Big Bang Theory?

Question

Sounds like a pretty nice theory...fine. What justifies the existence of the very first matter ever? Why is there anything, why is there even a universe at all?

Answer 1

There is no justification for Being, as such. Being just is. There are limits to explanation. Even if there is a Divine Creator of what we know as reality, the existence of this Creator is still without explanation. To borrow a phrase from Heidegger, we are THROWN into existence – meaning, there is ultimately no deeper "purpose" or explanation. If we are created by God, then we can think of the meaning of our own lives in terms of God, but ultimately there can be no meaning beyond God, or explanation for God's characteristics, so even God is thrown into existence. This is true even if God is eternal or "outside of time" since the term 'thrown' in this context is not necessarily an act that takes place in time – it is simply meant to get at the idea that there can be no "prior cause" or deeper explanation than the ultimate basic existence of Being (or God) Itself. So even if our own existence is not directly absurd (if we are creations of God), it is still the case that there is an ultimate absurdity to Being, because there is ultimately no explanation for God. You could say that God needs no explanation or IS his own explanation, but this does not change the ultimate absurdity. Being (or God) did not ask to BE, and did not choose Its own nature, so Being (or God) is ultimately THROWN into existence with whatever nature It has, and this is the inevitable core absurdity that lies at the heart of Being. This absurdity cannot be avoided, even by those who believe in God. Anyone who thinks that God can somehow explain away this ultimate absurdity is either deluding themselves, or they just don't quite understand the situation.

In terms of physical science, empty space is filled with energy, which you can think of as the potential for being. Even if some deeper theory can explain why the void has the characteristics that it does, there will always be another level of explanation left untouched. No matter how deeply our explanations go, we cannot escape the ultimately absurdity of Being. (By the way, "absurdity" in this case does not mean "humorous" – although one can certain say that it is anyway – but it simple means "without further explanation" or meaning. Ultimately, at some level, things "just are" and that is what the term "absurdity" in an existentialist sense refers to.

Bottom line: God, if there is such a thing, must ultimately be an existentialist (assuming He or She is being honest with Himself or Herself.

Answer 2

Exactly. Big bang theory is very cool, and it actually has neat parrallel with creationism but I dislike how it reduces the state of conscious awareness to being some random quirk of colliding particles of matter. There is profound argument against the probability of such an anomaly, and even big bang proponents have modelled it's likely evolution only to come up with something that more resembles quantum foam anyway.
So, nuh... it doesn't even explain to itself 'why' how can we expect it to do that for us?

Answer 3

In physical cosmology, the Big Bang is the scientific theory that the universe emerged from a tremendously dense and hot state about 13.7 billion years ago. The theory is based on the observations indicating the expansion of space in accord with the Robertson-Walker model of general relativity, as indicated by the Hubble redshift of distant galaxies taken together with the cosmological principle.

Extrapolated into the past, these observations show that the universe has expanded from a state in which all the matter and energy in the universe was at an immense temperature and density. Physicists do not widely agree on what happened before this, although general relativity predicts a gravitational singularity.

The Big Bang, a scientific theory, is not based on any religion. Some people have found similarities, however, that they believe have both theological and philosophical implications, since some religious interpretations and world views conflict with the Big Bang origin of the universe.

Some interpretations of the Big Bang theory go beyond science, and some purport to explain the cause of the Big Bang itself (first cause). These views have been criticized by some naturalist philosophers as being modern creation myths. Some people believe that the Big Bang theory is inconsistent with traditional views of creation such as that in Genesis, for example, while others, like astronomer Hugh Ross, believe that the Big Bang theory lends support to the idea of creation ex nihilo.

The Big Bang theory developed from observations of the structure of the universe and from theoretical considerations. Observers determined that most "spiral nebulae" were receding from Earth, but did not grasp the cosmological implications of this fact, or realize that the supposed nebulae were galaxies outside our Milky Way. Alexander Friedmann, a Russian and Soviet cosmologist and mathematician, derived the Friedmann equations from Albert Einstein's equations of general relativity in 1922, showing that the universe might be expanding in contrast to Einstein's advocated steady-state universe model. The expanding universe model was corroborated by Edwin Hubble's 1929 observations. Independently deriving these equations in 1927, Georges Lemaître, a Belgian Roman Catholic priest suggested, on the basis of the recession of spiral nebulae, that the universe began as a simple "primeval atom"—now known as the Big Bang.

Edwin Hubble provided an observational basis for Lemaître's theory two years later. He discovered that, seen from Earth, light from other galaxies is redshifted proportionally to their distance from Earth -- a fact now known as Hubble's law. Given the cosmological principle whereby the universe, when viewed on sufficiently large distance scales, has no preferred directions or preferred places, Hubble's law implied that the universe was expanding, contradicting the infinite and unchanging static universe scenario developed by Einstein.

Artist's depiction of the WMAP satellite gathering data to help scientists understand the Big Bang.Two distinct possibilities emerged. One was Fred Hoyle's steady state model, whereby new matter would be created as the universe seemed to expand. In this model, the universe is roughly the same at any point in time. The other was Lemaître's Big Bang theory, advocated and developed by George Gamow. Hoyle actually coined the name of Lemaître's theory, referring to it sarcastically as "this big bang idea" during a program broadcast on March 28, 1949, by the BBC Third Programme. Hoyle repeated the term in further broadcasts in early 1950, as part of a series of five lectures entitled The Nature of Things. The text of each lecture was published in The Listener a week after the broadcast, the first time that the term "big bang" appeared in print. While Hoyle's "steady state" and Lemaître's "Big Bang" were the two most popular models used to explain Hubble's observations, other ideas were also proposed, including the Milne model,[13] Richard Tolman's oscillatory universe,and Fritz Zwicky's tired light hypothesis.

For a while, support was split between the "steady state" and "Big Bang" theories. Eventually, the observational evidence began to favor the latter. The discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation in 1964 secured the Big Bang as the best theory of the origin and evolution of the cosmos. Much of the current work in cosmology includes understanding how galaxies form in the context of the Big Bang, understanding what happened at the Big Bang, and reconciling observations with the basic theory.

Huge advances in Big Bang cosmology have been made since the late 1990s as a result of major advances in telescope technology as well as copious data from satellites such as COBE, the Hubble Space Telescope, and WMAP. Cosmologists can now calculate many of the parameters of the Big Bang to a new level of precision, leading to the unexpected discovery that the expansion of the universe appears to be accelerating

Answer 4

The Universe is unlimited, infinite and eternal.

These are three different pretty tough concepts for the human mind to grasp. It doesn't matter how much science you can manage, this is very very tough.

There are so many things, and whatever we want to understand, we've pretty much done a good job, but like mr. Einstein very well said: ".....genius knows its limits"

Good luck!

Answer 5

Its unfathomable that the universe just "is" its a creation from God. However some scientists believe the universe started out about the size of a quarter and is constantly expanding, but just think...if it was the size of a quarter, what was surrounding it?

Answer 6

Existence does not need to be justified. And not all things have to have a cause or to have a reason to exist.

The science of cosmogony, like the science of biological evolution, does not claim to tell you "why". Science tells you what is so, as shown by evidence, and enables you to look for links of cause and effect where they may exist.

Answer 7

It is a silly theory based on the assumption that the universe had a beginning. Most likely, the universe was never created. It had always existed and will exist always, forever, eternally.

Answer 8

The question "why" presumes there was a 'cause.' I doubt there was a 'cause', we can only observe what is, anything beyond that is pure conjecture....to jump to a super natural conclusion does not make common sense....sorry.

Answer 9

i wonder that as well why was there even a big bang what was there before how did that get there .anyway 1 person !!GOD!!

Answer 10

God clapped his hands and BANG the universe was created.