Law of Conservation of Mass

[Aumaan Anubis]

Alright, I've been reading the Darkness Beyond the Stars. It's not a well known book, but it can give you a relative perception as to how large the universe is. Of how many planets there are, of how many stars there are.

So, we know that matter cannot be created nor destroyed. Check.
We also know that energy cannot be created nor destroyed. Check.

Yet at some point in time, vast quantities of matter somehow existed.

The question I'm driving at is, why does anything exist? Why does space exist? Why does time "exist?"
Why is there not a plane of nonexistence. In fact, the plane could not exist, so it would just be... nothing. Why is there anything?

Is it possible that all matter/energy has just existed? That matter/energy has had no start nor beginning? Because if there was a start, that would mean that it came from nothing.

It's an unusual question, and I've been thinking about it. And I know no one truly knows the answer, but I was wondering what other people's thoughts were on the matter.(hehe, matter)

Hopefully, you get what I'm trying to say. It's not an easy idea to convey.

Edit: Oh, and I would prefer that any religious ideas/theories be kept out of any and all discussion.

[xbox]

I spent a whole day thinking about this last week.
It made me feel all weird n stuff.

[Tural]

Nobody knows.

[guysullavin]

well, this is a tricky one

I think we don't know enough to actually answer this question, for all we know, elephants could hold the power of creating mass, time, and energy... but i extremely doubt it.

I personally just think that we should leave such an advanced question alone, because it is just something our primitive brains cant comprehend (except maybe tural's).

[Ombre]

I thought about this a long time ago, and still do think about it a lot. Whenever I bring it up in discussions people always resort to the Chaos Theory as an excuse for the how and why. I simply can't see a valid way for it to be explained with modern science. For matter to create itself from nothing would defy the laws of science as we know them, and for matter to be eternal would do the same.

[Cryticfarm]

I donno.
Figure it out :p.

[AbeFroman]

interesting, then technically i'm using a computer that is made out of material that is infinite years old. never thought of it like that till i read this post. even though it's a given.

it would make sense to me that matter has no beginning, we think of it as having a beginning because we (living things) have a beginning and an end. When thinking about things such as this we have trouble (and with good reason ) putting ourselves in Matter's shoes. If we were just pure matter, not a composition of a crapload of different elements and compounds etc, but like just a hunk of metal, then i'm sure we would understand what it means to have no beginning, but unfortunately we will never be able to put ourselves into the like of a gold bar.

therefore i firmly believe that matter does, in fact, have no beginning, all matter has existed for all of eternity and will always exist forever, i wish i could say until something, but there is no "until" it will just continue to exist.

with this belief i also disagree with the "big Bang" theory. i think it's just...existed...and pieces of matter drifting through space happened to crash into eachother, fall into eachother's gravitational orbits, form solar systems, galaxies, etc.

this is all just my opinion, but i'm sure some of you have accepted some theories for the unexplained things of the universe without proof before.

[xbox]

I'm in agreement with abe.

[metkillerjoe]

This is what physics is driving at. I had a discussion with my dad about it, and he says that is one of the fundamental questions.

But thinking about "nothingness" literally nothing (even more than simply nothing) is akin to thinking about the 4th dimension or death. We simply cannot fathom these concepts.

A better question. What/why upset a "perfect" equilibrium of nothingness?


As for the big bang, that was a 11th dimensional membrane collapse/collision (membrane theory on wiki).

[Aumaan Anubis]

I thought about this a long time ago, and still do think about it a lot. Whenever I bring it up in discussions people always resort to the Chaos Theory as an excuse for the how and why. I simply can't see a valid way for it to be explained with modern science. For matter to create itself from nothing would defy the laws of science as we know them, and for matter to be eternal would do the same.

Is there a simple way to explain Chaos Theory? I've looked it up on Wikipedia several times but I'm still not at a level in which I can understand what it's saying.

interesting, then technically i'm using a computer that is made out of material that is infinite years old. never thought of it like that till i read this post. even though it's a given

Technically, if you want to be that way about it, one could say that we ourselves, are as old as time, itself. As we are composed of matter which, as you believe, has no beginning and no end. We exist as long as time does.

[guysullavin]

Technically, we haven't figured out that we can't destroy matter/energy, for all we know, there could be some form of antimatter floating out there, we just haven't found it yet.
I wouldn't say that anything is impossible or just cant be done, because we haven't discovered everything, and we never will, because everything is as never-ending as the universe. as long as there's a universe, there will always be an infinant amount of materials and answers. i also agree with froman and say that matter just existed, because the thought of what created what is impossible, because then you can just say what created that? and so on and so fourth.
Humanity will come to an end eventually, then a new species will take over, then another, then another, then another, wether or not its actually advanced as we are or more advanced it doesn't matter.
I think the point of life is to mark that "we were here" for the next species, not find why are we here, because some people already know.
if you disagree, thats just your opinion, you do what you want with it. but i stand by mine.

i think this thread has brought out the inner-nerd in all of us

[AbeFroman]

Humanity will come to an end eventually, then a new species will take over, then another, then another, then another, wether or not its actually advanced as we are or more advanced it doesn't matter.

or maybe we will abandon earth to colonize other worlds, THEN a new species takes over...i vote that Bears take over, they are just plain cool

[guysullavin]

Humanity will come to an end eventually, then a new species will take over, then another, then another, then another, wether or not its actually advanced as we are or more advanced it doesn't matter.

or maybe we will abandon earth to colonize other worlds, THEN a new species takes over...i vote that Bears take over, they are just plain cool

lol... you kind of got what i was going at, but ok

[AbeFroman]

i was kind of half joking there, do you mean that something on earth will evolve (if you believe in that sort of thing, from what i've heard not everyone believes in evolution) into something capable of being as succesful if not more succesful than humans?
lolz bearz will evolvs into supermanz and rulez teh Worldz!
alright im done with bears, sorry

[guysullavin]

i was kind of half joking there, do you mean that something on earth will evolve (if you believe in that sort of thing, from what i've heard not everyone believes in evolution) into something capable of being as successful if not more successful than humans?

exactly, that is if the theories of evolution are correct. but it may develop a more stupid or "less developed" species which may have the world start its downfall, then to have them evolve into a worse/better race later.

[Kewlkyle64]

We exist because we're cool n stuff.

I know, I know, throw your crappy philosophy awards at me...

[GametagAeonFlux]

It's an endless question of what force/event x created everything else y? It's just one of life's great mysteries that will never be solved.

[SHOUTrvb]

We don't even have a Sunday school answer for this one here in theology land. According to the Bible, God is the beginning, as well as the end. But it can't just be looked at in a sense of Nothing + Beginning + Time + End = more nothing. The only chart I could conjure up that made any sense to look at was more along the lines of End -> Rotate to Beginning -> Time passes on -> End -> Repeat. The idea of pure "nothing" just doesn't make sense. There has to be something. So for the God theory to work, he would have to be the End before the Beginning if you catch my drift. I suppose the same concept could apply to science as well, but the Big Bang theory would also likely come into play. Time would have to literally start from its end. Just a circle that reworks itself out. Yes, I'm aware there are plenty of holes in these theories, but when speculation is all you have to go on, nothing should be treated as crazy. Meh.

[JK-47]

with this belief i also disagree with the "big Bang" theory. i think it's just...existed...and pieces of matter drifting through space happened to crash into eachother, fall into eachother's gravitational orbits, form solar systems, galaxies, etc.

To be fair, the theory says there was a point of singularity in the beginning, which holds an infinite amount of.. everything. Which later started to expand, get hot, etc etc. So by your perspective, the Big Bang theory could still work. It wasn't a process of having absolutely nothing, to an explosion of something.. more like an expansion of what was already there, which then started the process of what makes up our universe today.
Other than that, you make a valid point with the 'beginning and end' statement.

[Ombre]

Whatever way you view it you end up with a paradox and anything based on that paradox becomes a belief, not a scientific theory.