The last stars will burn out in 120 trillion years
We think. We still haven't solved things like the dark matter/energy problem. The answer to that alone could drastically change what we estimate will happen in the distant future.
this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2025
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Stuff only burns for so long. We might learn more about the geometry of space and that there is more out there at greater distances where maybe even other Big bangs are possible but there is a certain maximum amount of time that a star can exist.
Over the time scales of the life of a proton the maximum variability in the amount of time a star can burn is a rounding error against the scale of numbers needed to express the amount of time it takes for hawking radiation to reduce black holes to ultra long wavelengths of infrared radiation.
Yes, but we don't have proof that universe can't generate new matter. For all we know there is a mechanism in universe not yet observed that can create new matter out of little vacuum and more stars will keep forming.
So technically all we can say is, it's likely that stars will die out in 1000 trillion years.
Yes, but we don’t have proof that universe can’t generate new matter.
True... we also don't have proof there isn't a tea pot orbiting our Sun since it's creation, either.
However, there's also a complete lack of evidence of it.
You cannot prove a negative. The evidence says no new matter can be created. No evidence that new matter gets created. Therefore, we work on the model of no new matter creation.
On these scales, the accuracy of our observations should reduce our confidence though. It doesn't make sense to confidently say that, in 200 trillion years there will be no stars, because our observations of the rate of new matter creation (approximately zero) have a margin of error which allows for there to still be some
Until evidence shows otherwise, new matter being created doesnt fit our observations.
Go prove that wrong! Win yourself a Nobel prize in physics! That's what science is about!
I do also want to point out that stuff like "The conservation of energy" law, in other words, that energy cannot be created or destroyed, does not hold for our universe with our current models. An expanding universe violates the time-translation symmetry
This is our current models. This is what our current physics says. And we know it's incomplete.
When it comes to scientific predictions, you always, always, need the caveat, "under our current model of".
Space itself expanding doesnt, however...
So if all the existing matter came from the big Bang, is it possible to condense it all back into one place?
We also haven't tried every possible configuration of atoms to see if anything creates a portal to an infinite energy dimension or a perpetual motion machine or something we can use to make our own stars
Infinite energy is cheating. Same with travelling backwards in time.
My intuition tells me the universe doesn't allow cheaters.
But then I'm just an evolved bag of water cells clinging onto a clump of rock so what the fuck do I know?
I just had a moment of what is everything
I don't know how to explain it but from nothing to something to nothing again but no why
The 'why' is us.
Without consciousness in the universe, there might as well not be a universe.
Not having consciousness might be the best thing that could happen to a universe. Just everything existing, without desire or suffering.
With a universe that peaceful, there might as well not be us.
What would be the point of a universe if there was nothing experiencing it?
Who or what is it "best" for?
What is the "point" of this universe?
Us. Conscious creatures humans or otherwise. We are the genesis of "point".
By analogy, what's the point of a sun, or a planet, being a thing? It just is, right? A mechanism of nature.
Maybe we are do, but it's undeniable that we experience reality. Experience is the only thing they can have a point, by definition. This is simply axiomatic.
There is no knowing a universe without knowers, so whether something just is, absent is, is a nonsense question. Sense to whom, after all?
Why does the universe need to be known?
What makes 'us' so special that the worth of a whole universe is determined by our existence, inspite of the brevity of human history? Written history has only been around for 5,000. The oldest homo sapiens has only been around for 300,000 years. Was the universe insignificant for the rest of its 13,799,700,000 years?