outside the universe

[joshuam168]

So if the universe has a finite size, which i had previously, previously meaning way in the past, heard it didnt, what is outside the universe? Is there any mathematical proof or such or just wild speculation? It seems very confusing that there is something outside the universe, i mean what would it be like and such? It must just be my tiny incompetent early 21st century mind........

[north]

So if the universe has a finite size, which i had previously, previously meaning way in the past, heard it didnt, what is outside the universe? Is there any mathematical proof or such or just wild speculation? It seems very confusing that there is something outside the universe, i mean what would it be like and such? It must just be my tiny incompetent early 21st century mind........

 

what is outside the Universe ?

 

there isn't an outside nor does there need to be , " an outside of the Universe "

[Sisyphus]

Even if the universe is finite, there's still nothing "outside" it, by definition. Anything there is part of the universe. The way it can still be finite is not by having "edges" and an "outside," but by having interesting geometries. For example, it could "fold back" on it itself, such that traveling in any direction would eventually bring you back to where you started. It's more complicated than that, obviously, but that's the general idea.

[Bettina]

...what is outside the universe?

 

 

An eternal void full of the components needed to birth universes like ours. There, I said it.

 

Bettina

[Klaynos]

An eternal void full of the components needed to birth universes like ours. There, I said it.

 

Bettina

 

Prove it...

 

which you can't because if you can interact with it it's part of this universe...

[ydoaPs]

By definition of Universe, there is no outside.

[Bettina]

I never said the endless void was part of this universe and no, we cannot interact with it any more than those living in this soap bubble can interact with those living two soap bubbles over.

 

Also, the universe to me, means ours.

 

This is what I believe but I don't want the admins to push joshuam168's thread to pseudo science on my account so delete my posts when I've ventured too far from mainstream...

 

Bettina

[north]

the only thing outside our Universe , if there is such a thing , is room

[antimatter]

What I think Klaynos meant is that you can't prove the existence of this 'void' because if you could, it would be part of this Universe.

[ydoaPs]

The room would be part of the universe. Although, since space is nothing but a separation, there would be no "room" past the outwardmost object.

[north]

The room would be part of the universe. Although, since space is nothing but a separation, there would be no "room" past the outwardmost object.

 

yes and no

 

the "room " is based on energy/matter

 

for me and I have not calculated this but I think that there is a certain amount of space needed per atom for the atom to exist ( which would extend somewhat out beyond the atom its self ) and when then multiplied by the amount of atoms in the Universe would give you the size or the volume of the Universe as it is

[Sisyphus]

 

This is what I believe...

 

Why?

[Bettina]

Why?

 

Because it's not impossible which leaves the cat in limbo. And since some scientists tend to believe that it's closer to the truth than not then I'll stay a multiverse/bubble theory girl.

 

Bee

[iNow]

Bee - Not on topic, and I could have PM'd it to you (but then others wouldn't get to see), but if you haven't seen it already, you'd likely enjoy this talk since it branches into Weinberg's ideas here:

 

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7415898632278016197&ei=VNSsSM3-EYTYwgOgnIAr&q=dawkins+weinberg

 

(the guy on the bottom right of the opening picture was my Evolutionary Psychology teacher )

[Edtharan]

It is a bit like asking: What is north of the north pole?

 

If you travel to the North Pole, then all directions (on the surface of the Earth) is south. There is nothing North of the North pole and there is not Further North that you can go.

 

The North (and South) poles on the Earth are like a Singularity. The Big Bang is a singularity, as is the "Edge" of a Universe (finite or otherwise). It means that there is no "outside" the Universe as this would be a location equivalent to North of the North Pole.

[Arch2008]

Neil Turok claims that the cosmological constant is artificially low and that this can be explained by a “cyclic” universe, that grows from a Big Bang and then collapses into a Big Crunch only to Big Bang again.

http://wwwphy.princeton.edu/~steinh/lambda16.pdf

 

Thus, our own universe may have existed in multiple iterations. Also, colliding energy branes in hyperspace may have caused the BB and this process may have created other universes.

http://universe-review.ca/F15-particle.htm#manifold

 

Scientists hope to use the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data to determine what may have happened prior to the BB. This may settle the matter. However, no hard evidence has been found…yet.

[Royston]

Because it's not impossible which leaves the cat in limbo.

 

I presume you're referring to the many worlds interpretation?

 

I'm a bit tentative when it comes to this. Although it agrees with quantum formalism, and it does solve the problem of wavefunction collapse due to observation i.e if you think of the wavefunction before measurement as a number of probable eigenvalues, then the measurement causes the wavefunction to collapse to one eigenvalue. Or with your example, the cat is definitely alive. (It could be dead...not sure if you're a cat lover.)

 

The many worlds interpretation does away with this, by saying there's a universe for each probable eigenvalue...so the act of measurement doesn't have the effect of forcing the outcome into one, definite value due to observation. However these universes branch off completely seperate from our own i.e there is no way we can test for their existence i.e (as already said) the Universe is by definition everything, and the same applies to these alternate Universes.

 

You can't probe (tee hee) or test for something that's outside of everything, it doesn't make sense. It's worth noting that you can't consider these Universes next to each other, or collected in one Mother of all Universe's, because they, by definition would cease to be Universes. That would be a nice way of making the whole thing intuitive, but science isn't about making things intuitive, if the experiments and math say 'this is how it is', then you just have to deal with it. I personally don't like the many worlds interpretation, because you just can't test it's validity. It will always be a 'could be.'

 

EDIT: Sorry if you already knew all this, I'm bored at work and just fancied rattling on about something.

 

EDIT II: ack, not sure why I was typing Universes's I'm really not thinking straight today (corrected)

Edited August 21, 2008 by Snail

[Bettina]

Sorry if you already knew all this, I'm bored at work and just fancied rattling on about something.

 

I'm not a scientist nor am I in this field. I'm just a simple person who reads, dreams, and tries to make sense of why some scientists say "this is all there is" while others do not. What I've learned is that the "universe" is a loose term that can only describe the "observable" portion that we see and the unobservable portion that we can only infer.

 

I just have a problem with the term "all there is" so when someone asks (like the OP) what is outside [our] universe the correct answer....to me... is "we don't know". There could be big bangs going on everywhere in the unobservable void and we wouldn't know.

 

If you like balloons, think more balloons.

 

Bee (not the only one)

[John Cuthber]

2 days later and no comment from the OP.

OK so I'm paranoid, but; the evidence that this is not a "drive-by trolling" is what?

[Pete]

So if the universe has a finite size, which i had previously, previously meaning way in the past, heard it didnt, what is outside the universe? Is there any mathematical proof or such or just wild speculation? It seems very confusing that there is something outside the universe, i mean what would it be like and such? It must just be my tiny incompetent early 21st century mind........

There is the possibility of other universes which are spatially disconnected to our own.

 

Pete

[joshuam168]

ok it seems like i need to know if there is only one definition of "universe" or if there is a different definition for different theorys. Does the word "universe" have a set definition or is it definable? Because i have heard that the the universe is yay big and that the universe is infinitely big. So in the case that the universe is finite there has to be something outside. I have a hard time believing that there can't be something outside. But on the other hand if the universe is infinite then it encompasses all and my question is answered. So another question......can my first question be answered without speculation or is it not possible at this time to prove an answer?

 

 

P.S. If this thread must be moved into the speculative section then so be it. It seems to me as this is how answers to this questions can only turn out. And im not always sure what section to put my questions into

[iNow]

Joshuam,

 

Out of curiosity, have you read through the following thread?

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/forum/showthread.php?t=30787

 

 

 

If not, it's worth a look.

[bascule]

To quote Lee Smolin: "There is nothing outside the universe"

[Arch2008]

Cosmology is the study of the physical universe considered as a totality of phenomena in time and space. So, are there phenomena in the physical universe that can be explained as originating outside of the physical universe? The answer is yes. Dr. Lisa Randall has reason to say this:

http://discovermagazine.com/2006/jul/interview-randall/

She’s not alone. Many physicists are spending their careers analyzing extra dimensions beyond the commonly recognized ones with M theory. Basically, we’ve done all of the ‘easy’ science, only the really challenging stuff remains. Our understanding of the subatomic part of the universe is through mathematics and the scientific method. No one has directly seen a quark or an electron. However, if a scientist uses those same tools of math and the scientific method to explore dimensions that no one can see, a lot of people get skeptical. Remember that it took decades to discover the neutron or the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) after they were proposed. The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe data may give experimental evidence of other dimensions by using the CMB as a ‘fingerprint’ of what caused the Big Bang. Saying that oil prices will spike in September is pure, unadulterated speculation. Saying that the universe may be contained in some kind of hyperspace is not.

IMHO, of course.

Edited August 22, 2008 by Arch2008

[Royston]

Saying that the universe may be contained in some kind of hyperspace is not.

IMHO, of course.

 

But then it just boils down again, to whether such ideas can be falsifiable by experiment. Whether an idea follows a mathematical formalism, isn't enough. This just opens up a number of possibilites of what reality 'could' be, I don't really class that as science, just a subset of.

 

Meh, I missed this bit...

 

The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe data may give experimental evidence of other dimensions by using the CMB as a ‘fingerprint’ of what caused the Big Bang

 

Interesting.