E = mc2

“Our whole universe was in a hot, dense state

Then nearly fourteen billion years ago expansion started, wait

The earth began to cool, the autotrophs began to drool

Neanderthals developed tools

We built a wall* (we built the pyramids)

Math, science, history, unraveling the mysteries

That all started with the big bang (bang)”

*Mexico did not pay for this wall.

Einstein presented us with his most famous formula over a hundred years ago, and, still, most of us don’t really know what it means.  Most of us can translate it into English, though.  Energy is equal to Mass times the speed of light squared.  Since scientists have measured the speed of light at an astonishing 186,000 miles per second, it figures that a tiny amount of mass multiplied by 186,000 x 186,000 is a really big number.  So, an awful lot of energy can be obtained from a small amount of matter.  The Atomic Bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki proved that.  Conversely a lot of energy can convert a lump of coal into a diamond.

Energy and mass are interchangeable.  The more energy you have, the more mass that it can be converted into.  The more mass you have the more energy you can get from it.  If you have zero energy, you have zero mass, and vice versa, if you have zero mass, you have zero energy.

The Law of Conservation of Mass says that Matter can change form through physical and chemical changes, but through any of these changes matter is conserved.  The same amount of matter exists before and after the change – none is created or destroyed. A rusty metal bar weighs more than a shiny metal bar, because oxygen has been added to the metal, increasing its weight ever so slightly.  The weight of the rusty bar is equal to the weight of the original metal plus the added oxygen.

Just one more bit of science and I’ll make my point.

The amount of energy/matter in the universe is constant.  Over time, this energy becomes more and more spread out and less and less useful, even though the actual amount doesn’t change.

Now my point.

“In the beginning,” our world was not made out of nothing.  There wasn’t any matter, but there was an enormous amount of concentrated energy, which could be converted into matter.  “The whole universe was in a hot, dense state.”

Fourteen billion years ago (or maybe even further back) expansion started.  The Universe began to cool, and with this expansion and cooling, Energy was able to convert into matter, first hydrogen, then helium, then the suns, planets, moons, gases, and all the other elements.

So, while some people say that this world was created from nothing, that is not true.  There was always energy, which was converted into matter, and if the expansion of the Universe ever reverses, all the matter will once again return to energy, “a hot dense state,” and then the whole process will probably repeat, and that energy will expand and convert into matter.  World without end.  Amen.

Peace and Love, and all of the above,

Earl