How'd the Big Bang start? or what "set it off"?

Question

Just curious...

Answer 1

Physicists are now talking about M theory which says that two membrane shaped universes in the 11th dimension collided and started the big bang. The theory also says that there are an infinite number of parallel universes, all with their own laws of physics, and with their own shapes, that exist in the 11th dimension. They have the math to back up this theory, which was all put together from string theory. Sorry if this doesn't answer your question, but at least we are seeing that there might have been other universes before the big bang in the 11th dimension, and that parallel universes may have been around forever.

Answer 2

The correct answer is, "we can't say."

I largely discount the "colliding brane" theory from the first answer. Speculating about two branes touching in eleven dimensional space has nothing to do with observational evidence, as our scientific instruments are necessarily restricted to observing that which exists in our universe. Sure they can make the math of string theory work against this, but what fails to be mentioned in that answer is we don't even know for sure if string theory is even correct! (There's a very good chance that Roger Penrose's alternative theories about subatomic physics, regarding 'twistors', may well be the correct one, in which case M theory is a bust.) Also M theory and other oscilating universe models are completely unfalsifiable, as the Big Bang cataclysm always conveniently destroys all evidence of the heat-dead universe that preceded it.

Suffice it to say that the universe can only be worked back to the Big Bang itself; and since time is theorized to have begun with the Big Bang, there really is no "before before." At least not that science can reliably determine.

They only really began to realize that the universe had an origin when Hubble discovered that the universe was expanding. Einstein realized that if the universe was growing, that it had to have grown from something singular and ungrowing, a singularity.

Nobody has been able to work it back any further, regardless of what you read about any of the interesting mathematical ideas (like M) which are really just hypotheses and not theories.

Answer 3

We don't know. There are several competing theories, but no real way to distinguish between them. There are a number of observed phenomena that relate to the first second of the Big Bang that we don't understand---in particular "early inflation".

The Big Bang theory itself is very well established, and in fact we can see the Big Bang, in the sense that we can look back in time because of the finite speed of light. When we look far away, we see that the matter in the Universe was hotter and denser---that's basically the Big Bang. We can see all the way back to 400,000 years after the Bang, and see the Cosmic Microwave Background. The first few minutes after the Bang left easily analyzable traces in the isotope ratios of the light elements.

A lot of progress has been made in cosmology in recent years. Just because we don't understand the origins of the Big Bang now does not mean we will never understand. One big clue may be the nature of the Dark Energy. It would almost certainly help a lot to have a unified theory of physics that includes the standard model of particle physics, quantum mechanics, and gravity.

Answer 4

We don't know.

There are no experimental hints so far as to what happened "before" the big bang happened and there isn't even enough theory to say what happened in the early parts of the big bang.

M-Theory is not a theory because it is not "a large body of experimentally well tested material of explanatory and predictive power".

Sorry... but "We don't know." is the BEST answer one can give and get as of today. I wouldn't expect that to change much for the next 50-100 years.

Answer 5

Consider this:

EITHER you have to accept a first event, which, therefore cannot have a cause (or it wouldn't be the first event).

OR you have to assume that you can go back infinitely in time, and "first" has no meaning;

OR you have to rethink the nature of time itself.

None of these options is particularly intuitive, but you have to choose one.

If you choose “God”, then instead of “How did the Big Bang start”, you have to ask “How did God start”, which is exactly the same question, just with “the Big Bang” renamed as “God”.

Answer 6

The Big Bang is a philosophical idea. None of the proponents has any idea how it is meant to have started.

The origin of the universe is outside of scientific enquiry, since it was not observed, cannot be tested, or repreated. Thaty is not to say that we cannot speculate about it.

In fact we know quite a bit about it because the Creator Himself has given us his account in Genesis.

To believe in Creation is not unscientific (or scientific) - likewise a belief in the Big Bang.

However, we can look at the evidence we see in the present and see if it fits with one or other of those 2 ideas. There are many many problems with the Big Bang - which even evolutionists acknowledge. They have invented concepts such inflation, dark energy and dark matter (without any observation justification!) to prop up the BB.

From the mouths of secular evolutionists:

‘The big bang today relies on a growing number of hypothetical entities, things that we have never observed—inflation, dark matter and dark energy are the most prominent examples. Without them, there would be a fatal contradiction between the observations made by astronomers and the predictions of the big bang theory.’

‘But the big bang theory can’t survive without these fudge factors. Without the hypothetical inflation field, the big bang does not predict the smooth, isotropic cosmic background radiation that is observed, because there would be no way for parts of the universe that are now more than a few degrees away in the sky to come to the same temperature and thus emit the same amount of microwave radiation. … Inflation requires a density 20 times larger than that implied by big bang nucleosynthesis, the theory’s explanation of the origin of the light elements.’ [This refers to the horizon problem, and supports what we say in Light-travel time: a problem for the big bang.]

‘In no other field of physics would this continual recourse to new hypothetical objects be accepted as a way of bridging the gap between theory and observation. It would, at the least, raise serious questions about the validity of the underlying theory [emphasis in original].’

‘What is more, the big bang theory can boast of no quantitative predictions that have subsequently been validated by observation. The successes claimed by the theory’s supporters consist of its ability to retrospectively fit observations with a steadily increasing array of adjustable parameters, just as the old Earth-centred cosmology of Ptolemy needed layer upon layer of epicycles.’

http://www.creationontheweb.com/content/view/2019

Answer 7

the big bang may have occurred after the big death..which of course was preceded by a big bang which ..you got ...came after a big death.

There are certain constancies as we know in the physical world...one is that things are born and things die. Stars are born and stars die. Planets are born and die. Given the above, it is likely galaxies die and are born, etc..etc.. etc...... As further support to what I am saying, I submit to you that many scientists believe there is evidence that the universe is still expanding or as we might say it is "growing". Again, we know that what goes up, comes down, and that what grows, eventually dies. We also know that from death comes life.

Answer 8

We cannot answer your question, only with another question, where did all the matter come from? before the Big Bang we're told that there was nothing! Have a good day.

Answer 9

No one will ever find out. There are so many theories out there but they all have flaws in them.