Some Philosophical Observations on Cosmology
As a professional in the computer community for more than 18 years, I have learned how important assumptions are when solving logical problems. If one doesn't have a solid foundation of assumptions, then any logical house built on those assumptions is bound to crumble. Current cosmologist have made several bad assumptions, including the belief that the entire cosmos was created by a single big bang which supposedly contained all the material of the cosmos, that something can come from nothing, that the speed of gravity if infinite, and by their very models, that the cosmos itself is finite. Evidence from the Hubble Space Telescope contradicts these assumptions, so all logical thought based on these assumptions should be questioned. I would propose that the cosmos is infinite, Big Bang Events (BBEs) occur when the energies of black holes become too large to be contained within a single structure, that the speed of gravity is finite and equals C2, and that any single universe is limited to the amount of material that can orbit a single point.
The current model of cosmology is in a state of crisis. Evidence from the Hubble has been interpreted to indicate the universe is only 13.7 billion years old, yet we have stars in the Milky Way which are older, probably 20 billion years. Red giants are now thought to live a trillion (thousand billion) years. The Milky Way and associated galaxies are moving in a manner which is inconsistent with the movement of matter ejected from a single Big Bang. Other evidence which is a problem for the current model, includes observations of "clumpiness" at all levels within the Cosmos and of distant Quasars which have consumed entire galaxies and galaxies which are too far away and too old to have been included in a single big bang only 13.7 billion years ago. When calculating the age of "the universe" the age of the structures being viewed is never included. We have structures that were a trillion year old when the light left them 13.7 billion years ago, and yet cosmologists insist the entire "universe" is only 13.7 billion years old.
The current model of Cosmology states there was a single big bang which contained all the material of the cosmos and occurred about 13.7 billion years ago. No mention is made of what existed before The Big Bang, where the material originated, or how the Event occurred. This is a serious flaw since it essentially relies on faith and not science as the answer to the ultimate question of creation. Any scientific theory designed to describe the beginning should have a valid scientific mechanism to describe what happened before the beginning and where the energy came from that makes up the Event. Current theory basically says that everything just appeared out of nowhere and I find that explanation unacceptable and unscientific.
Since all material supposedly was created from the energy of this single big bang, all the material of the Cosmos should have a common origin and thus most of the material should be approximately the same age and this material should be expanding outward from that single spot where the event occurred. This is not the picture we see when we look at the heavens. Cosmologists try to overcome this problem by stating that space itself is expanding. Yet they have no idea what space is and how it could expand and this "space" has never been measured, except in their imaginations.
Current theory makes no statement of what eventually happens to black holes except a prediction that some of the material of the black holes "evaporates" due to Hawking's Radiation. This prediction doesn’t consider the fact that material is being drawn into these black holes at a rate which is far greater than any "evaporation" and that the "evaporation" only occurs when material is entering the black hole. The current view talks of black holes lasting 100 billion years into the future, but states the past only goes back 13.7 billion years. Current theory makes little mention of the interaction of black holes, how large black holes can become, or what might be their eventual end, except suggesting they "evaporate" back into space.
Current theory also ignores the cone of knowledge concept. In philosophy, we are always faced with a cone of knowledge which divides what we can know from the ultimately unknowable because of the limitations of the speed of light, the only way we "know" things. There will always be parts of the cosmos that can not be seen . Any time we look through our telescopes at the heavens, we must remember to place things in a Cosmic perspective. We can not see it all. If the Cosmos is infinite, then it continues in all directions further than we can see.
The last major problem is the assumption that the speed of gravity is infinite. Gravity is natures coordinate system. The connections of gravity are how nature measures all physical systems and how they compare to other physical systems nearby. Nature must use some "time" to update this system, and thus it is not infinite in speed. All modern cosmology is built from Euclidean math, which assumes its coordinate system is formed at an infinite speed in relation to the problem being solved. We can imagine a giant coordinate system with the center being at the point of a single big bang and all space then being related to this point through this giant coordinate system. But nature can't. As we solve the problem in our imagination, we never have to take into account the speed with which the coordinate system forms and updates itself, since it is infinite in our imagination. Nature doesn't have this luxury. If there is any limitation to the speed of gravity, then there is a direct limitation to the size and effect of any particular system. If galaxies are far enough away from us, then they can not affect us and can't be in any relationship of expansion or contraction with us
The only evidence for an expanding cosmos is the red shift. Any number of explanations could result in the red shift being an indication of distance, but not direction or speed. If the connections of gravity are stretched, then I would predict that energies would be shifted toward the red. Electrical and magnetic structures in space (such as galaxies, galaxy clusters, black holes, etc.) could also cause the shifting of energy to the red as the light passes through these systems and is partially used up. The point is that any explanation other than that these structures are moving away from us would completely invalidate the single big bang model assumption of a single expanding universe.
I propose we view the Cosmos as infinite in size and age. One of the implications of this assumption is that we can never see all of the Cosmos. Another is that all of the material of the Cosmos could not have been contained in a single big bang so there must have been more than one. Additionally, if we don’t assume that a single big bang started everything, then we need a mechanism to explain how big bangs occur and an explanation of the motions of celestial objects which appear to be expanding from our Earthly viewpoint. Also we need to redefine the definition of the words "universe" and "cosmos" so as to better fit the new model of cosmology proposed here.
A Universe under my model is defined as all the material which orbits about a common center. This would make the largest universe equal to a super galaxy cluster. The Cosmos would contain all the combined Universes. The Milky Way and all associated galaxies which are moving in concert with the Milky Way should be considered as the universes of our origin, while all galaxies outside this group should be considered as other universes, since there is no direct relationship between us and them. All of the "holes" in the cosmos now seen by 3D maps would represent positions where BBEs have occurred in the past. Mass can never become too concentrated in the cosmos, else a BBE is forced. The large stringy structures we see surrounding the holes occur because mass huddles around the edges of these Events.
Edwin Hubble first observed that light was red shifted for distant objects and concluded that "the universe" was expanding and that a single big bang was responsible for producing all the material we can see both near and far. If we consider the cosmos as infinite, there arises several problems associated with the assumption that a single big bang created everything. First, we have not measured the distance and motion of all the objects that we have observed so we don’t know that all material in the cosmos is expanding or moving away from us. All we know is that the wave length of light is shifted more by objects which appear further away than objects which are closer to us. Other explanations could account for this shift. Second, we can not even see most of the material of the cosmos, so how can we claim to know its motion? A third problem is that all of our observations eventually will prove to be "local" observations of the cosmos, since we are limited by our cone of knowledge. A fourth problem is that an infinite amount of material can never be included in a single Event . And a fifth problem is that the limitations of the speed of gravity make it impossible for all the material we can now see to have the proposed relationships of expansion or contraction.
I propose that the Cosmos is much larger than any one big bang and that the movements we see are the results of ALL the big bangs which have come before. If you imagine multiple big bangs occurring throughout time and understand that they are distributing their material in every direction throughout the Cosmos, I think you will find that most objects will appear to be moving away from you, no matter what your position within the Cosmos. We may be traveling as the remnants of the last big bang in our neighborhood, but the motions of all objects in the cosmos are a result of the energies of their creation and the energies obtained through interaction with other objects encountered in space and time. All matter of the Cosmos could not have been in "The Big Bang" as stated in current models. In fact, the Cosmos is home to many such Events separated by time and space.
I don't actually think a BBE is like an explosion. The actual event involves the movement of energy from an ordered gravitational system to one where each mass is now separate and independent of it neighbors. I don't think this mass actually expands from its location, but rather it remains in it's location, but is just not connected. Over time, other material will move into the space created by this new mass, and it will interact and begin making new ordered systems. But any material that is orbiting the Event but not included in the Event, will be "shot" outward by the loss of gravitational connection to the black hole just turned BBE. Thus the effect of any BBE would be to send material outward, as if from an explosion.
As we look at the physical world around us, we see that everything in nature has cycles. To think of the Cosmos as having only a single big bang with nothing existing before that event just doesn't seem to fit with the observations we make daily of the world around us. "What existed before the beginning?" is a valid scientific question that deserves an answer because all events we see in nature are cyclic. I propose Big Bang Events (BBEs) are also cyclic and occur when black holes become so large they can no longer hold the energy stored within. BBEs (pronounced bee bees) are initiated when gravity becomes so strong that its bond with matter is broken and the energy contained within the system is released.
Current theory says that a single BBE started everything. Current cosmologist must consider the questions posed by their finite cosmos model. It is not logically consistent to believe in an infinite Cosmos and a single big bang since this model involves a finite number of events, a finite expansion rate, and an edge by all accounts. These are all indications of a closed set and all closed sets are finite. Therefore, the single big bang model proposes a finite cosmos, something I find hard to swallow.
Cosmologist and astronomers are currently trying to measure the amount of mass in the universe to see if "the universe" is open or closed. In a closed universe, there is enough matter for gravity to stop the "expansion" of the single universe, eventually causing it to come back together. An open universe would be one in which there is not enough material to cause the universe to come back together, so the universe would just keep expanding. The very nature of this theory speaks against an infinite cosmos. If there is a value which represents the amount of matter required to close the universe, by definition the universe would have to be finite. Any defined amount of material would be finite, not infinite. One of anything can never be infinite. One of anything is not the way of nature, either.
It has been argued that it is not the amount of material, but the density that is being measured to decide the open or closed universe question. But that argument doesn’t make logical sense either. Since the cosmos is infinite, we can never measure the density of the entire cosmos because we cannot "see" everything which exists. This theory could only work for a defined space and the material contained within it. As an example, we could measure the amount of material we could see with the Hubble Telescope, but to accomplish that task accurately, the Hubble would have to look in every direction as far as it can see and account for all matter within that "box."
But what if we build a larger telescope and look further into space? Again, we can only arrive at a conclusion as to the status of that particular "box" and only after an exhaustive search of that region of space. We can not know what the status is of any larger "box" we might draw in our imaginations because we don’t know what exists outside the "box" we have measured. As our telescopes get larger and larger, the problem remains the same, only the dimensions of the "box" change.
Cosmologist have changed the numbers a great deal lately, but if the furthest thing we can see is 13.7 billion light years away, then we must assume we can also see material which is 13.7 billion light years away, in the opposite direction. That would mean that we currently "know" about a cosmos that is about 30 billion light years across, from the viewpoint of each "edge." (This is older than 13.7) Since the value is the same in every direction, this would suggest that current cosmologist have us at the center of the cosmos again. I thought we got rid of those ideas with Galileo. In an infinite cosmos, there is no center, so we can't be there.
The motion of our galaxy is further proof that there is more than a single big bang. The Milky Way and associated galaxies are flying across the "explosion." We are not expanding outward from the center of some imaginary single event. To imagine this situation, think of an explosion which throws a lot of dirt into the air. Now think of a bird flying through the dust of the explosion. (This is what the Milky Way galaxy appears to be doing.) If we were to see the bird flying through the explosion, would we conclude that the bird was created in the explosion? Probably not. Because the bird is flying through the explosion doesn’t mean he is connected or associated with that explosion. Similarly, just because our galaxy is flying through the debris of the last big bang in our neighborhood doesn’t mean the Milky Way was created in that Event. I suspect that the Milky Way and the associated galaxies orbiting the Milky Way were actually orbiting a larger structure, which eventually became a BBE. Our galaxy cluster was outside the Event horizon, and so we were propelled through the cosmos when our angular momentum was converted to straight line momentum by the Event and that explains our speed and direction in the cosmos.
What triggers a BBE philosophically is when gravity eventually "robs" mass of all its energy and has no place left to connect. The effective value of mass becomes zero (E=gmc2) and the equation "comes apart at the seams." At the beginning of a new universe, after a BBE, most of the energy of any new system is contained within the mass and is unconnected to the rest of the cosmos. As time passes, gravity slowly organizes the universe and "pulls" the energy from the mass. At the end of time in the depths of a black hole, eventually gravity becomes so strong that mass has no energy left to hold the system together and another BBE occurs.
Now let us examine the conditions surrounding these Events. Single black holes could becomes so large they convert by themselves to energy. But for the Event to occur, gravity must be increasing, to pass the threshold. If a black hole was just "sitting" in space and accumulating no new material, there would be no catalyst for the Event to occur. However, I suggest that BBEs are always precipitated by the accumulation of new material which finally pushes the mass/gravity relationship past its breaking point. The Event could occur during the process of drawing in new material or could occur by the collision of two or more super black holes with the mass/gravity equivalent of galaxy super clusters.
Since I first read estimates that the universe was 20 or less billion years old, I have never been comfortable with that estimate. Our solar system is 5 billion years old, yet is rich in all natural elements, organic molecules, and possibly even life. The material of our solar system has obviously been around a long time. Energy from a BBE would first be elementary particles, then hydrogen and would have to make passage through more than one star before it could be converted to helium, carbon, oxygen, etc. It just doesn't seem possible for a universe to be only13.7 billion years old, yet have enough time to complete all the necessary cycles. Nature would need time to create higher elements in larger stars(10 to 20+ billion years), disperse them (? Billion years), cycle them through other sizes of stars, create organic molecules (? Billion years) and then have them all come back together and form our solar system (5 billion years), all in only 13.7 billion years or less. This doesn’t even include all the time that the material was just "sitting alone" in space waiting to be involved in the next star system. The atoms in our bodies are older than 13.7 billion years.
This short time span is especially hard to imagine since we live on the edge of our galaxy where material is not particularly abundant. If there are stars in the Milky Way which are 1000 billion years old, then the beginning of our galaxy must have been long before that. Recently I sat and looked at granite rock here in New Mexico which is said to be about 3 ½ billion years old. I can’t believe that the material I saw represents one fourth of everything that has ever existed. The Milky Way has surely been rotating a very long time for its material to have undergone the long process of being converted from pure mass energy with no organization to the state we now see where there are many objects and much gravitational order.
As we view the heavens, we see where galaxies have collided. It is not logical to think there could be so many collisions if everything came from a single point and expanded outward. It makes more sense to think of these collisions as being the result of material being tossed in every direction by BBEs at different places in space and time. We should expect to see things moving in every direction and colliding with each other, but the assumption of a single big bang has clouded most thought as it pertains to cosmological patterns and how to interpret those patterns.
As a thought experiment, take the Hubble telescope and instantly transport yourself to the farthest galaxy that we can see with it. Now look further in the same direction. What would you see? You would see more stars and more galaxies that are just too far away for us to see from Earth, at least with the Hubble. In addition, what if you turned the telescope around and looked back towards Earth. I imagine you would be able to see the Milky Way, but what about the other 13.7 billion light years of material on past the Earth? Could you see it? Probably not, even though, in this thought experiment, you know that the material exists because you could see it from Earth before you started the journey. The point is that there is some limit to what we can see from Earth. We can build larger telescopes and see further, but we will never be able to see everything, so we must assume the cosmos is infinite since any limits will always be beyond our reach.
My model projects a Cosmos which is infinitely large and infinitely old. Although Universes come and go, the Cosmos appears to go on forever. The question of an open or closed universe, has no meaning. The question of dark matter and dark energy also seems unimportant. Both questions arose from assuming a single big bang and an infinite speed of gravity. The open/closed universe question arose because of our intense desire as human beings to "want" the "universe" to continue forever or to be a "closed" universe. No one wants to think that we live in an "open" universe that would apparently eventually come to an end. It seems to me that humanity has an inherent desire to see "things" continue forever. My model of an infinite cosmos embraces that desire.
If one assumes an infinite cosmos, then the questions of dark matter and dark energy and an open or closed universe are not the proper questions to be asking. In reality, material from a BBE will continue moving through the Cosmos and collecting in black holes until gravity robs mass of all its energy, and then that energy will be recycled in another BBE. It doesn't make any difference if that material is dark or light. And when one considers the limits on the speed of gravity, then far removed events and systems can have no effect on us and our universe. What is important is to view the Cosmos with an open mind so that we can accurately interpret what we see. After all, any model of science is merely a tool which we use to help us better understand the world around us. Viewing the cosmos as infinite is more beneficial to humanity and science than viewing the cosmos as finite.
We have direct evidence that the cosmos is at least several hundred billion years old. For all practical purposes, we can assume the Cosmos goes on forever since no event can stop the accumulation of matter into black holes. Hawking's Radiation may account for some material escaping, but could never account for the mass and gravity of entire galaxies, especially since black holes only get hungrier as they get older and larger. No event can stop those same black holes from eventually becoming so large that they revert back to energy as a BBE. In essence, God recycles.