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Path: utzoo!linus!jgb
From: jgb@linus.UUCP (Jonathan G. Bressel)
Newsgroups: net.space
Subject: Re: Big Bang
Message-ID: <913@linus.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 20-Apr-84 11:27:13 EST
Article-I.D.: linus.913
Posted: Fri Apr 20 11:27:13 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Apr-84 03:22:09 EST
Organization: MITRE Corp., Bedford MA
Lines: 37

>       Here is an interesting question posed by a friend. It is believed
>that we live in an expanding universe that was created from an very small
>very dense and very hot 'point' that let go around 20 billion years ago.
>There are two outcomes of this. One being that this event was a one time
>thing and the universe is open. That is that it will keep expanding until
>entropy sets in and the stars die out and that is the end of it. The other
>theory is that the universe is an oscillating one. That is it expands, and
>after some time it contracts again into that 'point' and the big bang starts
>over again with a new universe with new phyisical laws and constants.

>      I tend to subscribe to the latter theory since the contraction of
>the universe into a primordal 'point' that goes off again makes some
>sense. If the universe is a one time occurance, then one can say that
>perhaps the first line in the bible explains it all .... In the beginning
>there was light ! ......

>                                                harpo!jrl


harpo!jrl is entitled to this opinion, but I can't help noticing the
absurdity of this reasoning.  Since we haven't sufficient information about
the density of the universe, the only valid, scientific statement we can
make is that we don't yet know which theory gives a more accurate
description of the universe.  A scientist doesn't "subscribe" to a theory
because he likes its philosophical consequences.  In this case harpo!jrl
seems to favor the perpetual contraction theory merely because the
alternative theory resembles too much the account given in the bible.

As a point of information, the first line of the Bible reads:

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."

-- 
					Jonathan G. Bressel

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