John, First Linde didn't "prove" eternal inflation as you claim. Eternal inflation is a theory. In fact you yourself admit this when you write "IF Linde is correct..".
Basically the bounding problem of any physical infinity is that it would take infinite energy over infinite time to 'achieve' (though it is not really something subject to being achieved since by definition it's the result of an unending process) which I don't think anyone agrees exists. Though, on second thought judging by some of the other nonsense they believe, there is probably some physicist somewhere that believes in anything. The other approach, which you hint at, is that even if a physical infinity existed it would be unobservable. And since we can make a good case that only observables exist (or their direct effects) we can say that even if a physical infinite existed it wouldn't actually exist. Edgar On Saturday, February 22, 2014 1:13:14 PM UTC-5, John Clark wrote: > > On Sat, Feb 22, 2014 at 8:41 AM, Edgar L. Owen <edga...@att.net<javascript:> > > wrote: > > > I hate it when otherwise intelligent physicists use infinite in the >> sense of just really really big! >> > > I hate that too, in fact I take pride in not using the word "infinite" > unless a proper subset of the thing can be put into a one to one > correspondence with the entire thing; and as a result I sometime struggle > to come up with the correct word when "astronomical" seems too small but > "infinite" is too big. But I stand by what I said, the CMBR data is > consistent with the universe being infinite and not just very very very > big. Of course that doesn't prove it is in fact infinite but it doesn't > rule it out either. > > > There simply are and can be no physical infinities. >> > > Nobody has found a infinite number of any physical object, but even if > there were such things how would we know? > > > It's an impossible notion by its very definition. > > > Physical infinity might not exist, but if it doesn't it wouldn't be > because it was impossible by its very definition. > > > However it is simply impossible for anything physical to be "literally >> infinite" when the nature of infinity as an unending PROCESS (forever add >> +1) >> > > Maybe, maybe not. Alan Guth's Inflation theory is by far the most > successful in modern cosmology, it solves many problems that have plagued > the Big Bang idea such as the horizon problem and the flatness problem. > Guth postulated an inflation field (sometimes called a inflation substance) > that for a very brief time caused the universe to expand exponentially, > astronomically (insert a stronger word if you can find one) faster than the > speed of light. This doesn't violate Relativity because Einstein only > talked about how fast things could move in space not on how fast space > itself could expand. Guth said the field was such that after a short time > the inflation field (or substance) decayed away in a process somewhat > analogous to radioactive half life, and after the decay the universe > expanded at a much much more leisurely pace. > > But then Andre Linde proved that for Guth's idea to work the inflation > field had to expand faster than it decayed, Linde called it "Eternal > Inflation". Linde showed that for every volume in which the inflation field > decays away 2 other volumes don't decay. So one universe becomes 3, the > field decays in one universe but not in the other 2, then both of those two > universes splits in 3 again and the inflation field decays away in one and > doesn't decay in 2 others, and it goes on forever. So what we call "The Big > Bang" isn't the beginning of everything it's just the end of inflation in > our particular part of the universe. So according to Linde this field > created one Big Bang, then 2, then 4, then 8, then 16 etc in a unending > PROCESS. > > If Linde is correct then each universe that a Big Bang creates may or may > not be infinitely large, but it doesn't really matter because there are a > infinite (and not just astronomical) number of them. > > John K Clark > > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
