S
SugarMagnolia
Guest
It’s so embarrassing when Catholics say stuff like this.
- Status
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
Again–
This is from an account of the Big Bang. It is from Isaac Asimov’s “Guide to Earth and Space,” pages 248-249.
Today, however, scientists generally accept as fact that the solar system was formed by natural processes from a cloud of dust and gas 4.6 billion years ago, and that the cloud had existed since soon after the origin of the universe, perhaps 15 billion years ago.
But even if we go back to the big bang and imagine that all the matter and energy of the universe was concentrated into a tiny ball of incredibly dense, incredibly hot material that exploded to form the universe, where did that tiny ball come from? How did it come into existence? Must we assume supernatural creation?
Not necessarily. A branch of science was worked out in the 1920s called “quantum mechanics,” which is far too intricate to into here. It has been an extremely successful theory, explaining phenomena nothing else could adequately explain and predicting new phenomena that turned out to behave precisely in accordance with the predictions.
In 1980, an American physicist, Alan Guth, took up the problem of the origin of the big bang in terms of quantum mechanics. WE might visualize the universe before the big bang tok place as a vast, illimitable sea of nothingness. Apparently, though, that is not an accurate description. The nothingness contains energy, and it is not quite a vacuum because, by definition, a vacuum contains nothing at all. The preuniverse had energy, and since all of its other properties resemble those of a vacuum, it is called a “false vacuum.”
From this false vacuum, a tiny point of existence appears where the energy just happened, by the blind forces of random changes, to have concentrated itself. In fact we might imagine the illimitable false vacuum to be a frothing, bubbling mass, producing foam. Some of these bits of existence might disappear promptly, subsiding back into the false vacuum. Some, on the other hand, might be large enough, or have been formed under conditions, as to undergo a rapid expansion into a universe. We live in such a successful bubble.
This, to me, sounds like a myth.
This is from an account of the Big Bang. It is from Isaac Asimov’s “Guide to Earth and Space,” pages 248-249.
Today, however, scientists generally accept as fact that the solar system was formed by natural processes from a cloud of dust and gas 4.6 billion years ago, and that the cloud had existed since soon after the origin of the universe, perhaps 15 billion years ago.
But even if we go back to the big bang and imagine that all the matter and energy of the universe was concentrated into a tiny ball of incredibly dense, incredibly hot material that exploded to form the universe, where did that tiny ball come from? How did it come into existence? Must we assume supernatural creation?
Not necessarily. A branch of science was worked out in the 1920s called “quantum mechanics,” which is far too intricate to into here. It has been an extremely successful theory, explaining phenomena nothing else could adequately explain and predicting new phenomena that turned out to behave precisely in accordance with the predictions.
In 1980, an American physicist, Alan Guth, took up the problem of the origin of the big bang in terms of quantum mechanics. WE might visualize the universe before the big bang tok place as a vast, illimitable sea of nothingness. Apparently, though, that is not an accurate description. The nothingness contains energy, and it is not quite a vacuum because, by definition, a vacuum contains nothing at all. The preuniverse had energy, and since all of its other properties resemble those of a vacuum, it is called a “false vacuum.”
From this false vacuum, a tiny point of existence appears where the energy just happened, by the blind forces of random changes, to have concentrated itself. In fact we might imagine the illimitable false vacuum to be a frothing, bubbling mass, producing foam. Some of these bits of existence might disappear promptly, subsiding back into the false vacuum. Some, on the other hand, might be large enough, or have been formed under conditions, as to undergo a rapid expansion into a universe. We live in such a successful bubble.
This, to me, sounds like a myth.
L
Lethe
Guest
Er… right. Except it is not a MYTH because it is not symbolic, or sacred, or used for psychological reasons. There’s no reason people want to believe in the Big Bang, it is just a THEORY. Of course no one can prove it, no one was there, but it is based on a number of scientific discoveries and observations, for example the fact the universe is still expanding, and can be seen to be expanding from a point, where perhaps the ‘bang’ occured.
And evolution… Well, no one can prove that either, but it is just a step above natural selection. What survives survives, and what doesnt doesnt. It’s (natural selection is) about the most commonsense scientific theory I can think of. If a mutation of an animal is beneficial, when it reproduces (assuming it is not sterile), and its children reproduce, then eventually the animals with the new benefit will eventually outnumber the others, because of their benefit… Natural selection within a species has been observed within the timeline of human existence, on numerous occasions.
Evolution cannot be proven, but makes sense in a similar way, especially since we share so much DNA with other animals and even plants. Therefore, to me at least, it seems likely that we have evolved from ‘lower’ organisms. I’m not saying it’s perfect, or that it is the one true path, but it is the best theory I have heard yet,
And evolution… Well, no one can prove that either, but it is just a step above natural selection. What survives survives, and what doesnt doesnt. It’s (natural selection is) about the most commonsense scientific theory I can think of. If a mutation of an animal is beneficial, when it reproduces (assuming it is not sterile), and its children reproduce, then eventually the animals with the new benefit will eventually outnumber the others, because of their benefit… Natural selection within a species has been observed within the timeline of human existence, on numerous occasions.
Evolution cannot be proven, but makes sense in a similar way, especially since we share so much DNA with other animals and even plants. Therefore, to me at least, it seems likely that we have evolved from ‘lower’ organisms. I’m not saying it’s perfect, or that it is the one true path, but it is the best theory I have heard yet,
Z
Zatzat
Guest
Uhm…there’s mountains of evidence that support and prove that the theory of evolution is a fact.
Secondly, evolution in action is seen and proven in the lab, using fruit flies.
I
isaacthesyrian
Guest
If I can try to understand the OP here.
We have a bunch of raw data - like red shift and the cosmic microwave background. This is just stuff we pick up in the electromagnetic spectrum. But the conceptualization of this stuff into a theory is not the essence of the stuff. So in this sense the “big bang” as a concept exists in the human mind alone. What did happen - the creation of the world - God’s act of creation - is beyond concept and human comprehension. But we make sense of the world by conceptualization and distinction. And so at a very practical level we speak of the big bang as a successful theory because it works - quite well. Although we have no idea what happened at the very, very beginning…
The OP also claimed that the big bang is a myth. It is interesting to wonder if science can serve a psychologically similar purpose as the creation myths did for the ancients. Just because it might serve this purpose, however, does not mean that the big bang does not work as a scientific theory. For now, at least, it seems to work pretty well.
We have a bunch of raw data - like red shift and the cosmic microwave background. This is just stuff we pick up in the electromagnetic spectrum. But the conceptualization of this stuff into a theory is not the essence of the stuff. So in this sense the “big bang” as a concept exists in the human mind alone. What did happen - the creation of the world - God’s act of creation - is beyond concept and human comprehension. But we make sense of the world by conceptualization and distinction. And so at a very practical level we speak of the big bang as a successful theory because it works - quite well. Although we have no idea what happened at the very, very beginning…
The OP also claimed that the big bang is a myth. It is interesting to wonder if science can serve a psychologically similar purpose as the creation myths did for the ancients. Just because it might serve this purpose, however, does not mean that the big bang does not work as a scientific theory. For now, at least, it seems to work pretty well.
S
steveandersen
Guest
and you hold this opinion based on what?
there is limited room in natural science for personal opinion
you have to be able to show the goods, so to speak
what does that have to do with the Big bang?I have never seen the Big Bang personified… but my experiences may have been limited
tell me more.
physical laws seem very impersonal to meisn’t that a big Atheist argument … that nature is impersonal:?!?
I’m not quite sure what you are talking about
I don’t particularly care about the religious views of scientists as long as their work is non-biased and reproducible
didn’t God make evolution and physical laws?yes, our current physical laws break down very close to the Big Bang … and?
just a physics tease?
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
I am the Original Poster.
I will try to address the principle reasons why I believe the Big Bang is a myth.
Furthermore, I beg other posters to be gentle. I beg other posters to address the issues. I beg other poster, please do not attack me, thank you.
Here is the first point. It has many, many points involved with the mythical nature of the Big Bang.
Myth: a usual traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief or natural phenomenon (Webster’s Seventh College Dictionary)
This is from an account of the Big Bang. It is from Isaac Asimov’s “Guide to Earth and Space,” pages 248-249.
Today, however, scientists generally accept as fact that the solar system was formed by natural processes from a cloud of dust and gas 4.6 billion years ago, and that the cloud had existed since soon after the origin of the universe, perhaps 15 billion years ago.
But even if we go back to the big bang and imagine that all the matter and energy of the universe was concentrated into a tiny ball of incredibly dense, incredibly hot material that exploded to form the universe, where did that tiny ball come from? How did it come into existence? Must we assume supernatural creation?
Not necessarily. A branch of science was worked out in the 1920s called “quantum mechanics,” which is far too intricate to into here. It has been an extremely successful theory, explaining phenomena nothing else could adequately explain and predicting new phenomena that turned out to behave precisely in accordance with the predictions.
In 1980, an American physicist, Alan Guth, took up the problem of the origin of the big bang in terms of quantum mechanics. WE might visualize the universe before the big bang tok place as a vast, illimitable sea of nothingness. Apparently, though, that is not an accurate description. The nothingness contains energy, and it is not quite a vacuum because, by definition, a vacuum contains nothing at all. The preuniverse had energy, and since all of its other properties resemble those of a vacuum, it is called a “false vacuum.”
From this false vacuum, a tiny point of existence appears where the energy just happened, by the blind forces of random changes, to have concentrated itself. In fact we might imagine the illimitable false vacuum to be a frothing, bubbling mass, producing foam. Some of these bits of existence might disappear promptly, subsiding back into the false vacuum. Some, on the other hand, might be large enough, or have been formed under conditions, as to undergo a rapid expansion into a universe. We live in such a successful bubble.
This, to me, sounds like a myth.
I will try to address the principle reasons why I believe the Big Bang is a myth.
Furthermore, I beg other posters to be gentle. I beg other posters to address the issues. I beg other poster, please do not attack me, thank you.
Here is the first point. It has many, many points involved with the mythical nature of the Big Bang.
Myth: a usual traditional story of ostensibly historical events that serves to unfold part of the world view of a people or explain a practice, belief or natural phenomenon (Webster’s Seventh College Dictionary)
This is from an account of the Big Bang. It is from Isaac Asimov’s “Guide to Earth and Space,” pages 248-249.
Today, however, scientists generally accept as fact that the solar system was formed by natural processes from a cloud of dust and gas 4.6 billion years ago, and that the cloud had existed since soon after the origin of the universe, perhaps 15 billion years ago.
But even if we go back to the big bang and imagine that all the matter and energy of the universe was concentrated into a tiny ball of incredibly dense, incredibly hot material that exploded to form the universe, where did that tiny ball come from? How did it come into existence? Must we assume supernatural creation?
Not necessarily. A branch of science was worked out in the 1920s called “quantum mechanics,” which is far too intricate to into here. It has been an extremely successful theory, explaining phenomena nothing else could adequately explain and predicting new phenomena that turned out to behave precisely in accordance with the predictions.
In 1980, an American physicist, Alan Guth, took up the problem of the origin of the big bang in terms of quantum mechanics. WE might visualize the universe before the big bang tok place as a vast, illimitable sea of nothingness. Apparently, though, that is not an accurate description. The nothingness contains energy, and it is not quite a vacuum because, by definition, a vacuum contains nothing at all. The preuniverse had energy, and since all of its other properties resemble those of a vacuum, it is called a “false vacuum.”
From this false vacuum, a tiny point of existence appears where the energy just happened, by the blind forces of random changes, to have concentrated itself. In fact we might imagine the illimitable false vacuum to be a frothing, bubbling mass, producing foam. Some of these bits of existence might disappear promptly, subsiding back into the false vacuum. Some, on the other hand, might be large enough, or have been formed under conditions, as to undergo a rapid expansion into a universe. We live in such a successful bubble.
This, to me, sounds like a myth.
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
Second point: Does the Big Bang exclude the most important cause of all, GOD?!
In the classrooms the Big Bang might be taught. Is the most important cause exclude or included?
In the classrooms the Big Bang might be taught. Is the most important cause exclude or included?
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
It would be helpful if one defends the Bing Bang Theory, if one states which species of the Big Bang Theory that they are defending. One example, the God caused one or the not-God-caused one.
If science wants to limit its topic, I believe that is fine. This, my arguments, transcendends the limits of science.
If science wants to limit its topic, I believe that is fine. This, my arguments, transcendends the limits of science.
C
ChadS
Guest
This, to me, sounds like a myth.
Is your conception of the Big Bang as a myth based upon more than your reading of Asimov and a few paragraph quote that spans two pages? What Asimov wrote in that quote basically distills decades of work done by numerous physicists. It’s based upon innumerable calculations, observations, recalculations and refinements of their theories. To dismiss it all as a modern fable would be fine if Asimov were the first and last word on the subject, but in addition to what Asimov wrote there are astronomers and others building upon each others’ work taking up entire careers and publishing scads of books and articles about their discoveries. To simply say it’s all a myth seems rather short-sighted.
ChadS
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
No.
However, Asmiov does sound anti religions and like a myth.
Furthermore, he does say that it is really complex.
The complexity is really a big, big, big factor in my arguments.
When dealing with the issue, is God included or excluded from the discussion?
As I said, the scienctists may remove God from their discipline, and that is fine.
I am addressing the issues from beyond science.
There are at least two schools of thought on the big bang theory–God include or God exclude.
That is really, really big.
To add to the complexity, how many ideas for the beginning of the universe(s) are there?
However, Asmiov does sound anti religions and like a myth.
Furthermore, he does say that it is really complex.
The complexity is really a big, big, big factor in my arguments.
When dealing with the issue, is God included or excluded from the discussion?
As I said, the scienctists may remove God from their discipline, and that is fine.
I am addressing the issues from beyond science.
There are at least two schools of thought on the big bang theory–God include or God exclude.
That is really, really big.
To add to the complexity, how many ideas for the beginning of the universe(s) are there?
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
ChadS
I meant to say “yes” to your question.
I said no, then I explain as if it were a “yes.”
Sorry.
I meant to say “yes” to your question.
I said no, then I explain as if it were a “yes.”
Sorry.
A
AntiTheist
Guest
The Big Bang is a model to explain observed facts, such as the expanding universe.
We do not know what happened before the Big Bang – in fact, we cannot even go back past planck time – so it’s nonsensical to say that “god” (your god or any other god) is “included” or “excluded” from it. As I’ve said already, the only acceptable answer is “we don’t know.”
S
stenlis
Guest
I’ve got a feeling you don’t quite know what Big Bang is. You seem to think that Big Bang theory is based on philosophical positions of some people. This is not the case - Big Bang theory is a conjecture upon observed phenomena.
- Edwin Hubble observed in 1920’s that the galaxies and galaxy formations are moving apart from each other. All of them. Moreso, the ones that are farther from each other move faster away from each other. This is what you would observe about fragments of an exploding bomb.
- The above observation alone discredited the (then) common notion that the universe was unchanging - a so called ‘steady universe theory’.
- The conjecture is that because of the nature of the movement of the galaxies in the universe, all matter must have had a common point of origin, out of which it expanded out. This point of time and space is now called the ‘Big Bang’.
- There are two assumptions in the above conjecture:
a) that the laws of physics are universal - the same in any place and time in the universe
b) that we know (observe) a large enough sample of the universe - The conjecture has a number of corroborating observational evidence (not going into detail - you can find wikipedia entries on these):
a) Cosmic microwave background ratiation (colloquially - the ‘afterglow’ of the Big Bang)
b) Big Bang nucleosynthesis (the ratio of basic elements present in the ‘afterglow traces’ to the observed ratio of elements in the observed universe
c) The age of the universe deduced from the trajectories of the matter is in agreement with the age deduced from the ‘afterglow’ and they both agree with the age of the oldest objects in the observed universe (estimated through decay of the oldest stars)
T
Thing
Guest
The scientist who proposed the big bang theory was also a Catholic priest.
So for him there was no conflict between God and the big bang theory.
For many people the big bang represents a proof of the first words in Genesis where heaven and earth are created from the void.
The big bang theory is considered [by science] the most likely theory of the universes origin.
Asimov’s ideas about quantum foam and multiple universes are just ideas.
I understand there were efforts at one stage to locate ‘interference ripples’ in the universe. The idea being that if there was something in existance before the big bang, like Asimov’s energy and mulitple universes and bubbles, that then when our universe expanded through all of this stuff there would be detectable interference patterns in our universe. But as I understand nothing of the kind was ever detected. So evidentially then, one would have to say that there is no evidence of multiple universes or of pre-big bang quantum foam and bubbles.
Quantum foam, incidently, I believe, is connected to matter, so before matter was created there would be no quantum foam.
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
Another principle: how many scientists have actually studied each and every step in the theories of the Big Bang?
If an individual has not studied the points, then one has to say that I believe, not I know. One should say I believe the scholarship of this number of scientists.
Personally, I have not talked with one scientist who has actually studied the entire situation. I have talked to countless people who believe the scientists.
The scientist could be correct.
I have to grapple with what I know St. Augustine taught: God made the creation all at once. To me it is correct biblically, too.
Personally, I would like to know the actual number of scientists who have done the research.
It would be helpful to know if I am talking with a believer of the Big Bang or an actual researcher.
There is a big, big, big difference between a believer and a “knower.”
Moses knew God, and I believe Moses.
If an individual has not studied the points, then one has to say that I believe, not I know. One should say I believe the scholarship of this number of scientists.
Personally, I have not talked with one scientist who has actually studied the entire situation. I have talked to countless people who believe the scientists.
The scientist could be correct.
I have to grapple with what I know St. Augustine taught: God made the creation all at once. To me it is correct biblically, too.
Personally, I would like to know the actual number of scientists who have done the research.
It would be helpful to know if I am talking with a believer of the Big Bang or an actual researcher.
There is a big, big, big difference between a believer and a “knower.”
Moses knew God, and I believe Moses.
S
stenlis
Guest
Don’t know if you read my previous post in this thread but if you want numbers here’s the rough estimate - Hubble’s original finding (point 1,) has been verified by thousands (tens of thousands perhaps) of people.
In any case, in science it does not matter what you believe but what you can demonstrate.
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
Am I talking with believers or knowers?
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
Like in all religions, there are many sides to the issues. This issue is really, really, really big.
How many scientists implicitly and explicitly teach against the Big Bang theory?
How many scientists implicitly and explicitly teach against the Big Bang theory?
J
Jim_Baur
Guest
How many parts of the Big Bang Theories have not been discovered?
- Status