The History of Earth: UNIVERSE
Welcome to the History of Earth. We begin this series with the story of the universe and everything that happened in the 9 billion years before the creation of Earth.
From nothing came something. Just like that, *clicks fingers*, in a big bang. In fact, the Big Bang.
Or, more accurately, from nothing came… everything.
Or perhaps you believe that there actually was something before the nothing. Perhaps a quantum vacuum. In which case, everything came from something.
Indeed, you could say that everything came from everything, but simply changed its form. From quantum vacuum to material existence.
But how did the quantum vacuum begin? And why did it transform into material existence?
Oh, let’s stop asking impossible questions for a moment and pretend instead that we actually know what happened.
So, let’s start again.
13.8 billion years ago, our universe sparked into life.
Unless, it was 15.8 billion years ago.
Or some other timescale.
Or perhaps the universe is eternal.
Oh dear, this really hasn’t started well.
There is simply so much that #wedontknow.
All we do know is that our Universe exists. Beyond that, we grasp at unprovable theory.
And the current orthodox version of this unprovable theory is that it started c.13.8 billion years ago.
Let’s call that Day 0. Then let’s imagine that every day since then has consisted of 100 million years.
On Day 2, the first stars appeared, balls of gas pulled together by gravity. These stars are huge, perhaps 200 times the size of the Sun.
They each live for a mere million years (15 minutes in our chosen scale), and then explode.
By Day 4, these megastars no longer exist. The universe has moved on and left them behind.
But, in their explosive deaths, they have filled the emerging universe with gas, and from this gas new types of star emerge, stars that may burn for billions of years.
And, within the nuclear furnaces of these stars, hydrogen and helium are fused to form carbon, oxygen, nitrogen and, eventually, the heavier elements, including iron and calcium.
These stars also explode, as supernovae, flinging a soup of chemical elements into space.
And, with each generation of star, more elements are formed. Silver. Gold. Uranium.
By Day 5, galaxies are forming.
Then, for weeks, that is all. Stars are born; stars die, only to birth more stars.
It is now Day 92.
Our galaxy, the Milky Way, one of perhaps 150 billion galaxies, has expanded to a diameter of 100,000 light years, and contains perhaps 200 billion stars.
But there is one star missing in this firmament. Our own star. The Sun. For it does not yet exist.
That is on the ‘to do’ list for tomorrow.
This article is Part 1 in a series of 50 on the history of Earth. Each of the remaining articles tells the story of a 100-million year period in Earth’s history.
Click here for Part 2: SUN
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