If proof or speculation of the BIG BANG theory is correct, then what went on before then?

Question

Was there another universe in exsistance? Will there one day be another BIG BANG-like event. Will the universe stay infinite forever?

I want opinions and best sources, if any

Answer 1

Hello Sarah -

I'm afraid you have asked a question that will only be answered positively (at least for now) by people that don't know, like a couple of your early responders. I would encourage you to take all the math and physics courses that you can, because then and only then will you begin to understand all the information that's out there on this subject. Read the Bible, too. But always beware of people that are certain of absolute knowledge. They can be dangerous.

Answer 2

If the Big Bang theory is correct, then the question "what went on before then" is meaningless.

It is like asking "if the existence of the North Pole is correct, what is North of the North Pole?"

I am always amazed at people who call the Big Bang theory "speculation" or a "big joke" without even the *slightest* understanding of why scientists are finding it to be the best explanation for the evidence. Why do you people just assume that all these scientists ... Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, Edwin Hubble, Carl Sagan, Friedmann, Lemaître, Robertson, Walker, and *thousands* more physicists, astrophysicists, and cosmologists you never heard of ... every single one ... are all IDIOTS, and you are smarter than all of them?

Would it not be the intellectually honest thing to do to at least TRY to understand *WHY* these scientists find the Big Bang theory not only plausible, but *probable*?

Why did scientists arrive at the Big Bang theory? Simple. The universe is expanding.

Our observations show that the universe is expanding and we can find no evidence or reason why it just started expanding recently. Since there is no such evidence or reason ... we have to go with the evidence we have ... and conclude that the universe has ALWAYS been expanding just as it is today ... so at some point in the past it had zero size. Based on the current rate of expansion, we can compute that this point of zero size was about 14 billion years ago.

So the Big Bang theory explains that expansion, but it needed some actual *evidence*. So based on the mathematics, the computed age, and the type of energy that would have been released, scientists computed that there should be some background radiation of a certain frequency radiating from all directions in the universe. They set out to find that background radiation, and ... hello? ... there it was. Right in the range predicted.

That background radiation pretty much confirmed the Big Bang theory. The guys who found it (John Mather and George Smoot) won the Nobel Prize.

If you have an alternative theory ... a testable, *scientific* theory ... that explains the expansion of the universe ... then there is another Nobel Prize waiting for you.

If not, then if the best you got is calling the Big Bang a "joke" ... then why bother coming to science forums if you have such a low understanding of science, and such a high contempt for scientists?

Additional details:

"Will there one day be another BIG BANG-like event. Will the universe stay infinite forever?"

Now *those* are valid questions! The answer depends on how much mass is in the universe. If there is enough mass, then the universe will eventually collapse again and possibly produce another Big Bang. If not enough mass, it will continue to expand forever. Currently, there doesn't seem to be enough mass, so we think the latter is true. But there may be mass (dark matter) we haven't found yet. So we don't yet know for sure.

Answer 3

Nobody knows. This is related to the single most outstanding question in cosmology, which is "what is the average density of the universe?".

If the universe has a density greater than a certain critical density, then space is folded back on itself (you can think of this as 360-degree curvature in a fourth dimension), and the universe has a finite size. The universe will expand up to a point, then turn around and collapse. If this is the case, it seems possible that the Big Bang was the product of a previous collapse. But anything is possible.

If the universe has less density than the critical value, it will expand forever, which makes it seem likely that the Big Bang was a one-time event. It also gives us no insight into what may have come before.

Answer 4

Science does not have much to say about times earlier than a femptosecond AFTER the Big Bang. That's when, extrapolating backward from observations, our current understanding of physics fails. So we don't really know anything about the exact instant of the Big Bang, or before.
Sometimes in science you just don't know, and it is important you know that you don't know, so that you know what to work on.

That being said, there are various speculations that indicate that a Big Bang like ours may be a natural process in some larger domain. Until there is a fully unified theory of physics, there is not much hope of addressing such hypotheses.

A simple extrapolation from the current state of our Universe indicates that it will expand forever, and become essentially empty. Other fates are possible, but these too are just speculation.

Answer 5

Sorry I'm not an expert, but I'm thinking of how when the universe ends it is speculated that it will shrink back into a singularity (all the matter in the universe, really small) like it was before the big bang.

So my theory is that then the big bang happens again and everything in history repeats itself, and it goes on in an endless cycle before where we are now, and after.

Answer 6

I think that the big bang is really part of a cycle of big bangs that occur every hundred billion years. Imagine two universes that exist in different dimensions, like two pieces of paper right next to eachother. Its possible that these two universes could collide with a big bang-like effect, and create a third universe. If this is true, then nothing went on before the existence of our universe, but are still other universes in other dimensions left untapped.

Answer 7

Big Bang theory is interesting , the only articals I have read in refferance to subject matter is that many universes co habit in space and that two just happen to rub together ...and boom .
How the exsitance of this prior to became has not been explained , however many theories believe that mulitple universives are highly probable and may suport life. ( iE like the show sliders )

As far as another Big bang scientist believe it could happen but we are dealing with stuff that is light years away and our tecnology is un able to wrap it self around it as of yet.

There was a project that was started by the goverment in Germany i believe , but the funding got pulled and the project was never complete , this project was to prove the exsitance of multiple universes .

Answer 8

They originally thought that everything would eventually collapse on itself again, but now it appears that the universe is strangely expanding faster all of the time. Maybe big bangs are cyclic, but one thing to remember is that space and time are linked so time cannot be measured in any traditional sense at the point of the big bang.

Answer 9

The universe will end in 5 billion years, when the sun runs out of helium and hydrogen and it will explode causing a black hole to apeer and suck everything up. There probably was another universe, but the big bang caused it to disappear. I personally don't think that there will be another big bang but who knows.

Answer 10

I would be more willing to believe our ancestors were monkeys and other animals before I would believe that there was a magical "big bang" and this earth and universe is the result of the debris. It is one of the most ridiculous theories.