Astrophysics & Cosmology

Creation, Evolution, and Destiny

13.82 billion years ago there was nothing. A split second later there was everything! 

With so much of physics being built on conservation laws, it seems crazy that all the matter in the known universe can be spontaneously created into existence. Yet our best models are able to explain events up until the first picosecond after the “Big Bang”. Before that it is fuzzy whether the laws of physics, as we now know them, even applied.

So what was there before the “Big Bang”? Well if the universe, and time itself, began with the “Big Bang”, then this is not a valid question, there was no “before”. A more pertinent question might be to consider the final fate of the universe, with my bet being on an eventual “heat death” playing out – but scientists are not all in agreement, yet.

What we can say for certain is how we have developed our theories, and it essentially begins with Tycho Brache observing the appearance of a new star in 1572. Before then the “celestial orb” was thought to be fixed and have existed forever. It later turned out that this new star was actually the final death throws of a dying super massive star – a supernova!

Studying the light (both visible and non-visible) that reaches us from the stars and the darkest depths of the universe has been the only way we can obtain the data that has allowed us to piece together the puzzle so far – it’s amazing how we can learn so much from so little.