Cyclic universe could explain cosmic balancing act

Nature Magazine ^ | 04 May 2006 | Philip Ball

[PatrickHenry]

Wouldn't a yo-yo universe violate the second law of thermodynamics?

Why? If some force, like gravity, makes it collapse, it will do so. If something else makes it go Bang, it will do so. Why couldn't this continue eternally? Where would the energy loss due to some kind of friction go?

[UCANSEE2]

"But the irony is that Einstein insisted that the Theory of Relativity not only made sense, but it was the only possible explanation that did make sense."

I'm not so sure about that.

He also stated his first theories were totally incorrect.

The smartest man in the world is the one who realizes that he knows nothing.

[RightWhale]

Steinhardt and Turok say that their idea is testable

They always say that. Of course it is testable, so is gravitational blue-shift. If nothing else we can wait and see what happens.

[UCANSEE2]

"but I think understanding and accepting these concepts has more to do with intuition than anything.
"

Now, you, are a very smart person.

New theories, new inventions, come not from our individual brilliance over and above other humans.

It is given to many at the same time. Most do nothing with the info. The few are the ones that 'invented' it in history books.

[steve86]

If scientists are fully capable of believing in the concept of the infinite, then why would the concept of an infinite creator be so hard for some of them to swallow?

I think Michio Kaku, author of "Hyperspace", fits into that category, judging by his quips and quotes in the book: "Therefore, unicorns do not necessarily have to exist. And neither does God".

I skipped most of those sections, but it is a useful book overall.

[steve86]

"paired photons"="entangled photons"

[onedoug]

"If I knew God I'd be Him..." and know how and why the universe is.

[Bernard Marx]

I've always said that for there to be a Big Bang there also has to be a giB gnaB in which all physical constants, including time, reverse.

Don't ask me for the math; I had it all noted down but it got misplaced in the same spot where Hillary keeps all those missing FBI files.

[phantomworker]

For what it's worth, I like the oscillating universe because it avoids the problem of the universe's being strictly a one-time affair. That definitely is counter-intuitive.

Not necessarily counter intuitive. If you consider what intuition is, or could be. I think it those thoughts and ideas that cannot be clearly expressed in language which is based upon all our past knowledge and experiences. It is those math ideas, for example, or ideas about an oscillating universe that cannot be formally expressed yet you know intuitively, are true.

If you consider the survival of the fittest, the universe that survives is the universe that is self-perpetuating. Thus a universe that is a one-time affair might be doomed for self-destruction.

Life itself can be viewed as innately oscillating if you consider yin and yang, positive-negative charges, magnetism, binary zero sum, plus minus instances...and nature abhoring a vacuum so that it is constantly in flux and thus perpetuating life. (OK, time for a nap... ;))

[PatrickHenry]

Apparently, intuition is a relative thing.

[tomzz]

If you've really mastered that sort of physics, you should be able to invent a yoyo which requires no energy imput from the user. There should be lots of money in something like that.

[concentric circles]

Interesting. I recently read a section in the Urantia Book, a volume of cosmology, history, and religion published in 1955, which was titled:

Space Respiration

"We do not know the actual mechanism of space respiration; we merely observe that all space alternately contracts and expands..."

"The cycles of space respiration extend in each phase for a little more than one billion years..."

[tet68]

We always knew the universe was expanding.
It was trying to get away from Chuck Norris!

[Erasmus]

Trying to figure out the origins of the universe is like sweeping a dirt floor.

"Why, it's dirt, of course. Dirt, all the way down."

[Erasmus]

Typographical problem. They meant

1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
00000000000000000000000000000.

[VadeRetro]

I was joking, of course. Numbers of the form 10¹²⁰ often trip up the hasty pasters.

[longshadow]

Numbers of the form 10¹²⁰ often trip up the hasty pasters.

Not nearly as much as numbers of the form 1⁷²⁰....

[VadeRetro]

1⁷²⁰, yes. That was hasty composition, or hasty computation, methinks.

[spunkets]

The "blank" for dummies series books are generaly good. I don't know of any simplified text's, good, or not. I use good texts. An explaination of any simple physics can be found on the net though.

[Brilliant]

"that is the nature of the quantum universe..."


Well, you and I are not going to settle that here. That's what Eistein and Bohr spent years arguing about. Bohr won, according to modern physicists, but I still think Einstein was right that God does not play dice. Part of the problem with physics is that there is a degree of orthodoxy. There are some things you can't argue without being labeled a quack. That's one reason why Aristotle's view that the Earth is the center of the universe prevailed for almost 2,000 years. A lot of physicists will tell you that if you've got a theory that works in the sense that it predicts the right result, then that's all you need, even if it's wrong. They aren't going to change it until they get to a point where they just can't explain something.

Of course, some of us would say that they are already there inasmuch as they can't explain gravity. That doesn't seem to bother them though.