by Nikki Albert

Created on: November 26, 2010

The Universe boggles the mind. We are led to believe it began in the Big Bang, but infinitely condensed what? Where did that come from in the first place? What existed prior to the Big Bang? It is hard to believe anything came from nothing, so we might imagine that prior to the bang there was something. Then one begins to wonder if there were a states of affairs prior to the big bang, such as energy or particles, then they too must have existing somewhere, as in there is space outside of space. And if the occurrence of the bang happened from that environment then it could have happened a million times over, leading to many other universes beyond ours. Perhaps all these universes rotate around each other like our galaxies. While many debate whether time is infinite, as older philosopher’s once speculated on whether the universe was eternal, we have to think something is infinite, whether that be energy in some form and the potential to change. Simply because nothing comes from nothing.

Think of all the stars and the planets that rotate around them. Think of all the solar systems that combine into galaxies that move, collide and change throughout the universe. At the center of every galaxy think of that black hole and wonder what really goes on there. I wonder sometimes if a black hole is literally a hole in the galaxy, spewing out energy into that unknown terrain ‘outside’ of it. Because for some reason my mind fails to grasp that if I went to the very edge of the universe and took one more step that I would not be somewhere else. Certainly this universe is no clockwork universe. It is not as tangible as we like to believe and the microverse of atoms and quantum mechanics is down right peculiar at times. There is a vast difference from what we perceive, appearances, to the reality at hand.

Then we can debate what we have in the universe now. We perceive time and to the observer it is indeed relative, but does it exist in itself? We are immersed in the flow of time. The present being now, the past having gone and the future a potential not yet achieved. Yet with the branch theory of time, each and every choice leads to an infinite amount of alternate timelines. The block theory of time suggests that the past, present and future all exist, so while you may feel like it is the present, in fact all parts of you already exist and in a very deterministic fashion no matter what you choose, it is already all done. Some believe only the present exists

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