Would I be correct in saying that before the existence of the universe there was no 'nothing' to not exist?

Question

I was half hoping someone would have picked me up on and complained about my use of 'before'. As 'time' can't exist 'before' the existence of the universe ...

Answer 1

Basically, yes.  My perception is that there was no "before."

Edit:  Um, I did, (before you mentioned it:  I was the first answer.)

Answer 2

You could be right, but then again you could be wrong. At this point in time science can only speculate. There's not one shred of verifiable, hard evidence that any "thing" did or did not exist before the Big Bang.

Answer 3

Yeah, ur correct! Another UNIVERSE existed.... it collapsed in on itself, causing the 'BIG BANG' as it will again and again thru' time!

The big bang causes gases(later stars, planets, moons & galaxies to expand outwards... but they are still under the Universal gravity... BLACK HOLES! These expand continuously, becoming more powerful, and at this moment in time, scientist and astrologers don't know if the distant galaxies are 'staionary' or still expanding? But they do know that they are going to return to one point in space... the collapse of the universe.... so powerful that it will cause another BIG BANG.... catch 22? But no worries... it wont happen for billion upon billions of years yet!

Answer 4

this is a big philosophical question, there was no space time as we know it but I'm not sure that means much:

"Since it has been accepted within physics that the universe begun as a 'big bang' when both space and time came into existence, then there is the obvious question of why it began. Physicists sometimes say that this is a bad question because it is meaningless to talk of causality when there is no time or space. Descartes once argued that every event must have a cause because every cause must be at least as real as the effect, however this was later shown to be a circular argument. It proves that every event has a cause only if we assume that they do and so does not show that it is illogical to think of non-causal existence.

If we did know why the big bang happened then science would rightfully demand an explanation of the cause of this cause and so this would soon regress to an infinite causal chain. This provokes the idea that there must be something that has a necessary existence, something whose existence is self-explanatory. Many people argue that this is God although there is no need for personification in this essence of God. It could be argued that some kind or particle, or perhaps energy itself, has a necessary existence."

http://www.thestargarden.co.uk/why%20did...

Answer 5

it depends on what theory in which the universe was created but if you believe the more popular big bang theory the before our universe was another universe which collapsed in on it shelf to create our universe ans so on.... we do not know how many times this has happened and i believe that even if the human race was to carry on its evolving knowledge for the next 1 million years is still doubt that we will have found out or will ever find out. because there is no possible way that we could ever find out

Answer 6

I'm confused by your question, but you're right in saying that we can't talk about "before" the Big Bang.

The problem with using the terms "before", "after" and such, is that we use an imaginary time scale that, in our minds at least, can stretch infinitely into the past of the future. It doesn't work like that in real life. Just like nothing can accelerate to the speed of light and beyond, and nothing can cool down to the absolute zero or below, you can't track the flow of time further back than the Big Bang.

Answer 7

This is one of those questions that can go round and round your head and boggle it completely.

Who knows it's as correct as any other theory based on our coplete lack of real knowledge of what came before.

Answer 8

Yes, your double-negative makes it correct.  If there is no nothing, there is something... so your sentence reads something did not exist.   Very true.  Even now, something does not exist, like a real answer to this.

Answer 9

Yes, you would not be incorrect.