How was space created?

[synergy]

Can someone please explain to my confused, lost mind how space was created?<br />I know about The Big Bang, but what was that inside of?? <br />If the Big bang created space, then where was the big bang when it exploded?<br />Or was space always there, just the Big Bang created all the matter we see and stuff??

 

[kmarinas86]

Something that is outside space and time is unknowable to us. According to theory, space is inflated from 0 volume, to a larger finite volume. That doesn't mean it was created. It might have always existed, always growing from that infinitesimally small volume to its current volume and still growing..<br /><br />However, I think that a fractal is a better description of the universe.

 

[someone_else]

What's a fractal?

 

[kmarinas86]

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=define%3Afractal<br /><br />Definitions of fractal on the Web:<br /><br />Term coined by Benoit Mandelbrot in 1975, referring to objects built using recursion, where some aspect of the limiting object is infinite and another is finite, and where at any iteration, some piece of the object is a scaled down version of the previous iteration (cf Properties of Fractals Discussion, also Plane Figure Fractals Discussion).<br />www.shodor.org/interactivate/dictionary/f.html<br /><br />an object having a fractional dimension; one which has variation that is self-similar at all scales, in which the final level of detail is never reached and never can be reached by increasing the scale at which observations are made.<br />www.forestry.umt.edu/academics/courses/for503/stats_glossary.htm<br /><br />A mathematically generated pattern that is reproducible at any magnification or reduction.<br />www.dpia.org/glossary/f.html<br /><br />A set of data elements, frequently representing the points of a geometric figure, characterized by self affinity (parts resemble the whole) and invariance to scale (having similar attributes at various degrees of analytical precision).<br />www.isigmasystems.com/glossary.html<br /><br />A fractal has statistical self-similarity at all resolutions and is generated by an infinitely recursive process. In reality, those fractals generated by finite processes may exhibit no visible change in detail after some stage so are adequate approximations. So, for computer graphics we can extend the definition to include anything that has a subst

 

[Leovinus]

I think those are unanswerable questions. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[kmarinas86]

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=fractal+universe

 

[someone_else]

Wow...that was a ton of info...can you possibly put into layman's terms for those of us who are just learning...?

 

[bobw]

Benoit Mandelbrot's classic layman's description started off with "How long is the coastline of England?" and went on to show that if you look at a map it is x but if you scale the map it is 2x and if you go on the beach and watch the water go around all the little rocks it is longer still. Eventually the discussion turns to finite volumes enclosed by infinite boundaries. I was mostly interested in the computer graphics applications of it. "A tree is not rectangles, a cloud is not triangles..." or something like it opens his discussion of the fractal geometry of nature. Fractals are pretty complicated math and have a lot of applications.<br /><br />Here's part of the second paragraph from "Fractals Everywhere" by Barnsley:<br /><br />Classical geometry provides a first approximation to the structure of physical objects; it is the language we use to communicate the desighs of technological products, and, very approximately, the forms of natural creations. Fractal geometry is an extension of classical geometry. It can be used to make precise models of physical structures from ferns to galaxies. Fractal geometry is a new language. Once you can speak it, you can describe the shape of a cloud as precisely as an architect can describe a house.<br /><br />I have done some ferns but haven't got the hang of clouds yet <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[someone_else]

Thanks bobw...guess I have my work cut out for me! <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" />

 

[jeremy_swinarton]

I think that everything was created inside the big bang, and space wasn't here before it. If the big bang created space, and everything expands from the point of the big bang outwards, in theory the point where the big bang happened should be the center of the universe. Don't forget that the big bang is only a theory and no one really knows what "started" the universe or if it really began.

 

[aetherius]

Here's a cool link that shows how every point in an expanding universe can be the "center".<br /><br />http://www.exploratorium.edu/hubble/tools/center.html<br /><br />(Hold your mouse on a dot to move the top page.)<br /><br />It seems counter-intuitive that every point can be the center of the universe. I make sense of it by picturing the initial point itself as expanding. (In contrast to picturing expansion around the initial point.)

 

[igorsboss]

A fractal is something that looks the same at big scales as it does on small scales.<br /><br />For example, a small twig can look like a minature version of the big tree that it came from.