Human beings have always thought in terms of a beginning and an end to everything, from waking up in the morning to going to sleep, from starting a job to resigning, from birth to death. In contrast, the origins of the universe may not be so simple. In fact, there may have never been a beginning to the universe. What if the universe has always existed? Can we wrap our minds around this? A new theory based on “quantum corrections” seeks to explain the universe as finite and therefore infinite. Quantum corrections can be thought of as a cosmological constant term which does not require dark energy.
The universe is thought to have evolved out of a “Big Bang” or a theory that everything in existence is thought to have occupied a single infinitely dense point, or singularity until that began to expand, some 13.8 billion years ago. This theory is consistent with Einstein’s theory of relativity in mathematics. The problem with the “Big Bang” is that it allows for a logical explanation of what followed from this singularity but not for what occurred before that.
Maybe a better way to wrap our minds around this new theory is if we took a clock and began rewinding it. Would there be a beginning? Does there have to be a cause and effect for something to actually exist.
Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-02-big-quantum-equation-universe.html#jCp
