If we could see our 'universe' in its entirety from the outside, what would it look like?

Question

This question is for everybody, although I'm particularly interested in what atheists have to say. One disclaimer I need to make : I'm aware that the universe by definition would have no outside, since the universe is technically 'everything'. For our purposes, I mean universe as the part of the universe humans actually do have access to. M-Theory would suggest the universe we perceive may be one small component in a much grander whole [think Brane theory].

Yeah - I know this is kind of outside the realm of science. But even if you have no idea, try speculating. Personal opinion is fair game here.

Uncle - See above paragraph..

Answer 1

It would look like a single cell.

Answer 2

This is impossible to answer, right? We have the universe expanding but yet since time and space come into being with a universe, what is it expanding into? And although we do have the start of our universe, what can we say about the 'before' state since there's conceptually a 'before' but 'before' doesn't make sense because it involves time? This is why those who have a deep and direct enlightenment experience come away with the realization that the ultimate ground of reality is this thing that is formless and can't be imagined (it can't be because we can only imagine based on what our form is and what we can conceive of in a dualistic [self versus other] universe). I heard a Zen master give an answer to someone who asked what's left when the universe goes away. He matter-of-factly responded with 'there's always buddha nature' (this is 'god' or 'tao' or the 'immeasurable' - a word can't describe it). And this is what people directly experience as their real nature when they have an enlightenment experience (which is why everything of form -- including individual psychological consciousness and personalities -- are seen as illusory when this experience is had). So ... in a nutshell: the only thing that we can say about the answer to your question is speculation. And we may be able to say something real about it if we go for a direct experience of reality.

Answer 3

Hah! Trick question. The universe cannot be seen from the oustide except in a thought experiment. If you could, you would have the eye of God. You could see all events in all time, depending on how you choose to slice the spacetime loaf. Which goes to prove that God is a thought experiment, nothing more. We have a severe lack of imagination when it comes to the wonder of the large scale universe, M-theory notwithstanding.

Answer 4

There really isn't a meaningful way to answer that except to say I haven't the slightest clue. A map of it looks like this:

http://www.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn4314/dn4314-1_370.jpg

That is about as good as I can do. I think there probably are more than just ours, but that is purely speculation.

Answer 5

It would look like a huge sparkling eggshape. And it does have boundaries. There is an edge, although it continues to expand. That's what the so-called experts say, anyway.

Answer 6

The Universe means everything. How could we be outside of everything?

Answer 7

It would look just like the universe in it's entirety from the outside.

Answer 8

It would be very beautiful with the Earth as the beautiful blue glowing planet right in the center.

Answer 9

My understanding is that it looks fairly similar from everywhere. Lots of bright dots, basically. How bright, big and close together would depend on how far away you were, if it were possible to be far away.

Answer 10

It would be the mirror image of the universe we see when we look inside of ourselves.

Answer 11

I'm sure creationists will have preset way to answer this but I don't think we have very many theories about what it looks like