The Big Bang Theory is an explanation for the beginning of the universe. The universe today is expanding, as can be seen in the way all matter is moving outward. Tracing this movement back through time takes all matter to a single point, leading to the view that at one time all matter was concentrated in a singularity which for some unknown reason exploded, throwing all material now seen in the universe outward from that central point. There are various corollaries to this theory, such as the issue of whether the expanding universe will continue to expand forever or will eventually reach an end point and fall back on itself. There are also various consequences of the Big Bang which can be used to determine if the theory has validity. A number of researchers have examined aspects of the Big Bang theory and developed ideas related to it.
Davies (1991) discusses the issue of the Big Bang and some of the erroneous notions that are held concerning it. Davies notes the evidence that shows that the universe is expanding and then takes the reader back to the beginning to see where this expansion started. There are many different factors to be considered in this cosmological model, including the rate of expansion, whether the expansion has been uniform or not, and other issues that affect how we view the universe today, in its past, and in its future. The issue of what existed before the universe has been seen by many cosmologists to lie outside their field, but Davies tackles the issue and shows how an answer relates to quantum mechanics. The subject is complex and inconclusive as yet, but the direction of investigation is clear from this article and points the way to further research.
Ralph Alpher and George Gamow developed the idea of the Big Bang in the 1940s. They first focused on the point when the universe had cooled to a state consisting of radiation and matter, or ylem, Greek for the primordial stuff of life. They ...