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.

It is preferred that religious ideas / theories not be a large part of one's post.

[DoorM4n]

hahahah, well I would have totally thrown in how God is the creator... but you politely asked not to include religion.

Here is my explanation.

Humans are not flawless. Scientists are humans. Therefore, scientists are prone to making mistakes just as likely as any other human is.

We trust scientists that their information is 100% correct, subconsciously. We love scientists cause they can tell us stuff that we didn't know. I can be gullible and a skeptic pretty often but I usually tend to stay pretty neutral here.

We don't know and we will never know man. It is a question that will never be answered correctly unless somebody get correct.

My philosophy is that humans do not know everything for their own sake. It is ignorant to think that science can prove the veracity of the question. I believe that is blatantly dumb to believe that we know everything. We don't even know what is 7 miles below the sea level--in the Mariana Trench. I believe that the truth is beyond out normal world. I certainly believe that things are too perfectly matched in the world to have been taken place through evolution. There are other forces in the universe will never see until we pass on or maybe not. (depending on what you believe) What came first? The chicken or the egg; and how many?~XZ~42~It is the universal question. I believe there are things we will never know for certain reasons. Certain good reasons.

[xxpenguinxx]

Why are we worrying about this?

And who cares if the chicken or the egg came first, as long as we have both life's good. Eggs to eat and chickens to lay them, but don't eat them all we need some chickens left to lay more.

[Dragonfire]

Why are we worrying about this?

I was actually wondering the same thing when i saw this thread. Not to bash, but whats the point of it?

[Aumaan Anubis]

King: Hey, everybody, I am God.

Dude1: Hey, wait... what about...

Dude2: Dude, don't worry about it. ALL HAIL THE KING GOD!

[OwnZ joO]

Matter can be destroyed in nuclear reactions, but I think energy comes out of it if I remember correctly.

I didn't do this, but I would look into the big bang, I'm sure they have to have some explanation for their theory of how everything was created, or else it wouldn't make sense that the universe is expanding when matter can't be created.

[JacksonCougar]

They can explain everything right up to the smallest fraction of time you can imagine to the big bang event. At the actual time of the event? Some believe it may have been a "god", or something outside of current human understanding of the universe.

[DemonicSandwich]

Matter can be destroyed in nuclear reactions, but I think energy comes out of it if I remember correctly.

Even then matter is still not destroyed. Nuclear reactions such as that in the atomic bomb produce the massive energy by breaking up the atoms within into their protons and neutrons.

[Zieon Eslador]

Aumaan, you know about the "Big Rip" theory? Apparently about 100 billion years from now the energy that is holding together every atom and every quark and whatever is smaller will finally be exhausted and two of the four forces of nature will cease to exist, that will leave electromagnetism and gravity. I'm thinking that with only those two left everything will eventually find it's way back together and after compressing for another couple billion years and a new Big Bang will be born, but that still doesn't answer any of your original questions... And now I have a headache...

[Aumaan Anubis]

I was unaware of the 'lack of energy' aspect of the theory. I had glanced at it awhile back. All I got from it was that the universe would eventually start to compress after gravity slowed the velocity of the expansion of the universe, until it began to compress. Then of course, that leads to a second Big Bang.
But yes, as mentioned, that has absolutely nothing to do with the topic.

However, that brings up another idea. I, as most people have, have understood that in terms of time of the universe, we are probably the tick of a second on a 24 hour clock. However difficult that may be to conceive, imagine the idea that this 'cycle' of big bang, compression, big bang, compression, has occured multiple times? For instance, perhaps this is the 5th time that the big bang has occured. The overwhelming sense of uselessness and futility of our existence is particularly strong when I imagine that. Humans have believed that we could escape normal danger by colonizing other planets. But the universe coming back together and rapidly compressing every human to the size of an ant is... I don't know. And to think that all of the technical accomplishments of our history has already been done in past cycles of the big bang, compression, cycle? It's reincarnation. We are living what possibly past civilizations have already gone through.
Dang, this brings up a whole new set of philosophical and scientific questions for me.
DARN YOU ZIEON!

[Zieon Eslador]

I = sad.

Good luck with your new questions.