Is The Universe Hollow?

[Captain Spod]

If we accept that the big bang happened and everything is still travelling outward from its origin, should we expect that there would be a region of space completely empty of matter, and for this void to be getting bigger all the time? If not, then the only explanation I can think of is that I am being a bit naïve in expecting the big bang to have happened 'somewhere', but it's all my poor brain can manage.
Thanks,
CS

[naomi24]

Khandro, //it is folly to waste time and resources on idle speculation.//

Your statement applied to religion would have made perfect sense. However since you've applied it to science, it doesn't. Had men and women of science not speculated, just imagine what might have been lost to us.

[Clanad]

It seems to me that to speculate individual universes "residing" in their own "Black Holes" calls into doubt the most mystifying aspect of Black Hole descriptions... that being the graviational forces within (and even approaching the event horizon) are so strong that not even light can escape. Therefore, anything exuding light within a Black Hole would be unobservable and anyone "living" within the Black Hole would be unable to observe anything out side.

Having said that, the accelration of the expansion (Inflation) of the universe that occurred at about 10-^43 seconds after the initial "Big Bang" exceeded the speed of light for some unknown reason. It lasted an for an infintesimally short period of time.

At that point, light didn't actually exist... the first "light" didn't emerge until around 400,000 "years" after the Big Bang onset... at which "time" recombination caused the cooling atoms to form an electrically neutral gas matter which , today we can still detect as the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation. It then took another 300 million to 400 million years for light emerge from the "cosmic dark ages (NASA's term), since stars had not yet formed to give off light.

This event had the parallell effect of slowing the expansion rate of space due to the objects forming be able to pull on each other graviationally...

[Khandro]

naomi; There's all kinds of science, making chemical weapons, for example, is science.

[naomi24]

Khandro, now you're being silly again.

[THECORBYLOON]

If we are in a black hole, would we not be seeing things coming toward us rather than everything going away from us?

[mibn2cweus]

//If we are in a black hole, would we not be seeing things coming toward us rather than everything going away from us?//

Size increases and density decreases within as black holes acquire additional mass. As near as can be determined our universe has roughly the density appropriate for a black hole of similar size. If our universe is a feeding black hole, that might offer some explanation for its continued and variable rate of expansion.

[Old_Geezer]

Aye it is amazing how evolution can develop intellect with uses way beyond the survival advantages that actually caused it to develop. But I don't see why I should assume that means it will always be less than needed to understand things. I'll believe that when proven.

And in any case what we might find difficult to 'grasp' might be possible for the computing machines we build to 'grasp'. In which case we would understand it by proxy. Feed in the question, get the answer out. Might even be 42 if we are lucky.

[Khandro]

OG;// I don't see why I should assume that means it [intellect ]will always be less than needed to understand things. I'll believe that when proven.//

I know what you are saying, and it is impossible to imagine that things exist which we cannot imagine (if you see what i mean), and we are now doing many things which no single brain could achieve, so by a combination of brain-joining and computer technology, we might indeed understand the vastness of the universe we occupy, but, with the problems we are facing here, what would we gain I wonder?

I think we are equating the exploration of space as if it was a natural extension of the exploration of Earth. There is purposeful science - trying to find new forms of energy and removing poverty etc. - and there is what I would call 'science for science's sake', to which you will no doubt say they are not mutually exclusive, a point I would have to take, while remaining aware of the distinction :0)

[Old_Geezer]

I feel that knowledge is its own reward.

I also frequently contemplate the question of what is important, especially with regards to us and what we do. And I tend to be unable to find anything that can not be dismissed as unimportant in the bigger picture (even if lots of things seem important to us during our day). I suspect the pursuit of knowledge is at least as worthy as anything else.

[naomi24]

OG, //I suspect the pursuit of knowledge is at least as worthy as anything else. //

I agree.

[Hypognosis]

@mibs

//As we compare redshifts in more distant galaxies, the rate of expansion appears to decrease (to a point) with distance which implies that the rate of expansion has accelerated in more recent times.//

Thanks. Even Brian Cox's various shows glossed over this seemingly uncomplicated fact, leaving the viewer having to merely accept the point about acceleration.

I am often more interested in "how did scientists work that out?" than the "wow, look at this amazing thing" routine, which is what TV documentaries have descended to doing.

[mibn2cweus]

If there's only one thing I find more important than knowledge to the advancement of establishing our rightful place in reality it's comprehension and understanding. Knowledge, apart from how to integrate that knowledge into the overall picture if often a dangerous thing.