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--------- #1294 - How the Universe was Formed
- In the beginning there was only energy. But, if you take 90,000,000,000 joules of energy ( A joule is a kilogram * meters^2 / seconds^2) you can create 1 kilogram of matter. One joule of energy. E = m*c^2 , where the speed of light squared is (3*10^8 meters / second)^2. The Universe started with a concentrated spot of only energy. There was no space for the spot and time and not started yet. But, out of this “ spot” of energy came a creation and an expansion of space and time.
- Attachment - Big Bang
- In the first second of the expansion and cooling the four forces emerged. First gravity, then the strong and weak nuclear forces , then the electromagnetic force. In just 60 seconds the Universe was 1,000,000,000,000,000 miles in diameter and still as hot as 10,000,000,000 degrees. It was a nuclear furnace that produced matter according to E=mc^2 and all the hydrogen, helium, and lithium in the Universe was born.
- In the first 3 minutes all the matter in the Universe was produced in the form of the lighter elements. Space, time, energy and matter began to expand throughout creating the Universe that is still expanding after 13,750,000,000 years.
- First there was nothing, then you have a Universe. How amazing. Will the Universe expand forever, or will it somehow reverse course and start contracting back to nothing again?
- In order to further explain why the Universe we see today is so uniform, homogeneous, and geometrically flat we have to introduce the concept of Cosmic Inflation. Right when the four forces were emerging out the Big Bang the Universe went through a brief inflation faster than the speed of light. It doubled in size every 10^-34 seconds. This only lasted a short time, only 10^-30 seconds, but, during that time the Universe grew by 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times.
- During the period of matter creation 10^79 photons, 10^79 protons, 10^79 electrons, 10^79 neutrons were produced. They were catapulted into space in a plasma of ionized particles. It took 380,000 years before the expansion and cooling allowed the strong and weak nuclear forces and the electromagnetic force to create the first neutral atoms of the lightest elements. When this happened the electromagnetic energy of photons escaped the plasma.
- It is this first burst of electromagnetic energy that surrounds us today. It causes the static on your television and gets received as the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation. It started out as high energy Gamma Rays, traveled over 13,750,000,000 lightyears of distance and got stretched by expanding space to microwave wavelengths. It started out at 3,000 degrees and has cooled to 2.75 degrees Kelvin today. Which tells us that the Universe has expanded by a factor of 1,000 since then.
- It is hard to appreciate how fortunate all these numbers happened to turn out. If they were even the slightest bit different we could not exist. The Universe to support stars, galaxies, and life would not have happened. Everything had to be precisely right to create what we have today.
- The Universe is enormous. Somehow space curves in a way to allow it to be boundless and infinite. In other words there is no edge to space. There is no edge to the Universe. Space appears flat to us because it is so large. We see the flat part of a curved surface. It somehow appears the same to everyone no matter where they are in the Universe. Everything to everyone appears to be expanding away as if they are viewing it from the center. But, the Universe has no center. There is nothing beyond the Universe. The only space that exists is the space the Universe creates as it expands. Objects that are not held together by gravity are being separated by expanding space. The galaxies are forever flying apart or are merging, nothing in between.
- The Universe is bigger that we can ever see. The speed of light puts a limit on how far we can see. We have to wait till the light gets here. Therefore, we can not see beyond 13,750,000,000 lightyears. Light has traveled at 670,633,500 miles per hour over that entire time. The Observable Universe to us is only 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles across. If you look further you have to wait for the light to reach us.
- A period at the end of this sentence contains 500,000,000,000 protons. If you had atomic tweezers and you could pick yourself apart one atom at a time would could produce a pile of atoms weighing 154 pounds, if that is what you weigh when you started.
----------- The elements in the pile of atoms would be:
------------ oxygen ------------------ 95 pounds
------------ carbon ------------------ 356 pounds
------------ hydrogen --------------- 15 pounds
------------ nitrogen------------------ 4 pounds
------------ calcium ------------------ 2.2 pounds ( 35 ounces )
------------ phosphorus -------------- 27 ounces
------------ sulfur ------------------ 5 ounces
------------ sodium----------------- 3.5 ounces
------------ chlorine --------------- 3.4 ounces
------------ magnesium------------ .67 ounces
------------ iron------------------ .15 ounces
------------ fluorine -------------- .09 ounces
------------ zinc ------------------ .08 ounces
------------ silicon --------------- .04 ounces
- The pile of atoms would not be alive. But, it would be all the same elements. It is just a pile of atomic dust. A gust of wind would blow it away and all those elements would start making something else, water, rocks, sand, snails, bugs, or plants, who knows?
- If you could reassemble those atoms back together again to make you again, what a miracle!
- Mother Earth is the only planet we know that has managed to assemble atoms in this way to produce life. Of course it took a long time, say 4,500,000,000 years Somehow it produced life that is you. It produced a lot of other life too. 99.99% of all the life produced on Earth has become extinct. The average species only lasted 4,000,000 years.
Today we there are 1,900,000 species left that we have been discovered.
The total is likely ---------------- 8,800,000 species
------------------------------------ 6,500,000 are land species
------------------------------------ 2,200,000 are ocean species
------------------------------------ 7,800,000 are animals
------------------------------------ 611,000 are fungi
------------------------------------ 300,000 are plants.
------------------------------------ 1 is us.
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(1) From Bill Bryon’s “ A short history of everything.”
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