Short timer

And you just answered the title of this thread with this statement of yours. That’s the “point” I wanted to make sure I was comprehending correctly. Like I said, my words don’t match my thoughts correctly. The bolded part is what I wanted reassurance of. You’re getting deep, brother! I’m just making sure I comprehend the most acceptable theory correctly.

Yeah I’m not good with putting my thoughts into words. Your statement is not really what I’m trying to say. To put it simply, before objects came into existence, saying they have mass is nonsensical. MigL put it a lot clearer than I tried to explain, I feel he is in the same train of thought as I am. I’m not talking about now, I’m talking about the beginning. Any comment on elementary particles taking up space with the statement I quoted? Am I misunderstanding what is being said about elementary particles volume being nonzero? This explains what I’m trying to say for the most part.

My confusion may be from my understanding of how the “objects” came into existence. I was under the impression that they appeared from energy particles smashing into each other, that collision converting energy into “objects” aka matter, like they are trying to recreate with this experiment. I was under the impression there were no “objects” until inflation ended, just energy particles associated with fields because it was too hot still. I don’t see how this is circular at all. https://phys.org/news/2018-03-underway.html Professor Rose said: "This would be a pure demonstration of Einstein's famous equation that relates energy and mass: E=mc2, which tells us how much energy is produced when matter is turned to energy. What we are doing is the same but backwards: turning photon energy into mass, i.e. m=E/c2." No, can you please tell me?

Correct. Energy is not mass. It’s not circular if you start at the beginning of time. I’m not looking for any loopholes at all, I’m looking for clarification if I’m forcing the science to fit my thoughts. A simple “your thoughts are wrong” directed at me will be a good start if that’s how you feel. I have questions on this too because of statements like this....... In quantum mechanics, the concept of a point particle is complicated by the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, because even an elementary particle, with no internal structure, occupies a nonzero volume.

No, I would consider them a massless particle. Invariant. Are you saying the elementary particles that have mass don’t take up space?

It doesn’t, because in the “beginning”, what this thread is about, there were no “A” “B” “C”.

Yes, that’s where I’m looking for clarification. Since mass is a “property” of an object, without the object, there would be nothing for mass to be a property of. No muon, no mass. No baseball, no mass. No sun, no mass. The “object” has to exist before mass can be a property of it. My answer is yes, I would consider them objects if they have mass, how could they not be? To me, it’s completely nonsensical to think of something having mass as not an object. This is more of a question than a statement, hence the title of the thread. I’m looking for clarification. I want to make sure my thoughts are matching the science and not vise versa. I’ve received lots of great information so far from everyone, but I don’t see where my question is answered yet. Can mass be called mass without the object? My thoughts tell me most definitely, no. I’m pretty sure @MigL agrees with my thoughts, no objects, no such thing as “mass”, yet.

Does your definition of mass require an “object”?

So without the “object” aka matter, there is no mass. Energy associated with a field would gravitate as an equivalent amount of mass would. To refer to the singularity as infinitely dense energy would be correct. To refer to the singularity as infinite mass would be incorrect?

Sorry for the confusion, I thought it was clear in the first post of this thread, that’s what I was talking about. Here’s the question again from the original post. Edit: and he did state “in the earliest moments of the universe”.

This was my comprehension of the “beginning”. Extremely dense energy too hot to be converted to matter yet, then when it spread out and cooled enough, it began converting to matter....... Just like they are attempting to do here. https://phys.org/news/2018-03-underway.html 10^-43 seconds Known as the Planck Era, this is the closest that current physics can get to the absolute beginning of time. At this moment, the universe is thought to be incredibly hot, dense and turbulent, with the very fabric of space and time turned into a roiling morass. All the fundamental forces currently at work in the universe - gravity, electromagnetism and the so-called strong and weak nuclear forces - are thought to have been unified during this stage into a single "superforce". 10^-35 seconds The so-called Grand Unification Era, at the end of which the superforce begins to break apart into the constituent forces we see today. Around this time so-called inflationary energy triggers a dramatic burst of expansion, expanding the universe from far smaller than a subatomic particle to far larger than the cosmic volume we can see today. In the process, the primordial wrinkles in space-time are smoothed out. The energy dumped into the universe by the end of inflation leads to the appearance of particles of matter via Einstein's celebrated equation E=mc^2. Screwed up the multi quote, still learning this forum. MigL said: “Energy does gravitate, and in that way it is certainly equivalent to mass. In the earliest moments of the universe, everything would have consisted of fields. Fields which have an energy density, and therefore an equivalent 'mass'.” How can energy have an equivalence to mass because energy “gravitates” when it was unknown how strong gravity was going to be yet? I’ve heard of computer models simulating gravity being to strong and the universe ending up as nothing but black holes and on the flip side, gravity being too weak and the universe ending up with no Stars, galaxies, etc.

Lots of good information from you guys. I have a bunch of questions to make sure my thoughts are matching up with the science and I’m not forcing the science to match my thoughts. I will focus on one at a time. I need to clear up the definition of energy has an equivalence to mass. I always thought of equivalence as if you have X amount of mass, you would end up with X amount of energy if it was released from the matter it was associated with. On the flip side, the side I’m interested in, if you have X amount of massless energy that was converted to matter, you would end up with X amount of mass. The energy that was converted to the “object” is now at rest in that “object”. Mass of an object is a measure of it’s energy content. My thoughts are at the start of time, when there was no matter yet, just energy associated with fields. I always thought it as being a hypothetical scenario, “if this occurred, this would be the end result”. Like in this experiment, I’m imagining they know exactly how much mass they will end up with if they succeed with converting massless energy into matter. https://phys.org/news/2018-03-underway.html

Understood, but it would be absurd to refer to those energy fields as mass until the energy was converted to matter, correct?

I need to clear up some confusion. In the beginning of the universe, before inflation ended, there were no “objects” just energy. Is it proper to refer to that energy as “mass” before it cooled enough to be converted to matter? I was under the assumption the definition of mass was: Mass of an object or body is a measure of it’s energy content. I always thought that until the conversion to matter took place, it was just energy with the potential to be X amount of mass.

I belong to another forum that has nothing to do with science and we have a member that knows everything about everything. We got into a discussion about the beginning of the universe. Long story short, this is his definition of mass. He is under the impression that the “object” has nothing to do with mass, wherever there is energy there is mass, and it only gets worse from there. I will start with this and if you boys and girls are interested, I got many more laughs for you. Remember now, this is a guy that knows all about theoretical physics. I wanted to get the reaction from people that actually had a clue because I was rolling on the ground laughing.