What caused the big bang

Vampireskiss

If there was nothing there before it?

mukki

vampires did

Sam Vimes

Don't know, no one knows. Simple as.

But don't know =/= god did it

Vampireskiss

Its just that Atheists base their beliefs on science and that every occurrance has a scientific reason for its existence and yet when its comes to the biggest thing ever to happen we just don't know.Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist? So I wonder, what was it?

Gurgle

Vampireskiss wrote: »

If there was nothing there before it?

Feckin pre-school science curriculum 'First there was nothing, which exploded'.

The latest big bang was caused by the gravitational collapse of the previous 'universe'.

Saruman

Who said there was nothing? There was no universe as we know it but that does not constitute nothing, just nothing that we can quantify in terms we can understand.

Two random particles of "nothingness" collided and released the mother of all energy releases.

I am sure there is a more scientific way to describe of course

Oh and since nothing can be created from nothing and all energy/matter can only be converted, something must have been there before and all that happened was that whatever it was got changed in to our Universe.

The real question is, if the universe is expanding, is there still this nothingness beyond it being eaten up by our Universe?

togster

But i'm going to go with A: I don't know and neither does anyone else....Yet.

seamus

Could have been anything, could have been a "critical mass" type of incident. If the expanding/contracting universe theory is right, then moments before the big bang, the previous universe was in the final stages of contraction (i.e. all mass had compressed into a point mass). At that stage there would be a "tipping point" - perhaps all of the mass in the universe compressed into a single point is inherently unstable, thus the point mass before the big bang only existed for fractions of a microsecond before it exploded into the big bang.

This is not an answer we're likely to ever know because it's not an experiment we can recreate

Gurgle

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Atheists base their beliefs...

I think you're misunderstanding the word 'Athiest'.

Gregor Samsa

As Sam Vimes says, no one knows.

But since time itself didn't exist before the big bang, then it's possible that asking "what caused it" is the wrong question, as causality itself didn't exist before the universe.

Vampireskiss

phutyle wrote: »

As Sam Vimes says, no one knows.

But since time itself didn't exist before the big bang, then it's possible that asking "what caused it" is the wrong question, as causality itself didn't exist before the universe.

Casuality is something that is queried after the event has occured

Gregor Samsa

Saruman wrote: »

The real question is, if the universe is expanding, is there still this nothingness beyond it being eaten up by our Universe?

The universe isn't expanding into anything.

Think about the surface of a partially inflated balloon (just the 2 spatial dimensional surface, not the balloon itself), and draw 3 dots on it. Then blow up the balloon. The dots move apart (expansion) but they don't move "into" anything.

The universe is like that but a 3 (spatial) dimensional surface, instead of 2.

So in an expanding universe, space is expanding in every direction, from everywhere - not just at the "edges" (there are no edges). But the forces (gravity, electromagnetism etc) are stronger than the expansion at the local level, so we don't see the effects of the expansion - just the effects of the forces.

It's pretty mind blowing stuff, and very difficult to visualise or explain as we rely on using "real world" metaphors (from our day to day experience) that aren't adequate for the task at all.

onq

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Its just that Atheists base their beliefs on science and that every occurrance has a scientific reason for its existence and yet when its comes to the biggest thing ever to happen we just don't know.Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist? So I wonder, what was it?

Scientific method is a means to explain the world.

It tends to be stumped by matters of skill, art and belief.

It could attempt to codify the Prime Motion, but not cause the event.

ONQ

Dave!

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

Oh dear lord

Saruman

But what is the balloon expanding in to one has to wonder? In the balloon example (very good by the way) it is expanding through air so what occupies the space outside of the universe bubble?
I read a brief history of time many years ago and even Hawking did not have a solid definition of the universe and had various examples of how the universe might be shaped.

Gregor Samsa

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Casuality is something that is queried after the event has occured

I'm not sure what you're getting at.

Causality is the notion that there is a relationship between one event (the cause) and another (the effect). This relationship happens "in" time. The cause precedes the effect in a linear fashion.

You're asking what event caused the event known as the big bang.

But I'm saying that since there was no time, it's meaningless to ask what caused it* - you're using language from everyday experience (within time, where causality happens) to try to describe something from a very different set of circumstances.

*That doesn't make the investigation into the big bang meaningless - just that the question "what caused it" makes no sense given what we know about it.

Vampireskiss

Dave! wrote: »

Oh dear lord

Did you have a problem with my statement?

Saruman

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

How did I miss that the first time?
You seem to be implying that science is a "thing" or "force" with the ability to create a universe instead of just a word to describe how we try to understand the universe.

seamus

Saruman wrote: »

But what is the balloon expanding in to one has to wonder? In the balloon example (very good by the way) it is expanding through air so what occupies the space outside of the universe bubble?

In the balloon metaphor you need to forget that there's air inside it and air around it, that's not really what you're focussing on - it's the surface of the balloon, the actual rubber. That is, the dots move apart, but there's no change in the amount of rubber being "consumed" nor is there any additional rubber being added to the "universe", just the properties of the rubber that are changing. That's what makes it so difficult to visualise in the context of 3 dimensions.

toiletduck

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Its just that Atheists base their beliefs on science and that every occurrance has a scientific reason for its existence

Emm, no they don't.

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

That makes my head hurt.... Are you trying to get across a "the rules of the universe didn't exist ergo they can't be used to describe the beginning" point?

pts

Time for this old gem again:

onq

phutyle wrote: »

The universe isn't expanding into anything.

Think about the surface of a partially inflated balloon (just the 2 spatial dimensional surface, not the balloon itself), and draw 3 dots on it. Then blow up the balloon. The dots move apart (expansion) but they don't move "into" anything.

I've always had a difficulty with this on two levels.

Consider the dots as blobs, i.e. not merely having a one-dimensional existence, but two, so area comes into it - needed for a two dimensional representation.

Firstly its pretty clear that while the blobs aren't moving "into" anything in terms of the being on the balloon surface, they are expanding at the same rate as they surface and so if the distance between them is measured in units of their own width it shouldn't be seen to be changing by the blobs themselves.
It if one blob was first defined as 15 blob-widths away from the second, it should still be 15 blob-widths away from the second.
That's not the case in our universe - it seems it is expanding relative to the objects it encompasses.

Secondly, its pretty clear that the balloon is expanding to take up more volume in three dimensional space than it did previously, so inhabitants of that "outer" space will tend to notice it as it expands. What happens when they notice us?

Then there is the question that really is the elephant in the room.
Can such an occurrence occur within the universe - IOW can another big ban occur within the space time of a previous big bang and if so what happens to the matter/energy/dark matter/dark energy already in existence - is it "overwritten"/destroyed/negated? What?

And of course the question no-one has asked yet:

If a the big bang arose from "something infinitely small" of its own volition, this suggests that the universe is essentially self-created or created by God. But what if this is merely ascribing human perceptions to events that occur naturally. Think of bubbles in a stream. These occur within the stream naturally, often at regular intervals, repeating. The big bang may have occurred in a "suchness" that supports big bangs. There may be other big bangs, other bubbles. What happens if our bubble meets another?

Thanks for asking the question OP - it is as perennial as the grass and always diverting.



Better get back to work now.

ONQ

Saruman

Sometimes I think the cartoon in Men in black with the beings playing with marbles containing universes is about as plausible as anything I else I have heard

Mena

Sam Vimes wrote: »

Don't know, no one knows. Simple as.

But don't know =/= god did it

I'm firmly in this camp. Because we don't know something (yet) does not give license to make something up to fill the knowledge gap.

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

That's the funniest thing I've read in a while

Dades

The only thing atheists believe in common about the Big Bang, is that it wasn't initiated by a dude with a beard, a turtle, a pasta-based entity, or any other man-made deity placed out of reach of our current scientific understanding.

Everything else is individual speculation.

Captain Chaos

I was reading this last night after a few pints and it really got me thinking. I thinks its well worth a read if a bit long.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327191.600-dark-energy-may-disguise-shape-of-universe.html

Zillah

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

Pffbwahahahahahahaha!

Gregor Samsa

Saruman wrote: »

But what is the balloon expanding in to one has to wonder? In the balloon example (very good by the way) it is expanding through air so what occupies the space outside of the universe bubble?

Yeah, see that's where the metaphor breaks down. I said to concentrate on the *surface* of the balloon - not the material of the balloon itself, or the space it occupies. It is very difficult to grasp, and it is just a metaphor - so it's like that, not exactly that.

I'm not saying that the universe is like a balloon at all - I'm merely comparing the expansion of a 2D surface (which we can observe easily) with a 3D surface(which is more difficult to observe, especially since we're in it).

But the expansion of the universe can be observed.

The background radiation of the universe (the energy remnants of the big bang) can be detected coming from every direction equally. This means that the big bang wasn't like an explosion with a centre, and a blast coming out of it in every direction. If that was the case, we'd see the background radiation coming from one direction, as it emanated from the "epicentre" of the big bang. But as I said, we don't see that - we see it coming from every direction. So there is no "centre" - the expansion of the universe is literally happening between each of us right now - between you and your computer screen, between each sub atomic particle. But we don't see it or feel it, because the forces that hold everything together (gravity for the big stuff, weak and strong nuclear forces for the really little stuff, and electromagnetism for lots of stuff) are stronger in the short range than the current rate of expansion. But at the intergalactic level, our galaxy is moving away moving away from every other galaxy (except the ones that are close enough for gravity to influence), and every other galaxy is moving away from every other one (again, gravity permitting)

As for the shape of the universe that Hawking mentions, again the "shape" is a metaphor (flat, saddle, spherical) not a literal shape.

A "spherical" universe isn't a ball - any mention of geometry in cosmology is only concerned with surfaces, not objects.

Mad stuff altogehter. No wonder many people find it easier to believe that some old bloke just made it all and it runs like clockwork.

fintonie

after reading all was it a big bang or just the striking of a match stick.

Flamed Diving

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Its just that Atheists base their beliefs on science

No. Atheism is a rejection of other peoples belief in god/s. This may be based on science, or more likely on the ridiculous assertions of the believers. Note the difference between definition and causation.

Vampireskiss wrote: »

and that every occurrance has a scientific reason for its existence and yet when its comes to the biggest thing ever to happen we just don't know.

We didn't know the earth was spherical before. We didn't know the earths position in the universe. We didn't know how germs caused death. We didn't know atoms existed once. We once believed atoms to be the smallest particles, etc, etc, etc. It's called progression of knowledge. From darkness to light. The big bang is certainly a tough question to answer, because it happened so long ago, and we still don't have telescopes powerful enough to look back that far. Still, saying we don't know is far more humble and enlightened/honest than attached magic to it.

Vampireskiss wrote: »

Am I right in stating that we are all in agreement that it wasn't science that caused it for science didn't exist?

No, you are not, because it is a moronic statement. Science doesn't cause anything. Science simply explains previously unknown phenomenon.

Vampireskiss wrote: »

So I wonder, what was it?

Vampires.

WIZE

It was a Big Fart