After all is said and done, why does matter and space even exist anyway?
368492
The question you have asked has led many to the field of apologetics - the view that simple reasoning will lead one to believe that there exists an unending, supernatural, and omniposcent being.  The reasoning is quite simple, regardless of the method that was used to create the universe, something HAS to be unending.  If not, who started it?  Since something is eternal, what created matter and energy?  An intelligent being must have.  Since an intelligent being must have created all that is, this being must also have powers beyond those of the creation.  Hence, there is a supreme being (God or whomever you want to call Him) who has no beginning and no end and is all powerful.\nTo further prove this reasoning, look to statistics.  Most statisticians believe in a supreme being because they know how chance really works.  For example, there are about 200 bones in the human body.  If you wanted all the bones to line up in one particular order and you could try a different arrangement every second, how long would it take you to try every possible combination and find the right one?  It would take 2.5^367 years to try every possible combination.  By comparison, a billion years is only 1.0^9 years.  Statisticians know that blind chance alone is not sufficient to result in any meaningful creation, whether it be bones, chemicals, proteins, or whatever.  It takes life to make life.
178670
If the universe is infinite, it doesn't mean that everywhere is the center, it means that it has no center. Or, if you mean relative to the existing matter...well, that isn't infinite, and has a defined center.
1101831
everything is made up of energy so if space is infinite then something must be there and if something is infinitely there then energy would be infinite
995272
Science nor anyone else can answer your question! As far as science can determine, our universe (space) is not contained within any 'thing' else. If anyone tries to tell you otherwise, they're just blowin' smoke.
1158544
This "nothing" is what we perceive without the laws of physics. Our universe is limited by the knowledge we have about it. Recent theories (the "M" theory) suggest that endless universes exist, and sometimes they even collide one into other. Probably, out there, beyond the boundaries of 12 billions light years, others dimensions, other plan of existence exist.
256332
Time and space is distorted everywhere by everything. That is not a wild statement it is the truth. matter, any matter or energy, by its nature distorts space and time at a predictable magnitude.
554735
space probably does not end.  space-time may be something like the two-dimensional surface of a sphere.  it has no center and no edge.  nothing inside or outside the sphere exists for the two-dimensional surface, and nothing exists outside space-time in this model.
4816
Okay, so you know how quantum physics shows us that all points in space, all bits of matter are at any moment both a particle and a wave.  And Einstein's special theory of relativity shows us that all light is made of waves.  And these two theories combine in interesting ways, but don't completely gel.  For decades physicists have been struggling to reconcile the two theories, but they have been unable to do so effectively.  Something was always holding them back, basically because the universe seems to be holding more energy than there is space in the points of known mass.  This made scientists wonder where all the energy was.  And then they discovered, that the space in between the atoms was itself teeming with life.  And the life that lives at the bottom of all matter, inside the shell of the tiniest waves of photons, or quanta, is a strange world of simultaneously vibrating strings.  And those strings of multi-demensional vibrating pulsating energy play in a kind of metaphysical choir, creating all the intricacies of mass and energy in the universe, as if these tiny little strings were conductors conducting a vast symphony, only they were conducting that symphony with the conductors of all the other symphonies of the atoms they were orchestrating with.  And those collections of atoms and molecules and other interesting bits were actually being played by an army of conductors conducting simultaneously with an entire legion of instruments singing and strumming away.\n\nString theory is mind-bogglingly wild, because it's so advanced.  It took PBS three hours to explain it completely, and I was still lost.  Only when I completed the book about the show's research did I have a deeper grasp of it.  Basically you just need to know that these little strings that vibrate in 6, up to 10 dimensions (depending on whose theory applies to that particular "particle" - I told you, it's mind-blowing)  and how they vibrate impacts what manifests on the level of perceptible reality.\n\nWhat's so incredible about this is that science is finally catching up to philosophy.  The Middle Way, or what Huxley called the Perennial Philosophy, has always told us that the perception of life is merely the perception of imperceptible changes on a fundamental and/or spiritual nature, and the manifestation of those changes in the world that we see around us.  In many traditional cultures, those changes are manipulated by otherworldy figures, gods, angels and the like, which is outside the scope of scientists to discern, but in today's physics, the wall between the reality we see and the reality that is real is paper-thin.  Scientists are beginning to discover that everything truly is everything, and once they can prove it, life can get a whole lot more sane, because folks will have realized that what we are today is what we were twenty thousand years ago, we are one indescribable circle trailing itslef through time, perhaps even creating subtle vibrations that resonate with other vibrating universes that themselves are creating a reality in a world far, far different than this one, beyond all perceptible consciousness.  Perhaps, there may even be a heaven, in which all this is taking place and yet life is going on and on and on, without fear or violence or pain.\n\nEnjoy your continuing discovery of the details behind string theory.  It truly is a fascinating subject.
313515
The universe and space aren't the same thing. The universe was CREATED in space. Before the creation of the universe, it was just space. The universe now occupies space, and yes the universe is not infinite and according to scientists, the Big Crunch theory is the end of the our universe. However, space will still exist because the universe and space aren't the same thing.
833101
space is anything that is occupied by matter...\ndefined by dimensions...\nlike height, length and width...\n\nouter space...\nit is very vast..\njust imagine...\nyour country...\na part of the earth...\nwhich is a part of the solar system...\nwhich is a part of the milky way galaxy...\nand to think there are soooooooo many other galaxies....\nthat's outer space...\nan unimaginable dimension...
564057
It's an interesting question.  'Nothing' is an idea, not an object or a place.  By its very definition, it can't be something, because then it would not be nothing, so your sense of a physical space that we could call nothing is linguistically impossible.\n\nNot every culture has or had a word for 'nothing,' so in a sense, you could say that 'nothing' was an idea that someone invented at some unknown point in the past.  You can think of it as the absence of something, or as a philosophical abstract, or a mathematical starting point.  I think the oldest language with a word for 'zero' was Arabic.  Incidentally, this is why there was no year 0, and 1 B.C. is followed immediately by 1 A.D.  When the priests who were writing the calendar system that is the basis of the calendar we use today, they had never heard of the word/number/idea of zero.  How could they have missed this? Who knows?  It seems impossible to us now.\n\nAs for the 'no matter within a space' part of your question, the answer can be found in a common physics equation that I am sure you know: E=mc^2.  Energy and mass are equivalent.  If there is no 'matter,' or really, mass, within a particular volume of space can you really say that there is nothing there?  No.  On the quantum level, there is really no nothing.\n\nBecause there is still energy in any given space, there is the potential for mass there at any time.  Energy is not really a concept that can be localized or zeroed out- because of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle we know that it is impossibile to measure exact position and speed at the same time, and we have never been able to achieve absolute zero (the temperature at which all kinetic energy becomes zero)- it's probably impossible.  The average temperature of the universe is known to be 3 degrees Kelvin, due to the cosmic microwave background radiation, an after-effect of the Big Bang.  Basically what I'm saying is that if the 'energy' within a space can't be zero, on a quantum level, then the mass can't be, either.\n\nAnother way of thinking about it from a quantum mechanics perspective is wave/particle duality.  This is a concept that even physicists have trouble wrapping their minds around, but essentially the point is that particles have wavelike qualities and waves have particlelike qualities.  It's back to the Heisenberg uncertainty again.  Until they are measured, particles do not exist in any one place, they exist in all places simultaneously with different probabilities.  For any particular particle, there may be an infinitesimal chance that it is inside the space you are looking at to find emptiness, but if you add it all up, it is incredibly likely that some particle is there at all times.  \n\nOnce a particle's position is measured, the system collapses and the particle has a location, but you cannot measure every particle at once and any particle you have just measured can go back into its quantum state afterwards, and again be anywhere with some probability.\n\nThanks for the interesting question- a chance to flex my brain this afternoon.
1048724
Before we can address that question, we must first define universe. \n\nThe word universe denotes all space and everything (matter, energy) contained within it. The prefix uni means one. The root verse means word, carnate message, meaningful substance, matter. Questions regarding our universe persist today. Does it have a beginning and end, or does it go on forever and ever? Is it linear or curved? If it has limits of length or curvature, then what lies beyond the Universe? If something lies beyond the Universe, then can’t we accurately call that the Universe?\n\nSome lay people and some scientists conceive of the universe as infinite space. Others define the universe as finite, or limited (perhaps curved), space. Still others incorporate the elements of matter and/or energy into their definition of the universe, as opposed to the space beyond matter and energy.\n\nGiven these concepts of our universe, some scientists conclude that the “totality of space could be infinite. Shrink an infinite space by an arbitrary amount, and it is still infinite. (Scientific American March 2005).” \n\nAs to the notion that we live in an ever expanding universe, moving away from every other universe on the fabric of space-time, some scientists are careful to point out that “\n\nAndromeda, our nearest large galactic neighbor, is actually moving toward us, not away. Such exceptions arise because Hubble's law describes only the average behavior of galaxies (Scientific American March 2005).”\n\nIn accordance with your supposition that our universe is in another universe, “it has been hypothesized by some scientists that the universe may be part of a system of many other universes, known as the multiverse (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U... Modern astrophysicists talk about multiple "pocket" universes that branch off from one another. Stephen Hawking points out that parallel pocket universes can have no effect on a real observer inside a single pocket, so, according to Hawking, they are theoretical baggage that should be eliminated from cosmology, the study of the origins of the universe.\n\nSome string theories define the universe as a three-dimensional space in an invisible space having more dimensions. This is, in essence, a universe within a universe. Our zone, a “braneworld” could periodically bounce into another parallel braneworld. \n\nThis may create what would appear as a Big Bang from one perspective or a Big Bounce of alternating expanding and contracting universe from another perspective. Such a cataclysmic event is thought to occur 300 billion years from now, resulting in the rearranging and creation of a new universe.\n\nWhich is the end of expanding universe? That may be determined in 300 billion years, when it stops expanding (like a balloon). If any end exists, what will be behind this end? A multiverse void containing other expanding and contracting balloons, referred to as universes, may exist beyond our own.
1176720
Space was created during the Big Bang, the creation event of this Universe. But space is still constantly being created even now, since the expansion of the Universe is now still ongoing and actually accelerating.
1062311
If nothing exist, It must be outside our own Universe where there is no time, matter, energy nor space. Just 'nothing' which cannot be comprehended. \n\nHow can you comprehend nothing if nothing is existed?\nThere is nothing to be comprehended afterall.\nYou better stop thinking nothing and start thinking something.
984793
Space is not empty nor is it mostly empty.  Just because you don't see what is between one galaxy and another does not make space empty.  Most of the matter that makes up the universe is not visible.  Therefore the apperant emptiness of space.
258233
'Matter' does matter !
396914
Outer space is not nothing. Even without the presence of matter, it is teeming with quantum foam, particle-antiparticle pairs, space, and time. For all we know, spacetime may not exist outside our universe."\nAlso, the universe may not be bounded. The only way to "exit" may be to find a "fourth direction". Ie., think of a point in an unbounded plane. The only way for the point to exit its universe is to somehow find the "third direction".