Devil’s Advocate

Abstract

As a start, let us look back at the origin of the Universe, which, we are now fairly sure dates back 13.7 thousand million years – but strictly speaking we are not talking about the origin of the Universe at all, we are discussing its evolution, which is by no means the same thing. When we go back to our starting point, we are faced with two choices – neither of which is understandable. Either (a) the Universe began at a definite moment in time, or else it did not; (b) if it began at a set moment as the Universe itself. The only alternative is to say that the Universe has always existed, so that there was no beginning. But we are no better off here because however far back we look there is always a “before”.