Did the "big bang" create the chemical (?) reactions that resulted in the formation of life on earth?

Question

What preceded the "big bang"? And if life could result here on earth, could it not also be a possibility somewhere else in the universe?

Answer 1

Well in all honesty, it doesn't matter what happened before the big bang.  Some people believe that there was nothing before the big bang, and others believe that "our" big bang is just one of the endless cycles of big bangs that will occur over time.  In any case, I think it's entriely possible that there is live somewhere else in our universe.  

I think that the technology humans have been able to create in such a short period of time is truly remarkable.  Before you question our technological abilities, consider this.  The universe is 13.7 billions of years old.  For the sake of argument, let's say we're on one side, and the other intelligent  beings are on the other side.  Our Earth is just 4.5 billion years old.  We are separated from other galaxies by millions or even billions of light years away.  Even if we were separated by just 10000 light years, if they sent out some sort of signal now, or maybe 5000 years ago, we wouldn't even get it until some number of years later.  

I find it hard to believe that another universe will have evolved in the exact same way as ours, so there may be life, but not necessarily "intelligent" life.  For the most part though, especially nowaday, I don't think we should have the right to call ourselves "intelligent" life.  Way too many idiots.  Before searching for more idiots who claim to be intelligent, we should fix our own.

And about your thing relating to creation.  I think if we were the only intelligent life, you would actually be supporting the ideas of evolution.  If there was a god who created the universe, why would he pick this point out of every other possible location in the universe to create humans.  And if he created us here, why wouldn't he create us everywhere?

I think that if there were humans here, but not on the other planets or whatever, it would support evolution.  The conditions were just right on our earth to allow the organisms to develop the way they do.  The length of our year, how much sunlight we recieve, The suitable temperature for survival.  Think about it.  The way plants respond the same way throughout a 4 season year.  They bud in the spring, blossom in the summer, changes color in the fall, and survive through the winter.  This is perfect for the earth we live on.  If any of those factor were different, they wouldn't have been able to survive, and therefore a different, more successful organism would be prospering and able to reproduce.

Answer 2

I was just discussing this the other night with someone who is religious. I tend to think Frish's answer is correct because if God created us, how did he get created? Sooner or later, maybe after were all long gone, a scientist will figure out the whole truth with concrete evidence about how everything came to exist. Until that happens, we will be all left to have our own opinions.

Answer 3

Nothing exploded into everything we see today, or God spoke everything into existence...

Universe comes from 2 latin words:

UNI- means ONE

VERSE- means SPOKEN SENTENCE

Maybe God did speak everything into existence...

Answer 4

"Did the "big bang" create the chemical (?) reactions that resulted in the formation of life on earth?"

Yes, in a sense. The complex chemical elements needed for life can only be created via chemical reactions that occur in stars. Without stars, all you've got is a bunch of simple, useless (for generating life) elements.

"What preceded the "big bang"?"

Nothing - in fact, time itself did not exist until the Big Bang occurred, in that the flow of time began at the second the Big Bang took place some 14 odd billion years ago. At the instant that the Big Bang occurred, the universe was infinitely hot, and had no space or time. It's hard to imagine, at first, but there are scientific reasons for it.

There was no 'ball of gas,' as you put it, before the Big Bang occurred. In fact, there were no atoms - atoms are made up of smaller sub-atomic particles, such as protons and neutrons. These particles cannot form atoms above a certain very high temperature, so atoms only formed after the Big Bang had expanded and cooled to allow nuclear fusion to occur.

If you go back even further to the very second of the Big Bang, before it was too hot for protons and neutrons to form, you would see their building blocks. These are known as 'quarks'.

"And if life could result here on earth, could it not also be a possibility somewhere else in the universe?"

Yes, it could, and I have no doubts that there is life somewhere out there in the universe, but we will never see it, and here's why.

The Milky Way Galaxy, the galaxy we inhabit, is 100,000 light years long. Now, pretend that in addition to us, there are 50 other alien civilizations scattered around the Milky Way. These civilizations would be scattered randomly, so they would each be a good 5,000 light years away from us.

It would take them 5,000 years, if they traveled very close to the speed of light, to reach us. Now, humans can't go for 100 years without killing each other, I doubt an alien civilization could survive 5,000 years of continuous space travel.

Words cannot express how incredibly massive, empty and homogeneous the universe really is - space, on average, contains only ONE atom per cubic foot.

Answer 5

We were just talking about this in my biology class today. (Science)My teacher said that this "big bang" from somewhere came in and crash and created earth, then more stuff came in and created atmosphere and so on. About 4.5 billion years ago, oceans were formed by rain storms and the water would evaporate and drop .. BUT! There's a WHOLE DIFFERENT STORY in the other book(bible)

Answer 6

Yes and no. Before the Big Bang, universe was simply a huge non existant void, timeless and without space, then it exploded. If you remember what it's being a child, or you had a kid playing with LEGO bricks, just imagine him or her kicking a LEGO can. Now the room is filled of tiny little blocks, but there's not life. Some of theme are there in funny little shapes, but nothing else. But there's all here. On Earth happened the primordial soup, an high concentration of simple proteins and aminoacids, fused together by something. Lightning storm, God, what you believe is. Like your child putting up some simple forms, then the entire castle filled with tiny little LEGO people

Answer 7

Q.  What preceded the "big bang"?

A.  Literally NOTHING – since time and space were created by the big bang.

Q.  And if life could result here on earth, could it not also be a possibility somewhere else in the universe?

A.  YES, certainly life somewhere else in the universe is POSSIBLE, but, see below.

Q. And if there is life elsewhere, (intelligent life) how come we can't seem to find it?

There is a whole science built upon how to find alien life forms.  However, you are correct, we have yet to find any.

There are no "contrails" of their star ships crossing the heavens, no radio signals or television clips or laser blips or anything.  First, we have not looked very long.  Secondly, the Universe is VAST.  Third, what CAN we look for?  Fourth, what SHOULD we look for?  But, taking your point, if anything is alive out there, it ain't very obvious!

Q. What if this is it...and we are all alone in the universe?

A. It is highly possible we are alone in the universe.

Q.  Wouldn't that point toward Creation?

A.  Not sure how you jumped to that conclusion.  If we are alone or not, what difference could it make?  

I think our being alone in the universe is easily explained!

Q.  Because aren't the odds of life being elsewhere mathematically pretty high?

A.  The odds of life being SOMEWHERE ELSE (SOMEWHEN ELSE?) is high, since the Universe is so vast.  However, life as we know it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY in general!

Q.  So if we're alone, that would be "strange", wouldn't it?

A.  Yes, STRANGE is precisely the word for it!

You ask great questions and I believe your first point is correct, the conditions for life existed when the solar system formed (many BILLIONS of years after the big bang, since the elements heavier than hydrogen and helium needed to be formed in the center of stars as they die!)

That is, all the chemicals and radiation energy needed to have life start were here on Earth...self replicating molecules occurred, and the law of evolution takes over, and voila, here we are.

So, are we alone or not?

Let's try a "thought experiment":  Given how large the universe is, and how long it has been around, there may be a simpler way to look at why there may not be other "intelligent life" in the universe.

The universe is over 10 billion years old.

Lots of things can happen during this amount of time.

Consider our current situation.  Even with our existing technology, and some easily foreseen tech and science knowledge, we could start to navigate to other planets, and even other solar systems.

Let's say we can achieve half the speed of light, as we drift around the universe.  

Our Milky Way Galaxy is only a few 10's of thousands of light years across.  Therefore, in a few million years, even at half light speed, we ought to be migrated to all the inhabitable parts of the Galaxy!

Yet, we have ZERO evidence of ANY "aliens" out there, traveling around the stars...but there should be "dozens" if there are any at all!

My contention is that the Universe selects AGAINST intelligence.  

So called "Intelligent Life" exists outside of the "laws of nature".  

In human terms:

Humans are more than our biology.  We also have our "culture".  Culture includes language, fire, technology of all types, social posturing and other behaviors.

Culture is what has allowed us to achieve the numerical success we have around the world.

We can survive underwater, tops of mountains, even the surface of the moon, given enough "culture"!

Culture allows us to "ignore" or "overcome" nature.

But, it also has now begun to influence nature's equilibrium.  Our climate change chaos will disrupt human activities to such an extent that the viability of the world for human life will cease to exist, and we'll be extinct.

I contend that other so called "intelligent life" has reached our level of expertise, but Nature killed them off.

It is what will happen here too, since we've got too much inertia and the choices are too hard, to keep disaster from overtaking us.

Just like it has all who have preceeded us!

Answer 8

Tera. You thinking is beginning/ end type thinking. Those that say there was nothing before the big bang do not know what they are talking about. At the point of the singularity expansion we have enough data to say that there was a period of great density and heat, Then, they are right to say that time and space began then. But that does not rule out the circularity and cyclic nature of the process. Tera, absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence and scientists have no trouble saying, " I do not know. "

All stars are busy creating elements from simple hydrogen all the time.

What difference that we have not contacted other intelligences yet?

And your argument for creation is made with no evidence, just " gap " arguments. evidence of absence may not be absence of evidence, but it is not evidence for any position!

I think you need to start considering those chemistry and biology classes I mentioned the other day. Physics would not hurt either.

And why come to anthropology for a physics question? We have a math and science section with a physics subsection.

Answer 9

http://google.nationalgeographic.com/sea...

Answer 10

yes it did.

before the big bang there was the deep silence - just gas floating around and building momentum as it gurgled towards a central gravity point.

Other civilisations just don't want to talk to us - they've heard our radio waves but are waiting until we get a little more advanced before they respond.

It's all very simple really.