Where Is The Center Of The Big Bang Universe?

[sol invictus]

Same result was just my way of saying absolute zero or infinite temperature will both kill so there isn't much qualitative difference.

Oh... well... personally I'd prefer to be flash-frozen to absolute zero. Almost no damage to tissue would take place if it happened quickly enough (actually that might be wrong - if water expands enough turning to ice it could burst cells etc.). Anyway there might be a chance of revival.

Burning to a crisp at infinite temperature, though - that's bad!

But I suppose it's a matter of taste...

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

I fail to see how I've supported your point. Explain how my example defines an "edge" and you might be on to something. The difference is that in my example, there is a definite 3D space which is observable, whereas you are making up a hypothetical extra dimension which no one has ever observed in your case (that is, the dimension through which you'd be "shoveling"). If you simply leave your arguments at "in a hypothetical 4D+? space there could be an edge, despite us having no way to observe it" then you are simply making an argument from ignorance.

I ask you, what is the difference between a completely unobservable edge and no edge at all?

How can you see the 3D edge when you are constrained by the limits of space time? The light reaching the Earth aka the view we have of the Universe is a view of the past. We cannot see the actual real time Universe.

I'll expand on this tomorrow, I'm getting a bit sleepy.

 

[Smackety]

If we look really hard in any direction, can we see ourselves? That seems to follow from the balloon analogy.
If the current universe is too big for us to see our own light wrapping around, what about when the universe was much younger and smaller?
Can we see mirror images of very old galaxies in different locations because their light has lapped the galaxy multiple times in every direction?
I would think the "first" galaxy should be visible in every direction not obscured by a younger one.

 

[quarky]

The state of the universe is a bit depressing. It reminds me of peak oil.
Everyday, it gets less likely that we will be able to meet aliens.

btw,
if it turns out that everything is expanding, including atoms, would we have any valid reference point from which to assess this?

 

[Gate2501]

The light reaching the Earth aka the view we have of the Universe is a view of the past. We cannot see the actual real time Universe.

What you see when you move your hand over your mouse technically is a view of the past (albeit the uber near past). I don't think that you can speak about an "actual real time universe" without taking into account the fact that what you think is "actual" time is completely relative.

 

[Fredrik]

If we look really hard in any direction, can we see ourselves? That seems to follow from the balloon analogy.
If the current universe is too big for us to see our own light wrapping around, what about when the universe was much younger and smaller?
Can we see mirror images of very old galaxies in different locations because their light has lapped the galaxy multiple times in every direction?
I would think the "first" galaxy should be visible in every direction not obscured by a younger one.

The solution of Einstein's equation that's the most like the "balloon" we've been talking about describes a universe that collapses back into a big crunch. In that universe, something moving at the speed of light isn't going to make it all the way around before the big crunch, no matter when it's emitted. (I remember having to prove this as an exercise when I was studying GR).

I don't know how the answer changes if we instead consider a similar solution with a non-zero density of vacuum. If the expansion slows down at some time in the future, then maybe light from the early universe will be able to go all the way around, but it certainly hasn't done that yet.

 

[Paulhoff]

As a follow up, if (as claimed) ALL motion ceases at absolute zero then why is pressure from electron degeneracy allowed?

What does absolute zero have to do with electrons, they are still in motion within the atom.

Paul

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

What you see when you move your hand over your mouse technically is a view of the past (albeit the uber near past). I don't think that you can speak about an "actual real time universe" without taking into account the fact that what you think is "actual" time is completely relative.

When I look at my hand, the short distance makes the time factor less relevant. For all intents and purposes, I am seeing my hand in real time. But when I look at the Sun, it is light minutes away so it is minutes in the past, if I see a distant galaxy in a telescope, now it is years in the past.

But because I can observe things almost in real time that are close by, I can infer real time exists.

So I don't see the relevance of your claim that there is no actual real time universe. Of course there is. I have overwhelming evidence of it.

 

[robinson]

Time is a function of the observer.

Time has been a major subject of religion, philosophy, and science, but defining time in a non-controversial manner applicable to all fields of study has consistently eluded the greatest scholars.

 

[ben m]

We now know that NOTHING resists gravity below the Schwarzchild radius and it is the degeneracy pressure that exists. My question is since degeneracy pressure exists even at absolute zero, is a singularity hot or cold?

First of all, your intuitive definition of temperature won't work in a singularity. What's the mean velocity of the components of a singularity? What's the kinetic energy per particle? Is it in equilibrium? That's all meaningless for a single geometric point. However, in the more physicsy version of thermodynamics, temperature doesn't need to have anything to do with motion. It has to do with the distribution of available states, and how the density of states changes as a function of energy. A singularity has exactly one available state; as you add more energy it continues to have exactly one available state. That makes dS/dE = 0, which we would normally associate with infinite temperature. But it's really not a useful thing to discuss for a singularity.

As a follow up, if (as claimed) ALL motion ceases at absolute zero then why is pressure from electron degeneracy allowed?

Electron degeneracy pressure has nothing to do with motion. It's not a normal "pressure", the way you think of gas pressure being caused by particles bouncing off one another and exchanging momentum. The exclusion of two electrons from the same quantum state is true no matter what the electrons' energies.

 

[sol invictus]

A singularity has exactly one available state; as you add more energy it continues to have exactly one available state.

That's an interesting statement. Why do you think that?

Certainly it's not true for some types of timelike gravitational singularities I can think of. For a Schwarzschild BH singularity it might in some sense be true, but since the singularity is spacelike it's a little hard to see what a "state" of it even means, or how you can take a derivative of its entropy with respect to energy.

 

[Dark Jaguar]

Well I haven't read everything but what I did read was interesting.

Yes I suppose it's easily possible that the universe may be so big that closed or open formats can still be around and we just don't possess the granularity of measurement to notice the curvature. However, until we get that evidence, we have to go on what we do have right now, and that shows a flat universe at least for the time being.

Time as "function of the observer" isn't right. POSITION of the observer is what determines how you observe time to pass, sure, but that's also true even if your "observer" is a grain of sand with no real awareness at all. Further, though it's relative to your position and speed, there is still an absolute answer after you do the math from that data. One's state of mind isn't relavent except in terms of how time "feels" to someone.

A lot of people seem to suggest that the 4D space the 3D "balloon surface" is "expanding into" is time, but I never got that impression. If anything it would need to be a spacial dimension. It doesn't make sense for physical objects to move through time that way. Really though, from what I can tell it's a moot point, at least right now, to bother trying to figure out what it means for a 3D surface to "expand into" something that we have no way of detecting (as of yet).

Though a "closed" universe would allow one to see the back of their own head, this assumes the universe (specifically the back of your head part of it) has been around long enough for the light shining from the back of your head to fly all the way around and hit your eyes. Good luck standing still long enough to see that in action. It also assumes that the universe isn't still expanding, specifically expanding so fast that light can't keep up thus meaning you'd never ever see the back of your head because the light would never get to the other side. These two represent flat and open formats, and the balloon shape isn't quite the way to get it across. More like thinking of an ever expanding flat surface or crazy arse hard to render "saddle shape" where the parts pointing up and down expand into eternity.

 

[Soapy Sam]

It's in Wallace, Idaho.

http://wallace-id.com/centeroftheuniverse.html

 

[MattusMaximus]

So I don't see the relevance of your claim that there is no actual real time universe. Of course there is. I have overwhelming evidence of it.

Please be specific in your definition of "actual real time universe" - I want to make sure that you aren't speaking of a common & fundamental misconception about the nature of time.

 

[HghrSymmetry]

You can disagree with the conclusion, but as for the 156 b.l.yrs being the distance we can see, you need to re-read the article. We can see 12-14 billion light years or whatever the current estimate is for the age of the Universe. The calculation in the hypothesis is the distance the actual Universe has expanded since the singularity, its actual diameter.

Some sites do still mention that figure (granted, the article is dated to 04).

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mystery_monday_040524.html

 

[HghrSymmetry]

Oops, sorry, that's the same link you posted.

Disregard.

Thanks.

(hey forum folks, how about some more edit features so we can fix blunders?)

 

[MattusMaximus]

Oops, sorry, that's the same link you posted.

Disregard.

Thanks.

(hey forum folks, how about some more edit features so we can fix blunders?)

That is one of the coolest avatars EVER!

 

[HghrSymmetry]

Thanks Matt-M.

 

[INRM]

How can a finite system go to infinity?

 

[Yllanes]

How can a finite system go to infinity?

How can the Universe be infinite if it was all concentrated into a point at the Big Bang?