SUMMARY: Famed astronomer Sir Martin Rees, and a team of astronomers from Cambridge in UK believe that the early universe swarmed with miniature black holes. They believe that these smaller objects formed early and then merged together over time to create the supermassive black holes that now lurk at the centres of galaxies. Recent observations of the cosmic microwave background radiation shows that the Universe warmed up when the it was 400,000 years old, which could have been because of matter heating up around these mini black holes.

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From the article:
How does one determine that an omnidirectional, homogeneous, and isotropic radiation has been scattered? Do any of you know of a profile of the expansion rate over time? Seems like we were owed at least a reference to how this conclusion was reached.

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For those inclined to oppose human meddling with the structure of the universe or the composition and configuration of objects and groups of objects within the universe, consider:
Whether there is a limit to the magnitude of a modulation of chaos below which order remains invariant? Or, is order but a fiction invented by perspectives applied over finite, however large, time intervals?

The journalists did not distinguish whether the BH's were early accretions or were primordial (i.e., were not formed of normal matter), as I'm sure the Rees group must have done. There was no link to the source.

I remember mumbling some on this subject myself-- WMAP 1st-year data placed some constraints on the possible sizes of PBH's, but not on their subsequent accretion history. For them to still be around today, one of two circumstances must have occurred: 1) The primordial mass was larger than Earth's moon, or 2) Accretion exceeded evaporation until condition 1 was fulfilled. There is a third possibility which is highly speculative, that there exist stable regimes heavier than an atomic nucleus, but lighter than Earth's moon, which delay or prevent explosive decompression of a mini-BH.

Did they, perhaps, have access to more recent WMAP data? S

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Ignoramus et ignorabamus.-- Reymond

Wir mussen wissen. Wir werden wissen.--Hilbert

Pick one.

All of this sounds good in theory and makes alot of sense to me. I am wondering where the evidence is to support these conclusions. Considering that the article refers to new evidence and an upcoming meeting, it seems to me that the authors intend to present both the new data and new conclusions at the meeting. Maybe the information leaked out in anticipation by some excited undergrads. These particular authors are by no means 3rd rate researchers, so I would expect that what they will say will be worth of some attention.

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Quid hoc ad aeternitatum
The conversion of complex and abstract ideas into simple and concrete ones is the essential function of teacher of a body of knowledge.

This is definitely a step in the right direction.

The next step will probably be the finding that the early universe swarmed with neutron stars, rather than black holes.

Several measurements suggest that a neutron star is at the core of the Sun, and other Sun-like stars.

With kind regards,

Oliver
http://www.umr.edu/~om

now that sounds very familiar!

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Damien,
International Baccalaureate Physics teacher
Optics, Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing Instrumentation Major
Admin: Pacific Science and Art

Shouldn't this go in the "alternate theories" section?

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The funny thing about Newton is that he wasn't proven wrong; he was proven inaccurate.

It was his danged inability to throw apples at relativistic speeds toward the ground.

So one imaginary singularity (the pre-Big Bang one), out of which nothing can theoretically escape, spawned lots more singularities. Sounds like the theory is full of (black) holes to me.

Regards,
Ian Tresman

Thanks, Ian, for noting the similarity to the Emperor's new suit.

We understand little, but try to explain it all.

I personally prefer to focus on experimental measurements of the material at hand, and work my way back from there.

[E.g., values of mass per nucleon for the 2,850 known assemblages of neutrons and protons (all known stable and radioactive isotopes) contain a lot of information on compact states of matter that is not yet widely appreciated by the scientific community.]

I expect major changes in that part of cosmology that starts with "creation".

With kind regards,

Oliver
http://www.umr.edu/~om

Suppose the original singularity that allegedly gave birth to what we call our
present universe was simply a Super-Massive-Black-Hole from another universe.
Suppose this SMBH had gathered in enough mass that it reached a limit about
which whose size and other characteristics we can only guess. Its gravity well
became so 'deep' that it tore space apart somewhere in its well and separated
from its parent universe. Wrapped in on itself, it somehow became supercritical
and exploded, generating a new universe using a set of 4 randomly selected
dimensions to define the newly generated and inflating space. The newly liberated
matter then squeezed out like long strings of 'toothpaste' as aggregates of
quarks held together by the gluon-(nuclear strong force-gravitational force) force
combination similar to the electroweak-magnetic force used in our technology
of today. These other forces could compress and expand space locally and
globally.
Similarly, if black holes could fail to merge, and one be ejected to wander
the cosmos; and if one of these could be a galactic SMBH, and if as some say
black holes have two horizons with unconsumed quark matter in a superfluid
at the core; then an ejected SMBH could conceivably use up this quark matter
at its core and become a SMBH that exists as a naked singularity of galactic
power. Such a thing could wander anywhere and be invisible among the
intergalactic void until it encountered a galactic victim. Evidence of this may
not show up in observations until millions of years have past. If it consumed
our galaxy, the evidence will begin to be observed when our own local
systems appear to suddenly and without warning take on unpredicted trajectories.

The Big Bang singularity and black hole singularities are distinctly different things. The hole in logic here is in trying to make the direct comparison in that fashion, not in the theory itself.

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The funny thing about Newton is that he wasn't proven wrong; he was proven inaccurate.

It was his danged inability to throw apples at relativistic speeds toward the ground.

I can see what you're saying, but surely singularities can not be differentiated, by definition?


Regards,
Ian Tresman

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Ian Tresman
plasma-universe.com

Even Stephen Hawking, one of the biggest stalwarts of "what goes in a singularity cannot come out", eventually conceded that black holes do indeed have a record of what fell in it, much like a crater is a record of a former asteroid that existed before it hit the ground. So, that means it's possible to differentiate between different black holes. Hence they are not indifferentiable, and most certainly not by definition.

The big bang starts with a singularity that doesn't exist in space-time. It is space-time. That's a BIG differentiation right there.

Let's steer back to the main point: The Big Bang theory is not perfect. In fact I have a feeling certain aspects of it will undoubtably get turned on their head in the coming decades. But to toss it out based on popular whim? The reason the Big Bang is perceived to be popular is the same reason the theory of gravity is very popular. No one else has come up with a reasonable explanation given the evidence (in fact many counter-arguments will base their strength off of rhetorical technique over fact). If someone came out tomorrow and said "I found another way" and put his/her chips on the table with compelling proof, sure, I'm all for tossing the theory on its head.

And finally, the Big Bang theory is not the reason why tax dollors are spent on science. That's bogus. Advancement of human knowledge is the reason why tax dollors are spent on science. Right now the Big Bang is the summation of research data and suppositions that fit the data. If the suppositions don't fit, they don't become theories. So hollaring about precious tax money being spent on this is ludicrous. I bet you that large numbers of scientists who are in fact spending government research money are motivated to DISPROVE that and other popular theories. Imagine being the guy who said Einstein had it wrong! But to do so it requires work, patience, and in all likelihood a taste for persistent and bitter disappointment.

Because hey, the popular theory just might be right after all.

(or in Newton's case, mostly right... check my sig )

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The funny thing about Newton is that he wasn't proven wrong; he was proven inaccurate.

It was his danged inability to throw apples at relativistic speeds toward the ground.

To play the devils advocate, I disagree. A crater has properties, a singularity has none. You can not genertate information from a singularity... unless you make it up.

Sure I can record what goes into a Black Holes, but since a singularity means that the laws of physics do not apply, we have no way of knowing whether everything is converted into super-dense Swiss cheese, disppears, re-appears elsewhere, or what.

Consequently, all singularities are equal, unless termed otherwise by philosophical, clever mathematically, or religious reasons.

Regards,
Ian Tresman

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Ian Tresman
plasma-universe.com

Hi, Dave.

I don't understand.

What data does the Big Bang explain?

This thread started with an announcement that the early universe may have been filled with black holes, the most compact form of matter, rather than atomic hydrogen, the most dispersed form of matter.

Did the Big Bang make these two extreme forms of matter and by-passed intermediate forms of matter, such as neutron stars, iron, silicon, etc?

An explanation would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Oliver
http://www.umr.edu/~om

The Big Bang Theory does NOT have a unified explanation of the first minutes of the universe, nor does it have a unified way to explain what existed before. The theory described what we see, which is an expanding evolving universe, and the Cosmic Microwave Background.

Those of you (Ian & Oliver especially) who attack the big bang because of logical inconsistancies about the supposed singularity at the first instant are essentially saying that what we see and measure can't be true because we don't know how it started. Personally I am looking forward to a day when we know enough about the science that we can start making concrete statements about the beginning, but clearly we are not there yet.

Still there is no question that the early universe we observe was quite different from the universe today in ways consistent with the idea that the universe has been expanding for the last 13.7 billion years. It was hotter, denser, and had fewer, but brighter stars and more irregular star-burst galaxies.

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Forming opinions as we speak