wait. Can someone explain this please?

[Cavalry]

I was reading an article about the Hubble telescope and read that the universe is 14 billion years old. I know about the Big Bang theory, but when the universe was compacted, what surrounded it? just a big void of nothingness? Pitch black space? What was out there before the Big Bang?

 

[Sheepo]

Nothing. No existence. Not blackness. Not space. Void.

 

[AJ Rimmer]

Nothing. No existence. Not blackness. Not space. Void.

And four Daleks inside a Void Ship.

 

[Shift]

Thats the defining question. The Big Bang makes perfect sense, but how can a tiny atom of superhot 'liquid' just form out of void and then start chemically creating atoms of Hydrogen etc, I cant find any rational explanation for it.

 

[Shakermaker]

Our universe might have 'bubbled of' other universes: link.

 

[Raziaar]

I can far more swallow the thought that our universe came from something else, like another universe, more than coming from nothing. Like... if it came from nothing, where exactly was it in that nothingness when it exploded? If it came from another universe, if that's even possible... then at least that avoids the question of where that other universe came from and how the origin of all things came to be.

 

[theotherguy]

I was reading an article about the Hubble telescope and read that the universe is 14 billion years old. I know about the Big Bang theory, but when the universe was compacted, what surrounded it? just a big void of nothingness? Pitch black space? What was out there before the Big Bang?

Let me explain.

The title of the theory, "Big Bang" is very misleading. It was not an explosion at all, but an expansion of space and time itself.

Imagine a deflated balloon. Imagine that the inside surface of this balloon constitutes everything in the universe. This means that everything on the surface of the balloon corresponds to a specific coordinate in time and space. If you move off the surface of the balloon, you will be in nothingness, since time and space are defined as points on the surface of the balloon. Now, imagine we draw two little dots on the balloon and call them points A and B.

In the beginning, the surface of the balloon would have been crumpled and condensed into a small space. The distance between point A and point B is very small. Now, imagine that air is being pumped into the balloon. The surface of the balloon physically expands and grows larger. The distance between point A and point B grows larger and larger, not because the dots themselves are moving away from one another, but because more space exists between them.

The Big Bang is similar to this. Time and space itself was condensed, not necessarily the matter making up the universe. So, there was literally nothing "outside" of this space, because space itself was contained in this condensed point. There was also no "before", because time itself was also condensed into this point.

 

[theotherguy]

I can far more swallow the thought that our universe came from something else, like another universe, more than coming from nothing. Like... if it came from nothing, where exactly was it in that nothingness when it exploded? If it came from another universe, if that's even possible... then at least that avoids the question of where that other universe came from and how the origin of all things came to be.

Actually, multi-verse theories merely draw out the infinite regress another step. Once you say that our universe came from another universe, you have to explain where that universe came from, and so on and so forth. Eventually, you come to a universe which has "always" existed, or to a point where time and space began, which is exactly what the Big Bang theory proposes.

 

[99.vikram]

According to one of the popular Big Bang theories, the universe was very tiny about 13.5 billion years ago. Based on the Heisenberg principle, we can say that it was not a point but rather, a smear of space with absurdly dense matter and antimatter. We do not know what triggered the big bang, but the universe inflated, cooled and continued expanding. First quarks formed, then H atoms, then heavier nuclei. Very heavy elements like Iron were formed inside the core of stars.

Stephen Hawking's idea of the universe is a 4D sphere. If you keep going in a straight line, you will end up right back where you started (spacetime curves into itself like a sphere). The universe may thus be without a boundary, yet finite.

 

[Shift]

Yeh thats one way I like to look at it, that the Universe is like a circle, with no end, you go in direction then you end up at the same place again god knows how many billions of lightyears later. But really there is no true way of predicting how the Big Bang started, sure you could say the 'multiverse' theory but then you eventually end right back at the same question.

Personally I think the only way of answering that question is to think irationally.

 

[Cavalry]

yeah, where would the original universe in this multi-verse have come from?
Unless the multi-verse was made of an infinite chain of universes, but isn't infinite a non existant thing (I.E. You can't have infinite anything?)
but to say it was nothing but an empty void is just a bit much to accept.

 

[theotherguy]

yeah, where would the original universe in this multi-verse have come from?
Unless the multi-verse was made of an infinite chain of universes, but isn't infinite a non existant thing (I.E. You can't have infinite anything?)
but to say it was nothing but an empty void is just a bit much to accept.

Why? Because your brain can't wrap around it? Our brains are adapted to things which are in the middle, which aren't too big or too small or too fast or too slow. We have evolved to understand animals and people and plants, and to understand things which are solid and three dimensional and pulled down by gravity.

Mathematically, it makes perfect sense that nothing but void exists "beyond" the universe, and that even posing the question "what lay beyond the universe during the Big Bang" or "what came before the Big Bang" constitutes spouting utter nonsense. It would be like asking "what is north of the North Pole?" or "how old was I before I was born?"

 

[Shift]

yeah, where would the original universe in this multi-verse have come from?
Unless the multi-verse was made of an infinite chain of universes, but isn't infinite a non existant thing (I.E. You can't have infinite anything?)
but to say it was nothing but an empty void is just a bit much to accept.

Infinite does exist, for instance in numbers, and of course its gonna be hard to accept because the very boundaries of space is far beyond our understanding and comprehension. It is indeed fasinating and beautiful but at the same time it is incredibly hostile, dark and very, very wierd.

The void theory I feel is largely unplausable anyway, if indeed there was a point when space, time and laws of the nature did not exist, how could a single tiny atom have been formed, if thinking in rational terms, there is no way nothing, can create, something, its makes absultely no sense. There MUST have been some other side to whole process that I think we will never figure out. Like I said, I think the only way of explaining it is irationally, a supernatural force far beyond the laws of our reality.

 

[99.vikram]

even posing the question "what lay beyond the universe during the Big Bang" or "what came before the Big Bang" constitutes spouting utter nonsense. It would be like asking "what is north of the North Pole?" or "how old was I before I was born?"

Keep in mind we have no evidence that time began with the Big Bang - it's just the current theory. We know that spacetime gets scrunched up as we get closer to the singularity, but it's possible something existed before it that led to the singularity. Current theories can't explain the first instants of the Big Bang at all.

 

[The Monkey]

Nothing was out there. To matter, no energy, no time, no vacuum, no space. Nothing.

 

[mindless_moder]

The problem is that if we resolve ourselves to that path of thinking we may never uncover the truth behind the origins of our universe. So the real question becomes is there infact an answer ? just because the subject seems strange , complex and hard to disect at its face value doesnt mean that there is no reasonable explanation, we just havent found it yet . It may very well be beyond human understanding but if we dont strive to understand our universe then we may never know.

 

[MorganFreeman911]

LOL INTELLIGENT DESIGN

Sorry. Somebody had to say it.

 

[Shift]

Contribute or gtfo, sick of these sort of topics turning into religous rants, not welcome here.

And monkey, its a very bold statement considering there is no proof, at the end of the day, all we can do is guess, considering that not even the experts can answer the question.

 

[Krynn72]

Is it possible there there is no such thing as nothing? No such thing as a void? Could it be that the matter that was present during the big bang has always existed and that there never was a point where there was nothing?

 

[Shift]

Is it possible there there is no such thing as nothing? No such thing as a void? Could it be that the matter that was present during the big bang has always existed and that there never was a point where there was nothing?

Any of the possibilites are extraordinary to think about lol.

 

[Acepilotf14]

All of your explanations directly turn over the Laws of science.

So at some point something had to break a law, and thus divided by 0.

 

[Krynn72]

All of your explanations directly turn over the Laws of science.

So at some point something had to break a law, and thus divided by 0.

Perhaps diving by zero is what caused the big bang!

 

[Acepilotf14]

I bet in some alternate reality some kid broke into the lab where the super-super computer that controlled every computer in his world was, and made it divide by zero. It launched a gabillion nuclear missles to every corner of the universe, and blew everything up.

 

[Dan]

No matter what, Big Bang or God or whatever else, when you completely describe the fundamental nature of the universe, you come to a set of data that cannot be explained or further compressed, it has to be just because. But then, it would not exist if that existence was completely arbitrary. Something must force the universe to be the way it is, and that something is your perception of it. You do not exist to perceive any universe in which you do not exist, get it? It's a self supporting closed system, with reality described by the separation of your consciousness and your environment. The minute you let go of consciousness and identity, reality collapses on itself, but of course, then you wouldn't exist anymore either, so you can't really do that except as an objective thought experiment.

I'm sure many philosophers have settled on this truth many times in the past. It has a kind of Ying-Yang, 1 and 0, binary beauty to it.

 

[Oreolek]

That was Another Bang.
And it was inside Another Bang.
And the great secret of the universe is that the Universe is a small glass ball with people in it.And this glass ball is kept inside another one.And the Big Bang is actually a birth of a new ball.

 

[CptStern]

I was reading an article about the Hubble telescope and read that the universe is 14 billion years old. I know about the Big Bang theory, but when the universe was compacted, what surrounded it? just a big void of nothingness? Pitch black space? What was out there before the Big Bang?

before the big bang there was nothing, it was a vacuum, a giant hole of nothingness ...just think of a cosmic goatse

 

[theotherguy]

Is it possible there there is no such thing as nothing? No such thing as a void? Could it be that the matter that was present during the big bang has always existed and that there never was a point where there was nothing?

Aristotle thought exactly the same thing. "Nature abhors a vacuum"

However, experiments by Lavoisier and others disproved this, and today we can see that void can easily exist in nature, and in fact most of the universe is filled with nothing but empty space.

The kind of void we're talking about here, though, lacks even space, or time, it is simply an invalid coordinate, something that simply does not exist. It would be like saying "point X is on the X,Y plane at point (null, null)"

 

[Shift]

The most disturbing aspect of the universe is what scientists predict is in the center of a blackhole, an amazingly compacted point called the singularity, a point when space, time and very laws of the universe are distorted beyond belief, could a blackhole lead to this void, transport you to another point in the universe (maybe in the form of a white hole?).
Guess no one will know, since the the gravity is so incredible that it would rip anything to shreds, I think the only of passing through a blackhole is pass through it at speeds unimaginable, we are talking much, much faster than light, since they have even distort and suck that up too.

 

[Azner]

Fools.
God created earth.
*Kicked in balls*
Evolution is just a theory
*Kicked in balls*
I will be back
*Un balled*

 

[Dan]

The most disturbing aspect of the universe is what scientists predict is in the center of a blackhole, an amazingly compacted point called the singularity, a point when space, time and very laws of the universe are distorted beyond belief, could a blackhole lead to this void, transport you to another point in the universe (maybe in the form of a white hole?).
Guess no one will know, since the the gravity is so incredible that it would rip anything to shreds, I think the only of passing through a blackhole is pass through it at speeds unimaginable, we are talking much, much faster than light, since they have even distort and suck that up too.

To accelerate mass beyond the speed of light would require more than an infinite amount of force. Nobody has yet found a way around that other than the potential for changing the actual distance traveled in a straight line through curved space.

 

[Acepilotf14]

You all think you have it all figured out, don't you?
lol big bang LOL

I bet there's something missing that will make it all clear once we find it.
But we never will.

 

[Dan]

You all think you have it all figured out, don't you?
lol big bang LOL

I bet there's something missing that will make it all clear once we find it.
But we never will.

I have it figured out.

 

[Shift]

The Big Bang isnt certain to have happened, its just the most plausable theory around at the moment for explaining the formation of the universe, calculations were made and they found evidence to support those calculations, we will certainly get more factual details as our technology expands.

And yeh I was only speculating Dan, it would be hard enough to produce the energy to go at the speed of light itself, but faster, would be highly unlikely in normal propulsion theory. Apparantly the best method scientists see of travelling FTL is by creating bends in fabic of space to act as shortcuts, no idea of the science behind that though.