Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion Not-Quite-Science Forum An alternative theory to the big bang

The universe was at one point some sort of explosive on another level of perception, then it exploded.

Why not?

If you are trying to explain the Big Bang with Inflation to a school child K-8 your explanation might be a way of approaching the subject.

But from a serious science perspective nothing exploded and there are no known other levels of perception.

Sure there are, you can zoom right in so that everything is atoms, or right out so that everything is stars and planets. My theory is that when you zoom out further you will actually realise that planets and stars act like atoms for another universe so-to-speak.

Robert your theory, to use the term in the loosest possible sense, holds no water and it hasn't for more than 100 years.

http://www.tcd.ie/Physics/Schools/what/atoms/quantum/duality.html

The two-slit experiment works with atoms. It does not work with planets or marbles.

What was the source of the energy that caused the big bang? For instance, would the same effect have occurred if there was an implosion as would if there were an explosion, or a collision? Explosion coming from internal sources; collision coming from two objects meeting; implosion coming from matter being compressed to the point of saturation (?) and sudden energy release.
Mafuskey

Mafuskey asks:
"What was the source of the energy that caused the big bang?"

There is no known need for energy or a cause. The vacuum energy is more than sufficient.

There was no implosion. There was no explosion. There may or may not have been a collision. What is essential is the following:

"There is no difference between space growing larger and the speed of light in a vacuum growing smaller."

If instead we phrased the Big Bang as a change in the value of the speed of light ... no one would ask: "Where did the energy come from."

Does this help?

Thanks. It answers my question. Does it help? Not greatly as I have to now take on board and process the new perspective of objects shifting in space without an energy propelling them, and the idea that the speed of light is variable. I knew that it was when measured in a vacuum, as opposed to outside under normal circumstances, but did not know that the size of a vacuum made any difference (if it's empty, it's empty). Thanks anyway.

Nothing is shifting in space. Space, itself is expanding. There is no actual movement ... just something we describe using common-day terms and seems like movement.

Consider this. Lets say a trains is ten miles from the station. If the fastest speed possible is in the universe is 10 miles/hour then the station is 1 hour away. Lets assume that over time the speed at which the train can travel gets slower and slower. Such that after a year the fastest the train can travel is 1 mile/hour. Now the station is 10 hours away.

The distance didn't change. Not one angstrom. But the time it takes to get there has changed. That is essentially what we describe as the universe getting larger.

No one is measuring distance with a stick. They are measuring the amount of time it takes light to get here. And it keeps increasing.

D.A.,
We consider time as constant. We have to, (having
no other 'measuring stick` than C).
I admit to difficulty in 'space/time` vs 'space
thinking, but in your 'speed limit change` model,
wouldn't we see a 'blue` rather than a 'red`
shift in our astronomical observations?
Pragmatist

"There is something fascinating about science.
One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture
out of such a trifling investment of fact." - Mark Twain

According to Richard Feynman who I put this question to back in the 1960's ... no.

It is impossible to tell the difference between space expanding and the speed of light (or if you prefer time) changing.

They are just two different descriptions of the same thing.

But what I prefer about the alternative descrition is that it points out the "where did the energy come from" argument is without basis in science but is rather based upon common human experience.

D.A.,

It's nice to know I'm in good company.

Did Feynman, by any chance, say why?

Pragmatist

If he did I wasn't old enough at the time to put it all together. I just remember being an awe-struct teenager who actually got to talk to "him."

I remember nothing else from the seminar except his answer to my question.

"No one is measuring distance with a stick. They are measuring the amount of time it takes light to get here. And it keeps increasing."

Can a wave decelerate? So you don't avoid my question on account of it not being 'properly defined' I will include an example for which you should base your answer on: use a water ripple as a wave.

Secondly, this is nonsense;

"It is impossible to tell the difference between space expanding and the speed of light (or if you prefer time) changing"

If space were to expand the distance between objects would remain exactly the same because the objects, that exist in the expanding space, would expand with it. Now what have I over-looked or not defined properly?

Lastly, tell me why scientists think that the speed of light is the ?speed? of time as is apparent in the last quote I used. Surely scientists, who are so very careful about how they define things, would realise the difference between something happening and light-waves carrying information of that something happening -entering an eye. Or is this not true and there is something I don?t know on the matter? I there is, and it?s not common-knowledge, you have only yourself to blame so spare your cheap shots on my education.

Robert Miller wrote:
"If space were to expand the distance between objects would remain exactly the same"

No it wouldn't. Look again at the definition of length.

Length: the meter (m) defined as the distance traversed by a wave of light in a vacuum over 1/299 792 458 s (This definition fixes the speed of light at exactly 299 792 458 m/s).

If light traveled at a different speed in the past then distance, by definition, has changed but nothing has actually moved.

if i understand the theory correctly (im not a god after all), before the big bang, every thing was inside a black hole. while reading up on black holes i found that there was a reference to the fact that the stability of a black hole has something to do with the amount of matter near it and the ability to draw it in. now if all the matter of the universe was to be pulled into black holes which were then pulled into a single black hole, there would be nothing left to feed it. eventually it would become unstable and evaporate. since all matter had been shrunk to a space the size of an atom (one explation of it i heard) there would be no matter only energy, then as it expanded some of this energy "congealed" into matter. the time between the expansion and the congealing resulted in much of the energy being much farther out and moving away faster than others. since mass "creates gravity" (according to that same theory) gravity wells were created in many places which caused stars to pull in the matter.

im not really sure if i understand the theory that well, so dont jump me for misstating it, or not having it down perfectly

dehammer wrote:
"if i understand the theory correctly (im not a god after all), before the big bang, every thing was inside a black hole."

You don't understand it correctly. The theory does not say anthing about before the big bang. It doesn't even have anything to say about what happened in the first instants after the big bang. We can't see back that far into the past.

apparently you've not read much about the subject.

the theory states that all matter was in a small area different theories about as to the size of it. i believe it was Georges Lema?tre that first proposed a primeval atom. (http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/academy/universe/b_bang.html

here's another

http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/bigbang.htm

why don't you stop making statements that are so easy to show the idiocy of it and do a little research before claim to have any knowledge of something. its very tiring to see you try to claim to be an expert on everything when the only thing you have shown any knowledge of is political mud-slinging.

dehammer wrote:
"apparently you've not read much about the subject."

Well if you are nothing else you are consistent. Consistently wrong.

The difference is that I teach at a university and I read publications in peer reviewed journals while you are reading, it seems, comic books. Though I have to admit I am shocked you found a web site at a university. There may be hope for you some day.

But did you read it? No where in the entire text is the word "black" much less "black hole."

Try this site from Cornell instead:
http://instruct1.cit.cornell.edu/courses/astro101/lec31.htm

Note the statement:
# We can extrapolated back to about ~10-43 seconds after the Big Bang.

* Beyond this the physics is unknown.

That is the fact of the matter. We can not see all the way back to the bang. At ~10-43 seconds our math and physics break down.

1) just because you teach political mudslinging at a university, does not mean you know much about science. if someone who claims to have written a major paper on glaciers does not even know what glacial periods and intercultural period and does not believe that ice retreats during an ice age, there is little chance that these "piers" that reviewed you would know enough about science to understand the science of blowing their own noses.

2) you talk about inconsistency when you claim that know one knows about the first instances and then write that we know about the first minute.

3) Ive given you several links to university, although this is the first one that you give credit to understanding anything.

4) as i said there are different theories, which if you read the post you would know that ppl can only speculate (meaning theorise) the state that prior to the big bang. just because its not in this one does not mean that some one has not theorised that it was a black hole. many ppl have, because its logical to do so. one theory is that the universe is cyclic, meaning that after a time the gravity will pull everything back into another black hole and it will start all over again.

if you cant be bother to pay attention to whats going on, don't bother trying to bull-corn ppl into believing that you have any idea what your talking about.

here's a couple of researchers that have thought along this line.

http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/steinhardt.html

now before you make a fool of yourself claiming these are not real scientist, PAUL STEINHARDT is the Albert Einstein Professor in Science and on the faculty of both the Departments of Physics and Astrophysical Sciences at Princeton University. i have this sneaking suspicion that this guy knows a little bit more about science than you.

since your big on pier review here's one that was accepted by pier review
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000C55B5-C29B-1CDA-B4A8809EC588EEDF

even your vaulted BBC acknowledges it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1953244.stm

Mostly no dehammer;
The 'Hawking Radiation` produced by a
black hole is dependent on virtual particle
pairs created at the event horizon falling on
different sides of that 'surface`, and thus
represent tapping of vacuum energy.
Hawking also stated that the 'temperature`,
(intensity), of the radiation is inversely
proportional to the mass of the B.H.
An interesting idea however is :
What does the B.H. 'look` like from the inside?
Since time becomes disorted, (tends to stop),
at the event horizon, it might look like a
Big Bang???????????????????????????????????
Pure WAG but WTH.
Pragmatist