"Most scientists agree that the universe began some 12 to 20 billion years ago in what has come to be known as the Big Bang (a term coined by the English astrophysicist Fred Hoyle in 1950. Hoyle, who championed a rival cosmological theory, meant the "Big Bang" to be a term of derision, but the name was so catchy that it stuck.). Though the Big Bang suggests a colossal explosion, it wasn't really an "explosion" in the sense that we understand it. Space itself exploded."
http://archive.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Cyberia/Cosmos/InTheBeginning.html
