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Stephen Hawking: What was before the Big Bang?

kropotkin said:
all to do with the rate of information loss and mass loss of a black hole as it evaporates pointing to information content being to do with area rather than volume. Implication is that the three dimensions as experienced might just be effects of information processing, and not actually real :errrrrrr:


edit: i read the original article in SciAm a few years ago, but this is now subscription-only.
Some kind infothief has put the article up here
Click to expand...

So, it it in fact saying that despite appearances, due to some informational quirk, we are all in fact 2d beings, smeared across some cosmic supersurface and we only think we're 3d cos it's convenient cos our brains can't deal with 2D? And that tjhis could be happening on the sidewall of a gigantic black hole?

I really hope so cos otherwise I'm going to have to have a little lie down
 
kyser_soze said:
So, it it in fact saying that despite appearances, due to some informational quirk, we are all in fact 2d beings, smeared across some cosmic supersurface and we only think we're 3d cos it's convenient cos our brains can't deal with 2D? And that tjhis could be happening on the sidewall of a gigantic black hole?

I really hope so cos otherwise I'm going to have to have a little lie down
Click to expand...

Sounds like someone has being doing a little too much K.
 
PacificOcean said:
Sounds like someone has being doing a little too much K.
Click to expand...

Nope...you don't need K to come up with something like that you need to be fully conscious and aware of your environment and NOT a fucking mobile jelly.
 
kyser_soze said:
Nope...you don't need K to come up with something like that you need to be fully conscious and aware of your environment and NOT a fucking mobile jelly.
Click to expand...

That is exactly like a K hole, come on!
 
RubberBuccaneer said:
Ricjard and Judy asked this to Stephen Hawkings yesterday to which he ( aprox ) replied ' what a stupid question, it's like what is north of the north pole'

But why is a stupid question, answer it FFS or say you don't know.

So anyone cleverer than Stephen on here?
Click to expand...

The Big Pressure.
 
Ok then - how and why did nothing manage to explode?

I think these are sensible questions worth asking. I don't subscribe toa "creationist" theory, at all but I think there's still a lot of questions as to how the universe came into existance, and what existed before it. Just saying "there was nothing - which exploded. It just happened, but don't ask why" just looks awfully similar to a nonreligious version of "god did it. Don't question it", to me.
 
poster342002 said:
Ok then - how and why did nothing manage to explode?

I think these are sensible questions worth asking. I don't subscribe toa "creationist" theory, at all but I think there's still a lot of questions as to how the universe came into existance, and what existed before it. Just saying "there was nothing - which exploded. It just happened, but don't ask why" just looks awfully similar to a nonreligious version of "god did it. Don't question it", to me.
Click to expand...

You clearly aren't getting the whole time/space thing.

We, humans that is, exist in a universe which came into being with the Big Bang. As such, it is NOT POSSIBLE for us to know 'what' was there before the Big Bang. Kropotkin has said this twice so far - we're creatures of the reality that the BB created, and as such couldn't understand what went before.

IT may one day to be possible to have a theoretical understanding of what was 'before' the BB but we'll never 'know' simply because it's not this universe.

You could look at Brane theory if you want a quick explanation of how the BB happened (two dimensional branes collide and the energy released created our 3 dimension universe) but you'll always come back to the same problem - how did those branes get there etc.

The difference between the religious view at this point is that it may soon be possible to see far back enough in history to about the time of the Bang (if it happened - it's not a fixed in stone theory, just one that works on a lot of levels), but also that it's got the suffix 'theory' - that is it can be changed and isn't an absolute position.
 
kyser_soze said:
You clearly aren't getting the whole time/space thing.

We, humans that is, exist in a universe which came into being with the Big Bang. As such, it is NOT POSSIBLE for us to know 'what' was there before the Big Bang. Kropotkin has said this twice so far - we're creatures of the reality that the BB created, and as such couldn't understand what went before.

IT may one day to be possible to have a theoretical understanding of what was 'before' the BB but we'll never 'know' simply because it's not this universe.
Click to expand...
That's true with the current limits of scientific knowledge. At one time, it was impossible to "know" what was on the moon. Longer ago, it was impossible to "know" what was on the next continent.
 
xes said:
Another universe collapsing on itself?
Click to expand...

Exactly.

The science he works on states that the big bang is the beginning of time. They are to busy trying to work out all the current stuff to worry about what happened before.

They are also the biggest bunch of back stabbing bitches the world has ever seen. You know someone could have worked it all out and if the elite didnt agree with it, or were pissed off because they didnt work it all out, they would rubbish the idea just to be nasty bitches.

Rant over.
 
poster342002 said:
That's true with the current limits of scientific knowledge. At one time, it was impossible to "know" what was on the moon. Longer ago, it was impossible to "know" what was on the next continent.
Click to expand...

This is different. Both the things you refer to were so because at the time they were unobservable - the pre-BB universe will ALWAYS be unobservable simply because the BB created the universe that your continents and moon exist in. I.el the pre-BB universe IS NOT LIKE THIS ONE. We can't exist in it since the stuff we're made of was created by the BB - it would be like trying to observe the sperm and egg that MADE YOU in a sense, only this would be like trying to view what ultimately made the atoms and sub atomic particles that made you.

What existed pre-BB may be demonstrated by mathemetics, and I guess there probably is a theory of knowledge that says you can know stuff that happens outside of our universe but for most scientists it is a meaningless question - the BB (possibly) was a singularity that caused the universe to happen. To know what went before it would be to know what existed pre-this universe.
 
kyser_soze said:
This is different. Both the things you refer to were so because at the time they were unobservable - the pre-BB universe will ALWAYS be unobservable simply because the BB created the universe that your continents and moon exist in. I.el the pre-BB universe IS NOT LIKE THIS ONE. We can't exist in it since the stuff we're made of was created by the BB - it would be like trying to observe the sperm and egg that MADE YOU in a sense, only this would be like trying to view what ultimately made the atoms and sub atomic particles that made you.

What existed pre-BB may be demonstrated by mathemetics, and I guess there probably is a theory of knowledge that says you can know stuff that happens outside of our universe but for most scientists it is a meaningless question - the BB (possibly) was a singularity that caused the universe to happen. To know what went before it would be to know what existed pre-this universe.
Click to expand...

So there could have been a really cool place before the BB, we'll never know then. Like a world run by amazonian women with men as slaves!
 
That’s an old (and fairly well-accepted) explanation which increasing numbers of physicists seem to publicly taking issue with.
 
Isn't he rather saying that there is no meaning to the concept of 'before' the Big Bang? Hence the analogy with 'south of the south pole'.

Our ideas of time are not quite right in any case. They are clearly our ideas, not necessarily fundamental ideas out there.
 
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