Astrophysicists argue our universe is a projection on the 3D edge of a 4D black hole

SCIENCE has cast a new light on what came before we were blasted into existence 13.7 billion years ago - and it involves a 4D black hole.

WAS the universe born from a Big Bang, or a black hole’s burp? Physicists have cast new light on what came before we were blasted into existence 13.7 billion years ago.

All the astronomical clues point back to the moment our universe began.

But the idea of a Big Bang remains just that: An idea.

It’s a chaotic event that cannot be explained by the laws of physics.

Existing thinking states that before the Big Bang there was a “singularity”, an impossibly hot and dense state of space and time. Essentially, as some such as Stephen Hawkin have postulated, it was the contents of a black hole’s stomach.

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Matching our uniform, predictable and stable universe with the “physics-destroying insanity” of such a singularity is a problem scientists have been grappling with for decades.

“Cosmology’s greatest challenge is understanding the Big Bang itself,” three astrophysicists from Canada write.

“For all physicists know, dragons could have come flying out of the singularity,” Dr Niayesh Afshordi said.

Now he and his two colleagues from the Perimeter Institute for Theoretic Physics in Canada have a new argument as to what that dragon was: A four-dimensional black hole.

So, it’s time to put aside the idea of a Big Bang.

And replace it with a Big Burp: A black hole’s indigestion from another dimension.

From nothing to something ... The Big Bang, the point at which our universe emerged.

INSIDE THE EVENT HORIZON

The argument is a mind-twister.

So one star, in a four-dimensional universe, caused our universe to flash into existence on the walls of its event horizon as it collapsed into a black hole.

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Such a “projection” would help explain one problem Big Bang theorists continue to grapple with: Inflation, the moment the universe went from nothing to a whole lot of spacious something.

We’re a mirage. A projection of a black hole’s meal as it goes down its throat.

The three-dimensional black holes of our universe have a two-dimensional event horizon: A two-dimensional boundary that marks the ‘point of no return’.

In a four-dimensional universe, a black hole would have a three-dimensional event horizon.

“The idea that we come from the 3D edge of a collapsing 4D star in another universe might sound bizarre but at this point we want to test every explanation of the earliest days of our Universe,” astrophysicist Dr Alan Duffy of Melbourne’s Swinburne University says. “ If it passes the test then no matter how strange it may appear to our everyday lives we have to take it seriously.”

Life on the edge? A new theory of the creation of our universe postulates that we may actually be the projection on the event horizon of a black hole in a four-dimensional universe.

TESTING TOPIC

It’s an odd idea.

But, unlike the Big Bang, the researchers argue this one fits the maths.

It’s one that also the researchers say conforms to the primary rule of science: It produces testable predictions.

“Of course, our intuition tends to recoil at the idea that everything and everyone we know emerged from the event horizon of a single four-dimensional black hole,” their statement reads.

To explain their idea, the astrophysicists link back to the ancient parable of Plato’s cave — where prisoners spend their entire lives seeing only the shadows cast on the walls by a flickering fire.

“Their shackles have prevented them from perceiving the true world, a realm with one additional dimension,” they write. “Plato’s prisoners didn’t understand the powers behind the sun, just as we don’t understand the four-dimensional bulk universe. But at least they knew where to look for answers.”

Number crunch ... Astrophysicists argue that their new idea of the birth of our universe on the edge of a 4D black hole adds up - even if it sounds bizzare.

IDEAS SPAWN IDEAS

But, despite being the cover story for Scientific American, it’s an idea which has a lot of explaining remaining to be made.

“I personally favour the no less incredible idea that our universe expanded from smaller than an atom to larger than its current size in just a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second into its history, an idea called Inflation,” Dr Duffy says. “This is supported by what we see of the faded afterglow of the Big Bang.”

But if this new idea is proven right, it produces another mystery.

Where did the four-dimensional universe come from?

“Mathematics is a wonderful way to allow your imagination to run free, creating universes and beginnings that could be, even if they don’t exist in ours,” Dr Duffy says.