Physicist Neil Turok: Big Bang Wasn't the Beginning

[mudnpool]

Ill give you what supports my belief of higher beings. The universe is incredibly vast, though we do not currently know of any life out there, it is just using the head that there are other planets out there with life on them. Life with intelligence that would make humans look like bacteria. Humans are the most intelligent known species. Thus giving us a superior self reflection and making it hard to accept the idea of a more intelligent species. No I can not prove there is more life out there but I think it would be incredibly dumb to say there is no life some uncountable number of miles away. Also astral life forms. I have been to the astral plane and have seen life forms not know to the physical world. I can not prove this, but millions of others have experienced the same thing and there are many many books on it.

Are you happy?

[hicksfan]

Ill give you what supports my belief of higher beings. The universe is incredibly vast, though we do not currently know of any life out there, it is just using the head that there are other planets out there with life on them. Life with intelligence that would make humans look like bacteria. Humans are the most intelligent known species. Thus giving us a superior self reflection and making it hard to accept the idea of a more intelligent species. No I can not prove there is more life out there but I think it would be incredibly dumb to say there is no life some uncountable number of miles away. Also astral life forms. I have been to the astral plane and have seen life forms not know to the physical world. I can not prove this, but millions of others have experienced the same thing and there are many many books on it.

Are you happy?

lol, was it that painful? i'll contend you were much more honest in that effort. that's all i'm asking for.

i know there's a lot of consistent stories about things multiple people experience, i touched on it in the alien thread i responded in a few days ago about the similarity of physical description of aliens. arguably, though, i fully realize the potency of the brain and it's ability to alter our reality. in my honest summation, i think the common denominator is our brains. it's evolved to perform certain functions, a lot of survival mechanisms still deeply engrained. for example, our brains have a tendency to pick up a pattern and complete that pattern for us whether or not it's true reality of what it's actually observing. that's why we see faces in clouds, for instance. to me, the trick is to confirm it is not the brain performing a "trick" (if you will) and it's an actual experience.... something that sounds a lot easier than it actually is.

there's absolutely no question that your brain can make things very real that aren't. and in that, a person does experience that reality to a degree. ever heard tool's tune "Rosetta Stoned"? it touches on several of those aspects of the strength of the mind.

[Alicat]

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[hicksfan]

i find a high level of plausibility in the model. we know this universe is expanding, we're quite sure it started with a big bang. as i understand it, the expanding light is pushing against dark matter. if there was a big bang, you had all matter condensed to a very dense substance and therefore a finite amount by definition. the basic laws of physics state for every action there's an equal and opposite reaction. casual laws. at some point this dark matter will start to push back and could create a big contraction. this yo-yo effect is a pretty popular (popular as in well-liked because there is a substantial amount of logic flow to the proposition) notion amongst the people that put true time and effort into understanding. it's also a popular notion that things that happen in a previous universe has an effect on the following. it's described as each universe is a "child" of the previous one. it basically has the same composition, but original in it's own right.

when you start to talk conceptually of the universe, no one model really contains all the tangents known to exist. the big bang basically explains the current action taking place since this universe began. in it, there's no explanation for the reaction that will eventually take place when the universe quits expanding. the dilemma is having a more dynamic viewpoint. turok is expanding the mindset of the catalyst providing the energy and viewing it more as a whole than just one tangent. it's the closest rationalization of infinity i've found believable.

there's hardly any making up something even stranger, he's taking as many known tangible facets and adding pieces to the puzzle, not taking away.

thanks for rehashing phil hartman's frozen caveman lawyer strategy. if you truly wanted to understand a little more, i'd refrain from jumping to ridiculous conclusions for comical anecdote and read a book on the subject. bill bryson's "a short history of nearly everything" is one i'd recommend. a regular joe that asked a lot of really smart qualified people stupid questions and made them answer in a language he'd understand.

btw, hawking is a confirmed atheist.

"I thought I had left the existence of a Supreme Being completely open in my article. It would be perfectly consistent with all we know to say that there was a Being who was responsible for the laws of physics. However, I think it would be misleading to call such a Being "God", because this term is normally understood to have personal connotations which are not present in the law of physics."

"What I have done is to show that it is possible for the way the universe began to be determined by the laws of science. In that case, it would not be necessary to appeal to God to decide how the universe began. This doesn't prove that there is no God, only that God is not necessary."


to your final point - "repugnant is a creature who would squander the ability to lift an eye to heaven, conscious of his fleeting time here."

[Alicat]

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[hicksfan]

You're right it's scientifically thought to be a plausible model. Quantum theory does show that there is a level of reality that is beyond our daily experiences, this level is not directly accessible to us. Many universes big and small and parts of "reality" splitting off here and there. Nothing at the subatomic scale can really be said to exist until it is observed. Until then, particles occupy uncertain states and spins, or appear to be in different places at the same time- until they're observed. Ironic that it may be mathematics (Bells' theorem) to show the universe is not dualistic and deterministic. Interesting to think about and to try to understand, but trying to split infinity into levels and eternity into phases, it's long way down.

It's turtles all the way down!

btw, I pretty much agree with Hawking on theology

i tell you what i find mind-boggling in my very short understanding of any quantum theory is the fact you can split an atom and no matter how far apart the two pieces are, whatever you do to the one effects the other instantaneously.

i agree with hawking as well, that tends to be my rub when people start referring to all of these supernatural beings they contend do exist. you start to realize all of the indifferent casual laws in place. it definitely makes these "intentional" beings much harder to validate, and conversely the fact that we are alive and breathing for this moment in time that much more cause for appreciation