[Scarlett.]

What is the Universe?
Is the Universe in fact a spec of dust in a larger world?
How does time work?
Whats the Universe expanding into?
Why are we alive?
Literally what the hell is really going on?

[Shaun]

*head explodes*

We'll never know. Well, for now anyway

[Scarlett.]

I really wanna know
everything is confusing
I wish I wasnt so curious

[Matt10k]

I think the universe has always existed and will always exist. I can’t see any other explanation for getting something from nothing, so it’d seem to be the only logical explanation.

I also think it’s infinite in size in all directions ie. I don’t believe there is a smallest particle. Even the smallest particle has to be made of something!

I think time is just a measurement of change and not the magical dimension some believe it is.

I think the meaning of life is being able to have the awareness to ask that very question. There may be no answer but realising we are a part of it, enjoying it while we can and occasionally questioning it may be the answer after all. Here today, gone tomorrow…

[Scarlett.]

Good ideas there I definatley think that our universe is like a tiny part of an atom

[Mark]

@Matt - Big Bang theory explains the 'nothing to something' idea. Well it's not literally nothing, theres a principle called Singularity which explains how the Big Bang would have happened.

I've been reading up loads lately about Astronomy/Cosmology... and I'm sure Sticks will correct me if I'm wrong but here's my take on your questions.

The universe is everything that physically exists that we know of down to the laws of science.

Time is something we use as a measuring tool to put other things into context and to correlate different events, past and future.

If the universe is infinitely big, then you mustn't look at it from a distance point of view. Most people have problems grasping infinity because its hard to imagine something that doesn't end. Also I think this is right, but the term 'the universe is expanding' is incorrectly used. Although technically correct, the universe is more stretching. To me, someone saying the universe is constantly expanding is inferring indirectly that the universe has an edge. To say its stretching makes more sense, and I think more correct? Imagine you have a balloon, and you put some dots on it. When you blow air into it, the dots move away from each other (kind of like what the big bang essentially did I think). Now imagine the skin of a balloon not existing and the dots floating in the air, expanding in the same way.

We are alive due to 4.5 billion years worth of evolution

- Mark

[Matt10k]

Originally posted by Mark
@Matt - Big Bang theory explains the 'nothing to something' idea. Well it's not literally nothing, theres a principle called Singularity which explains how the Big Bang would have happened.

I've been reading up loads lately about Astronomy/Cosmology... and I'm sure Sticks will correct me if I'm wrong but here's my take on your questions.

The universe is everything that physically exists that we know of down to the laws of science.

Time is something we use as a measuring tool to put other things into context and to correlate different events, past and future.

If the universe is infinitely big, then you mustn't look at it from a distance point of view. Most people have problems grasping infinity because its hard to imagine something that doesn't end. Also I think this is right, but the term 'the universe is expanding' is incorrectly used. Although technically correct, the universe is more stretching. To me, someone saying the universe is constantly expanding is inferring indirectly that the universe has an edge. To say its stretching makes more sense, and I think more correct? Imagine you have a balloon, and you put some dots on it. When you blow air into it, the dots move away from each other (kind of like what the big bang essentially did I think). Now imagine the skin of a balloon not existing and the dots floating in the air, expanding in the same way.

We are alive due to 4.5 billion years worth of evolution

- Mark

How does the big bang theory explain how we got something from nothing? If everything formed from a single, infinitely small compressed piece of matter, this is still something.

Also, we observe the universe expanding or stretching, yet a balloon can only stretch because it has the air around it to stretch into. An object of infinite size cannot increase or decrease in size.

It may be that the universe we can observe is expanding into an area of the universe we can not yet observe or are not yet able to measure, yet as a whole it remains the same- difficult to comprehend size of infinity.

[Mark]

So singularity shows how the universe was most likely created, from intense pressure in a black hole forcing finite matter to expand an infinitely dense space. That's what we know and understand to be true. So although there is 'something' to spark off this reaction, why does there have to be a master architect involved? Saying 'someone/thing must have made it' just takes things a step further than something we are at the peak of knowing what happens, into territory we know nothing about.

I remember a few years ago when a state in America removed all existence of the word evolution from school text books. I'll try not to go on about religion too much (because it will get nasty ) but it amazes me how people who believe in a god will go as far to rule out the single unifying area of biology/chemistry/everything we know, in order to expand their profit making organisation. Just because we don't know how that original piece of matter got there, it doesn't mean that a creator put it there. We are hundreds/thousands of years away from knowing EXACTLY how everything happened, people just cannot accept we probably won't know it in our lifetimes, and use a god to fill in the missing answers. If a creator wanted to create a universe, worlds, galaxy's... why not create them? Why create a piece of matter.

Also the balloon example was a bad idea because obviously a balloon has an edge, which is why I said imagine the balloon goes.

You are right that it is difficult to comprehend the size of infinity... thats because you are giving it a 'size'. When you remove all boundaries, it becomes somewhat easier to visualize and understand.

- Mark

[Matt10k]

Originally posted by Mark
So singularity shows how the universe was most likely created, from intense pressure in a black hole forcing finite matter to expand an infinitely dense space. That's what we know and understand to be true. So although there is 'something' to spark off this reaction, why does there have to be a master architect involved? Saying 'someone/thing must have made it' just takes things a step further than something we are at the peak of knowing what happens, into territory we know nothing about.

I remember a few years ago when a state in America removed all existence of the word evolution from school text books. I'll try not to go on about religion too much (because it will get nasty ) but it amazes me how people who believe in a god will go as far to rule out the single unifying area of biology/chemistry/everything we know, in order to expand their profit making organisation. Just because we don't know how that original piece of matter got there, it doesn't mean that a creator put it there. We are hundreds/thousands of years away from knowing EXACTLY how everything happened, people just cannot accept we probably won't know it in our lifetimes, and use a god to fill in the missing answers. If a creator wanted to create a universe, worlds, galaxy's... why not create them? Why create a piece of matter.

Also the balloon example was a bad idea because obviously a balloon has an edge, which is why I said imagine the balloon goes.

You are right that it is difficult to comprehend the size of infinity... thats because you are giving it a 'size'. When you remove all boundaries, it becomes somewhat easier to visualize and understand.

- Mark

This is not a full explanation. We can (or think) we can trace the origins of the section of the universe we are able to understand down to a single point. I say ‘section’ of the universe because I still believe my original theory that the universe as a whole is infinite in size and that the part we can measure/ understand is on a cycle of constant expansion/ compression but that in order for it to be able to expand, there must be something for it to expand into ie. A part of the universe we do not yet understand or are able to measure that pre-dates the big bang and perhaps has always existed.

[Matt10k]

Can't believe I'm still up at this time talking about this

I think I better go to sleep!

Nice talking though.

I'd hope everyone thinks about the bigger picture from time to time...

[Captain.Remy]

This is such a complicated thing. It upsets me not to know why, how, who and where. I can't sleep if I think to it too much lol.

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally posted by Chewy
I really want to know

I am sure most of us do. But man cannot comprehend this at this moment in time. Maybe we will never know. It's questions like this that fascinate me. My most complex one is:

Eternity. Is the universe eternal? How can it be? But it cannot come to an abrupt end. So it must be?

[Dr43%er]

All you need to know is that everything revolves around me.

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally posted by Dr43%er
All you need to know is that everything revolves around me.

Are you the axis?

[Dr43%er]

Don't you swear at me!!!

[Mrluvaluva]

Well an axis is an imaginary line. You are imaginary. La la la. I can't hear you!

[Dr43%er]

In that case I can call you a cock nobler and you will never know about it.

[Sticks]

Come on

Every one knows the answer to life the universe and every thing is

42

As for what is the universe expanding into

see here

[Dr43%er]

That may be the answer, but what was the question again?

[Captain.Remy]

Message original : Sticks
Come on

Every one knows the answer to life the universe and every thing is

42

As for what is the universe expanding into

see here

Why 42 ?

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally posted by Dr43%er
In that case I can call you a cock nobler and you will never know about it.

That is an insult. I have reported you. Mods! Warn him!!!! I know my rights!!!! Ban him!!!!

[Dr43%er]

You can't hear me.

Remy. It is 42 because:

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (published in 1979), the characters visit the legendary planet Magrathea, home to the now-collapsed planet building industry, and meet Slartibartfast, a planetary coastline designer who was responsible for the fjords of Norway. Through archival recordings, he relates the story of a race of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings who built a computer named Deep Thought to calculate the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. When the answer was revealed as 42, they were told to build a more powerful computer to work out what the Ultimate Question actually was, but their plans never come to fruition. (Later on, referencing this, Adams would create a puzzle which could be approached in multiple ways, all yielding the answer 42.)

The computer, often mistaken for a planet (because of its size and use of biological components), was the Earth, and was destroyed by Vogons five minutes before the conclusion of its 10-million-year program. Two of the race of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings, who turn out to be Trillian's mice, want to dissect Arthur's brain to help reconstruct the question, since he is the last remaining survivor from Earth at the moment when it was destroyed. Trillian is also human but had left Earth six months previously with Zaphod Beeblebrox. Our protagonists escape, setting course for "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe". The mice, in Arthur's absence, create a phony question since it is too troublesome for them to wait 10 million years again just to cash in on a lucrative deal. Their new question was "How many roads must a man walk down?"

The book was adapted from the first four radio episodes. It was first published in 1979, initially in paperback, by Pan Books, after BBC Publishing had turned down the offer of publishing a novelisation, an action they would later regret.[14] The book reached number one on the book charts in only its second week, and sold over 250,000 copies within three months of its release. A hardback edition was published by Harmony Books, a division of Random House in the United States in October 1980, and the 1981 US paperback edition was promoted by the give-away of 3,000 free copies in the magazine Rolling Stone to build word of mouth. To date it has sold over 14 million copies.[15]

[Mrluvaluva]

"gives The doc karma, knowing he will hate that"! Mwahahahahahaha!

[Dr43%er]

"You are imaginary" So you are giving your imaginary friend karma. Bless. Remember, you are not different, you are special.

[Mrluvaluva]

Originally posted by Dr43%er
"You are imaginary" So you are giving your imaginary friend karma. Bless. Remember, you are not different, you are special.

I am. Thanks for noticing, my imaginary friend. Can I call you "Drop dead Fred"?