# How much of me came from the Big Bang? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 30, 2013, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477 "2013-12-30T13:42:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/41 "2013-12-31T15:39:41Z")
> [@ZenBeam](#): > > The constituent protons and neutrons were created in the Big Bang, but I’d say that the _Helium_ wasn’t created until the nuclei with two protons were made. In your analogy, you talk about isopropyl alcohol being “made”, not about it already existing when when the petroleum is pumped from a well. I suppose it comes down to the semantic difference between “came from” and “derived from” ultimately. Every element ultimately derives from the Big Bang, in that everything (matter and energy) came from the Big Bang, but not all elements were created in the Big Bang. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/42 "2013-12-31T15:53:58Z")
> [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](#): > > I think, especially since these two bits seem to be in contradiction otherwise, that in the first paragraph you meant to talk about _mass_ where you said _matter_. Because matter obviously can be converted into energy and be created from it; the annihilation of an electron and a positron to a photon has a particle that we would think of as constituting ‘matter’, the electron, going in, and none coming out. Likewise, in the proton+nucleus interaction I wrote down above, you’ve got more matter coming out than going in. It’s the invariant mass that’s separately conserved, following from energy conservation and mass-energy equivalence (energy can’t be destroyed and always retains its equivalent mass). I was relying to the use of those terms by UY Scuti, making the point that the casual use of those terms was not precise and could be corrected by people like you. That’s pretty much what this whole thread is. People remember high school science filtered through newspaper headlines. While the subject is fascinating, the fine details get sufficiently lost so that most people who don’t pay close attention can’t even frame a proper question on the subject. Giving the precise physics is always valuable, but that’s not necessarily the same as filling in the missing background. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/43 "2013-12-31T19:30:49Z")
There is no point in time when the Big Bang ceased to be occurring and something else, caused by it, took over or remained behind. You, and the universe you occupy? This _is_ the Big Bang. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/44 "2013-12-31T22:21:15Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > There is no point in time when the Big Bang ceased to be occurring and something else, caused by it, took over or remained behind. You, and the universe you occupy? This _is_ the Big Bang. That’s not any definition of the Big Bang that I recognize. In fact, my understanding of every definition is that the Big Bang had an identifiable end or else it doesn’t count as the Big Bang. What makes you say otherwise? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2013, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/45 "2013-12-31T23:52:04Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > There is no point in time when the Big Bang ceased to be occurring and something else, caused by it, took over or remained behind. You, and the universe you occupy? This _is_ the Big Bang. If that were so, then the term would be completely meaningless. The term is normally restricted to the singularity in which the Universe originated, or its immediate aftermath (usually no more than a few seconds or at most minutes). There may be no defined point in time when you ceased to be an embryo, but that doesn’t mean you’re one now. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/46 "2014-01-01T07:59:28Z")
Let me rephrase it then: the only sense in which there is a point in time when the Big Bang ceased to be occurring and something else, caused by it or left as its aftermath, took over as the existing condition, is us arbitrarily drawing such a line. It isn’t a separate occurrence or event; we’re still it, happening. Nothing has ever happened that isn’t part of the same sequence of events that started approx 12 billion years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/47 "2014-01-01T16:27:00Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > Let me rephrase it then: the only sense in which there is a point in time when the Big Bang ceased to be occurring and something else, caused by it or left as its aftermath, took over as the existing condition, is us arbitrarily drawing such a line. > > It isn’t a separate occurrence or event; we’re still it, happening. Nothing has ever happened that isn’t part of the same sequence of events that started approx 12 billion years ago. But that’s ludicrous if you try applying to it anything else. There’s no such thing as humans because we’re part of the same sequence of events that started approx 4.5 billion years ago. Slavery never ended in the U.S. because we’re part of the same sequence of events that started approx 500 years ago. AHunter3 was not born and will not die because he’s part of events that started approx 3.55 billion years ago. Things often do have identifiable beginnings and ends even if they are segments of a larger continuum. BTW, that continuum is 13.8 billion years, not 12. The Big Bang is defined as a time of violent expansion that appears to have started a fraction of a section after the origin of the universe and then stopped at a time shortly after that. It is as precisely delineated as a geological era on earth. It is meaningless to call it anything else. You’re arbitrarily changing the definition of a scientific term in a discussion of science. That doesn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![Yumblie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/76d3ee/32.png) [@Yumblie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yumblie)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/48 "2014-01-01T16:54:50Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > The Big Bang is defined as a time of violent expansion that appears to have started a fraction of a section after the origin of the universe and then stopped at a time shortly after that. Actually, that’s inflation. The Big Bang describes everything associated with the expansion of the universe at any time. This is why I prefer to describe the Big Bang as an on-going process rather than a singular event. At _t_ = 0, the Big Bang began. It continues to happen today, and as a result, the conditions of the universe in the future will be very different from today. I think it’s more useful to describe it this way because the Big Bang Theory is all about the evolution of the universe, not about its origin, which leads to a lot of misconceptions about it. Kind of like how the theory of evolution doesn’t say anything about how life began, only how it has changed, but nonetheless many people take issue with it because they think it describes the origin. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/49 "2014-01-01T17:25:54Z")
> [@Yumblie](#): > > Actually, that’s inflation. The Big Bang describes everything associated with the expansion of the universe at any time. I disagree. The commonest description of the [Big Bang](http://space.about.com/od/astronomybasics/a/Origin-Of-The-Universe.htm) is similar to this one: > [@](#): > > Once the singularity was created (however it happened), it began to expand through a process called inflation. … This theory is now referred to as the Big Bang, a term first coined by Sir Fred Hoyle during a British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) radio broadcast in 1950. Or [this one](http://www.umich.edu/~gs265/bigbang.htm): > [@](#): > > About 15 billion years ago a tremendous explosion started the expansion of the universe. This explosion is known as the Big Bang. At the point of this event all of the matter and energy of space was contained at one point. What exisisted prior to this event is completely unknown and is a matter of pure speculation. This occurance was not a conventional explosion but rather an event filling all of space with all of the particles of the embryonic universe rushing away from each other. The Big Bang actually consisted of an explosion of space within itself unlike an explosion of a bomb were fragments are thrown outward. The galaxies were not all clumped together, but rather the Big Bang lay the foundations for the universe. … > > Since the Big Bang, the universe has been continuously expanding and, thus, there has been more and more distance between clusters of galaxies. This definition is so entrenched that even this [intelligent design site](http://www.big-bang-theory.com/) uses it: > [@](#): > > After its initial appearance, [the universe] apparently inflated (the “Big Bang”), expanded and cooled, going from very, very small and very, very hot, to the size and temperature of our current universe. Inflation accounts for the short time lapse between the origin and rapid expansion. The origin was at one time called the Big Bang, but the later evidence refuted that and inflation came to be the description. But today the Big Bang and inflation describe the same period of time. The later expansion of the universe, at a less rapid pace, is emphatically not the Big Bang. It is a separate expansion, governed by separate causes, and needing separate mathematical causes. That’s how I understand it, and I’d like to see your cites for defining the Big Bang as “all of time”. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/50 "2014-01-01T18:36:53Z")
> [@Yumblie](#): > > The Big Bang describes everything associated with the expansion of the universe at any time. Not according to any dictionary definition, e.g. [Merriam Webster:](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/big%20bang) > [@](#): > > big bang > > noun > > : the cosmic explosion that marked the beginning of the universe according to the big bang theory I would also like to see a cite for the usage you propose in either a popular or technical sense. The [Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_microwave_background_radiation) is commonly described as being an “aftermath of the Big Bang,” not part of an ongoing Big Bang. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/51 "2014-01-01T18:45:14Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > But that’s ludicrous if you try applying to it anything else. > > There’s no such thing as humans because we’re part of the same sequence of events that started approx 4.5 billion years ago. > > Slavery never ended in the U.S. because we’re part of the same sequence of events that started approx 500 years ago. > > AHunter3 was not born and will not die because he’s part of events that started approx 3.55 billion years ago. I (and you and Mt McKinley and the sun and so forth) am make up of subatomic particles, and we contain nary a smidgen or jot of matter that isn’t, but it’s misleading to say that therefore you and I and etc do not _exist_. There is, nevertheless, an important understanding to be gained from grasping that yes indeed everything is made up of subatomic particles. And that all events are subsets of the one event. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/52 "2014-01-01T18:56:39Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > There is, nevertheless, an important understanding to be gained from grasping that yes indeed everything is made up of subatomic particles. And that all events are subsets of the one event. Your points that everything today is the result of the Big Bang, and that the delineation of a precise end point for the Big Bang is arbitrary, may be valid. However, that still doesn’t make it correct to say that the Big Bang is still occurring (your original claim). That simply doesn’t conform to any normal use of the term. ---
**Author:** ![Asympotically\_fat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47c2d/32.png) [@Asympotically\_fat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asympotically_fat)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/53 "2014-01-01T19:09:32Z")
The problem with defining the big bang as the singularity itself is that you have to ask the question is the singularity physical or is it just a sign that the physical theory behind big bang theory, general relativity stops being useful at about that time? The usefulness of big bang theory as a cosmological model is independent of the answer to this question though. So “when was the big bang?” doesn’t have a definitive answer. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/54 "2014-01-01T19:15:10Z")
> [@Asympotically\_fat](#): > > So “when was the big bang?” doesn’t have a definitive answer. Within a few fractions of a second, this may be true. On a scale of billions of years, we know pretty precisely when it occurred. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [January 1, 2014, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477/55 "2014-01-01T21:02:50Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > There is, nevertheless, an important understanding to be gained from grasping that yes indeed everything is made up of subatomic particles. And that all events are subsets of the one event. This has been said multiple times, including by me. That is not equivalent to saying that the Big Bang is still ongoing. One thing is true, the other thing is not. You’re simply redefining the term to suit your needs. That’s unnecessary and misleading, if not flat-out wrong. > [@Asympotically\_fat](#): > > The problem with defining the big bang as the singularity itself… I don’t see anyone here doing that, although I admit I can’t quite figure out what AHunter3’s actual timeline is. Is [this summary](http://www.space.com/52-the-expanding-universe-from-the-big-bang-to-today.html) a fair one? > [@](#): > > The universe was born with the Big Bang as an unimaginably hot, dense point. When the universe was just 10[sup]-34[/sup] of a second or so old — that is, a hundredth of a billionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second in age — it experienced an incredible burst of expansion known as inflation, in which space itself expanded faster than the speed of light. During this period, the universe doubled in size at least 90 times, going from subatomic-sized to golf-ball-sized almost instantaneously. > > After inflation, the growth of the universe continued, but at a slower rate. As space expanded, the universe cooled and matter formed. One second after the Big Bang, the universe was filled with neutrons, protons, electrons, anti-electrons, photons and neutrinos. If so, then saying that we are composed of particles that formed in the Big Bang is not even metaphorically correct, since those particles formed at a later time. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-much-of-me-came-from-the-big-bang/677477.md?page=2)