JustCurious?!

Yet another question from my reading: I read that in inflation, the universe expanded faster than the speed of light. I know that there is evidence to support inflation but I was wondering how since I thought nothing could beat the speed of light? Also, if inflation happened and the universe really did expand faster than the speed of light at the near-beginning of time, then does that mean the light is still catching up to the edge of the universe? Or has there been enough time and slowing down of the universe's expansion for light to have already caught up? Thanks in advance!

Thank you for the responses and the pdf! I am reading and mentating very slowly through the pdf since it has been many years since I took physics. From my understanding so far of the pdf: The entropy of black holes are proportional to area. But under Generalized Second Law, the entropy of black holes and its surrounding should never decrease. We know that black holes can evaporate, meaning the area goes down to zero and so the black hole's entropy also goes down to zero. Therefore under GSL, the surrounding environment's entropy must increase. Zel'dovich predicted that rotating black holes cause amplification of certain waves, which means quanta are spontaneously emitted. But in actuality, neutrinos have not shown to be amplified due to Pauli's exclusion principle. So at present time, are we trying to figure out what exactly are emitted by black holes? It seems that the more I read, the more questions I have.

Oh okay. I made a bad assumption about the world-line. Thanks for the info

Thanks for the clarification. So a particle in 4D creates world-lines which I assume also have wave properities? So do world-lines interact with each other causing constructive and destructive interference? If that is true, then would that mean that particles can disrupt other particles' time (ie cancel the particle's time-point)?

This is a purely imaginative question while I am reading Hawking's books. I am wondering about the whole light being a wave and particle at the same time and string theory; is light like a string through space-time so that in one point of view, light is a particle (cross-section of a string) but light is also a wave (like waves produced on a string)? So just as in the two-slit experiment that showed destructive interference and constructive interference, does this happen to light in the scale of the universe? I am trying to imagine light in the view of string theory with world-sheets having a wave-like properties and ripple effects with destructive and constructive interference. If other particles have wave-particle properties as stated in his book, do they also undergo destructive and constructive interference? Or maybe I just have an overactive imagination lol

But isn't the universe a spherical object only in imaginary time? Excuse me if I am completely wrong, but in real time I thought the universe has the big bang singularity so must have a beginning and the question was whether it would expand forever or collapse to a big crunch? One question regarding the universe being a spherical object in imaginary time...so space is finite but has no boundary/edge so has no beginning or end. If one pole of the spherical object is the big bang and the other pole is the big crunch, let's say the "north pole" being the big bang and the "south pole" big the big crunch, then if the universe gets to the state of being in the big crunch, would the polarities switch so the "south pole" becomes the "north pole"? In other words, is the big crunch interchangeable as the big bang in imaginary time? Adding to this thought: So time is a stretched to infinity at the singularity in a black hole/big bang, and time is faster when an observer is a greater distance (ie airplane vs earth surface analogy). I read that the farther galaxies are moving at faster away from us...not to think that we are the center of the universe but can we extrapolate that to mean that the farthest edges of the universe is moving faster than the part of the universe that is closer to the "epicenter"? So then does that mean that time is moving on to infinity at the edge of the universe just as it is infinity at the center of big bang? So....what does that mean?! So confused! Is the universe one giant wormhole or something?

Hi all! Just read Hawking's A Brief Time in History and starting on The Grand Design. I have to say my mind is blown! I never really understood what my physic's professor was really talking about until now. Anyway, I have a couple questions regarding the matter-antimatter asymmetry/CP violation. I read about how near the event horizon of black holes, one particle of the quark-antiquark pair fall into the black hole while the other particle can escape and as more mass is added to black holes, they can evaporate. I was wondering if there is a possibility that this black hole evaporation can cause matter-antimatter asymmetry if more quarks escape the event horizon as opposed to antiquarks. I think Hawking mentioned in his book that there are less primordial black holes than expected. If most of the primordial black holes have evaporated already and if a disproportionate number of quark particles escape the event horizon, could the matter-antimatter asymmetry be explained by the evaporation of most primordial black holes and escape of more quarks than antiquarks in the process? Sorry if this post is confusing or scientifically ignorant! Just some thoughts while I was reading.