The discussion centers around a 12-year-old's claims regarding potential flaws in the Big Bang theory, particularly focusing on the formation of elements like carbon and the implications for the age of the universe. The scope includes theoretical considerations and challenges to established astrophysical concepts.
Participants express disagreement regarding Jake's claims about the Earth's composition and the implications of his arguments on the Big Bang theory. There is no consensus on the validity of his points, and the discussion remains unresolved.
Participants highlight the need for more rigorous arguments and evidence to evaluate the claims made by Jake. There is an acknowledgment of the extensive research on nucleosynthesis, which may not align with Jake's assertions.
Source: http://www.indystar.com/article/20110320/LOCAL01/103200369Meanwhile, Jake is moving on to his next challenge: proving that the big-bang theory, the event some think led to the formation of the universe, is, well, wrong.
Wrong?
He explains.
"There are two different types of when stars end. When the little stars die, it's just like a small poof. They just turn into a planetary nebula. But the big ones, above 1.4 solar masses, blow up in one giant explosion, a supernova," Jake said. "What it does, is, in larger stars there is a larger mass, and it can fuse higher elements because it's more dense."
OK . . . trying to follow you.
"So you get all the elements, all the different materials, from those bigger stars. The little stars, they just make hydrogen and helium, and when they blow up, all the carbon that remains in them is just in the white dwarf; it never really comes off.
"So, um, in the big-bang theory, what they do is, there is this big explosion and there is all this temperature going off and the temperature decreases really rapidly because it's really big. The other day I calculated, they have this period where they suppose the hydrogen and helium were created, and, um, I don't care about the hydrogen and helium, but I thought, wouldn't there have to be some sort of carbon?"
He could go on and on.
And he did.
"Otherwise, the carbon would have to be coming out of the stars and hence the Earth, made mostly of carbon, we wouldn't be here. So I calculated, the time it would take to create 2 percent of the carbon in the universe, it would actually have to be several micro-seconds. Or a couple of nano-seconds, or something like that. An extremely small period of time. Like faster than a snap. That isn't going to happen."
"Because of that," he continued, "that means that the world would have never been created because none of the carbon would have been given 7 billion years to fuse together. We'd have to be 21 billion years old . . . and that would just screw everything up."
So, we had to ask.
If not the big bang, then how did the universe come about?
"I'm still working on that," he said. "I have an idea, but . . . I'm still working out the details."