Questions About Time Before the Big Bang

[Gold Barz]

Sequence of measurement, more appropriately than time, provides a physical basis for assessing change in quantum cosmology. Quantum mechanics retains its space/time separation, and relativity its spacetime unity, with sequencing inherent to the dynamical changes in both. Between two recorded events, physics maintains as a transient, probabilistic dynamic. There are then the two states of change - observation, and statistical continuity between observations. Sequence of measurement is a most objective and fundamental physical standard. Derived from the quantum wavefunction, action eigenvalues represent the possible sequential permutations (Planck steps) that observation's action follows. Successive compatible [complementary] measurements define null (0) [unit (±h)] eigenvalues. These quantum numbers order time- (or space-) independently overall, obeying a random walk statistic. It is indeed possible for retrograde, sequential action. A partial history of Planck steps lost to statistics represents the overdetermination with quantum mechanics. (From my website, below.)

Not to be rude but could you simplify this, I want to know about it I just can't understand it that well.

 

[selfAdjoint]

Wasnt it "our" time that didnt begin until 14 billion years ago, same with "our" space, I mean there could have been something before...like, dare i say, other universes? but that's not even science that's pure speculation and to us they might as well not even exist because they are in no way connected with our universe? do you agree self Adjoint?

Could have been, but didn't necessarily have to be. They don't need prior time to get the big bang.

 

[Loren Booda]

Gold Barz,

Simply, that consecutive measurements by the observer are more effective in marking physical change than tallying time alone.

Thanks for your patience.

 

[Thor]

Well according to the standard cosmological model time and space, actually spacetime, began around 14 billion years ago. There is no "before" that. There may be some kind of causalty hierarchy, but not time.

YEAH. RIGHT.
Once upon a time there was an after with no 'before'.
Do you realize how silly that is?

 

[Sempiternity]

With a succession of cause-and-effect events, there must necessarily be an original effect which did not have a cause.

 

[turbo]

With a succession of cause-and-effect events, there must necessarily be an original effect which did not have a cause.

Can you explain how this can be? What are the initial conditions necessary for the the original effect to arise? Cannot these conditions in any way be construed as causes?

 

[Chronos]

This qualifies for what I consider an 'Anthropic' argument. The concept of time before clocks is undefined, hence effectively infinite [by clock time]. Similarily, the concept of time after clocks [i.e., all clocks lose the ability to function] is equally undefined, hence also effectively infinite [by clock time]. This raises serious questions. We may not occupy a priveleged location in the universe, but we undeniably occupy a priveleged 'time' in a universe sandwiched between dual infinities. Sounds like philosophy to me. Food for thought:
http://www.anthropic-principle.com/preprints.html

 

[Danger]

Why isn't the answer to "before the big bang" question "some sort of an out-of-equilibrium system " (a disequilibrium state, for short)?

Probably because that makes no sense as written. Sorry, no offense intended, but you have to clarify that statement. The current universe is an 'out of equilibrium system'. When it reaches equilibrium, one way or the other, all life will cease to exist.

there could have been something before...like, dare i say, other universes? but that's not even science that's pure speculation and to us they might as well not even exist because they are in no way connected with our universe? do you agree self Adjoint?

That's absolutely correct. If there were preceding universes, or multiple co-existing ones, they would have no correlation to ours. Time there could pass billions of times faster or slower in relation to physical processes than it does here, but it doesn't matter because our time is entirely dependent upon the conditions in this universe.

consecutive measurements by the observer are more effective in marking physical change than tallying time alone.

Thanks for the translation, Loren. I've had (surprise, surprise) more than a couple of beers, and couldn't make heads nor tails of your first post. Reduced to a common-sense statement like this, it's perfectly agreeable.

YEAH. RIGHT.
Once upon a time there was an after with no 'before'.
Do you realize how silly that is?

Not half as silly as supposing that some supernatural being created it all. As a counter argument, how could there be a 'before' without an 'after'?

 

[Thor]

With a succession of cause-and-effect events, there must necessarily be an original effect which did not have a cause.

It doesn't necessarily follow. If time is eternal, there would be no original cause. Why are you predisposed to believe time is ('scuse the pun) temporary?

 

[Sempiternity]

The key to your statement is 'if'. That is, if time is eternal. When you say eternal, do you mean existing before the beginning and after the ending? Did time exist before the Big Bang? That would be the same as saying time existed before space. But, as discussed in Fabric of the Cosmos, there is no such thing as absolute time and absolute space. There is only absolute spacetime.

 

[mars2]

spacetime...
It exist from the Big Bang,I think.

 

[Thor]

The key to your statement is 'if'. That is, if time is eternal. When you say eternal, do you mean existing before the beginning and after the ending?

No. I mean there was no beginning, there will be no ending.

Did time exist before the Big Bang? That would be the same as saying time existed before space. But, as discussed in Fabric of the Cosmos, there is no such thing as absolute time and absolute space. There is only absolute spacetime.

Time is not a tangible. It is neither a field nor a fabric. It is nothing more nor less than the measurement of change. As subject 'X' changes from state #1 to state #2, subject 'Y' changes from state #3 to state #4 or as subject '1' changes from position #A to position #B, subject '2' changes from position #C to position #D. It is simply the application of incremental differentiation. It is no different than measuring distance with a ruler, but instead of comparing an unknown length to a standard unit, you are measuring the change occurring within some procedure against the duration of some standard event - like a rotation of the planet or the vibration of a cesium atom.

The process of change is always explained in terms of cause and effect - action and reaction. Conditions or states of being change during the process of cause and effect. But existence is not a state of being, it is the phenomenon of being, itself. Before something can change, before something can act or be acted upon it must first exist. And if being is required in order for change to occur then cause and effect is a function of existence. This is, of course, the antithesis of the premise that existence is a function of cause and effect - or "creation".

 

[turbo]

"It may prove useful in physics to consider events in all of time at once and to imagine that we at each instant are only aware of those that lie behind us." Richard Feynman

We are not the only ones who have had trouble with the concept of absolute time.

 

[turbo]

An older paper, but relevant to the thread

http://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/gr-qc/pdf/0508/0508001.pdf

 

[Einbeermug]

Time is a function of existence. Not the reverse.
Bigbangers, like creationists, wrongly presume the existence of the cosmos has temporal limits. It does not.

Before something can change of be changed, before it can act or be acted upon, something must exist.

If existence is required for change to occur, then time is a function of EXISTENCE. And any search for a beginning or an end is based upon a fallacy.

 

[qraal]

Time is a function of existence. Not the reverse.
Bigbangers, like creationists, wrongly presume the existence of the cosmos has temporal limits. It does not.

Before something can change of be changed, before it can act or be acted upon, something must exist.

If existence is required for change to occur, then time is a function of EXISTENCE. And any search for a beginning or an end is based upon a fallacy.

*head-scratching* *vigorous head-scratching*

 

[Freeman Dyson]

Don't we just assign t=0 at the big bang because that is when calculations can start?

The reason is that, in the cosmological models based on general relativity, the formulae for the expansion of the universe become particularly simple if you define t=0, cosmic time zero, to coincide with the big bang singularity. This is a great advantage for physics calculations dealing with the early universe, so defining cosmic time in this way makes good sense.

If we could get a theory of quantum gravity, couldn't we possibly assign time further back?

 

[Chronos]

The concept of time evaporates without entitities in motion. Time is what clocks measure, as Einstein said.

 

[Dmitry67]

The concept of time evaporates without entitities in motion. Time is what clocks measure, as Einstein said.

Time, like space is variable.
Time and space exist without any notions. Example: vacuum in QM.

 

[Chronos]

Time, like space is variable.

Agreed.

Time and space exist without any notions.

Disagreed.

Example: vacuum in QM.

How is that relevant?

 

[Dmitry67]

Time and space are part of space time continuum. Saying "The concept of time evaporates without entitities in motion" is equivalent to "The concept of space evaporates without entitities in motion"

Now it sounds crazier.
t and x are variables.
What you are saying is "the concept of real numbers evaporates if you don't have a function with dy/dx<>0. For example, if function is contant, x does not exist"

also, motion relative to what?
do you include virtual particles (which are real in some frames) into "entities"?

 

[Chronos]

Time and space are part of space time continuum. Saying "The concept of time evaporates without entitities in motion" is equivalent to "The concept of space evaporates without entitities in motion"

Agreed.

Now it sounds crazier.
t and x are variables.
What you are saying is "the concept of real numbers evaporates if you don't have a function with dy/dx<>0. For example, if function is contant, x does not exist"

Not at all, you are confounding the issue by injecting irrelevant arguments.

also, motion relative to what?
do you include virtual particles (which are real in some frames) into "entities"?

I like the motion relative to what part. I fail to see, however, the relevance of virtual particles in this discussion.

 

[Dmitry67]

Because there is no such thing as 'empty space'

 

[gabrielh]

Questions like these are grounded in uncertainty--not that they shouldn't be asked, they are vital questions that are indeed necessary to ask. The questions of when time began, when the universe began, etc. are questions that we simply don't know the answer to. Convention suggests that the moment time began was was at "The Big Bang." But the truth is, we don't know for sure if the universe was formed by a big bang--perhaps it had no origin at all, though observational evidence would suggest we are correct in assuming this a proper, or at least plausible, understanding of our origins.

 

[kishore_13]

Can you explain how this can be? What are the initial conditions necessary for the the original effect to arise? Cannot these conditions in any way be construed as causes?

According to Newton's law:"Every action has an equal and opposite reaction" and comparing it with the Cause and effect principle...Isn't every reaction or effect in essence another cause or action. So it sums up to the fact that cause and effect are just events..not different entities.

 

[jarhead]

I think (if the Big Bang Theory is correct) that the universe is always expanding and collapsing hens-forth the big bang it could been possible that there was another bb and another bb on and on

 

[binbots]

I believe in infinity which means there is no start to time. I see our universe and only part of a bigger universe which has a greater time. This universe is inside another universe so on and so on forever. Time as we know it is the start of our universe ONLY in it current form. Prior to the BB our universe had a diiferent form. So time is infinite and we are able to capture it at this moment.

 

[Chronos]

Time in this universe has a definitive beginning. Time before this universe arose is undefinable [hence irrelevant]. No 'clocks' predating the existence of this universe are known to exist.

 

[robheus]

The very concept of "begin of time" is already self-contradicting at it's very bottom, since to talk about "begin" means that we have a concept of time already in which something was not, then went through a birth process and thereafter was existing.

How can it possible be valid for time itself?

 

[Dmitry67]

there are many options.
Very likely close to the BB time will lose some of the properties we got used to
For example, due to very low entropy at BB 'arrow of time' won't be defined.
Or, the number of time dimensions will be different
Or, there will be no difference between spatial and time dimensions.

 

[TryToThink]

Time as we know it began at the formation of the universe. However, there was a sort-of time before that, as you need time to have a cause and effect chain reaction, such as the so-called "big bang". It took time for the random quarks to form quark/antiquark annihilation, time for the expansion of space, and time for the heat in that space, which was upward of a million degrees Fahrenheit, to dissipate to the point of quarks forming proton, nucleus, electron, and neutron. There is also the matter of local v.s universe time, which takes forever to explain, but I will. Later.

 

[Radrook]

Why exclude what existed before the BB from the term universe? Obviously SOMETHING existed otherwise there would be nothing here right now. So if something existed and the universe refers to all which exists then how do we cogently justify not classifying that something-as universe?

About time-well, time is a perception of a sequences of events. Since events are presently being assumed as happening prior to the Big Bang then using that criterion of potential perception of such events then time existed prior to the BB. Especially if we imagine appearances of virtual particles, intermittent collision of undulating branes, creation of dimensions, emergances of multiple bubble universe in a hyperspace and the like which scientists are now fondly tossing around as possible in order to take physics beyond the BB barrier.

 

[slider123]

Can anyone help me with this one!,i don't think its a very original question but keeps recurring in my head..
If time existed before the big bang,then it seems to me that time in the past may be infinite ie :That if there is no beginning of time the past therefore must be infinite,..If this is correct and the past is infinite ,then how could we reach the present time ,,ie have we waited an eternity to be born ,,which then leads me to conclude a contridictve answer that maybe by logic that time does not exist at all ..Or am i just talking a load of

 

[slider123]

Can anyone help me with this one!,i don't think its a very original question but keeps recurring in my head..
If time existed before the big bang,then it seems to me that time in the past may be infinite ie :That if there is no beginning of time the past therefore must be infinite,..If this is correct and the past is infinite ,then how could we reach the present time ,,ie have we waited an eternity to be born ,,which then leads me to conclude a contridictve answer that maybe by logic that time does not exist at all ..Or am i just talking a load of ??

 

[Dmitry67]

Why exclude what existed before the BB from the term universe? Obviously SOMETHING existed otherwise there would be nothing here right now. So if something existed and the universe refers to all which exists then how do we cogently justify not classifying that something-as universe?

"Obviously" is very misleading.
"Obviously" tells us too many things which are wrong: that simultaneously is absolute, that space is flat, that it is independent of time etc.
Don't trust "common sense"

Mathematically, there are solutions (Goedels for example) where time is looped. This example proved that there is no requirement for TIME to be in range -inf..+inf

 

[Dmitry67]

Can anyone help me with this one!,i don't think its a very original question but keeps recurring in my head..
If time existed before the big bang,then it seems to me that time in the past may be infinite ie :That if there is no beginning of time the past therefore must be infinite,..If this is correct and the past is infinite ,then how could we reach the present time ,,ie have we waited an eternity to be born ,,which then leads me to conclude a contridictve answer that maybe by logic that time does not exist at all ..Or am i just talking a load of ??

Leaving the 'time before the big bang thing' apart,
in physics 'future' and 'past' all 'exist' in some sense.
This very contre-intuitive picture is called Eternalism.
Please checking this article (no formulas inside) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternalism_(philosophy_of_time )

 

[NeedMorePower]

It is likely impossible to determine when time (should it exist) began. There are a number of issues with this argument, some of which have to do with relativity, and some that point out how physics grew out of philosophy.

First, does time exist? This seems to be an intuitively simple question, as we are surrounded by clocks, watches, calendars, celestial bodies, etc. Furthermore, does the quivering of a particular isotope of Cesium REALLY mean that time, itself, exists and can be "measured" to such an incredibly small scale? What is being measured, however,
time, orbiting bodies, or vibrations? Is one really equivalement to the other? Just because "everything doesn't happen all at once" prove that time, itself, exists?

If time does exist, did it have a beginning? What would that beginning have been? Until the past thousand years, or so, time began with the "creation" of the Earth. We know that time must have existed prior to that, because the Sun existed, and was formed, as well as the galaxy and the remainder of the cosmos. The concept recently proposed that the universe is the result of a collision of branes gives a new dimension (no pun) to the argument that something else may have existed prior to the universe, or that we live in a universe with a plentitude of parallel "baby universes". Certainly, if time existed, it would have existed prior to the formation of our universe.

Carrying on in this line of thought, we can imagine the theory of relativity extending to time, not only within our universe, but also the relativity of such time (by necessity) between universes.

If, on the other hand, time does not exist, as I have posited, none of this grand ediface is necessary.

Don't, however, throw away your alarm clock. Your boss still expects to see you in the office in the morning!

 

[CronoSpark]

Time and energy are interrelated IMO. Time exists if energy exists, but it would be hard to say that time existed in complete emptiness.

 

[Radrook]

Does this question have an answer? Does the beginning of time coincide with the Big Bang? Is it appropriate to ask what happened before the Big Bang?

I have read that the events prior to BB do not influence those after it. Does it mean that nothing happened before the BB? Or does it mean that events did occur but that they are useless for the discussions about our universe? If yes, what happened before the BB? Or does it mean that human mind cannot comprehend what happened before BB?

I am new to this forum. Sorry if I am being too naive or if I have not worded my questions properly but I am curious to understand this. Could you provide links where this topic is discussed? Thanks in advance.[/QUOTE


>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


Sure it's appropriate to ask what happened. In fact, scientists are speculating about it all the time. Ideas such as branes, virtual particles and multiple universes that could have existed prior to our Big Bang are common fodder for pre-Big Bang speculation. Here is am example:

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


Excerpt

Some theorists suggest that the Big Bang was not so much a birth as a transition, a "quantum leap" from some formless era of imaginary time, or from nothing at all. Still others are exploring models in which cosmic history begins with a collision with a universe from another dimension...

A New Possibility Is Introduced
That other universe could bring about creation itself, according to several recent theories. One of them, called branefall, was developed in 1998 by Dr. Georgi Dvali of New York University and Dr. Henry Tye, from Cornell. In it the universe emerges from its state of quantum formlessness as a tangle of strings and cold empty membranes stuck together. If, however, there is a gap between the branes at some point, the physicists said, they will begin to fall together.



Each brane, Dr. Dvali said, will experience the looming gravitational field of the other as an energy field in its own three-dimensional space and will begin to inflate rapidly, doubling its size more than a thousand times in the period it takes for the branes to fall together. "If there is at least one region where the branes are parallel, those regions will start an enormous expansion while other regions will collapse and shrink," Dr. Dvali said.
When the branes finally collide, their energy is released and the universe heats up, filling with matter and heat, as in the standard Big Bang.



This spring four physicists proposed a different kind of brane clash that they say could do away with inflation, the polestar of Big Bang theorizing for 20 years, altogether. Dr. Paul Steinhardt, one of the fathers of inflation, and his student Justin Khoury, both of Princeton, Dr. Burt Ovrut of the University of Pennsylvania and Dr. Turok call it the ekpyrotic universe, after the Greek word "ekpyrosis," which denotes the fiery death and rebirth of the world in


http://www.tomcoyner.com/before_the_big_bang_there_was__.htm


Excerpt:

What Came 'Before' the Big Bang? Leading Physicist Presents a Radical Theory . String theorists Neil Turok of Cambridge University and Paul Steinhardt, Albert Einstein Professor in Science and Director of the Princeton Center for Theoretical Science at Princeton believe that the cosmos we live in was actually created by the cyclical trillion-year collision of two universes (which they define as three-dimensional branes plus time) that were attracted toward each other by the leaking of gravity out of one of the universes.
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/02/what-came-before-the-big-bang-leading-physicists-present-a-radical-theory-weekend-feature.html





So if these branes existed prior to the Big Bang, being themselves the cause of the Big Bang-then time, as defined by the occurence of sequential events, existed before the Big Bang. The following link provides many videos dealing with your question.


Prior to Big Bang Videos

 

[zonedestruct]

they say that time must have had a start cause if time has been infinitely long then everything that should have happened would have already happened. well i think that time is infinite and there was no start to time therefore we have all already lived our lives but trillions of years ago and at this point in infinite time we are repeating what has already happened trillions of years ago cause time is infinite and anything that could happen now could have happened some time back in infinity.

 

[Farahday]

Only that which exists can change - act or be acted upon. This means cause and effect is a FUNCTION OF existence, a derivative of the fundamental phenomenon of being. No phenomenon can be the result of its own subordinate derivative, so the reverse can't be true - existence is NOT a function of cause and effect.

Time is simply the measurement of change.

If existence is not a function of cause and effect, it is not temporal in nature. And since existence didn't "begin", then neither did time.

 

[petm1]

Entropy leads to heat death of our visible universe, if this is the future what is the past? Big bang is one way to "look" back to the beginning but how do "we see" it? What if you think of big bang as a single event with two directions of motion, in and out like a focal point, let's call this motion energy and visualize it as a black and white whole. After 13 billion light years I would expect these two extremes to still be visible as our horizons. I like to think that because we are inside of the black hole and all paths are curved is why we always see a vanishing point, and the outside of the worm holes formed when the white whole flew apart is what makes up our focal points. Matter is the past that I "see" and mass is the past that I feel and if you think of the world line of matter as always beginning at the center connection called mass then you will always look towards the beginning by "seeing" the past.

 

[Mr. Burns]

I tend to agree with Stephen Hawking's idea of before the big bang. Assume that the lattitude lines on Earth represent time intervals in the early universe. You would assume the big bang took place at the south pole, moving north (along time). So therefore, it is silly to ask what is "south" of the south pole, as it would be to ask what is before the big bang

 

[Farahday]

Apparently the concept that the phenomenon of existence is not a function of cause and effect is not so easily grasped. Understandable, given the proclivaties of Judeo-Christian science and religion...but specious, just the same.

 

[SW VandeCarr]

March 3, 1923

http://www.time.com/time/archive/collections/0,21428,c_time_history,00.shtml

 

[Farahday]

March 3, 1923

http://www.time.com/time/archive/collections/0,21428,c_time_history,00.shtml

LOL...OK...OK...so Time really DID begin. And the way it is going, it will probably come to an end very soon.

 

[petm1]

I tend to agree with Stephen Hawking's idea of before the big bang. Assume that the lattitude lines on Earth represent time intervals in the early universe. You would assume the big bang took place at the south pole, moving north (along time). So therefore, it is silly to ask what is "south" of the south pole, as it would be to ask what is before the big bang

I would not assume time as moving in one direction only. I assume that time is more like a dilating point or area, with the latitude lines as the surface, there by making both north and south poles possible.

 

[bcrowell]

I would not assume time as moving in one direction only. I assume that time is more like a dilating point or area, with the latitude lines as the surface, there by making both north and south poles possible.

I assume that time is more like a burrito, with the tortilla as the surface, thereby making both salsa and avocado possible.

 

[petm1]

I assume that time is more like a burrito, with the tortilla as the surface, thereby making both salsa and avocado possible.

The difference between our examples says a lot about how we think. I see dilating light waves as the motion of time, why else would time be tied to the speed of light? I see these individual dilating areas, each emitted from a massive point, as a dilating image within my eye. These images make up my present, they are my future, but my past is anchored within this dilating frame we call earth. Your world seems to revolve around food.