Cosmologist on a Tire Swing
Cosmologist on a Tire Swing
[A tall panel with Cueball and Science Girl walking together through a landscape with three trees in the background and with many small pools of water. Their reflection is showing in the pool nearest to them.] Science Girl: What was before the big bang? Cueball: I think time began with the big bang. Cueball: So it doesn't make sense to ask what came before it. Cosmologist (off panel): Look out
[The next six panels are between the first tall panel and a similar panel at the end. They should be read from above and down in two columns of three images. The bottom of the first panel at the top is partly hidden by the second panel which is likewise partly hidden by the lower panel, and this repeats in the second column.] [A cosmologist looking like Megan comes swinging left past Science Girl and Cueball, who turns to look after her. She sit on an upstanding tire swing and the movement is indicated by two lines going from right to left.} Cosmologist: Wheeee Hi I'm a cosmologist on a tire swing!
[The cosmologist swings back right, hanging in her arms with her body almost vertical. The other two also turns right.] Cosmologist: We don't know whether time
[Going left, similar to the first of the small panels.] Cosmologist: started at the big bang.
[Going right, similar to the second of the small panels, but with the cosmologist sitting more upright.] Cosmologist: It might have!
[Going left, similar to the first of the small panels.] Cosmologist: Or maybe not! We don't know! Cueball: Oh. OK!
[Going right, similar to previous going right panels.] Science Girl: ...Your tire swing looks fun! Cosmologist: I can't stop!
[The last panel is again a full panel, with Cueball and Science Girl looking towards the right after the cosmologist who continued the last swing to the right from the last small panel, having just reach the upper part of the curve and has thus turned left to face them, before the swing will go down left again. The background is completely white with no indications of the trees and pools from the first panel.] Science Girl: Won't the swing stop on its own? Cosmologist: I thought it would, but it seems to be accelerating. Science Girl: Cosmology sounds pretty confusing. Cosmologist: Wheeeee!

Cueball and the curious Science Girl walk through a landscape with trees in the background and with many small pools of water. The setting of trees interspersed with these many small pools resembles the Wood between the Worlds , a meta-verse described in C.S. Lewis's The Magician's Nephew ; each pool leads into a different universe — one of these is ours, another is Narnia , and Charn (the world of Jadis the White Witch ) is also visited through these pools.
Science Girl asks about the time before the Big Bang . Cueball says he thinks there was no time before — which is implied by most forms of the Big Bang theory. But then they happen upon a cosmologist , Megan , on a swing who has several other theories about the universe.
Simply put, the tire swing is a symbolic representation of our universe. Scientific observations tell us that both space and time began with the Big Bang ~13.8 billion years ago. We don't know if there was such a thing as "before" the universe, or what that might be.
The first 6 panels reference ongoing speculation about where the universe came from and why it even exists in the first place. The last two panels relate to recent observations of the accelerating universe in which galaxies are now receding from each other at higher and higher speeds, due to dark energy .
The swing itself is likely a reference to the Cyclic Model , where the universe expands from a Big Bang, then contracts back in on itself under its own gravity for a Big Crunch , before bouncing outward again in another Big Bang, and repeating the whole process. On the other hand, the swing is accelerating as the universe — so it may also be a reference to the entire universe. We are all "trapped" on this swing — and it's accelerating! For the layman (and most scientists as well) cosmology is pretty confusing as Science Girl states at the end, to which the cosmologist just replies Wheeeee! and enjoys her ride with this accelerating swing/universe.
Another interpretation of the acceleration may referring to the physics of orbital motion in which a centrifugal force is always causing constant acceleration toward the center of the motion.
The title text references questions about the shape of the universe and what could lie "outside" of it. By the current understanding on physics laws, we can't see outside of the observable universe , but it's likely that the universe is bigger than this observable universe and uniform on large scale. Even though nobody can leave our own universe, Megan bets that such unknown worlds do exist - because this universe is here, and it must have come from somewhere — like her tire.
The shape of our universe was visited soon after in 1365: Inflation where we can see what the outer boundaries of our universe looks like.
Science Girl is seen later in conjunction with a tire swing in 1659: Tire Swing ; maybe she is preparing to become a cosmologist herself. Also this may explain from where the tire came from...
[A tall panel with Cueball and Science Girl walking together through a landscape with three trees in the background and with many small pools of water. Their reflection is showing in the pool nearest to them.] Science Girl: What was before the big bang? Cueball: I think time began with the big bang. Cueball: So it doesn't make sense to ask what came before it. Cosmologist (off panel): Look out
[The next six panels are between the first tall panel and a similar panel at the end. They should be read from above and down in two columns of three images. The bottom of the first panel at the top is partly hidden by the second panel which is likewise partly hidden by the lower panel, and this repeats in the second column.] [A cosmologist looking like Megan comes swinging left past Science Girl and Cueball, who turns to look after her. She sit on an upstanding tire swing and the movement is indicated by two lines going from right to left.} Cosmologist: Wheeee Hi I'm a cosmologist on a tire swing!
[The cosmologist swings back right, hanging in her arms with her body almost vertical. The other two also turns right.] Cosmologist: We don't know whether time
[Going left, similar to the first of the small panels.] Cosmologist: started at the big bang.
[Going right, similar to the second of the small panels, but with the cosmologist sitting more upright.] Cosmologist: It might have!
[Going left, similar to the first of the small panels.] Cosmologist: Or maybe not! We don't know! Cueball: Oh. OK!
[Going right, similar to previous going right panels.] Science Girl: ...Your tire swing looks fun! Cosmologist: I can't stop!
[The last panel is again a full panel, with Cueball and Science Girl looking towards the right after the cosmologist who continued the last swing to the right from the last small panel, having just reach the upper part of the curve and has thus turned left to face them, before the swing will go down left again. The background is completely white with no indications of the trees and pools from the first panel.] Science Girl: Won't the swing stop on its own? Cosmologist: I thought it would, but it seems to be accelerating. Science Girl: Cosmology sounds pretty confusing. Cosmologist: Wheeeee!
