{"id":45445,"date":"2023-06-05T10:38:34","date_gmt":"2023-06-05T10:38:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyatnightmagazine.com\/?p=118976"},"modified":"2023-06-05T12:32:35","modified_gmt":"2023-06-05T12:32:35","slug":"what-was-there-before-the-big-bang","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/what-was-there-before-the-big-bang\/","title":{"rendered":"What was there before the Big Bang?"},"content":{"rendered":"

We explore the theories about one of the most mind-boggling questions about the Universe. <\/p>

By Govert Schilling\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Monday, 05 June 2023 at 12:00 am<\/p>

\n\n

I<\/span>t\u2019s the question that always comes up when thinking about the origin of the Universe: what came before?<\/span><\/p>\n

And if there was no \u2018before\u2019, what was the cause of the Big Bang<\/a> in the first place?<\/span><\/p>\n

Until a few centuries ago, the answer was easy: some eternal deity set everything in motion.<\/p>\n

Even Isaac Newton<\/a> believed that God created the Universe, some 6,000 years ago.<\/p>\n

Later, many scientists, including young Albert Einstein, assumed the Universe itself to be eternal and everlasting.<\/p>\n

\""Albert\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Einstein\u2019s theories of spacetime revolutionised our understanding of the Universe. Credit: Bettmann \/ Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

But when cosmic expansion was discovered, Belgian cosmologist (and Jesuit priest) Georges Lema\u00eetre realised there must have been a beginning \u2013 a scientific version of Genesis, so to speak.<\/p>\n

Not that everyone immediately agreed.<\/p>\n

Well into the 1960s, Fred Hoyle\u2019s steady-state theory<\/a> was quite popular among iconoclastic scientists as well as lay people.<\/p>\n

Hoyle accepted the expansion of the Universe<\/a>, but he didn\u2019t believe in the Big Bang.<\/p>\n

Instead, he assumed that a slow, continuous creation of new matter could keep the average density and the general properties of the Universe constant over time.<\/p>\n

\""Popular\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Popular in the 1950s, steady-state theory claimed matter is continuously created as the Universe expands, a theory overtaken by the Big Bang idea that density drops as galaxies move away from one another<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

The 1964 discovery of the cosmic microwave background<\/a> was the major nail in the coffin of the steady-state theory.<\/p>\n

Ever since, supporting evidence for the Big Bang origin of our Universe has accumulated to a point where there\u2019s hardly any doubt left.<\/p>\n

Still, no one has the final answer to the question \u201cwhat happened before the Big Bang?\u201d.<\/p>\n

Could there have been a Universe before the Big Bang<\/a>?<\/p>\n

Most scientists simply ignore the question, as it seems to be too hard a nut to crack.<\/p>\n

\""A\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
A snapshot of the Cosmic Microwave Background \u2013 heat left over from the Big Bang \u2013 when the Universe was just 380,000 years old. Credit: ESA and the Planck Collaboration<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

In fact, when astronomers talk about the Big Bang, they usually do not refer to the very beginning of the Universe (time zero), but to the incredibly hot and compact state of the Universe in the first couple of minutes of its existence.<\/p>\n

To some extent, this is because no one has a real clue about the true nature of time, let alone about the beginning of time.<\/p>\n

British physicist Julian Barbour, for one, has argued that time doesn\u2019t even exist, except as an illusion in our minds.<\/p>\n

According to others (including Stephen Hawking), time came into existence together with the Universe, rendering the whole concept of the word \u2018before\u2019 meaningless.<\/p>\n

Asking what happened before the Big Bang would be like asking what lies north of the North Pole, or what distance is shorter than zero.<\/p>\n

\""Hubble\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Will all matter eventually crush back in on itself? Credit: NASA, ESA, H. Teplitz and M. Rafelski (IPAC\/Caltech), A. Koekemoer (STScI), R. Windhorst (Arizona State University), Z. Levay (STScI)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

Alternative theories<\/b><\/span><\/h2>\n

Then again, we simply don\u2019t know whether or not there was time before the Big Bang.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the once-popular idea of the cyclic (or oscillatory) Universe, the current expansion of space could one day revert into a contraction, and the resulting Big Crunch could bounce into a new Big Bang, starting the next cycle of an eternal sequence.<\/span><\/p>\n

For more on this, read our interview with Katie Mack about the end of the Universe<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s just one of many hypotheses in which our Universe is not unique, but part of a possibly infinite multiverse, one way or another.<\/p>\n

And if the multiverse is also infinite in time, we\u2019re back to the idea that everything has existed forever, conveniently circumnavigating the nagging question of a beginning.<\/p>\n

\""What\"<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>
Credit: NASA\/JPL<\/span><\/figcaption><\/div>\n

Finally, South African physicist Neil Turok thinks the Big Bang not only spawned our Universe, but also an anti-Universe, composed of anti\u00ad\u00ad\u200b\u00admatter<\/a> and running backward in time<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Again, an intriguing idea, but there\u2019s also no chance of confirmation (or rejection!) via observations.<\/p>\n

In the end, we have to admit we\u2019re ignorant about the true beginning of the Universe.<\/p>\n

And even if we lean towards an eternal multiverse with no real beginning at all, we don\u2019t know why there is something (or, more to the point, why there is everything) instead of nothing.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared in the June 2023 issue of <\/strong><\/em>BBC Sky at Night Magazine<\/strong>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n

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