https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIZRd1NdJyg (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIZRd1NdJyg) by John Lennox which contains a lot of shullbit but raises questions that make me think:
- How does (as Hawking says) a universe spontaneously come into existence via gravity? Is gravity "nothing"?
- How would matter be so created?
- Is M Theory really science? We can't test it.
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You realise that you are asking scientific questions specific to a hard subject, as a layman, in an atheist forum, right? E: I meant, you should ask them in a science forum.
Then why is there a science section here? 0.o
I'd say right now M theory is a framework for a theory. It's taken seriously because it gives sensible answers, but you're quite right, it's not yet testable, so researchers are--and should be--skeptical and use it with care.
And yes, in a certain sense, gravity is "nothing" insofar as it's the curvature of spacetime rather than a thing, at least in General Relativity. Physicists are searching for a graviton, and they have some theoretical reasons to expect there to be one, but there are theoretical reasons for there not to be one as well. It's an open area of inquiry.
There are several explanations for how the universe started; Hawking theorized that there was no actual Big Bang, but only the appearance of one when viewed from inside (where, of course, we are); I don't know if that's still an active area of research or not. M theory suggests that the Big Bang was caused by the collision of two higher-dimensional branes.
Basically, you're asking a question for which there is not yet a settled answer. :)
Quote from: satyesu on May 18, 2015, 06:24:24 PM
Then why is there a science section here? 0.o
There are lots of cool things happening in science that people like to talk about. They don't have to have anything to do with theism or atheism, and usually they don't. We also have folders for politics and the arts, including plain old movies (Imagine, Hollywood movies... like Batman). We don't have to be experts to talk about any of these things. We don't make any claims that this forum is a substitute for scientific journals. We may have answers for some things, but there are better sources out there.
Often times theists come in here and like to spring the old "If you don't believe in God, then explain this" gambit. Well, sometimes we can't. There are many things that nobody can explain (oh woe is us for not being able to explain the unexplainable). That is the domain of religion, which will explain anything to you, even if nobody else can explain it.
If you want to know what Stephen Hawking is talking about, most here are going to stumble. I read his Brief History of Time, and 96% of that book went right over my head, but that hardly puts me a position to say he's wrong, let alone explain it to anyone.
Thanks! ^^ Apologists sometimes knock the wind outta me.
Quote from: SGOS on May 18, 2015, 08:54:44 PM
If you want to know what Stephen Hawking is talking about, most here are going to stumble.
My ears are burning.
Quote from: SGOS on May 18, 2015, 08:54:44 PM
If you want to know what Stephen Hawking is talking about, most here are going to stumble. I read his Brief History of Time, and 96% of that book went right over my head, but that hardly puts me a position to say he's wrong, let alone explain it to anyone.
General Relativity's easy. M Theory is brainscorchy.
Stephen Hawking's book The Illustrated A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME was an international publishing phenomenon, translated into forty languages and selling over nine million copies, how can this twit say it is the most unread book? It may be so among the religious right that don't even know Scripture and hate science. The universe is composed of positive energy and negative energy which is gravity. They cancel themselves out leaving zero energy just like radio waves do that are out of phase with each other, and boost each other when they are. When they cancel each other they still exist, just like they did before the big bang. Space-time isn't nothing, it just consists of virtual particles that when they meet they create pure energy, which is still composed of particles of energy called photons. Even electrical magnetic waves are composed of particles, as are fields such as gravitational fields. There is no need for a God to explain this, only a genius like Einstein and Sir Isaac along with Hawking. When Einstein and Hawking mention God they are being metaphorical like the bible is so the intellectually challenge can understand them. :wall: Solitary