Origins
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@mariner4life said in Origins:
Who built the simulation? And where did their universe come from?
Future us.
This cartoon explains why Elon Musk thinks we’re characters in a computer simulation. He might be right.
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Why couldn't I be the model run that got to shag all the hot chicks?
If I ever meet that version - he's fucking dead!!!
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@mariner4life said in Origins:
These questions have always spun me out.
If the universe had a beginning, what was there before?
I had a theory when I was in high school that it was cyclical. Take our present situation with black holes, for argument's sake the massive black hole in galaxy NGC 1277 in the constellation Perseus. It's swallowing everything up to the point it's currently estimated to have a mass of 17 billion suns. My conjecture was ultimately these black holes end up swallowing all mass and the pressure at the point of singularity meant that in line with Boyle's Law, the temperature was infinite. Under such pressure, everything breaks down to subatomic levels which permitted matter to escape as per Hawking Radiation. I couldn't quite surmise why it would then do so violently, but the whole theory fell on its arse not just because of my inability to further develop the theory or do the required math, but because the universe is red shifted. Which kinda fucked my idea becoming worthy of a Nobel Prize.
If the universe is expanding, what is it expanding in to?
You need to think in terms of time and distance, which complicates things. Since you can't observe the universe from outside the universe, your perception is limited to what's inside. The best analogy is to pretend you're inside a balloon. To you given you're insignificant size there's no curve, the surface or edge is flat. The balloon might be inflating so from your perception everything is moving further away, but they're actually not moving.
It becomes more complicated when you look at the various possible models for the shape of the ballloon.
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@antipodean still nothing on the outside of the balloon though is there...not like space can come to a big wall, and you cant go any further...
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@taniwharugby said in Origins:
@antipodean still nothing on the outside of the balloon though is there...not like space can come to a big wall, and you cant go any further...
That's why one of the predominate theories (Friedmann's first) is space curves upon itself. Travel long enough and you end up where you started just like the surface of Earth - finite but with no boundary. Of course, that wouldn't happen because the universe would collapse to zero size before you could travel around it.
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Have become a fan over the break of 'The Infinite Monkey Cage'.
Google it if you're not familiar. Well worth a listen.
Been listening to pretty much the entire "back catelogue" of podcasts. Somebody mentioned it on the "podcasts" thread. I had heard the odd episode here on the ABC previously. Usually over the summer period (ie now).
Not sure if I'm better informed as I probably need to give it my undivided but I've generally had them playing in the background as I've been doing other stuff.
Need to re-listen to a few. Hopefully some info has found it's way in by osmosis.
Some laugh out loud lines. Giggled at one i heard this morning when discussing homeopathy and that the homeopaths were trying to poison them. The proof being they had analysed the drinking water and found absolutely no trace of cyanide.
If nothing else it appears that perhaps gravity doesn't actually exist. Just space-time curves at massive objects because Einstein.
Basically creation (for want of a better word) is out and out weird and completely counter intuitive.
And somewhen due to the joy of an infinite number of universes I am an All Black.
Still not sure exactly when strawberries die though. Something to do with cats in boxes.
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@booboo If you like Infinite Monkey Cage, Robin Ince plus guests are doing 3 science shows in NZ in April (Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch)
