Back in the 1930s, Belgian cosmologist and Catholic priest Georges Lemaître wrote a paper postulating the radical idea that the universe began with a massive explosion that scattered its contents, including our solar system, in every direction. Eventually dubbed the Big Bang theory, the idea that our universe is constantly expanding eventually took hold in the scientific community to the point where it’s just assumed to be true in much the same manner as Darwin’s theory of evolution is considered fact.

However, new photos and evidence from the recently activated James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have led one scientist to question this long-held theory about the origins of our universe. “The truth that these papers don’t report is that the hypothesis that the JWST’s images are blatantly and repeatedly contradicting is the Big Bang Hypothesis that the universe began 14 billion years ago in an incredibly hot, dense state and has been expanding ever since,” said scientist and author Eric J. Lerner. “Since that hypothesis has been defended for decades as unquestionable truth by the vast majority of cosmological theorists, the new data is causing these theorists to panic.” Indeed, he’s not alone is questioning The Narrative™.

Other scientists, however, dismiss Lerner as a crank who has an ulterior motive. “Don’t get me wrong — there is new and intriguing data emerging from the JWST,” Cnet’s Jackson Ryan writes. “Just not the kind that would undo the Big Bang theory. Most of this new data trickles down to the public in the form of scientific preprints, articles that are yet to undergo peer review and land on repositories like arXiv, or popular press articles.”

“The observations astrophysicists and cosmologists have made over decades line up with the Big Bang theory,” Ryan adds. “They don’t line up anywhere near as neatly if we use Lerner’s alternative theory. That’s doesn’t mean scientists won’t find evidence overturning the Big Bang theory. They just might! But, for now, it remains our best theory for explaining what we see.”

But Lerner also has his own theory about why this story hasn’t made more news, strongly insinuating his critics are on the take. “If anyone questions the Big Bang, they are labeled stupid and unfit for their jobs,” Lerner said. “Unfortunately, funding for cosmology comes from a very few government sources controlled by a handful of committees that are dominated by Big Bang theorists. These theorists have spent their lives building the Big Bang theory. Those who openly question the theory simply don’t get funded.”

I’m not a science writer; I barely managed to make it through ninth-grade science. But I still learned that most science is never really settled because theories always have to be tested against new observations, and the James Webb Space Telescope is going to give us a lot of new observations in the next few years. As Lerner concludes, “I have personally called on leading Big Bang theorists to openly debate the new evidence. For cosmology — as for any research area — to advance, this debate must happen openly in both scientific journals and the public media.”

We couldn’t agree more, but it’s not just the Big Bang’s “settled science” that really should be up for debate. Anyone ready to discuss global warming, maybe with a little humility this time?

Image: Fearedlion123, CC A-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons