Evolution and the Big Bang

[Kfox]

Did time always exist, or did it have a beginning?

How are you defining time?

 

[sayak83]

Lets see if we can clear some confusion. Answer the poll based on the two following statements.

"Evolution is what happened after life formed no matter if it was formed by abiogenesis, a god, an alien, etc.. Evolution happened after life formed.

The BB is what happened after the universe began no matter if the beginning was by a god, an alien, a fairy, etc.. The BB happened after the beginning.

I agree with both statements.

 

[Heyo]

Did time always exist, or did it have a beginning?

It always existed from its beginning on.

 

[ChristineM]

Did time always exist, or did it have a beginning?

Depends.
Some say the bb xreated time, some say it always existed

 

[Kfox]

I agree with both statements.

IMO the problem with the 2nd statement is it assumes there was such a thing as a beginning.

 

[Kfox]

It always existed from its beginning on.

Assuming there was a beginning

 

[sayak83]

Assuming there was a beginning

True. But " no matter.. etc. " would cover "beginning never happened" condition as well.

 

[Audie]

Regarding evolution, I would challenge the attempt to describe the formation of life as if it were a discrete event rather than a process. Furthermore one has to be a bit careful what one means by evolution. Classical Darwinian evolution requires an organism that replicates and passes on instructions for further replication to the products of replication. So I would agree that classical Darwinian evolution requires life to be already present. But I am not willing to agree that life appeared in an event, nor that Darwinian evolution is the only mechanism that may have operated to enable replicating biochemical systems to sustain themselves and develop in complexity.

Regarding the Big Bang, you and I have discussed this elsewhere but, for the benefit of other readers, The Big Bang is the current model for the evolution of the cosmos and it suggests that there was a start point, at a singularity. Some people use the term Big Bang to include this presumed singularity, but as the observational evidence can't allow that to be predicted with confidence, doing so is a bit speculative.

As a general observation, you seem to think you can browbeat science, by force of rhetoric, into simple categories of firm knowledge vs. total ignorance. This, I think, is naive.

I have not responded to your poll.

Its naive in the extreme of course, but a
natural outcome of a worldview that tequilas
absolutes and binary distinctions. Black and white, no nuance, no shades of grey.

 

[Valjean]

Depends.
Some say the bb xreated time, some say it always existed

So before time, when did it exist? Was there a "when" before time?

 

[ChristineM]

So before time, when did it exist? Was there a "when" before time?

You and i now as much as anyone. All there are are hypothesis.

 

[ratiocinator]

So before time, when did it exist? Was there a "when" before time?

No. "Before time" is a contradiction in terms.

 

[ratiocinator]

The BB is what happened after the universe began no matter if the beginning was by a god, an alien, a fairy, etc.. The BB happened after the beginning.

Too ambiguous. The Big bang theory concerns what happened after the start (if there was one). We can only use extrapolation (that we we can't be certain of at all) to go back to the start, if there was one.

 

[Subduction Zone]

No. "Before time" is a contradiction in terms.

But beginning of time would not be. So time may have begun with the Big Bang. That would make all time "after the Big Bang".

And I would have given your clarification a "Winner" frubal. The Big Bang is the event, the theory covers after the event. I think that the OP conflated the after with the Bib Bang just as many fundamentalists conflated evolution and abiogenesis. He did get that right.

 

[ratiocinator]

So time may have begun with the Big Bang.

Yes, it may have. That's what extrapolation using General Relativity suggests, but a theory that unites that with Quantum Field Theory (which we don't have) would be required to be sure.

 

[metis]

So before time, when did it exist?

I think the differences may have to do with how one defines "time". In the context of the BB, I regard "time" as sequencing since we know time can be relative in this context, thus not exact. So, what came before the BB is a legit question, but trying to answer "How much before?" is fraught with problems. The cosmologists I have read do believe there was a "before" in their dealing with the BB.

 

[Kfox]

Did time always exist, or did it have a beginning?

As long as something exists, the concept of time can be applied to it.

 

[Subduction Zone]

As long as something exists, the concept of time can be applied to it.

I do believe with the Quantum Bubble hypothesis that it did start out from "nothing" at least in the sense of matter and energy, and perhaps space too.

 

[Kfox]

I do believe with the Quantum Bubble hypothesis that it did start out from "nothing" at least in the sense of matter and energy, and perhaps space too.

Though the Quantum Bubble Hypothesis is only a hypothetical; I fail to see what it has to do with what I said.