The worst part is we’re here now and most of us are intrinsically forced to deal with whether we want to or not.
Ex physicist here: Fucking no clue, but here’s two neat ideas
-
Because there has always been things. Basically it’s entirely possible the universe just kind loops around given enough time, there are a few really interesting ways to do this but the classic one is where the big bang reverses and there’s a bug crunch before a new big bang. That’s not very likely based on our observations, but there are other more mathematically complex ways to have a cyclical universe, and they don’t necessarily require having a defined beginning.
-
Because nothingness is unstable. Basically, if there’s a concept of nothingness, no energy, particles time or space, but it’s possible for little universes to occasionally exist and disappear really quickly, then it’s possible that our universe suddenly popped into existence, got really fucking big before it could disappear again and then got stuck existing. This is based on the highly advanced area of physics called making a wild fucking guess.
I’d say most likely that we’ll have to be satisfied with that not being a question that can be answered. Much in the same way that we can’t answer the question of why the laws of physics look the way they do, we can just describe what they currently are.
There’s a third option: Black holes create new universes through some as yet undiscovered process. Then your existence just becomes a statistical eventuality, as do every other life that you could ever live.
There’s a fourth option: every reference to the mystical properties of black holes on lemmy creates new universes through some as yet undiscovered process. Then your existence just becomes a statistical eventuality, as do every other life that you could ever live.
It’s a simulation!!!
It’s a mega mind!
-
No one knows, it’s unlikely we ever will. There’s stuff and that’s why you can even ask this question. If there wasn’t anything, you wouldn’t be able to ask anything. It happened, so now we have to deal with it.
Your last sentence should become some kind of philosophy.
Look up Phenomenology.
There being stuff is privledge.
Aren’t quarks made up of the nothingness, the vacuum of space, somehow vibrating? I feel like that’s what smart people have been trying to tell me.
If that’s correct, then the nothing is the source of the something.
The question will probably never figure out.
I’m more about wondering about after everything now. When everything stops expanding and all the energy is gone, does everything collapse and cause another big bang? Has this happened before?
Is this “multiverse” many of us wonder about really just this same universe in different incarnations? Can any of these incarnations really be said to be “before” or “after” each other?
This is the stuff I ponder about recently.
You got us!
starts to dissolve
Has anyone really been far even as decided to use even go want to do look more like?
Fuck all this. Let’s get a second opinion from the nothingverse, maybe they know something we don’t
Why not?
Because.
No one knows. I really want to know, but the current understanding takes us back only to the big bang. Not why it happened or why anything exists at all.
The Anthropic Principle is at work here. If nothing existed we wouldn’t be here to ask why it exists.
Here’s some reaching: There’s the
theoryhypothesis that our universe is the inside of some construct in a higher universe* that is similar to if not actually a black hole.In our universe, time and space inside a black hole are causally disconnected from the outside so there can be a defined beginning without there needing to be time continuity across the event horizon. It’s often said that time and space switch places inside a black hole, which could mean that our time is relative to space outside of the universe. This hurts my head to think about. Almost like our time dimension runs sideways relative to whatever was “before”.
* As to whether this is turtles all the way down / universes all the way up, we’ll probably never know.
That’s not a theory; not in the scientific sense. That’s just someone being creative, we have no way to prove or disprove it, ergo it’s as useful as explaining everything by God.
You’re right. I should have used the word hypothesis.
Because when there’s nothing there is literally no meaning. Prior to the Big Bang there was no Entropy, no Time, no Matter or Energy. You cannot really discuss what happened then because it would be nonsense. You can’t even ask ‘how long before the BB did the nothing exist?’ because there was no time, so the answer is like dividing by zero. The BB brought all that into existence so by necessity anything must exist for your question to even have meaning.
To answer your question more directly: because nature abhors a vacuum (even though there was no vacuum before the BB because that would have been a ‘something’).
Prior to the Big Bang there was no Entropy, no Time, no Matter or Energy
Is there a consensus on this or you are just simplifying for the sake of simplifying?
I don’t even think there is a consensus on the Big Bang but if there was, then that’s when time began so “before” that is meaningless.
As much consensus as there can be. The BB is defined as being the event that brought everything into existence and so there’s no point in debating something that cannot be tested.
That’s what you did. We can’t know is very different from “there was no this and this and this prior”.
No, you’re confusing testability with reasonable interpretation via interpolation of data. I did simplify to answer the OP’s question. Prior to the Big Bang we can’t know what ‘exactly’ was going on, but at that point, by definition, Time and Entropy begins. It’s like arguing absolute zero doesn’t have consensus because it is physically impossible to attain that temperature, or that there are actually distances smaller than the Planck length.
The salient point is that Something HAS to exist because the opposite is literal meaninglessness and that has scientific consensus.
It’s like arguing absolute zero doesn’t have consensus as if I was part of the specialists that push forward our collective knowledge on the matter while at best knowing 0 is a small number.
The salient point is that Something HAS to exist because the opposite is literal meaninglessness and that has scientific consensus.
That’s literally opposite to the scientific consensus. People are in fact looking for models that justify why there is something rather than nothing, and it’s not because “the opposite is literal meaninglessness”.
Please, please, please think of all the people that infer knowledge from an autoritatve language heard online.
By consensus, I’m referring to the fact that scientists, when asked, say “the universe started ~14bya”. Any attempt to discuss earlier than that is wild conjecture so the only responsible way to deal with it is to accept that it is currently unknowable. Fact is we already see ‘something from nothing’ constantly. This phenomenon is readily proven. For example, spontaneous generation of quantum particle pairs are well established so the aforementioned conjecture is an attempt to be rigorous, but not an invalidation of consensus.
What is more dangerous for ‘people that infer knowledge from authoritative language’ is to believe that ‘consensus = matter settled, the end’. Nothing in science is absolute except, perhaps, the mathematical fundamentals. Are there still concepts or proposals that will get you laughed at by respectable scientists? Of course. That is what is meant by ‘consensus’ when it comes to Science.
Any attempt to discuss earlier than that is wild conjecture so the only responsible way to deal with it is to accept that it is currently unknowable.
Holy fuckity fuck.
Stop using those words. Stop saying “ANY ATTEMPT” or “THE ONLY RESPONSIBLE”. Stop laying out matter of factly that when you ask scientists they answer in a certain way.
Are you a scientist? Did you ask a theoretical astrophysicist? Are you quoting a paper on the subject?
This is your respectable clearly limited opinion. Portay it as such.
I never said consensus settles a matter, I’m just saying that pulling stuff out your ass and pretending they come from a position of consensus is harmful.
Also you clearly read “The Theory of Everything” or something to that extent by Hawkings and he quite literally mention that he’s going to study what happens before the Big Bang…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nondualism
One interesting take
The universe feels like a pretty whimsical place, so why not? Might as well try it out. If it sucks, you can always let everything crash into a singularity and start over.
Beat me to it. Why not was my answer to this question too.
Because 42.
No, that’s for “what do you get if you multiply six by nine?”"
