Barbershop Big Bang Theory

I came upon an article in Scientific American recently suggesting that the universe began with a "bang" rather than a "bounce." That was the story we were told as kids, of course, and it even appears in a flashback in Annie Hall (!977) where the young Alvy Singer tells his psychiatrist, "Why do your homework? The universe is expanding, and someday it will explode." The kid's got a point.

More recently, theories have been floated suggesting that the universe expands and contracts like an accordion in an endless series of bounces. So, which is it?

I have often pondered this question while sitting in the barber shop waiting to get a haircut, though a second question often comes to mind first: "I made a reservation online half an hour ago, when there was a half-hour wait; so why do I have to wait an additional half-hour once I get here? Did I pass through a wormhole or what?"

Though I find the question of the origin of the universe intriguing, the first thing that caught my eye in the article was the last phrase of the headline—"New Studies Find."

This is wretched journalism, and not in the least bit scientific. The proper phrase would be "New Studies Suggest." Nothing in astrophysics is definitively "found," and the origins and dim past of the universe will probably remain murky 'til the end of time, and beyond. The "findings" referred to in the article are merely speculations, and shaky ones at that.

Astrophysicists have established with some degree of confidence that in the first few milliseconds during which our current universe expanded—a blindingly hot phase known colloquially as the "inflationary period"—the universe behaved very differently than it does now. The speculations under review here deal with conflicting explanations of irregularities that have been detected recently within the cosmic microwave background, which is commonly considered the "footprint" of that nascent universe. The authors of the current article describe and also critique theories such as bispectrum and loop quantum cosmology before concluding that before the Big Bang produced our universe from a "singularity," there was ... nothing. The mass required to reverse the expansion of a previous incarnation and keep the "accordion" pumping simply does not exist.

Personally, I have my doubts. Four fifths of the mass required to explain the rotation of the galaxies we can see and measure—the infamous Dark Matter—has never been detected at any wave-length. We presume it's there because without it our gravitational formulas don't work. Well, maybe there's even more Dark Matter out there than we think, that we also can't see, that would make a different gravitational formula more accurate while also supporting the theory of an accordion universe—the "bounce" theory mentioned in the title.

Yet such arguments overlook a more basic point. Even if current evidence supported the "accordion" theory of numerous expansions and contractions, it would leave the question unanswered. How did the universe—whether singular and unique or seesaw and musical—get going in the first place? Where did it come from?

Thinking about this issue at any great length will make you seasick. I would not recommend it. But such questions do have their amusing side, because language is incapable of even phrasing the question correctly. For example, a moment ago I asked the question, Where did the universe come from?  Such a question makes sense if it refers to something discrete, like a wood tick that suddenly appears on my forearm, crawling toward my hand, as I'm driving. Where did that come from? It wasn't there a split-second ago. The window's closed, and I doubt if it fell from the inside roof of the car. Weird!

One thing I know for certain is that wherever it came from was somewhere else.

But you can't ask where the universe came from unless you believe there's somewhere else it could have come from. But that place would also be a part of the universe, which includes everything. Right? The question makes no sense.  

Yet it must be asked.   

Another question that makes no sense to me is this: I've been waiting patiently, thumbing through Golf Digest or Minnesota Monthly, until my name rises to the top of the list on the computer screen. I sit down in the barber chair, and the stylist asks me a question like "Why are we here today?" or "What are we thinking of?" Oh, my God. These are profound questions. Why are we here today? Why is anything here today?  

But I think I know what she's driving at. And I have an answer ready.

I point to my hair and say, "A little shorter, please. And could you clean up that unruly fluff on the back of my neck."