Live data from Hacker News

Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

bigthink.com

161–170 of 248 posts

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#161
post #22

Then how did the first one came about? What was there before it, pls don’t tell me nothing because it was nothing for a long time and then something must have triggered the first one. Or was there no first one because of infinity?

It would be surprising if something as limited as the human mind could comprehend the entirety of the universe. That it understands any part of it at all is already more than can be expected from mere matter. And that something does not make sense to the human mind doesn't mean that it can not be.

It'd be surprising if something as limited as an open interval was homeomorphic to the entirety of the real line. \j

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#162

The concept of infinity seems impossible to me in physical world. It's a great mathematical concept to model our understanding. Just like imaginary numbers. I cannot imagine anything being infinite in the physical world. I find the simulation hypothesis more probable than Universe being infinite. Space and Time is not infinite. It may be Gazillions of centuries old, but not infinity. It can't be.

>infinity seems impossible to me

"Me," in this case, is a microcontroller that evolved to move muscles on a primate body effectively.

Do we have any reason to believe such a system should be capable of grasping the true nature of the universe? After all, it's far outside the design spec!

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#163

The concept of infinity seems impossible to me in physical world. It's a great mathematical concept to model our understanding. Just like imaginary numbers. I cannot imagine anything being infinite in the physical world. I find the simulation hypothesis more probable than Universe being infinite. Space and Time is not infinite. It may be Gazillions of centuries old, but not infinity. It can't be.

If you're happy for mathematical structures to be infinite, why can't our universe (including ourselves) just be one infinite mathematical structure? Yes, it's very complex, but there's plenty of room in infinity. It doesn't need to have a "real" physical instantiation anywhere. It's like the simulation hypothesis, except you don't need the simulation. We're just the inside of an infinite self-experiencing mathematic…

It's an assumption that someone is happy with mathematical structures being infinite.

There are mathematicians unhappy with the notion even while being well versed in the Cantor (and other) arguments.

You can wander down that rabbit hole via (say) [1] as a starting point.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_(philosophy_of_...

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#164

I posit that the big bang wasn't an event in historical past, but is an ongoing process. Stuff that falls into black holes is squirted over all of time and space in the universe. We measure that as background radiation.

[dead]

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#165

I posit that the big bang wasn't an event in historical past, but is an ongoing process. Stuff that falls into black holes is squirted over all of time and space in the universe. We measure that as background radiation.

Intriguing, but I think if that were the case, you wouldn't see the relatively homogeneous and very cold background radiation we see.

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, that is my understanding. He does call it a crazy theory, but its a whole different kind of crazy that most people think of. I've listened to him talk about it and yea, when you actually listen to him you get the vibe of, "its an interesting idea that the math can't really prove or disprove, it may not be right, but it is an interesting thought experiment." I would say it is a step below Fred Hoyle. For those wh…

Should we entertain unfalsifiable theories?

"The Earth is round" was once an unsatisfiable theory for quite a while.

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#167
post #23

Very similar to Hinduism. Hinduism also describe multi verse, number of species on planet. A lot of theory in science is around advance Civilization that existed before modern day human (they are usually referred to as Giants). Hinduism talk about how earlier human were larger in height and have been reducing since the beginning.

Dude, stop posting comments like this which is just ignorant and gives a bad name to Hinduism where the subject of "Cyclic Creation and Absorption of Universe" is well detailed.

People interested in the subject should start at the "Time" section of Hindu Cosmology - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_cosmology

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What experiments violate causality?

https://phys.org/news/2017-04-physicists-violate-local-causa... is one

It seems like a huge leap to use a violation of bilocal (not even local in general) causality as confirmation of even theoretical possibility of human FTL travel

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, that is my understanding. He does call it a crazy theory, but its a whole different kind of crazy that most people think of. I've listened to him talk about it and yea, when you actually listen to him you get the vibe of, "its an interesting idea that the math can't really prove or disprove, it may not be right, but it is an interesting thought experiment." I would say it is a step below Fred Hoyle. For those wh…

Should we entertain unfalsifiable theories?

They are not unfalsifiable, just unprovable. Unfalsifiable means they can not be proven wrong even with additional data, whereas these we just can't prove nor denie with current data, but we could if we found more data.

Re: Roger Penrose claims our Universe has been through multiple Big Bangs

#170

The concept of infinity seems impossible to me in physical world. It's a great mathematical concept to model our understanding. Just like imaginary numbers. I cannot imagine anything being infinite in the physical world. I find the simulation hypothesis more probable than Universe being infinite. Space and Time is not infinite. It may be Gazillions of centuries old, but not infinity. It can't be.

But it can’t NOT be infinite! If space were three dimensionally finite, then there must be a boundary. But if there were a boundary, then there must be something beyond that boundary. And now we have a paradox that infinitely regresses. Same goes for time. Same goes for distance. How can there be both a finite distance, as well as an infinite number of points between two distinct points? To me, infinity seems to be everywhere I look
Post reply on HN