The Big Crunch!

If you have been a faithful follower of this blog from the beginning, you will remember our discussions (okay, maybe better described as my blathering) about the origins of our universe and the Big Bang Theory (the actual, widely accepted scientific theory of the beginning of everything, not the wildly popular CBS sitcom).  You will recall, I trust, that I expressed some skepticism as to the validity of the current state of said universe modeling because theorists used a fudge factor to get the universe to where it has to be if they are right about the start time, age and size of the universe as presented today.  Now, how many of you out there have had my fudge?  Yes, I know it’s good, thank you.  You may offer the opinion that it could be the best fudge in the universe, but I will avert it unequivocally.  Those of you not lucky enough to have experienced this treat will just have to take my word for it... much like the astrophysicists are asking us to accept that the development of the universe included a window of time when energy actually traveled faster than the speed of light.

With the (hypothetical) discovery of dark energy (I qualify it as hypothetical because no one has actually caught this lightning in a jar… it is purely a mathematical function used to explain why the expansion of the universe seems to be accelerating) the consensus about how the universe would eventually end rested on the big “freeze” or “chill” side of the argument.  The “big freeze” defining a universe that would continue to expand until all energy was exhausted and the universe would essentially be a cold, dark vastness of sub-atomic particles.  Brrrr!

Now, a couple of upstart physicists have parted with the rest of the astrophysical community as regards the end of the universe.  Drs. Nemanja Kaloper from UC Davis and Antonio Padilla of the University of Nottingham (no mention was made of Robin of Locksley) are asserting that “dark energy will dominate the universe shortly before a turnaround leading to an eventual collapse”.  Or what is popularly known as the Big Crunch.  The big crunch theory calls for the eventual re-attraction of all matter into the singularity from whence it came.  I read the “IFLSCIENCE!” article entitled “New Study Suggests We’re Approaching the ‘Big Crunch’ but it was way over my head so I offer you the citation in case you want to take this on yourself:

http://www.iflscience.com/physics/big-crunch-back-possible-end-universe

Now I, for one, am not a fan of crunch which is why I don’t put walnuts in my fudge.  You are free to build your fudge in accordance with your own moral dictates.  But since the “Big Crunch” is billions of years away, and the secret to perfect fudge is to not overcook it, we’ll have plenty of time to make all we need!