Red Shift certainly implies that it is expanding.

(Bazongaloid, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:36, 1 reply, 16 years ago)

Yep, and that's the best evidence we have about the universe expanding.

(PsychoChomp, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:39, Reply)

It's this part where my brain starts to hurt
if it's expanding, what's it expanding into? There's supposed to be quite literally nothing other than the universe, but if there's nothing, how can the universe be expanding into it? If there's something, then what?
( Kroney, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:42, Reply)

There is nothing apart from the universe but it's not expanding into anything.
it's just expanding.
Think of a balloon being blown up, you're inside the balloon.
and the balloon is the only thing there is.
and no one is blowing it.
(PsychoChomp, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:44, Reply)

My poor, three-dimensional brain
the balloon's expanding, yet there's nothing there for it to expand into. No matter, no gas, no physical anything, not even vacuum, literally nothing. If there's literally nothing there, it can't be expanded into.
( Kroney, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:46, Reply)

the universe is everything
and it is getting bigger

why does it need to be expanding into anything?
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:47, Reply)

How can it be getting bigger
unless there is something for it to be getting bigger into?

The concept of something getting bigger relative to nothing except itself is difficult for me to grasp.
( Kroney, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:49, Reply)

that's because you are within the universe
along with everything else.

For all we know the universe itself could be staying the same size and everything in it shrinking at the same rate and in the same way so it looks like the universe is what is getting bigger.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:51, Reply)

The worst thing about all this
is that I'm actually quite bright. Just apparently rather linear.
( Kroney, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:54, Reply)

you can't much more mind-boggling than what we are discussing
I just happen to like wrapping my mind around this sort of thing.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:56, Reply)

Ok, how about thinking about it as there's no more stuff in the universe, that stuff stays the same
but that stuff is getting further apart.
(PsychoChomp, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:00, Reply)

that's a better way of looking at it
the universe doesn't have outer limits, it goes on for ever, and everything that is in it started in the same place and is spreading out.

I foresee a "but how can it be infinite?" question coming on
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:03, Reply)

what's outside the balloon?
I appreciate I am struggling with this basic concept but how can somethign expand into nothing??????
( SteveFrench Cardio is for homo's. do you even lift bro?, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:47, Reply)

you aren't going to get a better explanation than "because it can"
we don't and very probably will never know what is outside the universe. Nor does it have any bearing on anything.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:48, Reply)

it must be God
your logic and science have turned me to religion! I hope you are happy you fucks.
( SteveFrench Cardio is for homo's. do you even lift bro?, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 15:52, Reply)

this whole thread is making my brain cells bang into each other
like when you're hungover and walk into doorframes
( Kitty v1.0 desperately naive, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:05, Reply)

"finite but unbounded"
At the risk of sounding like Doc Brown, it's difficult for us to think sufficiently-dimensionally. Here's the analogy I first heard.

Imagine beings who can only perceive two dimensions, living on the surface of a large sphere, so to them the world appears flat, but however far they go, they never fall off the edge. Strange.

We, on the other hand, are able to appreciate the fact that there's a third dimension. So we know what's really going on.

Just add a dimension or two, and you have us, and our appreciation of the Universe.

I think. (Though it makes my brain hurt.)
(BrianHequator was stretching owls, on, or around, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:08, Reply)

I read that explanation again very recently
it's a good one.
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:14, Reply)

I think I'm going to be sick
I just can't handle stuff like that. I think I might be inbred or something.
( Kitty v1.0 desperately naive, Wed 11 Aug 2010, 16:15, Reply)