I was under the impression that quantum fluctuations present the possibility of something coming from nothing. So in regards to the big bang, my question is this: Did the quantum fluctuation bring about the existence of the singularity that expanded (the big bang)? Or did the singularity already exist, and some attribute of a quantum fluctuation cause the singularity to expand?
Raatz
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This is what Stephen Hawking and some others think. QM produced the fluctuation (singularity) and the total energy of the universe is zero so it doesn't violate any known physical laws. Inflation is why it expanded, but I dunno WHY inflation happened.
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Some physicists speculate that quantum fluctuation caused atoms to appear from other dimensions. The singularity that created the Universe could have been been the result of one of those quantum fluctuations.
Jayjhis
Nobody really knows.
I will say this much though. Quantum fluctuations only make subatomic particles appear out of nothing, and those particles only exist for a very tiny point in time unless they form at the edge of a black hole's event horizon and one of them forms inside of it. By "form" I mean "pop into existence" by the way.
Anyhow, it's unlikely a whole universe could just pop into existence in the same way as a virtual particle does.
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My understanding is that a singularity never was formed at T=0.
There are many well-respected physicists, such as Stephen Hawking, Lawrence Krauss, Sean M. Carroll, Victor Stenger, Michio Kaku, Alan Guth, Alex Vilenkin, Robert A.J. Matthews, and Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek, who have created scientific models where the Big Bang and thus the entire universe could arise from nothing but a quantum vacuum fluctuation -- via natural processes.
In relativity, gravity is negative energy and matter is positive energy. Because the two seem to be equal in absolute total value, our observable universe appears balanced to the sum of zero. Our universe could thus have come into existence without violating conservation of mass and energy — with the matter of the universe condensing out of the positive energy as the universe cooled, and gravity created from the negative energy. When energy condenses into matter, equal parts of matter and antimatter are created — which annihilate each other to form energy. However there appears to be a slight imbalance to the process, which results in matter dominating over antimatter.
I know that this doesn't make sense in our Newtonian experience, but it does in the realm of quantum mechanics and relativity. As Nobel laureate physicist Richard Feynman wrote, "The theory of quantum electrodynamics describes nature as absurd from the point of view of common sense. And it agrees fully with experiment. So I hope you can accept nature as she is — absurd."
For more, watch the video at the 1st link - "A Universe From Nothing" by Lawrence Krauss.
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twangler
God's Firecracker. He put it there, lit the fuse and has been watching the explosion for 13+ billion years. At least that's what I would like to think:)