Astrophysics and Religion (extended edition)

Astrophysics, Religion, and Cycles Theory

This is to be a study in the nature of the universe and of religion, throughout it's course we will attempt to find the connection between all things.

Let us begin with an analysis of the various religions and their similar traits. Firstly, they all fill the basic human questions, I.E. where do we come from? where are we going? in the christian faith we are believed to have been created by Yahweh and if we lead a good life we shall eventually re-join him in Paradise. This belief coincides with a number of other religions (obviously all of the judeo-christian) and also the Hindu/Buddhist belief too. In both of these religions it is believed that the soul is reincarnated through various lifetimes, but the origin of the soul is from the god Atman. Atman is said to be a god who became bored with his solitary existence, so he divided himself up into nearly uncountable parts, dividing his consciousness into millions upon millions of souls. at this point Atman was divided, so he became Brahman, and further divided himself into the lesser gods (ganesha, shiva, Kali, etc) these gods were given the duty of creating and after a preset amount of time, destroying the world. for Atman life is a constantly recycling experience, and he experiences it from all possible angles, however the religion fails to identify where exactly Atman came from.
There are even more similarities found in christianity this way, as the bible speaks of a new earth were the faithful will go to live when they die. the hebrews call it paradise, Eden version 2.0. but one can expect that just as Adam and eve ate the apple, these people on the new earth/paradise will be unable to help themselves and the cycle will repeat. The only problem in this cycle is yet again , a complete lack of identification of the being who supposedly started the cycle. yahweh, god, etc.

The answer therefore cannot lie in religion, as all religions share the same problem that there is no account of an origin for a creator. This is most likely due to the fact that back when these religions were founded, Creator gods were simply thought to have always been there, however simple logic tells us that on a limitless timeline and infinite empty space a solitary omnipotent being doesn't simply pop into existence, nor can he possibly pre-date his own place of occupation. I being cannot occupy space if there is no space, therefore the space must pre-date the creator.

If the answer is not in religion, we next go to check science. The primary working theory for the creation of the universe has been widely accepted as the big bang theory. for those unfamiliar, the big bang is the belief that at some point in limitless time and space there existed a sphere, this sphere was super dense and contained all matter and energy that now exists in what we call the universe. Suddenly the ball exploded, and sent matter and energy off into every corner of the universe (metaphorically, since infinite space by definition cannot have corners) This theory is widely accepted by the science community, but however contains a number of distinct problems that prove it to be flawed.
1- where did the sphere come from? just like a god, it is limited in origin. one cannot simply say "it was always there" because that answers no questions and simply raises more.
2- if the sphere had all the energy in the universe, why did it not explode earlier?
3- if the sphere had all the mass in the universe, what possible energy source could cause it to pull away from itself?
4- what made the sphere select the specific time that it did? why not earlier? why not later? why did it explode in the first place?

All of these questions leave the big bang theory as flawed and invalid.

At this point in my pursuit I was tempted to leave the answer here, there is no answer, life is meaningless. but I was unsatisfied, there must be an answer that satisfies all questions.

I began to work on the following theory:
What if the real answer is actually a combination of religion and science? Religion attempts to add answers where there is no fact, yet is beaten down by facts, Science tries to find meaning in facts, yet does not have any answers. the answer must surely be in the combination of the two theories.
I was reminded of the religious theory of cyclical history and repetition of action. consider this, what if the big bang theory was, in practice, correct, but incorrect in regards to time and duration. the problem with the big bang theory is that humans can only accurately measure it from when it begins to when it ends. so what if it's ending is also it's beginning? the sphere explodes, shoots matter and energy out in every direction and the matter becomes planets, the energy becomes stars, etc. but then, trillions of years later, the mass at the origin of the explosion starts to pull all the matter back towards the center. we all know that mass is attracted to gravity, and the more mass and density an object has, the larger the gravity. so as the universe starts to close in on itself it begins to reconstitute itself into a super dense sphere again, sucking in all matter and energy in the universe. and here is where molecular physics comes in, matter likes to remain as even spread out as possible, and this sphere is counteracting that principle based on the laws of gravity, but what this proves to us, is that eventually the laws of gravity can, and do break. eventually density surpasses gravity, and when that happens, the sphere explodes, the cycle begins again.

This leaves us with an interesting religious and scientific question:
Does time repeat itself? or is the cycle merely ever repeating?
Realistically, the answer doesn't matter, at the time of universal reset, all sentient lifeforms have been compressed into the sphere, and are therefore unable to record or even notice what is happening. at this point of reset, all life also resets, so the question is purely speculation.

I however was not satisfied with this.
I later concluded that the only reasonable explanation is for the cycle to be endlessly repeating through infinite time and space. the perception to a human would be the same as if time itself repeated, but if time were to repeat, then it would change the rules of physics we were basing this theory and all other beliefs on, up would become down, night would become day, etc.

But where does this leave us on a religious viewpoint?
Up for debate, it could be said that religion had some insight into this process, one could also argue that human or whatever "Souls" are part of the energy that is constantly exploded through out our limitless time and space.

For myself, I prefer to believe that Souls are the only thing that repeat in this process. I pursue this belief because the alternative is that we each get one life, period, over the course of limitless time and space, and regardless of how we do in this life, it's unimportant because in a few trillion years the universe will reset and nobody well ever even know that my species existed. For this i consider myself and optimist. I'd like to think that my soul will live on, even after my body is dead and is reconstituted back into the sphere.

SO I had a chance to discuss my theory with my uncle whom is a physics professor. He gave me the following notes:
1- This theory of mine is already known to the physics community, they refer to it as the "big bang/ big crunch" theory.
2- my idea was correct, if the universe contracted back into a ball, not only is it likely to blow up and expand again, but it has to.
3- the theory cannot be tested because in the last ten years scientists have discovered vast amounts of gravity and energy sources that they cannot see. they can tell that the energy or gravity is being used, but cannot see what is generating it. they refer to these two as "dark matter" and "dark energy". and apparently these two account for 96% of all the stuff in the universe, and we can't even see it. my uncle seemed slightly perturbed by this, as it means that scientists truly know that they know nothing. but he is excited that now there is 96% of the universe still to discover.
4- string theory is bullshit. in my uncle's words: "the mathematics line up beautifully, however it doesn't make any sense."

So yea, im just happy that my theory that i developed with very little scientific knowledge is a sound one and is fairly widely accepted.
(it is accepted as a theory, not as fact, currently scientists are trying to figure out whether the universe has more mass or more energy. if it's more mass then it means that the universe will contract and the cyclical theory is correct. if it is more energy then it means the universe will be ever-expanding until we reach heat death when the universe becomes too spread out.)