There are a lot of things we have learned about the universe over the last millennium. But some things are still unknown to us, and these unsolved mysteries of the universe seem intriguing to us.

Let’s take a quick look at some of the puzzling mysteries we have no knowledge about to this day.

1. What is the universe made of?

Just ninety years ago, we had no problem describing what the universe consisted of atoms, which in turn consisted of (insert the words here you may have previously been taught about).

But a lot of knowledge leads to a lot of disappointments, and according to recent views, the universe is 96% made of unknown dark matter (this phrase was first used in 1933), comprising about 22% of the mass of the universe, and even less defined dark energy (~1998), which accounts for 74%.

And while the 4% is tangible, the other 96% is quite unfathomable, because “dark particles”, whatever they may be, must come into contact with ordinary matter very inconspicuously.

Reliable detection of these particles, dark matter for example, (the dark energy will be even more difficult!) has failed, but the list of possible candidates is too long: ultra-light, heavy, and even ultra-heavy. The knowledge regarding the properties of dark matter, however, is still very, very, very out of reach.

Half a century of attempts to imagine the interior of black holes and whether they have connecting tunnels between them did not produce any logical findings.

2. Why do we need these pathetic four percent of ordinary matter, all these atoms that make up stars, all that sand, and other people?

And the truth is that they do not exist. The standard model does not suggest that matter and antimatter at the birth of the universe had different quantities. But back then, after they have appeared, the anti-hydrogen was annihilated, counteracting with hydrogen, and so on.

The final picture must have been tragic: all atoms are annihilated, and the universe has photons with different energies scrambling around, only the light, and nothing but the light. In such a scenario, even this light was not to be seen by anyone.

And yet we are still here. So there is something that we are missing in this picture, there is an obvious mystery regarding asymmetry of matter and antimatter. There have been many attempts to explain it this way: say, for some reason, antimatter decayed faster than matter, and so on.

But even with some promising mechanisms of transformation of one kind of neutrino to another, may not give the correct or generally-accepted answer to this question…

3. Are there other universes other than our own?

This is a very awkward question because the whole picture of the world will need to be reconsidered with this answer. If there is more than one universe, they are indefinitely abundant and varied with a high degree of probability.

Other physicists like to refer to their numerical infinity saying that it is silly to ask why the observed physical laws and values of the fundamental physical constants are what they are. There is no fine-tuning of the universe they say.

No configuration exists, and all of us are a product of solving complex problems by the brute force of enormous proportions, the result of going through an infinite number of options for every conceivable physical law.

In one of the outcomes (among different universes) nature had its luck, and as a result, life has appeared, with a pair of eyes to look around. And was even endowed with the brains, that’s why it is now asking all kinds of silly questions.

But there is no fine-tuning (we attest to that!), only the blind but predictable game of chances. Take the number of letters that make up the word “Hamlet”, and with an infinite number of reordering the letters, you will certainly come up with “Hamlet” at a Shakespeare’s level if not even better.

In short, in the majority of parallel universes, no life is present. Which is indeed, very frustrating.

But there are other opinions out there. Some physicists claim that all of the so-called random processes are actually quite quantum in their nature, and therefore cannot occur until the moment when they have been looked at by an observer.

And even after that, there will be only one possibility in which the observer still exists, and “cat” is either dead or alive, that is there is only one reality which is our own world.

But how can we find out exactly which of the two approaches is correct?

4. Oops. We still need to mention the word “universe” one more time. Are we the only ones in it?

A million variants of this mystery of the universe have occupied inquiring minds for a long time. We will not go into details, but no aliens on the streets mean that we will either perish before becoming able to travel to other stars (how is it that we have not been visited by extraterrestrials yet?), or something else.

There is a couple of original explanations. The first, suggested by Stanislaw Lem, explains that our understanding of alien life is limited. We have initially separated all things in space into natural and artificially made, while many natural objects and phenomena can be a by-product of the process or the ultimate goal of some activity by highly advanced civilizations.

loneliness universe

According to this concept, some black holes may be energy generators and, at the same time, means to dispose of space debris, the stars can be a means of dispersion of the gas clouds, somehow interfering with this super-advanced civilization, and so on.

In this case, our attempts to find alien life are doomed to fail.

“The ability to distinguish between artificial and natural phenomena is a function of knowledge of those who establish such a difference … The presence of the energy “star’s” concentration of its influence, how far it can be detected, as well as its variations, all of these can only be known when we have a comparable energy level to operate with… “

The second option, which was not seriously described in science fiction even 60 years ago, may seem even more bizarre. There is no alien space travel because at some point, they have learned to change the laws of physics at will, quickly and easily, allowing infinitely expand their living space without the need to travel far distances, or able to find wormholes into other worlds that enable them to “colonize” space without traveling by spaceships.

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?

5. What is inside a black hole?

The trouble is not that we do not know this, but the fact that we do not even have an idea about a theory or an experiment that would allow us to find this out. The general theory of relativity fails to work under conditions of singularity, which is hypothetically present inside a black hole.

Maybe this is where quantum physics should step in, but decades of attempts to use it for these explanations, and in conjunction with the theory of relativity have not yet led to any success.

We need a theory of quantum gravitation concept, but it is, unfortunately, still cannot be devised. String theory and looping quantum gravitation concept, which criticize and juxtapose each other, have not yielded any unambiguous answers yet.

These are just some of the puzzling mysteries of the universe. Will they ever be solved? Let’s hope so.


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This Post Has 3 Comments

  1. Andy Stevens Boulogne

    Lets look at them and USE the Theory of Evolution of planets. 1.What is the universe made of …. Hydrogen and its multiples due to processes of fusion,fission and decay. 2.Why do we need these pathetic four percent of ordinary matter, all these atoms that make up stars, all that sand and other people?………………….its not about US…we are part of a complex process of energy equilibrium so the events which occur ,,,from planetary formation due to a star synthesizing energy from Hydrogen to the death of a star due to the lack of that fuel. 3.Are there other universes other than our own?……………………….There is but one universe but several state of manifestation of matter. Thus an ant or a microbe will answer the question slightly differently. 4.. Oops. We still need to mention the word “universe” one more time. Are we the only ones in it?…………………………………………………. We are not the only one in it..rather we are quite common and our beings inhabit a planet which is always the third planet orbiting any sun and is relevant to every star system. So any astronomer looking to discover life on any planet should look for any star with 3 or more satellites and focus on the one which is furthest away of the three. There would like the conditions for the sustenance of life. 5.What is inside a black hole?……………………………a black hole is a vortex created by the magnetism resulting from the movement of hydrogen ions in motion towards the central combustion chamber of a newly forming star within gas cloud. The hole appears BLACK because the LIGHT which would normally give Blue Shift Red Shift cannot be noticed because the rate of movement of the matter is faster than the speed of light. This means to our instruments it would appear BLACK.

  2. Louis Morelli

    Applying a new method for cosmological inquiry I have found surprising different explanations for these 5 questions. The method is based principally on calculations of universal evolution by the reverse way, starting here and now with biological organization of matter and going down towards the Big Bang. So, it is adding Biology and Neurology upon the unique method used by modern scientific theoretical models, which had applied only Physics and Math for studying the Universe.

    1. What is the universe made of?

    Matrix/DNA: Bits-informations coming from the system that generated this Universe, working as genes, like a human body is made off genes/bits-informations from its parents. If a bit is temporary active is energy, if it is inertial, is mass. Each bit emerges as vortex, which is the first shape of a universal natural system, having seven brutes forces/properties ( the universal systemic functions), that evolves into the nowaday seven life’s properties. Those first vortexes propagates as light waves, so, light has the code for functional systems,aka, life ( as suggested by the Matrix/DNA version of the graphic for electromagnetic spectrum of any light wave). All natural systems – from atoms to galaxies to human bodies are merelly evolutionary shapes of a universal Matrix evolving by a process of life’s cycle. So, all natural systems have their own version of DNA, which are identified in the models of matrix/DNA Theory. This universe is merely the fossil of our ancestors, inside which is occurring a process of natural genetic reproduction of the thing that created it.

    2. Why do we need these pathetic four percent of ordinary matter,…

    Matrix/DNA: As solved by Godel’s theorem, nobody can knows the thru of a system standing inside it. So, these suggestions about four percent or 30% is highly theoretical, as every human conception about the universe. We have seen less ordinary matter than other substances because our scientific power is limited to the universe’s skeleton due our method been Physics+Math. But, like the human body made by this Universe is composed by skeleton, soft biological coverture, plus mind, so, much be the whole Universe. We need developing “biological and neurological cosmology”, for studying this Universe, as we are doing at Matrix/DNA Theory. Only a biological coverture over the nowaday known galactic’s skeletons could explains life here, as shown by Matrix/DNA galactic model.

    3. Are there other universes other than our own?

    Matrix/DNA: Thousands of new discovered natural mechanisms and properties by matrix/DNA Theory are in needs of more researches and better understanding because they can improve human life and saving Humanity from extinction. We must study the universe, but stopping at its frontiers, because everything else will be metaphysics, which is scientifically a prejudice. This question makes no sense.

    4. Oops. We still need to mention the word “universe” one more time. Are we the only ones in it?

    Matrix/DNA: The answer is in the DNA: it is composed by atoms composing active genes intercalated with larger arrays of atoms composing “junk DNA”; so these larger distances between genes represents the larger distances between different life’s forms inside the universe. Evolution of the universal natural system makes that each time the genes are approximating, till all of them meeting in the shape of neurons, a superior natural architecture called brain. I can’t make this mental operation but things are suggesting that the encounter among developed life’s forms happens at a superior natural organization of matter. We are not bacterias limited to the skeleton of a human body, so, we are not limited to the skeleton of the Universe, composed by hard bodies like planets and stars.

    5. What is inside a black hole?

    Matrix/DNA: The whole modern cosmological model and theory that concluded by the existence of “black holes” is wrong, sorry. See at the Matrix/DNA Theory formula for natural systems what is the real structure inside galactics’ nucleus. As I said before, this galaxy has an invisible coverture where the connections among astronomical bodies and the transformations of these bodies is organized by less evolved life’s, biological properties. Our scientific team has not seen it yet due applying only Physiscs and Math, which does not translate the phenomenology and is not the language of the soft “meat” covering the galactic body.( Thanks by the good idea and I wrote an article about it at my website)

  3. Anna

    What is inside a black hole? – it is one of the mysterious questions for me! So excited and scared at the same time!

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