The myth of the Begining of Time

I am sure that many of you have heard debates where theologians have insisted that scientists no longer hold to the theory that time has always existed and that something cannot come from nothing... God fills in the gap by default - too bad it takes a scientist to come up with these incredible theories eh? I have heard this a number of times myself and get strange looks when I explain that I hold to the view that existence has always been. Well, it seems that scientists are beginning to have doubts about the beginning of time and here is the last paragraph from an article in the Scientific American.

"So, when did time begin? Science does not have a conclusive answer yet, but at least two potentially testable theories plausibly hold that the universe--and therefore time--existed well before the big bang. If either scenario is right, the cosmos has always been in existence and, even if it recollapses one day, will never end."

You can find the article here:
http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=00042F0D-1A0E-1085-94F483414B7F0000

Post 1

Monday, May 10, 2004 - 11:28am

I'm not a scientist but how about just saying that time/the universe as we know it began at the Big Bang, but the universe has always existed because there was something else here pre-big bang? I just don't quite see how the concept of time can have any real meaning prior to the universe being in its present state. I think I've heard of some cosmologists using some special term to refer to "time" prior to the Bang, presumably for this reason?

Post 2

Monday, May 10, 2004 - 1:53pm

Well, in order to describe time, you need events with which to measure time. Saying that time has a 'beginning' steals the concept of time as dependent upon an ambient existence in which things play out. So in that sense, time cannot have a beginning.

As far as an alternate notion of time, I've read A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking, and he makes mention of some kind of 'imaginary time' using imaginary numbers as opposed to real ones. However, such a thing has no physical significance and is a mathematical tool.

In any case, there is absolutely no evidence of the universe being created from nothing, Big Bang advocates notwithstanding. If there turned out to be something that predated the Big Bang, well, then whatever it was, it must have existed, and so ought to be part of the universe.

Post 3

Wednesday, May 12, 2004 - 2:48pm

Presumably you would also reject the concept of an 'infinite universe' for the same reason, Tim - because like creatio ex nihilo, the concept of 'infinity' bears no relation to reality as we know it.
So an interesting question would be, if the universe cannot be infinitely large, how can it also be inifinitely old?

WRT the 'Big Bang', the evidence suggests that it did occur, and if so, that no information could have survived it. This means that nothing prior to the 'Bang' could have had any effect on the current universe, making any argument over what came before it a moot point.

Post 4

Tuesday, June 15, 2004 - 7:57am