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  • Supported By:

  • Supported By: Protocol Labs

  • Protocol Labs

  • Protocol Labs What does our future hold?

  • Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence...

  • Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence... - Helen Keller

  • What does the future look like?

  • How will the universe meet its end?

  • We may never be truly certain.

  • But science has begun to paint a stunning picture of how the future might unfold.

  • Let's take a journey to the end of time.

  • We will travel through time exponentially, doubling our speed every 5 seconds.

  • The vision of the future will surely evolve as we probe for more clues. But one thing is clear:

  • The universe has only just begun.

  • 2019 [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2020 [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2021 [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2021 The Holocene has ended. [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2021 The Holocene has ended. [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2022 The Holocene has ended. [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2023 The Holocene has ended. [Anthrpocene era]

  • 2023 [Anthrpocene era]

  • What we do now,

  • What we do now,

  • What we do now,

  • What we do now,

  • and in the next few years,

  • will profoundly effect

  • the next few thousand years.

  • The only conditions modern humans

  • have ever known so far, are changing.

  • And changing fast.

  • Nothing stays the same on this planet.

  • Everything changes.

  • The Earth is going into one of these jumps

  • The Earth is going into one of these jumps

  • and you don't know what is going

  • to be on the other side of those jumps.

  • The Earth is always jumping. [Earth's magnetic field flips]

  • [Earth's magnetic field flips]

  • [Comet Hale-Bopp returns]

  • [Drastic sea level rise]

  • Things move on this planet [Drastic sea level rise]

  • Things are not still!

  • Everything is turning. [30 meter asteroid impact]

  • [30 meter asteroid impact]

  • [Antares goes supernova]

  • [Sahara becomes tropical]

  • [Constellations begin to wander]

  • [Voyager I passes nearby star]

  • [Interglacial period ends]

  • [Supervolcano eruption]

  • [New Hawaiian island appears]

  • [New island chains]

  • [Apollo footprints fade]

  • [Betelgeuse goes supernova]

  • [Stone monuments erode]

  • [Deadly gamma ray burst]

  • [Mars moon becomes a ring]

  • [Saturn's rings vanish]

  • [Antarctica melts]

  • [Major asteroid impact]

  • [New supercontinent]

  • [Sun increases luminosity]

  • As it begins to run out of fuel, [Sun increases luminosity]

  • As it begins to run out of fuel, [Photosynthesis ceases]

  • the sun won't simply fade away to nothing. [Photosynthesis ceases]

  • the sun won't simply fade away to nothing. [All plant life dies]

  • [All plant life dies]

  • [Oceans evaporate]

  • Its core will collapse, [Oceans evaporate]

  • [Oceans evaporate]

  • and the extra heat this generates [Oceans evaporate]

  • will cause its outer layers to expand. [Oceans evaporate]

  • will cause its outer layers to expand. [All life dies]

  • [All life dies]

  • [Sun expands]

  • [Sun becomes red giant]

  • [Earth destroyed by the dying Sun]

  • [Sun becomes a White Dwarf]

  • The sun is now dead. [Sun becomes a White Dwarf]

  • Its remains slowly cooling [Sun becomes a White Dwarf]

  • in the freezing temperatures of deep space.

  • The fate of the sun is the same as for all stars.

  • One day, they must all eventually die,

  • and the cosmos will be plunged

  • into eternal night.

  • All stars eventually will run out of fuel. [Stars begin to die off]

  • [Stars begin to die off]

  • The temperature of the universe drops. [Stars begin to die off]

  • [Stars begin to die off]

  • Stars, one by one,

  • in the night sky,

  • will turn off.

  • And there will be no more new stars

  • created.

  • And so the universe will end

  • not with a bang,

  • but with the whimper.

  • And not in fire, [Last Red Dwarf stars die]

  • [Last Red Dwarf stars die]

  • but in ice. [Last Red Dwarf stars die]

  • [Last Red Dwarf stars die]

  • [Degenerate era] "With the death of the last sun, the age of starlight comes to an end."

  • [Degenerate era]

  • [Degenerate era] "The universe becomes a cosmic boneyard, strewn with remnants of dead stars."

  • "The universe becomes a cosmic boneyard, strewn with remnants of dead stars."

  • "Our Sun becomes a White Dwarf - a hot, dense, shrunken stellar corpse."

  • With no fuel left to burn,

  • a white dwarf's faint glow

  • comes from the last residual heat

  • from its extinguished furnace.

  • Looking at it from where the earth is now,

  • it would only generate the same amount of light

  • as the full moon

  • on a clear night.

  • The faint glow of white dwarfs

  • will provide the only illumination

  • in a dark and empty void

  • littered with dead stars

  • and black holes.

  • In some ways it's kind of a ghost universe

  • it's the corpses,

  • the zombie stars,

  • that will take us into the future.

  • "Over time, gravity ejects dead stars and planets from their galaxies, sending them out into the freezing void."

  • "By chance, some Brown Dwarfs collide and form accidental new stars."

  • "Colliding neutron stars puncture the darkness with ultra bright supernova."

  • [Neutron star collision] Colliding neutron stars puncture the darkness with ultra bright supernova."

  • [Neutron star collision]

  • "Any surviving life forms may find refuge around aging White Dwarfs."

  • "But in time, even the White Dwarfs will fade and die."

  • A black dwarf will be the final fate of those last stars [Stars become Black Dwarfs]

  • White dwarfs that have become so cold, [Stars become Black Dwarfs]

  • that they barely emit any more heat or light.

  • Black dwarfs are dark,

  • dense,

  • decaying balls of degenerate matter.

  • Little more than the ashes of stars,

  • their constituent atoms are so severely crushed

  • that black dwarfs are a million times

  • denser than our sun.

  • Stars take so long to reach this point

  • we believe there are currently

  • no black dwarfs in the universe.

  • "Any matter that fails to escape its galaxy is sucked into a supermassive black hole at the center."

  • [Black holes swallow stray matter]

  • [Black holes swallow stray matter] "Long dormant black holes flare up in a blaze of glory."

  • [Degenerate era] "The rotational energy of black holes becomes the last reliable source of power for any exotic future civilizations."

  • We have a pace of life that's based

  • on the energy available to us now.

  • You could imagine living,

  • conscious systems,

  • which have a very different pace and therefore,

  • can extend out, at least,

  • a lot farther than you'd imagine otherwise.

  • You could have a living system where if,

  • it had a thought every 10 trillion years,

  • that would seem normal.

  • Ever if

  • our life dies out, one could imagine

  • at some time arbitrarily far in the future,

  • a fluctuation occurs which allows intelligent life

  • to exist again, for a little while.

  • So you might have islands in time of intelligence.

  • "As the expansion of the universe accelerates, it begins to spread matter apart faster than the speed of light." [Expansion of spacetime]

  • [Expansion of spacetime]

  • "By this point, distant galaxies and stars are receding do fast that their light has become undetectable." [Expansion of spacetime]

  • "By this point, distant galaxies and stars are receding do fast that their light has become undetectable."

  • "The secrets of the cosmos are locked away forever."

  • "Current theories predict that atoms themselves will begin to decay, destroying all remaining matter in the universe."

  • [Proton decay] "Current theories predict that atoms themselves will begin to decay, destroying all remaining matter in the universe."

  • [Proton decay]

  • A proton, one of the fundamental building blocks

  • of atomic matter, what makes us up,

  • can just spontaneously fall apart.

  • Any material that evades the pull of a black hole

  • eventually dies away as its protons disintegrate.

  • "Proton decay is still unproven - and so this chapter of the future could look very different in light of new discoveries."

  • The matter inside black dwarf's,

  • the last matter in the universe,

  • will eventually evaporate away,

  • and be carried off into the void as radiation

  • leaving absolutely nothing behind.

  • [Black hole era]

  • With the black dwarfs gone, [Black hole era]

  • there won't be a single atom of matter left. [Black hole era]

  • [Black hole era]

  • All that will remain of our once-rich cosmos

  • will be particles of light and black holes.

  • "The Black Hole Era begins."

  • "No planets, no stars, no lingering stellar remnants for life to cling to."

  • "Yet even now, time has only begun to tick."

  • "On the scale of a human lifetime, the universe has just emerged from the womb."

  • "Cold, dark, and empty - this is how the cosmos will spend most of its life."

  • "Our universe gives life only a brief moment to shine - a haven in time, safe from its fiery birth and icy death."

  • The arrow of time creates a bright window

  • in the universe's adolescence

  • during which life is possible.

  • But it's a window that doesn't stay open for long.

  • As a fraction of the lifespan of the universe,

  • as measured from its beginning

  • to the evaporation of the last black hole,

  • life,

  • life, as we know it,

  • life, as we know it, is only possible for

  • one (10^(0))

  • one thousandth (10^(-3))

  • one thousandth of a (10^(-3))

  • one thousandth of a billion (10^(-12))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion (10^(-21))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth (10^(-30))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion (10^(-39))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion (10^(-48))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion billionth (10^(-57))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion billionth billion (10^(-66))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion billionth billion billion (10^(-75))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion billion billion billion billionth, (10^(-84))

  • one thousandth of a billion billion billionth, billion billion billion billion billion billionth, of a percent. (10^(-84)%)

  • Black holes become

  • the fundamental building block of the universe.

  • A galaxy will basically be

  • a supermassive black hole in the center,

  • with smaller black holes orbiting it.

  • Zombie galaxies filled with black holes continue to evolve.

  • They'll eat each other, and they'll get bigger,

  • and maybe they'll fall into

  • the supermassive black hole and it'll get bigger.

  • The universe will still be an exciting, dynamic place.

  • it's just that the time scales we're talking about

  • are now trillions of years,

  • instead of thousands or millions of years.

  • [Black home mergers] "In this far flung age, black hole mergers become the main event."

  • "Some grow to enormous sizes, possibly trillions of times the mass of our sun."

  • "When they merge, they send out powerful gravity waves that resonate throughout the universe."

  • Black holes can bang on space-time like mallets on a drum.

  • And have a very characteristic song,

  • Imagine two black holes that have lived a long life together

  • At the end of their lives they're going around each other,

  • crossing thousands of kilometers in a fraction of a second.

  • As they do so,

  • they leave behind in their wake a ringing of space

  • an actual wave on space-time.

  • Space squeezes and stretches as it emanates out

  • from these black holes banging on the universe.

  • Those are the gravitational waves

  • and are literally the sounds of space ringing

  • and they will travel out from these black holes

  • at the speed of light as they ring down and coalesce into one,

  • spinning, quiet, black hole.

  • If you were standing near enough,

  • your ear would resonate

  • with the squeezing and stretching of space,

  • you would literally hear the sound.

  • Imagine a lighter black hole

  • falling into a very heavy black hole.

  • The sound you're hearing

  • is a light black hole banging

  • on space each time it gets close.

  • As it falls in, it gets faster, and it gets louder.

  • Scientists used to think black holes were immortal,

  • but even these will one day die.

  • Now we're talking about time scales of unimaginable length

  • quadrillions of years into the future.

  • On that time scale,

  • even the black holes begin to evaporate.

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • [Hawking radiation] According to quantum mechanics,

  • According to quantum mechanics,

  • [Hawking radiation] According to quantum mechanics,

  • space is filled with virtual particles

  • [Hawking radiation] space is filled with virtual particles

  • space is filled with virtual particles

  • [Hawking radiation] and antiparticles that are constantly materializing in pairs,

  • and antiparticles that are constantly materializing in pairs,

  • [Hawking radiation] and antiparticles that are constantly materializing in pairs,

  • [Hawking radiation] separating, coming together again,

  • separating, coming together again,

  • [Hawking radiation] separating, coming together again,

  • [Hawking radiation] and annihilating each other.

  • and annihilating each other.

  • [Hawking radiation] and annihilating each other.

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • [Hawking radiation] In the presence of a black hole,

  • one member of a pair of

  • [Hawking radiation] one member of a pair of

  • [Hawking radiation] virtual particles may fall into the hole,

  • virtual particles may fall into the hole,

  • [Hawking radiation] virtual particles may fall into the hole,

  • virtual particles may fall into the hole,

  • leaving the other member

  • without a partner with which to annihilate.

  • [Hawking radiation] without a partner with which to annihilate.

  • without a partner with which to annihilate.

  • [Hawking radiation] The forsaken particle appears to be radiation

  • The forsaken particle appears to be radiation

  • [Hawking radiation] The forsaken particle appears to be radiation

  • The forsaken particle appears to be radiation

  • emitted by the black hole.

  • [Hawking radiation] emitted by the black hole.

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • [Hawking radiation]

  • And so, black holes are not eternal.

  • And so, black holes are not eternal. [Black hole evaporation]

  • They evaporate away at an increasing rate,

  • until they vanish in a gigantic explosion.

  • Quantum mechanics has allowed particles and radiation [Black holes begin to die]

  • to escape from the ultimate prison -

  • A black hole.

  • "Black holes begin to evaporate away, erasing the last large-scale structures in the universe."

  • "As they die, they light up the darkness one by one."

  • "As the black holes slowly die off, the universe continues to expand, driven by a mysterious force we don't yet understand."

  • [Dark Energy inflates the universe] "As the black holes slowly die off, the universe continues to expand, driven by a mysterious force we don't yet understand."

  • "This is the frontier of human knowledge - a frontier ripe for exploration and discovery."

  • Philosophers and poets have asked the question,

  • "Will the world end in fire or ice?"

  • We can now give an answer.

  • The latest evidence shows that the universe

  • is not slowing down,

  • but it's speeding up out of control.

  • And the universe, we think, will die in ice

  • trillions upon trillions of years from now.

  • Empty space itself has energy.

  • In every little cubic centimeter of space,

  • whether or not there's stuff,

  • whether or not there's particles,

  • matter, radiation, whatever...

  • there is still energy, even in the space itself.

  • And this energy, according to Einstein,

  • exerts a push on the universe.

  • What is the weird stuff that's accelerating the universe?

  • We call it 'Dark energy'.

  • And this stuff is the dominant stuff of the universe

  • almost 3/4 of the matter-energy content

  • of the universe is this dark energy

  • and we don't know what it is.

  • Dark energy, unlike matter or radiation,

  • does not dilute away, as the universe expands.

  • This has crucial implications

  • for what the universe is going to do in the future.

  • So, what will be the future of the universe?

  • Well, if the dark energy remains dominant and repulsive,

  • the universe will expand forever.

  • Faster and faster and faster with time -

  • A runaway universe.

  • 70% of the energy of the universe

  • resides in empty space and we don't understand why.

  • But we do know what will happen.

  • If that energy continues to be there,

  • the universe will become cold and dark and empty.

  • That's the future as it might be.

  • We don't know because

  • we don't yet understand the nature of dark energy.

  • until we do,

  • we won't know the future,

  • we won't even understand our own origins

  • and that's why we want to know

  • and study this subject.

  • "Discovering the true nature of dark energy could change our vision of the future dramatically."

  • "If it somehow weakens over time, the universe could collapse under gravity - a 'big crunch'."

  • "Given a boost, it could tear the universe apart at the seams - a 'big rip'."

  • [Black hole era] "Physicists increasingly suspect that there may be multiple universes beyond our own, each with their own unique laws of physics."

  • "Some would harbor the right conditions for life. Others could collapse or be ripped apart."

  • "Others sill could be far more exotic than anything we could imagine."

  • "New pieces to this puzzle are out there somewhere, waiting to be found."

  • The forecast does seem to be for

  • an ever-colder, ever-emptier universe.

  • But then of course we have to ask,

  • "Could that end lead to a new beginning?"

  • And there are ideas, whereby what actually is the end

  • of our universe, could in some sense,

  • lead to the beginning of a new one.

  • "Some speculate that there may be a way to escape our universe before entropy erases everything."

  • "We could create simulated virtual universes, or with enough energy, create another one just like our own."

  • We've worked out the mathematics,

  • the equations,

  • they seem to say that

  • if you have an atom smasher,

  • that can constrict tremendous

  • amounts of energy at a single point,

  • you can perhaps open up a gateway -

  • A 'Baby universe'

  • Facing the death of everything there is

  • this perhaps is their only possibility of escape.

  • And this also raises a very intriguing possibility,

  • sheer pure speculation of course,

  • that perhaps any universe that has intelligent life in it,

  • will create baby universes, will create 'Lifeboats',

  • and will proliferate child universes.

  • and will proliferate child universes. [Last Black Hole evaporates]

  • [Last Black Hole evaporates]

  • So an evolution may take place among universes, [Last Black Hole evaporates]

  • in the multiverse. [Last Black Hole evaporates]

  • Survival of the fittest may take place.

  • So those universes which do not have intelligent life are 'Infertile',

  • they have no children.

  • But those universes that have

  • mild temperatures, stars like ours,

  • would create civilizations that could open up child universes

  • and they would then proliferate.

  • "If there is no way to escape the universe, then entropy will march on, destroying the last remaining supermassive black holes."

  • "As the last one explodes and dies, it bathes the universe in light one last time."

  • [Black Hole era] "As the last one explodes and dies, it bathes the universe in light one last time."

  • [Last Black Hole evaporates] "As the last one explodes and dies, it bathes the universe in light one last time."

  • THE END.

  • After an unimaginable length of time,

  • even the black holes will have evaporated,

  • and the universe will be

  • nothing but a sea of photons

  • gradually tending towards the same temperature

  • as the expansion of the universe cools them

  • towards absolute zero.

  • Once the very last remnants

  • of the very last stars

  • have finally decayed away to nothing,

  • and everything reaches the same temperature,

  • the story of the universe finally comes to an end.

  • "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • For the first time in its life, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • the universe will be permanent and unchanging. "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • Entropy finally stops increasing, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • because the cosmos cannot get any more disordered. "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS"

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS,

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS,

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, E

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ET

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETE

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETER

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERN

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNA

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNAL

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALL

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY

  • Nothing happens, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY.

  • and it keeps not happening, "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY.

  • "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY.

  • forever... "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY."

  • "TIME BECOMES MEANINGLESS, ETERNALLY."

  • "Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence... ...and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content." - Helen Keller

  • CRAFTED BY MELODYSHEEP

  • Supported by:

  • Supported by: Protocol Labs

  • Protocol Labs

  • Protocol Labs What will you discover?

  • Protocol Labs What will you discover? How will you change the future?

  • What will you discover? How will you change the future?

  • Featuring the voices of:

  • Featuring the voices of: David Attenborough

  • Featuring the voices of: Craig Childs

  • Featuring the voices of: Brian Cox

  • Featuring the voices of: Neil Degrasse Tyson

  • Featuring the voices of: Michelle Thaller

  • Featuring the voices of: Lawrence Krauss

  • Featuring the voices of: Michio Kaku

  • Featuring the voices of: Mike Rowe

  • Featuring the voices of: Phil Plait

  • Featuring the voices of: Janna Levin

  • Featuring the voices of: Stephen Hawking

  • Featuring the voices of: Sean Carroll

  • Featuring the voices of: Alex Filippenko

  • Featuring the voices of: Martin Rees

  • Thanks to: Juan Benet & my supporters on Patreon Patreon.com/melodysheep

  • MELODYSHEEP.COM | @MUSICALSCIENCE

  • For Ash

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