First Light

[AlexB23]

How did you know it was my ...

Oh, my last post.

LOL

That was a reference to my IQ.

IQ does not reflect one's intelligence, but I get the joke.

 

[AlexB23]

They let kids post in here?

Haha, yeah. I think ages 16+ here, my brother.

 

[dlamberth]

They let kids post in here?

Your posting. So, yes!

 

[dlamberth]

And after first light, we have first galaxies...

"You could say that these are the first 'direct' images of galaxy formation that we've ever seen."
James Webb Space Telescope spots 3 of our universe's earliest galaxies

 

[AV1611VET]

Your posting. So, yes!

 

[Chesterton]

After the Big Bang, the universe was like a hot soup of particles...

Primordial soups, hot soups...when it comes to studying (i.e., making stuff up about) beginnings, scientists really love soup.

 

[Ophiolite]

Primordial soups, hot soups...when it comes to studying (i.e., making stuff up about) beginnings, scientists really love soup.

It is the well known souper power of science!

 

[Chesterton]

It is the well known souper power of science!

Thing is, I tried this as a schoolkid. A history teacher asked me "what were the causes of the First World War"? I said "Well there were these people, and these other people, and alliances, and it was kind of a soup".

I did not get a good grade.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Thing is, I tried this as a schoolkid. A history teacher asked me "what were the causes of the First World War"? I said "Well there were these people, and these other people, and alliances, and it was kind of a soup".

I did not get a good grade.

Probably because you didn't answer the question.

 

[Chesterton]

Probably because you didn't answer the question.

Exactly.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Exactly.

Which has nothing to do with the use of "soup" as a metaphor.

 

[AV1611VET]

Primordial soups, hot soups...when it comes to studying (i.e., making stuff up about) beginnings, scientists really love soup.

Especially alphabet soup (A C G T).

 

[Chesterton]

Which has nothing to do with the use of "soup" as a metaphor.

My point is that it's just a way of saying nothing, as when scientists and philosophers use the word "emergence". Okay, something emerged. <waiting for details>

There was a soup, and then something happened. <waiting for details>

Don't get me wrong. I'm not criticizing science for not knowing everything. Not knowing is fine. But I find fault with explanations based on wholly vague premises.

 

[AV1611VET]

My point is that it's just a way of saying nothing, as when scientists and philosophers use the word "emergence". Okay, something emerged. <waiting for details>

There was a soup, and then something happened. <waiting for details>

Do you get the impression that faith plays a big part in this?

 

[Hans Blaster]

My point is that it's just a way of saying nothing, as when scientists and philosophers use the word "emergence". Okay, something emerged. <waiting for details>

We know what emerged from the "soup of particles" described in the article -- stuff, all the stuff. This is a solved problem.

There was a soup, and then something happened. <waiting for details>

Start by looking at primordial nucleosynthesis, large scale structure formation, star formation, galaxy formation, etc.

There are far more details than anyone will tolerate in a message board post.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not criticizing science for not knowing everything. Not knowing is fine. But I find fault with explanations based on wholly vague premises.

Your problem seems to be the use of the "soup" metaphor. Would it work better if it said:

"the Universe was an equilibrium distribution of sub-atomic particles at high temperature and density."

Does it make it easier to understand. (It does for me.)

 

[Ophiolite]

Thing is, I tried this as a schoolkid. A history teacher asked me "what were the causes of the First World War"? I said "Well there were these people, and these other people, and alliances, and it was kind of a soup".

I did not get a good grade.

Perhaps the result would have been different if you said "There were these people who were ardently fond of French onion soup and these other people who liked saurkraut soup and some chef from the second group was shot in Sarajevo and everyone moved directly to the second course."

Then again, perhaps not.

 

[Hans Blaster]

Perhaps the result would have been different if you said "There were these people who were ardently fond of French onion soup and these other people who liked saurkraut soup and some chef from the second group was shot in Sarajevo and everyone moved directly to the second course."

Then again, perhaps not.

I thought there was a sandwich or a cafe involved in the success of the assassination. Something about the coincidence of delays for the archduke and the assassin bringing them together for the fateful moment.

 

[dlamberth]

Primordial soups, hot soups...when it comes to studying (i.e., making stuff up about) beginnings, scientists really love soup.

To a layman like myself the use of "hot soup" makes a lot of sense when the full sentence is actually considered.

Here's two of the sentences in full:
"After the Big Bang, the universe was like a hot soup of particles (i.e. protons, neutrons, and electrons). When the universe started cooling, the protons and neutrons began combining into ionized atoms of hydrogen and deuterium."

 

[sjastro]

I'm surprised there are individuals who think their lack of knowledge and understanding is a standard that everyone else (including scientists) adheres to.
The subject of Big Bang Nucleosynthesis has made accurate predictions to the relative abundances of primordial hydrogen and helium in the universe.
What is even more impressive is before protons and neutrons existed (electrons came beforehand being fundamental particles), a quark gluon plasma is postulated to have existed in the time frame 0.000000000001 to 0.000001 seconds after the Big Bang when the universe was extremely hot and dense.

How did we arrive at this; a branch of quantum field theory known as quantum electrodynamics predicted the existence of a quark gluon plasma at extremely high temperatures and density conditions only possible in the early universe or in high energy collisions in particle accelerators.
Quark gluon plasma was discovered by CERN in 2000.
A ten-year journey through the quark–gluon plasma and beyond.

When quark gluon plasma cools a process known as hadronization occurs where protons and neutrons are formed.
Particle accelerator tests effectively reproduced temperature conditions very shortly after the Big Bang when the quark gluon plasma formed followed by the production of protons and neutrons.

Here is non technical popsci description of the quark gluon plasma.