Standard Cosmology and Thermodynamics

[coldcreation]

 

 

I would say that there is simply a conversion from potential energy (stored in the ground-state vacuum reservoir in the form of zero-point energy and zero-point fluctuations, ZPE, ZPF) to available energy. In that way the conservation of energy, or first law of thermodynamics is not violated.

 

So there would be no spontaneous creation of energy out of nothing, just as there would be no destruction of energy, just a trasformation. The total energy of the system remains the same.

 

 

CC your answer sure seems like an attempt at a snow job to me.

 

If you take a look at this, amongst other linkes easily available online, you will note that the early Dirac method of visualizing the vacuum (as an ocean of particle-virtual particle pair popping in and out of existance) is not always the most efficient way of understanding of what is really transpiring. We've come a long way since then.

 

Potential energy can be thought of as energy stored within a physical system. This energy can be released or converted into other forms of energy, including kinetic energy. It is called potential energy because it has the potential to change the states of objects in the system when the energy is released.

 

 

I would also look into Quantum field theory (QFT).

 

This quantum field theory [Dirac. 1927] could be used to model important processes such as the emission of a photon by an electron dropping into a quantum state of lower energy, a process in which the number of particles changes — one atom in the initial state becomes an atom plus a photon in the final state. It is now understood that the ability to describe such processes is one of the most important features of quantum field theory....

 

...A further boost for quantum field theory came with the discovery of the Dirac equation, a single-particle equation obeying both relativity and quantum mechanics, when it was shown that several of its undesirable properties (such as negative-energy states) could be eliminated by reformulating the Dirac equation as a quantum field theory.

 

You might want to peer into this too.

 

 

I snow-job-you not.

 

 

 

CC

[Erasmus00]

CC, I honestly don't know but if it is true that an electron and positron can spontaneously appear from vacuum fluctuations, annihilate, and create a photon wouldn't that be adding energy to the total system from nothing?

 

The answer is, yes, it would. What then is a vacuum fluctuation? The answer is that, in quantum mechanics we have uncertainty, in particular,

[math] \Delta E \Delta t > \frac{\hbar}{2}[/math]

 

This means that the uncertainty in energy can be quite high for very short times, and this uncertain energy can turn right into mass, say for instance, a positron, electron and photon all pop up out of the vacuum, and then annihilate.

 

What can't happen is some random point in space emitting photons.

-Will

[modest]

CC, I honestly don't know but if it is true that an electron and positron can spontaneously appear from vacuum fluctuations, annihilate, and create a photon wouldn't that be adding energy to the total system from nothing?

 

Quite right -

 

Vacuum fluctuations do represent a violation of the conservation of energy, but only for a very brief time (too small a time to measure). The Heisenberg uncertainty principle applies to uncertainty in the energy of the vacuum. As the energy of the vacuum fluctuates on a very small scale so called ‘virtual particles’ pop into existence and back out again. These particles are real as they have real effects - but they can only exist for the shortest of timescales (as the uncertainty principle dictates). Over a real-world scale the fluctuations of energy are balanced and no energy is gained or lost. Whatever energy deficit is created in the vacuum energy by virtual pair creation is instantly paid by pair annihilation. Only on a small planck time and metric scale is there a violation of the conservation of energy.

 

Virtual particles can be made real and long-lasting if they are in the presence of a strong field. But, whatever energy is gained by creating a particle in this system is paid by the system that helps create it. So, the net effect on energy is conservation (as always). An example of this is how real photons can ONLY be created by excited atoms.

 

A vacuum fluctuation is not going to give you a 'real' photon created from nothing (or the vacuum). Such a thing is not described by QED nor is it observed in the real world. If there is any contention on this I’m quite sure I can find sources.

 

Personally, the more I try to work QED the dumber I feel- but I think we are not wrong here.

 

-modest

[modest]

And after posting that I see Erasmus00’s reply which is a more elegant and simple response than mine. I’ll go hide in the corner now. :phones:

[coldcreation]

The answer is, yes, it would. What then is a vacuum fluctuation? The answer is that, in quantum mechanics we have uncertainty, in particular,

[math] Delta E Delta t > frac{hbar}{2}[/math]

 

This means that the uncertainty in energy can be quite high for very short times, and this uncertain energy can turn right into mass, say for instance, a positron, electron and photon all pop up out of the vacuum, and then annihilate.

 

What can't happen is some random point in space emitting photons.

-Will

 

Problems arrize when the something from nothing concept is employed in the context of the entire universe, cosmology, as was shown in the openning post of this thread (see Evidence for the Big Bang; first law). Indeed the extrapolation is massive, metaphysical.

 

Vaccum fluctuation are small, extremely small (see Casimir force). These fluctuations, also known as ground-state energy fluctuations of zero-point fluctuations of zero-point energy (ZPF of ZPE) are the minimum allowable (potential and available) energy in the vaccum.

 

It is well known that extrapolations involving the energy of the quantum mechanical vacuum has exposed the greatest scientific blunder of all times. It followed the conclusion that the vacuum energy was (greater than) 120 orders of magnitude more than the energy density in all other forms of matter in the entire universe: The greatest blunder indeed.

 

So the idea that the universe began as a quantum fluctuation (postulated based on the Dirac particle-virtual particle pairs popping in and out of the vacuum) leading to the concept that something (not just all the matter and energy in the universe but the universe itself, including spacetime) came from nothing (so as not to violate the first law of thermodynamics, energy conservation) and subsequently would expand like at precisley the right velocity, like a gas (until 1998 where it began to accelerated beyond even Hubble's laws wildest dreams) is absolutely unfounded, non-scientific, chimerical.

 

The energy of the vacuum is simply too small.

 

 

Yet this is how the big bang is perceived. It recalls a time when an unfilled tummy somehow gorged itself on a copious free lunch of roast, anti-roast, and burped out radiation first, then light elements, hot air (gas) and fortuitously heaved chunks of plasma.

 

Then with cold laughter the table of values was smashed, like an overloaded camel carrying the burning straw of knowledge into the bitter desert night. The big bang was the creator, victim of its own law, who sought fellow-creators, those who inscribe new values, new laws, on new tables. And even today its spirit still lives above the law; remaining on guard against the learned!

 

Where am I going astray?

 

 

 

 

CC

[Erasmus00]

The problem is when this concept of something coming from nothing is use in the context of the entire universe, cosmology, as was shown in the openning post of this thread (see Evidence for the Big Bang article. first law).

 

I don't claim the article is correct in what it is implying. The proper explanation involves a modern understanding of the first law. We recognize today that the first law is really a mathematical consequence of symmetry. What the first law is telling you is that the laws of physics are the same today as they were yesterday and they'll be the same tomorrow. In other words, now is not a special time.

 

HOWEVER, IF the universe had a beginning, then (by definition) that beginning was a special place in time. This forces non-conservation of energy!

 

Variable speed of light theories have a similar non-conservation of energy- the laws of physics (speed of light) change with time so energy isn't conserved.

-Will

[Buffy]

HOWEVER, IF the universe had a beginning, then (by definition) that beginning was a special place in time. This forces non-conservation of energy!

I have always preferred to view this "special case" as not at all special: the beginning was the one time--at least so far--when the universe was not a closed system, and thus would by definition not be breaking the conservation law.

 

Maybe it was really The Big Suck,

Buffy

[Erasmus00]

I have always preferred to view this "special case" as not at all special: the beginning was the one time--at least so far--when the universe was not a closed system, and thus would by definition not be breaking the conservation law.

 

 

I'm not sure if I agree. Allowing for conservation of energy at the beginning implies that time translation symmetry is valid, which seems to me to imply some sort of big crunch situation. This seems overly constraining for a model.

 

Plus, it skirts the issue of what we mean by conservation law. I've always been rather annoyed by the way that conservation laws are presented in intro physics/mechanics books. I feel that they are introduced as consequences of Newton's laws, and somewhat mysterious mathematical formulas. I prefer what I feel is the more physical approach of showing that conservation laws follow from symmetries. Hence, its not at all mysterious (for instance) that both particles AND electromagnetic fields can carry momentum (both have translation symmetry).

-Will

[HydrogenBond]

There is a simple consideration that allows the universe to form without energy or matter. If we look at EM energy, one of the basic relationships is that wavelength times frequency will equal the speed of light. If we increase frequency, the wavelength will fall to maintain the C product.

 

If you look at infinite wavelength energy, this can never multiply out to C. Infinity times zero can be anything one wants it to be. As such, infinite wavelength energy is a misnomer, and is not technically energy or matter. So if the universe began with this stuff, the universe would begin without energy or matter.

 

To get energy, we need to reduce that infinite wavelength to something finite so it can once again multiply to C. This requires relativity. If it goes to C, it would appear to be contracted within a point. So we need to back off to C-. This will be better and finite. But since this is less than C, it would have to become matter.

 

The question is, does the relativity contain energy. Since this particle was originally defined as energy, it is already going at C. So all we need to do is get it to go slower. This is going to be endothermic, so this not-energy can gain energy to become energy-matter. To maintain zero energy in the universe, there needs to be a reflection at C+. Theoretically, this is a good way to gather all the infinite wavelength not-energy, since time and space get mess up, with respect to infinite and point. The C+ isn't energy either, since it is going faster than the speed of light. So the C+ reflection and all the not-energy, cause energy to appear, where neither matter or energy once existed. One is still dealing with potentials, but not mass-energy potentials.

[HydrogenBond]

There is a simple consideration that allows the universe to form without energy or matter. If we look at EM energy, one of the basic relationships is that wavelength times frequency will equal the speed of light. If we increase frequency, the wavelength will fall to maintain the C product.

 

If you look at infinite wavelength energy, this can never multiply out to C. Infinity times zero can be anything one wants it to be. As such, infinite wavelength energy is a misnomer, and is not technically energy or matter. So if the universe began with this stuff, the universe would begin without energy or matter.

 

To get energy, we need to reduce that infinite wavelength to something finite so it can once again multiply to C. This requires relativity. If it goes to C, it would appear to be contracted within a point. So we need to back off to C-. This will be better and finite. But since this is less than C, it would have to become matter.

 

The question is, does the relativity contain energy. Since this particle was originally defined as energy, it is already going at C. So all we need to do is get it to go slower. This is going to be endothermic, so this not-energy can gain energy to become energy-matter. To maintain zero energy in the universe, there needs to be a reflection at C+. Theoretically, this is a good way to gather all the infinite wavelength not-energy, since time and space get mess up, with respect to infinite and point. The C+ isn't energy either, since it is going faster than the speed of light. So the C+ reflection and all the not-energy, cause energy to appear, where neither matter or energy once existed. One is still dealing with potentials, but not mass-energy potentials.

[Buffy]

I'm not sure if I agree. Allowing for conservation of energy at the beginning implies that time translation symmetry is valid, which seems to me to imply some sort of big crunch situation. This seems overly constraining for a model.

...or a multi-verse model, which is the direction I lean!

 

I can see how this would put constraints on the model, but ultimately that may be the way toward a structure of negative t.

 

There is a fascinating article titled "The Great Cosmic Roller-Coaster Ride" in this month's (Nov 2007) SciAm that discusses how string theory might explain the Big Bang. Basic thesis is that the "energy source" is the collision of a brane and an anti-brane in a Calabi-Yau multi-verse...to me that's not as constraining as it would be if the only alternative were a canonical Big Crunch/single-verse.

Plus, it skirts the issue of what we mean by conservation law. I've always been rather annoyed by the way that conservation laws are presented in intro physics/mechanics books. I feel that they are introduced as consequences of Newton's laws, and somewhat mysterious mathematical formulas. I prefer what I feel is the more physical approach of showing that conservation laws follow from symmetries.

I totally agree with you on this. Unfortunately symmetry--which is so fundamental to the way modern physics models work--is still seen as somehow an "advanced topic" that you should only get if you're a physics major, and that you ought to make everyone start with a Newtonian view, as if everything after that is built on it (which it ain't!).

 

Breaking symmetries is easy with my handy-dandy Pocket-Entropy,

Buffy

[LaurieAG]

Hi CC,

 

Vaccum fluctuation are small, extremely small (see Casimir force). These fluctuations, also known as ground energy fluctuations of zero-point fluctuations of zero-point energy (ZPF of ZPE) are the minimum allowable (potential and available) energy in the vaccum.

 

Considering that some current exotic particle detectors are based on large underground reservoirs with photon detectors and an absolute vacuum is something that we'll never see, surely we cannot discount actions involving this absolutely certain mass content in any experimental vacuum?

 

It would be interesting to see if these fluctuations fluctuate in proportion to the amount of mass in the test vacuum.

[modest]

So the idea that the universe began as a quantum fluctuation (postulated based on the Dirac particle-virtual particle pairs popping in and out of the vacuum) leading to the concept that something (not just all the matter and energy in the universe but the universe itself, including spacetime) came from nothing (so as not to violate the first law of thermodynamics, energy conservation) and subsequently would expand like at precisley the right velocity, like a gas (until 1998 where it began to accelerated beyond even Hubble's laws wildest dreams) is absolutely unfounded, non-scientific, chimerical.

 

The energy of the vacuum is simply too small.

 

 

Yet this is how the big bang is perceived. It recalls a time when an unfilled tummy somehow gorged itself on a copious free lunch of roast, anti-roast, and burped out radiation first, then light elements, hot air (gas) and fortuitously heaved chunks of plasma.

 

Then with cold laughter the table of values was smashed, like an overloaded camel carrying the burning straw of knowledge into the bitter desert night. The big bang was the creator, victim of its own law, who sought fellow-creators, those who inscribe new values, new laws, on new tables. And even today its spirit still lives above the law; remaining on guard against the learned!

 

Where am I going astray?

 

You post railing arguments against the Big Bang Theory based on scraps and tidbits of concepts that have no part in the BBT. Any quote or misunderstood concept no matter how inapplicable is presented as not only directly related to BBT but evidence against it. This entire thread is based on what CragD pointed out may well be a proofreading mishap! It’s like a PR agent who will say anything to change public perception. Unfortunately this kind of thing works. It only takes a few Halton Arps and suddenly a large portion of the public think relativity and BBT are witchcraft.

 

Tryon’s free lunch ‘theory’ is part of big accident quantum cosmology - NOT the big bang theory. BBT does not affirm that the universe was created by nothing much less a quantum fluctuation. You might as well criticize BBT because “big fizz cosmology” claims that an infinite number of universes are created by and co-exist within infinite superspacetime. Or that pure oscillation cosmologies postulate a single infinitely long strand of consecutive universes - each giving rise to the next. But, this will have absolutely no bearing on BBT.

 

Adding to this you completely misrepresent the free lunch and big accident origin theory. You say that a vacuum fluctuation is too small to create our universe. This is a complete lack of understanding of the theory. It is not a vacuum fluctuation inside our space-time that people like Tryon and Stenger propose began the universe but a quantum fluctuation of "the vacuum of some larger space in which our Universe is embedded" (Tryon, 1973, p397) “generating our universe and pehaps countless others very different from ours” (Stenger)

 

In any case, the validity of BBT is not tied to quantum cosmology.

 

And how is it worse for the first law of thermodynamics to have matter and energy created once in a singularity when the laws of physics have broken down versus a Hoyle or coldcreation position that the total existing amount of mass/energy in the universe is constantly increasing? You might as well argue that any existing universe violates conservation because it is not nothing. It’s silly.

[coldcreation]

...

Maybe it was really The Big Suck

 

 

...as opposed to a Big Blow?

 

 

 

...or a multi-verse model, which is the direction I lean! [...]

 

 

There is absolutely zero empirical evidence to support the multiverse model; nor is there any qualitative or quantitative necessity for it.

 

 

 

 

 

Mr. Creation

[coldcreation]

...snip...

 

And how is it worse for the first law of thermodynamics to have matter and energy created once in a singularity when the laws of physics have broken down versus a Hoyle or coldcreation position that the total existing amount of mass/energy in the universe is constantly increasing? You might as well argue that any existing universe violates conservation because it is not nothing. It’s silly.

 

 

 

Essentially, it appears that something is either missing or something has surpassed the sphere of physical science treacherously entering the domain of science fiction. Ilya Prigogine had taken a rather unambiguous stance on the issue:

 

“The standard model, which dominates the field of cosmology today, asserts that if we go backward in time, we would arrive at a singularity, a point that contains the totality of the energy and matter in the universe. However the model does not enable us to describe this singularity because the laws of physics cannot be applied to a point corresponding to an infinite density of matter and energy. It is no wonder that John Archibald Wheeler speaks of the big bang as confronting us “with the greatest crisis in physics.” Can we accept the big bang as a real event with laws of nature that are time reversible and deterministic?” He then proceeds with “the problems of measurement and irreversibility, but now in the cosmological context.” (Prigogine 1996)

 

 

 

CC

[coldcreation]

You post railing arguments against the Big Bang Theory based on scraps and tidbits of concepts that have no part in the BBT... This entire thread is based on what CragD pointed out may well be a proofreading mishap!

 

A "proofreading mishap" certainly not!

 

 

It’s like a PR agent who will say anything to change public perception.

 

He whom you imply is a PR agent is Björn Feuerbacher (and his associate Ryan Scranton), a physicist.

 

Unfortunately this kind of thing works. It only takes a few Halton Arps and suddenly a large portion of the public think... BBT are witchcraft.

 

It would be no overstatement to affirm that Halton Arp has put a dent in the expanding universe hypothesis by bringing to light a devastating quantity of observational evidence that directly contradict the big bang predictions, notably those of the Hubble law. As a result, Halton Arp has already achieved the status of scientific immortality—for a small minority that is: The moral majority however, would prefer to consider his work scientific mortality. The astronomer Halton Arp will undoubtedly go down in history as having led the most important one-man crusade that will have caused the downfall of explosion cosmology.

 

The observational evidence that Arp has amassed throughout the years, arguably denies legitimacy of the expanding cosmos premise. As a result, the name Halton Arp indubitably makes the features cringe, of those fervent believers of the standard models. Halton Arp is one of the most (if not the most) experienced observational astronomers, and an expert in galaxies and quasars—he worked with Edwin Hubble and graduated from Caltech in 1953 with Sandage. Arp began to report discordant redshifts for peculiar galaxies and quasars as early as the 1960s, and has persistently led the campaign of big bang-opponents with a large number of papers packed with observational data that disputedly contradict Hubble’s law.

 

It only takes one Halton Arp.

 

 

 

Tryon’s free lunch ‘theory’ is part of big accident quantum cosmology - NOT the big bang theory. BBT does not affirm that the universe was created by nothing much less a quantum fluctuation. You might as well criticize BBT because “big fizz cosmology” claims that an infinite number of universes are created by and co-exist within infinite superspacetime. Or that pure oscillation cosmologies postulate a single infinitely long strand of consecutive universes - each giving rise to the next. But, this will have absolutely no bearing on BBT.

 

This is true, However, many physicists believed that with an accurate particle theory, the new inflationary model could lead to a truthful prediction for the density inhomogeneities, but all efforts at conceptual shorthand fell flat. For the past couple of decades, small armies of particle physicists have been working on radical theories (e.g., string theory, superstring theory, M-theory). They're more right-brain, more creative than standard particle theories. I see them as art entertainment. There is a definite shift in the design strategy. Compared with observational or experimental physics it is almost anti-research. There is no pressure from competing theories because there’s no way to prove them wrong, no way to test them. Yet they seem somehow to have passed peer review.

 

 

Adding to this you completely misrepresent the free lunch and big accident origin theory. You say that a vacuum fluctuation is too small to create our universe. This is a complete lack of understanding of the theory. It is not a vacuum fluctuation inside our space-time that people like Tryon and Stenger propose began the universe but a quantum fluctuation of "the vacuum of some larger space in which our Universe is embedded" (Tryon, 1973, p397) “generating our universe and pehaps countless others very different from ours” (Stenger)

 

In the modern era the only promising way to counter a new world-view you despise is to pole vault it. You discard your old ideas (along with a few friends in the process), flying over the new theory, landing on your feet far beyond it, looking back at it, and say: Sorry to disappoint you science fiction freaks, but you ain’t seen nothing yet, I have the latest, spanking-new-fresh-off-the-press theory way out here. This would dawn on Hawking soon.

 

Guth could assault the big bang precisely because he was saying “Yo, my theory is better and newer.” At no time, however, does Guth attack the premise of Hawking’s big bang. He accepts fundamentally the entire foundation of the theory as built by its proponents: The void, the broken symmetry, the cataclysmic explosion, primordial creation of the light elements, the CMB is still the Mind of God, and redshift z is a Doppler effect (or similarly, space expansion) governed by the Hubble Law.

 

In any case, the validity of BBT is not tied to quantum cosmology.

That too is true.

 

For example, the Hartle-Hawking concept—where the void was a classical vacuum “ground state” with a Schrodinger-like wave-function description of the entire universe, thus avoiding the big bang singularity, reducing it to an artifact of a classical description—is nothing more nor nothing less than influenced and inspired indirectly by extreme relativity with an intravenous quantum infusion—commonly and whimsically referred to as quantum cosmology—a concept that lies beyond the extreme periphery of science, at the sharp edge of speculation.

 

And how is it worse for the first law of thermodynamics to have matter and energy created once in a singularity when the laws of physics have broken down, versus a Hoyle or Coldcreation position that the total existing amount of mass/energy in the universe is constantly increasing? You might as well argue that any existing universe violates conservation because it is not nothing. It’s silly.

 

The Hoyle or Coldcreation positions are unfortunately beyond the scope of this thread. For that discussion refer to Thermodynamics and Cosmology.

 

However, regarding the violation of the first law of thermodynamics where matter and energy are "created once in a singularity when the laws of physics have broken down," I would say that observations do not permit any other interpretation within the scope of big bang cosmology (but I could be wrong).

 

 

 

 

 

CC

[HydrogenBond]

One question one needs to ask is, does gravity give off energy? The other three forces, when they act, give off energy. As such, one would expect that gravity should also give off energy, if we assume it is a force. One obvious loss of energy potential, induced by gravity, is connected to entropy. In other words, if we started with a cloud of hydrogen and made a star, the entropy within the original hydrogen has to decrease, implying the free energy, that had been contained within the entropy of all the hydrogen, was given off due to the affect of the gravitational force.

 

If we took the current universe and compressed it to a point, all the free energy within the current universe's entropy will be lost. As far as I know, nobody has ever measured energy being given off by gravity, even though the free energy within the original entropy has to decrease.The next question becomes, where is this energy going if we don't measure it?

 

For the primordial atom to expand, we need to pump in entropy. As long as it remains highly orderred, it will just stay like it is. Since gravity can lower entropy, then it logically follows, the addition of entropy should act like anti-gravity, i.e., reciprical type affect, with no measureable energy connection between the two.

 

The simplest way to do this is with C+. Think of it, at faster than C, the laws of physics at C and below, no longer apply, exactly. C+ would create a chaos with respect to the normal laws of physics, i.e., entropy. With C+, the present may be the past and the here may be over there. Gravity by acting to remove the entropy could be neutralizng the affect of C+, so we don't measure this energy potential going into the universe.

 

If you look at the forces of nature, they are all attractive and therefore all act in a way that will cause matter to decrease its entropy. If the universe was formed by C+, then the forces act to lower the C+ toward C. Matter is below C. Matter provides more degrees of freedom for entropy than does energy. In other words, an energy quanta can do, maybe one thing. But a chunk of matter has an endless number of possible things it can do. So if one neutralized all the entropy so C+ equals C, then this would imply that all the matter would also have to go to C, to removed all its freedom.

 

As I discussed in an earlier post, infinite wavelength energy is not energy, since the product of wavelength and frequency does not equal C. But at the same time, it travels at C. Being the smallest possible quanta, it has only one degree of freedom. In other words, being at the bottom of the barrel and not being energy, it is sort of useless with respect to entropy. All it can do is travel at C.

 

If we pumped in entropy via C+, these will absorb energy and start to increase their degrees of entropy freedom. If we made of curve of degrees of entropy freedom increasing, the energy will get hotter. Eventually energy can only go so far up the curve. Next we need to add matter, but it has to start out very restricted, so the graph doesn't just jump but stays continuous. This may require the energy lose freedom and begin to concentrate to one area to compensate for the boost in matter's higher degree of freedom. This keeps the curve straight and continuous. Then the matter gains more degrees of freedom, i.e.., big boom. Again, the potential is C+, such that, here is there, and now is then.