Talk:Big Rip/Archive 1

Archive 1

List of doomsday scenarios

Could use votes to save this article, thanks MapleTree 22:17, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Time until the end of time

From the article:

"The authors of this hypothesis calculate that the end of time would be approximately 10³⁰ years after the Big Bang, or 10²⁰ years from now."

That puts the Big Bang 10³⁰ - 10²⁰ years in our past, which is 10³⁰ years ago to all intents and purposes -- eh?

This has been sorted by 64.218.161.210

Why does it say: "35 billion years after the Big Bang, or 20 billion years from now."? 10²⁰ and 10³⁰ are significantly higher. Are there any references for this? --Driux 01:54, 19 October 2006 (UTC) Nevermind, it was obviously originaly supposed 30 billion, instead of 10³⁰ etc. Driux 14:51, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Size of the universe

How can the edges of the universe be 46.5 billion light years away when the universe is nowhere near that old? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.22.232.20 (talk • contribs) on 12:46, 15 March 2007.

This is covered at observable universe. Light from distant galaxies has travelled about 13 billion years to reach us. However, these galaxies continued to move away from us as the universe expanded. 46 billion light-years is our estimate of where they are now. --Christopher Thomas 15:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

So what you mean is that the universe may be 13 billion years old, but the rate of expansion is faster than the speed of light so much so that the edges of the universe are 46.5 billion light years apart?

And, with reference to what you said, say for example, Star X is at the edge of the observable universe currently, is Star X's actual position at the edge of the universe currently? Mysterial 16:08, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

A star that we see now as being 13 billion light years away is indeed much farther away now, as we saw it 13 billion light years away 13 billion years ago. Different parts of the universe do expand FTL relative to each other, yes; this gives us a cosmological horizon, with an exact distance that depends on how we assume the expansion rate changes over time.

Saying that Star X is at the "edge of the universe" isn't quite correct. There isn't an edge, or at least not one that anyone's seen. What the size value says is that the edge of the observable universe - the part we can presently see - is farther away than it looks, due to expansion over time. --Christopher Thomas 17:16, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Ok.. if there isn't an edge, how does the universe expand in size? I mean, I assume what you meant is that it is infinitely huge and has no boundary. But if this is so, what can the universe expand into? Since the universe is still expanding, there should be some sort of boundary limiting it so that it makes sense to say that the universe expanded from say, Size A to Size B. Mysterial 16:19, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

See Metric expansion of space for details about this. The usual analogy given is to consider a balloon with dots on it, being inflated. The dots represent galaxies, the balloon represents space. By looking at how distant galaxies move with respect to each other, you can infer that space is expanding, and how fast it's expanding. The equations of relativity have certain solutions corresponding to an expanding universe, which are assumed to represent the type of universe we're in. --Christopher Thomas 20:31, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I've understood it much better now. Mysterial 15:39, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

The Five Ages of the Universe: Inside the Physics of Eternity

Is anyone familiar with this book? It lays out a scenario similar to this Big Rip, only the end of time occurs at 10^100 years, which is a mear factor of 10^87 years larger than laid out by the 50 billion year estimate. Is anyone capable of comparing the merits of each author's methods here?

-GK, 1/16/08 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.205.20.248 (talk) 02:05, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

"End of time"

Would the Big Rip really be literally (not just metaphorically) the "end of time" in the same way as the Big Crunch? Wouldn't it mean that the universe would still expand eternally, just very fast and without anything interesting?

Nickptar 01:25, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

There is a reason why this has been labeled as the possible end of time. How is time measured? It is measured as a sequence of events or phenomenon. Something must happen, which is a reference from which time is measured. After the big rip, there would be no interactions between various bodies in the universe. So, essentially, there is nothing to measure time against. The concept of time becomes meaningless. So, time actually ends. This is very interesting as even in the case if the universe ends in a big crunch as opposed to a big rip, time ends again as all future points to singularity. And, singularity is dimensionless. Here again, time is meaningless.

- Shobs [1]

Yes, but, if you consider time to be an illusion, and that everything in embedded in spacetime, time wouldn't end. Things would be just static, but time would go on. Also, consider the string theory, which states that particles are vibrating strings. Vibrations are certainly caused by the passage of time. Of course, string theory and the spacetime philosophical viewpoint are just theories, but I'm mentioning them, anyway, to show both aspects of the issue.--Orthologist 16:54, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

If time is an illusion, then there really is no time to go on. It would probably be more accurate to say that time is the result of vibration of strings than the reverse.--RLent 21:15, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

If so, if it was true and this is the end of everything... What will happen to our spirits? Would that die too? Would we see nothing? Would we all be resurrected in another universe? --62.31.182.173 (talk) 16:15, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't worry about our "spirits," since if they exist we can assume they do not obey typical physical laws, meaning there is absolutely no way to know anything about what would happen to them in physically hypothetical circumstances (they might, for example, be part of a different universe, in which the big rip does not occur). Also consider that in 50 billion years, the universe will look considerably different, and there is now way to know if we will exist. Even if we did exist, of course we would "see nothing," because we would die, if not when our home planet(s) is(are) flung from its(their) orbit(s), which is, keep in mind, a full 3 months before the end, then when our bodies are torn apart, which obviously will occur before you get down to the molecular or atomic level, and eventually the true 'end.' And of course, The Big Rip is so far an unlikely theory.Eebster the Great (talk) 19:35, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Observable Universe Shrinking or percentage of the observable universe shrinking?

Call me crazy, but why does this predict that the universe will rip itself apart? It talks about how if the observable universe becomes smaller than a structure, it's forces would no longer work and cause it to disintegrate. That might be true, but it neglets a lot of facts.

Firstly, what is the observation point? It talks about individual galaxies tearing each other apart, then solar systems, stars, etc. This assumes that anything outside the observable universe does not hold true to the laws of physics. This assumes that if we can't see it, it must be dictated by different laws, or no laws at all, in this case. Whether I can see it or not, doesn't affect how well it it follows standard laws. The main curiosity, is that since it says the individual structures tear themselves apart, that means that the observable universe is encapsulated around structures. It sounds like there is an observable universe around may atoms, my planet, my star, and my galaxy. If you look from my perspective, as the observable universe gets smaller than my galaxy, my galaxy would shatter. If you look from the point of view of Andromeda (when its observable universe shrinks smaller than itself), the milky way would have shattered a long time ago, because the edge of observable universe is just now touching itself. Call my crazy, but the milky way can't shatter at time A, 100 billion years from time A, and 10 billion years from time A. It will shatter when it shatters, it cant' do it more than once.

But this all sidesteps the main problem.... how is the observable universe shrinking because of this phantom energy? The PERCENTAGE of the observable universe from Earth may be shrinking, but nothing I've seen holds up a theory that the actual edge of observation is shrinking.

--Yogurtron 18:19, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

You misunderstand what is meant by the "edge of the observable universe" (which I think should more appropriately be replaced with "particle horizon"). We don't just not know about things outside of the observable universe, they literally cannot have any effect of any kind on anything inside it, since no forces move faster than light, and the observable universe is based on the speed of light. Physics would (presumably) hold just fine for objects outside of the observable universe, but they wouldn't be attracted to us at all. If our observable universe were smaller than the solar system, the Earth wouldn't orbit the Sun (although, of course, both would be gone by this time). When the observable universe is smaller than an atom, the electrons no longer would orbit the nucleus, and when it is smaller than the nucleus, the nucleons no longer would be attracted to one another. It is unclear what would happen when it gets smaller than a proton, since the physics of free quarks isn't well developed.Eebster the Great (talk) 21:24, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Black holes and the Big Rip

What would happen with a black hole in a Big Rip? 194.85.123.85 13:07, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, our current models treat black holes to be point objects (much the way fundamental particles are treated as point objects with a probability wavefunction describing where you might interact with them). This would make them unaffected by the big rip (though they'd still eventually evaporate via Hawking radiation). In practice, I'd expect very strange things to happen when the size of the observable universe became smaller than the size of the event horizon. I _think_ what happens is that as the size of the observable universe shrinks, the size of the event horizon shrinks as well, so that they never come in contact, but in practice we'd need a good theory of quantum gravity to understand what happens under conditions extreme enough for this to be a problem. A physicist specializing in relativity can give you a more accurate answer than I can. --Christopher Thomas 04:57, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

I think this is the most interesting question here. Because quantum mechanics prohibits things with mass having zero size, and black holes have mass, they must have a physical size. Therefore, when the Big Rip gets to them, they will expand. What they will expand into is a very interesting question. In the case of a supermassive black hole, there's a lot of mass that can be "unpacked" during a Big Rip. A quantum theory of gravity will likely be needed to predict this event. But once that mass is unpacked beyond the event horizon, a lot of energy associated with that mass will be released. Assuming the conservation of mass and energy holds within the event horizon, all of the mass/energy inside the horizon is still there, less only what has leaked as Hawking radiation. As discussed in another entry below, the forces binding gluons and other leptons together may well slow down the local expansion acceleration rate for some period of time. This might well be the start of a "Little Bang" on a localized scale. Makes you wonder whether our Big Bang was another universe's little one ... that would not violate the entropy principle either. I would appreciate any quantum physicists who might care about the quality of discussion on this starter page to comment. Thanks! SammySlim 21:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Why does quantum mechanics prohibit massive objects having zero size? The way I understand it, leptons at the instant of observation with infinitely uncertain velocity have zero size (which of course is impossible in the same way absolute zero is, but is infinitely approachable). Essentially, when a wave function collapses, the particle has a size limited only by the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, which doesn't really give the size of the object but the uncertainty of its location, and even that uncertainty is zero if the velocity is infinitely uncertain. What law are you referring to?

Also, since the event horizon of a black hole is dictated by gravity, I don't think its size would be affected by the size of the particle horizon until the particle horizon becomes actually smaller than the event horizon. I have no idea what would happen here, since the event horizon isn't literally filled with matter, but is just a theoretical construct. Once this size is reached, I imagine the event and particle horizons would be one and the same as they shrank down to near-zero. Since the black hole currently is treated as having zero size, no spontaneous eruption or anything would happen there, although I suppose anything emitted via Hawking radiation would almost instantly exit the black hole's particle horizon. If this is the case, the Big Rip ultimately would isolate every particle except black holes, which would still remain intact until they eventually evaporate away. Even quarks, I suppose, would be torn apart from eachother so that even hadrons cannot exist, and the universe would be an endless space of isolated elementary particles.Eebster the Great (talk) 19:51, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I think this is the most interesting question here. Because quantum mechanics prohibits things with mass having zero size, and black holes have mass, they must have a physical size.

=

As I understand them, black holes do not contain mass at the actual singularity. They are distortions of space caused by mass, which is then crushed out of existence, but leaving the distortion behind. The distortion is unable to cure itself back to flat space again, even if no new matter enters the black hole and the hole becomes empty when all matter inside is crushed.

When the particle horizon shrinks to the event horizon, it simply begins to stretch out the space of the black hole. The particle horizon is operating on space, and is not subject to the constraints imposed by the event horizon, eg that even light may not escape.

Recall even light cannot go faster than light in any reference frame, but two objects embedded in space can recede from each other faster than light, when the space between their locations expands faster than light. 59.167.103.33 (talk) 08:53, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

I think at this point we can safely say that nobody knows if black holes "contain mass at the actual singularity," but merely that the black holes have mass and that mass appears to be focused into a small region, which current equations consider to be a singularity, but which may not be when viewed by appropriate (and as of yet undiscovered) equations. Either way, I feel that we probably don't know nearly enough about the universe yet to determine what would happen if a black hole's particle horizon were smaller than its event horizon. On the one hand, I can say for certain that an event horizon CANNOT BE greater than the particle horizon, because gravity has no effect on anything outside of the particle horizon and therefore anything can escape the gravitational pull. Because the universe is expanding, I feel perhaps the space around a black hole would "flatten out" at some roughly proportionate rate, such that the event horizon is always smaller than the particle horizon. When they both approach the singularity, I do not know, except that if space is indeed continuous and not discrete, we shouldn't actually need to be concerned about the particle horizone ever getting SO small it literally encompasses a single point. However, when the particle horizon gets smaller than planck length, perhaps very strange things could occur. Or perhaps not; I really don't know. Eebster the Great (talk) 06:35, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Quantum Entanglement outside of the Observable Universe

After reading this article, I wondered about the single quantum effect I have heard about that appears to occur simultaneously in distant places (rather than spreading at the speed of light), which is quantum entanglement. Basically, if I have two entangled photons, and I force one to flip spins in a magnetic field, the other one will IMMEDIATELY flip spins as well. If our observable universe is shrinking, then it would be possible for previously entangled particles to no longer be in eachother's sphere of influence. When this happens, they should be "ripped" apart, but couldn't they still affect eachother at least in one sense, since they are entangled? Could this in theory allow for information to be transmitted outside of the observable universe?Eebster the Great (talk) 21:31, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Never mind, I read part of the Wiki article on entanglement, and I see now that no information can be transmitted via entanglement unless there is a classical channel. It's still interesting, though, that separate spheres would still be linked in one sense by entangled pairs.Eebster the Great (talk) 22:24, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Stephen Baxter's short story Last Contact revolves around the Big Rip 124.254.121.148 (talk) 11:11, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Our solar system 22 Ga in future?

Do they actually claim that our solar system will be unbound 3 months before the end? Our sun will shine for 6-8 Ga more, and afterwards the remnants of our Solar System will probably not contain Mercury, Venus nor Earth. Bad things happen now and then, but what will happen to our solar system about 22 Ga, is not very important to any of our very hypothetical descendents. ... said: Rursus (^mbork³) 21:37, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

The number 22Ga comes from a very large magnitude of ω = -1.5, given in the paper not as a prediction but as a case to consider. A value of, say ω = -1.01 would also lead to a "Big Rip" but much much further into the future, about 1000 Gya. In these models, yes, the solar system would be unbound shortly before a singularity at the Big Rip. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 03:39, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

I meant that our own solar system in its current form doesn't exist then to be destroyed, so there has to be some poor red dwarf civilisation that has to experience this dramatic event. Or in the case that ω = -1.01, no living creature whatsoever. Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 20:30, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

That's true, but the point is to show when causal contact would be lost at various scales, for illustration. These numbers should not be relied upon for disaster preparedness. :-) --Amble (talk) 18:55, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Does the Big Rip turn virtual particles into matter?

As I understand it (from popularized sources) Hawking radiation turns virtual particles into real matter at the event horizon of a black hole, because one gets separated from the other. The Big Rip should separate out virtual electron-positron pairs and so on, shouldn't it? Does this mean it would create matter all over the universe from nothing?

(This is similar to the discussion about quarks ripped apart above, but would seem to allow any particle to be created)

Also, is the Big Rip in any fundamental way different from cosmic expansion? (apart from being in the future, that is) Wnt (talk) 03:54, 11 May 2010 (UTC)

Great questions. As I understand it, the Big Rip would indeed produce real particles from virtual particles as you say, when the cosmic horizon becomes smaller than the corresponding Compton wavelength. This also happens during inflation, although it is not directly responsible for creating most of the electrons in an inflationary cosmology. Of course, the particles would also be diluted as they appear. I suppose that by "cosmic expansion" you have in mind cosmic inflation? They are different in that the horizon may keep an approximately constant size during inflation, while in a Big Rip scenario it shrinks, reaching zero size after a finite time. --Amble (talk) 03:23, 15 May 2010 (UTC)

There's much in the Hawking radiation article that still eludes me. It's clear that the temperature of the black hole (and the amount of radiation) is determined by a term in the Schwarzschild metric 1/(1-(2M)/r) (some constants seem to be omitted in this article...).

This is apparently very closely related to the surface gravity of the hole, with the temperature equal only to the gravity over 2 pi (again omitting constants). This seems to be an aspect of the Unruh effect: the black hole event horizon, accelerating, measures a finite temperature in vacuum, and being in equilibrium with it, radiates back at the same temperature. If I go by that logic, then it seems like the Big Rip wouldn't produce virtual particles because any given spot is not accelerating at all.

But if I view the original term as instead representing, say, the "tidal effect", the degree to which different acceleration is imposed on slightly separated points near the hole (which is also true), then such a tidal effect as we went through above is present in the Big Rip to a potentially infinite extent. In the black hole these two things are directly proportional to one another, but here they are completely unrelated. So which thing causes Hawking radiation — the Unruh effect, or the separation of virtual particles?

Then there's the "negative mass" thing. The Hawking radiation article explains the loss of black hole mass as that the virtual particle which enters the hole is interpreted as having a negative mass from the outside (I think). But where does the negative mass go here?

Anyway, if the Big Rip does create net mass, and more and more of it as it speeds up, shouldn't infinite mass counteract the dark energy and limit the process to an inflationary episode?

P.S. As a general comment about the articles on physics (as I go down the Schwarzschild rabbit hole), there seems to be a harsh division between very general descriptions and mathematical derivations where variables aren't defined, the purpose of substitutions isn't explained, the individual meaning of additive terms isn't specified and so on. I wish that there were more mid-level information provided. Wnt (talk) 16:48, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

I have noticed the same gap in mid-level information, and I think there are a couple of reasons for it. First, "mid-level" means that you can assume the reader is already familiar with some basic concepts and information, but won't have encountered more advanced material yet. This requires that topics be presented in a definite order, as in a series of textbooks or classes. It's almost impossible to do this in the form of encyclopedia articles, since there's no way to know what a given reader may or may not already have learned. Therefore, most Wikipedia articles are targeted either at an educated layman, or at subject-matter experts. The second reason is that information Wikipedia articles is sourced from existing and available literature, which tends to be either for specialists or for general audiences.

As for your specific questions about Hawking radiation, the Unruh effect, and the Big Rip, I'm afraid you're passing beyond the scope of this article discussion page, and in all likelihood, beyond the bounds of what can be done without mathematical formalism. I do not believe that there is any reliable or really correct formulation of these effects in terms of virtual particle pairs (see e.g. [2]), so you can take that picture as an illustrative but very limited analogy. --Amble (talk) 23:49, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

the second source is garbage

The second source (cited in the experimental data) is garbage. It displays at best the "layman's perspective of cosmology". "This has prompted scientists to believe that dark energy is in fact Einstein’s General Relativity cosmological constant" ? Absolute garbage, as well as the sentences surrounding it. Furthermore the "strength of dark energy," although that is a misuse of terms here, does not need to increase for the "big rip" scenario to occur. It need only stay constant, as it does not dilute with the expansion of the universe. What we measure as the Hubble parameter is increasing at a certain definite distance away from Earth, and closer than that you can't know, as gravitational and local effects overwhelm the metric expansion. in any case this gives a premature, simplistic, and incorrect description. Wing gundam (talk) 05:53, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

confusing

The article should explain in details how scale factor/fabric of space make this rip, what exactly is expanding.And how matter is measured in this fabric.

Space isn't literally a 'fabric', obviously; what is meant by that is that the nature of space itself expands. Essentially, you can think of it as distances themselves increasing, or everything in the universe becoming farther apart. There also isn't really a 'rip', just things no longer being attracted to or related to one another. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Eebster the Great (talk • contribs) 21:27, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

After reading the article, 1 thing attracted my attention. The Universe is only ment to be 13.7 billion years old, yet, its claims that the galaxies will move outside the abservable Universe which is 46.5 billions light years away, if the Universe is only 13.7 billion years old how can we see further than that.

This gets into general questions about distance in cosmology, and is not particularly associated with this article. See Distance measures (cosmology) —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 03:44, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

But if everything in space is expanding at the same rate, how do we know about it in the first place? Moreover, I recall reading that, while the universe is expanding, individual galaxies aren't, and I'd be surprised if any smaller entities are expanding as part of the universe's expansion.

That said, then it occurred to me: The expansion of space tries to pull galaxies apart, but the gravity of each galaxy counteracts this to keep the local scale of space under control. But it can't continue doing so indefinitely if the global scale factor is tending towards infinity, and so galaxies will eventually break apart. Smaller structures such as star systems and planets are similarly gravitationally bound, and will similarly eventually fall apart as space expands. At smaller scales still, electromagnetic and nuclear forces predominate to hold structures together, and these similarly will be eventually overcome by the expansion of space. Does this sound right? — Smjg (talk) 22:48, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Everything after the Big Rip

What does everything turn into after the Big Rip? I see atoms get destroyed, but into what?

Torn apart as in reduced to fundamental particles, flying apart at the speed of light.WolfKeeper 01:24, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Whereas fire destroys wood into ash, what does the Big Rip destroy anything into? Nothing is not the answer; everything has to be destroyed into something. --Shultz IV 00:44, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

We don't know what happens when quarks get ripped apart. When quarks get ripped apart from each other more quarks get formed. So you could end up with a runaway creation of quarks, and it could conceivably form a black hole or something; which might counter the expansion. But really, your guess is as good as anybodies. It may just be that everything ends up as fundamental particles, that just are flying apart at faster than the speed of light; so the universe would still be there, but wouldn't be doing anything very interesting.WolfKeeper 01:24, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

If you pull apart quarks, you get more quarks, but that takes energy. Wouldn't that tend to act as a brake on expansion?--RLent 06:14, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, the creation of new quarks consumes energy and this would have to be extracted from the expanding force, i.e. the dark energy. So, unless dark energy has some really strange properties (such as getting stronger when energy is extracted from it) or i'm missing a basic point in particle physics here this would certainly slow down the expansion, either by stealing energy from the expanding force or by creating mass and thus gravity that would overwhelm the the dark energy. --89.55.137.35 00:30, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

So the more the universe expands, the more matter it produces, the higher the gravity and the slower the expansion. This process would just cascade until the dark energy is completely drained, at which point you have a lot of quarks and the expansion is slowed down or halted. In the former case, you still have a conventional heat death; in the latter case, gravity will take over and cause a big crunch. Is this theory correct and which would happen? BrotherLaz —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.180.19.144 (talk) 15:25, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

How could the runaway creation of quarks form "a black hole or something?" --NEMT 18:14, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Maybe the total mass of the quarks becomes so huge it reaches a "critical mass" of sorts. --WikiSlasher 14:46, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

So theoretically, the big rip will literally renew the universe! 82.12.86.64 20:50, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Every mass has an associated volume and an associated schwarzschild radius. For matter of normal mass and normal density the schwarzschild radius is much smaller than the radius of its volume defined by mass and density. The schwarzschild radius grows with m, the radius of the volume of the object grows with the 3rd root of m. So the schwarzschild radius will grow faster than the volume radius. So at a fixed density the schwarzschild radius will exceed the volume radius if you add more and more mass. for example it requires insane densities to collapse an object as heavy as earth to a black hole. But when you accumulate a huge amount of something with a normal density it'll still collapse to a black hole (for this example: it would 150,000,000 times the sun's mass in standard-density water would collapse to a black hole all by itself) --89.55.144.157 23:43, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

We know so little, there is so much speculation. For all we know a Big Rip could be the next stage in a cyclic model. The observable universe could just be one side of a spectrum and we might never know what the other side is and whether it's nature is to loop around back to before the big bang. All just silly talk from me. :/ --99.225.10.18 (talk) 07:14, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Even if we had runaway quark creation slowing down the expansion of the universe and recreating hadrons, it wouldn't "renew" the universe, since a renewed universe would also have leptons, photons, and W and Z bosons, which this isolated universeling wouldn't have. Also, this recreation of particles from dark energy would seem to violate entropy.Eebster the Great (talk) 19:56, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

The quarks would also create free neutrons, which decay into protons and electrons. Photons would come from matter-antimatter annihilation. And the gauge bosons act as force carriers, so they're naturally there as there is matter. So yes - with my limited understanding of particle physics - i could see a runaway quark creation to renew the universe. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.172.114.162 (talk) 10:14, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Shrinking Observable Universe

While this might be true, and implied, it isn't at all obvious and the article does a very poor job of explaining why this is so. - Jlodman (talk) 03:49, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Have to agree with that, I just don't get it. Not quite. Although, what some user wrote above (the analogy with the ant and its home on a balloon that's being inflated) at least gave me some hint, I guess. It appears somewhat less than perfect, however, if some topic's best elucidations are to be found on the discussion site only. For all who also struggle, here's how "far" I get: Just consider the entire universe.. expanding at faster and ever faster rate.. the faster it expands, the less distant you naturally could depart from any one point.. and also return to it again, even with (theoretically) maximally possible velocity (which is equal to the speed of light).. but that just is the definition of the observable universe. The whole universe, obviously, gets larger all right, also in this theory, and it even grows at particularly faster rates according to this theory--it's just, that the latter would be the very reason for the observable (i. e. mutually interacting) universe becoming ever smaller, according to this theory. Interaction is always a two-way, or two-sided process, just as it is for the ant, on the balloon, which would make the one side, whereas its home would make the other side. (Because that is, what the ant might want to interact with.. AGAIN.. by eventually getting back to it, that is.)

What I'd personally find interesting too, but what the current article says nothing about, is the question of cosmological inflation, or, indeed, the relation between inflation and the Big Rip hypothesis. Because, at least as I (layperson!) see it, if ANY inflation is true, and a future Big Rip is also true, then the cosmological inflation MUST be chaotic in flavor. Or, am I wrong? Since an inflationary epoch, that isn't chaotic, would necessarily refute the Big Rip?! If inflation ever ENDED (globally), cosmic expansion must have decelerated at this point and, of course, relative to the velocity of expansion while inflation occured. That would've to be true, again, as I understand it, even though it could (and, as it seems, actually did) accelerate once more thereafter (only much slower). To my mind, a non-chaotic inflation as well as a future Big Rip could only be true, insofar as the hypothetical Phantom Energy had been weaker at earlier times of the cosmos' history. But why should that be? Zero Thrust (talk) 02:30, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Picture is Confusing

It's hard to tell what is going on in the animated picture near the top of the article. It seems that the galaxy is just getting blurry or stirred around, not being pulled apart. Thanks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.59.89.150 (talk) 22:22, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed - I personally think it should be removed. Smartse (talk) 12:55, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

I've now removed the picture. MarkGyver (talk) 02:17, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

someone replaced it? and yeah it looks rediculous — Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.124.255.119 (talk) 00:16, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I've removed it again, and added a comment directing people to tell us why it belongs before adding it back. MarkGyver (talk) 21:46, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Because it shows the structures of the galaxy progressively disintegrating. Whoop whoop pull up ^{Bitching Betty | Averted crashes} 01:42, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

My understanding is that the Big Rip is more like the boundaries of the observable universe shrinking so that distance objects essentially disappear, followed by closer and closer objects until nothing is left. File:Big rip.gif looks like disintegration as you describe, but I think the Big Rip would look more like the stars going out, starting with the most distant. MarkGyver (talk) 23:04, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

My change of 7.5 to 22

The current statement is: "Approximately three months before the end, the Solar System (or systems similar to our own at this time, as the fate of the Solar System 7.5 billion years in the future is questionable)"

I'm going to change the 7.5 to 22. It seems likely an editor took 14.5 billion as the current age of universe and subtracted it from 22 billion to get 7.5 billion. But the article says the time for the big rip in the scenario is 22 billion years from now, not when age of the universe is equal to 22 billion years. So, although the fate of the solar system in 7.5 billion years is indeed questionable, it's less confusing to say 22 billion, and the fate of sol system then is at least as questionable.2601:7:6580:5E3:D55A:2D0C:33E8:EC86 (talk) 13:12, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Last sentence of lede

This is unclear to me: "Sudden singularities and crunch or rip singularities at late times occur only for hypothetical matter with implausible physical properties." Isn't the article about a crunch singularity at a late time? Does that sentence therefore mean a big crunch scenario is highly implausible? We see the same sentence at the end of the lede of Big Crunch (I posted there also). --Middle 8 (t • c | privacy • COI) 22:36, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Shrinking?

Is the word "shrinking" a misprint? I don't see how a universe that is shrinking would prohibit interactions between its components.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.81.118.123 (talk • contribs) 06:23, 7 August 2005

Imagine you're an ant living on the surface of a balloon. And the balloon is being inflated.

Now, if you start at your house, and you walk around on the balloon, you find that if you get too far from home- you can never get back! That's because the expansion of the balloon means that your walking speed isn't enough to overcome the expansion- the distance between you and home is expanding as fast as you can walk!

• ::Wouldn't the ant expand as well? If the ant expanded, it's legs would get bigger, so it's walking speed would increase right??

That distance, which is the limit to how far you can get is the analogue of the 'observable universe' in the real world, except it's not ants walking around, it's light wizzing around!

If the speed of expansion of the balloon increases, then the observable universe shrinks, eventually your house falls apart.WolfKeeper

Basically, once different parts of an object are in different parts of space that are moving apart at the speed of light then the object is going to disintegrate. (It's the same principle as a black hole .)WolfKeeper

Alright, so the individual components of matter are accelerating away from each other at a rate which prevents signals from being received, and so they cannot receive an "attraction" signal from the strong force, etc.? I can understand this aspect; I just don't follow the usage of the word "shrinks" in your explanation. Is it because the universe will expand faster than the speed of light? --Original poster from above. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.81.118.123 (talk • contribs) 09:41, 12 August 2005

The expansion is linear per metre per second (e.g. 0.01cm per metre per second). So if two points are far enough apart they are moving away from each other at the speed of light (more precisely, the distance between them is increasing at faster than the speed of light). That's called the observable universe. So light can never go from one object to the other if they are initially more than that distance apart.

So, if the rate of expansion increases, the observable universe shrinks.WolfKeeper

Ah, thank you. That makes much more sense.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.81.118.123 (talk • contribs) 07:09, 5 September 2005

It's possibly not the best word to use, methinks - the observable universe will actually be increasing in size, as it can never decrease as time increases (it's defined as how far away photons can be coming from - that must increase as dictated by the speed of light),

No, the distance would actually be reducing; it's not just amount of matter. The volume of the observable universe decreases as the expansion rate goes up.WolfKeeper 21:24, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

however the amount of matter in the observable universe will be decreasing (i.e. bits will be 'dropping off the edge'). This isn't a contradiction because the density is being reduced, in this case due to the expansion of space (i.e. the separation between particles) rather than matter moving around. Mike Peel 16:43, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Doesnt this article miss that the expansion of the universe is accelerating in two ways? 1) there is more space to expand as it expands. 2) hubbles constant is actually increasing. Not noting the second confused me when reading, because i forgot the second. The second one is the one causing the visible universe to shrink, the radius of the visible universe is H/c with H hubbles constant (so its constant if H and c constant). Note that i do not know general relativity.(yet)

I guess the idea is sort of like having your ruler grow longer faster than you can inflate your ballon. If your balloon started out as the length of 5 rulers, and you inflate it fairly quickly, but the ruler grows even faster, clearly the balloon will be the relative size of fewer and fewere 'feet' and if the ruler is the only thing to compare it to, it will in a sense be "shrinking." This is not at all clearly explained, though, and it took me a while to figure it out (if I'm even correct, about which I'm not sure).Eebster the Great (talk) 19:41, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

EEBSTER -- yes you have it right...the space is increasing faster than the speed of light, ergo the observable universe is shrinking both in the sense that the ruler is growing faster than the balloon (a good analogy) and the stuff inside the balloon (the matter) is dropping off the edge of observable space. The key here is that the normal expansion of space-time is measured on galactic scale -- we can say that the effect is universal, but inside a galaxy or a solar system, the effects of gravity and other forces tend to immediately correct for the expansion i.e. if the solar system expands, gravitational behavior puts the pieces right back into the same alignment immediately (or as close to immediately as one can get). But if the expansion speeds up to the point where it overwhelms these compensating factors...things just fly apart. It's like asking "gee, if the space-time is expanding, why isn't my body flying apart" which is a good question and the answer is that local forces dwarf the space time expansion in the presence of a lot of matter (like your body)...but not in the relative emptiness of non-empty space. Chesspride 172.164.4.202 (talk) 08:12, 5 March 2016 (UTC)

Mixed rip theories

1. partial small rip and Unruh Big Bang: The big rip is non-perfect, the Hubble constant does not increase to infinity in a finite time, but increases fast enough to constitute the Unruh thermal bath enough to affect also the inertial observer (who in normal conditions is negligibly affected [but still, is subjected to puny spacetime distortions]), due to the distortion of spacetime itself; because parts of the inertial observer will accelerate with respect to each other, and the energy levels of interaction of the surrounding environment and accelerating observers, will have a huge impact on the inertial observer. Spacetime will become so disturbed, that no inertial observer could remain in an inertial state due to overall spatiotemporal turbulence, that doesn't have to reach an ideal big rip moment, but an energy threshold for a phase transition Big Bang (actually the phase transition Big Bang should become a new page [even if we reject the theory - it has to be mentioned]).
2. here add some other mixed theory
3. here add some other mixed theory
4. ... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:587:4105:C21C:D1E4:1B5F:C6A3:8340 (talk) 19:54, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

Puffball Universe

I have speculated for a number of years now that the Big Rip death of OUR universe would spawn nearly infinite numbers of new ones, each with their own Big Bang, and all causally disconnected from each other.

As the light cone shrinks down to Planck scale, quantum uncertainty increases exponentially, so that such incredibly small regions of spacetime could contain enough energy to start a new isolated creation of another universe. Since fungal puffballs explode releasing thousands or millions of spores, the rough analogy seemed appropriate enough to name my hypothesis.

2601:89:C601:C3B0:595F:D94C:343C:FCF (talk) 09:57, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, but see WP:Talk pages and WP:NOTFORUM. Talk pages are for discussion of improvements to their associated articles, not for general discussion and speculation of their topics. Largoplazo (talk) 11:15, 20 May 2021 (UTC)

Cyclic big rips which cause big bangs but then stop to allow in-between the galactic lifespan of the universes until they [big rips] re-appear to re-explode the universe

We didn't analyze well the mechanism of that sub-theory. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.49.59.200 (talk) 10:15, 4 October 2021 (UTC)

"meaning the Big Rip will not happen."

(found in overview at the very end)

does this mean the theory has been debunked? as it said "the big rip will not happen" 112.207.115.67 (talk) 04:57, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

Inversion

A couple of years ago I suggested in various cosmology-oriented online discussions that the shrinking light cones/cosmological horizons inherent in the Big Rip scenario might cause quantum-mechanical effects to create new mini-universes. As light cones shrink down to Planck scale, the uncertainty of contained energy becomes so large that the region might have enough to start a brand new local Big Bang, in this case causally disconnected from all other light cones. Then Inflation could causally reconnect them once again, resulting in a unified universe once again, and the pattern repeats endlessly. No net gain or loss of energy or entropy, just recompartmentalization. 2601:89:C701:9190:189:54BC:DFF1:A7A0 (talk) 2601:89:C701:9190:189:54BC:DFF1:A7A0 (talk) 03:20, 1 October 2023 (UTC)