A scientific theory that attempts to explain what existence was like prior to the big bang may have a fatal flaw.
Some theorists have suggested that the universe expands and contracts in endless cycles. This would mean that the universe has no beginning nor end, but instead grows towards the future and shrinks towards the past.
While this theory is appealing because it means there is no need for time to have a ‘beginning’, new research suggests that this ‘bouncing’ universe model may not be accurate.
“People proposed bouncing universes to make the universe infinite into the past, but what we show is that one of the newest types of these models doesn’t work,” says professor Will Kinney, a physicist at the UB College of Arts and Sciences.
“In this new type of model, which addresses problems with entropy, even if the universe has cycles, it still has to have a beginning.”
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