Infinity

dlamberth · Jul 4, 2006

I'm looking at the Human Being's capacity to look at infinity and even be able to discuss it.

I find it extraordinarily interesting, even being mystical in nature, that the Human Being, who is finite, who lives in the finite and who's life experiences are always finite can at the same exact time still be aware of the backdrop we call the infinite.

I think that's just totally cool that we are able to be in both of those places at the same time. I believe it also points towards Human Beings as having a mystical nature about us. Having a mystical nature, I believe, is one of the things that makes us Human and sets us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom.

.

JonF · Jul 4, 2006

relaxeus said:
Sure it does. It implies that there are an infinite number of universes with an infinite number of formations.

Absolutely not.

Consider the following cases: There exist an infinite number of universes but…
i)Infinitely many of them are empty, finitely many aren’t vacuous.
ii)There are only a countable infinite number of universes each differing in a single mater.
iii)All but this universe contain a single uninhabitable planet.
iv)All the universes are identical.

Anyone of these is possible if our only assumption is there are infinite universe.

relaxeus said:
A mathematical concept? Isn't infinity beyond math? I mean, you wouldn't sit by your calculator and notebook and try to solve a problem that would take an eternity to solve would you?

Mathematics is where infinity is studied formally. Modern math is the study of relations on sets. The most interesting cases of these sets are when they are infinitely big. Anywho, here is the “math” concept you are missing. Just because our universe of discourse is infinite, doesn’t mean every infinite subset is a compact cover of the universe.

bob135 · Jul 5, 2006

As far as I know, the Big Bang theory suggests that space itself is expanding. I don't really know how that works, although I've seen analogies comparing our universe to a balloon, with galaxies drawn on its surface.

Even if space was infinite, matter might be finite, so you would just run into empty space. Even if matter was infinite, there could be infinite possible configurations of matter, so you might not run into the same universe.

If you are a hard determinist, you wouldn't think that your situation could even occur, since to get a different outcome you would need different initial conditions or different laws of physics.

It seems the only way you wouldn't have a first cause is if time was finite. If time is infinite, how would we ever arrive at the present moment, since time would extend infinitely back?

Soul Searcher said:
I would think that the big bang, the energy/material that composed the big bang was still part of the universe. I do not see this as a valid explanantion as to the begining of the universe itself but perhaps the beginging of the current motion of the universe. That said I also don't put a lot of stock in the overall theory of the big bang it seems to consist of a bunch of assumptions based on a few observations.

If there really was a big bang that has shaped what we now see then it would seem likely that the big bang happened at the center of our universe.. I have heard it said that our universe is getting bigger and may someday collaspe into itself and perhaps a new big bang to start the process over. It seems however that this is all based on the concept that they "think" the glaxies are drifting apart. I find it unlikely that this is very well supported considering how they say the nearest galaxies are several light years away and we have no way of really measuring these distances that I know of. Logically if a planet was 100 light years away and we tried to measure that distance it would take 200 years to get the result and since we have not had the technology that long I think that what we are seeing often presented as fact is someones best guess.

Add to that that no one has ever discovered the boundries of the universe it would seem impossible to prove that it was getting larger or smaller and really amounts to nothing more than a wild guess based on evidence that amounts to far less than a drop of water in the ocean.

They can find stellar distances using a number of methods, shown here. I think its incorrect to say the big bang happened in the universe. The theory is that the big bang created the universe. Before that (a misleading term, since before implies time), I think there was a singularity. They can tell if stars are moving closer or farther by looking at redshift and blueshift. You know how cars and trains sound higher pitch when approaching and lower pitch when going away? Its the same thing, except with light (it goes to the red/blue end of the spectrum).

dlamberth said:
I find it extraordinarily interesting, even being mystical in nature, that the Human Being, who is finite, who lives in the finite and who's life experiences are always finite can at the same exact time still be aware of the backdrop we call the infinite.

I believe it also points towards Human Beings as having a mystical nature about us. Having a mystical nature, I believe, is one of the things that makes us Human and sets us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom.

Well, we can also think of perfect circles, perfectly whole numbers, and many other elegant mathematical concepts. I'd say its just evidence of our very developed cognitive capabilities, which set us apart from the animal kingdom (although other primates share some similar behaviors, like use of tools).

Soul Searcher · Jul 5, 2006

bob135 said:
They can find stellar distances using a number of methods, shown here. I think its incorrect to say the big bang happened in the universe. The theory is that the big bang created the universe. Before that (a misleading term, since before implies time), I think there was a singularity. They can tell if stars are moving closer or farther by looking at redshift and blueshift. You know how cars and trains sound higher pitch when approaching and lower pitch when going away? Its the same thing, except with light (it goes to the red/blue end of the spectrum).

Thanks for the link..interesting and good to know. I still have a major problem with them asserting that they can accurately measure the distance to these stars. As in star A is 300 light years away, Star B is 1000 light years away.

Problem.. even if thier method is 100% accurate they are actually measuring the distance that star A was 300 years ago and star B 1000 years ago. Since they also say these stars are always moving we really have no idea how far away they are now. See the problem? When they say it is x distance away they are misleading anyone who listens as what they are actually meaning is it was x distance y number of years ago according to our estimations.

As for the red and blue light shift considering that the earth is in constant motion at a pretty good rate of speed both rotating and orbiting the sun then even a stationary object may appear to be moving. Depending on an objects path and speed it may even appear to be moving closer to us at one time of year and farther away at another. However if an object on the plane of earths orbit is moving away at a speed high enough to not appear as moving closer at some point in our orbit that would indicate that it is or at least was moving farther away at a high rate of speed making thier estimation off by quite a bit.

The fact of the matter is that if they are correct and the light we are seeing left these stars 100s 1000s 100000s of years ago not only do we not know how far away they are today we do not even know that they still exist.

Telephone · Jul 5, 2006

relaxeus said:
I was thinking the other day about the possibility that space is infinite. Imagine looking into the sky, choosing a direction to go, and then setting off and going in that direction forever and ever. You would never reach the end. Even if you travelled extremely fast (say at the speed of light multiplied by 1 million billion trillon zillion, something ridiculously fast)

Is superluminal travel even possible (ignoring technical limitations), does the notion of superluminal travel or data transference even make sense ?

Is speed 'capped' ?

relaxeus said:
you would still never reach any kind of ending of space. On your journey you would pass countless universes. In fact, the number of universes would also be infinite because space is infinite.

Space being infinite does not require matter to be infinite. You may travel for a few million light years in one direction and then never come across matter again.

relaxeus said:
Across infinite space, and an infinite number of universes, if you travelled long enough, you would come across a universe exactly identical to ours.

This is not necessarily true, you may (or may not) experience an infinite amount of variation, never seeing the same object twice.

relaxeus said:
And universes exactly identical to ours would also be infinite. An infinte number of relaxeus' typing this exact same thing at this very moment - as well as an infinite number of relaxeus' who had written this exact same post 5 minutes ago, and 37 seconds ago, and 12 days into the future. In such a reality of infinite space, every single realistically possible formation of universes would come into being - an infinite number of times.

This is also not true, you may have infinite chances of coming across an identical universe and this possibility would never be exhausted (if we ignore the issue of infinite matter) but your hypothetically infinte space does not influence its own contents.

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

Soul Searcher,

As promised, here is the evidence for how we know the galaxies are expanding.

"In the 1920's, an astronomer named Edwin Hubble began looking at the spectral lines of far away stars. He noticed that they did not match any of the known elements at the time. However, he also noticed that they were parallel to the spectral lines produced by hydrogen, just shifted toward the red slightly. He noticed that almost all of the stars he looked at were shifted toward the red by a small percent. He calculated that theses galaxies and stars he was looking at were moving away from Earth at a rate of 1 million meters per second.

As astronomers studied the universe more intensely, they noticed that they rarely saw anything but red shifts, indicating that the galaxies in the universe were moving farther and farther apart from one another. The universe is getting bigger.

The expanding universe can be compared to a loaf of raisin bread before, during, and after baking. When first mixed, all of the raisins are fairly close together. Before baking, the bread is allowed to rise. As it rises, the raisins (representing all the galaxies in the universe) spread out away from one another. Those on the edge spread out faster than those in the center.

This raisin example is similar to how galaxies move away from the center of the universe. Those that are closest to the center of the universe do not move as quickly or as far as the stars and galaxies that are farther from the center of the universe. Because of the Doppler Effect, scientists realize that the shift towards the red part of the spectrum indicates the light source is moving away. If stars or galaxies were moving towards Earth the shift would be toward the blue part of the spectrum."

http://www.usoe.k12.ut.us/curr/science/core/earth/sciber9/Stand_1/html/1b.htm

Here is a bit from "a brief history of time" by stephen hawking, a reliable source, being one of the most accomplished physicists ever.

In the years following his proof of the existence of other galaxies, Hubble spent his time cataloging their distances and observing their spectra. At that time most people expected the galaxies to be moving around quite randomly, and so expected to find as many blue-shifted spectra as red-shifted ones. It was quite a surprise, therefore, to find that most galaxies appeared red-shifted: nearly all were moving away from us! More surprisingly still was the find that Hubble published in 1929: even the size of a galaxy's red shift is not random, but is directly proportional to the galaxy's distance from us. Or, in other words, the farther a galaxy is, the faster it is moving away! And that meant that the universe could not be static, as everyone previously had though, but is in fact expanding; the distance between the different galaxies is growing all the time.

I don't intend to argue much about these things because I don't know much about them, so don't try to engage me in a detailed discussion of physics lol.

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

Merlin said:
If we assume infinite.
But that's a big if.

Then we must assume no outside forces can effect any of the universes.
We must assume there is no God.

Then such possibilities begin to exist.

Big ifs.

Why must we assume no outside forces can affect any of the universes? I don't see why beings that are able to affect the universe from the outside can't exist.

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

dlamberth said:
I find it extraordinarily interesting, even being mystical in nature, that the Human Being, who is finite, who lives in the finite and who's life experiences are always finite can at the same exact time still be aware of the backdrop we call the infinite.

I think that's just totally cool that we are able to be in both of those places at the same time. I believe it also points towards Human Beings as having a mystical nature about us. Having a mystical nature, I believe, is one of the things that makes us Human and sets us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom.

Humans rock

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

JonF said:
Absolutely not.

Consider the following cases: There exist an infinite number of universes but…
i)Infinitely many of them are empty, finitely many aren’t vacuous.
ii)There are only a countable infinite number of universes each differing in a single mater.
iii)All but this universe contain a single uninhabitable planet.
iv)All the universes are identical.

Anyone of these is possible if our only assumption is there are infinite universe.

i) - I don't understand what you mean.

ii) - countable infinite? That doesn't make sense to me.

iii) - I dont think this is realistic because if there can be differences in formation of universes then that means that all the possible differences would be infinite through infinite space.

iv) - this is where you got me. I hadn't considered the possibility that universes can only form under absolutely precise conditions, which would mean that the resultant universes would always be identical to eachother. There would be an infinite number of universes where every single event, even such as me wrting this post, would happen at exactly the same place at exactly the same point in the that universes time.

On the other hand, many scientists, such as Stephen Hawking, believe in all possibilities. Here is what hawkings thinks on it, taken from "the universe in a nutshell". It seems vague to me though because I lack the basics and/or advanced levels of physics knowledge.
Here it is:

"Because the universe keeps on rolling the dice to see what happens next, it doesn't have just a single history, as one might have though. Instead, the universe must have every possible history, each with its own probability...
This idea that the universe has multiple histories may sound like science fiction, but it is now accepted as science fact...
...everything in the universe would be determined by the laws of science and by rolls of the dice within the universe. This may sounds presumptous, but it is what I and many other scientists believe."

I wasn't too impressed by this. Hawkings makes a lot of what seem to be assumptions to me, but then maybe he figured the common man would be totally lost if he went into the detailed mechanics of how these things work. The thing the struck me though was when he says "everything in the universe would be determined by the laws of science and by rolls of the dice within the universe". He makes a distinction between laws and chance. It seems that he thinks there are both, whereas I had thought there was no chance involved in how energy/matter operates. If hes right and there is chance involved and this chance is seperate from the laws of science and is completely random, and if there are an infinite number of universes then all the possibilites would have to be exhausted, infinitely.

Soul Searcher · Jul 5, 2006

relaxeus said:
I don't intend to argue much about these things because I don't know much about them, so don't try to engage me in a detailed discussion of physics lol.

I am not that well versed in it myself.

I have to wonder though how he/they came to the conclusion that this red tint means the objects are moving away from us and especially wonder how they concluded what the speed of those objects were? Especially considering that thier data is hundreds or thousands or even millions of years old.

The problem as I see it is there is no way to prove or disprove the theory therefore to me it seems like nothing more than an educated guess. We have no idea what kinds of gases and/or other material which may alter light patterns may exist between us and these stars.

Again for all we know these objects have been extinct for thousands of years or even millions of years. They could have changed course and be hurling toward us at near the speed of light at this very second and we would not know it for perhaps millions of years.

Now maybe they are correct in some or all of these theroies or at least somewhere in the correct ball park but when these things are presented as fact I have to wonder about the honesty of the person(s) making the claim.

Soul Searcher · Jul 5, 2006

One more thing.. It is my understanding that the universe is not the stars and galaxies but rather the container which holds the galaxies or the container and its contents. in other words space is part of the universe. We have never to my knowledge ever located any boundries to the universe.

So even if the theories about the galaxies moving farther apart is accurate that still does not require the container to be expanding. Could be when/if the ojects ever reach the edge [assuming there is an edge] they would be reflected or destroyed.

Almost anything is possible, we simply do not know much about the universe or for that matter we really don't know much about other planets in our own solar system.

mikenet2006 · Jul 5, 2006

Soul Searcher said:
One more thing.. It is my understanding that the universe is not the stars and galaxies but rather the container which holds the galaxies or the container and its contents. in other words space is part of the universe. We have never to my knowledge ever located any boundaries to the universe.

So even if the theories about the galaxies moving farther apart is accurate that still does not require the container to be expanding. Could be when/if the ojects ever reach the edge [assuming there is an edge] they would be reflected or destroyed.

Almost anything is possible, we simply do not know much about the universe or for that matter we really don't know much about other planets in our own solar system.[/quote

The closest we have come to finding an edge is the fact that the Hubble space telescope viewed far enough out to notice a thinning of the galaxies trillions and trillions of lightyears out. Beyond the galaxies on the edge of this expanding visible universe we see nothing.

It really is to hard to say for sure what is beyond the galaxies on the edge of the visible universe because hubbles viewing range does in fact have a limit. Maybee one day we will have a telescope so powerful that it can see far enough to view other groups of galaxies heading outward from there own point of origin hence forming there own universe.

If this is the truth of things perhaps one day we will be able to witness a big bang occur. The same way we presently view stars explode, and stars that are forming.

I don't belive there is a barrier of any kind out there but thats just me. This will likely be up in the air for decades or even centuries to come so right now its anyones guess.

I always stray away from theories that suggest limits or boundaries to things, because when I look in to history I see how small we once saw things.

Back in the day we believed that the earth was the center of the universe and it was stuck in a round sphere of sorts. All the stars were thought to be stuck to the inner wall of this sphere, giving a 360 degree view of white dots in all directions.
and that was the extent of there beliefs at the time.

The only way to have a chance at all to answer a question that we don't have the technology to answer is to look into history, as it often repeats itself.

Patzak · Jul 5, 2006

mikenet2006 said:
The closest we have come to finding an edge is the fact that the Hubble space telescope viewed far enough out to notice a thinning of the galaxies trillions and trillions of lightyears out. Beyond the galaxies on the edge of this expanding visible universe we see nothing.

It really is to hard to say for sure what is beyond the galaxies on the edge of the visible universe because hubbles viewing range does in fact have a limit. Maybee one day we will have a telescope so powerful that it can see far enough to view other groups of galaxies heading outward from there own point of origin hence forming there own universe.

Actually even the best telescopes can only see about 13.5 - 14 billion light years far. We must remember that the light from the galaxies we see at that distance has taken 13.5 - 14 billion years to arrive to the Earth - there's nothing to be seen beyond that, because to see it we would effectively have to look into the past beyond the big bang. We'll only be able to see further than that as time passes and the universe that can be observed expands.

Patzak · Jul 5, 2006

For anyone interested in/fascinated by the possible mind-boggling extent of our universe (or universes), you might want to check out Max Tegmark and his theory of everything. It's totally far-out, but I find its basic simplicity very intriguing: basically, he's saying that every possible mathematical structure also exists in reality (each in a separate universe) and that we're only self-aware mathematical structures (something like computer programs) inhabiting one of such universes which is, in the ultimate reality, nothing more than a mathematical system that only appears physical to its internal observers. I know, sounds ridiculous, but it basically comes down to pure simplicity: the claim that everything that can possibly exist actually exists.

He also deals with other kinds of parallel universes, such as the ones mentioned in the OP. Apparently, you can expect to find an identical copy of yourself in the range of approximatelly 10^10^29 meters. And yes, there are infinitely more of them further still.

Anyway, here's a link to his website:
http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/index.html

and since it's a very confusing website, here's a link to an abstract of one of his papers on the multiverse:

http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/multiverse.html
there's a link to a .pdf version of the entire paper at the top of the frame.

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

bob135 said:
Even if space was infinite, matter might be finite, so you would just run into empty space.

If the nature of existence is such that matter exists, why would it only be limited to one point? I think that if the laws of existence allow anything to exist anywhere across infinity then that anything must also exist elsewhere across infinity, according to that same nature, an infinite number of times.

bob135 said:
Even if matter was infinite, there could be infinite possible configurations of matter, so you might not run into the same universe.

I don't think matter is infinite, just like we are not infinite but are finite, occupying a certain point in space. Because matter is finite and occupies a limited space, then that would mean that there could only be a limited number of possible configurations. All of these configurations would occur an infinite number of times.

bob135 said:
If time is infinite, how would we ever arrive at the present moment, since time would extend infinitely back?

We have to think of time totally differently when dealing with infinite time. Because there would be no beginning, how would you decide when to start counting? If you did decide to start counting at a certain point, then you would have created a finite model of time, which would be inaccurate. So, time doesn't even seem to exist in the same sense as we normally think of it. The only possible solution is if time is thought of as a circle, and all possible configurations of matter exist at some point along the circle. Eventually, all the possible configurations of matter would be exhausted and you would reach a configuration that has already occured before. Does that mean that the "first" configuration came before the "second"? No, because that means you started counting and are applying a finite definition of time, with a beginning, to infinite time, which has no beginning. So, infinite time is not even a factor in how we can understand infinite matter. The only way to understand infinite matter in infinite space and infinite time is by the present configuration of that matter. And that's fine by me, because time doesn't even really exist, it is just a concept that helps us understand the changing formation of matter within our universe. Infact, when I said earlier that infinte time should be thought of as a circle, that isn't really right. Instead, the circle doesn't have anything to do with time and is instead made up of all the possible configurations of matter. Time is just an idea. Time isn't something we can hold or see or breath. Matter is really all that matters

relaxeus · Jul 5, 2006

Telephone said:
Is superluminal travel even possible (ignoring technical limitations), does the notion of superluminal travel or data transference even make sense ?

Is speed 'capped' ?

No idea. I was just using that example to make my point more understandable.

Telephone said:
Space being infinite does not require matter to be infinite.

I think it does, because if the nature of existence is such that matter exists, then that means that this same nature of existence must apply in other places, not just at one specific point. And because other places are infinite, that means that matter must be infinite.

Telephone said:
This is not necessarily true, you may (or may not) experience an infinite amount of variation, never seeing the same object twice...

...you may have infinite chances of coming across an identical universe and this possibility would never be exhausted

Are you saying you are going to wager that a coin tossed an infinite number of times will never land tails? I'll take that bet

bob135 · Jul 6, 2006

Soul Searcher said:
Thanks for the link..interesting and good to know. I still have a major problem with them asserting that they can accurately measure the distance to these stars. As in star A is 300 light years away, Star B is 1000 light years away.

Problem.. even if thier method is 100% accurate they are actually measuring the distance that star A was 300 years ago and star B 1000 years ago. Since they also say these stars are always moving we really have no idea how far away they are now. See the problem? When they say it is x distance away they are misleading anyone who listens as what they are actually meaning is it was x distance y number of years ago according to our estimations.

As for the red and blue light shift considering that the earth is in constant motion at a pretty good rate of speed both rotating and orbiting the sun then even a stationary object may appear to be moving. Depending on an objects path and speed it may even appear to be moving closer to us at one time of year and farther away at another. However if an object on the plane of earths orbit is moving away at a speed high enough to not appear as moving closer at some point in our orbit that would indicate that it is or at least was moving farther away at a high rate of speed making thier estimation off by quite a bit.

The fact of the matter is that if they are correct and the light we are seeing left these stars 100s 1000s 100000s of years ago not only do we not know how far away they are today we do not even know that they still exist.

Science is never 100% accurate, methods are never perfect, which is why they almost always have error margins on any term (age of the universe, star brightness, whatever). You are right that the light now reaching us is old, and could be from stars that no longer exist. However, that only complicates the model, that does not render it useless. Unfortunately I don't know enough about cosmology to explain the intricacies of calculating the position of stars. However, it would seem that they could compensate for movement over 1000 years or however long it has been.

Since the earths speed orbiting the sun is known, this can be compensated for (if it even has a significant effect) on redshift or blueshift.

But you are right, there is no way to know if those stars still exist, although you could extrapolate based on its current position in its life cycle (which can be determined by looking at color). Information can't travel faster than light, so thats the best we can do.

relaxeus said:
If the nature of existence is such that matter exists, why would it only be limited to one point? I think that if the laws of existence allow anything to exist anywhere across infinity then that anything must also exist elsewhere across infinity, according to that same nature, an infinite number of times.

I'm just saying that its possible, not necessarily true or false. I just thought that your OP made an unjustifiably strong claim, that we "would" run into an identical universe. Basically, just because X can happen doesn't mean X will happen, even with infinite repetition.

relaxeus said:
I don't think matter is infinite, just like we are not infinite but are finite, occupying a certain point in space. Because matter is finite and occupies a limited space, then that would mean that there could only be a limited number of possible configurations. All of these configurations would occur an infinite number of times.

This is the assumption (in bold) that I was trying to point out. If matter is infinitely divisible (why not?) then you can have infinite amounts of it and never get all of the combinations.

relaxeus said:
We have to think of time totally differently when dealing with infinite time. Because there would be no beginning, how would you decide when to start counting? If you did decide to start counting at a certain point, then you would have created a finite model of time, which would be inaccurate. So, time doesn't even seem to exist in the same sense as we normally think of it. The only possible solution is if time is thought of as a circle, and all possible configurations of matter exist at some point along the circle. Eventually, all the possible configurations of matter would be exhausted and you would reach a configuration that has already occured before. Does that mean that the "first" configuration came before the "second"? No, because that means you started counting and are applying a finite definition of time, with a beginning, to infinite time, which has no beginning. So, infinite time is not even a factor in how we can understand infinite matter. The only way to understand infinite matter in infinite space and infinite time is by the present configuration of that matter. And that's fine by me, because time doesn't even really exist, it is just a concept that helps us understand the changing formation of matter within our universe. Infact, when I said earlier that infinte time should be thought of as a circle, that isn't really right. Instead, the circle doesn't have anything to do with time and is instead made up of all the possible configurations of matter. Time is just an idea. Time isn't something we can hold or see or breath. Matter is really all that matters

Thats exactly my point, its impossible to reach now, because you could never begin, with an infinite time. How do you get somewhere without starting? How do you go somewhere without taking the first step? Its fine if "time doesn't exist" in the normal sense, but then you have a beginning. At the point when time ceases to exist in an unconventional sense and begins to exist in a conventional sense, you can call that the beginning of time.

I don't know a whole lot about physics, but I think time is a lot more than just an idea. You need time to get velocity, or any other rate of change, etc.

relaxeus said:
I think it does, because if the nature of existence is such that matter exists, then that means that this same nature of existence must apply in other places, not just at one specific point. And because other places are infinite, that means that matter must be infinite.

What is this "nature of existence" that you are talking about? Can you clarify?

mikenet2006 · Jul 6, 2006

Patzak said:
Actually even the best telescopes can only see about 13.5 - 14 billion light years far. We must remember that the light from the galaxies we see at that distance has taken 13.5 - 14 billion years to arrive to the Earth - there's nothing to be seen beyond that, because to see it we would effectively have to look into the past beyond the big bang. We'll only be able to see further than that as time passes and the universe that can be observed expands.

am I bad I thought it was trillions oops. If its Billions or trillions of lightyears we can see out, I still believe the basic concept that space is infinate in all directions though.

As well as infinate outerspace, I also think the Idea of innerspace could be true at the same time. Although im less opinionated on it. This meaning infinate worlds within worlds way beyond the microscopic level. Who is to say things dont get smaller than atoms and we simpley dont have tools powerfull enough to view them yet. Ever read """horton hears a who""" by dr seuz as a kid? I think an entire town lived on a cotten ball or snowflake or something its been a while

Its a neat idea that I could see being possible at least. It wasnt long ago that we didnt know what atoms were so who knows what we will know in 300 years.

MoonlessNight · Jul 6, 2006

relaxeus said:
I was thinking the other day about the possibility that space is infinite. Imagine looking into the sky, choosing a direction to go, and then setting off and going in that direction forever and ever. You would never reach the end. Even if you travelled extremely fast (say at the speed of light multiplied by 1 million billion trillon zillion, something ridiculously fast), you would still never reach any kind of ending of space. On your journey you would pass countless universes. In fact, the number of universes would also be infinite because space is infinite.

Sure, except I'm not sure that I get what you mean about countless universes. If this universe is infinite, you'd never leave it.

Across infinite space, and an infinite number of universes, if you travelled long enough, you would come across a universe exactly identical to ours. And universes exactly identical to ours would also be infinite. An infinte number of relaxeus' typing this exact same thing at this very moment - as well as an infinite number of relaxeus' who had written this exact same post 5 minutes ago, and 37 seconds ago, and 12 days into the future. In such a reality of infinite space, every single realistically possible formation of universes would come into being - an infinite number of times. Every single possible outcome!! Even all the choices you have made in your life, what kind of cloths you wore on certain days, who you married, who your friends were - there would be an infinite number of unvierses in which you had exhausted every single possibility during your life. Every possibility, across infinite space and universes, would occur an infinite number of times.

Well assuming that the distribution of "things" between universes allows repeats at all. Or to put it in the language of probability (since you have to assume that things are based off chance for the argument to work) there could be a distribution describing this universe in which the probability for any event to happen twice the exact same way is zero. And you still might have infinite variety. But everything is so vague that you can't say for sure.

Or even if things are deterministic, we can't say that every single set of starting conditions repeats. For example the universe might be empty after a certain point. Or if you insist that it be filled with "stuff" we could just repeat the same star infinitely past a certain point, and thus have no "repeat Earths." And who knows? There might be enough possibilities for events that you could fill the entire universe with different events. In fact you could for sure. As a simple example let's say there's an event in which I program a robot to write a number. Let's even restrict ourselves to integers. Since we have infinite integers we could have infinite robots all writing different numbers. And that's limiting ourselves to a very small perspective.

MoonlessNight · Jul 6, 2006

A mathematical concept? Isn't infinity beyond math? I mean, you wouldn't sit by your calculator and notebook and try to solve a problem that would take an eternity to solve would you?

I'm sorry to say it but Math has, at the core, nothing to do with numbers and Calculators. Until you understand that you don't have a good grasp on Mathematics.

Also, Infinity is not a number. (Well I guess except on the Riemann Sphere, but even there we don't really mean it in the same way that we mean infinity usually.) In most, but not all, cases I like to think of infinity as a direction.

Infinity

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The kingdom is within

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YES!! Another possibility!!

YES!! Another possibility!!

YES!! Another possibility!!

YES!! Another possibility!!

The kingdom is within

The kingdom is within

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YES!! Another possibility!!

YES!! Another possibility!!

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