The strange things that begin to happen the closer
you get to it
First of all, the power requirements. It would take a
particle accelerator with the ability to generate a temperature of 1027
degrees (Abs). If I was to write down that number it would look like
this;
10000000000000000000000000000o ,
So, I won't do that again.
As this is impossible to achieve without (makes sense
really, because that's what happened here anyway) using all of the power
left in the universe, we are just going to have to make do with the
latest Hadron Collider at Cern which will achieve a total collision
energy of 14 TeV. [TerraEVolts.] - (One Tev = 1.60217646 × 10-7
joules) - And in certain conditions, much more. Scientist at Cern hope
to get to within billionths of a second after the moment of the big
bang.
Anyway, I'm not going to do any more of that because
it is the second obstacle that really interests me.
It's the region of Cosmology and Astrophysics which can only be
approached with the power of thought.
This is the region of our universe which will be
forever out of bounds to us. It is the [place/time] where all of our
physical laws were created. Before they were created our universe was a
very strange place. We don't really have the words to describe this
place, we have mathematics, depending on which discipline you agree
with, but words fall short so I will have to use words like 'place' and
'time', as I have no wish, nor do I have the ability, to place the Maths
in front of you.
In this place impossible things happened. Gravity danced with
electromagnetism, strong and weak nuclear forces crowded close by,
making sure everything fitted together just right.
This was the place which could have spawned dragons, elves, trolls,
teleportation, and tachyon beams for Geordi La Forge. If God needed a
sitting room, this would be it.
Why then, didn't dragons result from this place? Why
does every action produce an opposite and equal reaction?
Why then, doesn't E=Mc2 + 2 ?
Or better still, why aren't the stars fixed to transparent celestial
spheres? or planetary orbits perfectly circular?
As the four forces broke up and fell apart our universe was suddenly
fixed, just the way we like it, forever.
Well, that's the standard thinking anyway.
The trouble with this is that it doesn't completely take quantum
fluctuation into account, you know, that thing about cats and boxes and
cyanide and radioactivity.
The thing is, it really didn't have to be this way. It could have been
so different. It could still be different, that's what the
guy who said we could have changed the age of the universe by
looking at it meant. I mean, that could never happen, could it?
Let's see.
One of the many things I have contemplated is a strange phenomenon
called 'Observational Genesis'. Put simply it means that the universe
conforms to our needs because we need it to be that way.
It goes like this:
As we get closer to the singularity, the moment of creation, we learn
how the physical laws of our universe came into being. Some time
immediately after the moment of the big bang those laws were all in a
quantum flux, waiting to be born, or being born into this universe then
jumping back out of it, (into one of an infinite number of 'other'
potential universes waiting for a big bang to come along). To fix a
particular law into our very own universe, someone had to 'observe' it.
This 'observation would then pull the law from it's quantum flux state
and 'pin' it into reality.
So, as we tunnel down into the depths of the creation event, we discover
more and more about the 'reality' of our own universe, and in doing so,
fix it even more firmly than it was before.
We tunnel using telescopes, LHC's, Proton smashers and experimentation.
The power of thought almost always comes first, then the experimenters
and the observers make or break the theories by fixing them with close
scrutiny.
Here is the craziest part.
In the future, scientists, experimenters, theologists, astronomers and
all, will still be fixing our laws for us. In fact they will have firmly
fixed any 'new' phenomenon long before we get to explore it thoroughly.
They are busy sending us clues down from the future so that we can
assist them in their further endeavours.
No wonder all of the dragons and elves and transparent crystalline
heavenly spheres disappeared from the world so long ago.