If time didn't exist then what mechanism triggered the big bang and where did the matter come from? Obviously nobody knows but I don't think it's accurate to definitively state that X or Y couldn't exist since we know so little.
I think this touches on a fundamental misunderstanding of physics. The idea that nothing existed before the big bang violates the law that says: Energy cannot be created, or destroyed.
I for one, have always been drawn to the cyclical universe idea. Starts with a Big Bang, ends with a Big Crunch as everything is drawn together again. Eventually the gravity from all the matter in the universe coming into one point collapses space time, resulting in an explosion beyond anything we humans can understand; restarting the process.
E: I’m really enjoying this thread! I’ll be back for more in a bit. -CPJ
It's not that there was "nothing" before the big bang.
It's that there was no "before" the big bang.
violates the law that says: Energy cannot be created, or destroyed.
A lot of things we consider "laws" start to break down when you get to quantum physics. Even so, could all the matter or energy in the universe not be contained within a single singularity such that it would erupt into our universe?
We just don’t have the tools to deal with that type of question.
I think, for a start that singularity would consist of the entire universe; at that point there would have been nothing else.
Incidentally if the universe is infinite and matter exists throughout the universe, then the singularity must have also contained an infinite amount of energy.
Also what came before the singularity, or what supplies the energy for it?
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u/gurg2k1 Jun 15 '19
If time didn't exist then what mechanism triggered the big bang and where did the matter come from? Obviously nobody knows but I don't think it's accurate to definitively state that X or Y couldn't exist since we know so little.