How It Began

This is the story about what we now know about the beginning of our universe. It is an incomplete story, maybe to be completed by men and women in the future, maybe not.

Twelve billion years ago an incredibly large amount of energy entered into what was to grow into our universe. This is what is called "The Big Bang." Nobody knows where this energy came from; nobody knows why the universe began to expand. But there is evidence that this is the way it started, and this article will present this evidence.

As the universe expanded, this energy began to condense into matter, and form the stars and planets that populate the universe today. We are used to the idea of matter transforming into energy. It is the source of the energy of nuclear power plants, of nuclear bombs, of the stars themselves.

Well, Einstein taught us that it can go the other way, too. Energy can crystallize into matter. And it did, at the beginning of the universe.

Quite a story! What is the evidence?

First: last century, astronomers discovered that all the galaxies were moving away from us. And those farther away were moving faster. This is because different parts of the energy/matter that was to form the universe was moving at different speeds. Parts that were moving faster are now very far away, slower parts didn't get very far.

(This doesn't mean that we're special. Scientists on distant stars - if there are any - would see all the galaxies moving away from them, too. Like raisins in a rising loaf of raisin bread, the galaxies are all moving apart from one another.)

Second bit of evidence. Everywhere we look, the universe is warm. Not very warm, but warmer than it should be. Because, when the energy appeared, it was incredibly hot, and as the universe expanded, it cooled to where it is now.

Third piece of evidence: the most abundant element in the universe is hydrogen, out of which stars are formed. When the energy condensed into matter, it condensed into the simplest atoms of all: hydrogen atoms.

And where did this all start? Since the entire universe was at first contained in a single point, it is as right to say it began on Merchantıs Row as any other place. That should put Rutland on the map!

(03/27/08)