Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 8, 2016 at 2:50pm

Will "The theorizing is costing multi-billions of taxpayers' dollars" kickstart some interest?

Permalink Reply by Stephen on November 8, 2016 at 3:17pm

Yes I can Tom. You could throw a stick at a crowd of Cosmologists and find a different theory being spouted. The weight of evidence points to a beginning but not enough to be certain.

Permalink Reply by Doone on November 16, 2016 at 3:04pm

Humans are all born and have beginnings.  The Big Bang is an event that created the universe we live in and may have come from an all existing multi universe.

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 16, 2016 at 9:21pm

doone, mathematicians can change an equation's plus sign to a minus sign and make an IMAGINED variable -- time -- run in reverse.

The mathematician Georges LeMaitre did that, crowded the mass of the entire universe into a very tiny space and told the Pope he had proved the truth of Genesis.

Physicists don't do that with the stuff we know as real time.

Ok, scifi authors can do it.

Permalink Reply by fester60613 on November 16, 2016 at 10:49pm

Scifi authors do it very well sometimes!

Permalink Reply by fester60613 on November 16, 2016 at 10:48pm

I don't know enough to accept *anything* wholeheartedly. 

But, I must say that, considering the incomprehensible size of the universe and Humanity's concomitant insignificance / ignorance of "what is," - and at the risk of sounding like Captain Obvious - I can readily accept that the universe either always has or has not always existed. Until it's proven, Schrodenger's cat is still in that damn box. :)

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 17, 2016 at 2:07am

That damn cat is very much in that damn box, fester.

If trying to peek into that box weren't costing so many billions of dollars, happily not by America's taxpayers, suspending judgment would very much be the rational choice.

Permalink Reply by Alexis Habiyaremye on November 17, 2016 at 12:56am

I can't explain the mechanism of an airplane or a computer, but I know they are man made. There are set principles that, once met, give machines and systems. The same applies to universe. A number of principles produced it at a certain time--beginning--and some other principles will end it at a certain time. I'm not too weak to be infatuated with sweet, soothing and short-sighted biases like "if you can't understand it, it's because God hid it away from you!" though. Time will tell anyway. Remember, some time in history, almost everybody believed Malaria was caused by evil spirits or bad air [mal-aria]. Not today--unless you're a true sheeple!

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 17, 2016 at 3:48am

Alexis, your post intrigues me.

A wing moving forward in air produces more upward-directed forces. A propeller turning in air produces the force that pulls the wing forward. You know what the engine does. Ergo you can explain much of an airplane. Computers? We in the industry advised people to not let anything made of sand (silicon) intimidate them.

The principles you mentioned? Did not they always exist?

Permalink Reply by Onyango Makagutu on November 17, 2016 at 3:58am

I have no problem accepting that the universe has always been.

Permalink Reply by Alexis Habiyaremye on November 17, 2016 at 4:26am

I thought science stems on "proof" instead of "acceptance" or "belief"! Can you sense a smell between an eternal universe and an eternal god?

Permalink Reply by Tom Sarbeck on November 17, 2016 at 5:17am

Alexis, we perhaps differ in our uses of words.

I won't ask "Can you wholeheartedly prove that the universe had no beginning?"

I can accept XYZ, but if doing so will affect me I will want evidence.

I seldom use the word "belief" or its various forms; it too often implies religion and a lack of evidence

In mathematics courses I learned to think in terms of proof, and in physics courses I learned to think in terms of evidence.

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