Mr. Sammi

NumberTenOx,

if you think a time interval that short has nothing to do with human perception THEN why are you mentioning it AND why did it arise out of the human mind AND why is it measured relative to terms of human perception.

I do not expect a real answer because that is what you think and not what you understand.

Sammi Na Boodie ()

NumberTenOx

Mr. Na Boodie,

First, I won't claim to understand your position. I was trying to answer the original post and I didn't spend much time trying to understand the posts on the perception of time. I apologize.

On the other hand, the use of the term "second" at the beginning of the universe has a completely self-consistent meaning to physics, just as today. What term would you have me use instead?

Hawkingfan

Then I suggest you read "A Brief History of Time".

Oh, and I forgot to address this. I am SOOOOOOOO sorry. May I be excused?

Starboy

could you elaborate on that?

eh

That isn't what inflation theorists claim. Plus, what happens when you have an accelerating space?

cfgauss

Sure it is. The speed of light was faster then, the universe expanded at c. And what do you mean by accelerating?

fando

You're not alone in thinking this. There was speculation among cosmologists in the 1970's that the flow of time as we experience it is tied to the way the cosmos expands. If the universe were closed, as in it will collapse in a big cruch, it was speculated that time would run backwards and we would relive our lives from death to birth as the universe collapses. For all I know, this idea is still floating around.

Friar Bellows

From where did you get the idea that the speed of light was "faster" back then? As for "accelerating", surely you've heard of the recent observations that seem to suggest that the expansion of the universe is speeding up? See here for instance.

Objects in space can definitely appear to be moving away at a faster speed than that of light. It's necessary, though, to be careful about what distance definition you're using. If by velocity you mean the rate of change of proper distance with cosmological time, then the speed of light limit can be breached. This does not contradict special relativity because here we are using the so-called comoving cosmological coordinates, rather than special relativity coordinates.

eh

Inflation does not need the assumption that the speed of light was faster in the past. And as our forum Friar pointed out, the expansion of the universe is getting faster and faster. Check the link provided.

Hawkingfan

According to Stephen Hawking, this theory has been abandoned. There is an explanation of why in his book "A Brief History of Time" in chapter 9 called "The Arrow of Time".
Also, Rich Talcott, editor of "Astronomy" magazine concurs and writes:
"If the universe is closed, it will eventually stop expanding and begin to contract. As seen by some supernatural, outside observer, the universe would appear to be a movie running in reverse. The galaxies would come together again, slowly at first but with increasing speed as time goes on. Time itself, however, would keep operating as it does and not in reverse. That implies that the observed universe would continue to evolve—stars would continue growing old and dying, and the light from the most distant galaxies would still appear redshifted because we would be seeing them as they were at a time before the contraction started."