10/21/19 Matthew Marlin Period 8

10/21/19

Matthew Marlin, Period 8 #19

Modern Mythology 2020

Aim: How did the universe begin? What are we made of? How did life begin? Are we alone?

Today in class we had a distinguished visitor in Dr. Davis who spoke to us about the origins of our universe and its contents. He also taught us about the reasoning behind the current theories on the origins of the universe and life.

The first thing we talked about was the way that we observe the universe and try to understand its origins. In a way quite similar to how we discover the origins of our planet (deeper is older) the further out in into space we “look” we are really looking further back in time. The reason we are looking further back in time is because light takes time to travel, for example, when we see the moon its light is about 1.3 seconds old and the light from the sun is approximately 8 minutes old. So far we have looked approximately 13.7 billion years into the past, however we cannot see any further due to some kind of blockage (cosmic background radiation) which we assume to be approximately 400,000 years, this idea leads into the “Big Bang” theory.

The “Big Bang” is a theoretical event where a singularity containing all finite matter, with infinite gravity and infinite density exploded and spread all the molecules into the universe. Further support for this theory comes from Hubble’s discovery that the universe is expanding via the Doppler effect; he noticed that galaxies surrounding the milky way appeared more red than they should have, indicating that all these galaxies were moving away from us, thus the universe was expanding.

We are carbon based life forms. The main theory of how we came to be is the “primordial soup” theory. This theory basically states that there were a bunch of compounds that existed on our planet that were then struck by lightning (an electric charge is necessary to this theory) and so began the long process of the modern theory of evolution. First, there were some basic molecules, then more complex molecules, and then eventually single-cell organisms and more complex organisms. This theory also indicates that all life began in the water and anything on land evolved from these aquatic organisms. 

The answer to the question “Are we alone?” is highly subjective and debated. The basic math for the likelihood of life occurring somewhere else in our universe is dictated by the Drake equation. However, the topic remains subjective because the equation has very few constants, so depending on how likely you consider certain events (planets in habitable, planets with intelligent life, planets that develop technology to communicate, and length of time before population of said planet is destroyed)there can be anywhere between 0 and 100,000,000+ planets we could communicate with. As of right now we are communicating with the rest of space via radio waves and we haven’t even “mapped” very much of it yet. 

The primary thing I learned today was that our universe is ever-expanding and that for some reason we cannot see further into the past. I became very interested in the ideas behind the “Big Bang” theory because with the science we have right now it seems to make sense. What else other than such a massive cosmic event could block our vision in space and time? I believe the reason I learned this lesson is because it is nature of people to question our existence and try to find understanding. In addition, it is important to understand if we are alone in this universe because if we aren’t that might not necessarily be a good thing; we are not very sophisticated in terms of space travel and engagements right now, so if other life were to find us there is the possibility of our colonization. Finally, I will use what I learned to try and find understanding and perhaps purpose in our world. Though it is my intention to become an engineer, in my opinion, it is very important for everyone to have a well-rounded education and to question “how?” and “why?” things happen. In fact, this lesson has made me consider other education paths, perhaps a double major in engineering and philosophy.