The universe will completely die in..

[Merlin5]

...a trillion years, give or take. Not a glimmer of light. Everything in the universe will be extinguished. No supernovas, stars, neutrons, planets, no explosions, nothing at all. So says the narrator at the end of a BBC 4 documentary I just watched.

The big bang was only around 13.8 billion years ago, so a trillion years (a thousand billion) is still a fair way off. I'm only posting this to say, it seems unbelievable to think that eventually no life will ever exist. If that is the case, it does make me wonder, just how important is life if it can be snubbed out seemingly forever, even a trillion years from now?

Or, does anyone think another big bang would probably be triggered again?

 

[Merlin5]

I always thought that the heat death of the Universe was way further into the future than a mere trillion years, something nearer to 10^100 years.

How many trillions is that then?

What happens to the mass/energy?

All get sucked into black holes maybe? The universe effectively disappearing up it's own ****

 

[Merlin5]

What documentary? Was it a newly recorded one or a re-airing of an old one? Recently astronomers have found out new information and they've come up with new theories which mean the big bang may not have happened the way we previously thought. This kind of research is constantly evolving as new information comes to light from new observations as data is gathered by all the probes and satellites we have in space.

I see that it's from 2012. Seven Ages of Starlight.
The story of the stars, from red giants and supernovae to black holes, and how discovering their tale has transformed our own understanding of the universe.


Never saw it before and only caught the last half hour. I got the trillion years wrong btw, as he says right at the end, 100 trillion years. So I was only 99 trillion years out


There's this most amazing fact in the programme where they say "80 years ago, Swiss scientist Fritz Zwicky was sure that when a supernova exploded, it left behind a kernel so dense, that a cupful would be as heavy as a mountain. He called it... a neutron star. "

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00yb434/seven-ages-of-starlight

 

[Merlin5]

"After an unimagineable legnth of time, even the black holes will have evaporated and the universe will be nothing but a sea of photons. And when I say unimagineable period of time, I really mean it. It's 10,000 trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion years. How big is that number? Well, if I were to start counting with a single atom representing one year, then there wouldn't be enough atoms in the entire universe to get anywhere near that number. The universe will remain vast and desolate for the rest of time. Nothing happens, and it keeps not happening... forever. "

Amazing stuff.