Brian Keating & Lex Fridman: What’s the Universe Expanding Into? 

One of my favorite things about Dr. Keating is his ability to explain things. He doesn't dumb it down, but crafts excellent analogies after giving you a basic primary in the physical reality you might not know. He doesn't get caught up in storytelling, but lays out the facts in an engaging way - no embellishments required. Gotta love good science communication

"I grew up in the Soviet Union. We watched propaganda." LOL, Lex is great.

The universe is expanding into an infinitely dense layer of cream cheese.

The puns and casual joking while explaining something so delicately is unmatched

The canvas is not expanding. The canvas of the universe is (for all intents and purposes) infinite. It’s what’s on the canvas that’s moving outward. A better analogy I think is to imagine an infinitely large swimming pool. Drop a few plastic balls in there. What will those balls be moving into? More pool water. The universe is not the nothingness between things. The universe IS the things in that nothingness.

That Se7en reference was hilarious!! 4:45

As Terence McKenna observed, “Modern science is based on the principle: ‘Give us one free miracle and we’ll explain the rest.’ The one free miracle is the appearance of all the mass and energy in the universe and all the laws that govern it in a single instant from nothing.

You know someone is good at what they do, when they can explain it in many ways

The universe is EVERYTHING. There is nothing outside of it because it's all encompassing. Now, if you're talking about our local universe (what we can see) the that's expanding into the part of the universe we can't see.

it's called intrinsic expansion, the universe isn't expanding "into" anything, it's expanding within its own confines. on a cosmic scale the distance between galaxies is steadily increasing, not just because the galaxies are moving away from each other (if they are), but because the space between them is itself expanding

“That’s any easy question”…a cosmologist assuming he knows what “space” is “expanding” into is like a virgin assuming he knows how sex is going to feel. 😂

I truly can’t believe we’re still referring to gravity as a fundamental force, when it’s nothing but a reaction of space-time mesh/canvas being stretched by mass. Not only does gravity not pull anything, it also doesn’t act over any type of distance. Space-time is always pushing back to its normal point of least resistance, and any stretching dominoes for as far as the effect of the mass allows; which on galactic terms is an extremely far distance, especially when it’s magnified by all the individual mass forces that domino inside of galaxies.

Don't think of the universe as expanding into more of something. Think of the universe as being this thing that is constantly stretching itself :). This is why the theory isny called expansion its called Inflation! Becuase the universe is inflating not "expanding" :) ❤️

Hi. Correct me if I am wrong as I am not a physics major. Etc. You are looking to observe the characteristics by inference at the furthest extent of expansion. That is within the perimeter of expansion? Not outside it. However, if observed one could see predictable features of expansion unless something not of those characteristics of this universe - were encountered? Yes?

" What is between those photons" Great question, Lex. Cosmologists should have been the first to escape chronocentric atomism, just as they once escaped geocentricism. And they may well do so, if they can manage to avoid the error which physicists can't avoid: Taking tweakable mathematical models to be descriptive of mechanism. Otherwise, Carver Mead, or some space scientists I have heard of will likely be first to glimpse the real mystery. And thanks to Brian for being frank about the unknowns and not inviting woo into the discussion :)

Great banter. I’m gonna watch the whole thing now (want to hear more on polarization and beyond).

This is one of the biggest questions i’ve had since i was 10 years old. But no matter what anybody says they don’t know.Nobody knows . There is not one person on the Earth that can explain any of this.

Thanks Brian. I always love your articulate explanation of the cosmos.

Silly question.. I’m still learning physics.. what demarcates the boundaries of space as it expands? Thank you

The mind! Thanks, I’ll be here all

The reason why we see galaxies beyond what we think we should see is because the big bang didn't happen mostly in one direction. The cone that they show of the observable universe is like one slice of a large pizza. Imagine 11 other slices the same size as the slice we're in. Tons and tons and tons of glaxies out there. A googolplex of galaxies if you will. Expanding in all directions rather than just that one cone that they show

_"It appears that the universe is bigger than it is older"_ Buzz . . . category error.

The universe operates like a toroid. Part is expanding, the other half is constantly contracting.

I wonder how much of this (if any) is easier to conceptualize at higher dimensions. If we could see time and space as an object the same way we can see a 1cm cube, how much further would the questions go..?

My theory is something is pulling away the universe like a dot To a other dot the 1st explode and create an attraction to the other dot at any distance because something is connecting the universe toghether

" As you get nearer and nearer to the moment of time that we call the present, things get more and more complicated. The universe is an engine for complexity. And if you entertain this, suddenly a light comes on, on the human condition. Instead of bowing to the fact that we are 'lucky to be here' , let's instead entertain the idea that, in terms of the universe, we are be the apple of its eye. We at the cutting edge of a 13 billion year old process of defining novelty." - Terence McKenna

What does it look like at the edge of the universe? If you “teleported” to the edge, would you ride the wave of expansion and remain at the edge, or would you be surpassed by it instantly?

Is polarization like seeing a grey room in an abandoned house and then in a blink you see the same room in living colour with people going about their day to day things? Or would it be like a fancy bending location trick where the globe as it is could be temporarily inverted with an immediate returned to the extroverted state?

Ooh! Brian did the space sample thing. I always wondered (since I thought of it) what you'd find in a space sample. Like you bring a cylinder into space with open ends move it through the space and then close the ends and bring it in and analyze what's in there. I asked in some science group and they said nothing would be in there because space is a vacuum. Are you sure nothing would be in there? We're in there. Amebas and planarians are in there. Hmm. Still.

I absolutely loved this conversation. Also, I use (stole) this explanation for the “but what is nothing?” question.

Very interesting video...makes me think of the joke we had in Physics class...final exam..."explain the universe... and give three examples"...

You mean there is no "Red Shift" it's just absolute gravitation? Fascinating.

...the universe expanding into what is between the protons is blowing my mind...that is genius

universe tends to enthalpy, great analogy

"Typically neurotic" old Polack sees cyclic conformal cosmologic expansion causing rupturable vacuum "weakness" towards the universal mid-region where earlier aeonic big bangs took place; no anti-deSitter space involved; just stress fractures providing a reverse plasma influx portal. Happy New Aeon!

The Universe is expanding into itself because it is curved. There, I saved you a lot of gibbering. The best bit is that none of "the universe" it is really there. When you observe from outside of "the box", this becomes clear. The way to visualise it is: the empty space in between all of the stuff is pointing to that which is real. The stuff is just as empty as the empty space between it. You will see it.

My guess is there's things bigger than are universe that our universe helps make up. Like a particle. The universe vibrates(?), it's full of w/e material needed to form whatever particle needed and it could appear hazy too. We have no idea, or any way to grasp what, if anything is larger than our universe. Imagine being as small as bacteria, trying to grasp the concept of a planet, that bacteria would die long before it made it around the globe or even realized it did.

1. universe is the same size and everything moves towards the great attractor inside each universe - 2. there is no big bang but rather constant syphoning of all the matter back and forth - 3. anti matter is what keeps walls/edges of each universe sanitized of all organic matter build up - 4. dark matter is one of 3 main products of anti matter and dark matter keeps stars moving towards the great attractor - 5. there is no light speed nor light photons on their own - but rather when dark matter grinds against star's electromagnetic fields and such grinding produces extremely high frequency vibration waves that start to glow - and to us it looks like light - also keep in mind that when dark matter overwhelms a star by pushing the star to follow the path to the great attractor then star dies - 6. the reason why we have seemingly millions of stars is because the dark matter vibrates constantly - so when it bounces each star back into the path it creates a rotational field which is what we call a gravity - basically gravity is the force that dark matter uses against electromagnetic fields produces by every matter in space - but anti-matter is the king of all matters - it keeps the entire universe from exploding - like a soap bubble that is made of thin spider silk but as strong as carbyne - 7. dark matter is a child of anti matter - only anti-matter and the great attractor can destroy it - 8. all universes are connected via black holes, white holes, worm holes/tunnels - basically like doors between rooms - 9. no organic matter can pass any of those doors - but what is interesting that anti-matter can and the great attractors use it to renovate the universe's walls as well as to generate dark matter that clears universe from stars that dont follow the path to the great attractor, as well sanitize universe from any sort of organic matter build up including us - 10. each universe has its own great attractor - but it is more like the main battery for each universe to run - stars are just the electromagnetic juice to keep the great attractor alive - in other words each universe is basically a closed down garden of electricity, magnetism, polarity, organic/dark/anti matters - the light has nothing to do with anything as well as gravity - those just interpretations of the end result the dark matter causes to the stars - 11. every organic matter produces electricity to feed the electromagnetic field around itself - we call that aura - basically a word to name the same thing we call light or aurora borealis/northern lights - why can humans see northern lights but cannot see aura around another human - because of amount of electromagnetic waves that generated is only 100 watt - which enough to light a bulb daily - so now you understand why we are needed by the great attractor in the first place and how a simple organic build up (think of a biohazard mold) in space has evolved into a complex creature - we are all made of star particles and we all have one single purpose/job to do - is to keep the great attractor from dying - and we fail then the universe will be lost entirely - as for the anti matter, where does it go when the great attractor dies, cause we know that anti matter is needed by the great attractor - but when no great attractor left then what happens to anti matter (forget the dark matter as it forms into organic matter and gets sanitized via high voltage discharge from the great attractor) - the anti matter exists the universe via the black hole and syphons to a connected universe via the white hole - notice when it enters the universe it looks like a glowing smoke - there you go - that is anti matter that escaped from a dead universe that lost its great attractor or this universe where we are at is about to be sanitized from all organic build up - yes! sounds bad! but even a space mold (organic matter build up) restarts its build up eventually - as we are aware of so far 6 times such build up happened before on earth - in other words, earth is in out of reach by our universe's anti matter and its baby who's called the dark matter - but when a new batch of anti matter syphons into the universe the balance can tilt towards less room for organic matter what we call life - so less life and more anti life -

The way my physics genius ex-husband explained it to me when I asked that question was basically that there is not empty space outside of the universe, but nothing exists beyond the horizon, not even space, because space, and time as well, are a function of the matter and energy within it.

The right question: What’s the Universe Expanding Out to?

tbh these two should have a regular show 2gether 🫂

According to the pre-roll commercial, it has something to do with Old Spice shampoo.

As a non conventional take, I personally think the information state outside an expanding universe is slowly compactifying due to the internal states of universes like ours doing work at the interface with the much vaster external state, and this is unpacking space time/information volume, albeit the exogenous compactification phase was not slow during inflation when our universe's boundary condition started exponentially hoovering up all the nascent space time volume of countless other unlucky proto universes - not all of them though....

42 is a number that connects everything

I have no problem meeting for classification of the situation within

All of this for me is fascinating and difficult to understand. But the one thing I just cannot fathom is why does the (observable) universe expand at an accelerated rate? What is causing the expansion to accelerate? Is the cause of the expansion itself also the same cause of it accelerating? Or is the acceleration of the expansion a completely separate cause? And also why CAN it accelerate constantly without stopping? Feels to me like an infinite amount of some sort of energy would be required to accelerate anything forever.

Yes the bottle would be empty, if you put the cap on and brought it back inside it would crush flat under immense pressure from the atmosphere

Why is nothing expanding towards us faster than we move away.

Omg i never even thought of that!! 🤯🤯

"Maximum Power, Scotty". From the StarShip Enterprise. 9:03

Man I wish I could understand physics like an expert does. Without the life time of dedicated study of it lol

….I’m laughing on the inside😂😂😂😂

So if you was the only thing to exist in this universe you’d be able to travel infinitely in every direction into the empty eternal void, this isn’t nothing this is something. This also obviously means that it was eternally here but the question is how can this empty eternal void manifest a universe or multiverses when it’s eternal properties is emptiness? P.S The universe itself can’t fill itself completely into every particle in this void as it’s expanding so it basically gets diluted in this 420 per square cm. As the universe ages, I’d assume this number will shrink due to the universe not having enough particles to fill the void it’s expanding in to, unless the particles themselves grow/duplicate at the same rate of expansion.

"What’s the Universe Expanding Into?" As long as there isn't a profit motive, this question is fine to ask

Brooklyn isn't excepted from expansion.

I’m not sure I followed the argument so well. I thought it was going to be a question of the “space” that spacetime exists in - sort of a spin on “where did the Big Bang take place[?]”. Or, “where is the Universe?” Well, it’s here… but where’s here? Maybe we say that the inflation of the Cosmos is the basis upon which any “here” could be - but that definitely seems to contradict the notion of a Multiverse. But regardless, is it meaningful to talk about a Universe coming into Being without conceiving of a meta-space of some sort that it came into? Seems like another “turtles all the way down” issue: wouldn’t we then need to explain how that space can exist at all too?

Are you saying, that the matter and energy of the universe reach out to a certain point, beyond which there's still empty space, and the matter and energy are expanding into it?

This is a fun to watch conversation, Lex Friedman plays one of the best straight man around these days to a cavalcade of effervescent bright scientific thinkers. There's a lot to learn yet about large scale, i.e. galactic and larger, magnetic fields and electric charges, as space has measurable permeability and permittivity properties? The metric to this observer appears to be curved along a size spectrum if all things appear to free fall at the same constant rate, if the persistence of straight triangles might be an illusory compensation effect? The following queries from a long time what me worry AE Neuman fan, that it takes at minimum a trinity of separate real point entities with a fourth dimension, following Hamilton, for movement in a 3D space to emerge? It's undefined or static in 3D before that reality, with all due respect to the imaginary numbers?! The next equinox approaches daily, keeping all things light for the following solstice, good rest of the day, this fun video made for today's mirth!

I wish I could spend more time on stuff like this

Does this not mean, given that the stuff in the bottle exists inside the universe, that the universe is expanding into stuff which can be found inside the universe? How can that be because that stuff surely cannot exist outside the universe unless we are saying that the outside the universe is made of a vacuum just like the inside? If that is true then I have a mind blowing thought…. Just maybe the vacuum is STILL the outside of the universe and the universe is not expanding into anything, it’s expanding THROUGH it with both inside and outside co-existing in the same time and space with maybe another dimension, we don’t understand, providing the defining co-ordinate of uniqueness.

why does light redshift with the expansion but matter doesn't do this "stretching"

Ωm + Ωr + ΩΛ = 1 presupposes that the universe may be explained using the Lambda-CDM model, which is based on the Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker (FLRW) metric, which describes the spacetime of a homogeneous and isotropic universe. If the universe were not homogeneous and isotropic, the FLRW metric would not be an accurate description of spacetime and the Lambda-CDM model would have to be modified to account for the deviation from homogeneity and isotropy. if the universe is diluting in mass-energy, one could introduce a new density parameter, Ωd, which would represent the density of the diluting component. The new density parameter would be added to the standard density parameters of matter, radiation, and dark energy: Ωm + Ωr + ΩΛ + Ωd = 1 The dilution could be modeled as a fluid with negative energy density, this would be a form of phantom energy, which would have a negative equation of state parameter. The equation of state parameter is the ratio of pressure to energy density, and it describes the behavior of the fluid. For a fluid with negative energy density, the equation of state would be: p = w * ρ Where w

I know this is kinda off topic, but I swear, if I didn’t look I would still be sure Dr Keating was interviewed by a well-done Jessie Pinkman.

@6:44 and following ~ " The notebook on which the Photons are written in. " I felt that! Very Mossy thoughts indeed.

It's expanding into the future, what's beyond it doesn't exist yet because we haven't got there yet. Acum.

Lex is very intelligent; I think he was hitting his comprehension limit with "What's in the Box!?"

vacuum is a crystal. Unit of crystal is a only place where can be located electric monopole and the only place where magnetic dipole can't be located. When magnetic dipole begins moving with arbitrary speed it enevitably encounter unit and will be broken to peaces ('+' and '-' electric monopoles) wich immediately located in nearest units and connect thamselves to 4D( becase they are binary 1-digit number systems). Then in 4D begins reincarnation of broken dipole. Time depends only on distance between '+' and '-' electric monopoles. So reincarnated in 4D dipole continue moving untill next collision but at not arbitrary speed. And i can't imagine other explanation why electromagnetic wave has no friction.

Of course it needs to keep expanding . I want to keep decorating it ! In my little corner of it i am having so much fun challenging the laws of physics ....... Tweaking gravity , because why not . Muons , gluons , charm quarks and so much more . But why have such dense experiences ?

We should get down to the fundamental building blocks of spacetime. What is the mechanism that makes spacetime work?

If the universe is expanding..realize any dimension is a measured area of space that is occupied with matter..the supposed view of vacuum of space is no matter...m. he is explaining there are particles now that we are starting to understand and discover that occupy this vacuum..or dark matter of space....so...think of any expansion of a balloon..if it's flat .it still has some air in there..some matter and particles...IF you blow more air in that balloon..the Ballon expands...and expands and expands with more matter expulsion..like a pulsar or nebular

Sounds like he is saying that it's the aether inside the small box. Perhaps those photons are just there, and something at some point in time may excite those photons to create the light.

“How does this make you feel emotionally?” *Proceeds to explain the physics* - this is the mark of a good scientist! 😂

Brian, I still don’t understand how we can see light from 13 billion years ago??? Is it ahead of us? Or behind? It’s all so complicated. Is there a book that explains this for an average person? And we missed you last December at the Simxa event ;). ❤

how the heck can you condense such a frikkin complex physics (a quantum fundamental one) into such an awesome explanation!!!!!!!!

This is like the infinite hotel : You have a hotel with infinite rooms, and every time a new person (Expansion) shows up, everybody moves up 1 room. After an infinite number of movements, an empty space will appear. I think the universe is infinite, and expanding within its own parameters, via supertask. The answer has to be like this, or else we would've figured something else out rationally by now, right?

Hi Brian. At around 1:51 you say a "serendipitous surprise" that the universe hasn't slowed in its expansion. Am I correctly inferring that you're implying that this is a good thing? Why is it serendipitous ?

Photons are ageless? Mind blown.

New gravitational wave detector is coming online should shed some light 🕯️

Full video?

That not on tinder line killed me .🤣

Another interesting guess that others have pondered is "What if there are higher dimensions, i.e. more than the known 4-dimensions of space-time, that we cannot perceive, that the universe is just a part of?" Without a way of measuring such higher dimensions we are limited in what we can know.

I like this vid good talks

Should not space decrease in density as it expands?

WHATS IN THE BOX? lol Lex with the 7even reference

Visualize space as a medium like water .. Why ? Because it not only wraps around an object , but deflects in every direction of the objects shape. Take a sub. You can track it by simply measuring the displacement on the surface of the ocean. (Not easy to do & requires satellites). But in that way I think anyone can visualize space.

Time in this place the universe is expanding into? If it’s nothing then where did the initial something of the universe come from? Why does anything exist instead of nothing existing?

Hmmmm.........doesnt the empty space still have quantum fluctuations? How do we know the space outside of the universe has that? Robert Lawrence Kuhn would get into a huge debate with you about what "nothing" really is. Nothing isn't even empty space, its nothing. I think that's what is outside the universe.

The universe doesn’t expand into nothing, it expands within itself. Meaning the space between galaxies is expanding and therefore expands space time. Time is therefore increased within the parameters of space.

"Bc they('re) traveling light" 😂

I learnt to ask Lex questions

Brian Keating really tryna get a laugh from a literal robot

My brain nearly exploded, luckily for me I couldn't really grasp the full significance of the ideas.

The universe is expanding into a big bang.

Lex Fridman interviewing Lex Fridman

Space and time are the same thing they both measure distance and change can't have one without the other

Cos space time probably folded so light distance isn't an accurate metric to measure how big the universe should be based on time since the big bang. It's too basic and doesn't factor in intense gravity folding space time

The universal mind is high per cubic centimeter. It may be that we should be looking at expansion in terms of exposure.

Wave duality in the Universe may occur to D_u or r_0 ~ G when gravity has static expansive potentialities'.

What if we aren't expanding and we're just being pulled by a bigger universe's gravity? Would explain the rate of expansion increasing over time?

gravity with Andromeda galaxy overcomes cosmological constant expansion? why do galaxies in local group / cluster defy cosmological constant expansion? do galaxies in local group revolve around a central body?