If the Universe was infinitely dense at the Big Bang, why didn't time stand still?

My question is; if time slowes closer to a black hole then at the beginning of the Big Bang when the universe was infanitnly dense, wouldn't time move infanintly slow? Wouldn't one second last for eons? I have a few other questions related to that, but I will start with this one.

Ahh, well it's not true to say that time slows down close to a black hole. The truth is a bit more subtle. If let's say you and a buddy of yours were having a conversation close to a black hole, time would appear completely normal. It's only if one of you was close to the black hole and the other one wasn't that you'd see the time dilation. So even though the universe was very dense at the beginning, time would still seem to pass normally to all things in the universe. This is especially true because, at the very beginning, the universe had pretty much uniform density throughout.

September 2007, Marko Krco (more by Marko Krco) (Like this Answer)

Still Curious?

Get More 'Curious?' with Our New PODCAST:

More questions about Black Holes and Quasars: Previous | Next

More questions about Cosmology and the Big Bang: Previous | Next

More questions about The Theory of Relativity: Previous | Next

How to ask a question:

If you have a follow-up question concerning the above subject, submit it here. If you have a question about another area of astronomy, find the topic you're interested in from the archive on our site menu, or go here for help.

URL: http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=731
This page has been accessed 21409 times since September 21, 2007.
Last modified: September 21, 2007 11:52:38 AM

Legal questions? See our copyright, disclaimer and privacy policy.
Ask an Astronomer is hosted by the Astronomy Department at Cornell University and is produced with PHP and MySQL.