Three Problems With the Big Bang

Real Clear Science ^ | Ross Pomeroy

[MtnClimber]

Somewhere around 13.8 billion years ago, the Universe began with a bang. In less than a second, the four fundamental forces -- electromagnetism, gravitation, weak nuclear interaction, and strong nuclear interaction -- which initially were joined as a single even more fundamental force, separated. Suddenly, the Universe started to expand at an exponential rate. Cosmic inflation had begun. ....

The Big Bang is the best theory we have to explain the birth and existence of the Universe. As astrophysicist Ethan Siegel wrote in his recent book Beyond the Galaxy:

"To this very day, there is no other model that is both consistent with General Relativity and explains the Hubble expansion of the Universe....

But while satisfying and substantially supported by the weight of scientific evidence, the defining theory of cosmology is not perfect. There remain three key problems.

The first is the Horizon Problem. If we look far out into space, billions of light years away, we see photons with the same temperature -- roughly 2.725 degrees Kelvin. If we look in another direction, we find the same thing. What a coincidence! In fact, when astronomers look in all directions, no matter how distant, they find that all regions have the same temperature. This is incredibly puzzling, Siegel says, "since these regions are separated by distances that are greater than any signal, even light, could have traveled in the time since the Universe was born." The Big Bang offers no explanation for this fascinating quirk.

Yet another quirk unexplained by the Big Bang is the Flatness Problem. Almost all the evidence collected by cosmologists indicates that the Universe is flat. Like a sheet of paper on a desk, spacetime shows almost no curvature whatsoever. Within the context of the Big Bang, this seems extremely unlikely.

[thoughtomator]

They just updated the problem without solving it - the horizon problem got magically solved by inflation but now inflation is inadequately explained, itself. Institutional science at its finest.

[lucky american]

There’s always the God theory.

[NTHockey]

My biggest problems with the Big Bang Theory is what caused it to happen and why. There had to be a catalyst where there was no matter why at that particular moment in time when there was no time.

Of course, religion provides an answer where man doesn’t even ask the question.

[colinhester]

Bflr

[MosesKnows]

religion provides an answer

We can create a guess when there is no answer. We can then compare the guess to experiment or experience. The Big Bang Theory guesses how the universe was created.

It is not a guess that there is a universe but its creation is a guess. Scientist tell us, with a great deal of certainty, the exact state of the universe a few parts of a microsecond after the Big Bang but nothing about the state of the universe a few parts of a microsecond before the Big Bang.

This is where religious or spiritual belief comes in. My belief in an infinite God is also a guess or theory that I accept on faith. Content with my belief I have no difficulty accepting that an infinite God can create a billion year old rock in one microsecond. I can’t prove I’m right and no one has proved me wrong.

No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong. Albert Einstein

The difference is that many people are involved in proving or disproving events that I am perfectly content to accept on faith, God and the Big Bang.

[kanawa]

To the discoverer goes the notoriety

Wrong usage.

[Maverick68]

I believe in the Big Bang....I also believe God lit the fuse...

[The Continental Op]

I still have a sneaking suspicion that Halton Arp may have been correct in his big bang criticism, and his notion of intrinsic redshift.

[dmz]

Thus supporting my lifelong contention that it takes as much faith to believe that the universe spontaneously created itself out of nothing as it takes to believe that God created the universe.

<><><><

One question then ... what is the unit of measure for faith, and what is the instrument you use to measure the amount of faith it takes to believe one thing over another?

[Personal Responsibility]

“The Big Bang” is a science-dumbed-down-for-us-layfolks term used by scientists to describe the origin of the universe. If I asked a priest to describe it, he might say “God said let there be light”. I mean, if you asked a scientist to describe the events of “let there be light” to the layfolks, wouldn’t an apt description be “there was a Big Bang”.

Same event, different perspectives, different descriptions.

[Personal Responsibility]

Time passes even if there is no universe is around to know it

[BDParrish]

(Excerpt)
Anyone doubting the Big Bang in its present form (which includes most astronomy-interested people outside the field of astronomy, according to one recent survey) would have good cause for that opinion and could easily defend such a position. This is a fundamentally different matter than proving the Big Bang did not happen, which would be proving a negative – something that is normally impossible. (E.g., we cannot prove that Santa Claus does not exist.) The Big Bang, much like the Santa Claus hypothesis, no longer makes testable predictions wherein proponents agree that a failure would falsify the hypothesis. Instead, the theory is continually amended to account for all new, unexpected discoveries. Indeed, many young scientists now think of this as a normal process in science! They forget or were never taught that a model has value only when it can predict new things that differentiate the model from chance and from other models before the new things are discovered. Explanations of new things are supposed to flow from the basic theory itself with at most an adjustable parameter or two, and not from add-on bits of new theory.
Read more at: “The Top 30 Problems With the Big Bang”
http://metaresearch.org/cosmology/BB-top-30.asp

[The Cajun]

When Physicists say flat, they mean that space is Euclidean.

All depends where you're doing the measuring.

As a whole probably yes, but around a super massive object, space/time is not flat (Euclidean) in that particular area.

[SunkenCiv]

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[mad_as_he$$]

Best most concise writings I have seen on the subject. Thanks!