What "caused" the big bang?

[jj]

No, forget theories here. Forget mathematics here.

There was something *physical* that really happened in space called the Big Bang. There was some explosion from mysterious vacumn fluctuations, or whatever, and that created the universe.

So what caused all of this to happen? What are the physical things that caused this voodoo vacumn woo-woo fluctuation to fluctuate and explode into the universe?

Do you understand the meaning of "random"?

Given pure vacuum, events of any energy can arise, given ENOUGH TIME, thanks to pure quantum vacuum flux. The more energetic they are, the less likely (by a lot) but a lot of "nothing forever" has to become something.

Now why there is a quantum vacuum froth is a different question.

 

[jj]

Ian,

Any serious questions, or are you just here to annoy people?

Dr. Stupid

Methinks we all know the answer to that. He (and, it appears, T'ai Chi) are here to annoy people.

T'ai Chi's disingenuity in the blackout thread in Politics also caught my attention in that regard.

 

[jj]

You're a f*cking retard who'll never understand anything.

He understands you well enough, Ian.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Perfectly clear BillieJoe. The truth of the matter is that Stimp is talkiing out of his a*se again. The Big Bang just arose acausally. There can be no vacuum fluctuations or quantum fluctuations in the absence of anything at all.
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Really? You state that as fact. Now prove it, since you've asserted it. If you can't fully and completely prove it, like you often hypocritically insist that others do when the DISbelieve, you are shown to be an ethically bankrupt provacateur.

PROVE IT OR ***S OFF, Ian.. [/B]

There can be no physical events which are caused or physically brought about in the context of nothingness, otherwise, by definition, it wouldn't be nothingness!

 

[sorgoth]

How did a simple discussion about the big bang turn into a flame war? Maturity, people. Try it out. And just because the other guy did it first is no excuse.

Okay, so I think I begin to understand that Nothing...well, isn't really what we think of when we think nothing...it's a kinda froth of random possibility? Could someone explain this in a little more detail? I'm curious.

 

[Interesting Ian]

How did a simple discussion about the big bang turn into a flame war? Maturity, people. Try it out. And just because the other guy did it first is no excuse.

Okay, so I think I begin to understand that Nothing...well, isn't really what we think of when we think nothing...it's a kinda froth of random possibility? Could someone explain this in a little more detail? I'm curious.

There's nothing to explain, nothing to understand. There is nothing inconsistent about the Universe spontaneously, wholly acausally, coming into being of its own accord. But people like Stimpson can't get their head around that

 

[T'ai Chi]

jj posted:

Methinks we all know the answer to that. He (and, it appears, T'ai Chi) are here to annoy people.

T'ai Chi's disingenuity in the blackout thread in Politics also caught my attention in that regard.

More name-calling? tsk. Show evidence for your claims about environmentalists in the blackout thread. This is a skeptics board.

Now, back to the regularly scheduled thread:

The material came from nothing?

I know of no thing that came from nothing. If it came from vacumn fluctuations, where did those fluctuations come from? How did they originate?

 

[Moccomouse]

Look. Here's the thing. The Big Bang bang makes no provisions for what happened before the Big Bang. That does not mean that there couldn't have possibly been anything before the Bang, but simply that the theory itself does not take into account what happened before. In fact, if the Big Bang was indeed T=0, then I don't see how there could have been anything before it, since everything needs space and time, no matter how small, for something to exist. In our universe, things must exist in both space and time. Right now, we exist in time at about T=15 or 20 billion years. Before T=0, there was neither space nor time. Can something happen and exist both instantanously and infinitely, with no space to exist in? Can you have a vacuum fluctuation if there is no vacuum?

Think about that sentence. The beginning of space AND time.

So lets say that someone comes up with evidence that there was indeed another universe before ours, and it all came together into a big crunch, and then exploded into a Big Bang, forming our universe. Does this mean something caused the Big Bang? Yes, but what it would also imply is that the Big Bang is NOT actually T=0. It would mean that we exist now at T=20 billion plus x(however many more billions of years the older universe was). It would just mean that we didn't take into account the age of the previous state of the universe.
If the universe is shown to be an absolutely infinite loop of Big Bangs and Big Crunches wiht no beginning or end, then logically there can be no T=0, can there?

So what caused the Big Bang? We don't know. If the theory is correct, and the Big Bang is indeed T=0, then I doubt we could ever answer the question in a way that is definable to our current understanding of the laws of physics.

 

[BillyJoe]

So WHY is "nothing" a "vacuum filled with quantum fluctuations"?

I understand (?) that Heisenberg Uncertainty means that even a vacuum has virtual particles appearing and disappearing constantly (zero point energy). But why is this so? Why is "nothing" not just "nothing"?

BillyJoe.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

T'ai Chi,

You got it - and perhaps more pertinently, nobody knows or can know what happened before, because according to Big Bang theory, there was no such thing as 'before'.
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So you believe strongly in a theory that says that there was a huge explosion that created everything, but that there was nothing before that?

Please point out where I claimed to "believe strongly" in any of the current Big Bang theories. On the contrary, I flat-out stated that I do not know.

Sounds like religious faith. Or faith in science.

Smells like a burning strawman.

If nobody knows what happened before, as you say, then when I say that there could be something before, I find it interesting when everyone says that me asking that question is silly.

No, you asking that question within the context of Big Bang theories, for which there is no "before", is silly. And you asking us to explain what happened before the Big Bang, without doing so within the context of a Big Bang theory, is even sillier.


Ian,

I am quite aware of this. What you seem to fail to realize is that the vacuum fluctuation hypothesis does not contradict any of this in any way.
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So what is your point dipstick?? If you say the big bang is caused by a vacuum fluctuation then that just begs the question of what caused the vacuum fluctuation! And of course nothing can cause it, since if there were a prior event then that event itself would be the beginning of the Universe!

Read what I said, Ian. The vacuum fluctuation hypothesis does not claim that the Big Bang is caused by a vacuum fluctuation. It claims that the Universe is a vacuum fluctuation.

Not that any of this means anything to you, since you don't have the slightest idea of what a vacuum fluctuation even is.

The hypothesis is not that the Big Bang was caused by a vacuum fluctuation, but that the Universe itself is a vacuum fluctuation.
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Complete cr*p. The Universe itself can only be a vacuum fluctuation in the context of some greater reality. If there is nothing whatsoever, there can be no vacuum fluctuation in this nothing whatsoever. Learn and understand moron.

Who said anything about there being nothing whatsoever? Once again, you are trying to look at the problem from the context of there being some time at which the universe did not exist, and then the Universe magically popping into existence. This is nonsensical.

Try to wrap your mind around this. The Universe is only several billion years old, but there was never a time when the Universe did not exist.

When you can understand that the above is not self-contradictory, then you have some chance of understanding the theories of the Big Bang.

Read my posts again moron. I originally cited the vacuum fluctuation hypothesis as an example of a scenario in which the Big Bang was acausal!
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If it was caused by a vacuum fluctuation it is not acausal retard!

Are you blind? I just said it wasn't!

You don't understand what acausal means. If a vacuum fluctuation were truly acausal then you would not be subscribing to naturalism. The fact that some event is inherently random doesn't mean that it is acausal! If it can be described by mathematical rules then it is causal not acausal.
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So now you are claiming that Quantum Mechanics violates naturalism?
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No I am certainly not!

Well, QM is an acausal theory.

You are completely clueless.
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Oh yeah?? Sorry, but I reckon it's you who is the f*cking ar*ehole.

That may very well be, but I am not a clueless ar*ehole.

Acausal means that the event is not caused by prior states. That does not necessarily mean that it cannot be described by mathematical rules, and it certainly doesn't mean that the probabilities cannot be described by mathematical rules.
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As I have repeatedly said, you have no idea what common words in the English language mean. The words "causal" and "acausal" are further examples of your complete and total incomprehension of the meaning of simple words. Why the f*ck don't you try and learn English before communicating on here?? You complete idiot!

This is the science forum, Ian. We are discussing science, and in doing so, we use scientific definitions. Common usage is vague and of no use here. If you want to discuss science, then learn the scientific definitions of the terms being used. or at the very least, listen when they are explained to you.

And before you start in with more of your "Stimpy is using the wrong definitions" nonsense again, I am using the word acausal as it is used in science. After all, science is what we are discussing here.
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I am not discussing science you idiot. I'm discussing the origin of the Universe. Try to understand the difference you complete and total cretin.

Then go start your own thread in the philosophy section. This is a discussion about Cosmological scientific theories about the Big Bang.

Bullsh*t. You don't know what you are talking about. I can only guess that what you are trying to say is that the origin of the Universe is supernatural. There is certainly no reason to think that this must be the case.
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Call it what the hell you like. The fact is the Universe exists. I an not saying it is caused by God, or there is anything mystical about it. Hell, even if I were a militant atheist I would see nothing problematic about the idea that the Universe arose wholly acausally.

Neither do I. I just don't think that acausal is synonymous with supernatural.

You're a f*cking retard who'll never understand anything.

And you are an abusive, willfully ignorant, alcoholic. What's your point?


Dr. Stupid

 

[BillyJoe]

Why is there not just nothing?.......

There's nothing to explain, nothing to understand. There is nothing inconsistent about the Universe spontaneously, wholly acausally, coming into being of its own accord. But people like Stimpson can't get their head around that

I can't either and neither can...........

I know of no thing that came from nothing. If it came from vacumn fluctuations, where did those fluctuations come from? How did they originate?

Some say "God did it" but then, whence God?

BillyJoe.
(Still looking for the answer)

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

BillyJoe,

So WHY is "nothing" a "vacuum filled with quantum fluctuations"?

I understand (?) that Heisenberg Uncertainty means that even a vacuum has virtual particles appearing and disappearing constantly (zero point energy). But why is this so? Why is "nothing" not just "nothing"?

Nobody knows. What's more, if we ever find out, then another question that nobody knows the answer to will just take its place.

In science, we often explain things in terms of other, more fundamental things, which we already understand, but at the most fundamental level our theories are only descriptive. That is just the nature of science.

Right now, we have two separate and incompatible theories sharing the most "fundamental" level: QM and GR. Both are purely descriptive. We hope to unify them into a single theory. When we do this, we will be explaining both in terms of some more fundamental theory, but that theory will only be descriptive. Likewise, that theory my get reduced to something even more fundamental, and so on.


Dr. Stupid

 

[BillyJoe]

Cat,

Nobody knows.

Bummer.

What's more, if we ever find out, then another question that nobody knows the answer to will just take its place.

Double bummer.

In science, we often explain things in terms of other, more fundamental things, which we already understand, but at the most fundamental level our theories are only descriptive. That is just the nature of science.

Well, that just great because, goddammitt, we don't have anything else.

Right now, we have two separate and incompatible theories sharing the most "fundamental" level: QM and GR. Both are purely descriptive. We hope to unify them into a single theory. When we do this, we will be explaining both in terms of some more fundamental theory, but that theory will only be descriptive. Likewise, that theory my get reduced to something even more fundamental, and so on

So there is NEVER an end to this process?
We never get to find out why there is something rather than nothing?


regards,
BillyJoe.
(And thanks for the info)

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

BillyJoe,

So there is NEVER an end to this process?
We never get to find out why there is something rather than nothing?

Sucks, don't it?

It could be worse, though. Imagine if we didn't even have science?


Dr. Stupid

 

[Tony]

If everything was created with the BB, and nothing (not even time) existed "before" the BB, how can something (the universe) arise out of nothing?

 

[JamesM]

So you believe strongly in a theory that says that there was a huge explosion that created everything, but that there was nothing before that?

I don't believe in a huge explosion, because my understanding of Big Bang theory is that it wasn't an explosion in the everyday sense of the word (although I have seen it described as that). Big Bang is a rather poorly chosen description. The term was coined by Fred Hoyle and he meant it to be derogatory - he preferred the Steady State theory.

Sounds like religious faith. Or faith in science.

Certainly the latter. Perhaps the scientific method will fail tomorrow, I don't know it won't. But, speaking as a practicing scientist, the pay is simply not good enough for me to carry on doing it if I didn't really believe it was the most effective way of finding out about the world.

If you want to talk about Big Bang, you have to accept that there was no time before it. If you want to postulate a hypothetical inflation of space, but with time existing before that point, without mathematics and without any empirical observation to support it, those ruminations might be better expressed on the philosophy forum.

If nobody knows what happened before, as you say, then when I say that there could be something before, I find it interesting when everyone says that me asking that question is silly.

It is true that nobody knows what happened before. But the vital point you continue to overlook is the reason why nobody knows. In Big Bang theory, there is no before. This has been pointed out by several posters in several ways - perhaps it might help if you explained your difficulty in acknowledging this?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

BillyJoe said:

So there is NEVER an end to this process?
We never get to find out why there is something rather than nothing?

Hell, we don't get to find out if there is even a reason why there is something rather than nothing.

~~ Paul

 

[Interesting Ian]

Who said anything about there being nothing whatsoever? Once again, you are trying to look at the problem from the context of there being some time at which the universe did not exist, and then the Universe magically popping into existence. This is nonsensical.

No I am not.

Try to wrap your mind around this. The Universe is only several billion years old, but there was never a time when the Universe did not exist.

I've understood this since the age of 15 when I read Paul Davies "The runaway Universe".

Well, QM is an acausal theory.

As I have said, you don't understand what acausal means. If something occurs due to physical laws, even if the chance of it occurring is only 50%, it is still caused. Acaused means without any discernable pattern. Entirely unpredictable.

That may very well be, but I am not a clueless ar*ehole.

I beg to differ.

Neither do I. I just don't think that acausal is synonymous with supernatural.

In this we disagree (with your definition of "supernatural").

 

[Interesting Ian]

So there is NEVER an end to this process?
We never get to find out why there is something rather than nothing?
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Sucks, don't it?
[/B]

No not at all.

 

[Interesting Ian]

It could be worse, though. Imagine if we didn't even have science?


Dr. Stupid [/B]

Imagine if reality were like what most intellectuals envisaged in the 17th century (ie the materialists). Most of our modern technology would not be possible.