First cause.

[Furrowed Brow]

A beginning must have a cause. No matter how far back you shift the question, the beginning must have a "first cause", and not just that, but an uncaused cause.

Why must a beginning have a cause?

[Furrowed Brow]

My opinion is that since everything else in this universe adheres to the law of cause and effect, we will discover that so do Vps

Achilles please refer me to any book on physics that clealry defines a “law of cause and effect”.

The subject is a can of worms. Try this link It lists just about all the approaches. Shall we tackle them one by one?

[QED]

However i am sure you all know, scientists believe we live in a multiverse.

Please excuse my nit-picking here, but to me "belief" sounds rather incongruous in this context. I'm sure that many rational, scientifically minded people would also like to disagree with your generalization. Currently there isn't a great deal to go on to inform us about the character of what is meant by "multiverse".

I would prefer to say that many scientists accept that we live in some kind of multiverse. Among other things, this is an almost inevitable consequence of the suite of different interpretations of Quantum Mechanics.

With many different parallel universes each with about 13 other different dimensions. So we might live in a universe that allows many different types or levels of existence. If we had 20 other parallel universes we would have 260 dimensions. But there are probably more than that. And just one, just one single dimension is where we live. We are one. Just one planet in one dimension in a multiverse of trillions of universes.

However here is the brain theory two parallel dimensions crashed together and sparked the BB. However i just think its fantastic, because we live in a world so complex that angels could exist. They could be different beings, in different dimensions. How people 2000 years ago knew, is another question, unless these beings can transcend into our dimension.

I though for a moment that you were going to mention Boltzmann Brains -- but I see instead that you meant brane (short for membrane).

The question of people "knowing" 2000 years ago that there were such things as angels has, I suspect, nothing whatsoever to do with knowledge about the actual content of the universe in which they lived. The complexities of the universe are undeniably great, but the motives and imaginations of people are not so. Even under carefully controlled conditions (alone in a cold garage) I often find myself accounting for misplaced spanners by imagining mischevious demons at work (just for a split-second before my rational unit gains control over my emotional processor).

[Goat]

Hey all,

One other interpretation for the cause of the big bang, is the brain theory. Apararantly our universe has space and time. And everything we can perceive exists on three dimensions. But also with in the universe there are other dimensions. String theory states that there are 13 other dimensions that exist in a 4 dimensional space. So i cannot imagine what that is, up, down, left, right, and time. Are the dimensions we live in. But 4 dimensional space then has one extra dimension. So whatever that may be is far beyond what i know. However all this exists in our universe.

However i am sure you all know, scientists believe we live in a multiverse. With many different parallel universes each with about 13 other different dimensions. So we might live in a universe that allows many different types or levels of existence. If we had 20 other parallel universes we would have 260 dimensions. But there are probably more than that. And just one, just one single dimension is where we live. We are one. Just one planet in one dimension in a multiverse of trillions of universes.

However here is the brain theory two parallel dimensions crashed together and sparked the BB. However i just think its fantastic, because we live in a world so complex that angels could exist. They could be different beings, in different dimensions. How people 2000 years ago knew, is another question, unless these beings can transcend into our dimension.

Regards,
Simon

That would be the 'brane' theory , or the 'cyclic univrse' model by Paul J. Steinhardt

[Beto]

Under what logic can "time" "begin"? I can't reason my way around this. It seems like a paradox, to me.

[olivergringold]

In an over-simplified nutshell, t = 0 at the point where space's expansion was contracted to null. When the big bang begins to extend space in an outward motion, the clock begins. Every point in space has a different clock, however, because light moves at the same speed no matter where you are or how fast you're moving.

[Beto]

In an over-simplified nutshell, t = 0 at the point where space's expansion was contracted to null. When the big bang begins to extend space in an outward motion, the clock begins. Every point in space has a different clock, however, because light moves at the same speed no matter where you are or how fast you're moving.

Still can't wrap my head around that.

When the big bang begins to expand space the clock begins... If there's no "clock" at the beginning how can it "begin"? Doesn't "time" already have to be "in effect" when we're referring to the "beginning" of an event, like "expansion of space"?

[Goat]

In an over-simplified nutshell, t = 0 at the point where space's expansion was contracted to null. When the big bang begins to extend space in an outward motion, the clock begins. Every point in space has a different clock, however, because light moves at the same speed no matter where you are or how fast you're moving.

Still can't wrap my head around that.

When the big bang begins to expand space the clock begins... If there's no "clock" at the beginning how can it "begin"? Doesn't "time" already have to be "in effect" when we're referring to the "beginning" of an event, like "expansion of space"?

Think of time as a point on the surface of a ball. .. make it the north pole. no matter what direction you go, it's the future. but, there is no direction to go to make it the past at that point.

[Beto]

In an over-simplified nutshell, t = 0 at the point where space's expansion was contracted to null. When the big bang begins to extend space in an outward motion, the clock begins. Every point in space has a different clock, however, because light moves at the same speed no matter where you are or how fast you're moving.

Still can't wrap my head around that.

When the big bang begins to expand space the clock begins... If there's no "clock" at the beginning how can it "begin"? Doesn't "time" already have to be "in effect" when we're referring to the "beginning" of an event, like "expansion of space"?

Think of time as a point on the surface of a ball. .. make it the north pole. no matter what direction you go, it's the future. but, there is no direction to go to make it the past at that point.

I do understand the analogy, and the point you guys are making. However, in my mind, the paradox remains. For something to "begin" there must be a reference to a prior, or previous event, so "time" must be "in effect" for a beginning to take place. For "time" to "begin" it must have already "begun". I still think that, logically, "time" cannot "begin" nor "end".

[olivergringold]

Try thinking about it in terms of software. What instruction set was a processor using *before* it was fed the loader? To be technical, none. To be literal, whatever instruction set the processor was fed by the software. Just because the processor wasn't doing anything prior to the start point, that does not mean it was incapable of starting. A start, by definition, implies that (in the context of the started thing) nothing happened prior.

Part of what you call a paradox I'm beginning to think is merely semantic. If you don't want to say that the universe had a start at the big bang and that to start would have required the big bang to have already taken place, then simply call the point at the big bang a proto-start, where the difference between time start and the proto-start is the god of the gap's summer cottage

[Beto]

Try thinking about it in terms of software. What instruction set was a processor using *before* it was fed the loader? To be technical, none. To be literal, whatever instruction set the processor was fed by the software. Just because the processor wasn't doing anything prior to the start point, that does not mean it was incapable of starting. A start, by definition, implies that (in the context of the started thing) nothing happened prior.

How can any analogy be strong on this issue if "time" is something that already exists in all possible settings? In any analogy the real "clock" is always ticking.

Part of what you call a paradox I'm beginning to think is merely semantic.

Unless I'm incurring in a fallacy of equivocation (and that might very well be the case), how can it be a "semantic problem"? To me, it just seems like a logic problem.

If you don't want to say that the universe had a start at the big bang and that to start would have required the big bang to have already taken place, then simply call the point at the big bang a proto-start, where the difference between time start and the proto-start is the god of the gap's summer cottage

Another poster tried to make me see reason in the concept of "imaginary time". I can't say he succeeded. Is this something like what you're saying?