[austintorn@aol.com]

Perhaps if a quark decays, like protons are supposed to do, then the Universe is not eternal.

If something was eternal, though, it would have no "how" or "why" and would already be surpassing "infinity" in age.

Maybe something like the possibility state of quantum world is eternal and can produce "substance".

[Profpat]

Hi Austin;

Actually there is no evidence for proton decay. In theory it should, and physicist put an estimated fastest half life of 10 years to the 35th power, but they admit, even though in theory it's supposed to, in fact it may not.

Back to our eternal, yet created universe.

Best,

Pat

P.S. From Wiki:Recent experiments at the Super-Kamiokande water Cherenkov radiation detector in Japan indicate that if protons decay at all, their half-life must be at least 1035 years.( that is 10 to the 35th power, it came out as 1035)

[Fripro]

Pat. Thank you for your welcome. I am suprised to see that others have thought about the difference in the so called published width of the Universe with respect to it age.

As I am a ardent believer that the Universe always was and always will be, I can only not understand the difference in the width of the universe and its so called big bang age--unless. . . .

One believes that vewing photo graphs in stero, from the Hubble telescope indicates that the Universe is rotating--thus the difference in the width to age measurement.

However if one also says the Universe is eternal, then the big bang is only a local bang, and the cyclic idea of the Universe is due to its rotation --which by the way also give us a complicated formula for gravity "g"

However none of it makes sense unless the Universe has an atmosphere dark matter, and its vortes galaxies its dark energy.

[Profpat]

I too think the universe could well be eternal. But as I mentioned before I also believe in a big bang, as there is much evidence to support that theory. This seeming paradox can be explained through a cyclical model of the universe. Forever expanding and contracting. From Wikipedia:

Singularities are avoided because the observed consequences of "Big Crunches" never reach zero size. In fact, should the universe begin a "big crunch" sort of process, string theory dictates that the universe could never be smaller than the size of a string, at which point it would actually begin expanding.

Best to you Fripro,

Pat