Since the Big Bang cosmology requires creation of energy (or matter, wich in my school is the same thing) I'm very interested in a question how astronomers (those who believe that there was something like the Big Bang in the past) explain the mechanism of creation of energy (hopefully without the divine intervention).

Astronomers do not explain the creation of energy. They assume it for lack of any way to explain its existence. Even astronomers don't know everything!

The Big Bang theory states that the Universe suddenly came into existence a long time ago with the sudden appearance of an unimaginably huge concentration of pure energy at a point in a superspace of which we know nothing. This point expanded into the four-dimensional space that contains the Universe that we know. Measurements on the cosmological microwave background radiation that appeared 380,000 years later have indicated that this happened 13.7 billion years ago. According to this theory, this concentration of pure energy at a single point instantly began to expand, thereby producing the expanding universe. Its contents consisted of pure electromagnetic energy with a spectrum indicative of a black body with a temperature of billions or even trillions of degrees. There existed no matter at all in the Universe at that time. As expansion progressed and the temperature fell, matter condensed out of the energy via Einstein's E = mc² somewhat analogous to the way that codling steam condenses into water or cooling water freezes into ice.

They begin with...once upon a time..

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Since when does BB theory require that the origin be a singularity? Same goes with inflation.

Let us remember that empty space is not energy = 0 . It is the ground state, and this can very well have energy associated with it.

Generally, divine intervention. Physics does not explain anything before 10^-43 s

alainprice: Since when does BB theory require that the origin be a singularity? Same goes with inflation.

dcl: Strictly speaking, it doesn't. But denying a singularity raises problems with causality. 10 exp -43 second ends the Planck era. It doesn't allow time for a synchronizing signal to propagate between separated points, so cosmologists do not try to say that space comes into existence throughoutl a finite volume.

alainprice: Let us remember that empty space is not energy = 0 . It is the ground state, and this can very well have energy associated with it.

dcl: I agree that space isn't energy = 0, but at time = 10 exp -43 seconds, there wasn't yet any space. Not even quantum mechanics was applicable yet because configuration space wasn't yet definable.

korjik: Generally, divine intervention. Physics does not explain anything before 10^-43 s

dcl: We're trying to discuss physics, not theology. I can't discuss divine intervention. I agree that physics doesn't explain anything before 10 exp -43 seconds, nor does it try to.

Well, there's your problem. BB doesn't assume the creation of energy. It just examines the aftereffects of its expansion from a point. Where the energy was before that is unobservable, and therefore not covered by nor relevant to the theory.

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JimJast: Since the Big Bang cosmology requires creation of energy

Noclevername: Well, there's your problem. BB doesn't assume the creation of energy. It just examines the aftereffects of its expansion from a point. Where the energy was before that is unobservable, and therefore not covered by nor relevant to the theory.

dcl: Perhaps "creation" isn't the most appropriate term to use in this context because some see that word as having religious overtones. But the Big Bang theory does seem to start with the assumption that there was a moment about 10 exp -43 seconds after time 0 when there was a huge concentration of energy at that point that was not there at time 0. Could we agree that the energy came into existence at that time without belaboring what we should call the process?

We can and have made study of the back ground noise that has still temperature from the original great expansion (BB) Its kind of blotchy in that it demonstrates a random non uniformity of the chaotic mess that was that great expansion....
We know nothing of what might have been at that time as the temperature was above that that would allow mater to be formed. A plasma state of super heated ... and here we are. Was this just energy? We do not know.
The ongoing work to unlock the secrets of Dark Energy that will be undertaken soon in those particle accelerators as yet not complete might cast some light on this question... or not.
Mark.

Thanks for so many responses but there has been a misunderstanding. I didn't ask about the creation of the universe (however it is an interesting subject by itself) but only about the everyday creation of energy that is needed according to the Big Bang Theory to compesate for the presumably lossless movement of photons in the universe.

As any object in the universe, the photons are subject to dynamical friction. Tiny in their case but still. In the Big Bang Theory the loss of energy to this friction is zero supposedly because of constant creation of this tiny amount of energy. As mathematicians investigating this problem say (eg. John Baez, possibly also Chris Hillman), this tiny amount of created energy comes from non conservation of momentum which is somehow converted into energy (John Baez says that only 4-momentum is conserved and not energy and momentum separately).

This was my question: How astronomers explain such conversion of momentum into energy that is required by the Big Bang Theory according to matematicians? I may add that matematicians can calculate that if this loss of energy to dynamical friction wouldn't be compensated somehow by the loss of momentum than there wouldn't be any redshift left to account for the expansion of the universe and astronomers insist that the universe is expanding. That's why the BB Theory necessarily needs this creation of energy (presumably at the expense of momentum, since so called "momenrgy" (J. A. Wheeler's term) has to be conserved otherwise the whole relativity collapses.

So my question is how astronomers, who insist that the universe is expanding (and such great observers can't be wrong -- according to J. A. Wheeler), explain the necessary mechanism of creation of energy needed to compensate for the dynamical friction of photons?

Sorry for not explaining the question from the beginning, but I thought that it is a known problem in astronomy that the astronomers deal every day with. So I just asked about the BB and the conservation of energy since I thought it is obvious what I'm asking about.

please show a reference showing that photons are subject to friction.

I just said that in th Big Bang Teory they are not, and my question was what is the mechanism of avoiding being the subjest to friction.

Any moving object in the universe that has some gravitational mass (which is the same as inertial mass, and therefore relativistic mass, and so non zero for photons) is a subject to loss of energy because of its gravitational interaction with the surroundings. It is called "dynamical friction" (as I learned from Ned Wright). So it is a universal thing.

This gravitational interaction necessarily causes a loss of energy (on average, excluding "sling effects"). That's why the Big Bang Theory needs a mechanism to compensate for this loss of energy, in other words, mechanism of creation of this tiny energy that would be seen as redshift if it were not compensated for. That's why I'm asking about the mechanism of creation of this energy lost to gravitational interaction.

I'm not an astronomer to do the observations and interpret them. I just know how to calculate some stuff and I can see that if there wouldn't be such mechanism you (the astronomers) wouldn't see the expansion. Since those two numbers (Hubble redshift and dynamical friction) seems very close to each other, maybe identical. So I'm asking what mechanism compensates for the dynamical friction of photons making it non existent? Eg. John Baez suggests it is exchanging of momentum for energy. But for me it is too vague to understand. That's why I'd like someone who understands the mechanism to explain it.

You sure it wasn't when the Ghostbusters in the next universe over crossed the streams?

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hhmmm.... i think..... i have to go away and cogitate!.....

start from the fundamentals.....some how the combination of 'energy' part and the 'creation' part is making me extremely uncomfortable.....

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Show a reference with the derivation of this dynamic friction then. I would also request that you use it to figure out the power of the energy loss of Earth's orbit then also.

JimJast: As I understand it, you are asking through what mechanism energy is being created continuously to offset the energy lost by photons in traveling through empty space. I am not aware that any such energy loss has been either observed or predicted by theory. The cosmological red shift is explained by Doppler effect, not by loss of energy by light while traveling through space.

Your argument seems to be based on the idea that photons lose energy through dissipation of rest mass, which implies that photons have rest mass greater than zero. Efforts to determine the rest mass of photons have been able thus far only to establish lower limits on the possible rest mass of a photon. They have not been able to show that the photon has precisely zero rest mass The fact that photons travel at a speed that special relativity says cannot be exceeded, much less attained by matter implies that photons have zero rest mass.

If you can document information to the contrary, please do so by citing references.

I thought cosmological redshift was not the Doppler effect, even though it has a similar outcome.

There are two basic theories.

The first states that if this principle where ever to be fully understood, it would result in the Universe immediately being replaced by something even more bizarre.

The second theory states that this has already happened.

Corollary: And this keeps happening, repetitively, every 5.39121 x 10^(-44) seconds.

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I am Mugs, of the Alien clan of Usa, Nordamerica, a Terran, of Sol.

Perception isn't reality. It's merely an abstraction thereof, and quite often not a very good one at that.

"Staying young requires the unceasing cultivation of the ability to unlearn old falsehoods." - Heinlein

"Freedom begins when you tell Ms. Grundy to go fly a kite." - Heinlein

So from this random question about the ' Where does the energy come from.' Not that this could be the answer... cos I just do not know, but. Does a SMBH ever reach a point where it just collapses. Becoming energy only. Next question: What is energy? and why do I never have enoughdo not answer this please.
Mark.

Amber Robot: I thought cosmological redshift was not the Doppler effect, even though it has a similar outcome.

dcl: Cosmological red shift is definitely Doppler effect. It occurs because the distance between the light source and the light detector is increasing becaus