If the universe is constantly expanding then what are we expanding in to?

Question

Is the universe expanding in to nothing or something that isn't there yet?! Asking this has truly f***ed my head up...

Answer 1

If the universe is infinitely big, then the answer is simply that it isn't expanding into anything; instead, what is happening is that every region of the universe, every distance between every pair of galaxies, is being "stretched", but the overall size of the universe was infinitely big to begin with and continues to remain infinitely big as time goes on, so the universe's size doesn't change, and therefore it doesn't expand into anything.

If, on the other hand, the universe has a finite size, then it may be legitimate to claim that there is something "outside of the universe" that the universe is expanding into. However, because we are, by definition, stuck within the space that makes up our universe and have no way to observe anything outside of it, this ceases to be a question that can be answered scientifically. So the answer in that case is that we really don't know what, if anything, the universe is expanding into.

Answer 2

Good question. If you'll forgive me for saying so, I think you might have a false mental picture of what's happening, which could be causing your confusion.

You're thinking of it like someone blowing up a balloon. Imagine someone in an empty room inflating a balloon - the balloon's surface area gets bigger, but the room containing the person inflating it remains the same size. In your picture, it's as though the balloon is the universe and the rest of the space in the room is...something else. This is not what's going on. At least, we don't think so.

The universe is all that there is (in this universe, at any rate, and alternative ones are at the moment only theoretically possible, not definitively established). It does no good to say that the room itself is expanding, because we start to get a mental picture of an outside-the-room (a garden, maybe) in which the room is placed, and then we're back to square one - any outside-the-room must ipso facto be a part of the universe.

The trouble arises because we don't know exactly how big the universe is (although we know how big is the bit of it that we can see), nor do we know whether it goes on forever or comes to some sort of stop at some point, nor do we know what that stop might consist in if it exists at all, nor do we even know what shape the universe is. We only know it's expanding because the light from distant stars and galaxies tells us so.

If you really want to get the true answer to this question, you'll need to become a cosmologist.

Answer 3

How refreshing to find an intelligent, stimulating question!

This is not so much an answer, more like my own speculation, and it explores two of the millions of different possibilites.

1) The LIving Universe.

If we consider the current size of the "Universe" and our own size, we are microscopic, in comparison, so to us, it is infinite.

Conversely, atoms are so small, we cannot actualy "see them", irrespective of instrumentation. Nevertheless, they exist and they occupy a "space", however microscopic.

Now imagine that we can shrink ourselves to sub-atomic dimensions and walk about on the surface of an Electron circling its nucleus. At that magnitude, the following "reclassification" might apply:

Nucleus = Star
Electrons = Planets
Atom = Solar System
Molecule = Galaxy
Cell = Universe
Tissue = Multiverse
Organism = "God"?

That could mean that Universe is simply growing and changing, as opposed to "expanding". What was originally a very dense "seed", made of precursor cells, is gradually differentiating, growing, assuming water and so the space between molecules is increasing

The problem is that we have no terms of reference outside our own dimension, "time", at our magnitude, is so nearly infinite, that our own planet may exist for a fraction of a moment of that growth, and therefore the brevity of our own life-span makes it impossible to observe galaxies (molecules) aggregating, or the cell itself "the Universe" reproducing, by "meiosis" or "mitosis", depending on wheather it is a Eukaryotic or Prokaryotic cell.

2) The Non-living Universe.

Another strand of reasoning is that the "Universe" could be the equivalent of a firework, lots of little particles burning furiously, for a short while, moving ever outwards, into what we tem "air" or "space", until they lose momentum and heat, then the stars grow dim and cold, the universe stops expanding.

Neither is easily proven, but it is better to speculate and get it wrong, than to let our minds fall into the brutish state of intellectual apathy that characterises some of the irrelevant, shallow responses to your very perceptive question.

Answer 4

The dimesions or 'shape' of the universe is already defined by the laws of physics. We can't see it because there is nothing to see as light or radiation hasn't reached it yet. It is expanding into is itself which is a dimension and is finite, not infinite. There is nothing infinite! Infinite doesn't exist.

So over time the light in the universe will end up at its origin. Once the light make a revolution there will be twice as many stars in the sky and maybe the black of space will no longer be black.

Answer 5

Very good question, Very thought provoking. The universe is expanded into the nothingness that surrounds it. It is expanding into the great void that is neither time nor space. It expands and the nothingness becomes something. That is a theory of quantum physics. Nothingness becomes something as something intrudes upon it. Many scientist believe that someday the universe will stop expanding and then contract and the something will be contracting leaving nothingness in its wake. Now I've given myself a head ache. I hope you are happy.

Answer 6

What I think is that there are millions of universes in space so I coined the phrase "gigaverse".My theory is that there is infinite space and nothing is there, not even nothing, basically saying that is not created yet.All these millions of universes are rapidly contracting and expanding and doing a little jig in a cycle.Then ultimately each of those gigaverses is a cell in a very complex organism that is simple in the higher power dimension.Assuming this we are aproximatley 0.000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 of something.We are literally nothing.So basically saying this, in bacteria's cells there are other gigaverses that are less complicated.This goes on forever in a circle.Eventually the gigaverses in those bacteria switch with us and we are smaller than them.It is a very confusing subject with which even I am confused sometimes.

Answer 7

This has a lot to do with Einstein's theory of relativity, which is very hard to understand. The answer to your question would be a never ending universe or 'SPACE'. Don't think about it to much cause it will screw with your head. You'll never find the end of the universe which is sort of lilke time that never ends. Traveling at the speed of light also enters into the solution or faster than the speed of light. Which can be horrifying to think about. Just as a joke though, gimme some of what ya takin.

Answer 8

A vacuum! Galaxies move apart, and when all of the others go beyond the edge of the Observable Universe, our Milky Way galaxy will be the only one we can perceive...if there are any of us alive to see anything by then. Some theories say everything will begin contracting again eventually, until we have another Cosmic Atom that will explode in another Big Bang.

Answer 9

No one seems to know the answer to this one, even the astronomers. When they say that the universe is expanding, they don't just mean that the galaxies are moving father apart. They mean that the space in-between is stretching, as evidenced by the fact that light itself from far away objects is stretched toward the red end of the spectrum.

Answer 10

It is expanding into a place called the outerverse (a place beyond the end of the universe) and the universe is expanding because the underverse is getting bigger (aka the center of the universe). if you are a big fan of science fiction then you know this.
and before you ask the outerverse does not go on forever, it eventually loops back in on itself this is where time travel is possible but only into the past