What Happened Before the Big Bang?
Discussion
Munter said:
Have we found the dark matter yet?
Nope. 
Munter said:
I can't help feeling that without that we're not working with all the pieces of the puzzle.
That's right, but we never are - there are always new things to discover, which is what's so exciting about science. Of course in the future we'll inevitably look back on things in hindsight and think "if only we knew about 'x'" back then, but that's always the case with discoveries; for example imagine if Mendel, Darwin and Wallace knew about DNA and genetics!Dark Matter is a biggie and there's a huge amount of work going on with regard to it.
Understanding dark matter is the least of our problems as it only makes up 27% of the universe. The more interesting bit in my book is dark energy, which makes up about 68% of the universe, with the remaining 5% being the normal matter we know a bit about.
As i understand it (which i don't), dark matter was thought up to explain attractive, i.e. gravitational, forces in the universe that couldn't be accounted for by standard matter alone. Dark energy is a repulsive force to do with the energy contained in empty space.
NASA have a bit on it here, including a list of recent discoveries that runs up to the 26 March:
http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/w...
As i understand it (which i don't), dark matter was thought up to explain attractive, i.e. gravitational, forces in the universe that couldn't be accounted for by standard matter alone. Dark energy is a repulsive force to do with the energy contained in empty space.
NASA have a bit on it here, including a list of recent discoveries that runs up to the 26 March:
http://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics/focus-areas/w...
Scientists who who are in the know, tell us that we only know what 5% of the universe is made of. The other 95% is going to be some really wierd stuff that will completely rewrite what we know. And when they do that, the answer to "what happened before?" will also be answered.
Personally, my money's on the great Invisible Flying Spaghetti Monster being involved.
Personally, my money's on the great Invisible Flying Spaghetti Monster being involved.
One theory is that out universe was created from the death of a previous universe.
When the old universe collapses it would have triggered the birth of our current universe. If this is true then this could be continually happening.
However this doesn't solve for how the first Universe was created.
Currently we can only see up to the point of recombination. (when electrons became attracted to the protons creating the first atoms and allowing the release of photons) We can see this in the cosmic microwave background and it something that is heavily studied as it is our only current chance of understanding what happened (it is possible it can show us the earliest structures, allowing us to test our current theoretical models)
Without some leap in current knowledge (most likely in particle Physics) we wont be able to see past this point and we will never be able to 100% prove the Big bang.
So it will always just be a theory, I also believe we may find a theory that more accurately fits the data we have. Currently multiple theories such as inflation have had to be devised to make the big bang theory fit.
That is the joy of Astronomy, we definitely have a lot to learn
When the old universe collapses it would have triggered the birth of our current universe. If this is true then this could be continually happening.
However this doesn't solve for how the first Universe was created.
Currently we can only see up to the point of recombination. (when electrons became attracted to the protons creating the first atoms and allowing the release of photons) We can see this in the cosmic microwave background and it something that is heavily studied as it is our only current chance of understanding what happened (it is possible it can show us the earliest structures, allowing us to test our current theoretical models)
Without some leap in current knowledge (most likely in particle Physics) we wont be able to see past this point and we will never be able to 100% prove the Big bang.
So it will always just be a theory, I also believe we may find a theory that more accurately fits the data we have. Currently multiple theories such as inflation have had to be devised to make the big bang theory fit.
That is the joy of Astronomy, we definitely have a lot to learn
Hoofy said:
It's quite funny, everyone spouting their own ideas on this thread without responding to my post. This is the Religion! forum, right? 
Your post doesn't ask a question, therefore what is your issue?Unless the question is the title, in which case everyone knows it's "the big foreplay".
Some Gump said:
Hoofy said:
It's quite funny, everyone spouting their own ideas on this thread without responding to my post. This is the Religion! forum, right?
Your post doesn't ask a question, therefore what is your issue?Unless the question is the title, in which case everyone knows it's "the big foreplay".
Hoofy said:
Did any of you watch it?
I think I did a few years back.As I recall it was simply summarising some of the leading hypotheses and/or ideas.
We don't actually know what happened before (or even if there was a before in the context of our current understanding of time). The current scientific theory breaks down if we try and go any further back than around 10^-34 seconds after the big bang occurred.
As I understand it, our current standard model theories and laws don't work in the nano-seconds after the theorised big bang. Before the big bang, there wasn't a space-time as we understand it.
It's a tantalising question, but I think we shall all need to accept the answer "we don't know" for a long time to come.
Something baking my noodle... if time doesn't exist outside of the universe, does the universe inhabit a state where it doesn't exist yet, is existing and once existed in one big random cat in a box like situation?
It's a tantalising question, but I think we shall all need to accept the answer "we don't know" for a long time to come.
Something baking my noodle... if time doesn't exist outside of the universe, does the universe inhabit a state where it doesn't exist yet, is existing and once existed in one big random cat in a box like situation?
esxste said:
Something baking my noodle... if time doesn't exist outside of the universe, does the universe inhabit a state where it doesn't exist yet, is existing and once existed in one big random cat in a box like situation?
Isn't that question taking the position that the universe is expanding in to something (that something being existing space-time that is 'outside' our universe)?.... which it isn't as it is the space-time within the existing universe that is expanding.(Probably mis-understood your question to be fair)
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