To Observe The Big Bang...

As mere humans living on a cosmically tiny place called Earth we have been able to master physics to the point where the visible horizon for the early universe can be counted in billions of light years. This is extraordinary in itself but imagine a future in which a technology is much more advanced as a result of massive increases in computing power derived from quantum computers and fusion energy. This is in light of today's viewpoint - something entirely novel is after all quite possible - unless we are arrogant enough to believe we have it virtually all in the bag already.  

The cosmic horizon is therefore largely determined or limited by our ability to measure or observe with our instruments. So ultimately it is our instruments which are linked to technological advancement that limit us. In the future era that is imagined in this post, humans might decide to put the computing power they have towards an all out attempt to see as far as we possibly can. Extend the visibility horizon that limits us to a point much further away.

Remembering that when we are talking about further away, we are also talking about seeing back in time. The light that we see from billions of light years away is indeed from billions of years ago. So if we extend the horizon we may potentially be able to get within meaningful reach of glimpses of the very start. The Big Bang.

It might seem fanciful by today's abilities, but these quantum computers or computer (who knows there may be a computing singularity on Earth at that point) might have the ability to detect very distant objects. This might be through detection of interference of light signals coming to us from stars many light years away. If the instruments could correlate the signals then it could result in a massive lens looking farther back in time than any Earthly instrument now can.

We may see some extraordinary things. Who knows how much resolution it might have. What I do know is that however large the antenna or lens, we probably won't ever resolve the event down to the singular emergence of the Universe; but however close we get will likely be a massive orders of magnitude greater than our present resolution. I think I have a high resolution file of NASA's Deep Space image (somewhere) as I think that is an amazing achievement by humans. That image took many hours of exposure by the Hubble space telescope and to me represents a great example of what humans can do if we put our energies into research.

I wonder whether the fact that we can imagine such things happening means that it might actually happen one day. I recognise that this might be some childish naiveté that lingers within me - but I do hope we can.

I think there is a great sign and lesson in what the Big Bang means to each of us (if one has put any thought into it at all). Some do in essence deny it. Some redefine it such that it leaves open an escape hatch towards their own favoured theory consisting of imagined probabilistic infinities. Our imaginations are seemingly endless and I have touched on the denial of a Creator by introducing infinity or imagined infinite constructs to explain our existence and I won't repeat them here.

I think it is important when thinking of all this to understand how very very little and insignificant we appear to be in the vastness of things thought about on the Universal scale. That small glimpse we have into the past through the NASA Deep Space image shows how limited we are in a sense; as even though it is our deepest look it is but a mere glimpse at a very small section of sky. There are so many small patches just like it that we could have looked at instead and this doesn't even begin to approach all that happened before the image or since.

The final humbling thought I have is that even if we can see those areas as they were 10 billion years ago say, what are they like now? No one will be around to see what they look like in the present, since light from those regions is travelling towards us right now (if those regions are still around that is) and will take billions of years to arrive here (if here is still around that is).

We gradually accept that we cannot know everything as it stands and this is a part of maturation and wisdom. To strive to understand but accept that we have limits in reality even if our imaginations are seemingly boundless.

One question I can't seem to dismiss is whether by looking in any cosmic direction we can determine where in space the Big Bang originated. Where is the point from which it expanded?

I suspect that the answer is that it is everywhere. This might sound odd but I liken it to an observer on any point on the Earth's surface facing any direction they wish and if they travel in that same direction will eventually end up where they were standing at the start, once more.

If the universe has the same surface like property that a sphere has ie. our three dimensions of space are somehow arranged in 4 dimensional (3 dimensions of space and one dimension of time) existence, like a sphere is in our three dimensional space then this might be true.

So when we look at the visible cosmic horizon we would in effect be seeing a typical sample of space that is essentially much like our own region, but in the distant past.

And that opens up another tantalising possiblity. If we could get far enough away from the Earth's present location through faster than light travel, we could potentially see the light that was emitted from our region into space from our own past and thereby glimpse events that happened hundreds, thousands, millions and perhaps billions of years ago. It's not quite the same as time travel, but in some way it is.