# So how was the matter in the universe created? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 21, 2005, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893 "2005-05-21T20:28:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lear\_s\_fool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/df788c/32.png) [@Lear\_s\_fool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lear_s_fool)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2005, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/1 "2005-05-21T20:28:17Z")
Alright I’ve heard of all the pop culture Einstein quotes like “Energy can not be created or destroyed only redirected?” (Excuse me if I fucked it up) No I’m a lit guy so my understanding of physics blows (what do you mean that cat is not alive or dead until I look at it that doesn’t make single fucking lick of sense) but from what I understand matter is pretty much concentrated energy (I’m sure its’ more complicated than that) So I’m thinking dose that mean what we know as energy in this universe has always existed? Or was it some how somehow created? ---
**Author:** ![rbroome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/838e76/32.png) [@rbroome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rbroome)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2005, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/2 "2005-05-21T20:53:39Z")
> [@Lear's\_fool](#): > > Alright I’ve heard of all the pop culture Einstein quotes like “Energy can not be created or destroyed only redirected?” (Excuse me if I fucked it up) > > No I’m a lit guy so my understanding of physics blows (what do you mean that cat is not alive or dead until I look at it that doesn’t make single fucking lick of sense) but from what I understand matter is pretty much concentrated energy (I’m sure its’ more complicated than that) > > So I’m thinking dose that mean what we know as energy in this universe has always existed? Or was it some how somehow created? people a whole smarter than I have thought deeply about this, so I can’t begin to answer your question. However, I can point out a common flaw in your assumptions. If I understand you, you are basing your question on the idea of linear time. That is, if you have something now, it existed previously. Perhaps in a different form, but it existed previously. The issue here is the concept of previously and how that effects the concept of exist. Time, as we know it, started at the moment of the big bang. At that moment energy and eventually matter started to exist. What was there prior to the big bang? Well, the problem is that there was no there nor was there any prior. No space, no time, no matter. Think of it as a movie, prior to the start of the projector there is no movie, while the movie is running there is movie time and movie space etc. I hasten to add that certainly the movie film and projector etc exists, but the point is the movie itself doesn’t. Physics, to my knowledge, hasn’t begun to understand the conditions in the big bang prior to the start-because by definition there is no prior. Hope I got that approximately correct. ---
**Author:** ![EssOEss](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/6bbea6/32.png) [@EssOEss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EssOEss)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2005, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/3 "2005-05-21T21:08:26Z")
Can you cite the time-began-with-big-bang aspect? I have honestly never heard of it and I thought I had browsed through the general ideas on how the universe started. Would be an interesting read. Or maybe I just skipped over this aspect in the big bang theories - perhaps it was trivialized… The only theories about the beginning of the universe that I can recall at the moment are the ones that say time is infinite - there is no beginning and there was always something there. This also coincides with my own personal opinion. Google gives lots of hits on “infinite time” and “infinite universe”, I think they can provide some interesting reading material. ---
**Author:** ![EssOEss](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/6bbea6/32.png) [@EssOEss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EssOEss)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2005, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/4 "2005-05-21T21:12:34Z")
Ah, found something on time-began-with-big-bang: [http://www.hawking.org.uk/text/public/bot.html](http://www.hawking.org.uk/text/public/bot.html) And something solid-ish on the infinite-time theory: [http://flatrock.org.nz/topics/science/brains\_have.htm](http://flatrock.org.nz/topics/science/brains_have.htm) (second article on page. maybe first is on topic too, did not check) ---
**Author:** ![Lear\_s\_fool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/df788c/32.png) [@Lear\_s\_fool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lear_s_fool)\ **Post date:** [May 21, 2005, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/5 "2005-05-21T21:42:14Z")
> [@rbroome](#): > > However, I can point out a common flaw in your assumptions. If I understand you, you are basing your question on the idea of linear time. That is, if you have something now, it existed previously. Perhaps in a different form, but it existed previously. The issue here is the concept of previously and how that effects the concept of exist. Ok but what gets me is that in singularity that blew up to create the universe matter was stacked so densely that the density and mass where infinite. Where the hell did this matter come from in the first place? Maybe I’m thinking to linearly about this but how can matter be created out of noting? ---
**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:** [May 21, 2005, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-how-was-the-matter-in-the-universe-created/304893/6 "2005-05-21T23:15:44Z")
[Vacuum energy](http://www.physicspost.com/articles.php?articleId=202) > [@](#): > > Quantum field theory considers the vacuum ground state not to be completely empty, but to consist of a seething mass of virtual particles and fields. Since these fields do not have a permanent existence, they are called vacuum fluctuations. In the Casimir effect, two metal plates can cause a change in the vacuum energy density between them which generates a measurable force. > > Some believe that vacuum energy might be the “dark energy” (also called quintessence) associated with the cosmological constant in General relativity, thought to be similar to a negative force of gravity. Observations that the expanding Universe appears to be accelerating seem to support the Cosmic inflation theory —first proposed by Alan Guth (1981) — in which the nascent Universe passed through a phase of exponential expansion driven by a negative vacuum energy density (positive vacuum pressure). [Vacuum Energy Density, or How Can Nothing Weigh Something?](http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~wright/cosmo_constant.html) > [@](#): > > the inflationary scenario for the first picosecond after the Big Bang proposes that a fairly large vacuum energy density existed during the inflationary epoch. [What Came Before the Big Bang?](http://superstringtheory.com/cosmo/cosmo4a1.html) > [@](#): > > Matter and radiation are gravitationally attractive, so in a maximally symmetric spacetime filled with matter, the gravitational force will inevitably cause any lumpiness in the matter to grow and condense. That’s how hydrogen gas turned into galaxies and stars. But vacuum energy comes with a high vacuum pressure, and that high vacuum pressure resists gravitational collapse as a kind of repulsive gravitational force. The pressure of the vacuum energy flattens out the lumpiness, and makes space get flatter, not lumpier, as it expands. > So one possible solution to the flatness problem would be if our Universe went through a phase where the only energy density present was a uniform vacuum energy.