The Illusion of Time (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Friday, August 06, 2010, 18:14 (5009 days ago) @ George Jelliss

GEORGE (commenting on the new Shu theory that does away with the Big Bang):
Personally I hope the big-bang "inflation" model is wrong, and that a replacement can be found, since it all seems so "ad hoc". It will need some very basic re-examination of assumptions.-It will indeed. A few weeks ago, we were all arguing about what might have happened before the Big Bang. We were offered various learned discourses on the subject of nothing, and why it's perfectly OK to believe that something can come out of nothing, and time didn't begin till the BB, even if we can't conceive of a BB happening without a "before". But if Shu's theory is correct, there was no BB, nothing came out of nothing, and time has no beginning and no end, so what price all those learned responses now? For me as an outsider (non-scientist, non-believer), the scientific contortions necessary in order to embrace such theories are amazingly similar to the theological contortions needed to believe in the God of the established religions. People tie themselves in knots to make reality fit in with their theories, and if eventually their hypothesis is challenged, off they go on another track, which will be equally riddled with potholes but will produce equally learned, scientific patches from the experts. Maybe the Shu theory is correct, maybe the chameleon theory is correct, maybe the BB theory is correct, and maybe there is some unknown form of energy (conscious or unconscious) which drives life and the universe and which we are simply incapable of observing. Who knows? Nobody. This should be enough to make us all sceptics. But of course it isn't.-My thanks both to David and to George for these constant updates.