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There's something that I'm not entirely sure of. For one, I was raised Catholic and still have enough of that in me that I'm agnostic (beliving in something, even if I don't know what it is). As a result, I actually believe in both theological and atheist ideas: a marriage of science and God's creation. Like, who's to say that "let there be light" wasn't the Big Bang? That Adam & Eve were our monkey ancestors, etc?

Anyway, one thing about the Big Bang that I'm not sure about is what was before the Big Bang? Energy can't be destroyed, right? Just changed? So there couldn't have been something come from nothing, certainly not an explosion that large.

What theories are there right now about what the universe was like before the Big Bang?

Scientists don't know and won't speculate. It's one of the Great Mysteries.

One theory is that the Big Bang is preceded and superceded by the Big Crunch and that it's just one infinite expansion and contraction after another.

Yeah, I was chatting to a friend about this a few minutes ago and that's what he said, too. That all matter was compressed from massive amounts of gravity to the size of a grapefruit.

Using that expanding and contracting analogy, though, it kind of makes me think of lungs. So, the universe is breathing? Over the course of billions of years?

If you hold any religious ideology then you cannot possibly believe that Adam and Eve are monkey ancestors. The Bible states God created Man in his image.

Docseverin said:

If you hold any religious ideology then you cannot possibly believe that Adam and Eve are monkey ancestors. The Bible states God created Man in his image.

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I don't mean to spearhead the discussion too far into the religious spectrum (which it probably undoubtedly will anyway), but two points of contention:

1) Nobody really knows what God, as described Biblically, really looks like. All existing imagery is speculation.
2) "In his image" can and has been taken to mean wildly various things, from physically to ideologically to even simply the ability to make choices for themselves.
Added at: 12:03

ThatNickGuy said:

There's something that I'm not entirely sure of. For one, I was raised Catholic and still have enough of that in me that I'm agnostic (beliving in something, even if I don't know what it is). As a result, I actually believe in both theological and atheist ideas: a marriage of science and God's creation. Like, who's to say that "let there be light" wasn't the Big Bang? That Adam & Eve were our monkey ancestors, etc?

Anyway, one thing about the Big Bang that I'm not sure about is what was before the Big Bang? Energy can't be destroyed, right? Just changed? So there couldn't have been something come from nothing, certainly not an explosion that large.

What theories are there right now about what the universe was like before the Big Bang?

Click to expand...

One theory is that the earth was formless and empty, with darkness over the surface of the deep.

God looks like Paul Newman.

HCGLNS said:

God looks like Paul Newman.

Click to expand...

George Burns, IMO.

Docseverin said:

If you hold any religious ideology then you cannot possibly believe that Adam and Eve are monkey ancestors. The Bible states God created Man in his image.

Click to expand...

Sure you can, the Catholic Church fully believes in and supports evolution.

I welcome my new monkey god.

Krisken said:

I welcome my new monkey god.

Click to expand...

If we are in his image, he is a monkey god.

We are basically chimps with bigger heads, shorter arms, and longer legs...

ThatNickGuy said:

Anyway, one thing about the Big Bang that I'm not sure about is what was before the Big Bang? Energy can't be destroyed, right? Just changed? So there couldn't have been something come from nothing, certainly not an explosion that large.

Click to expand...

This question is one of the major reasons we are investing so much time and money into particle accelerators.

The Big Bang, as a catchphrase, is nice but it really doesn't describe the theory very well. At best it's a description of universe inflation. Now, at some point the inflation was occurring at relativistic speeds, which is pretty much "explosive" on a human scale, but on a galactic scale it's all pretty leisurely.

The Singularity, or ball of energy and matter that was the seed of the big bang is only posited - right now we can only say with some certainty "The state of the universe was 'this' at the point that matter was finally slowly down to about the speed of light." To posit the big bang, one has to take the current state of the universe, observe the expansion (done by measuring red shift, which tells us how quickly distant stars are moving away from us), and then draw a straight line over time that shows that if the expansion followed our known physical laws and cosmological laws, then it must have, at some point, existed as a small ball of everything.

The particle accelerators are helping scientists understand whether these laws hold at galactic scales.

Unfortunately, that doesn't help you with your question. There are many theories about what might have brought the ball into existence, but they aren't much more than thought experiments at this point. There's little to no science that supports them.
Added at: 14:43

ThatNickGuy said:

There's something that I'm not entirely sure of. For one, I was raised Catholic and still have enough of that in me that I'm agnostic (beliving in something, even if I don't know what it is). As a result, I actually believe in both theological and atheist ideas: a marriage of science and God's creation. Like, who's to say that "let there be light" wasn't the Big Bang? That Adam & Eve were our monkey ancestors, etc?

Anyway, one thing about the Big Bang that I'm not sure about is what was before the Big Bang? Energy can't be destroyed, right? Just changed? So there couldn't have been something come from nothing, certainly not an explosion that large.

What theories are there right now about what the universe was like before the Big Bang?

Click to expand...

First it's not an explosion. It's an outward expansion of space-time itself.

Second google quantum foam.

I can't really add much more than what Adam said, due the the broad nature of that loaded question. Technically, it would be a singularity we're talking about; not a ball. Unless it happened to be rotating, but in reference to what? Who knows? The origin of the universe is probably one of those questions we'll never know.

Piotyr said:

George Burns, IMO.

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Everyone knows he looks like Alanis Morissette, duh.

"If you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all." -God

Docseverin said:

If you hold any religious ideology then you cannot possibly believe that Adam and Eve are monkey ancestors. The Bible states God created Man in his image.

Click to expand...

This is very much not true.

Espy said:

This is very much not true.

Click to expand...

Genesis

27God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them. 28God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it; and rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over every living thing that moves on the earth.” 29Then God said, “Behold, I have given you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth, and every tree which has fruit yielding seed; it shall be food for you; 30and to every beast of the earth and to every bird of the sky and to every thing that moves on the earth which has life, I have given every green plant for food”; and it was so. 31God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day.

The bible is pretty clear about it.

Oooohh, bible fight! It's on!

Lol, sorry should have been clearer as to what was not true:

"If you hold any religious ideology then you cannot possibly believe that Adam and Eve are monkey ancestors. The Bible states God created Man in his image."

Docseverin and Mathias - are you honestly telling people what they can and can't believe? Sure, you may be able to state that according to your interpretation and system of logic, one cannot hold two given beliefs, but it seems pretty trollish to start a flame war by saying, "you cannot believe..." regardless of what follows.

Oh yeah, well... yeah...
Added at: 16:52

First Lady Puffinstuff said:

Docseverin and Mathias - are you honestly telling people what they can and can't believe? Sure, you may be able to state that according to your interpretation and system of logic, one cannot hold two given beliefs, but it seems pretty trollish to start a flame war by saying, "you cannot believe..." regardless of what follows.

Click to expand...

No, I'm just saying that the bible is very specific that people look like God. People can believe the world is flat and on the back of giant turtle for all I care.

Trust me, as someone with one class to go before I have my Masters in Theology, people can believe and agree with all kinds of crazy stuff and be part of any religion. They can even agree with the science on evolution. *gasp*

*Fixed for clarity.

Besides, everyone knows that the other guy is always wrong and needs to be purged through fire. It's the only way to be sure.

Espy said:

Trust me, as someone with one class to go before I have my Masters in Theology, people can believe all kinds of crazy stuff and be part of any religion. Even evolution. *gasp*

Click to expand...

Evolution isn't religion.

Mathias said:

No, I'm just saying that the bible is very specific that people look like God.

Click to expand...

It's not actually. "In the image" is a much more complicated theologically concept than just "looks like".
Added at: 15:55

Mathias said:

Evolution isn't religion.

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You know what I meant but I fixed it so it makes more sense.

He's got two hands, two feet, a head and a torso. Probably lacking a penis, but hey he's God, he can pop one in there if he so pleases. Never had trouble knocking Mary up - heh heh heh.

Mathias said:

Evolution isn't religion.

Click to expand...

The thing is, people are led to believe in it, rather than accept that there may be a more scientifically sound principal available we just haven't discovered yet. There are many who would balk at the idea of evolution being incorrect and accept it purely on faith.

Uh, on that note... so anyway, this: "One theory is that the Big Bang is preceded and superceded by the Big Crunch and that it's just one infinite expansion and contraction after another." is really interesting, I always wished I have more science classes so I could have learned more about this kind of stuff.
Added at: 15:59

Krisken said:

The thing is, people are led to believe in it, rather than accept that there may be a more scientifically sound principal available we just haven't discovered yet. There are many who would balk at the idea of evolution being incorrect and accept it purely on faith.

Click to expand...

Please see my edit. I never meant to imply that evolution was religion. Merely that people could be religious and agree with the theory of evolution.

Krisken said:

The thing is, people are led to believe in it, rather than accept that there may be a more scientifically sound principal available we just haven't discovered yet. There are many who would balk at the idea of evolution being incorrect and accept it purely on faith.

Click to expand...

No I agree, a lot of people blindly accept things without critical thought and analysis. That's why society as a whole works great on the basis of consumerism and instant gratification.

I never said I believed it either way. I'm just saying that it could just as easily have be that, too, for all we know. Heck, maybe we're not thinking far back enough. Maybe Adam & Eve were the first ameba (sp?) or something.

Also, if God created "man" in "his" own image, what does that say about women? That they're freaks of nature? The Bible was written by a bunch of men during a period when women's rights were pretty much non-existant aside from the right to make babies and get back in the kitchen (paraphrasing, of course).

That's part of why I'm agnostic. Who's to say that God is male or female at all? He's something so big that we can't even comprehend his magnitude or form.

I was thinking more about the idea of the universe expanding and contracting over a period of a gajillion bazillion years. It gave me this great idea that the universe, as vast and unending as it is, is God's lungs. If you think about it on that level, then God is a pretty darn big dude.

Mathias said:

No I agree, a lot of people blindly accept things without critical thought and analysis. That's why society as a whole works great on the basis of consumerism and instant gratification.

Click to expand...

I can't argue with that.

Espy said:

I can't argue with that.

Click to expand...

You could if you tried.

See, I wasn't trying to argue! I was just making an observation.

Oh, boy. A friend of mine threw another theory at me. I told him about the idea of the universe expanding and contracting like a lung. And suggested that maybe the universe is God's lungs or one of them.

His response? "Or testes."

Damnit, this is making all inspiring me to write about all of this...somehow. Though I'm probably going to Hell now, thinking about the universe being God with blue balls.

ThatNickGuy said:

I never said I believed it either way. I'm just saying that it could just as easily have be that, too, for all we know. Heck, maybe we're not thinking far back enough. Maybe Adam & Eve were the first ameba (sp?) or something.

Also, if God created "man" in "his" own image, what does that say about women? That they're freaks of nature? The Bible was written by a bunch of men during a period when women's rights were pretty much non-existant aside from the right to make babies and get back in the kitchen (paraphrasing, of course).

That's part of why I'm agnostic. Who's to say that God is male or female at all? He's something so big that we can't even comprehend his magnitude or form.

I was thinking more about the idea of the universe expanding and contracting over a period of a gajillion bazillion years. It gave me this great idea that the universe, as vast and unending as it is, is God's lungs. If you think about it on that level, then God is a pretty darn big dude.

Click to expand...

That means that...



our whole solar system...



could be, like...



one tiny atom in the fingernail
of some other giant being.



This is too much!



That means...



-one tiny atom in my fingernail could be--
-Could be one little...



tiny universe.



Could l buy some pot from you?

*insert picture with "Not sure if serious" caption*

ThatNickGuy said:

*insert picture with "Not sure if serious" caption*

Click to expand...

The way I see it, time is a dimension, much like the three dimensions of space, and the various other dimensions we have in the various advanced fields of physics. Like all the other dimensions, time came into existence at the Big Bang. There was no time before the Big Bang, because time hadn't been created yet.

So the idea of "before the Big Bang" is conceptually meaningless, sort of like looking for the corners on a circle.

That's just me though, I have nothing more than a high school level of physics knowledge.

bhamv3 said:

sort of like looking for the corners on a circle.

Click to expand...

Ah, but circles may have corners... in the fourth dimension.

There is a 90 degree corner where the ink/toner/graphite meets the paper... on a REALLY small scale.

How did noonelse think to post this:

My personal opinion here:

I'm definitely not a astrophysicist or even a biophysicist, but the events leading up to the Big Bang, and the formation of life will always remain in speculation. It's just not possible to prove either one. Theories and ideas can be tossed around, but we likely won't ever know for sure.

As for the Bible and evolution and such, I don't read Genesis as a "How To..." manual. It's a narrative. It's saying Who created, not really How God created. According to the Bible, God created Man from the dust (miry clay). Dust/clay is carbon, nitrogen, phosphorous, etc, so We are made from the stuff around us (this has been shown in science), and we were made in His image. To me, God got the ball rolling (so to speak) and let it roll from there. Like an orchestral piece with the overture at the beginning, and then all the pieces keeping the same melody throughout.

I can and do believe in Creation, but I can't deny science. I don't see a problem with that. Einstein, Mendel, Copernicus, Newton all believed in God, according to their writings anyway.

drawn_inward said:

My personal opinion here:

I'm definitely not a astrophysicist or even a biophysicist, but the events leading up to the Big Bang, and the formation of life will always remain in speculation. It's just not possible to prove either one. Theories and ideas can be tossed around, but we likely won't ever know for sure.

As for the Bible and evolution and such, I don't read Genesis as a "How To..." manual. It's a narrative. It's saying Who created, not really How God created. According to the Bible, God created Man from the dust (miry clay). Dust/clay is carbon, nitrogen, phosphorous, etc, so We are made from the stuff around us (this has been shown in science), and we were made in His image. To me, God got the ball rolling (so to speak) and let it roll from there. Like an orchestral piece with the overture at the beginning, and then all the pieces keeping the same melody throughout.

I can and do believe in Creation, but I can't deny science. I don't see a problem with that. Einstein, Mendel, Copernicus, Newton all believed in God, according to their writings anyway.

Click to expand...

Same deal here. I actually had a lot of issues with religion for a while, but eventually I came to my own personal conclusion that having faith in something is better than being faith less.