At one point in time everything in the Universe was compressed into one tiny area (let's call this a hand grenade). Then, the big bang and everything started traveling outward at roughly the same speed (what speed?) like shrapnel.
It would seem logical that being in the vacuum of space everything would just move outward forever, never slowing down, but I know that is not so (why?).
If some force is slowing everything down, I assume it will all one day stop and eventually coalesce into one big hand grenade again.
Now my original question... Where are we in relation to the original big bang?
Where are we in relation to all of the other "shrapnel" or debris that was slung out from the big bang. Are we at the very edge (I think not as we would then see "nothing" in one direction, right?)?
Is there still a large mass of our "primordial soup" somewhere? Is there still a center from whence the big bang emanated? If so, where is it? ...and where are we in relation to it?
2006-07-11 07:19:16 · 7 answers · asked by Enigma 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
I could give you a far more detailed answer but it would take up a huge volume of my time writing it and your time reading it, but the simplest answer to where we are is 'right here'. As for the rest of your question I'd like to recommend a book called 'the 5 ages of the universe'. It a slim book (about 200 pages) that describes how the universe has unfolded in the past and answers how the universe will unfold in the future. It's not fiction but it's predictions are based on quantum physics.
2006-07-11 07:29:09 · answer #1 · answered by Augustus-Illuminati 3 · 7⤊ 1⤋
The best analogy is not the one of a grenade but the one of a bread with raisins in it. Not only is the whole thing getting bigger, like the grenade, but everything in it is going further away from each other. Now I'll try and clarify a few things: the speed of things being ejected from the grenade ie: big bang isn't measurable it isn't like a real grenade. You can't look where the shrapnel falls and then calculate the initial velocity, the physics involved at the big bang is much more complicated than Newtonian Mechanics so it isn't right to use those at the big bang. You're trusting the grenade analogy too much. Recent results show that the Universe is actually expanding faster and faster, but not faster than the big bang. So the whole slowing down part is erroneous. Use the link below to locate yourself in the Universe lol :) Keep in mind however that we are not in the middle of the Universe, but in the middle of the observable Universe (very different concepts).
2006-07-11 14:36:39 · answer #2 · answered by jerryjon02 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Unlike an explosion, there is no center to the expansion in the big Bang. In an explosion, things are moving through space, while in the Big Bang, it is space itself that is expanding. Also unlike an explosion, the gravity of the individual galaxies affects the expansion to a significant degree. The end result is tht there is no center for the expansion. Every place is expanding and things look the same everywhere. There is no edge to the universe either (except in the lame form of the farthest we can see). Finally, the 'primordial soup' is not something that the universe came from, it is actually what the universe looked like during the first stages of the expansion--hot and dense.
2006-07-11 14:35:15 · answer #3 · answered by mathematician 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Wherever you are, it seems like you are at the center of the U. And, from your point of view, it looks as if galaxies at the very edge of the observable U. are receding from you at nearly the speed of light. But from the point of view of any one of those distant galaxies, it seems to be standing still, at the center of the U.
Every frame of reference (point of view, basically) believes itself to be at rest mass; that is, it can't discern any relativistic mass in itself, as it would have if it were in motion. That is the concept at the heart of the theory of relativity.
2006-07-11 16:45:24 · answer #4 · answered by stanheidrich 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If we accept the "Philosophical existance" of "Arianna" The "woman universe"....and considering that our Galaxy is located as a cell in a muscle at her right knee area. then the big bang started at the moment of her concemption by her "mother" within her womb and later on....birth....and.....
WELL.....LET your mind fly away:) not all things are tangible:)
2006-07-11 22:12:07 · answer #5 · answered by UncleGeorge 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I am in the center of my universe.
2006-07-11 14:22:22 · answer #6 · answered by My Big Bear Ron 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
no one knows.
2006-07-11 22:16:39 · answer #7 · answered by hello 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋