The entropy thing always bugs me.
They can show a sandcastle blowing away and go "ooh look - entropy - time's arrow". But the sand forms another unique (if not so recognisable) pattern.
But they never show a copper sulphate solution forming itself into crystals, because that would run contrary to the argument.
Creationists are using the anomalies to claim that "some scientists are renouncing the theory of evolution". Which is bollx of course.
But what is amazing is that all the photons released at the big bang, which are still going, 13.7 billion light years from where they started have not experienced time at all. If they were wearing (zero mass) watches, not even 1 second would have elapsed.
Zero mass particles travel at the universal constant, C, speed of light, and at that speed time slows to zero.
The sandcastle thing is not an example of increasing entropy, it's a metaphor for it.
Entropy in a closed system is always increasing. A jar of copper sulfate solution is not a closed system because heat can leave or enter through the walls of the jar.
Anyway. My top tip for perspective is to climb Snowdon on a very sunny clear day. If it's clear enough you can see the coastline of North Wales, Morcambe Bay, and Cardigan Bay. This allows you to SEE the map of the Earth with your own eyes in full 360 vision and you can relate the actual tangible distances with your knowledge of the map of the globe. Then you can, for a brief moment get a real handle on the actual size of the Earth.
It's quite exhilarating 🙂
Entropy in a closed system is always increasing
This is the bit that gets me, the very fact that we have such high levels of order in our solar system/galaxy/universe serves to imply that either:
a) We are not in a closed system
b) The second law is wrong
I once had a vision of universes forming like bubbles in champagne amid an infinite ocean of dark matter and then collapsing in on themselves.
One day I would very much like to take up formal study of physics but I am not sure my maths is good enough. Interesting stuff though and in respect of the OP, somewhat sobering.
a) We are not in a closed system
Of course we're not!
Where's the sealed boundary around our solar system?
Or, if you mean the universe, then it may be a closed system in which case entropy IS increasing. However it is not maxed out yet.
PS the formal study of Physics is not like these TV shows 🙂
Of course we're not!
I did specify the levels of order in the universe, which as far as we know is a closed system, hence my postulation of an ocean of dark matter outside of our known universe to fuel the order that we see.
then it may be a closed system in which case entropy IS increasing
'may' being the operative word, we don't know (least of all me!). My original point on this thread was that if this is a sealed system and the second law is true, how did all this order come to exist in the first place, a perfectly valid question I hope.
the formal study of Physics is not like these TV shows
moly old chap, you seem to be very good at telling me things I already know. 🙂
the second law doesn't require that all regions of all systems have to be at the maximum entropy state possible all, just that changes to that system result in an increase in entropy.
sockpuppet, I know this, I am just curious as to how all of this order occurred in the first place and how we have become sufficiently complex that we can start to have half arsed cracks at explaining it all. 🙂
It is so highly improbable that there has to be some sort of fuel source driving the increased complexity of the universe to the eventual creation of pigeons.
Veering slightly off topic, there seem to be quite a few folk who are interested and eminently more capable than I of understanding all of this mind blowing stuff. I stumbled upon a series of videos a few weeks ago that claim to explain anti gravity and have the maths to back it up. I am in no position to verify this but am interested to hear what the forum thinks of this:
[url= http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread625411/pg1 ]Anti Gravity explained!?![/url]
Bunkum or genuine?
One day I would very much like to take up formal study of physics but I am not sure my maths is good enough.
My GF studied Physics at Uni, I remember looking at some of her work, think equations that literally run to several pages worth of solving. Made me want to vomit just looking at it, never mind trying to solve it, and I used to be good at Maths in high school and college.
Very interesting thread, particularly the Scale of the Universe thingy posted by Rich!
Torminalis - almost certainly bunkum. The whole idea the science tries to quash certain findings is laughable. If there were any shred of a Eureka moment in his research then there would be people all over the place trying to replicate or extend the work so that they could steal the Nobel prize from under his nose.
Any research scientist would sell their kidneys to find the evidence that lets them overturn one of the main established theories - whether that's gravity, evolution, thermodynamics or whatever. The major advances in science tend to come when someone does just this - and there is then a massive clamour to either disprove them or to confirm the actual findings. The fact that this work has been left to quietly slip away suggests that it's not all it purports to be, or that the global academic community isn't interested in overturning the status quo.
That link is full of lolz Torminalis 🙂
The thing I learned about maths at Uni was that it's possible to think you've proved one thing but you've actually made a mistake or a misconception, and you're just wrong.
moly old chap, you seem to be very good at telling me things I already know
Yeah it was my PhD speciality actually 😉
Re order in the universe, I believe there's been some work done showing that if you take something homogenous and expand it rapidly it forms locally dense areas or stringy bits, a bit like if you burst a soap bubble. You end up with a few large drops, in that case.
I don't know what kind of energy caused the rapid expansion but it's clearly the seed for the whole thing. I suppose a fairly tortured analogy would be a big water bomb in a bath. Burst the balloon and the bath fills instantly (ish) with sloshing water and then it eventually comes to rest still and flat. Question is, how did the balloon get there and who burst it?
I dunno, but then I'm no student of cosmology and I am fully aware that me simply being unable to explain it doesn't mean there's a hole in the theory 🙂
NB I am not accusing you of this.
That link is full of lolz Torminalis
Though I am too daft to understand why, I had a feeling it might be. 🙂
Well I mean it made me lol. In that the first vid was all crappy hip hop marketing efforts.
If you've really overturned the scientific establishment then your work will probably market itself, to those who matter.
Yeah, got all that. I guess what I want to know is what is the fuel source that allows the order that we have observed to thrive despite the trends described by the second law
Tormalis - the fuel source you're looking for is gravity. Current inflation theories suggest that the universe expanded under negative pressure from gravity (IAW the General Theory of Relativity), which effectively acted as a bank* prepared to lend limitless amounts of money, or energy in this case.
Calculations suggest that the universe we see today could have come from a ball of matter of mass 10kg squeezed into a point a bit smaller than an atomic nucleus.
* Good thing gravity isn't the universal equivalent of Northern Rock, or the whole thing is stuffed.
Apparently, as there was nothing before it, er - nothing...
Really? Got any evidence to prove this?
Thought not...
got any evidence to prove there was something there before elfin?
thought not....
😉
The moment of the big bang and before is a matter of conjecture. We don't know for sure, so just deal with it 🙂
Yeah but I'm not claiming there was or wasn't anything there before, am I?
See?
Can't have bin 'nothing'. That's like me saying to me mum 'nothing' when she asks what I'm up to. I'm always up to something. To say otherwise is a lie.
Can't have bin 'nothing'
why not?
Explain how something can come from nothing then. Go on.
And BTW I sent you an email t'other day to the addy in your profile.
Can't have bin 'nothing'.
Why not?
Just you can't conceive something doesn't mean it can't have been. Or not been.
Explain how something can come from nothing then. Go on
No, you explain why there HAS to have been something. Just because phil can't explain his position doesn't make your position automatically correct.
Neither can you then.
Well I have to say, I am flippin' glad Elfin turned up cos I was well confused before and now it all makes sense. 🙂
Elfin - IF there was something before the big bang, where did that come from?
Dunstable.
And where did Dunstable come from? 😀
woah there! i haven't stated a position to explain! i merely posted my comment to highlight that somebody asking for proof when they also couldn't provide evidence to prove otherwise...well is a little odd.
I don't know and quite frankly I don't care.
Well, I do actually, if truth be told.
Maybe our universe is just a tiny thing happening inside an atom of another universe, right, and so on and so on, but in some strange and unfathomable (to us anyway) manner, it all loops round so that those atoms within our own universe are actually the universes we're in.
Could be.
No Phil; I wasn't saying that there was or there wasn't, but when someone says there [i]wasn't[/i] something, then they have to prove it.
If they say there [i]might[/i] have bin nothing, then fair enough, but equally, then they can also say there [i]might[/i] have bin something.
Neither can you then.
Neither can I what?
when someone says there wasn't something, then they have to prove it
No they don't. I have read that current theories suggest X, I am not an expert on those theories but I defer to those who are, being in possession of greater knowledge on the subject than I. My own ignorance does not invalidate the idea.
And of course, all talk of the Big Bang is with respect to the Big Bang theory which is simply that. Bleedin obvious that no-one knows for sure innit?
i'm going to leave you and mol arguing over this as i didnt even make a statement to provide evidence for the the first place.
have fun 😆
Go and do something constructive like read my email then.
What did the email say?
No they don't.
Yes they do. If someone claims something as fact, then they need to be able to provide evidence of this fact. Otherwise it's just hypothesis and conjecture, not 'fact'.
Spot the difference:
[i]There was nothing before t'universe began.[/i]
[i]There might have bin nothing before t'universe began.[/i]
Email is private between myself and Phil and needn't concern anyone else. I only mentioned it here cos he hasn't replied that's all.
If someone claims something as fact
We're not. That is surely implicit in all talk of the Big Bang?
That the singularity that resulted in the universe occurred from a condition of there being no universe (ie: nothing), is something that will not accommodate "stands to reason" and "common sense" and other reference points of that ilk.
However, that does not make it impossible. Just very, very strange.
So, the BBT is as believable (or not) as the existence of a mystical creative deity then?
Ok. Glad we got that cleared up. 😀
Woppit, you bin running any pedestrians over lately?
So, the BBT is as believable (or not) as the existence of a mystical creative deity then?
There is evidence for one, and not the other.
@Woppit - but if there was an empty space that had existed for an infinite amount of time, then the laws of probability say that it is a certainty that the singularity (and big bang and ipso facto our universe) must appear at some point, then disappear once it's done its thing. After that a strange deity answering to the mystic name of Elfinsafety will appear and forge a new universe in the shape of old London town... or maybe Dunstable.
Except that there was no "before" the BB (time did not exist) or empty "space" in which it sat. There was simply nothing. Try and imagine it. When your brain starts to feel like it's turning itself inside out, take a break...
😀
There is evidence for one, and not the other.
There is? Please explain.
So, the BBT is as believable (or not) as the existence of a mystical creative deity then?
Universe is expanding in all directions. Therefore, at some point in time it was all in the same place. There is evidence of its expanding, evidence of how it expanded, what it was like shortly after it started expanding. However what caused it and what was there before is subject to informed conjecture based on what we know about the universe as it stands.
Oh and the universe includes time so there was really no 'before' since the word is a temporal concept. Time would seem to be finite but there is nothing before it.
Maybe take some peyote and come back to it Elf?
Unless we are merely a momentary bubble in a sea of dark matter, in which case, there was only dark matter before the BB.
Elf - if phil has not replied then it is not between you and he, it is between you and ...er ... you.
That's just the physicists cop out Woppit - Einstein & co may well have their theories that say space and time are one and the same and that therefore it makes no sense to ask what came 'before' time itself... but it's more fun to think of an infinitely aged universe in which anything and everything can and will eventually happen. Just think, there's one out there where I can ride a bike and I get some Tony bloke coming to me to ask for tips on how he can get better.