It all started when my mom met my dad and
they had me.
Hi, I’m the Universe, and this is the story
of my life.
At first there is nothing and then for absolutely
no reason there IS something.
That’s the big bang at t= 0 seconds.
The Big Bang occurs in which ordinary space
and time develop out of a maybe a gravitational
singularity something like a black hole.
But then it starts expanding and Something
causes it.
It may have been dark energy or dark matter,
we don’t know yet.
But it does starts expanding and it never
stops.
The infant universe cools as it begins expanding
outward.
It is almost completely smooth, with some
quantum variations here and there.
All the four fundamental interactions: the
gravitational and electromagnetic interactions
the strong and weak interactions were all
one superforce, at this point.
But then
Gravity separates and begins acting on the
universe—the remaining fundamental forces
stabilize into the electronuclear force, also
known as the Grand Unified Force.
We are now entering whats known as the electroweak
Epoch.
Temperature is falling down rapidly.
As a result, the strong nuclear force becomes
distinct from the electroweak force perhaps
fuelling the inflation of the universe.
Note that the time is 10 to the power of -36
seconds that is, not even half a second has
passed.
And here is where we come to the crucial part.
For no reason whatsoever the Universe starts
Inflating.
The Space suddenly and very rapidly expands
like crazy and temperature drops horrendously.
So that the size
of an object as small as a virus, would have
been
expanded all the way up to the size of a galaxy.
Everything happened in far less than a second.
There is good evidence that this happened,
lets come back to this moment, 2020, 13.6
billion years later.
See,
In whichever direction you look, you can still
sought of look back at big bang billions of
years ago.
So you kind of measure the temperature of
the universe, moments after the Big Bang.
Whichever direction you choose, this way,
that way, the temperature seems to be pretty
much the same.
And this, actually, poses a very fundamental
puzzle.
Because the light of Big Bang from that
direction, has just reached us . billion years
later.
But this light had never had a chance to go
all the way to the other end of the universe.
Which may take another . billion years.
And so this part and that part of the universe
have never communicated with each other.
But then how come that they know that they
have to have the same temperature?
Not just these parts, everywhere universe
seems to have the same temperature.
But how could
they arrange themselves that way if they haven't
ever met?
And that is a very big mystery.
it’s like having discovered two remote
islands in very different parts of the world.
But if you go there and talk to
the local people they speak exactly the same
language.
And even with the same accent.
that's how similar they are.
Then you don't have to be a genius to come
up with a
theory that well they must have talked to
each other in the past.
Which means that part of the universe and
that part of the universe had communication
at some point.
That way it can arrange itself, to have
exactly the same temperature as we see today.
what inflation does is it stretches out this
universe
by an incredible amount,
But when it was very small size, everybody
was
close to each other, and they could really
talk to each other.
that way, they could arrange themselves to
be in sort
of what we call- equilibrium, such that everything
had the same temperature at that stage.
Even though they got stretched out and they
got separated for . billion years.
They still remember that they arranged themselves
to have the
same temperature, same energy, and so on and
so forth.
that's what inflation is supposed to do for
us.
It, it solves this major puzzle.
There is another subtle thing.
The laws of physics at subatomic scales has
this uncertainty principal built in.
vacuum is not empty, but it's active.
It's like this.
energy is bubbling in and out all the time.
So if you're here, you may borrow energy for
some time, but you have to gree- give it back.
Or maybe you lend some energy to others, you
need to take it back again.
But as long as everything works out in the
end by conserving energy, it's okay.
So you have this vacuum, which is lending
and borrowing energy all the time.
And then you also have this inflation that
is stretching out the universe so quickly.
put these things together, we find something
really interesting.
When the universe was incredibly tiny.
.
in that small confines of space, there was
big uncertainty principle
at action, and you keep borrowing and lending
energies all the time.
Suppose you borrowed
energy from somebody else,
But then the universe gets stretched so quickly,
.
then the person you need
to give energy back to is now gone forever.
Again, you're stuck with energy you borrowed.
So, combining uncertainty principle and this
rapid
expansion of space, you are in the
end stuck with small variation of slightly
more energy here, slightly less energy here.
And you cannot put them back
into a smooth space again because
They're just so far away separated from each
other.
that's how we believe that
the structure of the universe was formed today.
We owe
that back to this quantum noise, from uncertainty
principle during the inflation.
But the exact reasons why it happened are
still being explored
