This game is played by two people, using small rackets, called battledores, made of parchment or rows of gut stretched across wooden frames, and shuttlecocks, made of a base of some light material, such as cork, with trimmed feathers fixed around the top.
An alternative model which once enjoyed equal status with the big bang is the steady state theory, first proposed in 1948 by Hermann Bondi, Thomas Gold, and Fred Hoyle. This model, too, assumes that the universe is expanding, but proposes that it has no beginning or end in space and time.
About 15 billion years ago a tremendous explosion started the expansion of the universe. This explosion is known as the Big Bang. At the point of this event all of the matter and energy of space was contained at one point. What exisisted prior to this event is completely unknown and is a matter of pure speculation.