Three trillion years from now, the universe will be observably static, the Milky Way alone, and scientists of the day likely won't be able to "infer that the beginning involved a Big Bang".
Three trillion years from now, the universe will be observably static, the Milky Way alone, and scientists of the day likely won't be able to "infer that the beginning involved a Big Bang".
Maybe the universe is a trillion years old and has experienced several big bangs and big collapses over the years. "People have inferred that time began then, but there really wasn't any reason for that inference. What we are proposing is very radical. It's saying there was time before the big bang."
Jim Holt asks Freeman Dyson, Lawrence Krauss, Ed Witten and other in trying to figure out how the universe will end. Further reading: Time Without End by Freeman Dyson, Frank Tipler's Omega Point theory, and The Physics of Extra-Terrestrial Civilizations by Michio Kaku.