What existed before the big bang? Something must have!

[danot]

Because although space does expand it does not need space to expand into.

 

It's difficult to explain with an earth bound analogy but image the surface of a baloon as a 2D representation. As the baloon inflates the "space" ie the surface area of the baloon expands and gets bigger. BUT there is not more being added to the baloon - there is no creation of more rubber - yet the surface is getting larger. This is similar in concept to how the Universe is expanding.

The balloon theory only relates to the expansion of all matter, it doesn't address the area of nothingness that the balloon(matter) consumes as it expands.

[s.hawkins]

Nothing can have always existed. everything that is, must have at some point become what it is.

 

why? do you think its because we and all around us do? we are carbon carbon is created only in stars. billions of years old we are (best yoda voice). time has no begining or end .its like a moment for us could be a billion years for another form of life. we see time s a river we travel along, but its a dimension we exist in. if you existed outside of time it has no effect or meaning.

[Obelix]

The balloon theory only relates to the expansion of all matter, it doesn't address the area of nothingness that the balloon(matter) consumes as it expands.

 

It's not a theory, it's an analogy. Why not though? If there is nothing there to consume then how can it consume it..:-)

 

As others have said, you can extend the argument reduction ab absurdum and you will always end up with a higher space to extend into, which is nonsense. Hence the question makes no sense ultimately. Once you can account for the observed expansion without the need for additional matter to be created the question is complete with it's answer.

[HeadingNorth]

Before you began to explain the principles behind your examples, you claimed that you could better support your argument and expose the flaws if you presented the process of the big bang in reverse order

 

You misunderstand me; I only said that I was counting them in reverse, starting with the Big Bang as event one and whatever caused it as event two, and so on. You can label them however you wish, or even not label them at all; it wouldn't affect the logic, but not labelling them makes it harder to follow.

[danot]

If the question is 'what contains space?' then it's a nonsense question- akin to asking 'is bigness big?'

 

'bigness' itself has no size- it's not in that category of entities that possess size- similarly 'space' is not in that category of things that are contained in space.

 

With the proviso that, in some models, one space can be represented as existing within a different form of space.

 

For example, it could make sense to theorise that a space is contained within a space of a higher dimension (this is the premise of the various 'flatland' analogies popular in cosmology to explain how a 3D space can be finite in size, yet lack any boundaries, by using the analogy of a 2D plane curved into a sphere in a higher (3D) space).

 

But, if you're making the claim that every space, by logical necessity, must be contained in a further space, then you're on dodgy ground, because, ultimately, that leads to an infinite heirachy of higher spaces.

 

There has to be some point at which a space simply is- i.e not 'contained' in anything.

 

On that view, space, not only does not require a higher space to contain it, but, cannot be contained, as it is part of the category of things that do not occupy space.

 

For example, to ask where in space is 'redness'- or what contains 'redness' is a category mistake. Similarly, to ask what contains 'space' is a category mistake (unless of course, as above, you're working on a model in which a particular space is contained in a higher dimensional space, or within a different category of space, but, even then, you're simply putting off the inevitable, because, at some point, you're going to have to end in a space which is 'uncontained').

The ideology behind this theory is deeply flawed.

 

The very idea that something can materialise out of nothing, then expand exponentially, consuming a nothingness(which is also expanding) as it does so is nonsensical to the extreme.

 

At any given moment during the expansion of our universe, there has to be areas of "expanding nothingness" being constantly occupied by the expanding matter.

 

The "expanding nothingness" that lies beyond the extreme edges our expanding universe must be the part of the very same "expanding nothingness" that occupies the areas between the galaxies.. It has to be!

[danot]

why? do you think its because we and all around us do? we are carbon carbon is created only in stars. billions of years old we are (best yoda voice). time has no begining or end .its like a moment for us could be a billion years for another form of life. we see time s a river we travel along, but its a dimension we exist in. if you existed outside of time it has no effect or meaning.

Time is only a concept. What I'm asking is: 'What physically existed before the big bang?.. something must have!

[bladesufc1]

Why does it defy logic to say that nothing existed before the big bang?

 

 

something had to bang? something had to create the bang, a bang can not create a noise without something solid to bang

 

no god didn't create the bang before any god people start to rant and rave

[Mercenary]

Time is only a concept. What I'm asking is: 'What physically existed before the big bang?.. something must have!

 

Why though? I think that you are attempting to apply human concepts to something totally outside our sphere of comprehension. Like a previous poster said, its akin to a microbe understanding a car. It's more than likely that the human race will be extinct long before we discover the answers.

[Obelix]

The ideology behind this theory is deeply flawed.

 

The very idea that something can materialise out of nothing, then expand exponentially, consuming a nothingness(which is also expanding) as it does so is nonsensical to the extreme.

 

I agree. It doesnt make it any less true though. Quantum mechanics is another field that appears to be exceedingly strange at first - in fact as someone once said, if you haven't been shocked by quantum theory you have not grasped or understood it.

 

At any given moment during the expansion of our universe, there has to be areas of "expanding nothingness" being constantly occupied by the expanding matter.

 

The "expanding nothingness" that lies beyond the extreme edges our expanding universe must be the part of the very same "expanding nothingness" that occupies the areas between the galaxies.. It has to be!

 

Why does there have to be? It's a serious question - there it nothing that says there must be something there...

[danot]

Why though? I think that you are attempting to apply human concepts to something totally outside our sphere of comprehension. Like a previous poster said, its akin to a microbe understanding a car. It's more than likely that the human race will be extinct long before we discover the answers.

But that is exactly what I'm not doing. It is in fact scientists that are making those presumptions, what I'm doing is questioning their logic.