JitterbugPerfume]

5. cosmic gas pain?

[Indiana Democrat]

3. What was before the "Big Bang"?

God.

[INTELBYTES]

6. Agreed! But afraid to say so in this forum...

[Indiana Democrat]

7. Why?

[INTELBYTES]

15. Not afraid so much of the proclaimaiont of my belief....

...but not intending to cause the flamefest that Gods very name produces in these forums of those that are hostile towards His mere concept.

[Snow]

21. That's not a name, that's a job title.......

[BeFree]

28. I like that -- "Job Title"

Here's the job description:

G enerate the
O rganization and subsequent
D e-organization, continiously.


The applicant will be able to create stuff by arranging dirt, air and water, in such a manner -- using the laws of physics -- so that the result is abundant life.

Some call it a Force, some call it magic. Some don't believe it happens, yet there they are!

[camero]

54. i've heard it in this form

G enerator
O perator
D estroyer

[Jacobin]

37. Not hostile towards Her concept

Just hostile to those who have hijacked Her name to promote insensitivity, hatred, violence, death, low taxes for the rich, invasions, homophobia, and the general idiocy that is broadcast by the likes of Falwell, Robertson, Bush*, et al.

[gristy]

12. A more accurate answer is that nobody knows.

But "God" is as good of an answer as any, I guess.

[Solomon]

18. Hey Indiana. Please check my

pm to you last night. I want to apologize for being out of line yesterday. I'm sorry man. I lost my head, and that's not like me at all. :pals:

[Jacobin]

4. Extreme Foreplay!!

:-)

[BeFree]

14. Feels good

We are the product of the universe's biggest orgasm

[jokerman93]

8. The Pataphysics of Good Sex

If infinite potential were a "thing" that took up no space, it would live happily antecedent to our "Big Bang".

[dtseiler]

9. Hawking

Stephen Hawking in "A Brief History of Time" says that basically it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because anything that happened before the Big Bang has no effect on us now, the Big Bang was like a big RESET button on time. So in trying to calculate the age of the universe, you really only need to count back to the Big Bang, anything before that is moot.

[YNGW]

13. That's convienient

A little TOO convienient for me.

[INTELBYTES]

17. Doesn't that just wrap things up in too neat and tidy of a package?

Instead of science trying to understand, they say, "We will start at this point that makes sense to us, and move on from there." Not that I blame them because infinity was never meant to be grasped by mortal minds.

[ProudGerman]

48. Something you're not sharing with the rest of the world?

Since you obviously have at least as great an understanding of astrophysics as Steven Hawking.

[INTELBYTES]

50. So tell us, "disciple of Hawkinig", where does he make his stand...

...on what was before the Big Bang? So you just will go along with his philosophy that it doesn't matter what happened before the big bang? It was like a reset button? See, all that just says is, that he doesn't know and instead of following it to it's logical conclusion, (and I'm not imposing what I believe that logical conclusion is), he is just giving up and saying in essence, we have our beginnings at the big bang, so don't bother thinking of how the material for the "big bang" came about. You have more faith than I do, and I believe in a Creator!

Just because someone has astrophysist, or rocket scientist, or PHD before their name, I'm not impressed. Sheep will follow a title. I admire them for their higher learning, and their knowledge, but they only know what they were taught by men before them.

[Carl Spackler]

33. So before the BB came the big Fatal Exception?

[Jacobin]

36. The Big Blue Screen!!

I like that. I'm subscibing to that view.

[ldf]

56. that's sorta my take on it, RESET

what was before the big bang? the previous big bang. and before that, the big bang before that big bang.

we seem to have an inability to grasp the concept of infinity, whether it be in time, or space.

big bang, expand, collapse. start all over.

and for those who will say we are expanding, and not collapsing? maybe, but i believe that as black holes gobble up each other, their gravitational fields become so much more intense that they will continue to merge, with ALL matter of the big bang eventually being pulled back into a single black hole, which is, again, the re-concentration of all original matter. we are just not at the point in the evolution of THIS big bang for that to be happening.

we ARE beginning to have evidence of black holes merging, becoming ever more powerful. i think it is just the next logical step.

so, big bangs back in time, to infinity.

not only that, but the void that is the universe without end probably has an infinite number of big bangs happening simultaneously, but they may be so far apart that there is never an overlap.

the whole train of thought is mind boggling. no wonder we have to have a fairytale to attempt to explain it.

unfortunately the fairytale was corrupted by people who want control.


an appropriate post for my 666th, huh?

[earthman dave]

10. Time started at the big bang, so there's no "before"

the analogy used by Hawking in "a brief history of time" is that the question is like saying "what's north of the north pole?"

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

11. A mystical take on the question

I'll answer this from a mystic's point of view: God created everything from God in a desire to know and understand God more. A hadith (saying of the Prophet) goes something like this: "I was a hidden treasure that longed to be known". Sufis believe everything is God (la illaha il Allah-usually translated as "there is no God but God" can also be translated as "There is nothing save the One"). The Christians say, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." This word was what made reality manifest from the One. The sound of it is "OM"-Unity rushing to diversity. We mystics say that all diversity goes back to Unity with the sound "HU", and that Unity and Diversity is a dynamic that is continuous, like the in- and out-breath of a person.

[unblock]

16. there IS no "before" the big bang

"before" is a statement about time.
time is a phenomenom that, just as gravity or distance, doesn't exist outside the laws of physics.

time only exists within the laws of physics. the laws of physics start with the big bang, and therefore so did time.

the concept of "before" the big bang is therefore meaningless.

[Jose Diablo]

19. Try this link

http://www.sciam.com/

Type "cosmology" into the search engine to obtain a list of articles and links to those articles.

There are many theories in cosmology. I kind of like the idea of many verses.

As for the concept of time as in what came before the "big bang", well there is no before because time comes into existence at the big bang. There is no before in this universe before the big bang.

Maybe a before in another universe that this one springs from. Who knows? And more to the point, how could any of the theories be proved, except in some thought experiment and some confirmation via some math equations that may or may not have some accuracy to reality.

[unblock]

20. another take on this is that all evidence is destroyed

some philosophers claim there was a "big crunch" from a previous universe, whose energy coalesced into a singularity, which then led to the big bang.

i say, "philosophers" because physicists have nothing to say about this (except when they put on their philosopher's hat). any information about any previous universe, including the physical laws themselves, would have been destroyed in the big crunch. consequently, it is theoretically impossible to scientifically know anything about a previous universe. therefore, physics has absolutely nothing to say about it. any hypothesis is impossible to disprove and therefore unscientific.

[INTELBYTES]

23. But wouldn't the laws of physics still apply if....

...the former universe was the big bang of a previous universe that had gone through the "big crunch" which was a result of the big bang of a previous universe that ....

It all wraps around, but to ignore a starting point...even if it is not called "time"... is to admit that man's finite mind cannot grasp eternity.

[warrior1]

24. There is also a theory

that goes a little like this.

Image that the big bang has happened before say maybe five, ten or hundred times before.

We could be a caught in a time loop.

Hey it's a good a reason for Deja vu.

[INTELBYTES]

27. But if you suppose that...

...would you also suppose that every "new universe" is a mirror image of the one before. Or was this one universe in a billion that happened to accidently create life on a single planet in the middle of a solar system in the middle of a galaxy in a "no-name" street in the universe at large?

[Jose Diablo]

29. Like Neo said

I like to believe I have free will.

A mirror image would imply a strict cause and effect universe. Quantum theory strongly implies that a universe of cause and effect does not exist.

Or as Einstein said after studying quantum theory, "it appears God does play with dice"

[warrior1]

39. right after the big bang

and I'm talking 'bout a very very very very small amount of time. Like a small fraction of a second, there was a war of anti-matter and matter. Just our luck there was a bit more matter so it won that battle. Had it there been more anti-matter we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Also, it was that energy that created matter. Opposite of Einstein's theory. At least I think it goes something like that.

[Lone_Wolf]

22. Inflation theory

If interested in this, you should look up inflation theoy. Stanford University's Andrei Linde is the main theorist in this area.

Briefly, the theory is (as strange as it may sound) matter can be created out of nothing. Vacuums can pop in and out of nothingness. These vacuums contain small amounts of energy. One explanation for the present universe is one of these vacuums popped into existence and expanded into the present universe in what we now know as the Big Bang.

I know it sounds weird, but it is interesting. Check it out.

[pmbryant]

49. I'll second this

A great, very readable, book that describes this fairly well to the interested amateur is "The Inflationary Universe" by Alan Guth. He's also the fellow who first came up with the concept behind this theory.

Fascinating look into what the Big Bang may really have been.

Peter

[ElsewheresDaughter]

26. The History of the Universe in 200 Words or Less

Quantum fluctuation. Inflation. Expansion. Strong nuclear interaction. Particle-antiparticle annihilation. Deuterium and helium production. Density perturbations. Recombination. Blackbody radiation. Local contraction. Cluster formation. Reionization? Violent relaxation. Virialization. Biased galaxy formation? Turbulent fragmentation. Contraction. Ionization. Compression. Opaque hydrogen. Massive star formation. Deuterium ignition. Hydrogen fusion. Hydrogen depletion. Core contraction. Envelope expansion. Helium fusion. Carbon, oxygen, and silicon fusion. Iron production. Implosion. Supernova explosion. Metals injection. Star formation. Supernova explosions. Star formation. Condensation. Planetesimal accretion. Planetary differentiation. Crust solidification. Volatile gas expulsion. Water condensation. Water dissociation. Ozone production. Ultraviolet absorption. Photosynthetic unicellular organisms. Oxidation. Mutation. Natural selection and evolution. Respiration. Cell differentiation. Sexual reproduction. Fossilization. Land exploration. Dinosaur extinction. Mammal expansion. Glaciation. Homo sapiens manifestation. Animal domestication. Food surplus production. Civilization! Innovation. Exploration. Religion. Warring nations. Empire creation and destruction. Exploration. Colonization. Taxation without representation. Revolution. Constitution. Election. Expansion. Industrialization. Rebellion. Emancipation Proclamation. Invention. Mass production. Urbanization. Immigration. World conflagration. League of Nations. Suffrage extension. Depression. World conflagration. Fission explosions. United Nations. Space exploration. Assassinations. Lunar excursions. Resignation. Computerization. World Trade Organization. Terrorism. Internet expansion. Reunification. Dissolution. World-Wide Web creation. Composition. Extrapolation?

[cryofan]

30. Bug Bang just a theory, We do not know how universe started or if...

...the universe will ever end. The 2nd law of thermodyanamics as applied to CLOSED systems is not the same as applied to open systems. The universe may be an open system. We just do not know. Thus, the universe does not necessarily have to come to an end. There are PhD physicists who think that the universe may be steady state, or that it may be eternal in nature.

All this talk about a big bang is just a theory. We really have no idea exactly what the universe is, just yet. We will probably know that someday, but today is not that day. What you read and hear in the media is mostly just people fighting for money and recognition.

Just assume for the time being that the universe has always been in existence and will always be in existence. That way, if the universe turns out to be eternal in nature, you can make appropriate decisions now that may enable you to possibly be revived someday and possibly even live forever. See www.alcor.org for more info.

[Carl Spackler]

31. Dinner and a movie

[Mattforclark]

32. The question doesn't make sense

from a scientific viewpoint. So you can either be agnostic about it or insert your favored metaphysical interpretation.

[Jose Diablo]

35. Yep

Its a mind game for sure.

Just fire-up the bowl and take a trip. Amounts to the same thing I think. When ya come down, its the same world as when ya left. No point to the exersize.

[INTELBYTES]

38. How does the question not make sense? (other than the hotdog question)

[DS1]

34. Why does there have to be something before it?

and what makes us so sure that ours is the only universe?

[INTELBYTES]

40. So, basically what many are saying is...

...there was always something eternally here causing us to be in existence. Either matter, or anti-matter, or energy, or a vacuum popping stuff in and out, there has always had to be something here. For you to say otherwise supports the fact that an outside force, ie: a Creator had to pop things into existence.

[warrior1]

43. The say that

the force that caused the big bang was very very small. What caused it to explode could be like what we know of black holes. Extreme gravity that it so great light can not escape it's pull. Things fall in are crushed out of existence by it's force. It rips matter apart to nothing.

They other thing about this energy created at the moment of the big bang, all of it is still around. More doesn't get created. It evolves.

[earthman dave]

45. Do you mind? I'm trying to eat, you can put words in my mouth later. nt

[Jose Diablo]

46. Google up

Kalam proof for the existence of God

Kalam is an Arabic word. I forget exactly the translated meaning but it is like argument. Around the 10th century or so a very great Muslim thinker conceived of the argument.

The argument is formatted in a logical format of statement and conclusion as:

1)Everything that begins to exist has a cause for its beginning,

2)The Universe had a beginning,

3)Therefore, the Universe has a cause for its beginning and that cause is not within the universe (it predates the Universe). By definition that cause must be God

The Kalam argument held for a long time until the early Renaissance. During the Renaissance the concept of a Universe without a beginning was put forward, probably to free mens minds from the church.

The idea of infinite universe held until about 1950 or so. The existence of cosmic microwave background radiation was discovered. This background radiation is the remnant of the big bang radiation shifted way to the red end at a temperature of about 2 degrees K. The conclusion that there was a beginning has opened the Kalam argument once more.

[INTELBYTES]

47. I can agree with everything. But Judaism was way ahead of the game...

...on that philosophy. The great muslim thinker was "standing on the shoulders of giants" to come up with that philosophy.

[Jose Diablo]

51. I am not Muslim

All "great" thinkers stand on the shoulders of giants.

An interesting read is L. Sprague de Camp, "The Ancient Engineers". The book describes how knowledge more or less advances.

For the first 4000 years or so, from when history began, mankind experienced about 1 new invention per century. As communication advanced (through war mostly) the rate of new knowledge increased until today, we can hardly keep-up with the changes.

The point I guess is that knowledge is cumulative, and it rate of accumulation has a lot to do with how much exists. Another point is the rate of new knowledge has a lot to do with the amount of "free" time people possess.

Leisure time has not been available until quite recently. Those available to think on anything other than the immediate needs to eat traditionally have been rare.

[INTELBYTES]

55. Good reply, and agreed!

I wasn't implying you were muslim, just answering to the message. Thanks for the book suggestion. I might have to check it out. If I may share a book with you as well, "Saucers of the Illuminate" helps answer questions of where some of our scientific reasoning came from.

[Jose Diablo]

58. I will look the book up

Thanks to *Bush I have plenty of free time now, to study. The wanker to use a english curse.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

41. This is like asking what the -3th move was in a game of chess (nt)

[INTELBYTES]

42. No, it's driving to a final conclusion. and that conclusion is...

...a definitive. Either you believe there was "always something eternally in exisitence" or you don't. And if you don't, then you are saying that it popped out of nothing which leads to conclusion of an outside force creating it.

[Jose Diablo]

60. I will not be that easy to come to a definitive conclusion

If there is an "outside force" that caused the creation, this "outside force" also has a foundation principle called faith.

If the existence of an outside force is proved beyond a doubt, then there is little need for the thing called faith. All the information I have about this outside force leads me to conclude that if he/she exists, he/she desires humans to have this thing called faith.

And if this outside force exists, you can be sure he/she will make sure we never possess definitive proof of his/hers existence, until such time he/she decides to stop the play.

Even if the universe had a beginning, it does not follow the beginning had a cause. Think a very large quantum fluctuation.

[INTELBYTES]

61. The outside force would have to be an "intelligent" source.

This at least starts you down the correct path.

Faith does not come without proof. And faith is built in for a reason. The Bible, whether you choose to believe it or not, is full of historical facts. Of these historical facts, many were prophesies ed before the "facts" were an actuality. Jesus is an historical figure. Whether you believe His ministry, His time on earth and His influence are irrefutable. But the bigger picture of faith is why the need for faith. That's a Biblical lesson in itself that I'd rather not try to explain in this forum.

[Jose Diablo]

62. Please, I have read Josh McDowell

I find his conclusions unsupportable. Not to say I do not believe, it is just his evidence did don't support the facts when I reviewed what he said the bible contained.

I have been down that path, it is a dead end.

[Jose Diablo]

63. I am now going to swear a solemn oath to my fellow DU'ers

I, JellyBean, do solemnly swear to avoid religion and beans from this point forward.

I should have known where this universe thread was going, been there done that a hundred times

[oneighty]

44. To heck with all of that!

Just where is the Universe? Everything gotta be someplace.

180

[SoCalDem]

52. The Little Poof?

:shrug:

[PVnRT]

53. Tomato soup

Trust me.

[INTELBYTES]

57. The answer to Life, Universe and everything else is...

42!! Don't believe me? Just ask Arthur Dent!

[mitchum]

59. The Big Foreplay?