[neutralino]

Originally Posted by dleviwing

neutralino;
Sorry but you can only have time zero if you are accepting the something from nothing scenario of the Standard Model (I don’t); all other time zero references are as you say, on a sliding scale; is the BB event time zero an absolute? I think not; it is only the best promoted one at this time. We just need a good reason to modify it!

Well, I wouldn't say that I'm convinced with a theory that makes everything from nothing. Luckily, it doesn't really matter what happened at the actual time of the big bang in order to do cosmology!

Now as for singularities, they fall into the same category as strings and gods; all theory and no evidence.

I wouldn't even say they fell into that category. There is no evidence for singularities because they absolutely do not exist. No physical theory of nature can contain singularities, and in fact singularities are only used as a mathematical tool to show where a theory breaks down.

The asymptotic nature of mathematics is why it is an abstract concept that can produce false observations and concepts. Scientists should not put their heads too far up their math and lose sight of reality; too many have done that already and caused unbelievable confusion.

I still stand by my comment that asymptotics are a good way to determine behaviour of a system, even if one cannot solve the equations of motion at a particular point. What confusion do you mean here; confusion within the scientific world, or in the popular world (I can guess you're talking about string theory!)