Cosmology & the Big Bang Theory

There are "steady state" theories that propose that everything in the universe is pretty much the way it always has been. The steady state theory posits that the universe is contained within a "closed" system, and so the assumption could be made that the universe extends for a vast though finite distance in all directions. However, in 1823 a German cosmologist named Wilhelm Olbers asked the question, "Why is the sky dark at night?" Olbers pointed out that if the universe extended nearly forever and stars were distributed evenly throughout it, we would eventually see a star no matter what direction we looked in. Thus the sky should be bright at night, in contradiction to what we observe (Pasachoff, 1981, 64).

There is also the "big bang" theory, so named because it supposes that at some time in the dim past, all the matter and energy in the universe were contained in one super-dense point. Most of the inconsistencies and observed phenomena that do not support a "steady state" theory of the universe, tend to support the "big bang" theory of the universe. At least that is how cosmologists and scientists construe the f

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on years ago. By using a combination of clues left over from smaller cosmological incidents, the scientific team determined the proximity of the Milky Way to Andromeda, and extrapolated the age of the universe (Cowen, 1995, 392). Conflicts do exist over the age of the universe, and thus the time at which the big bang occurred. Careful measurements of the speed at which the most distant galaxies are moving away from Earth suggest that the universe may be no older than 8 to 12 billion years. On the other hand, astronomers estimate the ages of our galaxy's oldest stars at 13 to 16 billion years (Dating the cosmos, 1995, 151). The reasons that the age of the universe is important, is that the continuity and consistency of matter throughout the universe gives us important clues as to how matter, anti-matter, and energy work to create the world around us. Other Big Bang Implications The big bang model of the universe makes definite predictions about the universe as it exists now. It predicts the formation of nuclei, the relative abundance of certain elements and the existence and exact temperature of radiation left over from the initial explosion that permeates the universe. As recently as 1994, Peter Jakobsen of the European S
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Approximate Word count = 1582
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page)

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