Was the big bang really the beginning of time? Or did the universe exist before then? Such a question seemed almost blasphemous only a decade ago. Most cosmologists insisted that it simply made no sense--that to contemplate a time before the big bang was like asking for directions to a place north of the North Pole. But developments in theoretical physics, especially the rise of string theory, have changed their perspective. The pre-bang universe has become the latest frontier of cosmology.

The new willingness to consider what might have happened before the bang is the latest swing of an intellectual pendulum that has rocked back and forth for millennia. In one form or another, the issue of the ultimate beginning has engaged philosophers and theologians in nearly every culture. It is entwined with a grand set of concerns, one famously encapsulated in an 1897 painting by Paul Gauguin: D'ou venons-nous? Que sommes-nous? Ou allons-nous? "Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?" The piece depicts the cycle of birth, life and death--origin, identity and destiny for each individual--and these personal concerns connect directly to cosmic ones. We can trace our lineage back through the generations, back through our animal ancestors, to early forms of life and protolife, to the elements synthesized in the primordial universe, to the amorphous energy deposited in space before that. Does our family tree extend forever backward? Or do its roots terminate? Is the cosmos as impermanent as we are?

11 Comments

1. 1. phayez 12:36 AM 12/27/08

   Before the blogs were canceled here on Sci Am I had a blog under the username "PHAYEZ" which dealt with, among other things, time and measurement. I put forward that time only exists as a feature of three dimensional existence. Time is the "velocity/distance of 3D matter relative to the velocity/distance of other 3D matter". Outside of three dimensions "TIME" as such does not exist and infinity is equal to zero "time". Also outside of three dimensions measurements cannot be made of anything which makes mathematics, with all due respect, irrelevant since the language of mathematics has, as a syntax, products of measurement. The existence and non-existence of time is a spatial relationship oxymoron which is difficult to grasp when you are an entity who is wholly dependent on being made up of atoms which are moving through space.
   One final comment, if I may, on the speed limit of light and the fact that even information cannot exceed the speed of light. At the speed of light time is zero, in other words for the light there is no time that passes so that regardless of where it arrives, it arrives instantaneously. Nothing can move faster than instantaneously, even information...
   Pierre
   username: PHAYEZ (Edmonton,Alberta,Canada)

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2. 2. aidankelly 09:59 AM 4/28/09

   "the idea that our universe is one of many D-branes floating within a higher-dimensional space. The branes exert attractive forces on one another and occasionally collide. The big bang could be the impact of another brane into ours."
   Gee, this sounds a lot like Hoyle's theory of continous creation, with his graph of our universe as a tiny triangle in an infinite sea. Maybe he deserved the Nobel prize after all. Aidan A. Kelly, Ph.D. (in theology)

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3. 3. Julian Mann 07:12 PM 1/2/10

   I do not buy into the concepts of String Theory or any kind of modern version of the Steady State theory. These ideas are outdated and unsupported by experimental evidence. There was indeed a Big Bang and the present state of the universe can be easily rewound in space and time, to demonstrate this.
   I think that with a little more theoretical work on Big Bang, most of the cosmological questions can be answered. Antimatter was probably not annihilated then against matter, but was forced into an alternative quantum state where it could no longer react with matter. The power of this gave rise to Inflation and explains the origin of Dark Matter.(Antimatter shielded since Big Bang) Aside from time, there should also be an Anti-time to maintain symmetry at Big Bang. The Quantum World operates in Anti-time and this explains why Quantum Mechanics appears very wierd. It looks like Matter and Antimatter exchanged Time dimensions at the Quantum level, due to Big Bang. Therefore we can probably define the state which existed before Big Bang, as the period before Time split from Anti-time. The existence of Anti-time would also give us a concept of Constancy of Entropy in the universe as a whole, when measured at any moment since Big Bang. Anti-time would also explain the phenomenom of Entanglement. Thus there is no contradiction between Quantum Mechanics and Relativity as far as the behaviour of these photons, due to one photon travelling in anti-time and therefore appearing to have travelled instantly.In reality it's speed has not exceeded C.
   

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4. 4. verdai 08:09 PM 7/28/10

   among the best things I'v heard on string theory, that it acknowledges a state existing prior to the "big bang".
   ( God, I'm tired of those words together-)
   not a bad theory of course all told. once we find those pesky extra dimensions.

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5. 5. Leoncefalo 10:13 AM 8/7/10

   The concept of time is integral to space and motion. Where there is no space, there is no time. The dimension of space is the action of motion. Therefore, there is no time without motion -no motion without space, no space without time. The Big Bang was the only time that everything moved at the speed of light. Since then, all motions have become relative (Einstein) within the universe, but still moving away at the speed C, at the relative distance.
   It is only man who measures the seconds, minutes and hours.
   Before there was light, there was darkness, and before that, there was nothing. To perceive darkness, there must be light.
   To perceive the light, the eye must be. BEFORE the Big Bang, there was the eye. . . .of G-d.

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6. 6. Leoncefalo 11:19 AM 8/7/10

   Any pre-Big Bang theory is viable only if it includes LeMaitre's concept of the 'primeval atom' -the inevitable state that conditions the 'Big Bang.' That all matter all over the universe expanded instantaneously is pure fantasy - the universe did not exist before it existed. Some philosophical wisdom is required to understand purely physical concepts. That is why 'science' as we perceive it today(2010) is inadequate to explain cosmolgical history. It does not satisfy that most insatiable of spirits - the human being. We certainly admire the adroitness of all the 'theories' and in our world there is room for an infinite amount. But though 'many are called, only a few will be chosen.' Mankind has tens of thousands of years left to explore his universe. No 'theory of everything' will be found anytime soon. Albert Einstein came the closest to it, for the child-like simplicity of his theories. And even he was wont to say. . .'G-d does not play dice." Chance and probability are human tools for imperfect human beings. That is their only measure and capacity to measure the infinite. And it is by this method that he approaches G-d. . .and perfection.

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7. 7. debu 08:36 AM 8/15/10

   A conspiracy to support big bang is going on. Science is becoming a platform to be popular. But we are still not declaring that ideas if NEWTON and EINSTEIN are not applicable beyond our solar system without some correction. NEWTONS law is to be modified F=P.G.M.m /R.R Where P is factor permeability of gravitoethertons or ETHER soup. Einstein was not quite right in space-time continuum and space and time are different not to be amulgamated. The cyclic theory of DR.PAUL is also half baked incomplete theory and before that DR.DATTA published ETHER=GRAVITY=DARK ENERGY THEORY OF GRAVITOERHERTONS AND BALLOON INSIDE BALLOON THEORY OF MATTER AND ANTIMATTER ON OPPOSITE ENTROPY PATH IN ASTRONOMY.NET IN YEAR 2002 . THE IDEAS OF RE CYCLIC ON ONE REACHING ZERO ENTROPY AND BIG BOUNCE AND DUE TO CP VIOLATION AGAIN MATTER AND ANTIMATTER UNIVERSES IS VERY INTERESTING AND EVERY BODY SHOULD STUDY--THE LINKS AVAILABLE IN --durgadas datta facebook--.

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8. 8. jmilliken 10:07 AM 10/28/10

   Time does not exist in the reality of nature. It is an abstraction brought about by human observation of our solar system for purposes of prediction and harvested for the control of the many by a few. The illusion of time has created ideas of time travel, time dilation, which remain as fantasies.

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9. 9. oldliver61 03:08 PM 1/1/11

   Is There a conscious God? "May the force be with you!" Does that force feel / think? Was that force ever one pure homogenous thing? What has always been? Where did the room come from? Does the room have walls or go on forever?

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10. 10. George Vth 12:37 AM 2/24/11

    The only possible logical answer is that the universe existed before the Big Bang, even if there was nothing in it. Just because a box is empty doesn't mean there is no box. Time and Space are required before there can be a Big Bang. You can measure a distance of say 10 light years between point A and point B, which may be two stars. Take the stars away and the distance is still there. I don't see what all the fuss is about.

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11. 11. gorobman 01:20 PM 7/21/12

    I think George Vth comes closest to the only rational explanation of defining the beginning of time. Students of physics and theology always try to confuse the issue by introducing spatial concepts, Big Bang theory and divine intervention. If we agree that time does exist now and it follows a linear path, it can be argued that time must be infinite since it cannot stop even if you remove all matter and light. What is impossible for me to logically fathom is how time and/or space can have no beginning and therefore no end. I wish someone could help me understand.

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