What Do We Really Know About The Beginning Of Time?

For as long as long as history has been recorded there has been interest in how the universe came to be. The science community seems to agree that the big bang was what created the universe, but there are many conflicting arguments surrounding what existed before the big bang and what initiated it. While there are nearly infinite responses to this question, there are only two paths one can take when answering it; either something existed prior to the big bang or the entire universe came from nothing. Lawrence M. Krauss, acclaimed physicist and cosmologist, uses his understanding of science in his book, A Universe from Nothing: Why There is Something Rather than Nothing, to elucidate that it is logical for something to come from nothing. Krauss recognizes that much of the world attributes the creation to God and quotes Steven Weinberg in saying that “science does not make it impossible to believe in God, but rather makes it possible to believe in God” (183).

It's one of several scientific models that attempts to explain why the universe is the way it is. The theory makes several predictions, many of which have been proven through observational data. As a result, it's the most popular and accepted theory regarding our universe's development. The most important concept to get across when talking about the big bang is expansion. Many people think that the big bang is about a moment in which all the matter and energy in the universe was concentrated in a tiny point.

2003. HSW Media Network A Convex Company. 24 Apr. 2003 <http://www.howstuffworks.com/question166.htm>. Kirkpatrick, Larry D., Gerald F. Wheeler.

This theory is not excepted in the scientific community because in has no evidence to back it up. That doesn’t mean it isn’t a possibility. There are a few other theories of the creations of the universe, but no other theories are as excepted as the big bang theory. Some of the important stuff to know that I have covered is the eras right after the Big Bang, the Big Bang it self and a few of the possible endings to the universe. I hope with this information you can have a better understanding of the universe, its creation, and it’s endings.

Encyclopedia Britannica Online. 22 Jan. 2005 < http://search.eb.com/ebi/article?tocId=9310645&query=RAY%20CHARLES&ct= >. Ray Charles: The Official Site. Comp. Chad Hanson, Ira Merrill, and Raenee Robinson.

Supernova Research Shows that the Universe is Expanding 'There is one thing even more vital to science than intelligent methods; and that is, the sincere desire to find out the truth, whatever it may be.' -Charles Sanders Pierce When it comes to science, there are many questions and few answers. Finding those few answers is what makes science interesting. One big question is science is whether or not the Universe is expanding. By observing and researching supernovas, one can decide that the Universe is expanding.

Even though we know a great amount more than the astronomers in the past, there is still an even larger amount we do not know about the universe to this day. Even our own solar system contains many questions yet to be answered. Some of these include the possibility of a planet beyond Pluto (Planet X), the means by which the system was created, and even the possibility of a sister star to the Sun named Nemesis. Another astronomical mystery is the creation of the universe. In time, many questions will be answered but some will always remain.

<hhttp//search.eb.com> “Uyghur History.” Uygur Worlds. 2004. Online. 12 Mar. 2004.

Some astronomers think that MOND is the reason to why everything in the galaxy is being held together. Other researchers think dark matter is really antimatter or baryonic matter, some astronomers also believe that the expansion of the universe is not caused by dark energy, but the universe is expanding as a result of the big bang. Dark matter and dark energy are still mystifying theories in the 21st century. However with current the knowledge astronomers have obtained by observing the effects dark matter and dark energy have upon the universe, many astronomers conclude that if our universe was void of dark matter and dark energy, the universe would have never been.

For thousands of years it was believed that our Universe was finite. In 1920, The Great Debate, also called the Shapley-Curtis Debate happened in Washington where Shapley argued that our Milky Way was the only galaxy in the Universe and Curtis argued that there were many other galaxies in the Universe but none of the opponents had any concrete evidence to prove their respective theories. However, in 1929 Edwin Hubble provided observational evidence from which he concluded that there was millions of galaxies in the Universe beside our Milky Way Galaxy. And in the process of discovering, he also found out that our Galaxy was in fact expanding! The public formation of the Great Debate influenced the ways ideas were presented and it ultimately lead to the trajectory of the Debate.