Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Cosmology: The Big Bang was a mirage from a collapsing higher-dimensional star?

Share
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Flipboard
Print
Email

An item in Nature asks, “Did a hyper-black hole spawn the Universe?,” adding “Big Bang was mirage from collapsing higher-dimensional star , theorists propose.”

The standard Big Bang model tells us that the Universe exploded out of an infinitely dense point, or singularity. But nobody knows what would have triggered this outburst: the known laws of physics cannot tell us what happened at that moment.

“For all physicists know, dragons could have come flying out of the singularity,” says Niayesh Afshordi, an astrophysicist at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Canada.

Or the Greek gods, or Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden, for that matter. … Just sayin’ is all.

The model also naturally explains our Universe’s uniformity. Because the 4D bulk universe could have existed for an infinitely long time in the past, there would have been ample opportunity for different parts of the 4D bulk to reach an equilibrium, which our 3D Universe would have inherited.

The picture has some problems, however. Earlier this year, the European Space Agency’s Planck space observatory released data that mapped the slight temperature fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background — the relic radiation that carries imprints of the Universe’s early moments. The observed patterns matched predictions made by the standard Big Bang model and inflation, but the black-hole model deviates from Planck’s observations by about 4%. Hoping to resolve the discrepancy, Afshordi says that his is now refining its model.

Readers can decide whether to believe the standard model or Afshordi’s proposal. A sci fi filmmaker could certainly work better with the latter.

Comments
I thought the Big Bang was an established scientific fact! If so, how come scientists keep trying to come up with other ideas? Plasma cosmology, Halton Arp's ideas, Hartnett's ideas, the unicorn burp idea, etc. Perhaps things are not as certain as we are often led to believe.tjguy
September 15, 2013
September
09
Sep
15
15
2013
11:50 PM
11
11
50
PM
PDT
Yes, but what made him burp?johnp
September 15, 2013
September
09
Sep
15
15
2013
04:39 AM
4
04
39
AM
PDT
p.s. not real unicorns, which I think today are known as bison or water buffalo, but the one's from children's stories. just needed to calrify.JGuy
September 15, 2013
September
09
Sep
15
15
2013
12:27 AM
12
12
27
AM
PDT
Actually, that higher-dimensional star is a mirage from the sparkles formed from of an even higher dimensional unicorn burp.JGuy
September 15, 2013
September
09
Sep
15
15
2013
12:22 AM
12
12
22
AM
PDT
just add another 5 imaginary dimensions or so that should make the equation work out :)wentzelitis
September 14, 2013
September
09
Sep
14
14
2013
09:25 PM
9
09
25
PM
PDT

Leave a Reply