Is the Big Bang the Only Explanation for the Universe's Nature?

[Godswitch]

Everyone seems preoccupied with the Big Bang and there are believers and non believers. I choose to look outside the box and understand The Nature Of The Universe...

Are there any articles available on this subject?

 

[phinds]

Everyone seems preoccupied with the Big Bang and there are believers and non believers. I choose to look outside the box and understand The Nature Of The Universe...

Are there any articles available on this subject?

Sounds like you're looking for books written by folks on acid, not physics books, and this is probably not the best place to get that kind of recommendation.

 

[Morgoth]

I don't get the question.

Big Bang is not questionable from the fact that we have observations confirming it. (From our knowledge over nuclear physics and how the universe is today, up to astronomical observations). Maybe the philosophies around Big Bang are "questionable" , and the BigBang's theory of course changed through the years from what it was back to when it was introduced.

Now what do you mean by the "The Nature of the Universe" for which you ask articles?

 

[e.bar.goum]

One could say that "The Nature of the Universe" as you put it, is precisely what cosmologists study. So, well, all of http://arxiv.org/list/astro-ph.CO/recent ?

Insofar as there is a "preoccupation" with the big bang, that seems to be an occupation of laypeople, rather than of cosmologists, as the above link shows.

However, when one wishes to study the "nature of the universe" one tends to study it's beginnings, as they guide the future evolution of the universe. In addition, the only place we can see the universe "as it is today" is, well, where you are sitting. As we look into space, we look back in time, so the reason for the study of the formation and evolution of the universe is obvious.

 

[Godswitch]

Yes I get your points:

By the Nature Of The Universe, I mean the Universe's function as a whole.

Question is...Does the universe function as some part of a larger cosmological machine, working on a far grander timescale.

And my reason for wanting to understand this is in doing so it might shed some light onto the Big Bang, if there was such an event!

 

[e.bar.goum]

...
By the Nature Of The Universe, I mean the Universe's function as a whole...

Well, it's function is to be a universe. Really, that's a totally nonsensical question. The universe is merely the space in which everything happens. There is no "purpose" to the universe. It just is. And there certainly was a Big Bang, in the form as defined by the consensus science. The only people who doubt it are pseudo-scientists, cranks, and people who don't understand physics.

 

[Morgoth]

Well, it's function is to be a universe. Really, that's a totally nonsensical question. The universe is merely the space in which everything happens. There is no "purpose" to the universe. It just is. And there certainly was a Big Bang, in the form as defined by the consensus science. The only people who doubt it are pseudo-scientists, cranks, and people who don't understand physics.

I disagree with such statements as "cranks" "not understanding" etc.
Of course everything seems like Big Bang Theory is correct. BUT- Big Bang theory has been enriched in such a point that it doesn't resemble to its initial status at all. New ideas, new knowledge, new observations are evolving the theory as we know today.

Now as for the rest, the ideas over a multiuniverse system come from M-Theory and there are several books of several levels you can search for it. Hawking has done a good job in his latest book in giving the idea of how the universe began and how it came to what we see today, although even he makes some philosophical statements.
It is NORMAL since by the time you try to give someone who has no foundations to understand something so complexed (like String/M Theory) you are to make such a conversation in book. It is even difficult to give people understand the "classical" quantum mechanics :p

 

[Godswitch]

Well, it's function is to be a universe. Really, that's a totally nonsensical question. The universe is merely the space in which everything happens. There is no "purpose" to the universe. It just is. And there certainly was a Big Bang, in the form as defined by the consensus science. The only people who doubt it are pseudo-scientists, cranks, and people who don't understand physics.

How is that a nonsensical question and your saying the Universe's function is to be a Universe , so why try to understand the big bang. Following on from what you say then there's nothing to the Big Bang...I mean you could go on but your contradicting yourself

 

[e.bar.goum]

Big Bang theory has been enriched in such a point that it doesn't resemble to its initial status at all. New ideas, new knowledge, new observations are evolving the theory as we know today.

Obviously, I never said that Big Bang theory wasn't allowed to evolve. However, there is little doubt that at one point, ~13.7 Gya, the universe was much smaller than it is "now", and has since expanded. Indeed, measurements of SN Ia in the last decade have confirmed that the idea of a "matter dominated" epoch giving way to a "cosmological constant dominated universe", as given by the Friedmann equations. Big bang cosmology is one of the triumphs of modern science. See also, http://xkcd.com/54/.

 

[e.bar.goum]

How is that a nonsensical question and your saying the Universe's function is to be a Universe , so why try to understand the big bang. Following on from what you say then there's nothing to the Big Bang...I mean you could go on but your contradicting yourself

It's nonsensical because the universe isn't something that can have a purpose apart from to contain reality. Why do things need to have a deeper purpose to study them? We study the universe because that's what we live in! The universes function is self-defined - to be a universe. I'm not contradicting myself at all.

 

[Morgoth]

this thing is turning into a philosophical conversation.
Hahahaha.
Finding the "purpose of universe".

 

[phinds]

this thing is turning into a philosophical conversation.
Hahahaha.
Finding the "purpose of universe".

I couldn't agree more. I still think my original post (#2) was correct.

 

[e.bar.goum]

this thing is turning into a philosophical conversation.
Hahahaha.
Finding the "purpose of universe".

Agreed. I think that's what I was trying to say, but obviously didn't say it bluntly enough.

 

[Godswitch]

It's nonsensical because the universe isn't something that can have a purpose apart from to contain reality. Why do things need to have a deeper purpose to study them? We study the universe because that's what we live in! The universes function is self-defined - to be a universe. I'm not contradicting myself at all.

You do not know that the purpose of the universe is to contain reality...Most things have a purpose and its a well known fact that the subject of reality is more of a philisophical topic...

To be or not to be...!

 

[Morgoth]

what is the purpose of an electron?
Because universe is way big enough to speak for its purpose

 

[e.bar.goum]

You do not know that the purpose of the universe is to contain reality...Most things have a purpose and its a well known fact that the subject of reality is more of a philisophical topic...

To be or not to be...!

I shouldn't even bother replying, but I'm bored, so why not? Not to get all semantic, but the definition of the word "universe" ( http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/214800?redirectedFrom=universe#eid ) encodes it's purpose, or lack thereof - "All existing matter, space, time, energy, etc., regarded collectively, esp. as constituting a systematic or ordered whole; the whole of creation, the cosmos."

Most things don't have a purpose! Only things that we create have a purpose. My mug, for holding tea, for instance. My iPod, to listen to music.

But things that are created in nature don't have a purpose, apart from perhaps the purpose of living things is to reproduce. The Earth doesn't have a purpose, nor does the sun or the oceans, or electrons, or protons. They just *are*.

 

[Godswitch]

Seems like you lot got problems

 

[Morgoth]

got problems because you try to give something not living a purpose or a consciousness?

these kind of conversations might be fun or interesting for someone searching. But of course they lack "science" because they are totally subjective. And so "there stops Science and starts Randomness"

 

[e.bar.goum]

It seems more problematic to attempt to assign everything "purpose".

 

[Godswitch]

There is no difference to discussing this as there is to discussing the multiverse or black holes...I mean once discovered what was before the big bang theory then in relation to my intitial question what will that prove.

 

[DaveC426913]

Godswitch, in science, we do not ask what the "purpose" of anything is - not black holes, not multiverses, not big bangs. Purpose is a philosophical question. It does not belong here.

Thread-lock requested.

 

[micromass]

Thread locked pending mentor discussion.