Mathnomalous said:
Sunday night, Discovery Channel ran a program titled "How the Universe Works." The program explained Big Bang theory, string theory, etc. One of the things mentioned was how the Universe (may have?) formed out of nothing. The narrator basically said one needs to take a "leap of faith."
How was this conclusion reached? Thanks for your time.
Mathnomalous, be careful. I didn't watch this particular show but Discovery Channel is not known to be reliable. It may cause harm to your brain.
I don't know any evidence that the U formed out of nothing, or any reason to take a "leap of faith".
In some models (mostly from before 2005, fashionable back in the 1990s) time is meaningless back before 13.7 some billion years ago. In other models (mostly studied after 2005 or so) time extends back before that and there is no emergence from "nothing".
Nonsingular cosmology has come into fashion since around 2005---people figure out models where a singularity (breakdown of theory) does not occur. No one thinks that a singularity occurred in nature---it just means a mathematical failure of a theory and you deal with it by fixing or replacing the theory.
But Discovery Channel is probably still talking about "The Singularity" as if it really means something. I don't know what they talk about, whatever stimulates people and keeps their ratings up. They have to make money.
A new book is coming out this year about today's research into models of conditions before the big bang. I don't like most of what I hear about it. They got around 20 top experts with maybe about 10 different models each to write a chapter. Reviewer copies have already gone out and the book has gotten praise from some prominent worldclass cosmologists. So hopefully this will impact the pop-sci outlets and Discovery Channel will get more up to date. I would guess they are about 10 years out of date at present, just my wildass guess.
But even then it won't be too good because the new book, called "Beyond the Big Bang" really is unselective. From what I can see by looking at the online material and the table of contents it has a large proportion of what is, in my humble opinion, garbage.
Interesting computer models that go back before the big bang are being run. Systematic variations and different cases are being explored. A serious attempt is being made to identify features of the CMB radiation that would result from various models and which might be detected by instruments now in orbit or which could be put in orbit. You may see some hard scientific results emerge in your lifetime.
But at the moment the prevailing professional attitude is "don't hold your breath". Don't take "leaps of faith". And just personally I would add to that my advice: don't watch garbage media or take highly speculative untested stuff seriously. Especially if it is 10 years out of date
but also even if it is recent! Wait until some of these nonsingular cosmology models have made some firm testable predictions and the predictions are being tested by actual instruments in orbit. Just my personal advice as someone who watches the quantum cosmology scene.
If you want to sample the quantum cosmology/early universe literature at technical level, skimming to find parts you can understand without too much math, here's a link.
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/spires/find/hep/www?rawcmd=FIND+DK+QUANTUM+COSMOLOGY+AND+DATE+%3E2007&FORMAT=www&SEQUENCE=citecount%28d%29
It is all I can offer because I don't know any reliable up-to-date popularization.
That link gets all the professional research in quantum cosmology that has appeared since 2007. You can change the date and other parameters and play around with the search tool if you want. Most of the papers are free PDF online if you click on the right thing. The influential ones are usually the ones with high citation counts. They have been cited often by other researchers. So I ordered the list by citation count to bring up the more important papers first.
Oh. Einstein-Online has a modest amount of reliable up to date popularization of quantum cosmology. there is a link in my sig. their stuff is post-2005 and they are a reputable research outfit. einstein-online is their public outreach website. It's not a big effort, popularization is not their focus. But the site has a few brief essays.