Slartibartfas

The Big Bang does not disprove the existence of god. The two things are simply two completely different things: the one is a scientific theory, the other one a theological concept. Theological concepts normally are aranged in a way that they lie outside of the realms of science.

The second point: The existence of god is completely insignificant for science in order to explain the Big Bang. As I already said above its "god" is nothing scientific. To explain scientific theories with religious concepts means from a scientist perspective to not explain it at all.

Thirdly: The validity of the theory of the Big Bang has nothing to do with what happened before it. There is no way to validate what happened before it, and so that is pure speculation at least. But the basic problem I guess is, that its highly doubtable if there existed a "before" at all, as its thought that time was created by the big bang. No time means there is no "before".

In the very beginning there did not exist matter at all, just energy. So no atoms at all there, as I said, not even matter. But I guess that was not your point as you asked for the cause for the Big Bang. I partially gave an answer to this in the paragraph above. There of course however speculations, one that I heard once, is that the laws of quantum mechanics know something like "fluctuations" within absolute vacuum. I have not really understood that concept though. I think what it says somehow is that "nothing" can divide itself into postive and negative energy that when it finds together is again annihilated aka "nothing". This on a larger scale would mean that our universe was borng out of "nothing" through a fluctuation that caused a fracture which led to the singularity which was the beginning of the Big Bang. But as I said above, time does not pass inside of singularities. So its a bit difficult to imagine I guess.

Speculating about what was beyond the Big Bang (a better word than "before"), is also therefore quite difficult as nothing indicates that our physical laws exist there. Theories even say that in the very beginning they were not all existing yet.

So what is possible beyond the Big Bang? Well from a scientific point of view: Everything and nothing, perhaps even both. But whatever it was, chances are high that it has vanished (or simply stayed outside) with the creation of the universe when physical laws set in and formed a universe we can see today.


Who says the Big Bang needed energy to be "caused"? But even if we suggest that the thermothermal laws should be applied also back then as well, its perfectly possible by supposing that the total energy in sum in our todays university is: zero. Positive and negative energy annihilates itself when being combined. So just bring all separated energy of the universe together and nothing will be left. But the total energy balance at the same time never changed.


And last but not least: Science does not claim that a theory has to be able to explain everything. We have alone 4 laws of fundamental forces, if I remember correctly. And up to this day no one was able to unify them into a single consistent theory that would explain them all. We are not even sure if there can be such theory at all. We have many theories, some even contradict each other, like matter being of massive and wave nature at the same time. All those theories are valied scientific theories. And the Big Bang is in its non perfection just a respectable "member of the club".
Perfection is something that is being left for religion I guess.

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Slartibartfas

Thats correct.
Science and religion are two different games. One can play both without giving up one or the other.

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Oregon Elephant

Not according to the Big Bang theory. Prior to it, there was nothing, no matter, no energy.

Slartibartfas

Wrong. The Big Bang Theory does not say anything about what was beyond it. It just says that the Big Bang started with a singularity.

In this state there was indeed no matter, only energy, matter needed "more space" to come into existance. But as I said in the posts above, its not necessary that the total energy balance changed due to the Big Bag, it still could be zero.

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Kazikli Bey

So, does that mean you subscribe to the belief that the universe in infinetely expanding?

If so, what is it exactly expanding into? Why is it expanding? Where exactly is the energy coming from that gives itself power to expand so?

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counterpointing

Too bad, no one will argue against my point, the one I made on the second page. I take it everyone agrees with me? I’m glad we are all in agreement.

iTaliAN_ICe

That's a good question, and one that we may never know the answer to. Scientific experiments conducted in the past, however, are allowing us to begin to form loose hypotheses about how life may have emerged spontaneously from non-life.

For example, the Miller-Urey experiment showed how organic compounds can form under conditions that may be similar to those on a primitive, pre-atmospheric earth. I couldn't find an accessible version of the experiment online, so here's a link to the Wikipedia article about it: Miller-Urey experiment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Nobody knows. I'll play dirty and turn the tables on you though. If a god "gave the energy for" the Big Bang, how was the god created? Where did its energy come from?

The Big Bang theory, as you know, is the theory that the universe expanded to its current state from a singularity - all of the matter in the universe compressed into a single, unimaginably dense, small, and hot point. If you're asking what triggered this expansion, I have no idea, and I doubt whether anyone ever will.

It doesn't. If the big bang theory is true (which it most likely is), all religious creation myths and stories would be dispelled. However, that doesn't mean some sort of god doesn't exist. I just don't believe that one does, and won't until I find good reason to.

Oregon Elephant

You like to jump to conclusions, don't you?

counterpointing

Who doesn’t? Especially when there is good reason too.

Oregon Elephant

Just because no one responded to you doesn't mean that they all agree with you.

And with that siad, your theory is flawed, just because something extends in both ways infinately, doesn't mean that the middle can't exist. It just means that from every point it extends forever in both directions. You're never getting closer to either side, no matter how far you go, but there is still a middle that can be marked, it just can't be marked with respect to the ends (because there are no ends).