Astrophysically Speaking, Part Two...

The big unanswered questions about the Universe, aside from the obvious ones like 'Who or what triggered the Big Bang?' and 'What are Dark Matter and Dark Energy?' (maybe the 'smoke' and the momentum from the Big Bang?)
- the other big questions should probably include something about the differences in the relative time-lines extant in our universe as compared to that of the source of the Big Bang. Obviously, wherever the Big Bang originated from operates on a vastly different time scale than our own. A scale in which our 'billions of years' may be measured in their nanoseconds, or minutes, or hours, or possibly days. In other words, whatever's taking billions of years here may be only a matter of hours in that other reality. Whoever or whatever set off that Big Bang, which must have been some (for us) unimaginably large thermonuclear explosion, may still be observing its effects and watching this expanding cloud of radioactive gases and dust particles as it dissipates above and beyond 'ground zero'. And we may be the unexpected products of someone's nuclear testing, or possibly some nuclear war in that other realm. And there's no way we can ever find out for sure.

I haven't yet touched on the repercussions these events must have on the whole subject of religion and God. But there must be some, obviously, because it's going to be exceedingly difficult to rationalize the whole of science and religion in view of present levels of understanding of the origin of our known physical universe. It may be interesting to see how our present crop of religion-mongers and Bible-punchers and televangelists try to explain how a benevolent and loving God created us from the midst of one of the most unimaginably hellish explosions ever known to man. This would seem to me to be an impossibility. God may well be capable of doing the impossible, but this still stretches my belief systems to the snapping point, and leaves me utterly confounded. I think I've just discovered the ultimate paradox, and I haven't any explanation to offer.