I was reading some articles on space.com and i guess from what i read the universe is gonna expand forever and keep getting faster and faster. Stars will move away from each other faster and faster as they die out and the universe will become a wasteland of nothingness in a 100 billion years. What are the theories and proof though for those that believe in the big crunch? what proof do you have for it, since there is proof the universe is speeding up in the process of expansion.
It all depends on the mass density and critical density of the universe, i.e if gravity prevails the universe will contract and if gravity fails the universe will expand forever. Just like when you blow stuff up on earth the earths gravity pulls down the blown up bits back to earth. A few years ago scientists believed that mass/critical density was equal meaning the universe will eventually attain a constant state, some however believe it will expand forever, I personally never read any article on whether it may collapse. For the universe to crunch there has to be a huge solar mass of light years in density in the center of gravity, no proof of this yet, instead I know of random clusters of huge mass in and around the solar system. To be honest no one can really say for sure, cosmology is a novel science with many theories and inaccuracies. My guess is that some parts of the universe will contract causing others to expand, its basic physics- there is a form of contraction in all expansion. When you expand a rubber band the muscles of your arms contract. To liberate energy one must condense energy.
Hum, most cosmologists discarded the big crunch theories in favour of forever expanding (or currently accelerating) type versions. Evidence such as observations of type Ia supernovae seems to point towards an accelerating space-time, (<i>to negate this evidence, there are various theories that attempt to modify gravity at very large distances to account for the observations</i>). When the universe does become a wasteland of nothingness, then according to Professor Penrose the few particles (if we assume they remain) will have no other particles to `interact with` (the other particles are beyond the observable universes horizon) and time` becomes <i>meaningless</i>` - this may be the conditions to `<b>reset</b>` the universe to a state similar to before the big bang.
Blobrana, do you recall any of the mechanism Penrose outlines to get the universe from a tenuous heat-death state to a singularity? Failing that, what's the book in which Penrose discusses such a possibility?
I can't quite see how a cold death will cause the Universe to reset itself. Before the Big Bang, there was no space (according to what I have read), but after the cold death, there will be lots of space. Can you clearify your thoughts a little more, please? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Wiki for big crunch theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_crunch Also adding to the mix is the Oscillating Universe. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscillating_universe
