If we could see 13.7 Billion lyears away?

[RCulling]

The age of the universe is approx 13billion years right?
(if not, sub the correct value for everytime i say 13billion)


I was wondering.. if we could, in theory, see something 13billion light years away
we would see it how it was that long ago right?
So would we not see the big bang?

This may well be impossible, just an interesting thought.. i thought..
If we could see something that far away, would we see the big bang?

I posted this on here in hope of a more educated answer?

Thanks

 

[Cyosis]

You're right that when we look at very distant objects we look very far back in time. However early on the universe was opaque to electromagnetic radiation and it took approximately 380,000 years for the universe to become transparent to electromagnetic radiation. That means we can't look further back than 380,000 years after the big bang. Not by detecting photons anyway.

 

[Ich]

If we could see something that far away, would we see the big bang?

Yes, it looks like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:WMAP_2010.png" .
For a disclaimer (actually, we can't see exactly the big bang, but the state of the universe 380000 years later), see https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=401866".

 

[RCulling]

Ah so this IS the cosmic background radiation i hear about in lectures :)
Thank you very much guys!

 

[Chronos]

With a neutrino telescope, we could theoretically see back almost to the main event. Unfortunately, such a telescope would require an aperature of many light years to achieve useful resolution.

 

[RCulling]

Can we see further than -age of the universe- light years away?
(in any part of the electromagnetic spectrum?)
Does the exapansion of the universe enable this?

 

[ViewsofMars]

I think it would be helpful to have a better understanding of the terminology used for "Big Bang" since the OP RCulling asked, "So would we not see the big bang?" Briefly, here are the observations that have been made.

In physical cosmology, the term Big Bang has two related meanings. It is a cosmological model in which the universe has been expanding for around 13.7 billion years (13.7 Ga), starting from a tremendously dense and hot state. The term is also used in a narrower sense to describe the fundamental 'fireball' that erupted at or close to time t=0 in the history of the universe.
http://observing.eu/big_bang_en.html