So I vote for infinity.
Just an infinite cycle of life and universes happening.




So while there may be a "before this big bang" there was never a time when "nothing" existed.

Nothing cannot exist.

I would recommend Steinhardt and Turok's book, "Endless Universe."

Interesting article about time.


“Einstein said, ‘Time has no independent existence apart from the order of events by which we measure it,’” Sorli told PhysOrg.com. “Time is exactly the order of events: this is my conclusion.”


http://mingle2.com/topic/show/314394

The above quote is what M theory has been about all along. However, the Multiverse would not be limited to two sheets or branes, but an infinite number. And the branes may represent universes with different physical properties.

M theory doesn't conflict with the big bang theory. It explains it and the possibility of an infinite number of big bangs... not only of our universe but infinite other universes as well.

Sounds reasonable to me.

I like infinite.

ONLY GOD KNOWS

abadhutamla,

So why the angry face?

What are you angry about?
(Your profile says you are "a sweet honest guy.'
Could that be a sweet, honest and sometimes angry guy?

Morningsong would have inserted something like this:

ONLY GOD KNOWS!

Well, one would initially think that the big bang theory violates the law of conservation of energy. However, if there was no universe before the big bang, then all the established laws that govern our universe wouldn't logically apply.

That's not to say that the big bang theory solves all the mysteries and complexities of the universe. There are definite problems with the theory. However, it's the best explanation we have at the moment. The beauty of science is that it changes and perfects itself as new, fresh knowledge is learned. If someone else offers an equally plausible theory, with an equal amount of evidence supporting it, I'm sure the scientific community won't scoff at the idea.

(bolded for emphasis) Really? The best? I don't think so, I think it's kind of a "the world is flat" theory, you know, allegedly the one where if asked what the world was on top of the reply was a giant turtle which, if asked what it was on top of, was ultimately an infinite number of giant turtles. The very title of this topic is such a question and infinite nothingness is the giant turtles. Don't know if you've heard, but the world is round and floating! I feel an infinite multiverse theory is much better.

And the notion that the scientific community won't scoff at plausible theories with supporting evidence is misguided. In my experience, my grandpa being a physicist by college degree, scientists and such intellectuals can be some of the biggest stick-in-the-mud know-it-alls you will ever meet! Grandpa would rather call Steven Hawking thick than reconsider his most loved theories.

*shrug*

I'm no scientist, but if you have a better theory in mind, let's hear it. Even a quick google search can show the multiple things that indicate a big bang, i.e an expanding universe, comsic background radiation, etc.

Though I will definitley concede my point about the scientific community being completely open to new ideas. It IS true, many in the field are hardened and prideful intellectuals.

I like string theory better.

Reposting:

This is what Steinhardt and Turok's book is about. They also refer to is as the Cyclic theory.

From http://www.spacedaily.com/news/cosmology-02c.html

Adding Trillions Of Years To The Life Of The Universe

A new theory of the universe suggests that space and time may not have begun in a big bang, but may have always existed in an endless cycle of expansion and rebirth.

Princeton physicist Paul Steinhardt and Neil Turok of Cambridge University described their proposed theory in an article published April 25 in an online edition of Science.

The theory proposes that, in each cycle, the universe refills with hot, dense matter and radiation, which begins a period of expansion and cooling like the one of the standard big bang picture.

After 14 billion years, the expansion of the universe accelerates, as astronomers have recently observed. After trillions of years, the matter and radiation are almost completely dissipated and the expansion stalls. An energy field that pervades the universe then creates new matter and radiation, which restarts the cycle.

Infinite multiverse. Anything along those lines is better than "suddenly there was a bang and the universe/reality existed." ^above cyclic theory, which I will read about in the morning when I'm not sleepy, sounds similar to what I'm trying to say.

the world is flat thinking was never a scientific theory and even if it was considered such by some it has been found to be flawed. but if the big bang theory is not the best science has at the moment, which scientific theory do you see as better?




well i don't think what you experienced with your grandpa is a true representation of "the scientific community." which of hawking's theories would your grandpa not reconsider? though degreed, did grandpa actually work in theoretical physics in the capacity of phd as hawking has for decades?

but infinite multiverse does not me the requirements of a SCIENTIFIC theory;

'a good theory will describe a large range of phenomena on the basis of a few simple postulates and will make definite predictions that can be tested. if the predictions agrees with the observations, the theory survives that test, though it can never be proved to be correct.'

stephen hawking, the universe in a nutshell.

does your infinite multiverse "theory" describe a large range of phenomena on the basis of a few simple postulates that will make definite predictions that can be tested? if so, what are the predictions and have they been tested and found to be predictable and repeatable as is in the case of the big bang theory?

There is a lot of talk about "initial conditions," in reference to a lot of things involving parallel universes, etc. In this instance, the standard position has been "we simply can't say what the conditions were before the Planck time." It's not scientifically testable in a lab at this point, so it's still all conjecture.



I just don't see it as that great of an explanation. If you examine the red-shift data, it's actually easier to conclude that some of the red-shift has been misread or misinterpreted, and that we need to go back and examine the red-shift indicators for distance, speed of recession, etc. There may be a discernible error that, if identified, would eliminate the need for sciento-magicians to try to pull dark rabbits out of dark hats, etc. Occam's Razor vs. "Vested Interests," as it were.

Jeannie....., how can

there possibly be multiverses ,when the Universe is Infinite...

how do you divide Infinity ....

numbers, divisions, separations, dimenions, ....none of this exists

in Eternity.......they are limited to our earth existence only.

Eternity has no beginning and no end.... Time ceases to be in Eternity.

The Big Bang theory has an incredible amount of hard scientific data to back it up. The part that is "fuzzy" is that it may be the beginning of everything ... or a super tiny part of everything. Current thinking is it's just a tiny event in a much larger multiverse.

We used to think that the Milky Way was our universe until Hubble showed a much larger picture of a much larger universe. Modern science has failed to probe the first tiny fraction of a second with the Standard Theory which falls apart at dimensions of the very small. String theory was an early attempt at going "deeper".

The expansion of the universe accelerating has surprised many in the field but intense scientific study has led to devices such as WMAP which has measured distances, red shifts, background radiation, etc. very accurately.

In addition, the Hubble Space Telescope has peered deeply into the early life of the universe to see how galaxies formed and compare theories to facts. Both instruments have caused many old theories (some of which are being offered here) to fail while confirming others. Dark matter has been mapped precisely. With dark matter comes dark energy and the predicted effects have been verified precisely. The precise predictions of the dark energy verify the expansion of the universe and the red shifting. (Einstein was right!)

The Standard Model of particles and quantum physics simply does not work mathematically with Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. To make it fit together Ed Witten, in 1995 developed the eleventh dimensional math that made all five of the strings theories "work" mathematically and geometrically, although not with each other showing that each string theory was only a piece of the whole. String theory really doesn't exist anymore. It is now M-theory, or membrane theory or "branes" for short.

Modern theoretical physicists have embraced M-theory and it is the dominate theory of how all of it (the very large and the very small) works together. People,who are not physicists, are quick to say "M-theory is just a theory!", or "It cannot be proven!" What apparently is not understood is that M-theory already works with all the things we already learned, from the Big Bang to quantum physics. What it is trying to include is the things that are too big or too small to understand using our current level of technology. So far, it works rather well mathematically. However, it only works with the addition of dimensions that we cannot see. Humans are sometimes crippled with a "show me" attitude. M-theory has room for refinement to cover parts of the universe we cannot see and do not understand.

Several top level theoretical physicists, such as Lisa Randall from Harvard, have experiments designed to attempt to prove M-theory at CERN by testing for the disappearance of matter into another dimension. When CERN gets up to full power ... who knows?

I think we should all wait for the news from LHC to see whether theories and fact match or not.... people rush too fast in theory ( remember the neutron faster than the speed of light )