Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site petsd.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!houxm!vax135!petsd!cjh From: cjh@petsd.UUCP (Chris Henrich) Newsgroups: net.physics Subject: Re: Re: Big Bang Impossible Message-ID: <394@petsd.UUCP> Date: Tue, 11-Dec-84 19:43:56 EST Article-I.D.: petsd.394 Posted: Tue Dec 11 19:43:56 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 12-Dec-84 06:21:21 EST Organization: Perkin-Elmer DSG, Tinton Falls, N.J. Lines: 40 [] > > If the whole universe was ina speck, said spec would have been a black hole > > and the "big bang" could not happen. No one has yet disputed this. Why not? > perhaps it reached critical mass and exploded? :-) :-) So the universe was inside a black hole, and nothing could :-) escape... as far as I can see, nothing *has* escaped; :-) everything is still inside the same black hole. It's just a :-) bit roomier now... When cosmologists say that "in the beginning" the universe was in a speck, they mean to say not only that all matter was concentrated into a tiny volume, but also that this volume contained all there was of space. Today the radius of the universe, if it is finite and well-defined, is billlyuns and billlyuns of light years; for many purposes, "infinity" (and the universe is flat). Here is an analogy that is not too bad: imagine a rubber baloon, painted black with white spots. Let the baloon inflate; then the white spots move apart from each other. Initially, when the baloon is very small, the spots are close together; if the baloon was the size of a "speck", then all the spots were crammed together in a speck. This expanding, spherical universe is quite different from the Schwarzschild solution of the Einstein equations which is commonly known as a "black hole." One difference is that the black hole is a stationary or slowly changing configuration, whereas the expanding universe clearly is rapidly changing. Regards, Chris -- Full-Name: Christopher J. Henrich UUCP: ..!(cornell | ariel | ukc | houxz)!vax135!petsd!cjh US Mail: MS 313; Perkin-Elmer; 106 Apple St; Tinton Falls, NJ 07724 Phone: (201) 870-5853