If everything exists within the universe then what is the universe expanding into?

Question

Scientists say that the universe is expanding. If the universe is all there is then how can it expand into noting?

Answer 1

I think there's a kind of exchange. I'm no scientist, but, as it expands into "nothingness" it evidently takes within itself more empty space, insofar as the concept of "more" is not a contradiction of the concept of "nothing". If it is "nothing", how can there be more of it? And yet, as the universe expands, it must incorporate more empty space, its outer frontiers being identifiable as the outer bounds of the expanding sphere that it is. Though it expands by some sort of geometric progression, it remains finite in volume and surface area, though, probably being roughly spherical, it is unbounded by anything besides the parameters of time. Nevertheless, it appears to me that, at some point of expansion, the matter inside it becomes so scarce, and the empty space between bundles of matter and energy so great, that the whole universe will simply, for all intelligible purposes, "fade out" and be virtually non-existent. Picture dropping a drop of red dye into a lake, and seeing the redness expand, grow into light red, then pink, then vanish wholly into clear water. The more the universe expands, the more empty space it becomes saturated with, till finally it is so saturated with emptiness that one cannot speak of its limits, for, by any sensible or intelligible measure, it will have vanished like a drop of red dye in a large lake. Of course, long before then we each shall have vanished individually, and mankind and all of his works reabsorbed, so that none (with the possible exception of God if such a being exists) will witness the dissipation and fading of our universe. Of course, perhaps by that time human intelligence or another intelligence will have invented self-replicating machine intelligence that can draw into itself, for purposes of its own infinite continuation, the fading waves and particles of energy, thereby, in its own being, perpetuating and continually recreating a new universe. Thus, robotics and artificial intelligence might strike upon an ultimate purpose greater than any for which mankind designed it: reversing what otherwise would have been the "irreversible entropy" of the universe! (If God created the universe in such a manner that physical laws, life and intelligence would emerge, perhaps THIS was His ultimate purpose in including the emergence of mankind in his plans, though if He, She or It were potent enough to do that in the first place, you have to ask what is the need for setting up the creation of some kind of whiz-bang robot computer in order to do it again? Give God credit for creating the universe, then contradict that by saying God's more intelligent creation has to build a machine to get the job done again? That makes very little sense. In fact, I've gone too far in these idle speculations to make any kind of sense whatsoever, any longer, and, besides that, the perceptive reader will have instantly detected my incompetence from the very beginning-- so I will cheerfully bow out right now. Check with Stephen Hawking. This is the best I can do.

Answer 2

The notion of the universe expanding but not being contained in anything from which the expansion is measured is a bit like the notion that as you round a curve in your car, if you know your speed you can guess the radius of the curve from the resulting centrifugal acceleration. Similarly, we know that expansion in general, as measured by the distance between galaxies, can be measured by the "red shift", a phenomenon that occurs with light when objects are moving away from you... it's a bit like the lowering of pitch when someone making a steady-pitch noise rides past you in a car, otherwise known as the "doppler effect".

Though the above drastically oversimplifies and neglects details, one can estimate that the universe is expanding based on the "galactic red shift" and other self-consistent measures. Now -- expanding INTO WHAT? One cannot tell without stepping outside the known dimensions, any more than you can tell what a balloon is expanding into by measuring the increasing distance of two dots made on the surface with a magic marker.

Hope this helps.

Answer 3

The universe is not a clearly defined volume. the size of the universe is equal to the contents of the universe. This raises the question "does the universe have an end?" My personal belief, put into simple terms is that the universe is like one of those old video games, when you get to one end, you just appear on the other end of the screen.

Answer 4

This is not the only Universe. We are like a bubble in a bubble bath of expanding and contracting universes. You are also making the mistake of thinking in only 4 dimensions, space and time. There are potentially 11 dimensions so our ideas of space and time describing all of reality is fundamentally flawed. We are only human after all.

Answer 5

dedpends on our definition of universe- what we think of the universe is really not infinite therefore it can expand. A true universe is shaped within itself connecting at various TIMES
ask Einstein about the shape of the universe or better yet Hawkings

Answer 6

Research suggests it may actually be contracting.