Comments on: Physical Cosmology http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/2007/10/physical-cosmology/ If you aren't going to care about something, may as well not care about astronomy Thu, 04 Dec 2008 01:19:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 By: bmartinf http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/2007/10/physical-cosmology/#comment-170262 bmartinf Tue, 23 Oct 2007 17:44:02 +0000 http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/index.php/archive/physical-cosmology/#comment-170262 I was not intending that we should stop studying the natural world around us and instead resort to "...and then a miracle occurs". To the contrary, the significant gains in understanding over the last century have restricted the number of possibilities for origins of the universe and have shown us how special we are. Prior to Hubble's research, many people thought that the universe had been in existence since infinity past. Because Einstein believed in a static universe, he added his cosmological constant initially to counteract the expansion of the universe that we now accept as evidence of the Big Bang and hence a beginning of the universe. This forces the discussion about what caused the Big Bang. As we continue learning about dark energy and dark matter, we will be able to further refine our models of the beginning of the universe. The Anthropic Principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle) does point to our current place (in space and time) in the universe being special, but to me it also highlights that there are certain parameters that require fine tuning for us to be here. I was not intending that we should stop studying the natural world around us and instead resort to “…and then a miracle occurs”. To the contrary, the significant gains in understanding over the last century have restricted the number of possibilities for origins of the universe and have shown us how special we are. Prior to Hubble’s research, many people thought that the universe had been in existence since infinity past. Because Einstein believed in a static universe, he added his cosmological constant initially to counteract the expansion of the universe that we now accept as evidence of the Big Bang and hence a beginning of the universe. This forces the discussion about what caused the Big Bang. As we continue learning about dark energy and dark matter, we will be able to further refine our models of the beginning of the universe.

The Anthropic Principle (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle) does point to our current place (in space and time) in the universe being special, but to me it also highlights that there are certain parameters that require fine tuning for us to be here.

]]> By: michael http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/2007/10/physical-cosmology/#comment-167577 michael Tue, 16 Oct 2007 15:26:07 +0000 http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/index.php/archive/physical-cosmology/#comment-167577 You bring up one physics issue and one religious one. The physics issue may or may not be true i.e. we may be able to figure out things prior to the Big Bang. Maybe not, but maybe. Just like we didn't used to think we'd ever understand stars and now we understand them very well. I agree that there is a lot of speculation that is probably not science concerning causes of the Big Bang. But in regards to your religious point, "the hand of the designer" is in the eye of the beholder. We don't know why the Big Bang banged but claiming it was a designer doesn't gain us anything. Maybe it's true, maybe it's not, that is truly speculation. The anthropomorphic principle refutes a lot of those issues about how we wouldn't be here if things weren't exactly just right. You bring up one physics issue and one religious one. The physics issue may or may not be true i.e. we may be able to figure out things prior to the Big Bang. Maybe not, but maybe. Just like we didn’t used to think we’d ever understand stars and now we understand them very well. I agree that there is a lot of speculation that is probably not science concerning causes of the Big Bang.

But in regards to your religious point, “the hand of the designer” is in the eye of the beholder. We don’t know why the Big Bang banged but claiming it was a designer doesn’t gain us anything. Maybe it’s true, maybe it’s not, that is truly speculation. The anthropomorphic principle refutes a lot of those issues about how we wouldn’t be here if things weren’t exactly just right.

]]> By: bmartinf http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/2007/10/physical-cosmology/#comment-167480 bmartinf Tue, 16 Oct 2007 03:04:22 +0000 http://www.slackerastronomy.org/wordpress/index.php/archive/physical-cosmology/#comment-167480 The portion of cosmology that falls into metaphysics is the speculation on what happened prior to the Big Bang, the existence of other universes, etc, for which we will never be able to obtain any evidence. This metaphysical speculation is often an attempt to explain the fine tuning of the universe by people who refuse to see the hand of a designer in the cosmic creation event that we call the Big Bang. If you haven't read "The Creator and the Cosmos" by Hugh Ross; I highly recommend it, or check out Hugh's website: www.reasons.org. The portion of cosmology that falls into metaphysics is the speculation on what happened prior to the Big Bang, the existence of other universes, etc, for which we will never be able to obtain any evidence.

This metaphysical speculation is often an attempt to explain the fine tuning of the universe by people who refuse to see the hand of a designer in the cosmic creation event that we call the Big Bang.

If you haven’t read “The Creator and the Cosmos” by Hugh Ross; I highly recommend it, or check out Hugh’s website: http://www.reasons.org.

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