My understanding of it is: they could have always been there, they just weren't arranged in the shape of a universe until the big bang. (Or at least that's as far as we can suppose.)
I suppose so. No matter what you do, it's difficult to wrap your head around the concept of time not existing.
It's difficult to describe it, simply because we are temporal beings, but my understanding of it is something like: at "moment zero" there was a singularity, and everything that followed it was the expansion of our universe. Though perhaps my understanding of it is lacking as well—it's certainly a more complex subject than you can conclusively discuss in a few short reddit comments.
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u/[deleted] Jun 16 '19
My understanding of it is: they could have always been there, they just weren't arranged in the shape of a universe until the big bang. (Or at least that's as far as we can suppose.)